The Greengrocer and His TV : The Culture of Communism after the 1968 Prague Spring

The 1968 Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia brought an end to the Prague Spring and its promise of -socialism with a human face.- Before the invasion, Czech reformers had made unexpected use of television to advance political and social change. In its aftermath, Communist Party leaders employed the medium to achieve -normalization,- pitching television stars against political dissidents in a televised spectacle that defined the times. The Greengrocer and His TV offers a new cultural history of communism from the Prague Spring to the Velvet Revolution that reveals how state-endorsed ideologies were played out on television, particularly through soap opera-like serials. In focusing on the small screen, Paulina Bren looks to the -normal- of normalization, to the everyday experience of late communism.