Jan Neruda was born in Prague, Bohemia, son of a small grocer who lived in the Malá Strana (Little Quarter) district of Prague. After studying philosophy and philology, he worked as a teacher until 1860, when he became a freelance journalist and writer. Neruda never married but had a close relationship to the writer Karolína Svetlá.
In his work Neruda promoted the idea of rebirth of Czech patriotism. He participated in all the central cultural and political struggles of his generation, and gained a reputation as a sensitive critic. Neruda became with Vítezslav Hálek the most prominent representative of the new literary trends.
Neruda was known for his satirical depiction of the petty bourgeois of Prague. His most popular prose work is "Povídky malostranské" (1877, Tales of the Little Quarter), a collection of short stories, which was translated into English in 1957 by the novelist and mystery writer Ellis Peters. Neruda's stories take the reader to the Little Quarter, to its streets and yards, shops, churches, houses, and restaurants.
After Neruda's death one of the streets in Little Quarter, Nerudova ulice (Neruda Street), was named after him.
The Chilean poet Neftalí Ricardo Reyes Basoalto (Pablo Neruda), Nobel Prize in Literature 1971, took his pseudonym after Jan Neruda.