Belarusian Writers Honour the Memory of Compatriots in Prague on Dziady — Photo Report
Reform.news Editorial Team · 1 November 2026, 18:54
https://reform.news/en/belarusian-writers-honour-the-memory-of-compatriots-in-prague-on-dziady-photo-report/The festival of contemporary Belarusian culture, “Pradmova”, is underway in the Czech capital. On Dziady, the day of remembrance of ancestors, Belarusian writers, publishers and representatives of the local Belarusian community visited Olšany Cemetery and the New Jewish Cemetery in Prague to lay flowers and light memorial candles.
Poet and translator Andrej Khadanovich and poet and chair of Belarusian PEN Taciana Niadbaj shared photographs and the brief caption “In Search of Their Own” on their social media accounts.
The Prague Dziady route included the final resting places of prominent compatriots and figures of the Belarusian Democratic Republic.
Piotr Krecheuski — Chairman of the Council of the Belarusian Democratic Republic (1919–1928). It was he who, in 1921, secured the relocation of the BDR government’s headquarters to Prague, making the Czech capital the main centre of Belarusian political emigration.
Vasil Zakharka — Chairman of the BDR Council (1928–1943), and his wife, Pelahia. He devoted his life to preserving the BDR state archive and continuing the work of Belarusian institutions in Western Europe.
Mikhal Zabejda — an outstanding Belarusian opera singer and teacher from the Hrodna region. Zabejda sang in 16 languages and brilliantly performed internationally renowned arias, including the Neapolitan song “Dicitencello vuje” and arias from the operas “Rigoletto”, “La Traviata” and “Eugene Onegin”. At the same time, he always included a condition in all his contracts and programmes: the second part of the concert had to consist exclusively of Belarusian songs.
The writers also visited the New Jewish Cemetery and the grave of world-renowned literary classic Franz Kafka — author of the celebrated novels “The Trial”, “The Castle”, “America” and other works.
The memory of those who preserved an independent Belarus and respect for the world’s literary heritage came together on a single Prague Dziady route.