COURAGE

povezivanje zbirki

The collection of the writer Vincas Mykolaitis-Putinas holds various documents: notes, correspondence and manuscripts. The documents illustrate very well the situation of intellectuals and writers in Soviet Lithuania. The government considered Mykolaitis-Putinas to be a famous Lithuanian writer, but on the other hand it tried to control his creative work. During the Late Stalinist period, the writer was often criticised by Party officials.

Vytautas Skuodis (1929-2016) was a Lithuanian scientist, Soviet dissident and former political prisoner. From 1979, he was a member of the dissident organisation the Lithuanian Helsinki Group. In 1978, he initiated and edited the journal Perspektyvos (Perspectives), the most recognised underground publication among the Lithuanian intelligentsia.
The Vytautas Skuodis collection holds various manuscripts of Skuodis’ monograhs, a PhD dissertation, articles, lectures, letters, reviews of diploma works by students, notes, memoirs and diaries. These documents are relevant to the topic of cultural opposition, because they reveal personally the involvement of Skuodis and other people in anti-Soviet activities.

The Václav Havel Collection at the Museum of Czech Literature contains letters of the dramatist, poet and president of the Czech Republic Václav Havel (1936–2011) to his wife Olga, written from prison between 1979 and 1983. Havel’s unique prison correspondence documents the life of this significant artist and philosopher, as well as the life of his wife before 1989.

Václav Havel (1936-2011) was an important Czech playwright and essayist, a critic of the communist regime, one of the initiators of Charter 77, a founding member of VONS (The Committee for the Defence of the Unjustly Prosecuted), a political prisoner and later president of Czechoslovakia and the Czech Republic. The collection consists mainly of materials of his dramatic creation and its dissenting effect.