Ferdinand Peroutka (6 February 1895 – 20 April 1978) was a Czech journalist and writer. A prominent political thinker and journalist during the
First Czechoslovak Republic
The First Czechoslovak Republic ( cs, První československá republika, sk, Prvá česko-slovenská republika), often colloquially referred to as the First Republic ( cs, První republika, Slovak: ''Prvá republika''), was the first Czechoslov ...
, Peroutka was persecuted by the
Nazi
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...
regime for his democratic convictions and imprisoned at
Buchenwald concentration camp
Buchenwald (; literally 'beech forest') was a Nazi concentration camp established on hill near Weimar, Germany, in July 1937. It was one of the first and the largest of the concentration camps within Germany's 1937 borders. Many actual or su ...
. Following the
1948 coup by the
Communist Party of Czechoslovakia
The Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (Czech and Slovak: ''Komunistická strana Československa'', KSČ) was a communist and Marxist–Leninist political party in Czechoslovakia that existed between 1921 and 1992. It was a member of the Cominte ...
, he emigrated to both the United Kingdom and later, the United States.
Life
Peroutka was born to a Czech family in
Prague
Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 million people. The city has a temperate ...
in 1895. In 1913 he began his career as a journalist. After World War I, he became an editor-in-chief of a new newspaper ''Tribuna'' ("Tribune"). Some articles published in ''Tribuna'' were later incorporated into books ''Z deníku žurnalistova'' ("Of the Journalist's Diary") and above all ''Jací jsme'' ("What we are like") —in this book Peroutka mapped some myths about the Czech nation.
In 1924 Peroutka passed from ''Tribuna'' to ''
Lidové noviny
''Lidové noviny'' (''People's News'', or ''The People's Newspaper'', ) is a daily newspaper published in Prague, the Czech Republic. It is the oldest Czech daily still in print, and a newspaper of record.[Tomáš Masaryk
Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk (7 March 185014 September 1937) was a Czechoslovak politician, statesman, sociologist, and philosopher. Until 1914, he advocated restructuring the Austro-Hungarian Empire into a federal state. With the help of t ...]
's donation—the magazine ''
Přítomnost'' ("The Presence"). As a commentator he became very influential, standing on the position of the "Castle" (group of President Masaryk) and criticizing both communists and the Right represented by the national-democratic party of the first Czechoslovak prime minister
Karel Kramář
Karel Kramář (27 December 1860 – 26 May 1937) was a Czech politician. He was a representative of the major Czech political party, the Young Czechs, in the Austrian Imperial Council from 1891 to 1915 (where he was also known as Karl Kramarsc ...
. Peroutka expressed his political and other opinions also in several books: ''Boje o dnešek'' ("Fights for Today"), ''Ano a ne'' ("Yes and No"), ''Budování státu'' ("Building of the State") and ''Osobnost, chaos a zlozvyky'' ("Personality, Chaos and Bad Habits"). As a representative of the Czech democratic tradition, Peroutka was arrested after the outbreak of World War II in 1939 and held in the
Buchenwald
Buchenwald (; literally 'beech forest') was a Nazi concentration camp established on hill near Weimar, Germany, in July 1937. It was one of the first and the largest of the concentration camps within Germany's 1937 borders. Many actual or su ...
concentration camp until 1945. He was offered freedom on the condition that he would serve as editor of a collaborationist ''Přítomnost''; he refused and spent the whole of the war in Buchenwald.
After liberation, Peroutka became editor-in-chief of the newspaper ''Svobodné noviny'' and refounded his famous magazine, ''Přítomnost'', under the name ''Dnešek'' ("Today"). The journal became prominent through its critical stance on postwar violence committed on the German minority and hundreds of alleged collaborators. Nonetheless it also fit the general pattern of the time by hosting illusory views of the Communist party underestimating its totalitarian pretensions. Peroutka wrote two dramas: ''Oblak a valčík'' ("The Cloud and the Waltz") and ''Štastlivec Sula'' ("Sula the Happy Man"). Political articles Peroutka issued in the book ''Tak nebo tak'' ("One Way Or Another").
In 1945–1946, Peroutka was also a member of the Provisional National Assembly for the
Czechoslovak National Social Party
Czech National Social Party (Czech: ''Česká strana národně sociální'', ČSNS) is a civic nationalist political party in the Czech Republic, that once played an important role in Czechoslovakia during the interwar period. It was established ...
.
He sat in parliament until the parliamentary elections in 1946. The
1948 Czechoslovak coup d'état
In late February 1948, the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, with Soviet backing, assumed undisputed control over the government of Czechoslovakia. It marked the onset of four decades of the party's rule in the country., sk, Február 1948) or ...
caused Peroutka to decide to emigrate. In 1951 he became a director of the Czech division of
Radio Free Europe
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) is a United States government funded organization that broadcasts and reports news, information, and analysis to countries in Eastern Europe, Central Asia, Caucasus, and the Middle East where it says tha ...
. The summa of his democratic life views was issued in 1959 as ''Democratic Manifesto''.
Peroutka also became a novelist in exile. He re-wrote his drama to the novel of the same name. The second novel, ''Pozdější život Panny'' ("The Later Life of the Virgin"), deals with the idea of the rescue of
Joan of Arc
Joan of Arc (french: link=yes, Jeanne d'Arc, translit= an daʁk} ; 1412 – 30 May 1431) is a patron saint of France, honored as a defender of the French nation for her role in the siege of Orléans and her insistence on the coronati ...
. Peroutka's last drama was named ''Kdybych se ještě jednou narodil'' ("If I Was Born One More Time").
References
External links
The Ferdinand Peroutka papersare available at the Hoover Institution Archives
{{DEFAULTSORT:Peroutka, Ferdinand
1895 births
1978 deaths
Writers from Prague
People from the Kingdom of Bohemia
Czech National Social Party politicians
Members of the Interim National Assembly of Czechoslovakia
Czech journalists
20th-century Czech dramatists and playwrights
Czech male dramatists and playwrights
Czechoslovak emigrants to the United States
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty people
Recipients of the Order of Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk
Buchenwald concentration camp survivors
20th-century male writers
Burials at Vyšehrad Cemetery
20th-century journalists