Page:The Spirit of Russia by T G Masaryk, volume 1.pdf/11

Rh The Spirit of Russia has been elected first president of the Czecho-Slovak republic.

An account of the origin of the study of Russia now presented to the English-speaking world may best be given in the author's own words.

"When the Russo-Japanese War and the revolution of 1905 increased the general interest in Russia, acquaintances of mine who knew that I had made a special study of that country suggested that I should write on the subject. I therefore published in the 'Oesterreichische Rundschau' an article giving a detailed account of the intimate connection between the revolution and Russian literature; and I also wrote reviews of the books then recently published by Mackenzie Wallace, Ular, Konni, Kropotkin, Petrov, Reissner, and Brückner. When reading these works I conceived the idea of elucidating the nature of the Russian revolution, and of discussing the Russian problem as a whole, in a study of Dostoevskii. The attempt, however, proved unsuccessful, for while making it I came to realize that it would be impossible to do justice to Dostoevskii without discussing his predecessors and successors, and that this would involve the consideration of the chief problems of the history of Russian literature, of the religious and philosophical thought of that country, indeed, of Russian literature in general.

"From youth onwards I had been greatly interested in Russia, my study of the country having begun with its literature. Contenting myself first with translations and subsequently learning Russian, from the study of Russian authors I acquired a knowledge of the country which I then endeavoured to amplify by reading history etc. and by visits to the Russian empire.

"The aim of the present work is to furnish an understanding of Russia from the inside, through the instrumentality of Russian literature; and since I have long paid especial attention to Dostoevskii and to his analysis of Russia, what I write about Dostoevskii is the core of the undertaking.

"Properly speaking, the entire study is devoted to Dostoevskii, but I lacked the literary skill requisite for the interweaving of all I wanted to say into an account of that author. The work has therefore been subdivided. The first part, that which I now publish, contains an account of the philosophy of history