Portrait of the poet Vilém Závada

From Hana Rambousková's commentary to the original LP album 1 18 1699"Portrait of the poet Vilém Závada" released by Supraphon in 1975 for the artist's seventieth birthday and now released digitally for the first time on the round anniversary of his birth. "The beginning poet is usually absorbed in himself and feels only himself. Only when he breaks out of his cocoon, when he opens himself to the world, will he begin to perceive what is happening around him. He doesn't understand much, he is painfully drowning in much. " These are the words of the National Artist VILém ZÁVADA. this native of black Ostrava, who turned 70 in May this year, says about his youth: "I clearly remember the moments of liberation in October 1918. But the fanfare and the lantern parades soon ended and everyday life began again. After four years of war and famine, epidemics were rampant, there was a fierce struggle for existence, the first major strikes and political upheavals. From my boyhood I was close to the poetry of Petr Bezruč, and that is why I was attracted by the first verses of Horo, Wolker and Seifert, and by the whole wave of social and proletarian art. But then I got to know Rimbaud and Apollinaire, and I was very charmed by Nezval. I liked his poeticism. But I did not share his agenda without reservation. I missed his lightness, playfulness and carefree poeticism. I was much more cumbersome against them. We were in the same situation with František Halas. Life pressed down on us with more weight than we could bear and express. And we grew up into ever harder times. However, those were beautiful times that I will never forget. But barely a decade had passed since liberation and the world was once again convulsed by crises. Unemployment was spreading. In Germany, revanchism was raising its voice, which then brought Hitler to power, civil war broke out in Spain, Mussolini raided Abyssinia, Hitler occupied Austria, and the twentieth anniversary of the young state became mired in the horrors of the Munich betrayal, after which came the complete occupation of Czechoslovakia and a new world war. History began to accelerate and there was no time to develop what was in each of us, what was our inner destiny. We had to get out of ourselves, they had to defend themselves, at least with the guns for now, that were available to us - the verses, novels, theatrical plays, drawings. We have felt the threat of a new war and the threat of new catastrophes for a long time, and I also expressed them in "Panychida", "Siren" and later in "The Way on Foot". Our life developed under the pressure of external historical events. And it was no different after the war. Even then, we could not concentrate only on our literary work; we all contributed in some way to the renewal of the life of our society. After all, our literature has always been more or less connected with the life of the nation, and this has not only kept it grounded, but has also given it lift and strength. " Shortly after the Second World War (in 1949) Vilém Závada published a new cycle of poems "Rising from the Dead", in 1950"City of Light", then in 1956 a collection "Wildflowers", "One Life" in 1962 and in 1970, for the first time for poetry lovers, the poetry collection "On the Threshold". VILE DEFECT (*22. May 1905 - † 30 November 1982)