The Havel Festival : Timeline : The Velvet Revolution, 1989

Celebrating the life and art of Václav Havel
New York City, October through December 2006

Timeline: The Velvet Revolution, 1989

Go back to
Life as a dissident playwright
1969 – 1988

Go forward to
The Presidency and beyond
1990 – 2006


	1989
		Havel is jailed for four months. Protests increase throughout Prague. The Velvet Revolution is about to begin.
	November 17
		A peaceful student demonstration is violently disrupted by the police.
	November 19
		Havel forms the Civic Forum, a revolutionary organization open to all who wish to join it.
	November 21
		Prime Minister Adamec meets with the Civic Forum, though he refuses entrance to Havel.
	November 22
		Havel addresses a crowd of 20,000 from a balcony over Wencelas Square. The Civic Forum chooses a theater called Laterna Magika as its headquarters.
	November 26
		Prime Minister Adamec meets with Havel, then appears with Havel and former Czech leader Alexander Dubcek in front of an audience of one million at Letna Plain. Adamec is booed and hissed, until he is forced to retreat.
	December 3
		Havel requests a larger headquarters for the Civic Forum. They move to the building of Czechoslovak-Soviet Friendship on Wenceslas Square.
	December 7
		Adamec resigns as Prime Minister.
	December 10
		The Civic Forum nominates Havel as president. Havel is reluctant.
	December 16
		Havel appears on television and announces he would accept the presidency, but only until free elections can be held.
	December 20
		Disturbing the Peace, a book which records an extended conversation between Havel and Karel Hvizdala (a Czech journalist living in Bonn, Germany), is released. The publisher, Melantrich, has put together and released the book in an unprecedented ten days.
	December 29
		Havel is unanimously elected President of Czechoslovakia by the parliament.

Go back to
Life as a dissident playwright
1969 – 1988

Go forward to
The Presidency and beyond
1990 – 2006

Václav Havel. Photo by Alan Pajer.

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