World-renowned playwright and human-rights activist, Václav Havel was the last President of Czechoslovakia and the first President of the Czech Republic.

Havel’s first publicly performed play was The Garden Party followed by The Memorandum and The Increased Difficulty of Concentration. After the suppression of the Prague Spring in 1968, Havel was banned from the theater and became more politically active.

His publications in English include Letters to Olga, Open Letters, Disturbing the Peace, and The Art of the Impossible a collection of speeches addressing all the relevant questions facing modern Europe today.