Live from Hotel Josef: Saturday

Sit near Gate 70 where the flight is to board. Begin a conversation with a fellow sitting next to me and he is from Managua, Nicaragua. His name is Octaviano César and he is the Czech Honorary Consul General as well as the representative of the Czech company, Lom. His wife is introduced to me. We three have a stimulating conversation. People are beginning to boars for the flight. We discover we will be sitting on the same row. It is a low number so no need to rush. When finally we do elect to board, it is a shock to discover that our Prague flight gate has been changed. Gate 70 passengers are on their way to Munchen. We are at another gate. Needless to say, we rush to this gate and discover no one from Air France is present The Czech Air Lines plane is parked down below, still connected to us. So near yet so far. We ask various Air France staff for assistance. But all report the flight is closed and there is nothing that can be done. We are too late. Another fellow has also failed to make the flight. His name is David and he is from Chicago. None of us heard any announcement. David, in fact, checked his computer for flight information and learned that the flight had been delayed for 20 minutes.

We rush to an Air France desk. The next flight departs at 13.10. Both David and I need to go out to the booking desk and get new boarding passes. What a pain. Finally all is accomplished and we are ready for the next departure. Once again I am sitting on the same row with the couple from Nicaragua. Bizarre. But not as bizarre as some years ago when I sat next to a young couple from Budapest on a flight to Warsaw that was followed a year later on another flight from Budapest to Warsaw with the same young couple sitting next to me. There have been even more bizarre incidents like this. But now is not the time or place to relate them.

Smooth flight. Change 200 euros. Say farewell to Octaviano and his wife. Stand with David. Will our checked luggage arrive or not? Get a message from Michael March wondering what has happened to me. Give him a call and report missing the flight, that I am at Prague airport and will be coming to the Hotel Josef as soon as I can. Suggest to David that we share a taxi into Prague. To my pleasant surprise, my bag appears. David doesn't get his. He reports the missing bag to the Czech Airlines and they promise to deliver it later tonight to his hotel, the Intercontinental. It's a beautiful warm sunny day as our taxi makes its way to the two hotels. Give David the Chicago Tribune article and invite him to dine when he is next in Paris. Continue to the Ministry of Education hotel that is around the corner from the Hotel Josef. Tonight the Hotel Josef is full, but I can move there tomorrow morning. Leave my bag in my room and walk the short distance to Hotel Josef.    

Michael March welcomes me. After our warm embrace, he reports he is tired and needs a nap and some rest and suggests I get some as well. He leaves me with Guillaume Basset. He is from Lyon, is in Prague more or less by accident (because his girlfriend, Laure, got a job here teaching French and he followed her). He discovered Michael March and the Writers' Festival  Guillaume also obtained a teaching job and became involved with the Writers' Festival. He introduces me to another assistant, Helena Stingova. She rushes off to change clothes for tonight's welcome dinner in the Prague mayor's residance. Another woman comes up to speak with Guillaume and we are introduced. Her name is Sophie Pons and she is a correspondent with AFP.

I spot Margaret Atwood and get up to greet her. She and her husband, Graeme Gibson, just arrived from Toronto, She goes upstairs to rest a bit before tonight's dinner.

A woman approaches. It is Milena Findeis. She has been involved with the Hotel Josef since 2002, the year we were introduced. She apologizes that the hotel is full and I must stay elsewhere tonight. It is not a problem. She also tells me that Rudolf Ploberger, the proprietor of the Hotel Josef, sends his greetings and best wishes to me. I ask her to return my good wishes to him. I have come to love the Hotel Josef and to greatly appreciate the kindness of Rudolf Ploberger. I know that Michael March is grateful to him for allowing the Prague Writers' Festival to base its operations here and the fact that he extends hospitality to such a large number of writers. Milena and I talk about her life and about her son, Jan. She seems to be involved in journalism this year and will be interviewing a number of writers attending the festival for Kurier, an Austrian newspaper based in Vienna.

Michael McClure looms into view. I get up and tell him that he and I met in the mid-60s when his play, The Beard, was presented in the Royal Court Theatre in London. One evening Michael and Rip Torn read poetry in my Arts Laboratory in Drury Lane. He smiles

and says he remembers the evening with great pleasure. I am introduced to an attractive woman named Amy who I believe is his wife. They excuse themselves and go up to their room to get ready for tonight.

Mollye Miller, from Baltimore, who was one of the assistants last year, is once again involved with the festival. She says that both she and Hannah Brooks-Motl are hostesses for the writers' festival again this year. Hannah will be flying into Prague from Scotland tomorrow. Hannah, from Madison, Wisconsin, lived in Prague for almost four years. She spent the past year studying in St.Andrews University. (Also Vojtech "PJ" Brtnik is on the team again and will handle my blog material for the Prague Writers' Festival web site.)

Martin Belk, one of the people responsible for the publication One Magazine, is here from Edinburgh. I tell him I dined last night with Mary Folliet, Sheila Colvin and John Calder in the Terminus Nord in Paris and that they all send greetings to him. Martin introduces me to Geraldine Sweeney and Jonathan Pryce who also are involved with the magazine. He thanks me for the help and support I have given the magazine. I tell him that I read the new issue, that Mary Folliet gave us copies in Paris and that I found it to be better and better as it evolves. Because I am a Consultant to the Calcutta Film Festival, I found the article, '"Europe's New Faces" - the second annual New Europe Film Festival piece in the current issue extremely valuable. Martin says that he is pleased I like the magazine and that he will put me into contact with the Festival Director, Jan Naszewski

About 19.30, Michael March gathers a number of writers in the lobby of the Hotel Josef and leads us via a scenic route to the residence of the Mayor of Prague. I walk with Gunter Kunert and his wife, Erika. He and I discuss our obligations to past events. He feels the havoc Germany unleashed upon the world means he can never forget and that he must bare this like a heavy weight on his shoulders for the rest of his life. I suggest that if his grandfather kicked my grandfather in the ass, it has nothing to do with our present relations, that we must live in the present and forget the pain and injustices of the past He disagrees. He feels we can never forget

The hip mayor of Prague, Pavel Bém, is hosting a welcome dinner in his fabulous residence. It is an amazing building. See lots of faces I recognize including the  attractive Ambassador to the Czech Republic from Sweden, Catherine von Heidenstan. She gives me a warm smile and tells me that she is sorry not to have attended a Sunday dinner since our meeting last year. I tell her she has another year to make it. I see Larissa Vergou. She is visiting her mother. I also learn that Michael and Vlasta have created a literary award in honor of her father, Spyros Vergou. Roots in Time. The Spiros Vergos Prize for Literature will be awarded for the first time this year to Natalia Gorbanevskaya tomorrow night at the Theatre Minor. Larissa is here tonight with her mother. I remember meeting her mother last year, so go over and throw her some kisses. I tell Larissa that I miss her father, that he had a great spirit and that he contributed so much to the Prague Writers' Festival. It is so good of Michael and Vlasta to create this award in his honor.

Meet Michael's surgeon and we discuss medical practices in Britain, France and the Czech Republic. See the fellow who is the proprietor of the Big Ben Bookshop. His name is Miro Peraica and he introduces me to his lovely wife, Ana. He is with two assistants from the shop, Matt Murphy and Radana Stasna.

Rossano Maniscalchi and I meet once again. We first met at the Prague Writers' Festival in 2002. Then last year we crossed paths again and he reported he has just had a new   daughter. Now this daughter is walking around and enjoying the evening, looking absolutely breath-taking, a future heart-breaker.

Michael March introduces me to a group of people that includes the current Ambassador from Mexico, Jose Louis Bernal.

As we all know, there is no such thing as a "free lunch". Next we have the speeches that welcome the writers to this delightful event. It is a small price to pay. Vlasta Brtnikova gives a welcome in Czech that is translated into English. Michael March also thanks a number of people. The Mexican Ambassador relates how the events in Mexico and around the world in 1968 shaped contemporary Mexico for the better. Then we are encouraged to eat and to drink and to enjoy ourselves. The food is excellent, especially the duck. I thank the chefs.

Walk into the back room and find the dessert. Discover once again how pleasant these rooms are. I remember them from 2002 and last year. Sit with Margaret Atwood and Graeme Gibson and we enjoy the peace and fresh air. Draw them a map back to the Hotel Josef and cross my fingers that they will make it.

Join Martin Belk and his group. They introduce me to a woman named Susan Reynolds. She is with the National Library in Great Britain. I mention that I will be giving a talk the 24th of June at the National Library of Scotland. Susan mentions Jim Naughton and says that he will not be here with us now because he has been promoted and that he must over-see examinations at Oxford.

It is getting late. The five of us cuddle under two umbrellas as we make our way back to our hotels in a heavy falling rain. It has been a long day for most of us. I fall into bed and sleep

Jim Haynes

http://www.jim-haynes.com