I was always more interested in literature, samizdat then political opposition
Pavel Jungmann was born on 16 May 1956 in Zlín (called Gottwaldov at the time). He graduated from grammar school and then from the Secondary Vocational School of Librarianship. He was expelled from the last year of Information and Library Studies at Charles University for distributing samizdat. After school he worked as the manager of a second-hand bookshop in Gottwaldov, where he came in touch with the people around Stanislav Devátý. He participated in the opposition to the totalitarian Communist regime. He was one of the founders and also the spokesman of the Society of Friends of the USA (SPUSA). He was in charge of the editing and typography of the samizdat SPUSA Magazine; he helped print numerous other samizdat materials, took part in demonstrations and other anti-regime activities, co-authored several petitions and letters of protest addressed to state institutions, and helped Stanislav Devátý escape over the border to what was then already a free Poland. This was not without repercussions. He was under State Security surveillance and was held in forty-eight-hour provisional detention several times. In 1989 he was one of the founding members of the Civic Forum in Zlín. He later left the second-hand bookshop and successfully managed the publishing house Archa for many years. As of 2017, he lives in Zlín-Kostelec.