František Listopad – Tristan čili zrada vzdělance [Tristan, or the Betrayal of the Intellectual]. 1954. Frontispiece by Toyen

Listopad, František. Tristan čili zrada vzdělance [Tristan, or the Betrayal of the Intellectual]. Vienna: Bohemica Viennensia, 1954. 4to. 29 × 21 cm. 22 single-sided mimeographed pages. Original illustrated wrappers. Frontispiece illustration by Toyen. Preface by Jiří Pistorius. First edition of Listopad's literary debut in exile, published in Vienna in 1954 as the second volume of the series Bohemica Viennensia. The work, subsequently translated into eight languages and awarded a literary prize, reinterprets the medieval legend of Tristan and Isolde, exploring themes of love, betrayal, mortality, freedom, and intellectual responsibility. The subtitle, The Betrayal of the Intellectual, invites a reading of the work in relation to Listopad's own experience of political disillusionment and exile following the Communist takeover of Czechoslovakia in February 1948. František Listopad (1921–2017), born Jiří Synek, was a Czech poet, writer, journalist, and theatre director. During the Nazi occupation he participated in the Czech resistance, and after the war helped establish the newspaper Mladá fronta. Working in Paris at the time of the Communist takeover, he refused to return to Czechoslovakia and remained in exile. He later settled in Portugal, where he became a prominent figure in literary and theatrical life under the name Jorge Listopad. The preface was written by Jiří Pistorius (1922–2014), a Czech literary critic and former assistant to Václav Černý who, like Listopad, went into exile following the Communist takeover. Pistorius subsequently became a professor of French literature at Williams College in Massachusetts. Includes a frontispiece by Toyen who settled in Paris in 1947. The contributions of Listopad, Pistorius, and Toyen place the publication within the cultural and intellectual networks of Czech exiles during the early Cold War. VG condition.