For historians whose tutorial careers started within the early twenty-first century, Jan Tesař (1933–2025) was an elusive, mysterious determine. A dissident and exile who refused to return to Czech tutorial life after November 1989, he was identified for his e-book Mnichovský komplex (‘The Munich complicated’), written in 1989 and printed in 2000.
In distinction to immediately’s world {of professional} academia, wherein teachers are underneath growing stress to embrace self-promotion, Tesař’s lifelong voluntary standing as an outsider provided an interesting different. His writing model and his scepticism vis-à-vis institutional historiography served as a reminder that in the end it’s the battle for artistic freedom, for a vital examination of the previous seen as a nexus of issues shaping the world we stay in, that’s the principal purpose for the pursuit of historiography as an educational topic.
Tesař appeared to participate in historiographical discourse from afar. We had learn his texts, however only some of us had met him in individual or certainly had an thought of the place he was primarily based and what he was engaged on. However, due to the Triáda publishing home, which undertook to convey out his work, Tesař had by no means been absent from the Czech milieu, regardless that he had by no means sought to play a visual function in nationwide tutorial life, not to mention to frequent the mental salons of post-November Czechia. This modified considerably following the publication of the three-part Czech Gypsy Rhapsody in 2016. Whereas Tesař’s place had not undergone any vital change, he obtained way more consideration and public appreciation than within the earlier twenty years. His ultimate work introduced him new readers, demonstrating that, even of their eighties, a historian can produce revelatory and socially related work.
So what was the trajectory of Tesař’s excited about the previous which his Rhapsody dropped at a conclusion?
In opposition to prevailing interpretations
Jan Tesař started his profession as a historian in 1956 on the Institute of Navy Historical past (VHÚ), his first employer after graduating from Prague’s Charles College. Fired two years later, he labored in his native japanese Bohemia, most notably on the Pardubice Museum. In 1961 he returned to VHÚ, solely to lose his job in 1969. A quick stint on the Institute of Historical past of the Czech Academy of Sciences was adopted by years of imprisonment, oppositional actions and, in 1980, exile.
Regardless of being one of the vital fascinating figures in Czech historiography of the Sixties, Tesař by no means held any vital institutional place. However, tutorial establishments performed a key function in his work as a historian. The VHÚ, along with Czechoslovak Committee on the Historical past of Antifascist Resistance, which Tesař co-founded in 1960 as an umbrella organisation to supervise work on a complete synthesis of the historical past of the wartime Protectorate and resistance (which stays unpublished), supplied platforms for a vital, ideologically and methodologically non-standard research of contemporary historical past. In these days it was fairly widespread for tutorial establishments, underneath the auspices of the Czechoslovak Communist Get together management, to again analysis extremely vital of the ideological interpretation of historical past that had been formally promoted till then. Tesař was capable of make most use of this institutional help. His work challenged not solely the official Stalinist and post-Stalinist interpretation of historical past but in addition mainstream reformist historiography.
Historians akin to Jan Křen, Václav Kural and Oldřich Janeček regarded anti-fascist resistance as a key section of what was known as the Czechoslovak revolution, the fruits of the battle for nationwide and social emancipation that started within the nineteenth century. Of their view, the anti-fascist resistance laid the groundwork for the nationwide revolution of Could 1945, which liberated the Czechs and Slovaks from German occupation and established a folks’s democracy. That, in flip, paved the way in which for the “Czechoslovak path to socialism”, topped by the socialist revolution of February 1948. Moderately than by pressure, the Communists took energy democratically, with the help of the vast majority of the inhabitants. Socialism achieved social hegemony. Of their view, the reform communism of the Sixties constructed on this authentic and basically democratic Czechoslovak socialism, cast not simply in school battle but in addition within the struggle towards the German occupiers.
A critic amongst reform communists
As a socialist, Tesař supported the reform motion throughout the Communist Get together of Czechoslovakia (KSČ) that got here to a head in 1968. On the identical time, he was a radical critic of reformist historiography and reformist insurance policies. His method was pushed not simply by his particular understanding of radical socialism, but in addition by methodological concerns that had developed over a few years. Most historians at the moment regarded the historical past of resistance as a historical past of the programmes and actions of resistance teams, notably the elite. The social relevance of the resistance motion and its anchoring in a broader historic context have been ignored. Tesař primarily based his analysis on sources that allowed a brand new take a look at the historical past of the resistance and the Protectorate.
For one factor, he studied regional supply supplies that dropped at mild brokers of historic occasions who weren’t part of the elites, permitting historical past to be seen from the attitude of the periphery. He was additionally conversant in materials within the archives of the Protectorate and the occupation administration. He regarded the Nazis and their collaborators as totally fledged brokers of historical past, stressing that “Nazism must be understood as a historic agent in its personal proper.” Moreover, he thought-about the cultural output of the interval, which enabled him to delve extra deeply into the thought processes of Czech nationalism underneath the Protectorate, whereas additionally considering the broader context of the themes he studied.
Tesař’s analysis was primarily based on meticulously constructed empirical foundations. Considered one of his first items of educational writing mapped the injury partisans prompted to railways in japanese Bohemia and western Moravia, and included an in depth evaluation of sabotage actions primarily based on interval studies by the Protectorate authorities. Tesař insisted that it was materials originating from the time of the Protectorate that should function the fundamental supply of data, since later recollections of those that took half within the occasions might paint a extremely idealised image of resistance and cater to present-day political necessities.
However his work was additionally conceptually formidable, in that it strove to seize main social occasions not simply from the attitude of resistance methods, but in addition by way of the evolution of Czech nationalism and Czech society’s attitudes to authoritarian politics. All this resulted in a physique of labor – a few of it printed in the course of the Sixties, and a few within the new millennium – which stays elementary to the historic research of the Protectorate and Czechoslovakia’s subsequent path in direction of Stalinism.
Tesař argued that it was neither the highway to socialism nor the battle towards potential annihilation by the Nazis that was the important thing concern of the day. His evaluation of the Nazi occupation technique demonstrated that the Nazis have been planning to Germanise the territory of the Protectorate, providing to a racially acceptable part of Czech society the chance for integration right into a Nationwide Socialist “new Europe”. The Czechs thus confronted the dilemma of whether or not to insist on the democratic, progressive and egalitarian character of the Czech nationwide venture, and to threat open battle with the occupier – or to simply accept the Germans’ provide, do away with the politically rigid and racially unsuitable, and implement a brand new idea of the Czech nation that may be culturally conservative, anti-democratic, racist and Nationwide Socialist. This view of the occupation was and has remained controversial, because it locations underneath vital scrutiny not solely the collaborators throughout the Czech elite, but in addition the anti-fascist resistance and the general influence of the battle and the occupation on Czech society.
Is the nation price saving?
In Tesař’s view, the Czech nationwide dilemma underneath occupation supplied the premise for the Nazi occupation insurance policies, which mirrored each the pursuits of the Third Reich in addition to these of the elites of the Protectorate and Czech society. As a substitute of dividing Czech society into the resistance, a gray zone, and collaborationists, Tesař established that there had existed a nationwide political present that included a substantial a part of the resistance, political representatives of the Protectorate and the vast majority of Czech society that recognized with the nationalist marketing campaign, drawing on the political ambiance of the Second Czechoslovak Republic [1 October 1938 to 15 March 1939 – trans.] – i.e., a celebration of nationwide traditions, Czech tradition and conservative values, constructed on the concept of “saving the nation” in laborious instances. A minimalist programme of nationwide survival was to be developed, its precondition being a compromise with the Nazis.
Tesař argued that this coverage of saving the nation, settlement on which united members of the Protectorate authorities with part of the resistance, served the curiosity of the Germans. The occupiers sought to suppress all the novel forces within the Protectorate and pacify the inhabitants on the territory that fashioned a key a part of the financial hinterland for Nazi growth. The pragmatic coverage of the lesser evil, of nationalism aligned with the Protectorate and a modus vivendi with the occupiers, was one of the best ways of integrating the Protectorate into the great-power politics of the Nazis.
Tesař criticized the historiography of the Second Republic and early Protectorate that’s nonetheless influential immediately and that seeks to rehabilitate, if not outright rejoice, the political elites that had aided and abetted the Nazis, or no less than depict as unproblematic the actions of these Protectorate politicians who cooperated with the resistance and themselves later grew to become victims of Nazi repression.
Nevertheless, Tesař went even additional together with his thesis of a “regressive nationwide consciousness”. He claimed that this primitive nationalism, which rejected democratic and progressive concepts related to the Czech nationwide emancipation, concerned a “peculiar mixture of sentimental headiness and the servility of decrepit weaklings”. The decline of “nationwide consciousness” had not solely caused an absence of societal help for home resistance but in addition facilitated a clean transition from Nazism to Stalinism, when servility in direction of the occupiers was changed by servility in direction of the liberators.
Tesař gave plenty of thought to the political content material of the Czech nationwide venture and the truth that the Czech nationwide existence couldn’t be taken without any consideration. In 1967, participating in a dialogue on the Czech query within the twentieth century, Tesař stated: “Is the endeavour to protect the nation at all times essentially a ‘progressive’ requirement? I don’t suppose so. But when we declare it’s, then, paradoxically, we deify nationhood … The Czech resistance is characterised exactly by the truth that even within the determined circumstances of occupation it was preoccupied with the query: Is our nation even price being fought for and liberated?”
Tesař’s reflections on the politics of “saving” the nation acquired a brand new dimension after Czechoslovakia was invaded by the armies of the Warsaw Pact. He seen the occasions that adopted 21 August 1968 by the scenario of the early Protectorate. His writing from this era, particularly his unfinished sequence of essays “Patriots and Fighters” got down to present that, as soon as once more, Czechs and Slovaks discovered themselves having to decide on between standing up for sure values on the one hand, and the “realism” of the lesser evil on the opposite. Because it transpired, it was Husák’s “lesser evil”, the pragmatic and “accountable” calming of the scenario after the “excesses” of 1968, that fashioned the muse of the long-term stability of the normalisation regime.
The place did Stalinism come from?
Within the late Sixties, Tesař centered on one other topic that was thought to be controversial even by many reform Communists. In his vital evaluation of his colleagues’ analysis into the historical past of the occupation, he identified that their interpretations relied too closely on the dichotomy between home traditions of democratic socialism and Stalinist authoritarianism, with the latter supposedly an extraneous ingredient imported from the Soviet Union. Tesař challenged this view, which round 1968 had develop into a broadly shared foundation of the reform communist interpretation of the historical past of Czechoslovak Stalinism.
Tesař as a substitute identified the continuity between the wartime interval and developments after 1948, in addition to the necessary function performed by the resistance in establishing the Stalinist dictatorship. In 1965 Tesař acknowledged that: “The resistance represented the unleashing of sophistication forces that have been ready to simply accept Soviet-style strategies, Soviet-style dictatorship … If we attempt to clarify the Nineteen Fifties, we won’t clarify or perceive something if we see it solely on account of outdoors stress. Such stress undoubtedly existed and undoubtedly performed an enormous function in our nation; nevertheless, I’m satisfied that it additionally chimed with sure inside tendencies bolstered by the resistance.”
4 years later, in his professional opinion on Miroslav Pich-Tůma, a partisan commander and later member of the StB [Czechoslovak secret service – trans.], on trial for crimes dedicated after February 1948, Tesař famous: “By a call of the occasion (as some type of seemingly mystical collective precept), a sure individual of ‘particular form is given the correct, within the curiosity of the occasion, to twist deep-rooted ethical requirements … Typically talking, it’s a tragedy of mankind and of these nations which have participated within the resistance specifically, that the anti-Nazi battle, being a rebellion towards dehumanisation, itself reaffirmed among the inhumane ideas within the apply of the opponents of Nazism.”
In 1969, Tesař additionally wrote: “There’s a direct continuity, one that may even be traced in particular person lives, from the resistance towards Nazism to the set up and upkeep of Czechoslovakia’s Stalinist regime. Nevertheless, that is additionally echoed by the attitudes of a society that was first raped by Nazism, was later gained over to affix the battle towards it and, finally, tailored for the needs of putting in the Stalinist regime and its passive help.” Tesař’s proposition that the legacy of World Battle II, notably the acceptance of political violence as a professional instrument of societal change, contributed to the arrival of Communist dictatorship, revised the reform Communist method to home Stalinism. Tesař argued that the crimes of the Nineteen Fifties weren’t the failure of people or a Soviet import, however fairly a systemic phenomenon with deeper historic roots.
The Serinek inspirations
The arrival of “normalisation” introduced an finish to Tesař’s profession as an expert historian. As early as in 1969 he joined opposition actions geared toward forming a political entrance towards the occupation and the coverage of “consolidation”. Tesař was among the many first activists focused by the Husák regime’s repressive insurance policies. Nevertheless, his determination to maneuver from tutorial research of the occupation and resistance to political motion, with all the implications that this entailed, didn’t imply that he stopped engaged on historic points. As his writing from the Seventies and Nineteen Eighties, in addition to the character of his opposition work from home and in exile, demonstrates, Tesař the activist drew on the expertise of the previous that he had studied in his capability as a historian. The organisation of resistance towards repressive dictatorship, the creation of buildings of an autonomous political society, Czechoslovak statehood and the function of political elites have been notably outstanding themes in his polemical writings within the context of Czechoslovak dissent and exile, in addition to after 1989.
Though Tesař’s return to historiography within the Nineteen Nineties and the noughties occurred by his older writings, Rhapsody, his ultimate work, confirmed that he continued exploring the topic which he had studied within the early years of his profession as a historian, rounding off his lifelong curiosity within the historical past of anti-fascist resistance and partisan warfare. The three-part publication is exceptional not simply by way of its subject material but in addition its methodology. At its core are the recollections of the Romani partisan fighter Josef Serinek, recorded by Tesař in 1963 and 1964, complemented by his intensive editorial notes, which signify a piece of historical past in their very own proper. Within the notes, Tesař corrected and contextualised Serinek’s recollections by drawing on further sources and setting the expertise of 1 explicit agent in historical past within the context of the broader historical past of the area and Czechoslovakia’s anti-fascist resistance.
Half three of The Rhapsody, entitled The Serinek Inspirations, is a historic essay on the character of guerrilla warfare and the query of why it was not higher deployed by the Czechoslovak resistance. Moderately than entertaining the prevailing assumption that the Czech Lands have been geographically unsuited to guerrilla warfare, Tesař examined the character of Czech nationalism statehood and political tradition. He critiqued the restricted understanding of Czechoslovakism among the many Czech political elites, who did not make use of Slovakia as the bottom for extra intensive guerrilla actions – regardless that it supplied not solely appropriate terrain but in addition native anti-fascist forces.
Tesař believed that Czech wartime politicians have been utilizing Czechoslovakism in an opportunistic means, merely writing Slovakia off – simply as did Czech reform communists in 1968, the dissident opposition underneath “normalisation”, and the Czech political elites in the course of the re-emergence of democracy after 1989. The Czech elites’ lack of curiosity within the potential of the Slovak guerrilla motion enabled the Soviets and the communists to name the photographs within the partisan motion within the waning months of the battle, and thus to develop into a key pressure on the highway to Stalinism.
For an emancipatory historiography
In his late work Tesař advocated a cooperation between the strategically considering political elites and autonomous activists in organising resistance towards overseas aggression and authoritarian energy. He didn’t juxtapose an idealised folks’s political activism primarily based on spontaneous actions and progressive political creativity with corrupt or incompetent elites. He merely claimed that for a politics of resistance to be significant, political elites should perceive the significance of grassroots political motion and never hinder its blossoming.
Tesař’s ultimate work is yet one more demonstration of his lifelong understanding of the historian’s function and its social significance. He was empirically thorough, methodologically unconventional and analytically subversive. Moderately than writing tales bolstering and glorifying the powers-that-be, he critiqued and questioned the studying of historical past on which energy is predicated. He argued that you must research what you consider is necessary and what you get pleasure from learning, no matter short-term mental tendencies; to consider the previous within the context of the present-day world and its contradictions; and to practise historic analysis as a scholarly self-discipline with an emancipatory cost, not merely as chilly evaluation but in addition as a social intervention on behalf of the oppressed and people who are weaker. Don’t be provincially narrow-minded; take into accounts long-term and – in immediately’s parlance – world impacts of historic developments, whereas on the identical time anchoring historic analysis in the neighborhood that you simply stay in, and to which you might have a accountability as a scholar and a citizen.
That is how we’d summarise Tesař’s recommendation to historians. Nevertheless, there may be one other lesson that follows from Tesař’s mental evolution: don’t be afraid of unconventionally rethinking and critically reassessing established and acclaimed conclusions. Even on the worth of being improper at instances.
This translation has been supported by the Ministry of Tradition of the Czech Republic
