The Wrong Side of the Iron Curtain? The English-Speaking Political Emigration to Czechoslovakia in the 1950s

Abstract

The paper analyzes the situation of English-speaking leftist-oriented persons who found themselves in Czechoslovakia in the 1950s. It focuses on short-term and long-term residents who worked for communist and communist-affiliated international organizations, and on political asylum seekers.

The paper touches on some aspects of the static everyday life problems and of the dynamic non-everyday experiences.

Keywords

• Czechoslovakia
• English-speaking residents
• international communism
• political asylum