Václav Táborský
* 1928 †︎ 2025
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"We had a few classmates who were not doing well. I remember one was the son of a railwayman. His name was Mach, he was a little boy and he never brought anything to eat with him, so I would sometimes share a snack with him. But it was Dejvice otherwise, so there were well-to-do families there. Most of my classmates who went to high school with me later were the sons of doctors, lawyers and civil servants."
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"We lived just five doors down from Vítězné Square in Dejvice, now called the Roundabout, I witnessed the fateful events of 1938 and 1939. In late September 1938, when the Munich Agreement was either imminent or done, the square was filled with crowds, just full. People were unhappy with both the president's and the government's decisions, and they were shouting, 'Give us guns, we've paid taxes for them!' They were also shouting and chanting, 'We want a military dictatorship!' They weren't satisfied with the decision that President Beneš and the government had made, and they wanted General Syrový to be in charge and they hoped to fight. All the people in that square hoped to fight."
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"We used to walk past the barracks and there were German soldiers in there, not behind bars but just separated. They called out to us, and since we mostly spoke German, learning German in school, we talked to them. They thought they could buy something, like ham or whipped cream cakes. They gave us money and asked us to go and buy it for them, and it was a great novelty for us. We ran around, we spoke German, and we brought them 150 grams of ham or head cheese, or three chocolate cakes or whipped cream cakes, and things like that. In the evening we told our parents and they immediately said, 'You morons, what were you thinking? They're the enemy!' So the next day those poor hungry soldiers, who probably didn't have a lot of whipped cream cakes and ham in Germany before they came to us, were left alone."
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Full recordings
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Toronto, 26.11.2023
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We had guns and we were hungry. Then I went to make movies
Václav Táborský, né Václav Špringl, was born in Prague on 28 September 1928. His father Václav Špringl was a legionnaire who brought his Jewish wife Alla Arkadievna Girškovič from Russian Siberia. The witness grew up in Dejvice in a military environment, with his father reaching the major rank. As a child, he was acutely aware of political developments, disagreed with the 1938 surrender, and experienced the Prague Uprising and direct threats to his life during the war. After the war, he studied film directing at FAMU (1947-1952) and worked with the Documentary Film Studio. He made over 80 documentaries and won the Golden Lion Award at the Venice IFF with two of them. He emigrated to Canada in 1968, where he worked for the National Film Board and co-founded film schools. He taught at the Universities of Ottawa and Toronto and was a major influence on the teaching of filmmaking in Canada. He wrote three autobiographical books and remained an active filmmaker until his death in 2025. He founded the Dagmar and Václav Táborský Foundation to support talented FAMU students.