I was born in Uhrovec, in the same house as Ľudovít Štúr. I grew up in the USSR, where my parents came to work. After returning to Slovakia, I worked as a laborer. In 1944, I joined the SNP. After World War II, I became a professional politician. I gradually held several positions in the state apparatus and increasingly higher positions in the leadership of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia. In 1968, I became the head of a movement that tried to reform the communist system in Czechoslovakia. This reform movement entered the subconscious of the world as the Prague Spring. Reform efforts were suppressed by the invasion of Warsaw Pact troops and the subsequent Soviet occupation of Czechoslovakia. Together with my colleagues, they forcibly dragged us to the USSR, where they forced us to sign an "agreement" dictated by the Moscow government. Gradually deprived of all functions, I lived in isolation for twenty years under the control of the ŠtB. For domestic citizens and especially abroad, I became a symbol of the struggle of the Slovak and Czech peoples for democracy. After the fall of the communist regime in 1989, I returned to public and political life. I was elected as Speaker of the Parliament. I died after a tragic car accident in the autumn of 1992.