55 20th century Czech dramatists and playwrights

Ludvík Aškenazy was a Czech writer and journalist. He was born into a Jewish family in Stanislawow, then part of the Second Republic of Poland, now present-day Ivano-Frankivsk, Ukraine.

Božena Benešová, née Zapletalová, was a Czech author and poet whose work is considered to have been at the forefront of psychological prose. The greater part of her youth was spent in Uherské Hradiště and Napajedla, where in 1896 she married a railway clerk named Josef Beneš. In 1908 she and her husband moved to Prague.

Egon Bondy, born Zbyněk Fišer, was a Czech philosopher, writer, and poet, one of the leading personalities of the Prague underground.

Jan Bor, real name Jan Jaroslav Strejček was a Czech director and playwright. He was a pupil of Max Reinhardt. His drama became the basis of Jiří Pauer's libretto for the opera Zuzana Vojířová (1958).

Emil František Burian was a Czech poet, journalist, singer, actor, musician, composer, dramatic adviser, playwright and director. He was also active in Communist Party of Czechoslovakia politics.

The Brothers Čapek were Josef and Karel Čapek, Czech writers who sometimes wrote together. They are commemorated both for their literary/artistic works and political activism against oppressive government. Their house is now a cultural monument of the Czech Republic, and there are various memorials to them. Their most famous work is the play Pictures from the Insects' Life, a humorous political allegory.

Karel Čapek was a Czech writer, playwright and critic. He has become best known for his science fiction, including his novel War with the Newts (1936) and play R.U.R., which introduced the word robot. He also wrote many politically charged works dealing with the social turmoil of his time. Influenced by American pragmatic liberalism, he campaigned in favor of free expression and strongly opposed the rise of both fascism and communism in Europe.

Radka Denemarková is a Czech novelist, dramatist, TV screenplay writer, translator, essayist.

Jan Drda was a Czech journalist, politician, playwright, screenwriter and author of modern fairytales. He was the Czech State Prize Laureate in 1949 and 1953, and was a nominated again for the same prize in 1965.

Jaroslav Durych was a Czech prose writer, poet, playwright, journalist, and military surgeon.

Viktor Dyk was a nationalist Czech poet, prose writer, playwright, politician and political writer. He was sent to jail during the First World War for opposing the Austro-Hungarian empire. He was one of the signatories of the Manifesto of Czech writers. Dyk co-founded a political party and entered politics. He died at age 53, leaving his many poems, plays and writings.

Otokar Fischer was a Czech translator, playwright, poet and critic.

Arnošt Goldflam is a Czech playwright, writer, director, screenwriter, and actor. He appeared in more than thirty films between 1986 and 2011.

Karel Hašler was a Czech songwriter, actor, lyricist, film and theatre director, composer, writer, dramatist, screenwriter and cabaretier. He was murdered in the Mauthausen concentration camp.

Václav Havel was a Czech statesman, writer and former dissident, who served as the last President of Czechoslovakia from 1989 until the dissolution of Czechoslovakia in 1992 and then as the first President of the Czech Republic from 1993 to 2003. As a writer of Czech literature, he is known for his plays, essays, and memoirs.

Jaroslav Hilbert was a Czech dramatist and writer. His most famous works include Guilt (1896), the Pariahs (1900), Falkenstein (1903), and Nest in the storm (1919).

František Hrubín was a Czech poet and writer. He was a lifetime member of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia.

Eva Hudečková is Czech actress, playwright and writer.

Ilja Hurník was a Czech composer and essayist.

Alois Jirásek was a Czech writer, author of historical novels and plays. Jirásek was a high school history teacher in Litomyšl and later in Prague until his retirement in 1909. He wrote a series of historical novels imbued with faith in his nation and in progress toward freedom and justice. He was close to many important Czech personalities like M.Aleš, J.V. Sládek, K.V. Rais or Z.J. Nejedlý. He attended an art club in Union Cafe with them. He worked as a redactor in Zvon magazine and was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1918, 1919, 1921 and 1930.

Ivan Klíma is a Czech novelist and playwright. He has received the Magnesia Litera award and the Franz Kafka Prize, among other honors.

Pavel Kohout is a Czech and Austrian novelist, playwright, and poet. He was a member of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, a Prague Spring participant and dissident in the 1970s until he was not allowed to return from Austria. He was a founding member of the Charter 77 movement.

Jiří Kolář Czech pronunciation (help·info) was a Czech poet, writer, painter and translator. His work included both literary and visual art.

Paul Kornfeld was a Prague-born German-language Jewish writer whose expressionist plays and scholarly treatises on the theory of drama earned him a specialized niche in influencing contemporary intellectual discourse.

Ludvík Kundera was a Czech writer, translator, poet, playwright, editor and literary historian. He was a notable exponent of the Czech avant-garde literature and a prolific translator of German authors. In 2007, he received the Medal of Merit for service to the Republic. In 2009, he was awarded the Jaroslav Seifert Award, presented by the Charter 77 Foundation. Kundera was a cousin of Czech-French writer Milan Kundera and nephew of the pianist and musicologist also named Ludvík Kundera.

Milan Kundera is a Czech writer who went into exile in France in 1975, becoming a naturalised French citizen in 1981. Kundera's Czechoslovak citizenship was revoked in 1979. He was given a Czech citizenship in 2019. He "sees himself as a French writer and insists his work should be studied as French literature and classified as such in book stores".

Jaroslav Kvapil was a Czech poet, theatre director, translator, playwright, and librettist. From 1900 he was a director and Dramaturg at the National Theatre in Prague, where he introduced plays by Anton Chekhov, Henrik Ibsen and Maxim Gorky into the repertory. Later he was a director at the Vinohrady Theatre (1921–1928). He wrote six plays, but is today chiefly remembered as the librettist of Antonín Dvořák's Rusalka.

Pavel Landovský, nicknamed Lanďák, was a Czech actor, playwright, and director. He was a prominent dissident under the communist regime of former Czechoslovakia.

František Langer was a Czech-Jewish playwright, screenwriter, essayist, literary critic, publicist and military physician.

Miloš Macourek was a Czech poet, playwright, author and screenwriter.

Vítězslav Nezval was one of the most prolific avant-garde Czech writers in the first half of the twentieth century and a co-founder of the Surrealist movement in Czechoslovakia.

Jan Novák is a Czech-American writer, screenwriter and playwright. He writes in both Czech and English, frequently translating his work. He has received awards in both the United States and the Czech Republic. He has worked closely with such figures as Václav Havel and Miloš Forman.

Halina Pawlowská is a Czech playwright, short story writer, journalist and editor. She has worked as a screenwriter and show presenter for Czech television.

Eduard Petiška was a Czech poet, translator, playwright and novelist, the author of many books for children and young people, and a translator and theorist of children's literature. He wrote over ninety books, which were translated to dozens of languages.

Boleslav Polívka is a Czech film and theatre actor, mime, playwright and screenwriter. He has appeared in more than 40 films.

Gabriela Preissová, née Gabriela Sekerová, sometimes used pen name Matylda Dumontová, was a Czech writer and playwright. Her play Její pastorkyňa was the basis for the opera Jenůfa by Leoš Janáček, as well as a film by Miroslav Cikán. Her earlier opera The Beginning of a Romance was also based on one of her stories.

Antonín Přidal was a Czech translator from English, Spanish and French, and writer, journalist and university lecturer.

Václav Renč was a Czech poet, dramatist and translator. Like other Catholic ruralistic writers, his themes included God, traditions and the countryside.

Olga Scheinpflugová was a Czech actress and writer. She was a daughter of the writer, journalist and playwright Karel Scheinpflug. In 1935, she married the writer Karel Čapek.

Karol Efraim Sidon is a Czech rabbi, writer and playwright. He is the Chief Rabbi of the Czech Republic, and former Chief Rabbi of the city of Prague.

Jan Skopeček was a Czech actor and playwright.

Ladislav Smoček is a Czech writer, playwright and theater director.

Ladislav Smoljak was a Czech film and theater director, actor and screenwriter. He was born in Prague.

Fráňa Šrámek was a Czech anarchist, impressionist, and vitalist poet, novelist, and playwright.

Helena Štáchová was a Czech puppeteer, voice actress and playwright. Štáchová served as the head and director of the Spejbl and Hurvínek Theater (S+H), which opened in 1930 as the former Czechoslovakia's first professional puppet theater, from 1996 until her death in 2017. She also provided the voice of popular puppets, Manicka and Mrs. Katerina, who are the female equivalents of the Spejbl and Hurvínek puppet characters. In addition, Štáchová worked as a voice actress as well. Notably, Štáchová provided the Czech language-voice of Lisa Simpson on the Czech version of the American animated sitcom, The Simpsons.

Jiří Stránský was a Czech author, playwright, translator, screenwriter, twice a political prisoner of the communist regime, and human rights advocate. He was the grandson of Czechoslovak politician Jan Malypetr.

Jiří Suchý is a Czech film actor, writer and stage actor. He also writes music. Currently he is the owner of the theatre Semafor in Prague where he has performed for many years and which he helped to establish in 1959.

Zdeněk Svěrák is a Czech actor, humorist, playwright and scriptwriter, and one of the most well-known and popular Czech cultural personalities. Since 1968 he has appeared in 32 films.

Milan Uhde is a Czech playwright and politician. He is a member of the Civic Democratic Party.

Vladislav Vančura was an important Bohemian (Czech) writer active in the 20th century, who was killed by the Nazis. He was also active as a film director, playwright and screenwriter.

Jiří Voskovec, born Jiří Wachsmann and known in the United States as George Voskovec was a Czech actor, writer, dramatist, and director who became an American citizen in 1955. Throughout much of his career he was associated with actor and playwright Jan Werich. In the U.S., he is best known for his role as the 11th juror in the 1957 film 12 Angry Men.

Jaroslav Vrchlický was a Czech lyrical poet. He was nominated for the Nobel prize in literature eight times.

Jan Werich was a Czech actor, playwright and writer.

Jiří Wolker was a Czech poet, journalist and playwright. He was one of the founding members of KSČ - Communist Party of Czechoslovakia - in 1921.

Petr Zelenka is a Czech playwright and director of theatre and film. His films have been recognized at international festivals in Moscow and Rotterdam. In 2008, his film Karamazovi was the Czech Republic's official Oscar submission for Best Foreign Language Film.