Historical Writing in Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary

Abstract

This chapter focuses on historical writing in three central European states—Poland, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia. It looks at the long-term trends and phenomena in historical writing in the region. The first is the coexistence during the immediate post-war years of communist policy, together with more or less nationalistic historical interpretations. The next stage is typified by attempts to control education and research, and to reshape the organizational structure of historiography. An output of both of these phenomena was the ‘final’ or mature Marxist interpretations of Polish, Hungarian, Czech, and Slovak history. The next regional stage to have a considerable impact on the region’s historiography is the ‘golden age’ of the 1960s, when most of the innovative and influential books were published, and historians from East Central Europe came into closer contact with their colleagues from the western part of the continent.