Dénesi Tamás (szerk.): Collectanea Sancti Martini - A Pannonhalmi Főapátság Gyűjteményeinek Értesítője 5. (Pannonhalma, 2017)
II. Közlemények
196 Vajda Tamás: Várkonyi Hildebrand a szegedi egyetemen (1929–1940) Tamás Vajda A Benedictine monk and professor of psychology: Hildebrand Dezső Várkonyi at the University of Szeged (1929–1940) Dezső Várkonyi is the founder of researches in modern child psychology in Hungary. He joined the Benedictine Order under his mother’s influence after the school-leav-ing examination. It was then that he assumed the name Hildebrand. As a second -ary-school teacher of Latin and philosophy, acquired a doctoral degree in philosophy and pedagogy, then taught philosophy and pedagogy at the college of the Order in Pannonhalma between 1912 and 1923. He was a privat-docent at the University of Pécs from 1923, and the director of the university library. In the academic year of 1928/29, with a state grant, he studied philosophy and psychology at the Sorbonne in Paris. Then he got the mastery of the methods of studying modern child psychol-ogy, due to which Hildebrand Várkonyi’s interest increasingly turned to psychology based on experimental and scientific foundations instead of theoretical pedagogy based on philosophy. Upon the advice of Kunó Klebelsberg, the Regent appointed him to a professorship at the Department of Educational Psychology, University of Szeged on 18 December 1929. Subsequently, he exerted his work of modern scholarship in Szeged until 1940. His research interest concentrated on questions of psychology laying the founda-tion of education. He established a laboratory of psychology in 1931. In the labora -tory of equipped with modern instruments, many talented students of his became committed to experimental pedagogy and educational psychology for life. In the summer of 1936, he started organising a new, co-educational, experimental primary school. Várkonyi met the expenses of the Garden School launched in Újszeged from his income as a university professor and dean. Owing to his comprehensive work, Professor Várkonyi was popular among university students and teachers in schools, as well. He frequently delivered lectures forming new points of view on different occasions of further training for teachers and meetings of pedagogical societies. His appointment to the University of Szeged was due to the ability of the Catholic Church to enforce interests, however, he scarcely complied with the requirements of the idea of a monk, his appearance in lay attire, his style of lecturing, and the crisis of his private life raised a scandal in the eyes of many. His inconsistent relationship to the Church and monastic life finally led him to leave the Order in January 1948. His extremely rich academic work of organising education and scholarship, and his exemplary public activity has been duly appreciated only recently.
