Title: PRAG AUGUSTI 1968
Photographer(s): Sune Jonsson
Writer(s): Sune Jonsson
Designer(s):
Publisher(s): LTs förlag, Stockholm, Sweden
Year: 1968
Print run:
Language(s): Swedish
Pages: 88
Size: 18 x 22 cm
Binding: Softcover
Edition:
Print: Printed by Centraltryckeriet, Borås, Sweden
Nation(s) and year(s) of Protest: Republic of Czech, 1968
ISBN:
Sune Jonsson, known as landscaper photographer, by pure coincidence was in Prague , with the journalist Dag Lindberg, for a Swedish magazine, during the dramatic days in which the Soviet troops crushed the popular uprising in August 1968.
1968 was the summer of enthusiasm in Prague, censorship was eliminated and the broadcasting media could freely report on Alexander Dubçek’s peaceful revolution.
But Monday 21st August 1968 troops from the Warsaw Pact poured into the Czechoslovakian capital to reinstall the pre-Prague Spring order.
People in Prague first reacted with alarm and later with fury. But after only a few days the spontaneous acts of violence were gradually replaced by a conscious, disciplined and effective civil resistance. This had a strongly demoralizing effect on the intruders and aroused admiration among advocates of non violence all over the free world.
The most famous report on Prague 1968 is by Josef Koudelka, (which we will talk about more in another post of his book -Invasion 68:Prague-), a report that wasn't published with Koudelka's name but with "P P" - Prague Photographer.
Differently, since swedish photographer, Jonsson published this book quite immediately when got back in Sweden with a link to Koudelka, in fact in the 4 th pictures above we see Koudelka with his camera taking photo. He was only a few meters from this famous Russian tank and the Czech photographer Josef Koudelka.