But our most vital source of information was of course the reality we were living in. Literární noviny began publishing more reportage treating contemporary everyday difficulties. Personally, I rarely contributed to the paper, but because I was in charge of the opinion pages, I sought out the most qualified specialists.
The editorial office kept growing, doubtless owing to the Socialist economy and the increasing interest in Literární noviny, which was reaching a circulation of about a hundred thousand.
A large group of contributors gradually became concentrated around the newspaper. Among them were philosophers, sociologists, economists, historians, and young lawyers. Because we were a newspaper of writers, we had to attend to the level of language, which often demanded significant editing, and several, later important, authors of academic articles and books recalled how Literární noviny had taught them to write more “humanly.” We also had to publish prose, poetry, and articles that were not so much to our taste, but we couldn’t refuse them either because they were written by members of the Writers’ Union, that is, our publishers, or because otherwise we would be accused of censoring opinions we didn’t agree with.
Writing or procuring a good article, however, was only the first step in the editorial process. The second was securing permission for its publication. The more compelling the topic, the more original and nonconformist its conclusions, the less likely it was that the supervisors would approve it.
We became accustomed to preparing several such articles for a single issue; thus it was more likely that one would get through. We also agreed with the authors ahead of time which sentences or paragraphs were possible to delete so that we could make a deal with the censor. Because the censor wanted to see only the printed page, whoever was working in the typesetting room would run with the page to the editors’ driver, Mr. Houdek, who was always parked as close as possible to the printers. Then we waited to see if the page would be approved. One of my diary entries (from May 1967) describes it best:
In the afternoon it was my turn in the typesetting room. When I’m on duty here (at least so it seems to me) the censor raises more hell than usual. They stopped a gloss of academic titles (why this, for God’s sake?). The lead article about the coldheartedness of people and dehumanizing bureaucratic relations. Excellent reportage about the housing situation — no generalizations, just facts and figures, unless insisting that people are entitled to a place to live is a dangerous generalization. Then they removed a report on prostitution. Also excellently written. The typesetter said: as if we had prostitution. And laughed. He said he had to read it — he liked reading things that wouldn’t make it past the censor because they were actually about something.
Production dragged on and on. The issue is going to be so dreadful I could scream. Mrs. H. complains she’ll be here until at least eight, another fourteen-hour day. She’s had enough. The proofreader is moaning because he has the flu. He wanted to stay home, but the doctor refused to allow it. If only it wasn’t taking so long; he’s getting feverish. The typesetter had to finish up because his train leaves at six. The new typesetter is more patient — don’t worry, we’ll make it, he assures me.
We drove to the inspector just before eight. As on every Thursday he curses the day he became a driver. He was supposed to have stayed at Walter, where he’d been a clerk until 1945. Usually he doesn’t curse the institution of censorship, he only curses himself for allowing himself to be dragged into a job that makes his life so difficult. He stopped in front of the dreary building and took off about fifteen minutes later with another man, who had shaken his hand cordially. “Who was that?” I ask later. He said it was our censor. “Why do you greet him so warmly?”
“Please,” he says, “if I wasn’t friends with the censor, we’d never be able to publish.”
So that’s why we’re still being published.
Usually their objections were not expressed directly. Instead they would say things like society was not yet ripe for such opinions expressed in a certain article or that the article might be true, but it wasn’t the whole truth, and because it wasn’t the whole truth (since the concept of whole truth is ridiculous), they had confiscated the article. At other times they would say the party was currently giving priority to other issues.
Arguments with press control became more frequent as well as more serious. Everything came to a head at the beginning of July 1967 and the Six-Day War. The official Czech reaction to the war, like the Soviet reaction, was severe and one-sided. The Czechs and Soviets broke off all diplomatic ties with Israel as the aggressor and launched a hateful press campaign. The unconditional bias of the official propaganda, which did not take into consideration the fact that the Arab states had been preparing for a war in which the Israeli state was to be “wiped off the map,” led us to organize a discussion of several writers. We all tried to speak as dispassionately as possible about the causes of the war and about Israeli politics in general, that is, at variance with government policy, both ours and that of the Soviet Union. The transcript of the meeting, which we wanted to publish, was confiscated, and the news office warned that it was beyond what could be tolerated.
This happened right before the Fourth Congress of the Union of Writers.
*
The congresses of all organizations were supposed to be a display of loyalty to the Communist Party. The ideological department, which was intended to oversee the Writers’ Union, was aware that writers had been lately behaving ever more recalcitrantly (irresponsibly, in their conception) and therefore insisted on postponing the congress in order to buy time and try to figure out who might disrupt this manifestation of loyalty. With the help of state security forces, they designated two groups of writers as the most dangerous: the first were nonparty writers who had contributed to the recently banned Tvář, including Václav Havel, Antonín Brousek, Věra Linhartová, and Jiří Gruša. The other group were writers of Literární noviny, primarily Milan Jungmann, A. J. Liehm, Ludvík Vaculík, and myself. A proclamation, delivered to parliament by Deputy Jaroslav Pružinec several weeks before the congress attests to the concept of art that prevailed among party officials. The target of their attack was the movies of young filmmakers, primarily the wonderful Daisies by Věra Chytilová along with other remarkable films by Jan Němec, Antonín Máša, and Juraj Herz. The proclamation applied, however, to art in general.
Respected members of the National Assembly, I would like to present an interpellation in the name of twenty-one members of Parliament in which we would like to demonstrate how resources required by the state budget are being squandered. . This regards two films we have seen, which, according to
Literární
noviny,
. . “demonstrate the fundamental path of our cultural life.” We are convinced (however) that no honorable worker, farmer, or intellectual would want to or could tread this path, because the two films,
Daisies
and
A Report on the Party and the Guests,
filmed at the Czechoslovak film studios Barrandov, have nothing in common with our republic and the ideals of communism.