Jára Cimrman - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Jára Cimrman or Jára da Cimrman (ˈjaːra da ˈtsɪmr̩man) is a Czech

Czech people

Czechs, or Czech people are a western Slavic people of Central Europe, living predominantly in the Czech Republic. Small populations of Czechs also live in Slovakia, Austria, the United States, the United Kingdom, Chile, Argentina, Canada, Germany, Russia and other countries...

fictional character created by Jiří Šebánek, Ladislav Smoljak

Ladislav Smoljak

Ladislav Smoljak was a Czech film and theater director, actor and screenwriter. He was born in Prague.Smoljak tried to study at an art academy but failed the admission process. He went on to study physics and mathematics, and later worked as journalist and scriptwriter...

and Zdeněk Svěrák

Zdenek Sverák

Zdeněk Svěrák is a Czech actor, humorist and scriptwriter. He is one of the most popular Czech cultural personalities. In 1989, he was a member of the jury at the 39th Berlin International Film Festival....

. He is presented as one of the greatest Czech playwrights, poets, composers, teachers, travellers, philosophers, inventors, detectives, mathematicians and sportsmen of the 19th and early 20th century. Playing the game on his real existence is part of his characterization.

Cimrman made its first appearance on a regular radio programme Nealkoholická vinárna U Pavouka ("The Spider Non-Alcoholic Wine Bar") on December 23, 1966. Although the character was originally meant to be just a caricature of the Czech people, history

History of the Czech lands

The history of the Czech lands includes the following periods:* Slavs: Bohemians and Moravians – arrival into Czech area during the 6th century * Samo’s realm * Moravian principality in Moravia* Great Moravia...

, and culture

Culture of the Czech Republic

This article is about the culture of the Czech Republic.-Festivities and traditions:Czech people celebrate Christmas every year, beginning with a dinner on 24 December. The tables for this dinner can only be set for an even number of guests, because an odd number will bring bad luck...

, he became an immensely popular character of modern Czech folklore, and an artificial national hero.

Cimrman is a major character or the putative author of a great number of books, plays, and films. The Jára Cimrman Theatre in Žižkov

Žižkov

Žižkov is a cadastral district of Prague, Czech Republic. Most of Žižkov lies in the municipal and administrative district of Prague 3, except for very small parts which are in Prague 8 and Prague 10. Prior to 1922, Žižkov was an independent city....

is one of Prague

Prague

Prague is the capital and largest city of the Czech Republic. Situated in the north-west of the country on the Vltava river, the city is home to about 1.3 million people, while its metropolitan area is estimated to have a population of over 2.3 million...

's most frequented theatrical houses.

Fictional biography

The huge popularity of the Jára Cimrman character has resulted in the compilation of a fairly detailed fictional biography by his admirers.

The precise dates of his birth and death have not been agreed upon. He is said to have been born in Vienna

Vienna

Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...

sometime between 1869 and 1874 to an Austria

Austria

Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...

n mother actress Marlen Jelinek (Jelínek is a surname of a Czech origin which, however, frequently appears in Austria, the word itself means a "small/young stag" in Czech) and a Czech father tailor Leopold Cimrman (Cimrman is a German surname Zimmermann written using the Czech orthography, which is an obvious allusion to the fact that many ethnic Czechs have German surnames, the word itself means "carpenter" in German). Jára Cimrman considered himself Czech, which can be understood from his note in his diary saying: "I would like to see my native country — Böhmen" (Böhmen being the German name for Bohemia

Bohemia

Bohemia is a historical region in central Europe, occupying the western two-thirds of the traditional Czech Lands. It is located in the contemporary Czech Republic with its capital in Prague...

, Čechy in Czech). He was last seen in Liptákov, in the Jizera Mountains

Jizera Mountains

Jizera Mountains , or Izera Mountains, are part of the Western Sudetes on the border between the Czech Republic and Poland. The major part is formed from granite, with some areas formed from basalt. The mountains got their name from the Jizera River, which rises at the southern base of Smrk...

of North Bohemia

North Bohemia

North Bohemia , is a region in the north of the Czech Republic.- Location :North Bohemia roughly covers the present-day NUTS regional unit of CZ04 Severozápad and the western part of CZ05 Severovýchod....

, in 1914.

Cimrman had little recognition during his lifetime. He himself stated in a poem ("Ážmilid"): "From some I have met with ridicule and from others I have mostly also met with ridicule" ("U jedněch setkával jsem se s výsměchem a u druhých většinou také s výsměchem"). Mankind only became acquainted with his genius following the discovery of a chest with his belongings by Dr. Evžen Hedvábný (pseudonym of jazz musician Karel Velebný

Karel Velebný

Karel Velebný was a Czech jazz musician, composer, arranger, actor, writer and music pedagogue. Velebný was one of the founders and pioneers of modern Czech jazz in the second half of the 20th century.-Biography:...

) in Liptákov) on February 26, 1966.

Czechs, their mentality and their hero

For many Czechs, Jára Cimrman is not only one of many ordinary funny characters. His status in Czech culture is much deeper and complex than it may seem at the first sight, especially for a foreigner. In the view of Czechs, the whole history of the Czech nation represents a struggle with expansive attempts of bigger nations who have always tried to dominate the Central European region

Central Europe

Central Europe or alternatively Middle Europe is a region of the European continent lying between the variously defined areas of Eastern and Western Europe...

and who have considered it their "sphere of interest".

No matter in which situation, Cimrman is always depicted as a determined fighter against the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, despite the fact that his very name and origin themselves reflect the ethnically mixed nature of the Czech (and Austrian) population. This symbolizes not only a silent resistance of the Czech people against the Soviet occupation but against any form of oppression which have often taken place in the Czech lands

Czech lands

Czech lands is an auxiliary term used mainly to describe the combination of Bohemia, Moravia and Czech Silesia. Today, those three historic provinces compose the Czech Republic. The Czech lands had been settled by the Celts , then later by various Germanic tribes until the beginning of 7th...

.

Over centuries of military occupations and autocracies, the Czechs developed a mentality which allowed them to resist even the toughest opponents, not by force which they usually lacked, but rather by using their brain and tactics. Reinhard Heydrich

Reinhard Heydrich

Reinhard Tristan Eugen Heydrich , also known as The Hangman, was a high-ranking German Nazi official.He was SS-Obergruppenführer and General der Polizei, chief of the Reich Main Security Office and Stellvertretender Reichsprotektor of Bohemia and Moravia...

(who usually called Czechs "The Laughing beasts"), when instructing heads of his Prague’s gestapo

Gestapo

The Gestapo was the official secret police of Nazi Germany. Beginning on 20 April 1934, it was under the administration of the SS leader Heinrich Himmler in his position as Chief of German Police...

, warned them that unlike the Poles

Poles

thumb|right|180px|The state flag of [[Poland]] as used by Polish government and diplomatic authoritiesThe Polish people, or Poles , are a nation indigenous to Poland. They are united by the Polish language, which belongs to the historical Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages of Central Europe...

or the Yugoslavs

Yugoslavs

Yugoslavs is a national designation used by a minority of South Slavs across the countries of the former Yugoslavia and in the diaspora...

who are rigid and stubborn and who can be therefore broken by sufficient force, “Czechs are servile and flexible as sticks which first bend down and then whip back when least expected.”

One of the most used, cited, remembered and very well understood phrases in the Czech Republic

Czech Republic

The Czech Republic is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Poland to the northeast, Slovakia to the east, Austria to the south, and Germany to the west and northwest....

is associated with Cimrman and we can find its origin in the movie Jára Cimrman Lying, Sleeping

Jára Cimrman Lying, Sleeping

Jára Cimrman Lying, Sleeping is a 1983 Czechoslovak comedy film directed by Ladislav Smoljak, about the fictional national hero Jára Cimrman.-Cast:* Zdeněk Svěrák - Jára da Cimrman * Valerie Kaplanová - Museum janitor...

. Cimrman, as a teacher in the local school, gave this advice to a group of children standing in front of a pound (fence for cattle), wondering how to get over it. “Children, in your life you will have to face obstacles. Tyrš

Sokol

The Sokol movement is a youth sport movement and gymnastics organization first founded in Czech region of Austria-Hungary, Prague, in 1862 by Miroslav Tyrš and Jindřich Fügner...

says: “Jump, climb, but never ever bend down” but I say: “You may bend down too, but then you must straighten up again!”

The self-image of bending down and then straightening up characterizes a wide-spread Czechs' view of the last two centuries of the Czech history.

Relationships with other nations

When considering relationships with other nations, there is a broad consensus in the Czech society that the Czechs give and don’t get anything back in return and that although they are at least as talented, intelligent and innovative as other nations, they are always those who end up with empty hands. Other nations just use their ideas and take advantages of Czechs every time they have the opportunity.

We can for example learn from one of the Cimrmanologic lectures that Cimrman was, mainly due to bad luck and Austro-Hungarian bureaucracy, unable to attend the Olympic Games in 1908. But he could at least sell special shoes he invented for this purpose (running shoes „koniášky“) in London and as a result “the Czech craftsmanship helped sportsmen of other nations to succeed again”.

This can be considered as a reference to the fact that during Austro-Hungarian, Nazi and Soviet occupation, Czech factories have produced goods for other nations, in many cases free of charge. The former Soviet Union

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

was also delivered huge amounts of uranium

Uranium

Uranium is a silvery-white metallic chemical element in the actinide series of the periodic table, with atomic number 92. It is assigned the chemical symbol U. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons...

from Czechoslovakia

Czechoslovakia

Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...

, again free of charge.

In the movie Jára Cimrman Lying, Sleeping

Jára Cimrman Lying, Sleeping

, Cimrman gives advices to a number of artists, inventors and scientists from other nations, who thus become famous thanks to Cimrman. This concerns, among others, Gustave Eiffel

Gustave Eiffel

Alexandre Gustave Eiffel was a French structural engineer from the École Centrale Paris, an architect, an entrepreneur and a specialist of metallic structures...

, Guglielmo Marconi

Guglielmo Marconi

Guglielmo Marconi was an Italian inventor, known as the father of long distance radio transmission and for his development of Marconi's law and a radio telegraph system. Marconi is often credited as the inventor of radio, and indeed he shared the 1909 Nobel Prize in Physics with Karl Ferdinand...

, Johann Strauss

Johann Strauss II

Johann Strauss II , also known as Johann Baptist Strauss or Johann Strauss, Jr., the Younger, or the Son , was an Austrian composer of light music, particularly dance music and operettas. He composed over 500 waltzes, polkas, quadrilles, and other types of dance music, as well as several operettas...

or Anton Pavlovich Chekhov

Anton Chekhov

Anton Pavlovich Chekhov was a Russian physician, dramatist and author who is considered to be among the greatest writers of short stories in history. His career as a dramatist produced four classics and his best short stories are held in high esteem by writers and critics...

. This may be a reference to one of the traits of the Czechs' self-stereotype, namely, that although they are very intelligent and talented, Czechs are often too naive and do not know how to sell themselves.

It is often futile, but Czechs never give up

In the Czech history

History of the Czech lands

, there were moments when in spite of dozens of years of hard work and efforts to achieve freedom and prosperity, or in general to create a better world for all, the Czech nation eventually ended up ruined, depleted and its members deeply disappointed and on their knees, but not for long.

This is mainly a case of church reformation initiated by Jan Hus

Jan Hus

Jan Hus , often referred to in English as John Hus or John Huss, was a Czech priest, philosopher, reformer, and master at Charles University in Prague...

and than followed by Martin Luther

Martin Luther

Martin Luther was a German priest, professor of theology and iconic figure of the Protestant Reformation. He strongly disputed the claim that freedom from God's punishment for sin could be purchased with money. He confronted indulgence salesman Johann Tetzel with his Ninety-Five Theses in 1517...

which ended in 1620 by Battle of White Mountain

Battle of White Mountain

The Battle of White Mountain, 8 November 1620 was an early battle in the Thirty Years' War in which an army of 30,000 Bohemians and mercenaries under Christian of Anhalt were routed by 27,000 men of the combined armies of Ferdinand II, Holy Roman Emperor under Charles Bonaventure de Longueval,...

which was a culmination of almost total destruction of the Czech nation, the case of struggle for independence of Czechoslovakia in 1918 which ended up by Nazi occupation sped up by Munich Betrayal

Munich Agreement

The Munich Pact was an agreement permitting the Nazi German annexation of Czechoslovakia's Sudetenland. The Sudetenland were areas along Czech borders, mainly inhabited by ethnic Germans. The agreement was negotiated at a conference held in Munich, Germany, among the major powers of Europe without...

and than by Communist Occupation by Soviet Union which started in 1948.

In other words, there is a strong feeling in the Czech society that almost everything Czechs created or did in the past was ruined by occupants, betrayals, agreements concluded “about us, without us” or by bad luck and that it was therefore absolutely futile. There is a general feeling than we (Czechs) have to start over and over again.

This feeling of futility is nicely demonstrated by a scene (again) in the movie Jára Cimrman Lying, Sleeping

Jára Cimrman Lying, Sleeping

in which Cimrman tries to patent several inventions but he is always told that someone else who had the same idea and got it patented “has just left the office”. The only invention he was able to patent was bikini

Bikini

The bikini is typically a women's two-piece swimsuit. One part of the attire covers the breasts and the other part covers the crotch and part of or the entire buttocks, leaving an uncovered area between the two. Merriam–Webster describes the bikini as "a woman's scanty two-piece bathing suit" or "a...

. But he never stops trying.

Contributions

According to his biographers, Jára Cimrman made extensive contributions to mankind, in all areas. He proposed the Panama Canal

Panama Canal

The Panama Canal is a ship canal in Panama that joins the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean and is a key conduit for international maritime trade. Built from 1904 to 1914, the canal has seen annual traffic rise from about 1,000 ships early on to 14,702 vessels measuring a total of 309.6...

to the U.S. government

Federal government of the United States

The federal government of the United States is the national government of the constitutional republic of fifty states that is the United States of America. The federal government comprises three distinct branches of government: a legislative, an executive and a judiciary. These branches and...

, including a libretto

Libretto

A libretto is the text used in an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata, or musical. The term "libretto" is also sometimes used to refer to the text of major liturgical works, such as mass, requiem, and sacred cantata, or even the story line of a...

for an opera

Opera

Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...

of the same name. He reformed the school system in Galicia. With Count Zeppelin

Ferdinand von Zeppelin

Ferdinand Adolf Heinrich August Graf von Zeppelin was a German general and later aircraft manufacturer. He founded the Zeppelin Airship company...

he constructed the first rigid airship

Airship

An airship or dirigible is a type of aerostat or "lighter-than-air aircraft" that can be steered and propelled through the air using rudders and propellers or other thrust mechanisms...

using Swedish

Sweden

Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....

steel

Steel

Steel is an alloy that consists mostly of iron and has a carbon content between 0.2% and 2.1% by weight, depending on the grade. Carbon is the most common alloying material for iron, but various other alloying elements are used, such as manganese, chromium, vanadium, and tungsten...

and Czech wicker

Wicker

Wicker is hard woven fiber formed into a rigid material, usually used for baskets or furniture. Wicker is often made of material of plant origin, but plastic fibers are also used....

(the wicker being for the cabin). He was deported from Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

as an anarchist, and his personal documents carried a note that he was "a source of unrest." This led the Swiss

Switzerland

Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

company Omega to offer him a job to improve the balance wheel

Balance wheel

The balance wheel is the timekeeping device used in mechanical watches and some clocks, analogous to the pendulum in a pendulum clock. It is a weighted wheel that rotates back and forth, being returned toward its center position by a spiral spring, the balance spring or hairspring...

for their Piccolo line of ladies' watch

Watch

A watch is a small timepiece, typically worn either on the wrist or attached on a chain and carried in a pocket, with wristwatches being the most common type of watch used today. They evolved in the 17th century from spring powered clocks, which appeared in the 15th century. The first watches were...

es. (N.B. the Czech and German words for a watch's balance wheel ("nepokoj", "Unruhe") mean "unrest.") While in Switzerland, he introduced (and practised for some time) the profession of obstetrician

Obstetrics

Obstetrics is the medical specialty dealing with the care of all women's reproductive tracts and their children during pregnancy , childbirth and the postnatal period...

, under the difficult Alpine

Alps

The Alps is one of the great mountain range systems of Europe, stretching from Austria and Slovenia in the east through Italy, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Germany to France in the west....

conditions. He conducted investigations about the life of Arctic

Arctic

The Arctic is a region located at the northern-most part of the Earth. The Arctic consists of the Arctic Ocean and parts of Canada, Russia, Greenland, the United States, Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Iceland. The Arctic region consists of a vast, ice-covered ocean, surrounded by treeless permafrost...

tribes who eat their fellows; and once, while running away from a furious tribe, he missed the North Pole

North Pole

The North Pole, also known as the Geographic North Pole or Terrestrial North Pole, is, subject to the caveats explained below, defined as the point in the northern hemisphere where the Earth's axis of rotation meets its surface...

by a mere seven meters.

In Paraguay

Paraguay

Paraguay , officially the Republic of Paraguay , is a landlocked country in South America. It is bordered by Argentina to the south and southwest, Brazil to the east and northeast, and Bolivia to the northwest. Paraguay lies on both banks of the Paraguay River, which runs through the center of the...

he supposedly created the first puppet-show. In Vienna

Vienna

he established a school of criminology

Criminology

Criminology is the scientific study of the nature, extent, causes, and control of criminal behavior in both the individual and in society...

, music

Music

Music is an art form whose medium is sound and silence. Its common elements are pitch , rhythm , dynamics, and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture...

and ballet

Ballet

Ballet is a type of performance dance, that originated in the Italian Renaissance courts of the 15th century, and which was further developed in France and Russia as a concert dance form. The early portions preceded the invention of the proscenium stage and were presented in large chambers with...

. He corresponded with G.B. Shaw

George Bernard Shaw

George Bernard Shaw was an Irish playwright and a co-founder of the London School of Economics. Although his first profitable writing was music and literary criticism, in which capacity he wrote many highly articulate pieces of journalism, his main talent was for drama, and he wrote more than 60...

for many years, but unfortunately the dogged Irishman

Ireland

Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...

never replied. He invented yoghurt

Yoghurt

Yoghurt, yogurt or yogourt is a dairy product produced by bacterial fermentation of milk. The bacteria used to make yoghurt are known as "yoghurt cultures"...

. He generously helped many great scientists: On his own back he carried 45 tubs of pitchblende to the basement of Mr.

Pierre Curie

Pierre Curie was a French physicist, a pioneer in crystallography, magnetism, piezoelectricity and radioactivity, and Nobel laureate. He was the son of Dr. Eugène Curie and Sophie-Claire Depouilly Curie ...

and Mrs. Curie

Marie Curie

Marie Skłodowska-Curie was a physicist and chemist famous for her pioneering research on radioactivity. She was the first person honored with two Nobel Prizes—in physics and chemistry...

, he assisted Prof. Burian with his first plastic surgery, he reworked the electrical contact on Edison

Thomas Edison

Thomas Alva Edison was an American inventor and businessman. He developed many devices that greatly influenced life around the world, including the phonograph, the motion picture camera, and a long-lasting, practical electric light bulb. In addition, he created the world’s first industrial...

's first lightbulb, and he found an underlease for Mr. Eiffel

Eiffel

-Engineering:* Eiffel Tower in Paris, designed by Gustave Eiffel in motif as twin to the Eifel ridge, re-dubbed Maria Pia Bridge, previously built in o Porto, Portugal - The Twin Towers of Eiffel...

. He is the creator of the philosophy

Philosophy

Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...

of Externism

Externism

Externism is a fictional philosophical theory proposed by the famous fictitious Czech genius Jára Cimrman. This character appears in many plays by authors from the Jára Cimrman Theatre in Prague. The first act of the theatre performances is usually filled with a lecture on Cimrman's personality,...

. Because of his enthusiasm for natural sciences, he discovered the monopole

Magnetic monopole

A magnetic monopole is a hypothetical particle in particle physics that is a magnet with only one magnetic pole . In more technical terms, a magnetic monopole would have a net "magnetic charge". Modern interest in the concept stems from particle theories, notably the grand unified and superstring...

(as opposed to the then well known dipole

Dipole

In physics, there are several kinds of dipoles:*An electric dipole is a separation of positive and negative charges. The simplest example of this is a pair of electric charges of equal magnitude but opposite sign, separated by some distance. A permanent electric dipole is called an electret.*A...

), but this discovery fell into oblivion until it was confusedly revived by 20th century economists

Economics

Economics is the social science that analyzes the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. The term economics comes from the Ancient Greek from + , hence "rules of the house"...

. He is also known for having advised Mendeleev, having seen the first draft, that the Periodic Table

Periodic table

The periodic table of the chemical elements is a tabular display of the 118 known chemical elements organized by selected properties of their atomic structures. Elements are presented by increasing atomic number, the number of protons in an atom's atomic nucleus...

should be rotated to its current orientation.

Another one of his great inventions is also the internet itself, although without widespread usage of computers, he had to rely on telephones. His internet basically consisted of an old circus tent where he had a telephone aparate and various pensioned highschool teachers, who answered all kinds of question people had. Also the well known WWW prefix originated here. One of the teachers' name was Weber and since he stuttered, he also introduced himself as "W-W-W.Weber."

Pedagogue

Most of the pedagogical work of Jára Cimrman is presented in the theatre play Vyšetřování ztráty třídní knihy ("Investigation of the Loss of a Class Book", 1967).

Cimrman became a teacher in a small village known as Struk, as a punishment by court, when it was revealed he could read and write as well.

He also, in accordance with his ideology of "Futurism", prepared his students as a teacher for the future practical usage of phones, which were being installed in Austria at that time and planted such a euphoria, that when the first phone apparatus was installed, many of his former students began throwing a whole fortune into the phones, calling random numbers and many of them went home from the post office as complete beggars.

He also revolutionized his small town schooling methods with dividing the lectured subjects into clearly marked "Forget-me-not" and "Not-forget-me-not" materials. The former was one-tenth of all the learning material and was meant to be remembered, while the latter made up nine-tenths of the given subject and was intended from the start to be forgotten.

As a teacher, he also put his pupils under stress to improve information retention for a particularly important part of the subject — he either snapped his whip hard on the ground or took off his wig ("úlek oslněním" — "fright by daze"). This apparently successful method bears his name to this day as the famous "Cimrman's Fixation by Shock".

When students misbehaved, he did not punish them but punished himself instead — his theory was that pupils certainly must love their teacher and therefore would feel remorse if he should suffer. When his students put water into his ink-bottle instead of ink, he did not leave his house for a week. His students had no school then and so had enough free time to feel sorry for him. Alternately he would refuse to have a cigarette after lunch and commented on it thus: "Today, after lunch, I will not smoke a cigar ("viržínko"). Don't cry, it's your own fault."

Playwright

Jára Cimrman is claimed to have authored numerous plays, many of which are said to have been lost. These plays include Posel světla (English "Herald of Light"), featuring his own comic vision of the future world where people are all good to each other and so a person may, ironically, act as a complete heartless monster without any remorse.

Another play presented as a work of Cimrman is Záskok ("The Stand-in"), which portrays actors of a fictional amateur theatre, performing a play that is messed up by a famous and reportedly brilliant, yet in reality dumb person who cannot forget to say other people's lines and lines from other plays and who cannot even remember the name of his own character.

Cimrman never received great fame as a playwright in his lifetime, often because of his innovatory practices, such as changing the length of the play in several successive performances or presenting new ideas. He is stated to have sent many of his plays to Ladislav Stroupežnický

Ladislav Stroupežnický

Ladislav Stroupežnický was a renowned Czech author, playwright, and dramatist, best known for the frequently staged play Naši furianti.-Life:...

(a famous Czech playwright) under his name and two pseudonyms, forming such a bundle of rejected works that Stroupežnický recalls they "cost him 60 working days". He also encouraged Cimrman not to write to him and if possible "not to write at all". After Cimrman replied on a familiar note, because they both studied at the same school, Stroupežnický never recovered.

One of the plays, also said to be lost, which was a subject of their correspondence, was Čechové na Řípu (English: "Czechs on Říp

RIP

R.I.P. is an abbreviation for rest in peace .R.I.P. or RIP may also refer to:-Biology:*Regulated intramembrane proteolysis, a biochemical process which regulates a semipermeable membrane...

"), a fictional account of an old Bohemian legend, which is here said to feature not only the legendary Forefather Czech

Lech, Czech and Rus

Lech, Čech, and Rus is a legend of three brothers – Lech, Čech, and Rus – who founded three Slavic nations: Poland , Bohemia, and Ruthenia...

, but also other characters as Forefather German, Forefather Jew and, in dialogue only, Forefather Gipsy, by which Cimrman wanted to honour all major nationalities living in Bohemia

Bohemia

Bohemia is a historical region in central Europe, occupying the western two-thirds of the traditional Czech Lands. It is located in the contemporary Czech Republic with its capital in Prague...

. The play was later re-done and its name changed to Čechové na řípu ("Czechs for Turnip", changing just uppercase "Ř" into lower case "ř"), in order to motivate people to work at a sugar refinery in Klánovice.

Another man, whom Cimrman is said to have surprised with his works was Jacob Durman, director of the Royal Chamber Theatre in Haag, who, after reading his play Prázdniny s kanibalem Dufkem ("Vacation with cannibal Dufek") is said not to "come out of astonishment." Cimrman replied: "Dear Mr. Durman, the theatre is here mainly so that the spectator shall be astonished. I am sending you five more plays."

Many of Cimrman's unsuccessful plays are reported to be performed by his infamous theatrical group Lipany

Lipany (Cimrman)

Lipany was the name of a fictional theatrical group, created by the fictional Czech playwright/inventor and overall "genius" Jára Cimrman. It received its name from the Battle at Lipany, where the Bohemians obtained a devastating defeat.-Personnel:...

. Cimrman's theatre still possesses the original properties from the play Akt (English: "The Nude"), through which the author himself left the stage. A common way to escape angry or unsatisfied audience was the even more infamous scene Vichr z hor ("Drift From the Mountains"), allowing the actors to escape swiftly.

Cimrmanologists admit that Cimrman has failed to obtain any recognition in this field (as well as in any other) because his methods were far too ahead of his time. This is also in strong contrast with the fact how brilliantly he helped Anton Chekhov

Anton Chekhov

with his play (advising him that two sisters

Three Sisters (play)

Three Sisters is a play by Russian author and playwright Anton Chekhov, perhaps partially inspired by the situation of the three Brontë sisters, but most probably by the three Zimmermann sisters in Perm...

are not enough).

Physical appearance

The physical and facial appearance of Jára Cimrman past his childhood years is a great mystery, as (we are told) there exist no photos of his person. In some of many lectures on Jára Cimrman it was declared that from the few details known (a "T" as a remnant of him hitting his head repeatedly against a fence) a few hundred possible silhouettes were created.

Cimrmanology

The Cimrman's character was invented for a regular radio programme Nealkoholická vinárna U Pavouka ("The Spider Non-Alcoholic Wine Bar") in 1966. As the authors later reminisced about it, the mystification with presenting a new discovery of a forgotten Czech genius was successful. Some listeners considered it humorous, some asked a punishment for those who tried to deceive people, and others (at least in the beginning) believed. In 1967 Jiří Šebánek together with Miloň Čepelka, Ladislav Smoljak

Ladislav Smoljak

and Zdeněk Svěrák

Zdenek Sverák

founded the Jára Cimrman Theatre. The first play was called Akt ("The Nude"). Jiří Šebánek later left the theatre and in 1980 founded Salon Cimrman.

People from the Jára Cimrman Theatre and Salon Cimrman call themselves Cimrmanologists and pretend to be enthusiastic scholars who explore and analyse the Cimrman's life and work. Their findings have been presented to the lay public in a variety of ways. Lectures on Jára Cimrman followed by a dramatization inspired on the scholars' discoveries have been very popular in the Jára Cimrman Theatre, while Salon Cimrman focuses just on lectures.

In 1983 Ladislav Smoljak directed the film Jára Cimrman ležící, spící ("Jára Cimrman Lying, Sleeping") and in 1984 Ladislav Smoljak and Zdeněk Svěrák made a detective film comedy Rozpuštěný a vypuštěný
Rozpuštěný a vypuštěný
Dissolved and Effused is a 1985 Czechoslovak comedy film directed by Ladislav Smoljak....

("Dissolved and Drained"), based on the theatre play Vražda v salónním coupé
Vražda v salonním coupé
Vražda v salonním coupé is a stage comedy play in repertory of Jára Cimrman Theatre. The authors are Zdeněk Svěrák and Ladislav Smoljak and the co-authorship is credited to a fictional Czech inventor, philosopher and dramatic Jára Cimrman. The play was premiered on 14th May, 1970 in Malostranská...

("Murder in a Chair Carriage"), the putative author of which was Jára Cimrman.

Cimrmanologists also wrote several books on Jára Cimrman:

J. Šebánek, L. Smoljak, Z. Svěrák, K. Velebný: Jára da Cimrman (1970)
J. Klusák, J. Šebánek, L. Smoljak, Z. Svěrák, K. Velebný: Cimrman v říši hudby ("Cimrman in the Music Domain", 1971)
J. Šebánek: Já, Jára Cimrman ("I, Jára Cimrman", 1991)

A museum on Jára Cimrman's inventions was opened in the basement of the Petřín Lookout Tower

Petrínská rozhledna

The Petřín Lookout Tower is a 60 metre high steel framework tower in Prague, which strongly resembles the Eiffel Tower. Although it is much shorter than the Eiffel Tower, it stands atop a sizable hill, Petřín, so the top is actually at a higher altitude than that of the Eiffel Tower...

in Prague

Prague

in 2002.

Greatest Czech contest

In early 2005, the Czech Television

Czech television

Czech television may refer to:*Television in the Czech Republic*Česká televize...

started a contest to choose The Greatest Czech

Nejvetší Cech

Největší Čech is the Czech spin-off of the BBC Greatest Britons show; a television poll of the populace to name the greatest Czech in history. The series was broadcast by the national public-service broadcaster, Česká televize...

(inspired by the British show 100 Greatest Britons

100 Greatest Britons

100 Greatest Britons was broadcast in 2002 by the BBC. The programme was the result of a vote conducted to determine whom the United Kingdom public considers the greatest British people in history. The series, Great Britons, included individual programmes on the top ten, with viewers having further...

). The obvious candidates included pop singers, Czech kings and national heroes. Surprisingly, on January 15 it seemed that most of the votes (by SMS

Short message service

Short Message Service is a text messaging service component of phone, web, or mobile communication systems, using standardized communications protocols that allow the exchange of short text messages between fixed line or mobile phone devices...

, the Internet or mail) had gone to Jára Cimrman. However, the Czech Television decided to disqualify Cimrman, saying that only real people were eligible for the contest — a decision that was strongly criticized by the public. An on-line petition was started to try to keep Cimrman eligible. The popular support for Cimrman caused the Czech Television to create a special category for fictional characters to recognize Cimrman's popularity, and Czech Television did a documentary about Cimrman as well; however, they did not include him in the main contest.

External links

Czech

Žižkovské divadlo Járy Cimrmana (The Cimrman Theatre).
Unofficial pages of the Jára Cimrman Theatre
Lidové noviny newspaper article about Jára Cimrman winning the competition so far.
Czech Press Agency news that Jára Cimrman will be disqualified although he is leading the scores.
Britské listy article criticizing Czech Television.
Announcement by Czech Television of a special award for Jára Cimrman.
Cimrmanův zpravodaj (The Cimrman Bulletin).

English

Feeling Short of Real Heroes, Thus Fond of a Fake One: New York Times 17 May 2005; somewhat differently edited in International Herald Tribune
International Herald Tribune
The International Herald Tribune is a widely read English language international newspaper. It combines the resources of its own correspondents with those of The New York Times and is printed at 38 sites throughout the world, for sale in more than 160 countries and territories...

16 May as Prague's greatest hero is really a blank Czech
article on the contest in Prague Post
The first Czech on the moon, Haaretz
Haaretz
Haaretz is Israel's oldest daily newspaper. It was founded in 1918 and is now published in both Hebrew and English in Berliner format. The English edition is published and sold together with the International Herald Tribune. Both Hebrew and English editions can be read on the Internet...

9 June 2005
Kafka Meets Monty Python, Time
Time (magazine)
Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...

2002
Czechs' hero? The people's choice is a joke, IHT March 2005
A nationally syndicated column released after the vote with a biography.
The Jara Cimrman theater - several plays and excerpts translated into English
The website for Petrin Tower, the location of the Cimrman Museum

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

Fictional biography

Czechs, their mentality and their hero

Relationships with other nations

It is often futile, but Czechs never give up

Contributions

Pedagogue

Playwright

Physical appearance

Cimrmanology

Greatest Czech contest

See also

External links