“I did not get as far as Národní Street. I was in Albertov, and I was in Vyšehrad, and then we started marching in a procession down to the Vyšehradská Street, and we walked past the ministry of justice and then it was already clear that it was bad, because there was already a double line of policemen armed with shields and batons standing against us by the building of the ministry of justice. They were standing in two lines, and I was walking in the front row and about three people away from me there was John Bok. I had a camera borrowed from somebody, and when I saw those policemen, or the members of the Public Security, I was worried about the camera. I was not afraid for myself. Then, when we approached them, they started beating us and I, as usual, experienced a blessing in disguise. They did not hit me, and although they did not hit me, I got behind this row of policemen. That was because when they started beating us, somehow the row of people spread and I actually got behind that double line of policemen. I saw John Bok, and there were about five policemen beating him, they tore off his jacket and they threw him to the ground and they were beating him with batons. I think that there were six of them, because five of them remained there and one of them started running towards me, because I was running to them and I was in shock, I was yelling: ‘Leave him alone, leave him alone.’ And he ran to me, and he sprayed a tear gas into my eyes from some twenty or thirty centimeters and then I became dazed. Since I started feeling dizzy, several people then helped me, and I began to feel sick, and so I went to a tram stop and I went home and thus I did not experience the worst things that happened on Národní Street, because at that time I was already at home.”
“This poem was lost, they confiscated it from me at that time and I have never seen it again. The name of Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev was not mentioned there, but it was quite obvious. It was basically a kind of reflection on the reactions of those schoolmates and many people around me. It was nothing eloquent: ‘A dictator died, crowds rejoiced, how big will be his photo in tomorrow’s papers?’ Basically, you could say the poems were innocent things like this. But at that time, it was enough for being sent to prison.”
“I was looking for some people who shared the same views, or I desired them. I wanted to sign Charter 77 for a long time after I had learnt that it had not ceased and that it was still alive. But I did not know anybody, I absolutely did not know anybody from that environment. Only after my first prison term I somehow... Or it was in some tavern and there was Miroslav Hájek, he is no longer alive, his nickname was Míra Nemíra, and he knew many families of Charter 77 signatories, and especially Václav Benda and his family. Somebody told him that I had been imprisoned for my poems. We started talking and he, I think, brought up the topic of Charter 77. I told him: ‘I would like to sign it so much, but I don’t know where.’ At that time he introduced me to Václav Benda, and I signed Charter 77 in his home. We were thinking about it, because my trial was being reopened at that time, and I did not want to wait and I simply signed it. In 1985 I was sentenced for the second time. Then I got to know other prominent people. At that time, they were figures of immense authority for me: Ing. Petr Uhl, Anna Šabatová, Petruška Šustrová, Dana Němcová, Václav Malý and later Václav Havel, of course, and many others. For me it was as if to step into some magical world.”
Lenka Marečková was born on June 3, 1963. She was imprisoned twice for recitation of her own poems at an authors’ poetry reading in Písek in 1982. She was nineteen years old during her first prison term. Lenka was arrested several times on various occasions, and she initiated and participated in the publication of an independent ecological Bulletin and in 1988 she established the Independent Ecological Society. She signed the declaration of Charter 77 in 1984. She took part in activities of many independent movements, including the Independent Peace Association and especially the editorial committee of VONS (the Committee for the Defense of the Unjustly Prosecuted), which was meeting in her home for about three years. She assisted in publication of many samizdat works and she kept an archive of Information on Charter 77 in her home. In her profession she deals with the issues of prisons, criminal law and human rights. At present she collaborates with the Václav Havel Library and she focuses on spirituality.
