The outstanding personality of our contemporary journalism, and even of the writing scene, is without exaggeration a master of his field, crowned with a number of degrees, from Mgr. to PhD. to Doc... Czech journalist, publicist, poet and writer Petr Žantovský. A specialist in public relations and a university professor who still remembers the times when the so-called journalistic ethics existed and was practiced. A short time ago, he published a unique publication Censorship versus Freedom, and we can meet him in person, for example, at a series of lectures and christenings at the Slovak House in Prague's Soukenická Street, which he organises as chairman of the Union of Czech Writers, where Žantovský succeeded the well-known poet Karel Sýs, whose death just a year ago.
Petr Žantovský (1962) studied journalism, history and theory of mass media. At the University of Economics in Prague he lectures on censorship, freedom of speech, propaganda and disinformation. He has published more than a dozen books of interviews with leading personalities of our political, cultural and social life, as well as a number of publications of his commentaries on contemporary issues of the Czech Republic and monographs on the state of Czech journalism. He also writes prose and poetry. Among other things, for his collection of poems Forbidden Flowers, Petr Žantovský was awarded the 2017 annual prize of the Slovak Centre of the Pen Club, of which he has been a member since 2008.
In sohe is currently the head of the Union of Czech Writers, which he introduces to us in the following lines.
"The Union of Czech Writers was founded 25 years ago by the work and immeasurable activity of the poet Karel Sýs. Initially, it gathered mainly authors of the generation that entered literature at the turn of the 1970s and 1980s and which was driven out of literature again after 1989, regardless of whether they were authors of quality or not. Again, one can recall that terrible word cadre. Once again, someone was deciding who could and could not enter the public space, who could publish, who could enter the media. Sýs and co. (for all of them I would also like to mention Michal Černík, unfortunately also deceased last year) invested a lot of work in the UČS project and saved many valuable literary works that might otherwise have fallen through the newly set cadre net into oblivion.
I was elected President of the UČS last November and, in line with the opinion of my colleagues in the Union, I set out to open doors and build bridges. There are a number of writers' organisations in this country, which is good, any plurality is positive, but until now they have not been able to agree with each other on common interests and activities. That has changed. We started to organise joint events with other organisations (the Writers' Community, the Non-Fiction Writers' Club, the Czech and Slovak Writers' Club, the Slovak Centre of the Penklub). Firstly, regular monthly Literary Salons, where members of these organisations present their new books, and also professional conferences - one of them was held recently to commemorate the 140th anniversary of the birth of the important Czech-Jewish-German, actually world famous writer and journalist Egon Erwin Kisch. For all these activities, as you mentioned above, we have found a beautiful facility in the Slovak House in Prague, Soukenická 3. An underground hall with all the equipment, enabling meetings and discussions, theatre, music, exhibitions and other activities. And because the world is so small, the director of the Slovak House is Vladimír Skalský, the newly elected president of the Slovak Centre Penu."
So you took over this respectable association after the death of its founder and long-time chairman, the poet Karel Sys, when his serious illness severely curtailed its professional life. With what ideas and plans did you take that honourable position on your overburdened shoulders ...?
"These ideas included, above all, the aforementioned building of bridges between writers of different "denominations". This has taken off very quickly and I am glad of it. The second important development is a kind of "federalization" of our activities. Not only do we have Slovak authors and organisations among us, but we also want to continue our joint activities with colleagues from Slovakia, which already before Covid took the form of repeated conferences called Intersections of Czech and Slovak Literature after 1989. There is now much to build on. In addition, we have previously organised conferences on the 100th birthday of the Czechoslovak writer Ladislav Mňaček, a seminar on the travels of Božena Němcová to Slovakia and her study of local folklore, etc. For us, the federation simply ended politically, but not culturally."
Cultural Salons, talks, baptisms, conferences... What does their organization entail?
"First of all, ask him what he's making... Nothing. I mean, in a pecuniary sense. The main "yield" is beautiful encounters, lots of words heard, poetic and otherwise, discussions about the meaning of literature in today's world. No one involved in these events gets any reward from anywhere. The office of President of the UOC is an honorable one, and I consider it an honor as well. And also as a commitment. In today's world, literature has less and less space, it is being displaced by technology, by the experience industry... But what will happen to a nation without artistic literature? It will disappear. And that is what we are trying our best to prevent."
Which recent events would you like to highlight?
"I already mentioned the Kisch conference. I was very happy that Prof. Viera Glosíková from Charles University, a great expert on Kisch's life and work, accepted the invitation to be on the panel. Břetislav Dytrich, a representative of the Non-Fiction Authors Club, also gave his view and Stanislav Motl, a well-known publicist and writer, who deals with events and personalities of the past, gave a great conclusion. Finally, S. Motl screened his extraordinary documentary film about Kisch. I think this event was a very dignified, but also professional and friendly reminder of the importance of the personality in question. In addition, I often speak at various meetings and discussion evenings where the topic is freedom of speech and censorship.."
Most of the remembered events take place in the Slovak House. What can you say about it in the context of this interview? Your relationship to Slovakia, your wife is Slovak?
"No, my wife is from Pardubice in eastern Bohemia, just like me, but we have had many friends in Slovakia since we were young and the separation of the two republics has not changed that. Moreover, as you have already written, I received a doctorate and an associate professorship in Slovakia, my wife also received an associate professorship, we are simply straddling both parts of our common homeland, humanly and professionally. We have books published there (even one joint one, with poetry), besides the Penklub premium I also received the prize of the Slovak Writers' Association for my book Uncensored Reflections and Essays, which I wrote together with the eminent Slovak publicist Pavel Dinka, I have been cooperating with the local Literary Weekly (for almost 10 years now), with the Banská Bystrica-based Slobodni vysielacom (for almost the same period of time), etc. Just recently, I was at the founding assembly of the Slovak Free Media near Bratislava."
Was it related to your involvement in the Association of Independent Journalists of the Czech Republic?
"Yes. We founded the ANM with Stanislav Novotny and others in 2015, and since the following year we have been presenting the Kramer Prizes for independent journalism, and here I have also smuggled in a "federal" format, so that every year - this year for the tenth time - Slovak colleagues are also awarded. And this is what I was lecturing about at the Assembly.
By the way, the idea behind the creation of ANM was actually the same as my ideas about the UOC. Simply put: there is no mainstream and alternative journalism. There is only good and bad, and the latter is meaningless. It's not the technology that makes the difference. And the same is true for literature. With ANM, however, we have mostly stumbled with the so-called mainstream. They mostly come off as loyal, uncritical, pro-regime, propagandist, and they have their privileges to guard from that. A doubting opponent is a liability. We probably have a long way to go to eliminate this "class struggle."
This brings us to the final question - what is the state of contemporary journalism, why and where has journalistic ethics gone? We will certainly find answers in your just published book Censorship versus Freedom (published by LEDA), but before we open it...
"I've already sketched it out above. Our journalism is divided into those who accept without further ado the theses and doctrines of the current government, reject any criticism and polemics, and try to silence critical voices, to ostracize the bearers of undesirable opinions from the public space. As far as the private media are concerned, let them do what they can, but in the case of the public media this is unforgivable. They are in breach of Article 2 of the Act on the Czech Television and Radio, which requires them, on the contrary, to promote pluralism of opinion and debate and to allow citizens to draw their own judgement from the confrontation of different views. This is absolutely not allowed today. And - among other things - it is a typical manifestation of censorship. The authorities do not know which way to go anymore, so they are trying to remake the image of the world, rewrite history and rubber-stamp national memory. I am optimistic, I don't believe that it will succeed permanently, but it will take a lot of work and the cohesion of the sensible ones."
Thank you for the interview Ivan Cerny
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