Author focuses on conception of world as simultaneously constituted and lived by humans in the thought of Karel Kosík and Erazim Kohák. He seeks first an overall interpretation of the thought of Karel Kosík which would bridge the apparent gap between his early Marxist thought and his later essayistic critique of modern age. He comes to the conclusion that both phases of Kosík’s thought share substantive traits and even that Kosík’s later criticism of global capitalism is possible only on the foundations laid in his early works. Susequently the author presents phenomenologically oriented thought of Erazim Kohák which in spite of differences in overall philosophical framework manifests numerous parallels with Kosík’s thought. In Kohák’s work the author traces the problem of values and of valuing in general. On that basis he then analyses Kohák’s idea of home and offers it as a possible answer to the question of anchoring and orientating of lived experience in the dynamics of a world constituted by human being and living.
The contribution will focus on the philosophical conception of cultural and national identity of Erazim Kohák and journalistic thinking of the history of Pavel Tigrid in 20th century. In both cases, the aim is to find the concept of national identity. Kohák formulated his concept clearly and peculiarly in the book Hearth and Horizon (2009), Pavel Tigrid somewhat indefinitely in the book Pocket Guide of an Intelligent Woman After Her Destiny (1988). Both authors were political exiles after February 1948. In terms of opposition to the Communist regime, Kohák and Tigrid represent not only prominent figures, but also a sample of diversity, which was characterized by anti-communist exile.
Author seeks to analyse crucial role of metaphor in Erazim Kohák’s The Embers and the Stars and other works in English. She rejects conventional interpretation of metaphors as deviant usage and examines Kohák’s use in terms of the theories of Lakoff and Johnson, pointing out that Kohák purposefully uses metaphors to forge patterns of meaning which render experience intelligible. Tus he is able to interpret the experience of the sacred not as description of alternative reality but as encounter with transcendental meaning of ordinary experience.