Without a foothold

Philosopher František Novosád regrets in the liberal weekly newspaper Týždeň the comparatively minor influence of Slovakian intellectuals on daily life: "In the 20th century the elites here were all but completely replaced every twenty years. There was no continuity. ... The intellectuals in Poland or Russia have a firmer foothold. No matter what the regime did to Russian intellectuals, they always had Dostoevsky and Tolstoy in their minds and so they saw the world with different eyes. ... In addition, Slovakian intellectuals see it as their duty to be extremely critical and to destroy all the myths they encounter. They have an extremely destructive nature. That is because of the discontinuity. A university, for example, needs 50 or 60 years to function well. And it needs three or four generations of professors who can build on the work of their predecessors."

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