Worlds of Dissent: Charter 77, The Plastic People of the Universe, and Czech Culture under Communism

Jonathan Bolton

Published by Harvard University Press 2012

Worlds of Dissent

Charter 77, The Plastic People of the Universe, and Czech Culture under Communism

Jonathan Bolton

https://doi.org/10.4159/harvard.9780674064836

Overview
Contents

About this book

Worlds of Dissent analyzes the myths of Central European resistance popularized by Western journalists and historians, and replaces them with a picture of the struggle against state repression as the dissidents themselves understood, debated, and lived it. In the late 1970s, when Czech intellectuals, writers, and artists drafted Charter 77 and called on their government to respect human rights, they hesitated to name themselves “dissidents.” Their personal and political experiences—diverse, uncertain, nameless—have been obscured by victory narratives that portray them as larger-than-life heroes who defeated Communism in Czechoslovakia.

Jonathan Bolton draws on diaries, letters, personal essays, and other first-person texts to analyze Czech dissent less as a political philosophy than as an everyday experience. Bolton considers not only Václav Havel but also a range of men and women writers who have received less attention in the West—including Ludvík Vaculík, whose 1980 diary The Czech Dream Book is a compelling portrait of dissident life.

Bolton recovers the stories that dissidents told about themselves, and brings their dilemmas and decisions to life for contemporary readers. Dissidents often debated, and even doubted, their own influence as they confronted incommensurable choices and the messiness of real life. Portraying dissent as a human, imperfect phenomenon, Bolton frees the dissidents from the suffocating confines of moral absolutes. Worlds of Dissent offers a rare opportunity to understand the texture of dissent in a closed society.

Author / Editor information

Bolton Jonathan :

Jonathan Bolton is Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures at Harvard University.

Topics

Frontmatter Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	i
Contents Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	vii
Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
1. The Impasse of Dissent Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	19
2. The Stages of Demobilization Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	47
3. The Shadow World Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	72
4. Legends of the Underground Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	115
5. Everything Changed with the Charter Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	152
6. The Public of the Powerless Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	201
7. Dreams of a Dissident Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	239
Conclusion Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	266
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	285
Acknowledgments Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	329
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	331

Language: English
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Audience: General/trade;
Pages
- Main content: 360

eBook

Published: April 13, 2012
ISBN: 9780674064836