Jiřina Tůmová-Schubertová, sekretářka československého PEN klubu. Životopisný portrét nenápadné ženy a velké kulturní diplomatky
Jiřina Tůmová-Schubertová, Secretary of the Czechoslovak PEN. A Biographical Study of an Inconspicuous Woman and Great Cultural Diplomat

Summary/Abstract: This biographical study focuses on the figure of the first Secretary of the Czechoslovak PEN Club, Jiřina Tůmová (1890–1968). Tůmová represents the continuity of this writers’ organization from its establishment until the mid-1960s. The author of the study historically contextualizes newly-discovered information about Tůmová’s life, discussing her acting career in her youth and her work for the Czechoslovak PEN Secretariat in the 1920s and 1930s as well as in the postwar period, when communist cultural policy threatened the existence of the Czechoslovak branch. One section also reviews in detail her participation in the anti-Nazi resistance, to which she contributed together with her husband, Vladimír Tůma, who was murdered by the Nazis in Pankrác Prison. The study documents how Tůmová was an important cultural diplomat and made an essential contribution to organizing the 16th Congress of the PEN International in Prague. The study is augmented by two annexes – a bibliography of Tůmová’s works, and her memoirs on the establishment of the Czechoslovak PEN, from the archival collection.

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