Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk as a Subject of Scientific Apology after 1989

Abstract

Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk features in a number of texts, especially in connection with his political activity as president of Czechoslovakia, or his activities during the First World War. In fact, there are only a few significant texts that give a biographical summary of T. G. Masaryk's lifelong work. In the Czech post-1989 environment, these are, in particular, the texts by Stanislav Polák and Jaroslav Opat, published at the turn of the millennium, but prepared in part during the dissent era. Notably, Polák's extensive, seven-volume work, T. G. Masaryk. Towards Ideal and Truth, however, shifts from the genre of scientific biography to that of apology, a defence of Masaryk's actions as moral in all circumstances. This study draws attention to the blending of the scientific biography of prominent Czech political personalities with their "hagiography," an uncritical defence which subsequently permeates historical thinking and the interpretation of Czech history as a whole.