Jak a proč přemýšlet o české národní existenci? Poznámky na okraj dvou intelektuálních pokusů

Abstract

The author considers several texts that have recently been devoted to Masaryk’s book Česká otázka (The Czech Question), but the topic of the article revolves around the more general issue of “the Czech question,” and not the book itself. The intention is to find out what the contemporary forms and pathways are of the intellectual self-reflection on Czech national existence. On the one hand, there is a collection of philosophers and other experts in the humanities who are trying to determine the extent to which Masaryk’s book, dating from the end of the 19th century, is still important for the current state of the Czech nation (and thus “Czech questions”). On the other hand, another focus of the article is a set of twenty reflections on the current state of, and the degree of threat to, the nation’s uniqueness, written by a prominent Czech neurologist who also takes into account the more than century-long debate on the “meaning of Czech history.” Although a comparison of both approaches reveals some similarities in their awareness of a crisis in the current state of the Czech nation, significant differences in methodological starting points soon step into the foreground and from this emerge differences in the conclusions the different approaches reach, differences that touch on the future toward which the nation is maturing.

Keywords

• t. g. masaryk
• the czech question
• czech history
• the nation