Anticharta
Anticharta was the backlash of the ruling Communist Party of Czechoslovakia to Charter 77 , a communiqué of the artistic opposition. According to the party, it was signed by over 2000 artists.
The central organ of the communist party, Rudé právo , published a statement on January 12, 1977 under the heading The Stranded and Usurpers ( Czech Ztroskotanci a samozvanci ), in which the actions of the opposition were condemned. The signatories of the charter were supposed to boycott the honest work of the people. On January 28, 1977, national artists, actors and other public figures were invited to the National Theater. In front of this selected audience, the actress Jiřina Švorcová read the resolution of the Czechoslovak artistic associations, which called for artistic work in the name of socialism and peace, and for loyalty to the communist regime. In the days that followed, many citizens were forced to sign the Anticharta in their workplaces. Anyone who did not sign had to expect problems.
According to a publication in the central organ Rudé Právo on January 31, 1977, numerous artists are said to have signed this Anticharta. A similar event took place on February 4, 1977 in the Theater of Music ( Divadlo hudby ). On February 12, 1977, the party organ announced that a total of 76 national artists, 360 deserving artists and a further seven thousand people had signed the charter.
However, the directory was never too credible, as it included the names of people who had not signed. Many of the artists and personalities listed in the daily stated that they had refused to sign. Others said they did not have the courage to protest the misinformation, others later signed under pressure, and some said they had protested in vain against their name being published. However, before the end of the communist dictatorship in 1989 there was no reasonable way to make this protest public. In the end, the list, including the famous actor Jan Werich , who was seriously ill at the time, was kept as an attendance list for the event, but not as a protest note.
A small number of the artists, such as Bohumil Hrabal or Vladimír Neff , were allowed to republish their works after they signed it.