Jan Skácel

Who was Jan Skácel?

Jan Skácel was a Czech poet of Moravian origin, widely acclaimed as one of the best poets who had been writing in Czech.

He often juxtaposed the fear stoked by the communist regime in Czechoslovakia and the highly free syntax of Czech language. His poems are closely connected to the traditions and the nature of the region he lived in, Southern Moravia.

His poems were mentioned in the book Ignorance written by Milan Kundera.

Skácel was the editor of Host do domu, an important literary magazine between 1963 and 1969. He was awarded the German international literary Petrarca-Preis in 1989.

When in 1996 she won the Georg-Büchner Prize for literature, the German poet Sarah Kirsch named Skácel as a major influence. []