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Did Milan Kundera Tattle on an Anti-Communist Spy?

  • 10/14/08 at 12:03 PM
Did Milan Kundera Tattle on an Anti-Communist Spy?

Photo: Getty Images

Maybe! According to the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes, in 1950, The Unbearable Lightness of Being author, Milan Kundera, informed on a guest in a Czechoslovakian student dormitory where he lived when he was 21 years old. The guest, Miroslav Dvoracek, was apparently an American-backed anti-Communist spy; he was arrested and served fourteen years in prison, including a stint of hard labor in a uranium mine. Kundera was a member of the Communist party in his youth, but he's been a critic of totalitarianism since the Soviets invaded Czechoslovakia in 1968. In a statement, Kundera said, "I object in the strongest manner to these accusations, which are pure lies" and claims the media is attempting "the assassination of an author." Also, in Kundera's defense, Dvoracek doesn't sound like he was a very good spy.

Report Says Acclaimed Czech Writer Informed on a Supposed Spy [NYT]

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