Lubomír Martínek

"There's this strange idea as if an emigrant - either they simply fault him for trying for something better - I have to say, after my experiences from the 90s and in the 2000s, I don't know who has the right to fault emigrants for that. I mean, does anyone here ever do anything else than to try for something better? This argument doesn't seem very relevant to me. When they fault emigrants for not being better, then I don't see why they should be better. Emigration is just as broad a phenomenon, just as broad a group as any other group - it has its rotters, its thieves, its frauds, its careerist, its amazing people, its adventurers, its businessmen, its various generations... Why should emigrants be any better than the population they arose from?"

"It's a devilish Czech matter that it's a huge difference if in such key historical moments like in '48, '68, you're fourteen, or seventeen, or twenty years old. Suddenly, the differences between generations means nothing, and I was hit by this stupidity at the age of fourteen, which was quite dumb, because that's the kind of most aggravated, slightly historical period. Nothing much was going on yet in '68, a year later I was taking part in the intifada here behind the National Museum, throwing stones and such tomfoolery. Nonetheless there were some very unpleasant changes going on - switching from primary to secondary school, the changing of professors, changing of neighbours, and those idiots who swore that they'll never bend to anyone, and 'Boys, fight and resist! I won't shave until the Russians leave!' and a year later the same ones were pressuring me into the SSM (Union of Socialist Youth). This pressure, the beginning was quite icky. Nonetheless with hindsight I am quite glad of this lesson, because I feel that I gained a great head start in front of the others, that I realised very quickly, when about seventeen, eighteen, I had a rough but clear idea of the given balance of character in society. It took me a bit longer to find out that this is a constant, that you can't really do anything about it, that the number of shitpants and bastards are always about the same, and then later on in my life, getting along in this world, I saw that in the various contexts it was very similar everywhere."

"That was an amazing touch of Freud. That was a wonderful experience, because I still don't have it sorted out wit Freud, how much did he get it right, how much is it overblown. I feel its like Mr. Freud found the key to one room and he thinks he has the pick for all the locks. But something from this level (of consciousness) really does exist, upon crossing the borders the subconscious really did come gushing out. Suddenly memory works in a completely different way. Those were hallucinatory states, where I would arrive at Zábradlí (the theatre) where I was a stage hand, and the laws of physics were overruled - the seats weren't worn down one bit after ten years, they were the same; there was my dog ear in the ashtray, I remember exactly how I had snubbed it there. A toolbox on Malostranská Square was rotted just to the same degree as it was at the moment I left. You'd walk past the house you used to live in, and the names on the bell plates were the same. You'd open the door and the same stench of cabbage would billow out. Simply, there were amazing things coming up through these taste and smell memories - so that was a wonderful experience."

"At the time when I was there, I think there was quite an interesting constellation of Czech intellectuals. There were three viewpoints as if - one was represented by Tigrid and his (magazine) Testimony (Svědectví), that was a political matter, the second viewpoint was represented by Antonín Liehm, who edited the Lettre Internationale, a very good magazine, I did translations for him for the One Hundred and Fifty Thousand Words, so that was partly my living. Of course the closest viewpoint to me was the third one - Jiří Kolář. Each of these viewpoints had a loose community of people around them, and they all knew each other of course. Those who were more interested in art would gravitate towards Kolář more than Tigrid. Those who were more politically oriented would keep to the Testimony."