Born in Prague, he was working in Paris as a correspondent for Lidové noviny[1] when Nazi Germany occupied the rest of Czechoslovakia on 15 March 1939.

In 1951 he was arrested by the country's Communist government for alleged espionage, and following the demands of the state prosecutor for the death penalty, he was ultimately sentenced to hard labor in the Jáchymov uranium mines.

[3][4] In 1989, following the Velvet Revolution, which brought down the communist regime, he became chairman of the Czech PEN club.

His second wife was Geraldine Thomson-Mucha (1917–2012), a Scottish born composer who lived in Prague until her death on 12 October 2012.

Most [The Bridge], Studené slunce [Cold Sun] – reflecting his experience of a life in Stalinist prison – and Podivné lásky [Strange Loves] – his recollections of his relationship with Czech composer Vítězslava Kaprálová and the life of a Czech émigré community in Paris at the dawn of the World War II.