Věra Fischerová

* 1916

  • “There were not many of us, about ten. I remember that the Pope was short and that he was sitting in a golden armchair. It was right in the Vatican. He granted us absolution and he spoke about something. Daddy understood him, because he had studied a grammar school, where Italian was taught as well, and he could thus understand all languages.”

  • “He told the communists: ´I will not draw for you.´ He grabbed his hat and ´good-bye,´ and off he went. They said: ´What do you mean you will not? Neprakta, Nesvadba, and others are drawing, and you are not? We also know that you make illustrations for French newspapers.´ But he left and he went to work in the soft drink factory. Well, we do hate them…”

  • “The Americans arrived, some of them had to know him from the war, they saw the paintings, and the Fast Arrows, they were looking at all of this and telling him: ´Man, leave it all here and come with us, we’ll give you a villa, just take your three kids and leave it all here, the country will go to hell.´ The Americans already knew it.”

  • “He was there on some errands (in the Mladý Hlasatel (Young Herald) magazine or in the Melantrich publishing house) and he met my husband and asked him: ´Listen, wouldn’t you like to do some illustrations? I’m now working on something for boys. It’s called Rychlé šípy (Fast Arrows).´ He replied: ´Well, I’ll try.´ But he was not too keen on that, because the work was paid very badly. But he told him: ´All right, I’ll try it.´ He created one page, then another, and it eventually spread like that.”

  • “They didn’t catch him, but they followed him on the Wenceslas Square. He didn’t drive a car. He was walking over the Wenceslas Square and he sensed that they were after him, he could see it. All of a sudden, somebody whispered to him: ´Run down by the National Theatre, and escape through those lanes there.´ Just imagine it, my husband did it and it saved his life. The other three men were shot and he would have been shot as well.”

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    Praha, 10.06.2014

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I have never again met anyone like him

With her daughter (1959-1960)
With her daughter (1959-1960)
zdroj: Soukromý archiv pamětnice

Věra Fischerová was born December 24, 1916 in Vienna. Her father Karel Pražák was an officer in the Austro-Hungarian army and he was teaching at the military academy during the First World War. After the establishment of Czechoslovakia the family moved to Prague where her father continued in his military career. Věra studied at the State Industrial School and found a job as a seamstress in the fashion studio Fenclová in Prague on the Národní Street. She got acquainted with Jan Fischer and they married in 1936. Three children were born after their wedding. The family lived in Prague-Motol and Jan Fischer worked as a newspaper and book illustrator and he was also producing his own paintings and graphic designs. During WWII he joined the anti-Nazi resistance movement and it was only by a miracle that he evaded arrest. Her father took part in protests against the rising communist regime after the liberation and he was imprisoned for one year after 1948. The family lost their apartment house in Hřebenky in Prague, a house whose past tenants included, among others, the writer Karel Poláček. Jan Fischer refused to work for the communist press and subsequently he was dismissed from the Union of Visual Artists and he lost all opportunities for publishing. After some time he found a job in a soft drink factory and later in the marketing department of the Meopta company. He died prematurely of meningitis in 1960. Věra Fischerová did not remarry after his death and she returned to her seamstress‘ profession. She now lives in a retirement home in Prague.