Smetana Hall All guidebooks about Prague will mention the Municipal House but the Smetana Hall inside the building gets much less coverage probably because it’s not a place that you can just walk into. Strange, when you think that the Smetana Hall was to be the beacon of the celebration of Slavic culture and the … Read More
Politics and History – Charter 77 You don’t have to spend too much time watching Czech news to learn that famous people have died. Sometimes however the name is followed by a simple phrase “Charter 77 signatory”. In our current time of being able to say pretty much whatever we like and not have to … Read More
Exploring Prague’s Vyšehrad Cemetery It’s not normally on many people’s top ten list of things to do in Prague unless 1) you like cemeteries, 2) you like art/design and 3) you know something of Czech culture. But for some people a trip to the Vyšehrad Cemetery will be an interesting and rewarding experience. I’ll show … Read More
Famous Czechs – Mordecai Maisel Mordecai, Mordechaj or Mordechai, Maisel, Meisel or Meysel. There have been several interpretations of his name so I’m going to stick with Mordecai Maisel (fun fact: in Yiddish, Maisel means mouse). Let’s put ourselves in the last half of the 16th Century. Emperors Maximilian and Rudolf II have been kind … Read More
Famous Czechs – Alfons Mucha Alfons Mucha is one of the most famous Czechs but in a strange twist of fate if you look him up in Wikipedia you’ll find that although he was born just south-west of Brno in 1860 he was technically not born in Czech. When he died in Prague in 1939 … Read More
Mánes Exhibition Hall The Mánes Exhibition Hall, or to give it its full name “The Building of the Mánes Society of Fine Artists” is on the riverside one block up river from the National Theatre but if you aim for Slavonic Island you’ll see the large white building from the main road. In Czech, Mánes … Read More
Famous Czechs – Miloš Forman Ask the average person what film directors they have heard of and it will be a pretty short list including Alfred Hitchcock and Steven Spielberg I imagine. Now ask your average Czech person and they’ll probably reel off a dozen names off the top of their head without even thinking. … Read More
The Egyptian Who Won Wimbledon – Famous Czechs – Jaroslav Drobny If you are wondering what possible link there can be between Prague and an Egyptian who won the Men’s Singles Title at Wimbledon then read on because it’s an interesting story. You won’t find the name Jaroslav Drobný in many history books but look … Read More
Famous Czechs – Jan Zajic To set the scene you have to understand that the August 1968 invasion of Prague by Warsaw Pact countries extinguished the Prague Spring freedoms. Any political or social reforms were cancelled and Czechoslovakia regressed to its 1950’s state. As was increasingly common in the late 1960s, the method of the … Read More
Famous Czechs – Karel Hašler Every year thousands of people are walking up or down the Old Castle Steps at the back of Prague Castle and at the top of the steps they walk past (and briefly look at) a sculpture of a man with his legs crossed, leaning against the wall and playing a … Read More