Archive for Czech Republic

HHhH

Posted in Uncategorized with tags , , , , , , on 27 May 2012 by delclem

“HHhH is Reinhard Heydrich, the ‘butcher of Prague’, a man who physically and ideologically embodied the Nazi regime. His immediate superior was Heinrich Himmler, and rumours were whispered in the shadows of the Third Reich that ‘Himmler’s brain is called Heydrich’ – in German, Himmlers Hirn heisst Heydrich, or HHhH.

The book traces the planning, execution and aftermath of Operation Anthropoid, the resistance’s successful plot to assassinate Heydrich in Prague, the city he commanded as Reichsprotektor of Bohemia and Moravia. The two heroes of the novel are Jozef Gabcik and Jan Kubis, the almost unbearably brave assassins, but Heydrich, in all his horror, is the central character. “All the characters are real. All the events depicted are true,” asserts the book’s cover. And hence Binet’s dilemma.” Read the full review in THE IRISH TIMES, 2012

PS. Heydrich was assassinated exactly 70 years ago.
>Another review (guardian.co.uk)

Continent of Corruption

Posted in Uncategorized with tags , , , , , , , , on 17 April 2012 by delclem

Bribes as the Lubricant of Neoliberal Central Europe

Let’s be honest: the center of Europe is not just the region of phony Habsburg nostalgia and a shared cuisine. It is also the place where experienced patients hand over a box of chocolates (with a creatively hidden banknote) to the treating doctor and/or the nurse. Continue reading

Josef Škvorecký (1924 – 2012)

Posted in Uncategorized with tags , , , , , , , on 6 January 2012 by delclem

“Just over two weeks after the death of Vaclav Havel, another Czech literary figure who played a key role in his country’s Communist-era dissident movement, Josef Skvorecky, died of cancer Tuesday. He was 87.”

Continue reading

Vaclav Havel 1936 – 2011

Posted in Uncategorized with tags , , , on 20 December 2011 by delclem

Author of absurd theatre, dissident, prisoner, president, European; the Czech leader who tried to teach his compatriots lessons in ethics and who lost Slovakia: Vaclav Havel is dead. See obituaries below (c) THE GUARDIAN, 2011.

Editorial on the European VH

Michael Billington on the dramatist VH

Timothy Garton Ash on the epitome VH

VH´s life in pictures

The radiant heroes of Jáchymov

Posted in Uncategorized with tags , , , , , , , , , , on 2 October 2011 by delclem

A new novel by Austrian author Josef Haslinger recalls the gloomy gulag past of a Bohemian health spa. Continue reading

Material culture: Terezín

Posted in Uncategorized with tags , , , , , , , , on 6 August 2011 by delclem

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Places like Theresienstadt (above) or Auschwitz show how connected the Habsburg heritage and the Nazi era are in Central Europe. In some cases, like in Western Ukraine (Galicia), the Austro-Hungarian past even seems to be the prehistory of genocide.

Photos (c) Ruthner, 2011