The worst thing about copying was having to replace eleven carbon papers after each page
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Lubor Maťa was born on 29 January 1960 in Ústí nad Labem to parents Karel and Anna, née Roubíčková. Before entering primary school they moved to Karviná, after another five years to Liberec. He experienced the occupation of Czechoslovakia by the Warsaw Pact troops at his grandparents’ home in Česká Třebová. He studied at the grammar school in Frýdlant, gradually getting acquainted with the unofficial Czech music scene. In 1978, his father Karel Mata was wrongly accused of stealing socialist property and State Security (StB) searched their home. They found the text of Charter 77, but no one was charged. In 1979, Lubor Maťa began studying at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering of the Czech Technical University (ČVUT), completing only two years. He began working at the student halls of residence in Strahov, and was employed in the boiler room until 1991. His friends introduced him to underground culture and publishing samizdat. He participated in the distribution of banned books by Czech and international authors, but State Security never found out about his activities. In 1987, he entered compulsory military service in Louny, which he made easier for himself by running a film club. In the spring of 1989 he returned to Prague and on 17 November he was among the participants in a permitted demonstration on Národní Street, which was brutally dispersed by the security forces. He helped spread information about the revolutionary events in the Civic Forum centre. After the change of regime, he sold newspapers and books and founded a book distribution company, which became the Kosmas wholesale in 1999. The first book was published by Mata in 1993. He founded the Green Tulip music festival in Řevnice and co-organised the Magorovo Vydří event. He collaborated with many personalities of the music underground on the publication of their books. In 2024 Lubor Maťa was living in Prague.
