born Oct. 5, 1936, Prague, Czech.
Czech playwright and dissident, first president of the Czech Republic (from 1993).
He worked in a Prague theatre from 1959 and became resident playwright by 1968. His plays, including The Memorandum (1965), are absurdist, satirical examinations of bureaucratic routines that explore the moral compromises made by those living under totalitarianism. They were banned by the communist authorities, and Havel was repeatedly arrested and imprisoned in the 1970s and '80s. During antigovernment demonstrations in 1989, he became the leading figure in the Civic Forum, a coalition of groups pressing for democratic reforms. The Communist Party capitulated (in the bloodless "Velvet Revolution") and formed a coalition government with the Civic Forum, and Havel was elected president in 1989. In 1993 he was elected president of the new Czech Republic.