The Walls Behind the Curtain: East European Prison Literature, 1945–1990

Rudolf Dobiáš (b. 1934)

158 | cZEcHosloVaKia rudolf dobiáš (b. 1934) A prominent Slovak writer and journalist, well known for his works for children, Dobiáš was arrested while still a secondary school student at the age of eighteen and charged with antistate activity. He was sentenced to hard labor in the uranium mines in Jáchymov. After his release in 1960 he held a variety of jobs while finishing his studies at the Technical Secondary Chemical School in Bratislava. From 1975 to 1978 he pursued a career as a freelance writer, gaining a reputation for his children’s books as well as for his radio plays, more than thirty of which were aimed at a young audience. In 1987 he accepted the position of warden at a home for parentless children, a position he held until 1989. After the fall of communism in Czechoslovakia he served as a journalist on the staff of the Slovak daily Slovenský dennik and became especially active in the cause of former political prisoners. Until his retirement, he held the position of editor in chief of the magazine Svedectvo (Testimony), published by the Confederation of Political Prisoners. Dobiáš’s earliest book based on his prison experiences was Svedectvo troch križov (The Testimony of Three Crosses, 1993), a documentary account of a contrived Communist trial and the deaths of three of his fellow students from the high school he attended in Trenčín. In a subsequent volume of novellas, Temná zeleň (Dark Green, 1996), Dobiáš preserved the documentary form of Svedectvo troch križov. The third book in what may be regarded as Dobiáš’s political cycle is Zvony a hroby: Príbehy z prítmia (Bells and Graves: Stories from the Shadows, 2000). It originated in late 1953 and early 1954—the “longest winter” of his life— when he was held in solitary confinement in the interrogation room of the State Security Police. The title of the work elucidates a central tension between the lyrical, represented by poetry, and the prosaic, based on what Dobiáš regarded as the tragic fate of people, mostly his fellow prisoners at the Jáchymov camp. In 2009 Dobiáš brought out a valuable anthology of Slovak prison poetry under the title Básnici za mrežami: Antológia poézie napísanej vo väzení (Poets Behind Bars: An Anthology of Poetry Written in Prison). The following excerpts are from Zvony a hroby: Príbehy z prítmia (Bratislava: Dilema, 2000), 5, 8, 118, 119–21, 125– 26, and have been translated from Slovak by Harold B. Segel. cZEcHosloVaKia | 159 from Zvony a hroby Instead of an Introduction The idea for this book, more precisely the name of the book, arose at the end of 1953 and the beginning of 1954. My decision to write it was, so to say, irresponsible, or at the very least incompetent, for the reason that until then I had written nothing worthy of attention, if I exclude some love poems. I was induced to write them especially by my age, and perhaps I was also helped a little by my muse. But in no way did I consider myself a poet, to say nothing of a writer. The short days and long nights of the longest winter of my life I spent in solitary confinement in the headquarters of State Security on the February Victory Street in Bratislava. I then had enough time to ponder my future, and when its prospects were not happy, I consoled myself with images of how I would continue on with my literary efforts. Since as a political prisoner at that time I was unable to possess either paper or pencil, I had to content myself with inventing at least the name of my future book—Bells and Graves. It is quite possible that my inspiration for this was the sound of bells that occasionally succeeded in penetrating my solitude and chatting with me. And perhaps also the fact that I was buried alive in a grave in which the groans and cries of the tortured and possibly also of deranged inquisitors resounded at night. 160 | cZEcHosloVaKia After 1989 these graves really began to open, and I was able to browse through them as if through a book, which those who lived it with their lives neither had the chance, dared, nor were able to write. Koniec šialeného storočia (The End of an Insane Century) In our part of...