I was born on 14th February 1943 in London. My father was a Czech diplomat, at the time of the Nazi invasion of Czechoslovakia he was posted in Tirana (Albania) and, understandably, had decided against going back to Prague. Instead, with my mother they had found their way to Greece, then to Southern France and finally to England. My father entered the army and with the Allied Forces he fought in Northern Africa before, ranked a Major, he was sent as the leader of a regiment of paratroopers to aid Tito’s partisans in Serbia.

By the end of the war I was already around, we came to Prague and some time later went to Belgrade, where my father was named a trade attache at the Czechoslovak Embassy. That was in 1947-48, and amongst the children of the staff who were my playmates, was also the Ambassador’s daughter, Marie Korbel. I was too young to remember, and I doubt that Madelaine Albright (as probably the most powerful woman in the world is now known) would remember me either. After that my father was named the Consular General in Berlin, so we had moved to Germany and stayed there until his sudden death in 1950.

With my mother we came back to Prague, and moved several more times as I grew up and went to school. I finished my schooling in 1960 with matriculation, and wanted to go on to the University, but was denied the entry. The fact that my father had once fought with the Allied Forces was enough to disqualify me (it would have ended my father’s career too, had he lived). Under the rules of the hard-line Communist regime I was a person never to be trusted. I did not mind much at the time, as I was madly in love with the theatre. I acted and sung my way through the ensuing two years of compulsory army service, and continued as an entertainer afterwards. A few years later however I had made another attempt to enter the University, to study operatic singing. I was already a private student of one of the professors, who urged me to shave off my beard before the forthcoming auditions. I ignored her warnings only to my peril. The man who chaired the selection committee had not gained his position through any great artistic endeavours, but rather by his willingness to follow the party line. My performance was well received by the rest of the committee members, but the chairman had vetoed me, declaring that “beatnics with beards were unwanted elements at the Prague Academy”!

These turned out to be the prophetic words, as I was soon to prove him right by becoming one of the band of undesirables, who had attempted to found an opposition party to the Communists during the Dubcek’s era, which was to end with the Soviet invasion and occupation of the country. I had made up my mind there and then: I was going to keep my beard, but would say goodbye to the totalitarians! With my status as a “British born” I had no problems moving to London, where I had tried to continue my singing career, appearing in a few minor operatic productions. It did not lead to any major breakthroughs however, other than signing the marriage contract with another Czech refugee Dagmar, whom I had invited to one of the performances.
The bedsitters in London were cold, so we had decided to migrate to Australia and start a new life here. We came to Brisbane in March 1973 and have now been living here for more than 25 years. I had buried my singing ambitions and eventually took up painting as a means of making a living. In the more recent years I have also been active as a writer and a translator.

I still wear that same beard. I am convinced that the most important decision I had ever made in my entire life was the one not to shave it off my face, on the eve of that memorable audition. Had it been otherwise, I would have almost certainly been accepted to the University, and would have probably carved up some sort of a career as a singer or a teacher, in any case a conformist, behind the now defunct Iron Curtain. Do I ever regret it?
Never!

Voyen Koreis, Brisbane, Australia

Autoportrait - The Eternal Pilgrim




back to Main Page