Contemporary LGBT+ literature is open and uncompromising

Interview with František Baďura for Deník N

František Baďura has been known since the time when he organized literary evenings in Kladno, and later there was also a period of working together at the National Library. Years ago, together with actor and LGBT+ activist Jiří Hromada, he helped create evenings of gay and lesbian literature called Gay Viola and devoted his bachelor’s thesis to this topic. And although he is, as he himself says, more of a practitioner than a theorist, he knows a great deal about Czech LGBT+ literature, and especially about its authors. This is also why, a year ago, he founded an interesting project
called Odnaproti.

Photo: Jiří Vopálenský

To begin with, it must be said that you yourself are gay and, together with your partner, you even found yourself in the media spotlight because you were the first gay couple in the Czech Republic to take two small disabled boys from a children’s home into foster care. How do gay people live here today?

Personally for us – for me and my husband – life here is wonderful and we have only good experiences with Czech society. When we sometimes appear in a news report, the next day we receive positive reactions from friends as well as from other people, and in all the time we have had children, we have not encountered any negative attitudes. Whether it is teachers, doctors, whether we are in the countryside or in a shop, the experiences are always positive. I am convinced that Czech society is ready for so‑called marriage for all. After all, the whole situation is absurd – we pay the same taxes, we have the same obligations as everyone in the so‑called majority society, so why should we be denied the right to a full and contented life.

Brokeback Mountain / Photo: Filip

And do those positive reactions relate only to in‑person meetings, or does it also apply to social networks, where people tend to be more “courageous”?

Someone once said that in every society there are about five percent idiots, and I think they are mainly on social networks, so my husband and I do not comment on it in any way and we do not react to it at all, it just passes us by.

I would say, however, that in today’s divided society the media sometimes pose a problem as well, and I am now talking about public service media. Their effort to be balanced sometimes leads to them giving space to views that verge on fascism. I do not know whether that is all right; balance is a good thing, but in my opinion it is not true that everyone forms their own opinion. Nowadays, when there is so much information and media literacy is almost non‑existent, the average listener or viewer often adopts even complete nonsense.

Jitka Smutná / Photo: Jiří Vopálenský

There is undoubtedly something to that. But let’s turn the page now – it’s been exactly a year since you founded the website Odnaproti.cz dedicated to Czech LGBT+ literature. What led you to do it, and why did you choose that name?

I still belong to those who, after the Velvet Revolution, that is, at the beginning of the 1990s, experienced a period when literature once again meant something for a while. And I belong to the generation of gay men for whom literature helped with self-acceptance and coming out. In the early 1990s I myself used to run around the rich network of Prague second-hand bookshops, many of which no longer even exist today, and I bought books by homosexual authors who were slowly starting to be published here – Truman Capote, Tennessee Williams, André Gide, James Baldwin, John Cheever; all of them and many others began to appear here at the turn of the 1980s and 1990s. Today, in my view, LGBT literature is somewhat on the fringes of interest – within the LGBT+ community the focus is more on politics, activism, public figures, on who speaks up for us, what people say about us, and of course gossip. The one who is, in a way, still holding the imaginary banner of LGBT+ culture is the excellent film festival Mezipatra, but literature is, in my opinion, pushed into the background, which is nothing unusual, because one has to make more time for it.

With this project, the aim is to bring “queer” literature back into awareness and to bring together people who see it similarly. It has caught on, it has been going for a year now, and it brings enormous joy. The second reason is that it is a form of relaxation alongside the demanding upbringing of two boys.

The name was invented by the poet, lyricist and columnist Pavel Buňata, who was at the time the most popular editor of the legendary 1990s gay and lesbian magazine SOHO revue, where he himself published under the pseudonym Ad Meer. Pavel’s suggestion caught the attention and eventually won in a subsequent vote on Facebook. The name Odnaproti alludes to the idea that people should live together, side by side, or opposite each other as neighbours. Simply to meet and talk to one another.

While the meaning of the abbreviation LGBT+ is clear – it refers to lesbians, gays, bisexuals, trans people, etc. – the term “LGBT+ literature” is not so straightforward, and several possible interpretations suggest themselves: works by authors of any orientation dealing with the issues of sexual minorities; works by LGBT+ authors writing about these issues; or literature written by authors with a minority sexual orientation but thematically neutral in this respect. So how is it really?

That is more a question for literary scholars and theorists; this is a practitioner who likes to bring together people with similar interests and desires, so from this perspective it probably includes everything listed above.

Jan Yenkee Kalina / Photo Jiří Vopálenský

The risk of persecution hung over homosexuals in Czechoslovakia virtually until 1989, yet a few publicly known figures could still be found among them – in the field of literature, for example, the writer Ladislav Fuks.

Interest in LGBT+ literature only awoke in the early 1990s, at the time of coming out, but the mentioned Fuks really was probably the only official author about whom it was, so to speak, whispered. Others either kept it secret, or they appeared in samizdat, or did not publish at all and were blacklisted – such as the poet Jiří Kuběna or the writer Václav Jamek.

Fuks’s work is deeply admired. His own life was not easy, and after the revolution the new cultural gatekeepers pointed fingers at him for having “sold out” during the period of normalization. Fortunately, this did not last long, and soon his selected writings began to be published, two monographs about him appeared, and in short, Fuks underwent a partial rehabilitation. There remains a debt owed to Fuks that should be repaid at some future literary evening.

Sylva Ficová a Anna Štičková / Photo Jiří Vopálenský

Works with this theme could officially start being published only after the Velvet Revolution. Among the first swallows was the interesting prose work Paci, paci, pacičky from 1984 (it was not published until 1987 in samizdat and a year later in magazine form in Revolver Revue), written by František Růžička under the pseudonym Václav Bauman. In 2017 it even received a new edition from Filip Tomáš at Akropolis. Which works of LGBT+ literature from that time stood out?

The very first text on the topic of homosexuality was Radoslav Nenadál’s 1985 short story Růžový kavalír (The Pink Cavalier), which appeared in his collection Rakvářova dcera a jiné prózy (The Coffin Maker’s Daughter and Other Prose). It was essentially his debut, and from then on he regularly incorporated motifs of homosexuality into his prose.

The book Paci, paci, pacičky was also a major discovery, because reading something so funny and written with such exaggeration and self‑irony was very encouraging.

It was a problematic piece of prose for two reasons at once – besides thematizing homosexuality, it was also quite strongly directed against the regime of the time.

Yes, in a way it was samizdat squared. There is also the beautiful two‑part prose work by Jiří Pastýř, Smutek Sebesám. Pastýř is an artistic pseudonym, and to this day only a handful of chosen people know the author’s real name. Pastýř’s two‑volume lyrical diary still ranks among the key works of Czech “queer” literature. It contains many beautiful images and sophisticated metaphors. At times it is a little awkward, but maintaining the form the author chose was certainly very difficult. Back then, Czech critics, who were not prepared for gay and lesbian literature at all, clearly had no idea what to do with the book and were quite harsh on the author.

Another important work from the early 1990s is Nenadál’s novella My tě zazdíme, Aido (We’ll Wall You In, Aida), which today reads like a kind of activist text, written almost to order, but it spoke to many boys of one generation and helped them.

Patti Smith - Just Kids / Photo Jiří Vopálenský

Natálie Lemon a Štěpán Tuček

I read somewhere that Václav Jamek’s book O prašivém houfci was written precisely as a polemic with this text by Nenadál?

Not as a polemic. It was more the first opportunity to write a coherent essay on homosexuality and AIDS. It was published as a kind of extensive afterword to this novella by Nenadál. Only after seven years did it receive a standalone edition in a substantially expanded version under the title you mentioned.

But let’s return to the current project – in addition to the website, where it is possible to find profiles of selected authors, excerpts from their works, and a bit of the history of LGBT+ literature here, literary evenings have also been launched under the Odnaproti banner at the Patra café in Prague, of which seven have taken place so far. Have your expectations been fulfilled?

Definitely yes. The website is gradually being updated and over time there will be much more there. Almost forty people came to the first literary evening in April last year, and attendance has eventually stabilized between thirty and fifty visitors, which, given the competition in Prague in terms of various literary events, is, in this view, good.

Ladislav Fuks - Pan Theodor Mundstock / Photo Jiří Vopálenský

Radek Fejt

It is not only about author readings by contemporary representatives of domestic LGBT+ literature; several older works have also been brought to life in the form of staged readings, such as Jiří Karásek ze Lvovic’s novel Lost Paradise or Radoslav Nenadál’s novella The Undertaker’s Daughter. Does contemporary literature attract more response, or the classics?

To tell the truth, I am a bit skeptical about author readings. Once the author finishes the work, it should then live its own life beyond its creator. During readings of their own texts, authors sometimes impose their interpretation on the audience: This is what I meant. But every reader perceives a text in their own way, according to their experiences, attitudes, and how open their heart and mind are. Those who have extensive reading experience and thus benefit the text greatly are actors. That is why I work with them.

Which actors have already performed at the Odnaproti evenings?

Jan Cina and Petr Vančura, the reciter Mirek Kovářík, Radek Fejt from Divadlo Bez Hranic, Martina Prášilová from Divadlo v Celetné, the young actor Štěpán Tuček, and there will also be Jiří Hromada and Milan Hein.

Do the actors you invite also belong to the LGBT+ community?

It is about half and half. Alongside Martina Prášilová, actors who do not belong to the LGBT+ community have included, for example, actresses Johana Schmidtmajerová, known from several interesting Prague theatre projects, and Hana Müllerová from Divadlo Vosto5.

Do they receive fees? How are these evenings actually financed? Have you applied for any grants?

I have not applied for a grant; I do not have the head or the capacity for it. Admission is charged precisely because the artists should be paid, and most of the time it covers the costs.

To return to the earlier question, thanks to the actors there is success whether Karásek’s Lost Paradise is being read here, or, for example, the prose of Theo Addair.

Among contemporary authors of LGBT+ literature, your evenings have featured, for example, Mike Perry, Kamil Marcel Hodáček, and the already mentioned Theo Addair. Has anyone ever refused to take part for any reason, or refused to provide their text?

No one has turned me down, but when I invite some LGBT+ writers to come here just to have a look, without it being their own presentation, they refuse for one reason – they see the whole thing as unnecessary self-segregation.

And regarding the visitors – it’s clear that you can’t keep track of everyone who comes to your evenings (in fact, it would be rather sad if you knew them all personally), but can you say whether these events resonate beyond the community of sexual minorities?

What’s wonderful is that audiences here at Patera span generations, and it doesn’t matter at all whether the reading is, for example, Muffin and Tea, Karásek’s Lost Paradise, or something else. And at least a third of them really come from the majority of society.

Tennesse Willimas - Římské jaro paní Stoneové

Valérie Zawadská a Filip Sychra

While researching for this interview, I was struck by how many LGBT+ authors ostentatiously signal their focus already through the titles of their books. Buzíčci by Jan Folný, Pražská buzna by Jiří Markvart, Vesnický závod with the subtitle “A Truly Erotic Gay Novel” by the author duo writing under the pseudonym Full.of & Leckdo. Does homosexuality still carry a whiff of scandal today, does LGBT+ thematics promise a certain marketing potential?

I think it does. If one day we live in a completely free society – and I firmly believe we will – I still think there will always be a little grain of bourgeois mentality in each of us, so we will never get rid of that. And today’s Czech society is truly bourgeois. And when there are two men or two women side by side, let alone when it comes to gender transition, it will always be a spicy topic.

We could see that for ourselves last year thanks to the affair sparked by an allegedly scandalous passage from Alan Hollinghurst’s novel The Line of Beauty (which, incidentally, won the Man Booker Prize), broadcast on the Vltava radio station before ten o’clock in the evening. But openness in depicting intimate life is part of LGBT+ literature, or is that wrong?

That’s true, although mainstream literature doesn’t exactly wear a chastity belt either. In LGBT+ literature, it is, in my view, a matter of a kind of inner liberation – both on a personal level and on a social and political level, where literature naturally also belongs. After all, during that endlessly long period when the LGBT+ community had to hide and deny its own nature, desires and wishes, it was art that provided the space to let all that suppressed feeling out. And that includes erotica. When looking at today’s colourful Pride parades, it is essentially the same thing, a release of a certain built-up pressure. And many of us are simply incredibly glad to be in this world and happy to be living in a fairly free society.

Tomáš Padevět / Photo Jiří Vopálenský

And what else do you think is characteristic of LGBT+ literature? Is it perhaps more autobiographical?

That is again more a question for theorists. I would say that today’s LGBT+ literature is more open and uses motifs that some people may find harsher. It is also more uncompromising towards the world and society than it was thirty years ago. It is quite interesting that this kind of “queer” literature is not accepted even by some LGBT+ readers, especially those from the older generation.

It also struck me that there are not many LGBT+ authors who write genre fiction – for example crime novels, horror, fantasy or sci‑fi. Recently I have only come across a mention of Theo Addair’s fantasy series In the Shadow of the Service Tree, whose first volume was published by Laser and the second volume is due to be published this year.

However, on the internet, for example on individual authors’ personal websites, fantasy within LGBT+ literature is a very popular genre. There is even a slight concern that this might be yet another way of hiding. But sometimes these are very good texts. It is, however, more of a literature outside the mainstream, which is mostly published online. This may be a new distinctive feature of contemporary queer literature.

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And what about LGBT+ prose and poetry? Is more prose being published?

Yes, but mainly because poetry in general is read and sold less. Poetry works more on the internet. In my case, it was mostly poets who got in touch, and it took some time before amateur authors writing prose made themselves known. Because writing something with the feeling that no one will publish it anyway often leads to writing poetry instead. But there is a new phenomenon of online novels published in installments, and many of them are LGBT+. For example, Eva Pospíšilová and Klára Foldynová, who are both a writing and a personal couple, have written two very successful novels this way, Pátá minuta and Neexistence, and are now looking for a publisher.

Who today is considered a living classic in domestic LGBT+ literature?

Everyone who manages to succeed without the support of omnipresent media and large publishing houses deserves attention. Personally, there is great respect for all those who, over the past year, have found the courage to step out of their shells and open their drawers – for many of them it was a difficult and crucial step. The aim of the Odnaproti project was therefore not only to start presenting domestic LGBT+ literature, but also to bring together people with similar interests and goals so that they could meet, get to know each other, and share their experiences... And this is happening, which is a great source of joy.

And are there any publishing houses specializing in LGBT+ literature?

There is a small Prague publishing house called Kampe that is open to LGBT+ themes and such authors. But breaking through, for example, into Euromedia Group, as Theo managed to do (the author writing under the pseudonym Theo Addair published the books Muffin a čaj and Koláčky a spiklenci with the Yoli imprint, which focuses on the young adult genre; editor’s note PN) – it seems he had to compromise a little so that the novel Muffin a čaj could be published there at all.

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But there are exceptions: Jan Folný is published by Host (Buzíčci, Weekend in London), Mike Perry has just released the book Hotel Dream, Room 36 with the publisher Práh...

That’s true, but there is no publishing house here that would deliberately focus on queer literature and actively seek out its authors. This is probably also because the book market is too small.

Now a slight digression – in [year] a guide to the queer history of the capital between 1380 and 2000 was published under the title Queer Prague. Which places, in your opinion, would belong in a similar guide to contemporary Prague?

And that is exactly the problem: today LGBT+ life and culture often take place in the virtual sphere, on social networks and on the internet, so any new places...

Take Patra, for example, where we’re sitting right now...

They are probably the only place that systematically supports Czech queer culture. There are film screenings, talks, exhibitions and our literary and music evenings. However, it seems that there definitely wouldn’t be enough material for a follow-up guide that would map specific physical locations, let alone purely literary ones.

And what plans are there for the Odnaproti project in the future?

Something big is being prepared for June, when an online database of Czech LGBT+ literature, including translated works, will be launched. It is being created by a Czech woman living with her husband in Sweden. The literary evenings at Patra will, of course, continue; they have already taken on the character of literary and musical shows, because professional musicians are also invited. And everything that has been experienced over the past year – all those impressions, inspirations, recommendations and the little bit of knowledge that may exist about Czech LGBT literature – is meant to be transformed – and now the secret is out and there’s no going back (laughs) – into a book, a kind of queer guide to literary Bohemia.

František Baďura / Photo Jiří Vopálenský

František Baďura (*1972) comes from Ondřejov and has had an exceptionally positive relationship with literature since his youth. He completed a bachelor’s degree in Language and Literary Culture at the Faculty of Education in Hradec Králové. At the turn of the millennium, he began to take part in organizing literary evenings in Kladno and also in Prague, where he now lives with his husband and two disabled boys whom they took from children’s homes. He worked at the National Library and is now employed as a program officer at the Municipal Library of Prague. He has contributed to several book titles connected with the cultural history of the Kladno region and is himself the author of the book Literary Wanderings around Kladno (Halda 2016). At the beginning of 2019, he founded the website Odnaproti.cz, dedicated to Czech LGBT literature, under whose banner he later began organizing literary evenings at Patra in Vršovice.

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