Authors
Jiří HÁJÍČEK
The fiction writer and journalist Jiří Hájíček was born in České Budějovice on 11 September 1967. He spent his childhood and youth in Týn nad Vltavou, where he completed secondary school. In 1989 he graduated from agricultural college in České Budějovice, did his national service, and then worked for three years in agriculture. Since 1993 he has been employed as a bank clerk. He lives in České Budějovice.
Since his beginnings as a poet on Zelené peří (Green Feathers), the radio programme of Mirek Kovářík, Jiří Hájíček has written fiction based on the present day. Reflecting on the realities of home after the collapse of the Iron Curtain, he observes chiefly the new opportunities for work and life in general, which impact greatly on the lives of his main characters. The slow action of the simple story and concentration on the main epic line enable the author to focus on internal developments and the heroes’ emotions. The protagonist of almost every one of his works is called Pavel, and though he is not one and the same character, he is always a fragile, melancholy young man from rural south Bohemia. Through Pavel’s excited perception and feelings the reader catches a glimpse of events around him; Pavel appears here as a spotlight, while the narratorial voice retires to the background. The sincerity and suggestiveness of the statement increases the verisimilitude of the story happening to the young man in the present. Not till the novel Dobrodruzi hlavního proudu (Mainstream Adventurers) did Hájíček abandon this model; the story is now alternately considered by Pavel and his girlfriend Dominika, and, for the first time, set in Prague. The thematic structure in each of his two large works of fiction is similar: the plot begins in the late 1980s, when Pavel is a hopeful student with a career as a researcher in front of him. After the Velvet Revolution (in November and December 1989), despite the protests of his girlfriend, he lets a friend lure him into dicey dealings, which he at first considers a frivolous adventure that he can leave at any time. In the novel Zloději zelených koní (Thieves of Green Horses) it is the search for precious moldavite stones and their sale; in Dobrodruzi hlavního proudu, it is a sales company which, at the price of onerous loans, grows to enormous dimensions. In the end his sweetheart leaves him, having in the meantime become a well-balanced, confident woman; he is swindled by his friend cum business partner, and it is too late for him to resume a career in science. His own failure and the loss of his sweetheart, however, lead Pavel not to resignation, but to insight and reconciliation, thanks to which he remains open to the world.
(eg)
Deutsch 
Jiří HÁJÍČEK, Deutsch.doc
En français Jiří HÁJÍČEK, En français.doc
