One should be honest, brave, and strong
Marie Königová was born on 6 August 1931 in Prague. Her grandfather was the prominent Doctor Balcar from Průhonice, and her father was Augustin Šulc, a well-known Prague businessman who imported English BSA motorbikes from Birmingham. The family was persecuted when the Communists came to power, and Marie‘s father was unjustly interned. Marie was not allowed to study medicine, and so in 1952 she instead enrolled at the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics of Charles University. After graduating from university she worked with Docent Svoboda as a programmer at the Research Institute of Computing Machines and then at the Czech Language Institute. Although she repeatedly refused to join the Communist Party, she achieved excellent results in her field. In 1976 she earned a minor doctorate at the Faculty of Arts of Charles University, and in 1989 she completed an internship at the University of Toronto. She has written numerous expert publications. She worked in leading positions in her field until 2003, when she went into retirement. She is married and has three children. Her hobbies include sports, exercising, and skiing. As of 2017, she lives in the company of her ever-growing family in Prague 10.