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Ivan Olbracht, born Kamil Zeman (6 January 1882 – 20 December 1952), was a Czech people writer, journalist, censor and translator of German language prose.
Later, he became an editor in Prague ( , The People's Right). In 1920, he spent six months living in the Soviet Union. The following year, he joined the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia and began working for Rudé právo. He was twice imprisoned due to his communist views, first in 1926 (in Slezská Ostrava) and later in 1928 (in Pankrác Prison).
In 1929, together with six other writers, Olbracht signed a protest statement against the new leadership of the Communist Party. This resulted in his expulsion from the party and loss of his editorial post. Without political obligations or a job, he turned his attention entirely toward writing. The ensuing years were some of his most productive. Beginning in 1931, he started to travel regularly to Carpathian Ruthenia, in the east of Czechoslovakia. The region, which was inhabited mostly by Rusyn people peasants and Jews, created a deep impression on him. His experiences there inspired some of his best works. His novel, Nikola Šuhaj loupežník (Nikola Šuhaj, Outlaw), published in 1933 was based on a real person. The story spoke of a peasant Robin Hood who robbed the rich to provide for the poor. The book eventually acquired the status of a folktale.
In 1934, he co-wrote the screenplay for Marijka nevěrnice (Marijka the Unfaithful). The following year, he published Hory a staletí (Mountains and Centuries), which was a combination of political ethnography and criticism of what he perceived as the Czechoslovak government's colonialist policies in Podkarpatská Rus. In 1937, his book Golet v údolí (Golet in the Valley) was published. The book consisted of three interwoven stories about Orthodox Jews. The longest of the stories was "Smutné oči Hany Karadžičové" (The Sad Eyes of Hana Karadžičová), a sad tale of a Jewish girl who is ostracized by her village for marrying an atheist Jew. "Golet in the Valley" was the last of his works. His books set in Carpathian Ruthenia are regarded as his best, reflecting his gift of combining documentary realism and fictional drama.
Fear of persecution drove him to the small town of Stříbřec during World War II. There he once again joined the Communist Party and was active in the resistance. He worked for a while in the Ministry of Information after the war. His writings during that period were limited to adaptations, including the retelling of Bible stories for children.
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