Abstract
The chapter in the scholarly book focuses on the origins of leisure time and how people learnt to spend it during the interwar Czechoslovakia. and it does so in connection with implementation of 8-hour working day. When the implementation of the 8-hour working day was being discussed, there were discussions about the rest for the body and mind and its benefits to the workers in modern machine production.
The 8-hour working day was supposed to help to reduce morbidity and accident rate of workers, and create space for their self-education and change of lifestyle. Citizens' leisure time was supposed to be productively used by the new Czechoslovak state.
Despite all the declarations remained unorganized for majority of the society. Tramping became the imaginary tip of the iceberg of leisure time.
First tramps escaped to the symbolic "temple of nature". The demand of recreation outdoors as such was widely spread as there was the premise of better performance - for employers and also for the new state.
However, tramps' disorganization and escapism were perceived negatively. Paradoxically, the desire of young people to escape and resist the everyday life could be partially motivated by mass culture represented by the genre of adventures in literature and film, which was considered as garbage by contemporary critics.