Josef Čapek was born in Hronov, Bohemia, on 23rd March, 1887. He was a painter and writer. Čapek published several novels and a play, Land of Many Names. He also produced political cartoons for the Lidove Noviny , a newspaper based in Prague. An opponent of Adolf Hitler, he was arrested after the German invasion of Czechoslovakia.

Capek spent the war in a concentration camp and died at Belsen in April, 1945.