Václav Havel's Life Biography
8. dubna 1975
VH writes an open letter to Dr. Gustáv Husák, a critical analysis of normalization which in reality means demoralization and the loss of human identity.
listopad–prosinec 1975
He sets up the samizdat Dispatch Editions, which circulates copies of texts by banned authors. The only attempt at a domestic production of one of Havel's plays, the premiere of The Beggar's Opera, an ironic parable about the symbiosis of the criminal underworld and worldly powers inspired by John Gay’s play, is staged by the Divadlo Na tahu amateur theatre company (directed by Andrej Krob) in Horní Počernice. Those involved, including audience members, are later fired from their jobs and persecuted. It is an event rich in symbolism and significant in the creation of a community of Czech dissidents.
1976
Through Jiří Němec, a former colleague from Tvář magazine, VH becomes closer to the music and cultural underground, in particular the scene’s leader Ivan Martin Jirous (born 1944). When the band The Plastic People of the Universe is put on trial, he organizes protests in their support. In August he joins seven Czech writers and philosophers in writing a letter to the German author Heinrich Böll. In the context of the trial, a community develops that will later form the basis of Charter 77.
9. října 1976
The single-act plays Audience and Unveiling are premiered at the Burgtheater in Vienna. Thanks to its director Achim Benning, a decade begins during which almost all of Havel's plays are staged, one by one, some of them in world premiere.
6. ledna 1977
Publication of Charter 77, the manifesto of a movement demanding the observance of human rights in Czechoslovakia. The Charter unites several hundred activists of diverse ideological backgrounds - democrats, Christians, reform Communists and the underground. VH co-authors the text and becomes one of the Charter's three first spokespersons. He is arrested and held in custody from January to May. In October he receives a suspended sentence for “harming state interests abroad“. Another spokesman, philosopher Jan Patočka (born 1907), who Havel is very close to, dies from exhaustion following police interrogations.
1. října 1977
The third edition of a festival of underground music is held at Hrádeček near Trutnov. Though such a show by banned underground musicians at an unofficial venue was punishable, hundreds attended.
27. dubna 1978
VH together with other signatories of Charter 77 founds the Committee for the Defence of the Unjustly Prosecuted (VONS). It monitored and drew attention to the cases of those who were prosecuted contrary to the then laws of Czechoslovakia.
srpen 1978
VH attends the first joint meeting of the representatives of the Polish Committee for Social Self-defence (KOR) and Charter 77, held on the Czechoslovak-Polish border. At the second meeting in September, he co-signs the Joint Letter to human rights activists in Eastern Europe, signed by 21 participants in the meeting. A third meeting, planned for October, is thwarted by Czechoslovak and Polish police.
říjen 1978
VH writes his best-known essay The Power of the Powerless, an analysis of the current condition of and prospects for political dissent and a text about ceasing to “live a lie“ and attempting to “live in truth“.
1978–79
VH is under house arrest for six months. From December 1978 the secret police monitor the staircase of his home in Prague. They also build a special sentry box facing Hrádeček that is nicknamed Lunochod. From May 1979 he and 11 other VONS members are arrested.
