The Modern Novel

Biography

Pavel Kohout was born in 1897 in Prague. He graduated from Charles University in theatre and aesthetics.

At this time, he was a committed communist and member of the communist party. However, he eventually had a falling out with the communists when he was involved in reading out a letter from Solzhenitsyn. He had been writing plays but as he and others were banned from the conventional theatre they performed their plays privately in people’s houses. He was very active in 1968 but after the Soviet invasion he was unable to find work. He and his wife were allowed to visit Austria where he worked in the theatre but then they were banned from returning to Czechoslovakia and their citizenship was stripped from them. After the fall of communism, he and his wife passed their time between Prague and Austria.
He wrote plays and poems as well as several novels, four of which have een translated into English.

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Pavel Kohout