Po stopách „krvavých průvodců“ Jiřího Padevěta
In the footprints of the “bloody guidebooks” by Jiří Padevět

Summary/Abstract: Padevět, Jiří: Krvavé finále: Jaro 1945 v českých zemích. Prague: Academia,2015, 691 pp., ISBN 978-80-200-2464-0; Padevět, Jiří: Krvavé léto 1945: Poválečné násilí v českých zemích. Prague: Academia,2016, 692 pp., ISBN 978-80-200-2600-2. Both publications (The Bloody Finals: The spring of 1945 in the Czech Lands and The Bloody Summer of 1945: Post-war violence in the Czech Lands) are extensive historical textual-and-pictorial guidebooks mapping the geography of violence in the Czech Lands in the end of the Second World War and shortly thereafter, and as such fit well into the broader portfolio of works of this type written by Jiří Padevět. In the reviewer’s opinion, the books are primarily intended as documentary, popularization and educational publications and therefore lack many attributes of a regular historical work, but their reflections in the media and society, which make their author a respected authority in the interpretation of modern Czech history, justify and perhaps even necessitate subjecting the books to a critical review. While fully respecting the author’s intentions and motives, which aim at a remedial selfreflection of the nation’s past and which he has obviously succeeded to achieve,there is one outstanding problem, namely that the books do not contain any definition of the genre selected by the author and its principles; the same applies to the theoretico-methodological basis. In addition, they neither contain an adequate reflection of previous research results nor provide an adequate publishing service and give up any attempt at an interpretation. In the reviewer’s opinion, the guidebooks lack relevant instructions for use and a key allowing the reader to evaluate the accumulated empirical information they contain. The reviewer further focuses on whether and how the two books advance historical knowledge, the questions they open, what they bring from the viewpoint of historical culture, and on their editorial and publishing quality.

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