Ota Filip

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Ota Filip, circa 1997

Ota Filip (born March 9, 1930 in Schlesisch Ostrau ; † March 2, 2018 in Garmisch-Partenkirchen ) was a Czech-speaking writer who has lived in the Federal Republic of Germany since his expatriation from Czechoslovakia in 1974 and also wrote in German. He is considered an important figure in Czech exile literature.

Life

Ota Filip was born in 1930 as the son of a Czech confectioner in Ostrau, his mother was of Polish or Galician origin. He spent his youth in Ostrava and Prague and after graduating from high school (1948) and distance learning in literature and journalism at Charles University in Prague, he worked as an editor for various newspapers and on the radio. In 1959 he joined the Communist Party , but was expelled from it in 1960 because of critical comments. In 1960 and 1969 he was sentenced to prison terms and forced labor for "undermining the state and society" and worked as a miner, truck driver and construction worker. Despite the writing ban, he wrote novels, the manuscripts of which circulated among political sympathizers in the Federal Republic of Germany and Austria . During this time u. a. his Roman Cafe on the road to the cemetery , for which he received the Grand Prize of the City of Ostrava in 1967. In 1968, during the Prague Spring , he worked as a publishing editor . A year after the crackdown on the Prague Spring, he was arrested again in 1969 for allegedly critical of the system and sentenced to 18 months in prison. He then worked as a furniture fitter, truck driver and construction worker.

In 1974 he was expatriated with his family and has since lived as a freelance writer and political journalist in West Germany , where he a. a. worked as an editor for S. Fischer Verlag . In 1977 he received German citizenship. Since the collapse of the Eastern Bloc , he has devoted himself in essays and books to the topic of German-Czech reconciliation. He was a member of the Bavarian Academy of Fine Arts , the German PEN Center and the Czech Writers' Association.

Filip wrote satirical short stories from Czechoslovakia during the communist era. One of his characters is the worker Josef Nowak, who fights against the adversities of everyday socialist life.

Due to documents discovered in Prague in 1997, a public discussion arose about Filip's work for the StB secret service in the 1950s and 1970s. Filip did not deny his involvement, but turned against allegations of personally harming those persecuted by the regime. He referred to the constraints of a totalitarian system, specifically to the conditions of his solitary confinement, from which it was difficult to escape, and admitted that he had failed under these conditions, which he regretted very much.

Ota Filip died in early March 2018, a week before his 88th birthday.

Awards

Ota Filip received a. a. In 1986 he was awarded the Adelbert von Chamisso Prize for German-language migrant literature , in 1991 the Andreas Gryphius Prize and Die Löwenpfote (Munich City Prize for Literature), and in 1999 the Villa Massimo scholarship in Rome. In 2010 he held the Chamisso Poetics Lecturer at the Technical University of Dresden . On October 28, 2012, the President of the Czech Republic awarded him the Medal for Special Merit in the Fine Arts.

Works

  • The café on the road to the cemetery: Roman . S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 1968.
  • A fool for every city: Roman . S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 1969.
  • The Assumption of Lojzek Lapáček from Silesian Ostrava: Roman . S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 1973.
  • Wallenstein and Lucretia: Roman . S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 1978.
  • May devotion: Roman . S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 1980 (original title "Poskvrněné Početi" 1976)
  • Grandfather and the Cannon: Roman . S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 1981.
  • Tomato thieves in Azerbaijan and other satires . Fischer Taschenbuchverlag, Frankfurt am Main 1981.
  • Longing for Procida: Roman . S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 1988.
  • The silent dead under the clover: reunion with Bohemia . Langen-Müller, Munich 1992.
  • Café Slavia: Roman . S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 1985; New edition: Herbig, Munich 2001.
  • The seventh curriculum vitae: autobiographical novel . Herbig, Munich 2001.
  • The Russian House: A novel about Gabriele Münter and Wassily Kandinsky . LangenMüller, Munich 2005.
  • Osmý čili nedokončený životopis . Host, Brno 2007.

Secondary literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Zemřel přední český exilový spisovatel Ota Filip. Podívejte se na jeho poslední rozhovor per reflex - Reflex.cz . In: Reflex.cz . ( reflex.cz [accessed on March 2, 2018]).
  2. ↑ a b Jan Kubica: Spisovatel Ota Filip. Větrné mlýny (Prague) 2012, ISBN 9788074430466
  3. ↑ Ota Filip. In: Pearl Divers . Retrieved December 18, 2014 .
  4. ↑ Ota Filip: Před minulostí nelze utéct. [You cannot escape from the past]. In: czsk.net. Slovensko-český klub, accessed December 18, 2014 (Czech, interview).
  5. ↑ Ota Filip. Robert Bosch Foundation , accessed December 18, 2014 .
  6. ↑ 9th Dresden Chamisso Poetics Lecturer with Ota Filip. Technical University of Dresden, accessed on December 18, 2014 .
  7. ↑ Marco Zimmermann: Fighter, writer, athlete - President awards medals. In: Radio Praha . October 29, 2012, accessed December 18, 2014 .
  8. ↑ Late billing. Stanford University Libraries, accessed December 18, 2014 .
personal data
SURNAME Filip, Ota
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German and Czech speaking writer
DATE OF BIRTH March 9, 1930
PLACE OF BIRTH Silesian Ostrau
DATE OF DEATH 2nd March 2018
Place of death Garmisch-Partenkirchen