A conversation with Jáchym Topol, writer and former programme director of the Václav Havel Library, on the book Václav Havel: I Hid It Somewhere. At the heart of this volume is Havel’s posthumously published essayistic reportage – lost and rediscovered decades after it was written – chronicling events around Charter 77, his first imprisonment, the interrogation and other methods of the State Security police, his release, and his subsequent doubts. This is an extraordinary account of profound self-examination by a man grappling with a sense of his own failure and questions of whether he stood his ground when under duress. Supplemented with essays by other authors, the book sheds new light on the character, courage and doubts of one of the most influential Czech thinkers of the 20th century.

Jáchym Topol. Moderation: Tilman Spreckelsen