Page 43 - Potocco, Marcello, ed. 2018. Literatura v preseku družbe, družba v preseku literature. The Crossroads of Literature and Social Praxis. Zbornik povzetkov. Book of Abstracts. Koper: Založba Univerze na Primorskem
P. 43
rei Terian the crossroads of literature and social praxis, ljubljana, 2018 41
Lucian Blaga University of Sibiu
Recoding Modernism in Romanian Literary Culture
during ‘Liberal’ Communism
This paper explores how the Romanian literature and criticism of
the ‘liberal’-communist era (1964-1971) recovered and, more im
portantly, recoded modernism. To this end, my study uses as a
benchmark the development of late modernism in Western liter
atures (c. 1945-1965), as a radical, experimental, often conceptual
and ‘committed’ form of art. Conversely, the emergence of social
ist realism interrupted the evolution of modernism across East Eu
ropean literatures; for example, in Romanian literature, the rejec
tion of modernism sparked several harsh press campaigns between
1956-1958. Yet, despite these attempts, modernism was recovered
in Romania over the 1960s, in two ways: first, by rediscovering the
modernist tradition of interwar Romanian literature, and second,
by practicing and supporting ‘neo-modernist’ literature that sought
to (re)synchronize itself with Western cultures. However, the main
thesis of my paper is that, if in Western literatures late modernism
served as a tactic of challenging the establishment and causing po
litical disruption, Romanian neomodernism functioned rather as a
way of legitimizing social cohesion and, in particular, the post-Sta
linist ideological system; although neomodernism was launched as
a subversive tool (i.e. as a weapon against socialist realism), its re
coding in a ‘humanist’ and purely ‘aesthetic’ key soon suppressed its
political and ideological potential.
Lucian Blaga University of Sibiu
Recoding Modernism in Romanian Literary Culture
during ‘Liberal’ Communism
This paper explores how the Romanian literature and criticism of
the ‘liberal’-communist era (1964-1971) recovered and, more im
portantly, recoded modernism. To this end, my study uses as a
benchmark the development of late modernism in Western liter
atures (c. 1945-1965), as a radical, experimental, often conceptual
and ‘committed’ form of art. Conversely, the emergence of social
ist realism interrupted the evolution of modernism across East Eu
ropean literatures; for example, in Romanian literature, the rejec
tion of modernism sparked several harsh press campaigns between
1956-1958. Yet, despite these attempts, modernism was recovered
in Romania over the 1960s, in two ways: first, by rediscovering the
modernist tradition of interwar Romanian literature, and second,
by practicing and supporting ‘neo-modernist’ literature that sought
to (re)synchronize itself with Western cultures. However, the main
thesis of my paper is that, if in Western literatures late modernism
served as a tactic of challenging the establishment and causing po
litical disruption, Romanian neomodernism functioned rather as a
way of legitimizing social cohesion and, in particular, the post-Sta
linist ideological system; although neomodernism was launched as
a subversive tool (i.e. as a weapon against socialist realism), its re
coding in a ‘humanist’ and purely ‘aesthetic’ key soon suppressed its
political and ideological potential.
