Roman Sikora

Roman Sikora

Playwright, theatre critic, author of radio plays. His dramas have been published in German, Hungarian, Slovene and French and have been performed on many European stages. He won second place in the Alfréd Radok Awards competition (1997). He was born in Třinec on 3 July 1970.


Title Publisher Year Selected published translations Awards
Pillars of Society (Opory společnosti) Větrné mlýny 2002
Aut mori Svět a divadlo 1999
The Detritus of Antigone (Smetení Antigony) Svět a divadlo 1998
The Cat on the Cloud, Sodomgomorrah!, The Tank, Wolves (Kočka na mráčku, Sodomagomora!, Tank, Vlci) JAMU 1996
Opory společnosti
Roman Sikora
Pillars of Society
Opory společnosti
Aut mori
Roman Sikora
Aut mori
Smetení Antigony
Roman Sikora
The Detritus of Antigone
Smetení Antigony
Kočka na mráčku, Sodomagomora!, Tank, Vlci
Roman Sikora
The Cat on the Cloud, Sodomgomorrah!, The Tank, Wolves
Kočka na mráčku, Sodomagomora!, Tank, Vlci

He completed his training at a metallurgical trade school and spent three years working at the Třinec iron and steel works, after which he went to JAMU in Brno, where he studied directing and dramaturgy. His debut work was the play Kočka na mráčku (The Cat on the Cloud, 1994) and he has written over twenty critical and fiercely satirical plays, which rail against politics, society and mass culture. He spent twelve years as a receptionist at the Brno City Theatre.

In the play Smetení Antigony (The Detritus of Antigone, 1997), which brought him success in the Alfréd Radok Awards, he presents a contemporary version of the classical tragedy of the daughter of King Oedipus. The author describes his heroine thus: “She is a rebel. She is promiscuous. She is insolent. But above all, through her improper behaviour she increasingly acts as a reminder of the earlier events which were supposed to remain forgotten. Imprisoned in the captivity of her own body, because it is all that is left of love in her world, she fights but doesn’t have anything to fight for, she rebels but doesn’t know what against, she is dying and doesn’t know why.”

His other works include Jitro kouzelníků (The Dawn of the Magicians, 2003), a variation on Shakespeare’s Macbeth; a series of satires about talentless little artists entitled Největší básník (The Greatest Poet, 2006); Zpověď masochisty (Confessions of a Masochist, 2011) about the submissive Mr M. with the subtitle Labyrint světa a ráj biče (The Labyrinth of the World and the Paradise of the Whip); and Pohřbívání (Burying, 2012), which is a live broadcast from the funeral of President Václav Klaus.