Philip escapes a police stop in Prague

Philip escapes a police stop in Prague when he refuses to go quietly with two uniformed officers, turns a street encounter into a public standoff, and slips away on a trolley. Recalled later as a tense, improvised escape, the episode also marks the point at which his annual visits to Czechoslovakia acquire lasting consequences: he loses access to the country, and a Czech friend is questioned about him after his departure.

Background and Surveillance

Philip dates his first strong attraction to Prague to 1971, after he had finished a book and was traveling from Vienna. His publisher there had brought him to the publishing house, where the director and staff toasted him with slivovitz; a lunch with an editor then offered an early glimpse of divisions within the literary world. He returned in the spring in later years, often to see writer friends. By then, police followed him around the city, especially during visits to those friends. The men who usually tracked him were plainclothes officers who kept their distance. In 1975, the familiar surveillance gave way to a direct encounter: two uniformed policemen approached him on the street and demanded to see his papers.

The Street Confrontation and Escape

Philip showed the officers his passport, visa, and hotel identification card, but they insisted that he accompany them to the police station. He refused and began shouting in English and his high-school French that he wanted to see the ambassador at the American Embassy. Only a few feet from a trolley stop, he also called to the bystanders that the police were harassing him without cause and demanded to be taken to the embassy. The uniforms were not acting alone. One officer repeatedly went up the street to consult a plainclothesman in a blue raincoat, then returned to renew the demand. Philip kept refusing. A young German couple came closer to see what was happening; he asked them to stay and gave them his name and hotel, with instructions to contact the American ambassador if the police dragged him away. The standoff lasted about fifteen minutes, each refusal sending an officer back for instructions. When both uniformed officers went to the end of the block to confer with the plainclothesman, a trolley arrived. Philip boarded rather than wait to be arrested. Still sweating heavily and with his heart pounding, he got off two stops later, crossed a bridge, and took a trolley in the opposite direction. At a phone kiosk, he called a Czech friend and described what had happened.

Consequences and Significance

The friend laughed and assured Philip that the police had meant only to harass and frighten him, and that it was safe to return to his hotel. Philip did so without further incident. That apparent resolution proved temporary: afterward, he was never again able to obtain a visa to Czechoslovakia. The evening after Philip left Prague, police took the friend he had called from his home and questioned him through the night. In a later letter, the friend reported that the officers had focused on Philip and his repeated visits, asking why he came to Czechoslovakia so often. The episode thus extends beyond the escape itself: the surveillance reaches a local acquaintance, and the consequences of Philip’s presence persist after he has crossed the border. His closing explanation was comic rather than defensive: he said he had gone to Czechoslovakia for the jokes, reserving England for the girls.