"I Am Proud That We Are Facing Our Past"

Brno writer Kateřina Tučková speaks about half-forgotten stories of Brno, the power of art and the need to admit mistakes.

Where do you think Brno's identity lies, what does it consists of?
I see the difference between the identity of Brno as a city and the identity Brno residents. If you ask about the former, then the character of the city was probably mostly shaped by the cohabitation of its Czech, German and Jewish residents. These people built the city to become a strong industrial and cultural centre with solid ties to Vienna. If you ask for the identity of a Brno resident, then a more important role is probably played by your personal experience. The understanding of the city as a crossroads of nationalities, religions and different cultures perhaps worked with people born until the mid-20th century, but I do not think it is so for those who were born after the war. The concealment or marginalization of German and Jewish influences on the character of the city made two post-war generations experience it a different way than I, who grew up after the revolution and witnessed the opening of formerly tabooed issues.

The history of Brno is also inseparably linked with the textile industry; it was the subject of an exhibition Brno – Moravian Manchester, in which you were also involved.
This part of Brno's history shows well the different perception of the city's identity. People born after the war had little information about it, as it was overshadowed by propaganda exaggerating the achievements of socialist economy in Vlněna and Mosilana factories. Few people at that time wondered about who had built the factories, equipped them with machinery, built tenement houses for the workers, founded schools and hospitals, and built villas, which the town boasted. Only after the revolution we were able to read that the building of the Applied Arts Palace (Uměleckoprůmyslový palác) in Husova Street had been erected by the textile entrepreneurs Offermanns to serve the education and entertainment of the people of Brno.

The plot of your novel The Expulsion Of Gerta Schnirch also takes place in Brno. What prompted you to write a story that reflects wild expulsions from Brno?
The fact that I moved to a locations where you can still see the uprooting caused by several changes of the population – nowadays, Bratislavská Street and its surroundings are a socially exclude area that hardly anyone calls otherwise than "the ghetto". This place, thanks to its history, resembles a Sudetenland in Brno. This made me research the past of this location and, and there I found the story of Gerta.

What is your personal relationship to the described events? Are they related to the story of your family?
That might seem self-understood, yet it is not so, as I have no German ancestry. Rather, I was motivated by an unpleasant surprise: on a housefront in Bratislavská Street that I passed by every day, there is still an inscription saying Mährische Spiegelindustrie. Despite that, no-one ever spoke about the German residents of Brno. Why? Where are they? And because in the early 1990s the wild expulsions were still not taught about, I learned about this horrid reality myself.

Does the main character have a real prototype, or what were your sources when writing your novel?
Gerta is a fictional character, although the Schnirch family did live in Brno. But I built on two life stories – one of the survivors who was not afraid to share her memories, and letters of another woman, who after the expulsion got stuck on seasonal work in South Moravian villages. However, these stories I combined together, are model ones – in similar variations they happened to a number of women affected by the expulsion. This is eloquently described in the book of testimonies of the expelled Brno residents Němci ven! Die Deutschen raus! ("Germans out!")

What reactions to the book did you expect, and what was the actual response to it?
Even when I collected the materials, I knew that this theme evoked strong controversy. It resulted from interviews with survivors, who often did not want to share their memories, because not only they went through the trauma of the expulsion, but continued to be stigmatized because of their origin, which passed on to the following generation as well. Later I was also exposed to a lot of insults during the readings. Indeed, a purposely black and white interpretation can still stir a wave of emotions – we experienced this during the last presidential election. But luckily, my generation is already able of self-reflection. Admitting mistakes is no longer so painful for us, on the contrary, we perceive it as necessary and cathartic. I speak in plural because I feel that in this context of Brno, a "need for catharsis" was felt by more people – it began with a request for apology by the Youth for Intercultural Understanding in 2001 and continued with a wave of artistic works such as plays by Miroslav Bambůšek, my own play Gerta or the play Be Free! in the Feste Theatre. I think we all felt that this taboo of "the problem with Germans in Brno" had to be let out and resolved. The art in this case had the power to prepare the soil for a substantial social gesture, such as this year's Year of Reconciliation. I am very moved to see that this is happening, and also proud that finally we are able to face our own past.

The theatrical adaptation of your novel is staged now in the HaDivadlo. How did the stage production of your book emerge?
I have not interfered too much with the stage production of my novel. All the credits go to Marian Amsler, who dramatized the story and directed the performance, and of course to the actors, who made it happen. The concept of a circular stage is an excellent idea and I really do like the performance. I am glad that similar opinions have been expressed by reviewers and audiences. It relatively rarely happens that way.

Will you continue to draw inspiration from our modern history? What are you working on right now?
Yes, in my current work I am building on a theme, which is rooted in our recent past and still echoes today. But before I finish the book, I'd rather not talk about it.

Kateřina Tučková
was born in Brno in 1980. She graduated in Czech Studies and Art History and works as an independent curator within her own project ARSkontakt; to the general public, however, she is mostly known as the author of widely acclaimed novels The Expulsion Of Gerta Schnirch (2009) and Goddesses from Žítková (2012).

More on www.katerina-tuckova.cz  
photo: www.vojtechvlk.com