Czechast: Jan Urban remembers Václav Havel

Václav Havel, playwright, dissident and the first president of the Czech Republic, would have turned 90 on October 5. In this edition of Czechast, former Charter 77 activist Jan Urban remembers first meeting him in the final years of communist rule – and reflects on the qualities that made Havel such an extraordinary figure within the dissident movement.

Jan Urban was 17 when he first became aware of Václav Havel during the Prague Spring of 1968. At the time, he recalls, Havel seemed like “some old guy”. It would be another two decades before the two men finally met.

By then, Urban was deeply involved in Czechoslovakia’s dissident movement, working behind the scenes for Charter 77. Their first personal encounter came in 1988, in a pub near Havel’s Prague flat – a place Havel frequently used almost as an office despite the constant surveillance of the communist secret police. Urban remembers being immediately struck by Havel’s personality.

Václav Havel|Photo: Post Bellum

“The most improbable person with charisma that made you believe in him in an instant. He was stuttering. Sometimes he was incoherent. But most of the time, he was able to formulate surprisingly clear positions on many subjects.”

Urban is considerably more critical of Havel’s performance after the fall of communism, when the dissident became Czechoslovak president. But nearly four decades after their first meeting, he remains unequivocal about what he considers Havel’s most important legacy.

“That moral call – and values – should have a place in politics. Maybe it sounds near to religious, but I think that is the most important legacy that he left behind.”

For more, listen to the latest episode of Czechast.