Czech-German cultural – In a series of candid conversations, Czech and German intellectuals examine the decline of independent publishing, the fragility of public broadcasting, and the weight of history in an era of digital noise.
The literary and political landscapes of Czechia and Germany are shifting. and a new collection of dialogues in the journal Osteuropa suggests that the transition is proving far from comfortable. By pairing Czech and German writers. scholars. and media professionals. the project reveals how two neighbors are grappling with the same eroding foundations—whether in the halls of independent publishing or the studios of public broadcasting.
For author Martin Vopěnka and editor Katharina Raabe, the modern book industry feels like a shrinking space. Both point to the consolidation of publishing houses. distributors. and bookstores into the hands of a few massive conglomerates as a primary culprit for the thinning of diverse literature. Raabe notes that while German literature has found new vitality through migrant voices and a shift toward autofictional storytelling. the rise of online platforms has simultaneously chipped away at the traditional critic’s authority. The data is sobering: in Germany. two-thirds of the population age ten and up did not buy a single book last year.
Yet, a sense of intimacy remains. Vopěnka finds hope in the resilience of printed books and the enduring power of children’s stories. In Czechia. he argues. social media has paradoxically strengthened a smaller linguistic market by bridging the gap between writers and their readers. For both, the act of reading requires a solitude that feels increasingly threatened in our digitally tethered lives.
This same tension bleeds into the public sphere. Television presenter Václav Moravec and Deutschlandradio director Stefan Raue see their industry at a crossroads. Czech broadcasting. in particular. faces a bleak cycle of government interference. oligarch ownership. and a race to the bottom to compete with private media. Both Germany and Czechia maintain public broadcasting through license fees to ensure independence. yet this model is under fire from right-wing parties in both nations. Moravec and Raue lament that the mandate to serve a broad public has morphed into a “bothsidesism” that often sacrifices objective truth. While Moravec sees this as a democratic failure. Raue clings to the possibility that AI-driven research and public content creation might eventually stabilize the media landscape.
History itself is being pulled into this volatile present. Historians Kamil Činátl and Ute Frevert disagree on how to handle the past: Činátl believes historians must actively diagnose the present to help people navigate crises. while Frevert argues that their true duty is to dismantle the illusion of novelty by uncovering patterns and precedents. Both scholars express concern over the emotional and commercial exploitation of memory. noting that national frameworks still too often suffocate global perspectives.
These concerns aren’t entirely new, a point underscored by the lives of Russian émigrés in 1920s Prague. Writer Ilma Rakusa and historian Ulrich Schmid reflect on the poet Marina Tsvetaeva and the linguist Roman Jakobson. both of whom found themselves navigating the borders of identity and politics long before the digital age. Tsvetaeva. who produced her finest work while living in poverty in Prague. eventually returned to the Soviet Union in 1939 and committed suicide at 49. Jakobson. meanwhile. bridged the divide between Russian formalism and the Prague school while maintaining a complicated. often criticized relationship with his Soviet citizenship until he finally reached the United States.
As these dialogues demonstrate, whether discussing the 1920s or the 2020s, the struggle to keep culture and truth independent of power remains a fragile, constant endeavor.
Czechia Germany Osteuropa literature public broadcasting culture history media publishing