Ivan Klíma

Ivan Klíma (born Ivan Kauders, 9 September 1931 – 4 October 2025) was a Czech novelist and playwright. He received the Magnesia Litera award and the Franz Kafka Prize, among other honours.<ref name=delbos>Interview: Ivan Klíma, Stephan Delbos, The Prague Post, 29 February 2012</ref>

Early life and career

Klíma was born Ivan Kauders in Prague on 9 September 1931.<ref name = NYT>Template:Cite news</ref> His early childhood in Prague was happy and uneventful, but this all changed with the German invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1938, after the Munich Agreement.<ref name = NYT/> He only learned of his Jewish heritage once the invasion had occurred.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

In November 1941, first his father Vilém Klíma and then, in December, he and his mother and brother were ordered to leave for the concentration camp at Theriesenstadt (Terezín), where he was to remain until its liberation by the Red Army in May 1945.<ref name = "Guardian>Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="Academia">Template:Cite web</ref> He and both his parents survived incarceration, even though Terezín, a holding camp for Jews from central and southern Europe, was regularly cleared of its overcrowded population by transports to "the East," that is, to death camps such as Auschwitz. The family adopted the less German-sounding surname of Klíma after the war.<ref name = NYT/>

Klíma wrote graphically about this period in articles in the British literary magazine Granta, particularly A Childhood in Terezin.<ref name=granta>Ivan Klíma. A Childhood in Terezin. Granta 44, 1993, pp 191–208</ref> He wrote that "anyone who has been through a concentration camp as a child, who has been completely dependent on an external power which can at any moment come in and beat or kill him and everyone around him, probably moves through life at least a bit differently from people who have been spared such an education. That life can be snapped like a piece of string - that was my daily lesson as a child."<ref name ="Guardian"/>

With the post-war rise of the Czech Communist regime and proxy Soviet control, Klima became a member of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Eventually, his childhood hopes for the triumph of good over evil became an adult awareness that it was often "not the forces of good and evil that do battle with each other, but merely two different evils, in competition for the control of the world".<ref name=granta/> The show trials and murders of those who opposed the new regime began, and Klíma's father was again imprisoned, this time by fellow countrymen.

During the Prague Spring of 1968, Klíma was a leading dissident. At the time of the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in August 1968, Klíma was in London, on his way to a teaching engagement in Michigan. However, he returned to Prague in March 1970. Although he was then deprived of his passport and forced to work in menial jobs, he remained a member of the literary 'underground', smuggling books and getting involved in samizdat. After the overthrow of communism in 1989, Klíma became a prominent supporter of Václav Havel.<ref name ="Guardian" />

Personal life and death

In 1958, Klíma married psychologist Helena Mala, with whom he had two children.<ref name = NYT/>

Klíma died at his residence in Prague, on the morning of 4 October 2025, at the age of 94.<ref name = NYT/><ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Writing

Klíma was awarded the Franz Kafka Prize in 2002. His two-volume memoir Moje šílené století (My Crazy Century) won the Magnesia Litera, a Czech literary prize, in the non-fiction category in 2010. My Crazy Century was published in English in 2013 by Grove Press.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Bibliography

• Bezvadný den (1960; English: A Wonderful Day)<ref name="bradbrook">Template:Cite book</ref>
• Hodina ticha (1963; English: A Peaceful Hour)<ref name="bradbrook"/>
• Milenci na jednu noc (1964)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Loď, jménem Naděje (1969)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• A Ship Named Hope: Two Novels (1970)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Milostné léto (1972; English: A Summer Affair (1987))<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Ma veselá jitra (1979; English: My Merry Mornings: Stories from Prague (1985))<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Moje první lásky (1985; English: My First Loves (1986))<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Láska a smetí (1986; English: Love and Garbage (1990))<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Soudce z milosti (1986; English: Judge on Trial (1991))<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Už se blíží meče: Eseje, Fejetony, Rozhovory (1990)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Ministr a anděl (1990)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Rozhovor v Praze (1990)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Moje zlatá řemesla (1990; English: My Golden Trades)<ref name="bradbrook"/>
• Hry: Hra o dvou dějstvích (1991)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Ostrov mrtvých králů (1992)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Čekání na tmu, čekání na světlo (1993; English: Waiting for the Dark, Waiting for the Light)<ref name="bradbrook"/>
• The Spirit of Prague and Other Essays (1994)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Milostné rozhovory (1995)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Jak daleko je slunce (1995)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Poslední stupeň důvěrnosti (1996; English: Ultimate Intimacy)<ref name="bradbrook"/>
• Kruh nepřátel českého jazyka: Fejetony (1998)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• O chlapci, který se nestal číslem (1998)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Fictions and Histories (1998)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Lovers for a Day: New and Collected Stories on Love (1999)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Ani svatí, ani andělé (1999; English: No Saints or Angels)<ref name="bradbrook"/>
• Between Security and Insecurity (1999)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Velký věk chce mít též velké mordy: život a dílo Karla Čapka (2001; English: A Great Age Needs Great Murders: Life and Works of Karel Čapek)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Karel Čapek: Life and Work (English translation of above; 2002)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Premiér a anděl (2003)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Moje nebezpečné výlety (2004; English: My Golden Trips)<ref name="bradbrook"/>
• Moje šílené století (2009; English: My Crazy Century (2013))<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

External links

• Template:IMDb name
• Spisovatel Ivan Klíma převzal Cenu Karla Čapka, tomu i poděkoval (Lidové noviny) Template:In lang
• "Optimism Outlasted a Lifetime of Horrors - Ivan Klima's 'My Crazy Century' Spans Decades of Czech Life", The New York Times, 17 November 2013,
• Maya Jaggi: " Building bridges", The Guardian, 1 May 2004,
• "Ivan Klíma: a sceptic in the era of entertainment culture", Czech Radio, 8. 11. 2009,