No Night So Dark
2020–2024, exhibition and podcast
The Wels family was meant to be forgotten, but their story was preserved in a box at the back of a cupboard, including two remarkable books that bring a lost world to life.
2020–2024, exhibition and podcast
The Wels family was meant to be forgotten, but their story was preserved in a box at the back of a cupboard, including two remarkable books that bring a lost world to life.
Czech Radio 2022
I was approached by Leah Gaffen from Class Acts, an initiative that works with bilingual children in the Czech Republic. Leah and her colleagues invited children and teenagers between eleven and eighteen to write a story in English about someone in their family who had inspired them or influenced how they see the world. Our cooperation resulted in the six-part podcast A Stitch in Time.
When we listen to archive recordings, not only do we hear the words of those who speak, but also the tone of their voice. We travel in time, as voices from the past reach us with an immediacy that can be powerful, moving and sometimes dramatic. Czech Radio has one of the richest and most diverse audio archives in the world, reflecting the complexities of this country’s history. I have often drawn from sound archives in my historical research, in my teaching and in documentaries, radio drama and podcasts.
A tale of two villages
I first became interested in Lidice in the 1990s when I interviewed Anna Nešporová, who had survived the destruction of the village by the Nazis in 1942. She was one of the strongest people I have ever met and the impressions of that first meeting have always stayed with me. Since then I have returned to Lidice many times as I have tried to understand more of the complex legacy of the massacre.
Hannah Pritchard (1709–68) was one the great English actresses of the eighteenth century, excelling in tragedy and comedy. On stage she was a pioneer, interpreting important female roles by contemporary playwrights and bringing many Shakespearean roles to life in ways that had never been seen before. Only gradually is her huge contribution to the history of English theatre being appreciated.
There have been Roma in Europe since the Middle Ages and today they make up one of the continent’s largest minorities. Roma have a rich and ancient oral culture, that has survived in many forms, despite centuries of discrimination and attempts at forced assimilation. Today, across Europe, traditional Romany ways of life are disappearing under the pressures of modern life, but many are turning to writing as a way of preserving and asserting their culture.
In her lifetime Elizabeth Jane Weston was better known across Europe than Shakespeare. Known to her many admirers as “Westonia”, Elizabeth was born in England but spent almost all her short life in Bohemia, where she died in 1612. Her grave is still preserved in the cloister of Saint Thomas’s Church in Prague’s Lesser Quarter. In 2012 I organised a series of events to commemorate the four hundredth anniversary of the poet’s death.
Václav Havel grew up in a world of privilege, but it was a world of political engagement, where questions were asked, and where there was constant debate about the central issues of the day.
Here are links to programmes with and about poets, featured in my biweekly radio series Czech Books between 2003 and 2019.
Here you will find links to programmes with and about some of the best contemporary Czech prose writers, featured in my biweekly radio series Czech Books from 2003 to 2019.
It is surprising how many international Czech literary connections there are – and not just to Prague…