Pavel Janáček (born January 16, 1968, in

Prague Prague ( ; ) is the capital and List of cities and towns in the Czech Republic, largest city of the Czech Republic and the historical capital of Bohemia. Prague, located on the Vltava River, has a population of about 1.4 million, while its P ...

) is a

Czech Czech may refer to: * Anything from or related to the Czech Republic, a country in Europe ** Czech language ** Czechs, the people of the area ** Czech culture ** Czech cuisine * One of three mythical brothers, Lech, Czech, and Rus *Czech (surnam ...

literary historian and critic. His research focus and interests lie in popular literature,

pulp fiction ''Pulp Fiction'' is a 1994 American independent crime film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino from a story he conceived with Roger Avary.See, e.g., King (2002), pp. 185–7; ; It tells four intertwining tales of crime and violence ...

and the literary culture of late the 19th and particularly the 20th century. Currently, he specializes in the history of

censorship Censorship is the suppression of speech, public communication, or other information. This may be done on the basis that such material is considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, or "inconvenient". Censorship can be conducted by governmen ...

and the social regulation of literature. The political environment of Czechoslovakia before 1989 – his parents were intellectuals critical towards the Warsaw pact invasion in Czechoslovakia in August 1968 – prevented him from attending the Faculty of Arts of the

Charles University Charles University (CUNI; , UK; ; ), or historically as the University of Prague (), is the largest university in the Czech Republic. It is one of the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, oldest universities in the world in conti ...

. Instead he earned himself a degree from the Prague University of Economics. Between 1990 and 1995, he worked for the cultural section of the daily

Lidové noviny ''Lidové noviny'' (''People's News'', or ''The People's Newspaper'', ) is a daily newspaper published in Prague, the Czech Republic. It is the oldest Czech daily still in print, and a newspaper of record. It is a national news daily covering po ...

, in 1995–1996 for the literary magazine Tvar. Since 1995, he is affiliated with the Institute for Czech Literature of the

Czech Academy of Sciences The Czech Academy of Sciences (abbr. CAS, , abbr. AV ČR) was established in 1992 by the Czech National Council as the Czech successor of the former Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences and its tradition goes back to the Royal Bohemian Society of Sc ...

initially at the Department for Contemporary Literature (which he was leading for a short period). In 2003, he established the Department for Research into Literary Culture. From 2010 until 2020, he was the director of the Institute of Czech Literature. Between 2003 and 2010 Janáček taught literature at the Institute of Czech and Comparative Literature at the Faculty of Arts of the

. The programme Vltava of the Czech public radio

Český rozhlas Czech Radio (, ČRo) is the Public broadcasting, public radio broadcaster of the Czech Republic operating continuously since 1923. It is the oldest national radio broadcaster in continental Europe and the second-oldest in Europe after the BBC. ...

regularly broadcasts his show "Slovo o literatuře", where he and his guests debate contemporary Czech fiction and current literary events.

References

Bibliography

* * Literární brak: operace vyloučení, operace nahrazení, 1938-1951. Brno, Host 2004. * Sedm století Slavětína: malá knížka k velkému výročí obce (with Hana Dočekalová et al.). Slavětín, Obec Slavětín 2014. * V obecném zájmu. Cenzura a sociální regulace literatury v moderní české kultuře, 1749-2014 (with Michael Wögerbauer, Petr Píša, Petr Šámal et al.). Praha, Academia - Ústav pro českou literaturu AV ČR, 2015. {{DEFAULTSORT:Janacek, Pavel Journalists from Prague 1968 births Living people