Ota Pavel

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Ota Pavel (originally Otto Popper ) (born July 2, 1930 in Prague ; † March 31, 1973 there ) was a Czech writer , narrator and journalist and is considered the founder of modern Czech sports journalism .

Life

Ota Pavel Museum in Buštěhrad

The youngest son of a traveling salesman was raised by his father to love nature and sport. In addition to hiking and fishing, they practiced various sports, especially soccer and ice hockey . The Jewish father and the two brothers were deported to concentration camps during the Second World War and survived. Ota was able to stay with his Christian mother in the Kladno area because he was not yet of legal age.

At thirteen he started his first job as a miner in Dubí near Kladno . According to a wish of the father, the family got a Czech name and Popper became Pavel. After the war, Ota attended the business and language school in Prague, trained the youth hockey team of the Sparta Prague club and shortly afterwards began working as a sports journalist.

From 1949 to 1956 he worked for the Czechoslovak Radio and reported in reports and feature articles on the 1955 Spartakiade , which were published in the magazine Stadion , for which Pavel worked until 1956. In 1957 he worked for the magazine The Czechoslovak Soldier (Československý voják). In 1960 he passed his high school diploma at a middle school for workers. By the late 1960s, he made a name for himself as a popular sports editor.

As a reporter, Pavel visited many countries, including accompanying the Czech army football team to the USA , and also visiting the Soviet Union , France , Yugoslavia , Switzerland and Austria . During the Olympic Winter Games in Innsbruck in 1964, he fell seriously ill with manic-depressive psychosis (he tried to set fire to a farm) and was put into early retirement. He seeks consolation in nature and fishing and, despite his illness, continues to devote himself to literature. His best friend at that time was the writer Arnošt Lustig .

Ota Pavel died of a heart attack and was buried next to his father in the New Jewish Cemetery in Prague-Olšany. In 2002 a museum was built in Buštěhrad , which is dedicated to his life's work. The exhibition includes numerous photographs, documents and personal items.

Quote

“Summer started and it was nice. The cherry blossoms had fallen off, and the blossoms of the pear and apple trees also fell, and the fruit began in that third year of the war. He came to Buštěhrad in the afternoon and the roebuck was divided fairly. We gave a leg to the baker Blaha, who was very good to us during the war, one went to the estate of the burgers, who were even more good to us, and Mama put everything else in beautiful earthenware pots and she cooked my brothers Hugo and Jirka sauce and beef steaks, which was their specialty. The boys stuffed themselves full for the years to come, to endure Theresienstadt, Auschwitz, Mauthausen, the death marches in thirty degrees of frost and the dragging of stones on the stairs of Mauthausen in thirty degrees of heat, and all the pretty things the Germans had in store for them. Hugo came back in pretty good shape. Jirka returned from Mauthausen and weighed forty kilos; He almost died of hunger and torture for six months before he finally began to live again. He never told me much about it, only once, and when we came to talk about the roebuck he said: “Perhaps this roebuck saved my life. Perhaps these last pieces of decent meat kept me accurate until the end. ""

- Ota Pavel

Works

His sports reports were factual and avoided the formation of legends and myths. He made his debut in 1964 with texts accompanying photographs by Vilém Heckel in the book Mountains and People (Hory a lidé). But he only became known with his book Dukla between Skyscrapers (Dukla mezi mrakodrapy), in which he describes the history, relegation and success of the football team FK Dukla Prague . In the period after his retirement, two of his best-known books The Death of the Beautiful Roebuck (Smrt krásných srnců) and How I met the fish (Jak jsem potkal ryby) were published. They are memories of his youth and his fishing experiences, written in first-person form, contrasted with later events in his life.

His complete work - a creed in the victory of good and justice - is not too extensive, but always captivates with punch lines, wit and linguistic quality.

German-language publications

  • How I met the fish, illustrated by Oliver Briese (original title: Jak jsem potkal ryby , translated by Elisabeth Borchardt) (= spectrum , volume 97), Volk und Welt, Berlin 1976; New edition: Phileas, Berlin 2005, ISBN 978-3-00-015728-8 .
  • The death of the beautiful roebuck (original title: Smrt krásných srnců , translated by Elisabeth Borchardt). People and World, Berlin 1973; New edition: Gutenberg Book Guild, Frankfurt am Main 2008, ISBN 978-3-940111-52-4 .
  • Sunny mountains , photos by Vilém Heckel, text by Oto Pavel translated by Eva Svorčiková, Artia, Prague 1962, DNB 57719447X .

Sports reports and stories

  • Dukla mezi mrakodrapy. 1964.
  • Plná bedna šampaňského. 1967.
  • Pohár od Pánaboha. 1971.
  • Syn celerového krále. 1972.
  • Pohádka o Raškovi. About the life of ski jumper Jiří Raška , 1974.

review

  • Smrt krásných srnců. 1971.
  • Jak jsem potkal ryby. 1974.

Reading out

  • Cena vítězství (1968) - excerpts from Dukla mezi mrakodrapy and Plná bedna šampaňského .
  • Velký vodní tulák (1980).

Collections

  • Fialový poustevník (1977)
  • Smrt krásných srnců - Jak jsem potkal ryby (1981)
  • Zlatí úhoři (1991)

Other publications

  • Hory a lidé, 1964

Published posthumously

  • Fialový poustevník, 1977
  • Sedm deka zlata, 1980
  • Veliký vodní tulák, 1980
  • Mám rád tu řeku, 1989
  • Zlatí úhoři, 1985
  • Výstup na Eiger , 1989
  • Mám rád tu řeku, 1989
  • Jak šel táta Afrikou 1994
  • Omyl a jiné povídky, 1995
  • Olympijské hry a jiné povídky, 1996

Filmography

His works also served as templates for films and TV productions:

  • Kapři pro wehrmacht , FAMU film, 1975 (German carp for the Wehrmacht )
  • Zlatí úhoři , TV film with Vladimír Menšík in the leading role, 1979 (German Golden Eels )
  • Smrt krásných srnců , FAMU with Karel Heřmánek in the leading role, 1986 (German: The death of beautiful roebucks )
  • Pohár za první poločas , TV production (German cup for the first half )

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ From: The death of the beautiful roebuck . Quoted from H. Broder , Jewish calendar 2009-2010 , March 27/12. Nissan
personal data
SURNAME Pavel, Ota
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Popper, Ota (original name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Czechoslovak writer and sports journalist
DATE OF BIRTH 2nd July 1930
PLACE OF BIRTH Prague
DATE OF DEATH March 31, 1973
Place of death Prague