Stirrings & Fears Among Czech Writers

Prague, July 15, 1968, seems different from before. While there are more shops and restaurants, more scaffoldings on the old houses in need of restoration, and more cars in the streets, these changes say little. In fact, their insignificance is what has given the major thrust to the developments of the last half year. No, the difference is in mood. There is a lightness, even gaiety in the air. Hopes are up, everything is tinged with promise.

One already intuits this at the border points. Perhaps it is in the customs officials who are giving so casual a salute. Or in an art historian, at the complex of Hradcany Castle, from where the Stalinists ruled so arbitrarily for two decades, talking with as much pleasure about the politics o...