Democracy and Myth in Russia and Eastern Europe (Basees Routledge Series on Russian and East European Studies)

Democracy and Myth in Russia and Eastern Europe

In the absence of democratic state institutions, Eastern European countries were considered to possess only myths of democracy. Working on the premise that democracy is not only an institutional arrangement but also a civilisational project, this book argues that mythical narratives help to understand the emergence of democracy without ‘democrats’. Examining different national traditions as well as pre-communist and communist narratives, myths are seen as politically fabricated ‘programmes of truth’ that form and sustain the political imagination. Appearing as cultural, literary, or historical resources, myths amount to ideology in narrative form, which actors use in political struggles for the sake of achieving social compliance with and loyalty to the authority of new political forms. Drawing on a wide range of case studies including Ukraine, Russia, Poland, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia, this book argues that narratives about the past are not simply legacies of former regimes but have actively shaped representations and meanings of democracy in the region. Taking different theoretical and methodological approaches, the power of myth is explored for issues such as OHDGHUVKLSFROOHFWLYHLGHQWLW\IRUPDWLRQOLWHUDU\UHSUHVHQWDWLRQRIKHURLF¿JXUHV cultural symbolism in performative art as well as for the constitution of legitimacy and civic identity in post-communist democracies. Alexander Wöll teaches Czech and Russian at the University of Oxford, where he lectures in the Sub-Faculty of Russian and Other Slavonic Languages and at University College. He is the author of Doubles: Mirror-writing, stone monument and usurpation (1999) and Jakub Deml: Life and work – a study in Middle European literature (2006). Harald Wydra teaches Politics at the University of Cambridge, where he is a Fellow of St Catharine’s College. He is the author of Continuities in Poland’s permanent transition (2001) and Communism and the Emergence of Democracy (2007).

BASEES/Routledge series on Russian and East European studies Series editor: Richard Sakwa Department of Politics and International Relations, University of Kent Editorial Committee: Julian Cooper, Centre for Russian and East European Studies, University of Birmingham Terry Cox, Department of Central and East European Studies, University of Glasgow Rosalind Marsh, Department of European Studies and Modern Languages, University of Bath David Moon, Department of History, University of Durham Hilary Pilkington, Department of Sociology, University of Warwick Stephen White, Department of Politics, University of Glasgow Founding Editorial Committee Member: George Blazyca, Centre for Contemporary European Studies, University of Paisley This series is published on behalf of BASEES (the British Association for Slavonic and East European Studies). The series comprises original, highquality, research-level work by both new and established scholars on all aspects of Russian, Soviet, post-Soviet and East European Studies in humanities and social science subjects. 1 Ukraine’s Foreign and Security Policy, 1991–2000 Roman Wolczuk

5 Political Elites and the New Russia Anton Steen

2 Political Parties in the Russian Regions Derek S. Hutcheson

6 Dostoevsky and the Idea of Russianness Sarah Hudspith

3 Local Communities and Post-Communist Transformation Edited by Simon Smith

7 Performing Russia – Folk Revival and Russian Identity Laura J. Olson

4 Repression and Resistance in Communist Europe J.C. Sharman

8 Russian Transformations Edited by Leo McCann

9 Soviet Music and Society under Lenin and Stalin The baton and sickle Edited by Neil Edmunds 10 State Building in Ukraine The Ukrainian parliament, 1990–2003 Sarah Whitmore 11 Defending Human Rights in Russia Sergei Kovalyov, dissident and Human Rights Commissioner, 1969–2003 Emma Gilligan 12 Small-Town Russia Postcommunist livelihoods and identities: a portrait of the intelligentsia in Achit, Bednodemyanovsk and Zubtsov, 1999–2000 Anne White

17 Soviet Dissent and Russia’s Transition to Democracy Dissident legacies Robert Horvath 18 Russian and Soviet Film Adaptations of Literature, 1900–2001 Screening the word Edited by Stephen Hutchings and Anat Vernitski 19 Russia as a Great Power Dimensions of security under Putin Edited by Jakob Hedenskog, Vilhelm Konnander, Bertil Nygren, Ingmar Oldberg and Christer Pursiainen 20 Katyn and the Soviet Massacre of 1940 Truth, justice and memory George Sanford

13 Russian Society and the Orthodox Church Religion in Russia after communism Zoe Knox

21 Conscience, Dissent and Reform in Soviet Russia Philip Boobbyer

14 Russian Literary Culture in the Camera Age The word as image Stephen Hutchings

22 The Limits of Russian Democratisation Emergency powers and states of emergency Alexander N. Domrin

15 Between Stalin and Hitler Class war and race war on the Dvina, 1940–46 Geoffrey Swain 16 Literature in Post-Communist Russia and Eastern Europe The Russian, Czech and Slovak ¿FWLRQRIWKH&KDQJHV± Rajendra A. Chitnis

23 The Dilemmas of Destalinisation A social and cultural history of reform in the Khrushchev era Edited by Polly Jones 24 News Media and Power in Russia Olessia Koltsova

25 Post-Soviet Civil Society Democratization in Russia and the Baltic States Anders Uhlin

31 Western Intellectuals and the Soviet Union, 1920–40 From Red Square to the Left Bank Ludmila Stern

26 The Collapse of Communist Power in Poland Jacqueline Hayden

32 The Germans of the Soviet Union Irina Mukhina

27 Television, Democracy and Elections in Russia Sarah Oates

33 Re-constructing the Post-Soviet Industrial Region The Donbas in transition Edited by Adam Swain

28 Russian Constitutionalism Historical and contemporary development Andrey N. Medushevsky 29 Late Stalinist Russia Society between reconstruction and reinvention Edited by Juliane Fürst 30 The Transformation of Urban Space in Post-Soviet Russia Konstantin Axenov, Isolde Brade and Evgenij Bondarchuk

34 Chechnya – Russia’s ‘War on Terror’ John Russell 35 The New Right in the New Europe Czech transformation and rightZLQJSROLWLFV± Seán Hanley 36 Democracy and Myth in Russia and Eastern Europe Edited by Alexander Wöll and Harald Wydra

Democracy and Myth in Russia and Eastern Europe

Edited by Alexander Wöll and Harald Wydra

)LUVWSXEOLVKHG by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 270 Madison Ave, New York, NY 10016

This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2007. “To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.” Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business ‹6HOHFWLRQDQGHGLWRULDOPDWWHU$OH[DQGHU:|OODQG+DUDOG:\GUD individual chapters, the contributors All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data A catalog record for this book has been requested

ISBN 0-203-93466-0 Master e-book ISBN ,6%1;KEN ISBN10: 0-203-93466-0 (ebk) ,6%1KEN ,6%1HEN

To Dominik A.W. To my parents H.W.

Contents

Notes on contributors Preface and acknowledgements Introduction: democracy in Eastern Europe – myth and reality

xi xiii

1

HARALD WYDRA

PART I

Leadership, communism, and identity-formation 1 Mythology and the Trickster: interpreting communism

25 27

AGNES HORVATH

2 The non-being of communism and myths of democratisation

45

ARPAD SZAKOLCZAI

3 The power of second reality: communist myths and representations of democracy

60

HARALD WYDRA

PART II

Literature and representations of democracy

77

  µ0D]HSD¶DVDV\PEROLF¿JXUHRI8NUDLQLDQDXWRQRP\

79

THOMAS GROB

5 Misoteutonic myths: lopping noses in Hussite nationalism and love’s sweet cure ROBERT B. PYNSENT



x

Contents 6 The myth of the dialogue of myths: Russia and Europe

122

WALTER KOSCHMAL

7 Myths and democratic attitudes in Poland and Russia: an intermedial comparison

141

ALEXANDER WÖLL

PART III

Myths, legitimacy, and civic identity in post-communist democracies 8 Contested traditions? The usage of three national holidays in contemporary Hungary

167

169

HEINO NYYSSÖNEN

9 The paradox of infra-liberalism: towards a genealogy of ‘managed democracy’ in Putin’s Russia



SERGEI PROZOROV

10 Myth and democratic identity in Russia

203

RICHARD SAKWA

Index

219

Contributors

Thomas Grob teaches Slavonic studies at the Universities of Konstanz (Germany) and St Gallen (Switzerland). He is the author of Daniil Kharms’ unkindliche Kindlichkeit (1994) and Russian Post-Romanticism (forthcoming). Agnes Horvath teaches Political Anthropology at the Università Cattolica of Milan. She is the author of various articles dealing with transitory situations DQG¿JXUHVDQGFRDXWKRUHGWZRERRNVRQFRPPXQLVWSRZHU  Walter Koschmal is Professor of Slavonic Studies and Head of Department of Slavic Philology at the University of Regensburg, where he is also the Chairman of the interdisciplinary research centre Europaeum. Heino Nyyssönen teaches at the University of Jyväskylä, Finland. Currently he works at the Academy of Finland and also in Budapest. He is the author of The Presence of the Past in Politics: ‘1956’ after 1956 in Hungary (1999). Sergei Prozorov is Professor of International Relations at Petrozavodsk State University. He is the author of three books, the most recent being Foucault, Freedom and Sovereignty (2007) and a number of articles on political philosophy and international relations. Robert Pynsent is Professor of Czech and Slovak Literature at University College London (School of Slavonic and East European Studies). He is author or editor of seventeen books and some eighty articles in academic journals. He is under contract to write a history of Czech literary histories and a book on the ‘Czech idea’ from the Middle Ages to the present. Richard Sakwa is Professor of Russian and European Politics at the University of Kent. His recent books include Putin: Russia’s choice (2004) and Chechnya: From past to future (2005) (editor and contributor). His current research interests focus on problems of democratic development in Russia and other post-Soviet states. Arpad Szakolczai is Professor of Sociology at University College, Cork. His publications include The Dissolution of Communist PowerZLWK$JQHV

xii

Contributors Horvath), Max Weber and Michel Foucault  5HÀH[LYH+LVWRULFDO6RFLR logy (2000), The Genesis of Modernity (2003), and Sociology, Religion and Grace (2007).

Alexander Wöll teaches Czech and Russian at the University of Oxford, where he lectures in the Sub-Faculty of Russian and Other Slavonic Languages and at University College. He is the author of Doubles: Mirror-writing, stone monument and usurpation (1999) and Jakub Deml: Life and work – a study in Middle European literature (2006). Harald Wydra teaches Politics at the University of Cambridge, where he is a Fellow of St Catharine’s College. He is the author of Continuities in Poland’s Permanent Transition (2001) and Communism and the Emergence of Democracy (2007).

Preface and acknowledgements

Two main intuitions were at the root of this project. On the one hand, we were TXLWH XQVDWLV¿HG ZLWK WKH LQVWLWXWLRQDOLVW DFFRXQWV RI GHPRFUDWLVDWLRQ WKDW KDYH dominated the social science literature on post-communist Eastern Europe throughout the 1990s. In our view, the dominant paradigm of democratic transition and consolidation did not really grasp the predicament of countries in deep transformation. We were suspicious of its quasi-mythical status of a politically non-negotiable programme of truth, which would be the only acceptable interpretation of political change. On the other hand, we sensed that understanding the realities of democracy in the region would require transcending the standard tools applied to the processes of institutional differentiation in democratic systems. Acknowledging the importance of literature, culture, and history for shaping the political and social imagination in the region, we undertook the analytical connection between democracy and myth. In our view, mythological conVWUXFWLRQVRIUHDOLW\KDYHEHHQSROLWLFDOO\HIIHFWLYHDVWKH\LQÀXHQFHGGHPRFUDWLF visions and aspirations before the fall of communism, but have also been constiWXWLYHIRUWKHSROLWLFDOLPDJLQDWLRQDIWHU Quite a few of the contributions in this volume emanate from the conference ‘Myth and Democracy in eastern Europe’, held in late October 2002 at the University of Regensburg. This conference brought together political scientists, scholars of literary studies, sociologists, anthropologists, and historians with the objective to gauge the relationship between mythical narratives and representations of democracy, both under communism and in contemporary contexts, in different countries of the region. We acknowledge the valuable and committed assistance of Rita Jeromin and Irina Wenzel in organising the conference. We also appreciate the generous support by the Hans-Vielberth Foundation and the Thyssen Foundation. Finally, we would like to thank Mathias Marquard for his research assistance in editing all of the manuscripts. $OH[DQGHU:|OODQG+DUDOG:\GUD Oxford and Cambridge

Introduction Democracy in Eastern Europe – myth and reality Harald Wydra

Introduction Democracy and myth are not obvious companions. Many political scientists understand by democracy the institutionally organised competition for power in states where representatives of the people act inside the constitutionally guaranteed boundaries of the rule of law. Political decision-making in a representative democracy relies upon the division of labour between an elite of professional politicians, whose exercise of authority is contingent on the consent of voters. Thus, democratic politics depends on the institutionalisation of uncertainty, which is bounded by a framework of rules and norms. This dominant view of democratic politics would exclude myth, which is seen as apolitical or, at best, SUHSROLWLFDO7KHV\PEROLFQDWXUHRIP\WKGRHVQRW¿WZHOOWKHZRUOGRILQWHUHVW based and institutionally designed power politics. Myth refers to strong stories WKDW DUH ¿UPO\ EHOLHYHG E\ SHRSOH EHFDXVH WKH\ JURXQG WKH RULJLQ RI UHOLJLRQ culture, a people, or a nation in unmovable certainties about the past. Tinged with subjectivity, irrationality, and relative to individual cultures, myth is at odds with universally applicable criteria such as party competition, legal frames for democratic accountability, economic performance, or levels of freedom according to which democracy as a systemic arrangement is often measured. Myths may be used in political rhetoric as discursive resources in order to shape social attitudes but due to their idealism they seem to be averse to controversy, and, therefore, have no place in interest-based politics. With its tendency to defend one non-contingent truth, myth appears to be openly anti-democratic. Eastern European political history makes the connection of these two concepts appear even more paradoxical. Until the recent wave of democratisation DIWHUGHPRFUDWLFSROLWLFVZDVFRQVSLFXRXVE\LWVDEVHQFHLQWKLVSDUWRIWKH world. Although forms of totalitarian democracy or people’s democracy were central to the legitimisation of communist rule, the practices of Soviet-type regimes were monopolistic and undemocratic. This lack of democratic experience has largely been associated with authoritarian practices of power that supported ethnic against civic, romantic against enlightened, or idealist against realist conceptions of politics. The pervasiveness of essentialist approaches to nation, ethnicity, or the people precluded practices of democratic government in

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WHUPV RI LQWHUHVWEDVHGFRQÀLFWUHVROXWLRQ:KLOH5XVVLD EHIRUH  SURGXFHG ‘sham constitutionalism’, Eastern Europe saw failed democratic experiments in the inter-war period. Communist power in Russia and in Eastern Europe after UHOLHGXSRQFRQVWLWXWLRQDOP\WKVFXOWVRISHUVRQDOLW\DQGWKHGRJPDWLVP of Marxism–Leninism, as well as the eschatological myth of a transition to communism. The relevant literature on democratisation in post-communist Eastern Europe has not only concealed this paradox but used it for the sake of imposing its programme of truth. Democratisation was reduced to the institutionalisation of interest-based party politics, guided by the interests and the knowledge of enlightened elites who would craft, develop, and consolidate democracy. After  WKH SDUDGLJP RI µWUDQVLWLRQ WR GHPRFUDF\¶ KDV DVVXPHG D TXDVL mythical character in as far as the idea of its establishment by design has become politically non-negotiable. Despite extended criticism, the concept of transition KDV PDLQWDLQHG FRQVLGHUDEOH LQÀXHQFH ZKLFK LV UHÀHFWHG LQ WKH P\ULDG ZRUNV WKDW GHSORUH GHIHFWLYH GHUDLOHG LQFRPSOHWH XQ¿QLVKHG RU IDLOHG GHPRFUDFLHV By identifying the ‘West’ as the place of origin of democratic universalism, the complex social and narrative construction of the concept of democracy is simpli¿HG5DWKHUWKDQSD\LQJWULEXWHWRWKHLQWULFDFLHVRILWVKLVWRULFDOEHFRPLQJFRPSDUDWLYHUHVHDUFKDI¿UPVRQHGRPLQDQWVRFLDOLGHQWLW\WKDWDSSHDUVWLPHOHVVDQG excludes competing alternatives. The underlying idea of this book is to examine how the role of culture and discourse can account for the paradox of the victory of democracy without democrats. This volume works on the premise that mythical narratives have shaped meanings of democracy in Eastern Europe. The impact of myths was crucial for the self-representation of countries in the region as democratic but also tangible in the creation of the image of Western democracy that cast a spell on the popular imagination in Eastern Europe. Rather than following the stereotypical divide between democratic West and non-democratic East, the engagement of imagination and myth also applies to what Westerners think about Easterners and to inter-regional discourses among different regions and intellectual traditions in Central and South-east Europe, and Russia. A recent study, Making Capitalism without Capitalists, has argued that post-communist societies not only developed new forms of capitalism but that this new experience also forces us to reconsider classical approaches to capitalism (Eyal et al. 1999). In the absence of a class of private proprietors in Central Europe under communism, a different social strata, the cultural bourgeoisie (Bildungsbürgertum), assumed the historic mission of building a capitalist economic order. Capitalism entered Eastern Europe not through a professional elite but by way of humanistically oriented intellectuals. Often socially unattached, they would use the power of strong stories about the uneven modernisation of Eastern Europe in a push for the Westernisation of forms of economic production. Contextualising how narratives emerge in social settings of disruption and crisis makes myths appear as deliberate political programmes aiming to shape the social imagination. To use a term coined by Bruce Lincoln, myths are ‘ideol-

Introduction 3 RJ\LQQDUUDWLYHIRUP¶5DWKHUWKDQGH¿QLQJP\WKRQHVKRXOGOLPLWRQHVHOIWRWKH observation that myth denotes a style of narrative discourse and its attendant VSHFL¿F LQVWDQFHV /LQFROQ  L[  7KH LQÀXHQFH RU SRZHU RI P\WK FDQ EH strongly positive, such as when denoting primordial truths or sacred stories of origins, but also used negatively, standing for lies or obsolete world views. Unlike autocratic power, political authority in democracies cannot be maintained without an ongoing quest for legitimacy. Mythical narratives are a crucial device for legitimising systems of symbolic world-maintenance. As the novus ordo saecolorum in the founding of the United States of America or the powerful myth of the French Revolutions indicate, nascent republics invoke their own origins and the need for beginnings. While constitutions and declarations of rights are supposed to regulate the normative and procedural aspects of the workings of a democratic system, they are often also articles of faith. Postcommunist countries celebrated founding elections but also went through shock WKHUDSLHV RU DWWHPSWV DW SXUL¿FDWLRQ ZKLFK LV LOOXVWUDWHG E\ WKH ULWXDOOLNH ODQguage of lustration. The recent process of drafting a constitution for Europe revealed the tight relationship between the search for constitutive beginnings and WKHSUDJPDWLFUHDOLVPRIGHPRFUDWLFFRQVWLWXWLRQEXLOGLQJ7KH¿UVWGUDIWRIWKH preamble to the Constitution for Europe in May 2003 expressed the desire to root the future European democracy in its Greek origins by using Pericles’ funeral oration as recorded by Thucydides (Canfora 2004: 11–16). It stated that ‘our constitution is called democracy because power is in the hands not of a minority but of the entire people’.1 The convention was driven by the commonVHQVHLGHDWKDW*UHHFHLQYHQWHGGHPRFUDF\EXWFRXOGQRW¿QGPXFKVXSSRUWIRU democracy in philosophers such as Plato or Demosthenes and, therefore, turned to Thucydides. However, Thucydides’ portrayal of Pericles stresses that what ZDV QRPLQDOO\ FDOOHG D GHPRFUDF\ LQ UHDOLW\ ZDV D JRYHUQPHQW RI WKH ¿UVW citizen (pròtos anèr). While the funeral oration acknowledged that the power emanating from the majority does not abolish liberty, the idealisation of democracy in the draft constitution as the power of the entire people distorted and falsi¿HGWKHRULJLQDODFFRXQW This example of how democrats use mythical representations of the ‘origin’ of democracy is instructive for two main reasons. On the one hand, the very idea of origin commands more authority than historical accuracy. Beyond mere political correctness one submits to the creation myth of Western civilisation, according to which all good comes from Greece, where the transition from mythos to logos occurred, standing for progress, science, and rationality. On the other hand, the crucial attribute of myth is not to make disappear but to distort (Barthes  /LNHDOOP\WKPDNHUVGHPRFUDWVEHOLHYLQJLQWKHWUXWKRIDQRULJLQ of their constitutional form (Greece invented democracy) tend to make their VWRU\µIDOVL¿FDWLRQSURRI¶E\SURMHFWLQJDQLPDJHRIWKHSDVWDVµQDWXUDO¶LQRUGHU to make it instrumental for the present. Thus, the mythopoeia of stories and meta-narratives provided by democrats is not limited to metaphors. The story of liberal democracy in the West could not have become the dominant programme of organising power in states, had democrats not backed up their practices with

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‘ideology in narrative form’. Democratic states legitimised their own system internally but also turned these practices and knowledge of them into programmes of ‘truth’ to be defended against the outside. Although tentative and provisional in their interpretations of pasts and potential futures, the chapters in this volume share a common concern for the historicity of a concept’s nature and for understanding political reality by the KHUPHQHXWLFDO DFFRXQW RI WKH IRUPDWLRQ RI PHDQLQJ &KDEDO DQG 'DOR]  Wydra 2007). Using various approaches to myth, all contributions insist that myth-making as the fabrication of strongly structured stories has a rationality of its own. Writers, historians, politicians, or scholars simplify contested visions of political goals, social crisis, or existential uncertainty because they want to create loyalty, belonging, and social identity. Part I consists of a number of chapters that use the prism of comparative mythology and symbolic politics to examine the interplays between communism and democracy from a perspective of leadership, political spirituality, and identity-formation. Taking the cases of the Czech lands, Russia, and Poland, Part II examines how literature expresses culturally and historically grown social imaginations of inside and outside, as well as of self-representations as democratic. Part III comprises a number of chapters that look at how post-communist democracies use myth for the sake of legitimisation and the creation of civic identity.  7KLVLQWURGXFWLRQDGGUHVVHVWKUHHLVVXHV,QD¿UVWVWHSLWRXWOLQHVDFRQFHSWRI myth that questions its apolitical nature. Myth as ideology in narrative form draws on the fabrication of knowledge out of social strife and political struggles, aiming to maintain social identities against ‘enemies’ but also to create reality by constitutive imagination. Such practices of the constitutive imagination are anthropological constants used by democrats in democratic systems and by states that rely upon authoritarian practices. In a second step, this introduction outlines how the story of democracy has been characterised by shifts in meaning of the concepts, often marked by violent transitions and performative symbolisations of individual leaders in reactions to these. The post-war theorisation of democracy as inaugurated by Schumpeter developed a master-narrative for purposes of shaping and defending social identities and power arrangements. While it was a response to the manipulative power of myths used by the totalitarian regimes of fascism and Bolshevism, its effect under the conditions of the Cold War was to turn the Western version of democracy into an ‘ideology in narrative form’, which became an empire of the mind for many Eastern Europeans. In a third step, it is intended to problematise the reciprocities between East and West. The lack of democrats in the accepted Western sense of the word was offset by a powerful imagination where internal narratives about national traditions of collective identity and self-government became allied with representations of democracy as a realm of freedom from communist rule. Deprived of representative forms of democracy, the power of constitutive imagination made people desire what they conceived as an elsewhere reality, which harboured the ‘truth’ of freedom. Freedom and equality were goals of aspiration, focused in the urgency of the imaginative power to acquire them.

Introduction  

The political uses of myth As scholars such as Roland Barthes have reminded us, myth is depoliticised speech, where the contingent and historical quality of a given political fact disDSSHDUV %DUWKHV  ±  +LV IDPRXV H[DPSOH HYRNHV D EODFN VROGLHU VDOXWLQJWKH)UHQFKÀDJ+HUHWKHPHDQLQJRIWKHSLFWXUHUHFHGHVDVWKHP\WKRI )UHQFKLPSHULDOLW\DQGLWVLQWHJUDWLYHFKDUDFWHUKDYHWKHJUHDWHVWLQÀXHQFH7KH point is not to deny things, as myth is very explicit about imperiality, rather to SXULI\WKHPWRJLYHWKHPDQDWXUDODQGHWHUQDOMXVWL¿FDWLRQDVLI)UHQFKLPSHULality was a fact that needed no explanation. Myth turns historical and political contingency into an essential, natural, fact. Yet, the idea that myth would simply be apolitical is in itself a well-hedged myth. If we turn from the assessment of myth as a phenomenon of language that structures speech and discourse to its role as a resource in the struggle for political power, then it appears that myths have a distinctively political dimension as far as they are symbolic resources in repertoires of political contention. In historical reality, the tendency to the natural and timeless quality of myth can be traced back to how not only leaders, crowds, intellectuals, interpreters, and legislators, but also historians and scholars of myth themselves fabricate myths. While transformations of power rely upon the material basis of institutional differentiation and the aggregation of interests, they also require the discursivesymbolic recreation of worlds of meaning. This relationship is neither paradoxical nor pathological. Any major social revolution or war shatters acquired systems of symbolic world-maintenance. Political and social revolutions produce formidable authority vacuums, reverse meanings and feelings, and cast a spell on the popular imagination. The rebirth of politics in the late Soviet 8QLRQDQGLQ(DVWHUQ(XURSHGXULQJWKHVVXEVWDQWLDOO\XQGHUPLQHGWKHULWXalistic character of communist myth-making. Yet, the conquest of new spaces of political articulation came along with new myths such as ‘Europe’, the ‘market’, or ‘democracy’. For many Western observers, the proliferation of mythologies DIWHUZDVHTXLYDOHQWWRWKHULVHRILUUDWLRQDOLW\DQGWUDGLWLRQDOIRUPV RISROLWLFDOLGHQWLW\+RVNLQJDQG6FK|SÀLQ7LVPDQHDQDX 0\WKRlogical constructions of reality, however, refer not only to destructive and demonising myths of vengeance and victimisation, but also to integrative projects of state independence, national homogenisation, and acts of foundation such as ‘democratic constitutions’. Despite their ‘anti-revolutionary’ character, WKH UHYROXWLRQV RI  DQG  ± ODFNLQJ D UHYROXWLRQDU\ FODVV WHOHRORJLFDO expectations, or political utopias – nevertheless acquired a cosmic dimension. The politics of enchantment imply the ‘nonrational’, the sacred, or symbols, which become pillars for the reconstitution of legitimacy in the reordering of SHRSOH¶VHQWLUHPHDQLQJIXOZRUOGV9HUGHU\±  This brings us to Emile Durkheim’s and Marcel Mauss’s observation that µHYHU\ P\WKRORJ\ LV IXQGDPHQWDOO\ D FODVVL¿FDWLRQ EXW RQH ZKLFK ERUURZV LWV SULQFLSOHVIURPUHOLJLRXVEHOLHIVQRWIURPVFLHQWL¿FLGHDV¶'XUNKHLPDQG0DXVV ± 7KHPRGHUQVWDWHDVWKHFHQWUHRIEXUHDXFUDWLFUDWLRQDOLVDWLRQDQG

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H. Wydra

as a secularised entity seems to be in open contradiction to religious motivations. As Alessandro Pizzorno has shown, however, the emergence of the political and the appearance of the modern state did not expunge transcendence and godly HQGV3L]]RUQR± $WWKHRXWVHWRIWKHPRGHUQVWDWHZDVWKHGLVVRFLDtion not of religious from state power but of the spiritual from the temporal SRZHUV%HIRUHWKHWHUULWRULDOLVDWLRQRIWKHVWDWH±ZKLFKDOORZHGIRUWKHLGHQWL¿cation of the ‘other’ as not belonging to or threatening this territory – the Church delimited the space between friend and enemy spiritually. The emergence of the ‘Western style’ of vesting power in a state consisted of an absolute project that established spiritual power as a compound of four types of power: the control of RUJDQLVDWLRQ RI NQRZOHGJH WKH SURGXFWLRQ RI QRUPV WKH SROLWLFV RI GHYRWLRQ DQGWKHLGHQWL¿FDWLRQRIWKHHQHPLHVRIVRFLHW\7KHGHPRFUDWLFDJHGLGQRWIXQdamentally discontinue the engagement between religion and politics. The overthrow of God as a source of legitimate authority in the French Revolution came along with the re-divinisation of politics, replacing the divine right of kings with what Edgar Quinet called a people-God (peuple-Dieu /HIRUW 7KH French Revolution can be likened to a religious revolution in as far as it took the citizen in an abstract way as much as religion takes man in an abstract way with UHJDUGWRWUDQVFHQGHQFH7RFTXHYLOOH± 7KXVWKHGHFOLQHRIUHOLgion as a function of the growing separation of church and state and patterns of legal-rational domination should not conceal that both logically and historically PRGHUQ SROLWLFVUHVWV XSRQ D WKHRORJLFDOSROLWLFDOIRUPDWLRQ/HIRUW   7KH GLVLQWHJUDWLRQRIWKHERG\RIVRFLDOLQVWLWXWLRQVWKHORVVRIDGH¿QLQJFHQWUHRI power and identity was met by an attempt to sacralise human and secular institutions such as the People, the State, the Nation, or Sovereignty. Thus, the analysis of modern states must conceive of political order by distinguishing at least two levels (Edelman 1964: 12–20). While political systems rely XSRQWKHLQVWLWXWLRQDOLVDWLRQRISROLWLFDODXWKRULW\ULJKWVFODLPVDQGFRQÀLFWWKH nature of man and his volition hinge on the irrationality of political constitutions and the expressive and symbolic functions of the polity. When the structural constraints of political authority, social control, legal order, or tradition are weakened, the authority vacuum threatens the basis of human existence and demands an existential response to it. The meanings of values and norms associated with the intentions and behaviour of leadership do not pre-exist action as belief-systems, but are articulated in liminal situations of authority vacuum before being ritualised and discursively aggregated in state ideologies. Thus, ‘political reality’ also contains meanings and symbolic markers of certainty that illuminate human beings who continuously create and bear them as the mode DQGFRQGLWLRQRIWKHLUVHOIUHDOLVDWLRQ9RHJHOLQ±  Modern political thought could not theorise the new type of politics in states without an appeal to the authority of an invisible power. This invisible power is of higher authority, of a quasi-divine nature that casts a spell on the collective imagination by myths and symbols. The power of myth was central to the theoretical foundations of modern politics, which in the exemplary cases of MachiaYHOOL+REEHVRU5RXVVHDXDUHXVXDOO\FKDUDFWHULVHGE\µUHDOLVW¶µVFLHQWL¿F¶RU

Introduction 7 ‘rational’ perspectives. Confronted with the puzzle of how to account for contingency and necessity in politics that threatens to frustrate the hopes, expectations, and outcomes of our actions, Machiavelli secularised the half-mythical power of IRUWXQHWKDWKDGWREHFRXQWHUDFWHGE\KXPDQYLUWXH&DVVLUHU±  Hobbes’s ‘individualist’ foundation of political order in the interest of selfpreservation works on the premise of a non-human authority. In the need to MXVWLI\KRZD¿UVWFRQWUDFWFRXOGHVWDEOLVKDVRYHUHLJQSRZHULQFRQGLWLRQVRIWKH absence of civil law in the state of nature, Hobbes refers to a sacred oath as the expression of the fear of that invisible power, which is the worship of God (Hobbes 1991: 99). Rousseau’s solution for taming the self-destructive force of self-love (amour propre) resorts to patriotism by the worship of the collective god of the nation (Rousseau 1990: 42). The coercive apparatus of the state cannot do without myths as markers of GLIIHUHQWLDWLRQ([WHUQDOO\QDWLRQVOHJLWLPLVHWKHPVHOYHVE\DI¿UPLQJWKHLULGHQtity through stories and narratives, which differentiate them substantially from their enemies. Domestically, they rely upon a politically fabricated pool of myths and symbols associated with revolutionary events or the consequences of wars, which includes deliberate forgetting and historical error, as crucial elements for successful nation-building. The rise of nationalism anywhere requires the ascendancy and the representation of the idea of a chosen people, which claims to submit individual liberties to a national interest, which in reality is an imagined community based on literature, language, and narrative (Anderson 1991). Narratives about the foundation of the United States of America, the rise of democratic politics in the French Revolution, the imperial expansion of Britain as bringing capitalism to the world, or about West Germany’s economic miracle (Wirtschaftswunder) after the Second World War have attenuated social contradictions and political contention. The radicalisation of the masses during and after the First World War gave a new twist to the relationship between myth and democracy. The rise of the political religions of Bolshevism and fascism drew on the emergence of mob rule in the Russian Revolution and the subsequent Civil War as well as on the deep economic and moral crisis in Italy and Germany. Bereft of material, moral, and spiritual certainties, people’s fears were radicalised by reckless demagogues and their skilful manipulation of crowds. Arguably, no other author than Georges 6RUHOKDGPRUHLQÀXHQFHRQ0XVVROLQL/HQLQDQG+LWOHU:KLOHKLVP\WKRIWKH general strike had little appeal to the proletarian masses, his voluntarism about P\WKDVWKH¿UVWDFWRIUHEHOOLRQDJDLQVWUHDVRQUHFRJQLVHGWKHSROLWLFDORSSRUWXnity to stir up emotions and engineer, to use a metaphor by Gustave Le Bon, the ‘souls’ of crowds. Given the manipulative power of states with regard to crowds, it is not a paradox that the great technical age of the early twentieth century developed a new technique of manufacturing myths as a form of mental rearmament, which preceded Germany’s real rearmament after 1933 (Cassirer 1946:  )RU*HRUJHV'XPp]LO*HUPDQ\¶VPLOLWDULVDWLRQFRXOGEHGLUHFWO\OLQNHGWR P\WKLFDOURRWVVXFKDVLQWKHSUDFWLFHVRIJRG2GLQ'XPp]LO ,QKLVYLHZ the absence of strong priestly institutions differentiated the Germans from all

  H. Wydra other Indo-European peoples and account for the bellicosity of their mythology. The sovereign magician Odin was characterised by a host of ills such as confused egalitarianism, the dynamism of totalitarian economies, a communism drawn to the masses, and a heroic anti-capitalist morality. This militarisation of German mythology was resuscitated in the nineteenth century and gave Hitler a huge arsenal of myths to draw on.  3ROLWLFDO P\WKV WKHUHIRUH DUH QR PHUH ¿JPHQWV RI WKH LPDJLQDWLRQ EXW DUH manufactured by what Quentin Skinner termed innovative ideologues. The important point is not the externalisation of a concrete mythical strong story but WRXQGHUVWDQGWKHFRQGLWLRQVXQGHUZKLFKP\WKVEHFRPHÀH[LEOHWUDQVIRUPDEOH and exploitable political tools for the sake of arousing and mobilising human EHLQJV)RU&ODXGH/pYL6WUDXVVP\WKVZRXOGOD\EDUHWKHLQQHUZRUNLQJVDQG raisons d’être of beliefs and help us to discover operational modes of the human PLQG/pYL6WUDXVV 6XFKHOHPHQWDU\µVWUXFWXUHV¶RIWKHKXPDQPLQG DUH FRQVWDQW RYHU FHQWXULHV DQG DUH XQLYHUVDOO\ GHWHFWDEOH ,Q WKLV YHLQ /pYL Strauss forcefully argued that myth and ritual feed back into social discourse and practice, restating and resolving social contradictions as a rational enterprise. His formalism and focus on synchrony, however, downplayed the role of individual QDUUDWLYHVDQGKLVWRULFDOFRQWH[W:LWKUHJDUGWRWKHHYHQWVRI0D\LQ3DULV the following remark sheds light on the problems of his structuralism: ‘structures do not go out in the streets’ (Lincoln 1999: 146). Partly as a result of the dominant structuralist interpretation of myth, many have regarded myth as not operating in historical time and as being ignorant of PDWKHPDWLFDOSK\VLFDO WLPH 8QOLNH KLVWRULFDO WLPH ZKLFK LV EDVHG RQ D ¿[HG chronology and the strict observation of a determinate, unequivocal order in the sequence of the moments of time, many myths elude such divisions of stages of time. Suggesting a high degree of continuity between social and cosmic order, they assign to particular events one and only one position in a rigid system (CasVLUHU± )RU0LUFHD(OLDGHIRULQVWDQFHWKHVWUXFWXUHRIP\WKZDV not one of historical becoming in terms of fabrication and applicability, but was rooted in the religious reality of creation and origin, which would transcend the SODQHRIKLVWRULFDOIRUPV(OLDGH±  While myth as acts of speech and structured narratives are of an ahistorical nature, as social phenomena they have a concrete historical basis, where people need to make sense of extreme experiences. People believe myths not because the historical evidence is compelling but because they are attempts to make sense of uncertainty by ‘structuring’ events. Myths are not ontologically stable, but interpretations that draw on perceptions about people’s social experiences IRUWKHVDNHRIVHWWLQJRXWGH¿QLWLRQVRINQRZOHGJHOR\DOW\DQGEHORQJLQJIRU the political reality to come. They are both a function and an outcome of transformations of consciousness, which are discursively constructed by attaching to VSHFL¿FHYHQWVVRPHPHDQLQJRIRULJLQVDFUHGRUEHJLQQLQJ,QVLGHWKHSROLWLFDO struggle of a revolutionary event, for instance, myths depict antagonistic programmes and ideas for society in the starkest possible terms, accentuating oppositions between two sides. Yet, any extreme opposition of social forces in the

Introduction 9 ÀXLGLW\RIHYHQWVZLOOJLYHZD\WRWKHH[LVWHQWLDOQHHGWRH[SODLQWKHXQFHUWDLQWLHVDULVLQJLQVXVSHQGHGWLPH&ULWLFDOHYHQWVGHPDQGQHZDFWVRIVLJQL¿FDWLRQ which establish new myths and rituals. Thus, myths have a communicative function that responds to such crises in order to externalise inner impulses and tensions and to establish mutual support with others. They are not based on factual accuracy, but on their applicability for creating loyalty, unanimity, and belonging. After the Second World War, the political confrontation between the ‘Eastern bloc’ and the ‘Western world’ during the Cold War required a range of ideological-symbolic markers of certainty, which in the post-war period could RQO\ EH GLVWRUWLQJ PHPRULHV DQG FUHDWLQJ P\WKV -XGW  ±  7KH concept ‘totalitarian’ was established as the polar opposite of a democratic Western-type liberal regime, as a pejorative term that simultaneously designates DQGGLVDSSURYHVRIRQHSDUW\VWDWHVDQGPDVVWHUURU*OHDVRQ  If forms of power in a state are constructed as a social identity against a constitutive outside, the anthropological basis of experience is crucial for understanding the transformative power of myth. In Victor Turner’s terms, myth relates to how one state of affairs becomes another: how an unpeopled world EHFDPHSRSXODWHGKRZFKDRVEHFDPHFRVPRVKRZLPPRUWDOVEHFDPHPRUWDO KRZ WKH VHDVRQV FDPH WR UHSODFH D FOLPDWH ZLWKRXW VHDVRQV KRZ WKH RULJLQDO XQLW\ RI PDQNLQG EHFDPH D SOXUDOLW\ RI WULEHV RU QDWLRQV KRZ DQGURJ\QRXV EHLQJVEHFDPHPHQDQGZRPHQDQGVRRQ0\WKVDUHOLPLQDOSKHQRPHQDWKH\ are frequently told at a time or in a site that is ‘betwixt and between’ (Turner  ,IGXULQJWKH)UHQFK5HYROXWLRQLQ0LFKHOHW¶VZRUGVWLPHGLGQRWH[LVW any more, time had vanished, then this is the social context which is best adapted to myth-making. This is why even historical enquiry cannot escape the need for fabricating strong stories. As Michel de Certeau has argued, historiographical discourse engages with the modalities of what was once a liminal in-between sitXDWLRQ DQ µLQLWLDO ]HUR¶ &HUWHDX    $V WKH EHJLQQLQJ RI WKH KLVWRU\ RI nations, classes, or empires is a lost object, the task of historiography is to represent a scene of violence which is concealed and erased from memory. In other words, the death that made it all possible is maintained alive by historiography in order to play an ‘active’ role in the sense of structuring social relations.  $GLIIHUHQWZD\RIH[SODLQLQJWKHLQLWLDO]HURE\P\WKVLVSURYLGHGE\5HQp Girard’s mimetic anthropology, which suggests that myths were ritualised stories told about concrete events of bloodshed, in which communities resolved an internal crisis by killing a scapegoat victim (Girard 1977). For Girard, the origins of cultural order rely on a double mythical representation of this unique victim. It consists of the belief that the victim was both truly guilty and that its death brought peace to the community. The ritualisation of myth, in Girard’s view, celebrates the foundation of cultural order through violence. If men need strong stories to structure their existence, these rely not only on discourse but on truths that are celebrated by social practices of ritual. Taking the case of communist power, Agnes Horvath’s contribution to this YROXPHLGHQWL¿HVDVSHFL¿FW\SHRIOHDGHUVKLSWKDWWXUQVWKLVH[WUHPHDQWDJRQLVP

10 H. Wydra of forces into a permanent pattern upon which the exercise of power is based. Drawing on comparative mythology, anthropology, and analytical psychology, VKHLQWURGXFHVWKHP\WKRORJLFDO¿JXUHRIWKH7ULFNVWHUDVDQDQDO\WLFDOFDWHJRU\ for understanding the formation of leadership out of liminal situations. This speFL¿FW\SHRIOHDGHUVKLSIRXQGLWVSDUDGLJPDWLFPRGHUQDSSOLFDWLRQLQWKHULVHRI %ROVKHYLVP :KHUHDV D FKDULVPDWLF ¿JXUH JHQHUDWHV XQLW\ D 7ULFNVWHU GLYLGHV not least because of the controversies provoked by his very nature. The Trickster arises as a non-entity but appropriates power by using techniques of domination based on miming, mocking, and sowing disorder. Thomas Grob’s chapter can be seen as an empirical application of the trickster paradigm with regard to Ivan Mazepa, the seventeenth-century Cossack leader who became the mythical ¿JXUH V\PEROLVLQJ WKH 8NUDLQLDQ ZLOO WR IUHHGRP DQG GHPRFUDF\ 7UDFLQJ WKH vicissitudes of mythical narratives throughout three centuries, the chapter outlines the political relevance and the characteristics of the historical Mazepa before turning to analyse important steps in the creation of a mythologised history of Mazepa as the symbol of Ukrainian autonomy. Both contributions suggest for the different cases of communism and UkrainLDQQDWLRQDOLGHQWLW\WKDWLGHQWL¿FDWLRQRIZKDWLVUHDOLW\GHSHQGVRQSURJUDPPHV of chance, where knowledge is the product of power, partisan forces, and the discursive-symbolic dismissal of other views as ‘myths’. As Paul Veyne has forcefully argued, the very distinction of ‘truths’ and ‘myths’ is not based on any PDWHULDO HVVHQFH EXW UDWKHU UHÀHFWV FKDQJLQJ PHWKRGV RI HQTXLU\ DQG SURJUDPPHVRISURGXFLQJWUXWK9H\QH 7KHULVHRIFRQWURYHUV\LQKLVWRULRJraphy as an academic discipline, for instance, made the need for sources pressing, something Greek historiography and early modern writers did not worry about. The major reason why so much importance is attached to chronolRJ\LVWKDWLWLVDVHOIVXI¿FLHQWSURJUDPPHRIWUXWKLQZKLFKWLPHDQGVSDFHDUH LGHQWL¿HGE\WKHNQRZOHGJHRIHYHQWVDQGORFDOLWLHV)RUWKH*UHHNVP\WKZDV not the communication of what one has seen but of what was said of the gods and heroes. The only source of knowledge was ‘they say’, having a mysterious authority to it. The struggle for power, therefore, must take seriously the irrationalist hypothesis according to which the existence of reality is constituted by imagination. Such imagination is not a faculty of individual psychology, but arises in arbitrary frameworks in the interplay of contingent forces that deploy truths, interests, or myths in order to project their own all-inclusive space (Veyne ± 7KHRULVWVRIP\WKVIRULQVWDQFHSXUVXHGSROLWLFDOSURJUDPPHV WKDW ZHUH FUXFLDOO\ LQÀXHQFHG E\ VRFLDO FRQWH[W DQG SROLWLFDO SUHIHUHQFHV IDU EH\RQG WKH OLWHUDU\ EDVLV RI P\WKLFDO VRXUFHV 6WUHQVNL  /LQFROQ   $OWKRXJK /pYL6WUDXVV UHIXWHG DUJXPHQWV DERXW µSULPLWLYH PHQWDOLW\¶ DQG WKH savage mind, so prominent in theories of myth that were developed in the context of a colonial period and distinguished between colonisers and colonial VXEMHFWV KLV ZRUN KDG DQ LGHRORJLFDO WKUXVW +H DFFHSWHG P\WK DV D GH¿QLQJ product of the ‘savage mind’, although it was seen as hardly inferior to the technological rationality of modern man. After all, disruptions of academic careers and their successful re-establishment in the cases of Cassirer, Malinowski,

Introduction 11 (OLDGH DQG /pYL6WUDXVV OHG WR WKH IRXQGDWLRQ RI VFKRROV PDNLQJ SRVVLEOH WKH development and dissemination of concepts of myth associated with their great mentors. It established imperialistic forms of discourses on myth. The role of myth regards the changes of visions and climates of opinion, making radical FKDQJHV¿UVWDSSHDUDVDQHZÀLJKWRIWKHVRFLDOLPDJLQDWLRQ7KHSRLQWLVWRVHH that individual volition needs to engage social groups in a project of the collective imagination, which will legitimise the reality of new power arrangements.

Democracy as ideology in narrative form If myth as ideology in narrative form has been used by interpreters such as the founders of modern political thought, totalitarian movements, or scholars of myth, then why should democrats stand apart? Post-war democratic theory responded to the social and political crises of European states after the First :RUOG:DUZLWKDGH¿QLWLRQRIPRGHUQUHSUHVHQWDWLYHGHPRFUDF\WKDWZDVVXSposed to ward off the mythical and quasi-religious slant of the egalitarian ‘classical doctrine’. Ever since Joseph Schumpeter’s distinction between socialism and democracy, representative democratic government has come to be seen as the empirical study of how accountable democratic elites are selected and HPSRZHUHG6FKXPSHWHU 7KHIRFXVRQGH¿QLQJSRZHUDVWKHFDSDFLW\RI an institutionalised set of rules and norms to control the actions, behaviour, and responses of citizens downplayed the importance of the social and psychological aspects of democracy with the argument that crowds are too sensitive to irraWLRQDO LPSXOVHV DQG SDVVLRQV 4XLWH ULJKWO\ 6FKXPSHWHU LGHQWL¿HG WKH URRWV RI the so-called ‘classical doctrine’ in the age of reason and its belief in the truth of human emancipation, aiming to create a collective image of the ‘people’ as the sovereign in a given territory. His ‘realist’ approach to the democratic method expunged popular sovereignty and the public good as myths, constructed by the religious fervour of the classical doctrine. Indeed, Rousseau’s volonté générale is a formidable product of the constitutive imagination, creating the myth of people’s equality, which would suspend the distinction between dominating and dominated. Yet, this myth is necessary to vindicate beliefs in a social contract and to safeguard the popular basis of democracy, i.e. the ritual of participation in a vote, each of which has to be counted. The story told by transition studies in comparative politics discarded forms of participatory citizenship-based democracy proposed by dissidents, civic forums, or social movements as unrealistic and visionary. Implicitly, transition studies placed the origin of democracy entirely outside the region, assuming that with the collapse of communism democracy would become the politically nonQHJRWLDEOH JRDO IRU WKHVH SROLWLFDO VRFLHWLHV ,QÀXHQWLDO WKHRULHV RI GHPRFUDWLF transition and consolidation have posited some essentials without which no democracy can be established as a constituted political order (Linz and Stepan 1996). They required a range of arenas that should include stateness, a political society, a civil society, or a working bureaucracy. The interaction between this VHW RI DUHQDV ZRXOG WKHQ GH¿QH WKH UXOHV RI WKH JDPH DFFRUGLQJ WR ZKLFK D

12 H. Wydra consolidated democracy becomes the ‘only game in town’. This logical construction emptied a practice of its historically grown web of meanings, memories, and representations, which is in itself an act of constructing strong stories and which sets one particular idea of democracy as the model unbound by time, space, or culture. The story of liberal democracy, therefore, is no less ideology in narrative form than is Rousseau’s classical doctrine. A major argument about WKH µUHDOLVP¶ RI WKH GHPRFUDWLF PHWKRG ZDV WKDW LW UHÀHFWHG WKH VWDWXV TXR RI advanced liberal democracies. However, Schumpeter’s seminal Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy was published in 1943 in the middle of a world war that threatened the existence of political democracy as a constitutional form of government. Faced with the collapse of democracies everywhere except for the United States and the United Kingdom, it was less an empirical description than a normative prescription about the only possible way to avoid the evils of totaliWDULDQLVP,VDDF±  Since the dramatic history of democratisation in the modern world has been marked by incivility, violence, and popular mass mobilisation in revolutions and wars, it needs to be seen as a lengthy process of social construction bound to be open-ended and contingent upon an ongoing process of explaining political transIRUPDWLRQVE\QDUUDWLYHFRQVWUXFWLRQDQGV\PEROLFSROLWLFV0DUNRII:KLWHhead 2002: 36–64). Before the end of the eighteenth century democracy was a term of abuse, regarded not only by conservatives but also by reformers as either irrational or dangerous, or both. Neither the constitution of the United States nor that of the First French Republic use the term ‘democracy’. In order to turn the democratic revolutions in the United States and France into acts of foundation and new beginnings, the real occurrence of violence and hatred had to be distorted by means of strongly structured meta-narratives. The formation of popular self-consciousness KDVWRLQFOXGHWKHSHUIRUPDWLYHQDUUDWLYHDQGLPDJLQDWLYHDFWVRIVLJQL¿FDWLRQWKDW UHO\XSRQWKUHHGLPHQVLRQVRIVRFLDOO\PHGLDWHGDFWVRILQWHUSUHWDWLRQ/HIRUW ± )LUVWWKHUHLVLQVWLWXWLRQDOIRUPDOLVDWLRQmise en forme) as a reaction to the politicisation of existence in liminal situations of major crises, where people’s lives, identities, and representations, are at stake. Second, there is the articulation of meaningful relations (mise en sens), which requires that subordination to political authority is accepted, trusted, and legitimised. Finally, the dramatic quest for power relies upon the performance of leaders (mise en scène). The liminal situation of loss, disorientation, or uncertainty is compensated by the imaginative power – often conveyed in theatrical and expressive terms – of URRWLQJFLWL]HQV¶LGHQWLW\LQDFRPPXQLW\¶VRULJLQVKHURLFVDFUL¿FHRUVLQJXODUity with regard to others. Since Pericles’ speech to the Athenians in 430 BC or $EUDKDP /LQFROQ¶V *HWW\VEXUJ DGGUHVV LQ  WKH WKHDWULFDO GLPHQVLRQ RI democratic politics has been tightly linked to narratives about extreme experiHQFHVDQGWKHVDFUL¿FHRISHRSOHIRUWKHFRPPXQLW\%RWKVSHHFKHVDUHHXORJLHV to honour the war dead in the incipient Peloponnesian War or the Battle in Gettysburg in the American Civil War. Pericles’ speech praised the Athenian people for living a form of government that did not emulate the institutions of its neighbours but was itself a model, a paradigm to be imitated. Lincoln’s Gettysburg

Introduction 13 Address provided the classical synthesis of democracy by identifying it as the ‘government of the people, by the people, for the people’. The theatricality of RUDWRU\SHUIRUPDQFHKLJKOLJKWVOLEHUW\E\UHODWLQJWKHVXSUHPHVDFUL¿FHRIJLYLQJ up one’s life for the community to the ‘people’ as the basis, the actor, and the EHQH¿FLDU\RIGHPRFUDWLFJRYHUQPHQW In Athens, the praise for citizens before the assembled city was not the praise of the collective but addressed each citizen qua citizen, not a collective image of the ‘people’. Socrates ironically remarked: When I hear praised those who have just died in battle and, with them, our ancestors, our city, and ourselves, I feel more noble and great . . . the entire civic body comes out of it exalted, and it takes me three days to get over this emotion. 9H\QH $QGLQGHHG3HULFOHV¶VSHHFKZLWKLWVIRFXVRQGHPRFUDF\LVLQUHDOLW\DJORUL¿cation of the individual, not as a part of a population or a people but as the manifestation of being a free citizen. Conversely, Lincoln’s classical synthesis of democracy has to balance individual liberty and a modern conception of the people as a collective, the nation. According to Giovanni Sartori, Lincoln’s formula has ‘stylistic impetus’ rather than logical meaning, constituting an inexplicable proposition (Sartori 1973: 27). The self-presentation of Soviet communism as democratic could perfectly well use Lincoln’s formula. When Stalin in 1936 declared the Soviet Union to be the most democratic country in the world, he drew on the Marxist–Leninist conception of the people as a sociological UHDOLW\P\VWL¿HGLQWKHGRFWULQHRIWKHSUROHWDULDWDVWKH3HRSOHDV2QH)URPD liberal perspective, the claim for representation was based not on the ‘truth’ of individualism and his formal rights but on the ‘myth’ of equating the people with WKH VRFLDO ¿FWLRQ RI WKH µFODVV¶
14 H. Wydra For all their complexities and fundamental differences, the ‘democratic politics’ created by the French Revolution and the Russian Revolutions bore the seeds of ‘totalitarian democracy’, where the structural uncertainty about power under the pressure of crowds and mob rule produced the constitutive imaginaWLRQ RI WKH P\WK RI HTXDOLW\ 7DOPRQ   7RFTXHYLOOH DOUHDG\ VHQVHG WKH problem that democratic egalitarianism would produce mediocre leaders who ZRXOG EH VODYHV WR VORJDQV DQG SURGXFH ORZ FXOWXUH 7RFTXHYLOOH    Good leadership and attempts at raising the souls of the people would be subject WR WKH ¿FNOH DQG VKRUWWHUP LQWHUHVWV RI WKH SXEOLF )XUWKHUPRUH WKH SRWHQWLDO contagion with communism required setting itself as the absolute version of the origin of democracy in liberty, thus concealing the self-representation of communism as democratic. As Arpad Szakolczai shows in his chapter, communism turned this tendency towards lower culture into a doctrine by making the suffering of the lower classes the major basis for establishing a myth of communist democracy. Using WKHZRUNRI%pOD+DPYDVDQG-DQ3DWRþNDKHVKRZVWKDWFRPPXQLVWUXOHZDVD non-being, institutionalising absurdity by stirring up the dark, hidden recesses of the mind and the soul, and awakening the forces of the unconscious. The main reason why many – especially leftist – democrats in the West did not recognise communism for its destructive tendencies, was the spell cast by the logic of levelling down and producing democracy for the suffering masses. Conversely, however, there is the myth of ennobling, by which individuals discover that it is the transformations of individual behaviour and the creation of genuine elites that may improve life conditions of the community.  7KHUROHRISHUIRUPDQFHDQGV\PEROLVDWLRQLQWKHGH¿QLWLRQRISROLWLFDOFRPPXQLW\FDVWVGRXEWRQZKDWWKHOLEHUDOFRQVHQVXVKDVLGHQWL¿HGDVQDWXUDOULJKWV or innate dispositions of democratic individualism to protect life, property, and liberty by the rule of law. In this vein, Sergei Prozorov’s contribution uses Putin’s project of managed democracy in order to show how state-building in Russia discloses liberalism as a myth. Rather than being the re-establishment of authoritarian rule, Putin’s ‘managed democracy’ applies techniques of power that are very similar to practices of neoliberal government. Putin’s ‘infraliberalism’ depoliticises social life by reducing politics to political technologies of electoral marketing. What appears to be authoritarian, is in reality the disclosure of the liberal myth of the atemporal origins of political order. In the exceptional moment of transition, Putin’s reconstruction of society employs illiberal or ‘authoritarian’ practices with the aim to demobilise political society. The idea of propagating a model of liberal democracy as a timeless value and a goal of political development has de-politicised historical experience in Eastern Europe. The distinction between non-democratic communism and Western GHPRFUDF\LQWHUSUHWLYHO\VLPSOL¿HGWKHLQWHUSOD\RIFRQWLQJHQWIRUFHVE\IRUPXlating and propagandistically implementing a realm of the constitutive imagination. The paradigms of democratic transition and consolidation as the central normative goal of institutional transformation turned one methodology of political science into a programme of truth, which sets the timeless values of demo-

Introduction   cratic individualism and the systemic arrangements of democratic states as the non-negotiable narrative. Nowadays, exporting Western-style political democracy has become a goal of political development on a global scale precisely because it presents the evolution of democracy as a homogeneous story based on an origin, sustained by values such as natural rights and by government institutions in states. In this sense, liberal democracy was based on a constant and directed error, defended by a meta-narrative of democratisation that would be universally applicable by excluding alternative forms. As Edward Said noted for the imperial setting of American culture, many commentators invoke universalism by overlooking the fact that their own political horizons are formed in an imperial setting. The interpretation of other cultures, texts, and people seems to occur in a timeless vacuum, as if the proclaimed XQLYHUVDOLVPZDVIUHHIURPDWWDFKPHQWLQKLELWLRQDQGLQWHUHVW6DLG  The dominant narrative in liberal democratic theory has expunged much of its own distorted history and social roots by claiming a core of democratic values that seem to be ‘always there’. Democratisation in the United States, for instance, was not primarily perceived as a socio-genetic process of emancipation of a feudal structure but as the institutional guarantee of individual freedom +DUW] ,QWKHDEVHQFHRIDVRFLDOUHYROXWLRQDQDWLRQµERUQHTXDO¶DQG acquiring a dominant international role developed a psychological disposition towards liberal absolutism. As a frame of mind, liberal absolutism was less interested in the social process of emancipation from old power structures, but identi¿HG WKH DOLHQ ZLWK WKH XQLQWHOOLJLEOH ZKLFK ZRXOG FUHDWH GHHS DQ[LHW\ ZKHQ threatening domestic forms of democracy.  $W ERWWRP HVWDEOLVKHG PRGHUQ GHPRFUDFLHV DSSOLHG D GHOLEHUDWLYH ¿OWHU E\ which values, procedures, and behaviour are de-historicised and taken out of cultural context. How far the constitutive imagination of ‘liberal democracy’ stretched is perhaps best illustrated by the fact that it encompassed autocracies and terror regimes whose loyalty was portrayed as democratic in order to be LQVWUXPHQWDOLQWKH¿JKWDJDLQVWWRWDOLWDULDQLVP6LQFHWKHPDMRUWDVNWRSHUIRUP was to avoid the contagion of society with communism, the United States narratively transformed anti-democratic autocracies such as Franco’s Spain, Pinochet’s Chile, Reza Pahlevi’s Iran, or authoritarian South Korea into states whose cooperation was vital for defending democracy against the communist threat. Similarly, French politics was considered to be immune against the virus of fascism due to its inherent democratic political culture, a claim that has more attributes of a myth than of historical truth (Dobry 2004).

Myths of democracy in Eastern Europe Whereas master narratives have created fairly uncontested accounts of the democratic credentials of the Greek polis, the American republic, or other Western democracies, in many Eastern European countries the people as a political subject were more a project for political symbolism and myth-making than a reality. Ever since Enlightenment thought established the category of ‘Eastern

16 H. Wydra Europe’ as the mythical ‘Other’, Western Europe, i.e. the ‘civilised’ part that was not included in the idea of Eastern Europe, represented itself as Europe (Wolff 1994). Consequently, Western historiography has tended to exclude Eastern Europe from the concept of Europe on the grounds of natural, unbridgeable differences, implying that the West is superior and alone deserves the name RI(XURSH'DYLHV± $WERWWRPWKLVVSHFL¿FRQWRORJ\RIWUDGLWLRQ and assumptions about civilisational backwardness constituted the meta-narrative of the lack of democratic experience. Indeed, Eastern European political history was characterised by belated stateformation, insecure boundaries, forced migration, and foreign domination. Here, heroic myths about one’s nation as the chosen people were more conspicuous than in the West because political realities such as lacking statehood, foreign occupation, or substantial territorial uncertainty reinforced the need for selfglorifying myths (Sugar and Lederer 1994: 43–47). Unlike in Western Europe, the state here was not the product but the carrier and instrument of social and economic change, gaining ascendancy over all aspects of social life of the nation. Rather than the gradual development of a capitalist economy or a ‘bourgeois society’ one could witness a gradual increase in etatism, which produced a society of pariah entrepreneurs, and of political classes competing for the spoils of the state. In view of weak civil society and an apathetic peasantry, Russia’s traditional pattern of development prioritised state-induced reform. The relatively low level of political centralisation in the multi-ethnic Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman empires made large parts of Eastern Europe become the ideal ground for processes of nation-building that relied upon the integrity and importance of each Volk. In the tradition of Johann Gottfried Herder, language became the decisive factor by which collective identity of a Volk could be achieved +HUGHU   0\WKV ZHUH WKH OLQJXLVWLF IRUP WKDW PHGLDWHG EHWZHHQ FOLPDWLF and geographical conditions and the formation of nations. Herder conceived of myths as discourses of differentiation, akin to cultural relativism. In historical reality, however, his romantic humanitarianism was under constant pressure by the cultural determinism applied by interpreters who needed to frame their immediate practical objective of independent statehood by fabricating ancient roots of origins of their nations. As a consequence, state elites deliberately used ‘culture’ for political purposes. Since many of these countries did not ‘exist’ in the Western European sense of relatively unbroken historical continuity, intellectual elites engineered cultural roots based on linguistic separatism, ethnic distinctiveness, and historical master narratives of a beginning of the nation. As a FRQVHTXHQFH LGHDV RI FXOWXUH LQ WKHVH FRXQWULHV KDYH EHHQ VWURQJO\ LQÀXHQFHG E\ WKH WHPSWDWLRQ RI GHWHUPLQLVP +DQQ    (VSHFLDOO\ LQ PXOWLHWKQLF contexts, they have been associated with cultural racism, erecting boundaries of exclusion or legitimising violence. Similarly, cultural preconceptions such as Russian authoritarianism, a Balkan mentality, or the fatalistic Orthodox soul are considered as mysterious residual variables, which bar the path to development. The political conditions of small states in fear of annihilation would favour and often even elicit the construction of mythical narrative for the sake of

Introduction 17 grounding a country’s history in an origin that would acquire the status of the truth and become a powerful weapon for the sake of vengeance and aggressive nationalism (Mertus 1999). Fear of victimisation has been one, if not the most important, element in many national historiographies. In the case of Kosovo, for instance, both the Serbs and the Albanians rooted arguments about their distinctiveness in history and religion in claims about their remote ancestry in this UHJLRQ*RVVLDX[ 6HUEVFODLPHGWKHVWDWXVRIDQHOHFWHGSHRSOHGXHWRWKH OHJHQGRI3ULQFH/D]DUZKRVHGHIHDWE\WKH7XUNVLQZDVDVDFUL¿FHERXQG to be redeemed. Albanians tended to go back in time as far as the sixth and seventh centuries, claiming an Illyrian–Albanian continuity and ranking above 6ODYLF SHRSOH :KHQ 6ORERGDQ 0LORãHYLü XQOHDVKHG QDWLRQDOLVW DJJUHVVLRQ against the Albanian ethnic majority in Kosovo, he could draw on the mythical FRQVFLRXVQHVV LQ SRSXODU PHPRU\ RI  ZKLFK ZDV FRPPHPRUDWHG LQ D unique gathering of some two million people on Kosovo poljeLQ-XO\ Yet, even Czech nationalism, based on ‘bourgeois nationalism’ with its advocacy of constitutional monarchy, parliamentarism, or federalism, championed a mythical existence of the Czech nation as well as outdated rights and institutions. As Robert Pynsent shows in his contribution to this volume, the selfunderstanding of Czechs as ‘naturally’ democratic has been sustained since the Middle Ages by misoteutonic myths and bloody practices of nose lopping. AntiGerman practices of violence characteristic of the Hussite tradition survived the re-interpretation of Hussitism by the Romantic historian Palacký, by the republiFDQUHYROXWLRQDULHVRIWKHQE\0DVDU\NDQGRWKHUSROLWLFLDQVOHDGLQJXSWR HWKQLFGLVFULPLQDWLRQDIWHUDQGWRWKHPDVVH[SXOVLRQLQ:LWKWKHHQG of communism came Havel’s apology for the expulsion of the Germans and the chance to overcome the democratic tradition of Hussitism by defeating Czech misoteutonic myths.  /DQJXDJH DQG OLWHUDWXUH UHÀHFW VRFLDO SUDFWLFHV DQG FXOWXUDO V\PEROLVP $OWKRXJK /pYL6WUDXVV DGPLWWHG WKDW P\WK LV D ZRUN RI DUW DURXVLQJ GHHS DHVthetic emotion, he refused this for poetry, with the argument that poetry is a form of speech that can only be translated at the cost of serious distortions (Jakobson DQG /pYL6WUDXVV    $V $OH[DQGHU :|OO VKRZV LQ KLV FKDSWHU KRZHYHU poetry emerges in a social context of literary and artistic expression, which UHÀHFWVQDWLRQDOWUDGLWLRQVDQGLVV\PEROLFRIDJLYHQFXOWXUHDQGODQJXDJH7KH FRPSDULVRQRIWZRSRHPVE\WKH3ROLVKZULWHU0LURQ%LDáRV]HZVNLDQGE\WKH Russian Ossip Mandelstam gives evidence of how elitist high culture in Russia highlights renewal, while Polish culture transforms older forms of art into everyGD\FXOWXUH:KLOH%LDáRV]HZVNL¶VSRHPKaruzela z madonnami shows the democratic exchange between high and popular culture by means of innovation, Mandelstam’s poem focuses on renewal by thematising timeless symbols and showing deeper attachment for cosmic unity. We are reminded here that there looms large the risk of falling into the trap of maintaining dichotomic separations such as backward societies versus enlightened Europe or the dichotomy between ‘East’ and ‘West’. In this vein, Walter Koschmal examines the mythical uses of Eurasianism for the creation of Russian

  H. Wydra political identity. Critical of the Europeanisation of Russia, he focuses on how Russia’s self-image derives from its position between Europe and Asia. The problems of Russian democracy are seen as rooted partly in the European image of Russia as much as in the Russian image of Europe. The power of the myth of democracy has perhaps no better advocate than the fact that regime theory and comparative politics deemed it possible to turn completely non-democratic societies into democracies. It is, therefore, no surprise that the turn towards democracy in Russia did not match explanatory patterns provided by major theories of democratisation developed in the West (Anderson et al. 2001: 19–22). One reason may be attributed to the fact that notions such as culture, civic associationalism, or social capital, are seen as institutionally mediated and not as imaginatively constituted. From such a perspective, mythical ‘romantic’ narratives, communities of memory of revolutionary popular uprisings, or national markers of independence and freedom are discarded as unreal. Hans Kohn’s classical work, for instance, derived from this focus on language-based nationalism the crucial distinction that nationalism in the West was based on reality, while Eastern nationalism relied upon myths and dreams (Kohn 1961: 330). Yet, as recent work on collective identity and the emergence of the national idea in Central and South-east Europe has argued, it is simplifying to see these cultures merely as either self-referential ideological carriers of national uniqueness or as shaped by the ideological dichotomy of Cold War bipolarity. A collection of foundational texts of nations in Eastern Europe argues that the emerging discourses of national identity occurred within intellectual traditions that were not simply outside the setting of the ‘Enlightenment’ in the ‘West’ but that in themselves formed discourses that mirrored cultural transfers inside the region and WKHLUHQWDQJOHGKLVWRULHV7UHQFVpQ\LDQG.RSHþHN± 7KXVHPHUJLQJ discourses of national identity could have a democratic and anti-democratic, liberal and anti-liberal, or Western-oriented and autochthonist character. Mythical representations emerge, therefore, when political cultures and societies are attracted by the superiority of an acknowledged higher or more attractive culture and the search for recognition. A useful analogy can be made with Franz Borkenau’s work on myth-making in the emergence of Western civilisation, where he links the emergence of myth to the asymmetry between forms of civilisation that suddenly start interacting, both substantial and communicative %RUNHQDX 0\WKDULVHVZKHUHSULPLWLYHFXOWXUHZHUHSXVKHGRXWRI the timelessness of eternal repetition by a unique historical disruption, a deep crisis that provoked a profound shock to an established order and a consequential break with traditional meta-narratives. It does not arise where primitive communities become mere passive objects of integration in high culture but where primitives invade a decaying high culture as conquerors. Myth belongs to the W\SHRIµLQGLUHFWDI¿OLDWLRQ¶LHZKHUHDµGDUNDJH¶LQWHUYHQHVEHWZHHQWKHROGHU and the younger culture, i.e. between that of antiquity and that of the West. In the early Middle Ages the most important myth-production happened neither among the primitives nor in the domain of the old high culture but at the crossroads of the contact of two contrasting forms of life, in the border zone.2

Introduction 19 At the root of the contest between Russia and the West are not two entirely different civilisations but Russia’s sense of backwardness and the psychological engagement to imitate ‘the West’ and, eventually, to achieve supremacy by overFRPLQJWKHPRGHO
20 H. Wydra characterised by the overall feeling of a conservative ‘return to normality’. The HYHQWVRIKDYHUHPDLQHGLQDP\WKLFDOQRPDQ¶VODQG,QIHZFRXQWULHVZDV there a central idea that would have mobilised the populace. Whereas ten years on from 1917, there was already a rich literature on the actors, methods, and PRWLYHVRIWKH2FWREHU5HYROXWLRQDGHFDGHDIWHUDFFRXQWVRIWKHHYHQWVRI that year and their aftermath were relatively scarce, often reducing actors to REMHFWVRI+LVWRU\DVDUHL¿HGDFWRU.HQQH\± ,QWKLVYHLQGLVFRXUVHV RI GHPRFUDWLVDWLRQ DUH PXOWLSOH EHFDXVH WKH\ UHÀHFW KLVWRULFDO DQG FXOtural particularities, which are handed down in narratives in national settings and political traditions (Dryzek and Holmes 2002). As the contributions of 1\\VV|QHQDQG6DNZDPDNHFOHDUWKLVPD\WDNHGLIIHUHQWIRUPVVXFKDVUHFDVWing memories of crucial events in a country’s past or re-interpreting formerly DXWKRULWDULDQIRUPVRIWKHVWDWH+HLQR1\\VV|QHQWXUQVWRWKHUROHRIWKHFRQstruction of collective memory in the process of democratisation in Hungary. He H[DPLQHVWKUHHRI¿FLDOQDWLRQDOKROLGD\VZLWKDYLHZWRWKHLUXVHVDV7LPH6SDFHV in domestic political mobilisation. He argues that these recurrent TimeSpaces PDUNZKDWKDVEHHQLQÀXHQWLDOERWKLQLQYRNLQJUHYROXWLRQDU\WUDGLWLRQVRILQGHpendent statehood but also in shaping a collective memory that provides for selfLGHQWL¿FDWLRQRIWKH+XQJDULDQSHRSOHLQDULVLQJGHPRFUDWLFSROLW\E\PHDQVRI mythical representations. Finally, Richard Sakwa examines the role of mythical representations of Russia’s past in Putin’s project to establish a civic identity for the new post-communist democratic state. Putin’s project of establishing democratic identity is based on the idea of rejecting any Sonderweg for Russia but to XUJH5XVVLDWR¿QGDSODFHLQRQHPRGHUQLW\7KHGDXQWLQJWDVNRIGRLQJDZD\ with many myths about Russia’s own path of civilisation, Eurasianism, or empire is hardly possible without creating new myths.

Conclusion This volume adds another range of ‘stories’ to the vast amount of literature on democratisation in Eastern Europe. It is motivated by the conviction that the instrument of institutionalist accounts of democratisation has produced only one kind of tune. By limiting democratic politics to institution-building and interestbased public policies, history and culture in Eastern Europe are relegated into the timeless and de-historicised category of ‘legacy’. Yet, myths are not only the functions of a ‘legacy’, a bygone system such as communism or a ‘natural’ attribute of nationalism in Eastern Europe. They have a rationality of their own LQ WHUPV RI D FRQVWLWXWLYH LPDJLQDWLRQ WKDW HPHUJHV DV D UHVSRQVH WR VSHFL¿F experiences. Thus, non-democrats and democrats alike establish programmes of truth as ideology in narrative form. As this introduction has claimed, democracy in Eastern Europe has been shaping up across multiple changes of meanings, as a context-laden and historically generated concept. The distinctive power of myth in Eastern Europe and Russia pervaded tsarism, Russian messianism, Bolshevik revolutionary communism, as well as the perceptions of democracy as a realm of freedom, powerfully

Introduction 21 sustained by the ideology of freedom in the West, and of lasting subversive LQÀXHQFHDJDLQVWFRPPXQLVWSRZHU'HVSLWHLWVRSHQO\DQWLOLEHUDOV\VWHPLFIHDtures such as a negation of the rule of law, civil liberties, or constitutional rights, the political evolution of communism contained shifts in subjectivity and the GHYHORSPHQW RI QHZ PHDQLQJV RI GHPRFUDF\ 6DNZD  :\GUD   7KH power of the powerless in Czechoslovakia, for instance, was much more realistic than different forms of ‘Czech realism’ that had entailed disastrous consequences LQRU+DYHO 'HYHORSLQJGHPRFUDF\XQGHUFRPPXQLVP WR D VLJQL¿FDQW H[WHQW UHOLHG RQ WKH XUJHQW KRSH WR DWWDLQ WKLV XQGLIIHUHQWLDWHG good, generated by images of the West that exerted a spell on Eastern consciousness and imagination. The desire to belong to the free world, as equals of the economic, social, and political realities constituted an imagination that grasped WKHKD]\QRWLRQRIWKHµ:HVW¶DVDUHDOPRIIUHHGRP,Q*\|UJ\.RQUiG¶VYLHZ 6ROLGDUQRĞü¶VXQH[SHFWHGYLJRXUDQGSRSXODULW\FRQ¿UPHGWKDW democracy is on our minds: it is what we crave the most because it is what we lack the most, in every sphere of activity, in our economy and culture as much as in politics – and especially in those areas where we meet face to face and can look in the eye the people who make the decisions in our name and order us to carry them out. .RQUiG Eastern Europe’s urge to make up for this lack of democratic practice by heartfelt desires supports the democratic uses of such mythological constructions RIUHDOLW\0\WKVKDYHEHHQLQÀXHQWLDOLQWKHIRUPDWLRQRIPHDQLQJVRIGHPRFracy and thus, avant la lettre, the articulation of consciousness, beliefs, and attitudes that would facilitate the self-perception of the people as a political subject. While civic identity is often seen as a result of a democratic system, the very idea of civic identity requires aspirations, expectations, and social imagination. The point is to recognise that democratic politics is not simply incompatible with mythical representations, but quite on the contrary, cannot do without them.

Notes  ,QWKH¿QDOGUDIWWKLVZDVDPHQGHGWRUHDGµ2XU&RQVWLWXWLRQ  LVFDOOHGDGHPRFUDF\ because power is in the hands not of a minority but of the greatest number’. 2 In the case of the West this was along the Danube and the Rhine, while in Southern Europe the intensive Germanisation turned L ombardy and Friaul into ‘barbaric terri WRU\¶DQGWKXVLQWRDPDLQIRFXVRIP\WKIRUPDWLRQVHH%RUNHQDX 

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22 H. Wydra Anderson, R., Fish, M.S., Hanson, S.E. and Roeder, P.C. (2001) Postcommunism and the Theory of Democracy, Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press. %DUWKHV5 Mythologies, reprint edition, London: Paladin. %RUNHQDX) End and Beginning: On the Generations of Cultures and the Origins of the West, ed. by Loewenthal, R., New York: Columbia University Press. Canfora, L. (2004) La democrazia: Storia di un’ideologia, Rome and Bari: Editori Laterzi. Cassirer, E. (1946) The Myth of the State, New Haven and London: Yale University Press. &DVVLUHU (   The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms, Vol. 2, Mythical Thought, New Haven and London: Yale University Press. &HUWHDX0GH L’écriture de l’histoire, Paris: Gallimard. Chabal, P. and Daloz, J.-P. (2006) Culture Troubles. Politics and the Interpretation of Meaning, London: Hurst. Cirtautas, A.M. (1997) The Polish Solidarity Movement: Revolution, Democracy, and Natural Rights, London and New York: Routledge. 'DKO5$ Preface to Democratic Theory, Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Davies, N. (1996) Europe: A History, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Dobry, M. (ed.) (2004) Le mythe de l’allergie française fascisme, Paris: Albin Michel. Douglas, M. (1967) ‘The Meaning of Myth with Special Reference to La Geste d’Asdiwal’, in Leach, E. (ed.) The Structural Study of Myth and Totemism, London: Tavistock, 49–69. Dryzek, J. and Holmes, L. (2002) Post-Communist Democratisation, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 'XPp]LO *   Mitra-Varuna: Essai sur deux représentations indo-européennes de la souveraineté, Paris: PUF. Durkheim, E. and Mauss, M. (1963) 3ULPLWLYH &ODVVL¿FDWLRQ, Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Edelman, M. (1964) The Symbolic Uses of Politics, Urbana: University of Illinois Press. Eliade, M. (1960) Myths, Dreams, and Mysteries, London: Harvill. Elias, N. (1996) The Germans: Power Struggles and the Development of Habitus in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, ed. by Schroeter, M., Cambridge: Polity Press. (\DO*6]HOpQ\L,DQG7RZQVOH\( Making Capitalism without Capialists: The New Ruling Elite in Eastern Europe, London and New York: Verso. Figes, O. (2003) Natasha’s Dance: A Cultural History of Russia, London: Penguin Books. Girard, R. (1977) Violence and the Sacred, Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press. *OHDVRQ$ Totalitarianism: The Inner History of the Cold War, Oxford: Oxford University Press. *RVVLDX[-) µ/HVGHX[SDVVpVGX.RVRYR¶Socio-Anthropologie ± Hann, C.M. (2002) Postsocialism: Ideals, Ideologies and Practices in Eurasia, London: Routledge. +DUW]/ The Liberal Tradition in America, New York: Harvest. +DYHO 9   µ7KH 3RZHU RI WKH 3RZHUOHVV¶ LQ .HDQH - HG  The Power of the Powerless: Citizens Against the State in Eastern Europe, London: Hutchinson & Co., 23–96. +HUGHU-* WerkeHGE\%ROODFKHU0YROV)UDQNIXUW0DLQ'HXWVFKHU.ODVsiker Verlag. Hobbes, T. (1991) Leviathan, ed. by Tuck, R., Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Introduction 23 +RVNLQJ*DQG6FK|SÀLQ* Myths and Nationhood, London: Hurst. ,VDDF -&   Democracy in Dark Times, Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press. -DNREVRQ5DQG/pYL6WUDXVV& µ³/HV&KDWV´GH&KDUOHV%DXGHODLUH¶L’Homme ± -XGW 7   Postwar: A History of Europe since 1945, London and New York: Penguin. .HQQH\ 3   µ:KDW LV WKH +LVWRU\ RI " 1HZ 6FKRODUVKLS IURP (DVW&HQWUDO Europe’, East European Politics and Societies 13 (2), 419–431. .KDUNKRUGLQ2 Main Concepts of Russian Politics, Lanham: University Press of America. Kohn, H. (1961) The Idea of Nationalism: A Study in its Origins and Background, 2nd edn, New York: Macmillan. .RQUiG *   Antipolitcs: An Essay, San Diego, New York and London: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. Kubik, J. (1994) The Power Symbols Against the Symbols of Power: The Rise of Solidarity and the Fall of State Socialism in Poland, University Park: Penn State University Press. /HIRUW& Essais sur le politique, Paris: Seuil. /pYL6WUDXVV& The Naked Man, New York: Harper & Row. Lincoln, B. (1999) Theorizing Myth: Narrative, Ideology, and Scholarship, Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. Linz, J. and Stepan, A. (1996) Problems of Democratic Transition and Consolidation: Southern Europe, South America and Post-Communist Europe, Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press. Markoff, J. (1996) Waves of Democracy: Social Movements and Political Change, Thousand Oaks: Pine Forge Press. Mertus, J. (1999) Kosovo: How Myths and Truths Started a War, Berkeley: University of California Press. 3L]]RUQR$ µ3ROLWLFV8QERXQG¶LQ0DLHU&6HG Changing Boundaries of the Political, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 27–62. Rousseau, J.J. (1990) The Social Contract and Discourses, London: Dent. Said, E.W. (1993) Culture and Imperialism, New York: Knopf. 6DNZD5 µ6XEMHFWLYLW\3ROLWLFVDQG2UGHULQ5XVVLDQ3ROLWLFDO(YROXWLRQ¶Slavic Review ± Sartori, G. (1973) Democratic Theory, Westport: Greenwood Press. Schumpeter, J.A. (1976) Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy WK HGQ /RQGRQ George Allen & Unwin. 6WUHQVNL, Four Theories of Myth in Twentieth-Century History: Cassirer, Eliade, Lévi-Strauss, and Malinowski, Iowa City: University of Iowa Press. Sugar, P. and Lederer, I. (1994) Nationalism in Eastern Europe, Seattle and London: University of Washington Press. 6]FV- µ7KUHH+LVWRULFDO5HJLRQVRI(XURSH¶LQ.HDQH-HG Civil Society and the State, London: Verso, 291–332. 7DOPRQ- The Origins of Totalitarian Democracy, London: Secker & Warburg. 7LVPDQHDQX 9   Fantasies of Salvation: Democracy, Nationalisms, and Myth in Post-Communist Europe, Princeton: Princeton University Press. Tocqueville, A. de (1969) Democracy in America, New York: Harper & Row. 7RFTXHYLOOH$GH L’ancien régime et la révolution, Paris: Flammarion.

24 H. Wydra 7UHQFVpQ\L%DQG.RSHþHN0 Discourses of Collective Identity in Central and Southern Europe (1770–1945), Vol. 1, Budapest and New York: Central European University Press. 7XUQHU9 µ0\WKDQG6\PERO¶LQ6LOOV'HG International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, New York: Macmillan. Verdery, K. (1999) The Political Lives of Dead Bodies: Reburial and Postsocialist Change, New York: Columbia University Press. 9H\QH 3   Did the Greeks Believe in their Myths? An Essay on the Constitutive Imagination, Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. 9RHJHOLQ( The New Science of Politics: An Introduction, Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. :DOLFNL$   The Three Traditions in Polish Patriotism and their Contemporary Relevance, Bloomington: The Polish Studies Center. Whitehead, L. (2002) Democratization: Theory and Experience, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Wolff, L. (1994) Inventing Eastern Europe: The Map of Civilization on the Mind of the Enlightenment, Stanford: Stanford University Press. Wydra, H. (2007) Communism and the Emergence of Democracy, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Part I

Leadership, communism, and identity-formation

1

Mythology and the Trickster Interpreting communism Agnes Horvath

Nothing comes out of nothingness Parmenides

Introduction Although it is unusual to begin a chapter with personal remarks, the following might help to situate the main argument. It was about a year ago that we travelled from an archaeological trip on an island back to the continent by ferry. 0LGZD\LQWKHFURVVLQJDWWKH¿IWKKRXUZKHQORRNLQJDURXQGXVVHHLQJRQO\ grey faces, tired, forceless bodies and aimless movements, we recognized ourselves as the Easterners of Europe, travellers between space and time, those who never arrive. Torn from one land and not yet arriving at the other is the permanence of the nulla, where everything can happen without any meaning, bodies are simply pushed back and forth by the same movement, as in a bowling game, as there is no clear will or force that gets hold of the events. Nothing is important, no values exist; the nulla is the only reality. However, in mathematics, the nulla LV QRW YDOXHOHVV ,W LV D WRRO GH¿QHG E\ convention, by means of which a number of operations are rendered possible – for example, helping to move from natural numbers to negative integers, then to irrational and even imaginary numbers. Nulla is the place of Myth too, this is ZK\WKHFKLOGKRRGRIPRGHUQPDQWKHFRQVFLRXVGH¿QHGSHUVRQZLWKKLVWRU\ face and identity was born only afterwards. Thus we arrive at the dwelling place RIWKH7ULFNVWHUWKHLQ¿QLWHDQGIRUPOHVVUHDOH[LVWHQFHRIWKHnulla or the world of pure Mythology, before or after history, identity, politics, state or community, SDVVLRQGHYRWLRQIULHQGVKLS7KLVLVWKHÀXLGVWDWHRIQRQEHLQJ This is why any attempt to capture the nulla in politics through a purely formal and institutional analysis, focusing on democracy, parliamentarism, or WKHVWDWHRIODZLVLQYDLQDVWKHVHDUHVROLGIRUPVIUDPHVDQGGH¿QLWLRQVDQG so are out of the territory of the zero. Instead, we offer a different way to catch this numberless number, making use of the psychological heritage of mankind as contained in myths. In the footsteps of C.G. Jung and Károly Kerényi, and others, we will analyse communism as a traumatic drama that took place in the last century. As Harald Wydra argues in his contribution to this volume,

28 A. Horvath democracy and democratization in contemporary East Central Europe must be UHODWHGWRFRPPXQLVPWRWKHÀX[VWDWHRIQRQEHLQJZKHUHHYHQWKRVHZKRZHUH aware of the falsity of communists’ claims were led into the same state of slavery of the mind, the same dissolution of inner composure and articulate, distinct thinking. For both its agents and victims communism was delirious, with a swift and rolling emotional force that was capable of capturing and subordinating. Even those who were aware of the falsity of the enchanting communist claims were led into the same state of submission, and through resignation to the dissoOXWLRQRILQQHUFRPSRVXUHDQGWRWKHVXFFHVVIXOFDSWLYDWLQJRIWKHPLQG0LáRV] 1951; Tismaneanu and Shapiro 1991). Richard Sakwa called it a communist ‘incubus’ (Sakwa 2006), and indeed the coercive policies followed by the Communist Party when in power penetrated the entire social body, rolling over and over again at a very fast rate until the regime acquired a hallucinatory shape: too banal to take it seriously, yet too horrible to turn one’s back on it – an irresistibly infectious regime. Communism produced a transformation of society similar to a viral infection, spreading rapidly through all the internal organs, liquefying them and breaking them down and apart. Communism was a disease,1 whose virulence neither drugs nor vaccines could stop. It mimed the Enlightenment, mimicked progress and the liberation of individuals from all bondages of order, imitated Jacobinism in imposing terror and being elitist, aped the large scale of the capitalist state and its bureaucracy, copied socialism with its calls for wider equality, without ever arriving anywhere. It relied on the identity and unity of the entire political body, until at the very end only one person remained who was concerned with politics, ‘he [Gorbachev] alone decided on it, placing himself at great risk, putting in doubt the successful political and material prospects that awaited him’ (Sakwa 2006), stated the adviser of the politician. Within a short time communism multiplied the formlessness created by the devastation of the Russian Civil War +ROPHV6DNZD LQWURGXFLQJVLJQL¿FDQWFKDQJHVLQWKHVWUXFture of institutional separateness, by promoting an ‘indifferentiation’2 characteristic of transitory situations, and thus erasing the articulation of organizational substance and frameworks, and blotting out awareness of the political conditions. The self-proclaimed and perpetual transformations of the system from one state to another, from the dictatorship of the proletariat to the building of socialism, and then to communism, which was always postponed into the future, not only lacked a proper political articulation, but propagated an extreme degree of confusion (Mauss 1992: 174–176). Constant crises and endless campaigns of ZDUV DQG SHUVHFXWLRQ ZHUH IROORZHG E\ LQWHOOHFWXDO H[KDXVWLRQ DQG LQWHQVL¿HG agony, eliminating the possibility of social self-regeneration. Not a single theoretical innovation came out of Eastern Europe, making this nothing the only visible thing on the ruins of communism. So in the following our aim is to provide a guide to the nullaDQGLWV¿JXUHWKHPLPHWLFtrickster.

Mythology and the Trickster 29

The mime 7KHUHDUHDVPDQ\NLQGVRI7ULFNVWHUVDVWKHUHDUHSODFHVZKHUHWKLV¿JXUHKDV EHHQ LGHQWL¿HG 7KH 7ULFNVWHU LV ZHOO NQRZQ LQ :HVW $IULFD 1RUWK $PHULFD Scandinavia, the Far East and Greece, and in many other places. The most aversive one, however, is the archaic Dorian Mime, the fool with a stupid face, who is carrying harm without any reason (Nicoll 1963). The ‘dull and wanton MegarHDQ MHVW¶ DV WKLV ¿JXUH DSSHDUHG LQ $ULVWRSKDQHV¶ Wasp, from whom ‘Do not expect anything great’. The mime, when imitating human affairs (the name mimes is a pure derivation of mimesis), is different even from comedy. Comedies also show what is worst in man, making him ridiculous through his errors, but the mime is transforming human concerns into formlessness, and clearly takes a stance against normal human life. When a comedy makes us laugh, it has an attitude towards life, trying to make one better by showing up the reverse of things. The mime does nothing comparable, it rejects nothing and shows up nothing, it simply embodies pure negligence and carelessness, and is completely XQPRUDODQGXQGLGDFWLFLQSUHVHQWLQJDVKDGRZHG¿JXUHRIWKHFRSLHGRULJLQDO Through the monotonous repetition of the standard themes of greed, cruelty, avarice, lust or licentiousness, the mime embodies passivity and negativity together in a way that is arrogant in its humbleness. The mime stages a joyless, blunt, defenceless world where nothing is to be loved. The mimetai are never DVOHHS DQG KDYH DQ LQ¿QLWH H[WHUQDO DGDSWDELOLW\ WR DOO WKH YLFLVVLWXGHV RI OLIH The states of chaos and confusion dreaded by normal human beings are the conditions that make them thrive. The mimes originated in the phallic Momus, who was never worshipped among the Greeks (though appears among the gods of Hesiod as the son of 1LJKW  +H EHFDPH D OLWHUDO ¿JXUH JHQHUDOO\ UHSUHVHQWHG PDVNHG LQ RUGHU WR dupe his victims (Hammond and Scullard 1970). In modern use a mimeograph is a machine that prints copies just like the mimetai copy morals, desires and actions of others. In mimicking others the mimetai try to be like them or act like them, even though the mime is not really that person. In its generic version it represents a new understanding of the nature of man, linking imitation with falsehood, perjury and fraud. The mask of the mimetai, with its baldness, broad nose and full lips, sharp, staring eyes and big ears, catch the symbols of eagerness, greediness and lustful appetite, the insatiable libidinousness that has UHFXUUHGWKURXJKRXWWKHFHQWXULHVLQWKH¿JXUHVRIWKHDSHIR[FR\RWHHWFLQ the folk tales of all people. Under his mask, when in imitation, this gloomy, base and mysterious character is even more threatening. From it derived the whole family of demonic beings: dwarfs and homunculi, dragons, serpents and monkeys who enslave humans, making them blunt and stunted, robbing their souls, bringing psychic malady to them. By his blundering and lurking the mime, ‘the little man’s farce’ (Nicoll 1963), transports humans into a degraded, defenceless dummy existence, where they lose their creativity and also their care and interest for the world. The ancient authors recognized that the mime was something other than pure

30 A. Horvath entertainment: it was ‘this mime of mortal life’3 that through imitation literally sucks out the juices of life, splitting the identity of a man with his soul, turning him into a violent, obsessive and coercive being. Mimicry steals the meaning of order, taking away the essence of everyday life, bringing with itself a certain emptying during the mechanical imitation of human drives and needs (O’Sullivan 1987). The ‘mimic-fool’ type received an excellent overview in Enid Welsford’s book on the laughter-making parasite or buffoon. This type appears in idiotic, JURWHVTXH¿JXUHVOLNHKXQFKEDFNVS\JPLHVOLYLQJVNHOHWRQVRUJQRPHVDOZD\V represented with an exaggerated phallus (Welsford 1966: 61). Welsford also evokes the example of Vidushaka, the misshapen Brahmin dwarf, who appears LQWKH.DPD6XWUDDQGZKRVHQDPHVLJQL¿HVWKHµRQHJLYHQWRDEXVH¶LELG  But Vidushaka also has a different identity/mask: ‘one who knows only a part of NQRZOHGJH DQ DPXVLQJ SHUVRQ DQG D FRQ¿GDQW LV FDOOHG 9LGXVKDND RU MRNHU¶ (ibid.: 63). Vidushaka always wears a mask, has no face or identity, is grotesque in body and foolish in mind, continuously petted and abused. Yet, he is also under divine protection, being an empty vessel that transmits divine presence DQGVRWKHFRQ¿GDQWRIKLJKHUDXWKRULWLHV:HOVIRUGDFFHSWVWKHYLHZWKDWGZDUIV were ipso facto regarded as priests and magicians, credited with special knowlHGJHRIWKHGLYLQH7KHLUGDQFHVZHUHDVVXPHGWRKDYHPDJLFDOVLJQL¿FDQFHDQG thus had vital importance in a number of cultures starting from Egypt and Rome. ,Q DQFLHQW *UHHFH WKLV ¿JXUH ZDV UHSUHVHQWHG E\ WKH 'RULDQ 0LPH DV HDUO\ DV the sixth century BC (ibid.: 58), and also by the strange and mysterious archaic deities, the Kabirs (Kabeiroi).

The trickster in anthropology and mythology For the anthropologist Mary Douglas, who studied under Evans-Pritchard, author of the Zande Trickster, joke and joke perception are the expression of a sort of pollution, and so an undifferentiated, unorganized and uncontrolled relation. She starts with Bergson’s analysis on laughter, according to which a joke is always a punishment: ‘something “bad”, mechanical, rigid, encrusted is attacked by something “good”, spontaneous, instinctive’ (Douglas 1966: 363). But she moves beyond Bergson as he failed to realize the sinister implications of joking. A joke is always a play upon form, with the danger of formlessness: ‘It is frivolous in that it produces no real alternative, only an exhilarating sense of freedom from form in general’ (ibid.: 365). Douglas suggested that a joke is essentially an antirite, so when joking is used in ritual it attacks the sense of rite, the very order and hierarchy of society. A joke is not just something out of ritual order, it has no place at all when we are trying to make sense of the world, whether concerning the value of the individual or the different levels and values of social relations (ibid.: 370). A joke is of the same kind as dirt, closely linked to death and sex. This is why joking is practised in funerals (the polluting duties of burial), at ritual killing (the ritual mock killing of a god), or at rituals connected to sexuality, like weddings, and this is why obscenity is so much part and parcel of

Mythology and the Trickster 31 joking. In his book on clowns Don Handelman refers to Douglas’s conception of GLUW DQG DUJXHV WKDW FORZQ W\SHV KDYH DQ DI¿QLW\ ZLWK GLUW DV WKH\ DUH MXVW DV out-of-place as dirt is. He also notes the clown’s presence during marriages (the Pakistan wedding) and various kinds of ritual licences (the Pueblo Indian clowns, the Hopi clown, etc.): ‘The clowns build their ash-house, eat like gluttons, drink urine and enact burlesques of marriage and intercourse’ (Handelman 1990: 251). In West Africa the trickster god, Es(h)u, is omnipresent in words and deeds. The whole life of the tribe is permanently under the god’s power, as he plays on all levels of meaning from social order to family life and sexuality. The god (VK X(OHJEDUDLVDFRPSOH[¿JXUHRILQWULJXHDQGGLVDVWHU+HLVGRXEOHYRLFHG as though somebody with two mouths, and he is constantly inciting to discontent )UREHQLXV +HIDOVL¿HVWUXWKDQGPRGL¿HVDVKHUHSHDWVZKDWRUGLnary people are saying and doing, but by doing so he translates it immediately into another meaning. He assigns the value of indeterminacy for every movement and happening. The Yorubans were very much aware of his polluting danger: the trickster myth was sacred; it was not narrated either to children or to strangers.43UD\LQJDGPLUDWLRQDQGGHYRWLRQZDVQHFHVVDU\EH\RQGVDFUL¿FHWR catch the god’s benevolence or to turn his destructive energy away from the tribe: ‘Eshu, do not deceive and harm me: deceive another’ (part of a prayer, in Pemberton 1975). His jokes pollute mutual understanding; he is continuously playing with established forms; his activity expresses undifferentiated and unorganized, uncontrolled relations. The Trickster is considered a permanent danger, always present when ‘an accepted pattern is confronted by something else’, whirling into the never-ending curve of the nulla, the nothingness (Douglas 1966: 364). In the terminology used by Victor Turner the Trickster represents the via negativa, the breaking of codes, which leads to nothing and reaches nowhere (Turner 1968: 578). In her 1975 essay on the marginal Trickster Barbara %DEFRFN$EUDKDPV HPSKDVL]HG WKH WKUHDWHQLQJ FKDUDFWHU RI WKH ¿JXUH WKH ‘Trickster’s connection with nothingness, with negativity, and often with the introduction of death into the world is a threat both to reality and to our ways of seeing it complexly’ (Babcock-Abrahams 1975: 185). For archaic people especially, however, this aggressive, vindictive, vain threat for normal existence was DOVRWKHRQO\VRXUFHRISURFUHDWLYLW\7ULFNVWHUZDVRQHRIWKH¿UVWGHLWLHV,WLV SUREDEO\IRUWKHVDPHUHDVRQWKDW3ODWRDUJXHGWKDWWKH¿UVWW\SHRIORYHLQFOXGHG all kinds of lust, including gluttony or tyranny, before the appearance among humans of the divine attributes of grace and beauty: ‘We must observe that in each one of us there are two ruling and leading principles, which we follow whithersoever they lead; one is the innate desire for pleasures, the other an acquired opinion which strives for the best’ (Plato, Phaedrus 237d–e, emphasis added). Franz Boas, the founding father of American anthropology, agreed that ‘the trickster elements were the most primitive aspects’ of the North American culture heroes that motivate self-centring, amorality and greed, a more than H[SOLFLWHDJHUQHVVDIWHUKXPDQÀHVK5LFNHWWV 

32 A. Horvath Hermes, in his Phrygian name Cadmilus, descendant of Hephaestus and one of the Kabirs, is the equivalent deity among the Greeks. His similarity to Es(h)u is widely recognized (Gates 1987: 8–9). The myth of the Kabirs very much follows a standard trickster pattern, with a murder between three brothers, the penis of one of the Kabirs cut and wrapped into a purple cloth, garlanded and carried on a bronze shield (note the circle form) being the foundation of the cult of the Kabiroi. Below E(s)hu and Hermes/Cadmilus stands Momus, the mimes and the clown, both the decoders of humans. The word clown (cloyne, cloine, or clowne) (Handelman 1990: 240) is also related to clone, meaning the reproduction of something like human: feelings, actions and behaviour similar to the KXPDQ SURGXFHG DUWL¿FLDOO\ DV LI WKH\ ZHUH RULJLQDO DV LI WKH\ ZHUH LGHQWLFDO with it, thus approximating the real. All these stage characters like the fool or the jester are analogous with the clown (ibid.: 236). Handelman emphasizes the DI¿QLW\RIWKHFORZQZLWKWKHOXPSLVKDQGLPSHUIHFWDVVXJJHVWHGE\WKHZRUG clot: some kind of sticky lump that is formed from a liquid, impossible to seize RUGRPLQDWHEHLQJÀXLGFRQWLQXDOO\FKDQJLQJLWVIRUPDQGPRGHRIH[LVWHQFH ‘The clown is torn out of context, and its outline is blurry. It is “lumpish” in its imperfect, but congealed and adhering fusion of unlike attributes’ (ibid.: 241). Mimes and clowns are able to imitate humans so perfectly exactly because of their own congealed liquidity, but also – as Handelman notes, referring to Welsford – due to their tendency ‘to “dissolve” the solidity of the world’ (ibid.: 241). Figuratively the Trickster is often represented as a spider. This image captures well his malignant power as the wandering spirit at night, corrupting and annihilating the soul and then destroying the body. The spider has been conQHFWHG WR WKH 6FDQGLQDYLDQ WULFNVWHU ¿JXUH /RNL/RFNH 5RRWK    DV well as Ananse, the Ashanti Trickster (Pelton 1980), the trickster god of the Oglala Dakota Indians in North America (Radin 1956: 133), and also Ture, the Zande Trickster (Evans-Pritchard 1967). The spider is a highly plausible image IRUJDLQLQJPDVWHU\RYHUWKHGHSUDYHGDVLW¿UVWFDWFKHVRUHQFORVHVLWVYLFWLPV LQQHWVDQGWKHQVXFNVXSWKHÀXLGVRIOLYLQJRUJDQV The threads of a net constitute the structure of a trap, creating a solid body to FDSWXUH DQG NHHS VRPHWKLQJ LQ SODFH 7KH QHW LV PRVWO\ XVHG IRU FDWFKLQJ ¿VK WKRXJKZDVDOVRXVHGLQKXQWLQJ,WDSSHDUVLQWKLVZD\LQWKH/RNLWDOHDQGLV present in the Thracian version of the Orpheus myth as well, where Orpheus appears as a fox, just as in Thrace Dionysos was a fox-god, representing the GLYLQH KXQW FRQQHFWHG WR WKH µVDFUL¿FLDO IXQFWLRQV¶ RI WKH µQHWKXQWHU¶ (LVOHU 1921: 26–27). The mystic conception of catching the divine essence, assuring fertility and abundance, through the net (often symbolized by the womb) is also SUHVHQWLQPDUULDJHULWXDOVLQWKHDFWRIWKURZLQJD¿VKHUPHQ¶VQHWRYHUWKHQHZ bride (ibid.: 162), or in Christianity by the idea of Jesus being a catcher of souls.5 The Trickster’s hostility towards any ordered relation perhaps even originated in his bad experiences with the net. Being ignorant about what is good and bad and not being able to learn from experience he is vulnerable and can easily be trapped by those rendered clever by their experiences. The fool’s ignorance is

Mythology and the Trickster 33 identical with the idiot’s clot, the thick scrotum, as the fool/idiot knows only one thing and repeats it endlessly. This is why so many Tricksters are phallic beings, OLNH/RNLRUWKH$PHULFDQ,QGLDQWULFNVWHU¿JXUH:DNGMXQNDJDDQGWKHLUDQLPDO counterparts: the spider, the coyote, the rabbit or the tortoise; wily deceivers lurking around humans, desiring them, digging traps for them, though in the end the Trickster is always the one who falls into it. Jensen suggests that deception was introduced in the heroic age, as it frequently appears in narratives in that way, as an important and characteristic element of mythology: ‘it seems that man has become aware of his superiority over other creatures in the exercise of cunning’ (Jensen 1963: 71). Kerényi considered it remarkable that ‘the trickster does not have its roots H[FOXVLYHO\LQPDQ¶EXWFDQEHVRZHOOUHSUHVHQWHGE\DQLPDO¿JXUHV.HUpQ\L 1972: 187). In the same way the procreative phallic image is somehow also separate from humans. This ‘disobedient and self-willed’ (Plato, Timaeus 91b) thing is like an animal that would not listen to reason. Jung turned Radin’s Trickster into an archetype, but the Trickster is somehow more than a simple part of the inborn human psyche. Its patterns are evidently there, but only as a distinct and indiscriminate clot, to which it is possible to convert a mode of being that can be learned. The Trickster features are not the deep essences of the soul, to be UHYHDOHGDQGLGHQWL¿HGZLWK5DWKHULQVLGHHYHU\KXPDQEHLQJWKHUHDUHIRUPless spots that can be activated; like a small dirty irritation that can be turned into a huge and ugly abscess by scratching. Consciousness is the instrument by which the mind controls activities, learning from experience and separating right from wrong. However, by unwisely irritating this clot, it can develop a misguided, perverse interest in formlessness itself. This is what is represented in myths and legends by the ugly monster at the bottom of the lake or the cave that is awakened by the careless. The Trickster, this impersonation of formlessness, is always lurking on the borderline.6 It belongs neither to the realm of the gods, nor to the humans, as it does not participate in their experiences, yet has a foot inside both worlds. The Trickster is not the opposite of life (it is not simply death), but only something different; it is just one of the many classes of being which are mingling with each other. Plato calls this the not being, a type of reality to which the sophist is luring the heedless: ‘Evidently this is precisely not-being, which we are looking for because of the sophist’ (Plato, Sophist 258b). Sophisma is also a technical WHUPXVHGE\3OXWDUFKLQGLFDWLQJWKHVXEWOHÀH[LEOHSRO\PRUSKLFDQGDPELJXous kind of being that is waiting in the shadows poking out a bait in order to lure and capture its victims (Detienne and Vernant 1978: 159). Thus, the Trickster is not a real human being, not even an archetype, but a stubborn pattern of mimicry, a formless non-being who only gains reality by catching what really exists. It is thus an instinctive existence similar to animals, or – after Descartes one should say – to mechanical constructions. While the sophist Trickster is the HQHP\RIPHDQLQJIXORUGHULWKDVDQDI¿QLW\ZLWKWKHUHSHWLWLYHLQVWLQFWXDODQG mechanical; this is why Hermes the Trickster was also called a mechaniota. Thus, while the sophists altered the meaning of the word Sophia, the term as it

34 A. Horvath DSSHDUHG LQ +RPHU¶V ZULWLQJV DOUHDG\ KDG DQ DI¿QLW\ ZLWK WKH 7ULFNVWHU DV LW ‘was used of any organised body of knowledge with its own rules and methods handed on from one generation to another within a professional group’ who kept LW ¿UPO\ WRJHWKHU LELG   )URP WKLV SHUVSHFWLYH LW LV QRW VR VXUSULVLQJ WKDW Plato ‘roundly condemns and rejects all these forms of knowledge’ (ibid.). In classical mythologies and tales the Trickster always comes to a community that is in order. The Trickster is lured by its opposite, which is serenity, calmness and measure. This order, however, is dissolved soon after his arrival, and then the situation remains imprisoned in a trickster-like existence, where nothing grows or changes, where destiny seems inexorable.7 All types of trickster tales and myths bear imprints of liminal permanency, or a state of terminality, the terrifying situation resulting from the rule of the Trickster: the killing of gods, the stealing of the sun, the proliferation of incest and cannibalism. In these stories the world is turned upside down in all senses, where man is seemingly just an observer who becomes an outsider to his own life, where his fate is taken out of his hands. In trickster myths after a time the role of man is reduced to collecting the tales containing the exploits of the Trickster, who becomes not only the unheroic hero, but even the sole protagonist (Arne and Thompson 1995). Thus the 7ULFNVWHUJDLQVEHLQJDWWKHH[SHQVHRIDOOEHLQJVSHUPHDWLQJKXPDQVLQÀXHQFing every part of them, passing through their thinking and thus spreading into them; he comes to life by parasitically extinguishing all life around himself, sucking up and into himself the vital liquids. This is the way how the Platonic not-being takes part in reality, and also how lies and forgery come into being: by thinking or saying what is not. Imitations, likenesses and miming are appearing, SUHWHQGLQJ WR EH UHDOLW\ DQG LQ¿OWUDWLQJ HYHU\ VHJPHQW RI VRFLHW\ EHFRPLQJ taken for granted in a matter of fact way. This leads to the rule of false discourse: ‘when things are said about you, but things other are said as the same and things that are not as things that are, it appears that when such a combination is formed of verbs and nouns we have really and truly false discourse’ (Plato, Sophist 263d).8 It has been suggested that the Trickster has unique linguistic power, that he is the ‘meeting-place of all words’, the ‘master of all language’, even ‘the “really real” ’ (Pelton 1980: 269). This is in direct consequence of the ‘many-faced and ironic’ nature of symbols, ideals, rituals and customs, which are all imaginative and imitative (ibid.). The Trickster’s twisted words are the products of his juggling them, showing the ‘multiformity’ of their elements, as ‘he is a composition RI WKH KXPDQ MXJJOLQJ DQG ÀLSÀRSSLQJ QHHGHG WR KROG LQ EDODQFH WKH ZRUGV arising from all conversation in which man is engaged’ (ibid.: 270). But the 7ULFNVWHUOLQJXLVWLVDOVRDQLPDJHPDNHUZKRPLPHVWKH¿JXUHDQGWKHYRLFH the words and the arguments of others. His essential incompleteness is always connected to a behaviour that is at once gross and subtle: ‘Eshu’s penis breaks, the travellers fall into the river, and the people shout with glee: the destination is never reached – and therefore it is here’ (ibid.: 271). Mechaniota was a Greek name of Hermes (Hesiod, Hymn to Hermes, line 436). It implied getting something done in a special way, within a particular,

Mythology and the Trickster 35 autonomous system. The Trickster uses mechanical, automatic procedures, a certain device that moves without a particular purpose, just strolling around in order to catch something desirable by being the opposite of its own indeterminacy. It could be beauty, productivity, harmony, wealth, food, anything that is the opposite of the Trickster’s non-being existence of pain, suffering, insatiety, restlessness and weakness. Once its object of desire was consumed, or rather destroyed by rendering it equal to the Trickster, he is again on the road, looking for new prey, leaving behind the blunt, the joyless, the defenceless: the former objects of his desire. The soul is the principium that keeps man together. It is the force that survives after the death of the body, and which carries the identity of the human being to the underworld. Persons are really souls; this is their true self, which is in contact with the divine. The body is not an essential part of existence, as its survival is not necessary for continued existence. The immortality of the soul is the principle that upholds the divine power in man, which is everything that directly touches the springs of life. This power has a special connotation for the Trickster (and studying the Trickster stories one cannot help the suspicion that this power (the soul) was originally robbed from him; or, even better, following the general pattern, he became the victim when he wanted to victimize), as he lacks divine attributes. Plato has recognized this: ‘They are not so dark as to be less real than what is not, or so luminously clear as to be more real than what is’ (Plato, The Republic 479d). The proper expression of this dark character is the nulla, or the curve that completely turns back into itself. In his Mechanica Aristotle explains the amazing qualities of the circle in reversing relationships of power, which enables the smaller and weaker to dominate the stronger and bigger. The circle unites within itself several opposites, each one giving birth to its own opposite, and so possessing a power that is beyond ordinary logic. Following Aristotle, Detienne and Vernant suggest its extension to intelligence, that ‘itself becomes constant movement, polymorphism, reversal, deceit and duplicity’. They give several examples for this phenomenon: the verbal ploys used by a sophist in making the adversary’s powerful argument recoil against him; the merchant who makes money out of nothing; or the politician who assesses the uncertain course of events in advance (Detienne and Vernant 1978: 46–48). Uncertainty marks the world of marginality. Here the unexpected can always RFFXUIRUWXQHVFDQEHLQVWDQWDQHRXVO\UHYHUVHGDQGVDFUL¿FHLVWKHPDLQFHQWUH of gravitation for social, religious and ritual life.

Trickster seeds and foundations The boundless was called apeironE\WKH*UHHNV,WLVWKHUHDOPRIWKHLQ¿QLWH and formless existence of the gods and so the location of mythology, a place for polymorphic monsters, for shifting, multiple, unpredictable entities like the titans or the typhoon. The apeiron is the Becoming, a place that cannot be crossed; it is chaos, lacking form, an absence of determination, all brute matter, a dark fog, DQDE\VV WKDW KDV QHLWKHU OLPLWV QRU IRXQGDWLRQV ,W FRQWDLQV QR ¿[HG SODFHV RU

36 A. Horvath established directions, it is forever misty, an opaque mass without top or bottom, it knows neither right nor left. The apeironLVDVSDFHODFNLQJDQ\¿[HGSRLQWV for orientation – except for one thing. This singular and unique mode of existence is mimicry, which is appropriate for the soft, supple body of the apeiron. Here appearances and reality no longer correspond to each other, but stand in contrast, producing illusion. Where there is an absence of determination, only mimicry shows the way out. Where the shores are lost from view, with sky and water becoming indistinguishable, illusion comes up as the sole point of reference. Within a single, dark, indistinct mass only the imitation of forms, gestures, faces can bring something resembling solidity. The sperm (sperma, or seed) is associated with Metis, the Greek goddess of cunning, who is also called sperma kluton theon (the ‘illustrious seed of the gods’), and whose name is connected with mítos, the ‘thread of the woven tissue’ (Detienne and Vernant 1978: 163). In a myth Metis was swallowed by Zeus and in this way gave birth to Athena, the clever and beautiful maiden who founded the wonderful city of Athens. Forms, beauty and knowledge plunged in this way into the formless abyss, but the myth also shows us how the complex thread of mítos has caught nothingness into schemes, into Being. Metis governs darkness, bringing light to it, thus giving birth to the opposite forces of good and bad, light and dark, and also to Eros. Concerning the conception of Eros, Plato’s Symposium repeats the most ancient of mystic themes, when Poros, the offspring of Metis, sowed his seeds into the body of Penia, who represented pure barrenness, the lack of determination. This is how the realm of Becoming, the universe of foggy abyss, became the fertile world of Being, establishing an order and adopting measures concerning what is to be the most expedient (metis). Poros/Metis is the one who crosses through, the trailblazer of the pass or the discoverer of the passage, the one who owns the stratagem, the techneRI¿QGLQJWKHZD\RXWRI impossible situations, the only one who is able to grasp the multiple, unpredictable features of Becoming. Metis is the cunning goddess of the Greeks, an important and authentic deity, who is fertile in inventiveness, capable of devising a SODQ VXLWHG WR FLUFXPVWDQFHV LQ HYHU\ RFFDVLRQ /DWHU IRU WKH 2USKLFV 0HWLV ceases to be female, is transformed into an androgynous god, Metis-Phanes, creating a world where the Orphic Dionysos would take the place of Zeus (Detienne DQG9HUQDQW± %XW0HWLVLQFRUSRUDWHVWKH7ULFNVWHU¿JXUHDVZHOO µ7ULFNVWHULVWKHQDPHJLYHQWRDW\SHRIP\VWLF¿JXUHGLVWLQJXLVKHGE\KLVVNLOO at trickery and deceit as well as by his prodigious biological drive and exaggerated bodily parts’ (O’Sullivan 1987: 45). All the exploits of this divine character told in various Trickster mythologies take place in a situation of opening up. Every situation that has a resemblance to Becoming – uncertainty, confusion, dizziness – are receptive to Metis/Poros/ sophistai/Trickster. They begot Eros, the never-ending multiplication of the intermediary, who tries to create a pass between two worlds: between men and gods, or between man and woman. Forever mediating between high and low, thus confusing the different directions of space and layers of quality, the diverse FRORXUVVSHFLHVDQGYRLFHVDUHXQLWHGDQGWKXVEHFRPHVLPSOL¿HGE\KLP(URV

Mythology and the Trickster 37 is a parasitic being who is living on the efforts produced by others, eliminating their honour and virtue, consuming their principles of life into a directionless limitlessness. It is forever wandering until there is no above and below, no right and left any more, only a great mingling together. The Trickster combines features of the transformer culture hero and the alienWRDQ\FXOWXUHZDQGHUHU$WRQHPRPHQWKHLVOLNHDIRUHVW¿UHWKDWZLOOUXQLWV course until everything that feeds its appetite is burnt out; at another time he is the founder of cultures, continuously operating between opposite poles generating tension for creativity. Still, common to both aspects is that whatever he does he performs without explicit knowledge or conscious intention. Whether doing good by gifting his skills or causing harm and disease, he is indifferent about it. His intelligence operates beyond true knowledge, in the realm of instincts. This LVZK\KHLVRIWHQFRQ¿JXUHGLQDQLPDOIRUPVOLNHDVSLGHUDIR[RUDFR\RWH types that embody speedy shifts and reversals, unexpected acts and an urge for revenge. He is swift, mobile and dangerous, a living trap who is silently waiting in the shadows, ever on alert. Poros (Metis, sophist, Trickster) is the one who leads out of the apeiron, crossing the unending ocean of doubt and smoothing the unceasing eddies of uncertainty, and is the passage, the crossing, the escape from the extremities of the nulla. O’Sullivan argues that ‘the tricksters’ most conspicuous bodily parts are passages (mouth, nostrils, anus, ears, vagina) and members that bridge or SHQHWUDWHWKRVHSDVVDJHVHJKHDGVSHQLVRULQWKHFDVHRIWKHVSLGHU¿JXUHWKH ¿ODPHQWZLWKZKLFKKHVSLQVKLVZHE 2¶6XOOLYDQ 7KLVLVZK\WKHcoitus a targo is the Trickster’s preferred passage to humans, the round whole, the symbolic nulla in the human body where worlds meet, come together, pass through and interpenetrate one another – when the ‘nothing’ annuls the ‘existent’, restoring desire to its truly rightful place: to pure imagination without any sense, as it is not linked with procreation, but only with the cloacal matrix.

The liminal Trickster In initiation rites the locus classicus de natura et origine deformitatis,9 or the situation of liminality is invoked, where beauty and grace is excluded from the factors that give birth to something new, and where Metis is called upon instead. The concept of ‘liminality’ was developed by Arnold van Gennep on the basis of a comprehensive study of such rites, and elaborated further by Victor Turner. These rites include public rituals in which the entire community participates as a performer, like the various cyclical rituals celebrating the passing of seasons, central for agricultural societies. Van Gennep wrote a huge multi-volume work, running to several thousands of pages, which collected the folklore of France in relation to such rituals. However, the most characteristic initiation rites are those public rituals through which individuals within particular communities are guided from one stage or role in their life course to another. This can be a passage from youth to adulthood, or from unmarried to married status, or it could include ceremonies organized around major life-experiences like birth, illness or

38 A. Horvath death. These rituals traditionally were not formal ceremonies but genuine trials DQGSHUIRUPDQFHVLQZKLFKWKHLQGLYLGXDO¶VROGLGHQWLW\ZDV¿UVWFDQFHOOHGRXW so that at the end a new identity could be successfully assigned.  7KHVHULWHVWKHUHIRUHLQYROYHGDVXFFHVVLRQRIWKUHHVWDJHV,QWKH¿UVWVWDJH called a rite of separation, the candidates were separated from their familiar surrounding, were deprived of clothing, food, shelter and sexual pleasures, and were often subject to the abuses of others. At the same time, they were also given license to steal, rob and abuse, doing all the typical character-signs of the trickVWHU ¿JXUH 7KH\ EHFDPH RXWFDVWV WKH\ ZHUH WKUHDWHQHG EXW DOVR UHSUHVHQWHG D threat. Ridicule, abuse and fasting, however, all served a purpose. These trials of endurance represented a stage of preparation for the actual performance. Turner HPSKDVL]HV WKDW DW WKLV VWDJH WKH FRPSOH[ WH[WXUH RI VRFLDO OLIH ZDV VLPSOL¿HG into a most basic structure involving only two sides (Turner 1967: 99). There were the leaders running the ceremony, and the rest of the community, whether initiands or simple members, who were supposed to obey without a word. The out-of-the-ordinary conditions were not restricted to those who had to perform the rituals. Many of the prohibitions – especially concerning the special pleasures of life, like sexual activity or the consumption of meat or alcohol – were extended to the entire community. Everybody had to be on their toes, PDNLQJ VDFUL¿FHV LQ RUGHU WR SURPRWH WKH VXFFHVVIXO SHUIRUPDQFH LQ WKH VWDJH where the uncontrolled love characteristic of the primal chaotic elements was evoked. Such conditions were extremely dangerous, as they represented a combination of disorder, chaos and confusion characteristic of the abyss on the one hand, and excessive violence and concentration of power on the other. This is why ULWHV RI SDVVDJH ZHUH RQO\ SHUIRUPHG LQ WKH SUHVHQFH RI VSHFLDOO\ TXDOL¿HG ‘masters of ceremonies’, medicine men or diviners who usually belonged to other villages, having gone through special initiation rites themselves, and who were widely recognized and respected due to their skills and knowledge.10 This period, lasting for a few days or at most a couple of weeks, was followed by the second stage, the actual performance of the test, trial or initiation rite. Here the individuals had to provide telling proofs that they merited the passage into the next stage of their life. This middle phase was called the liminal phase proper. Finally, once the trials or performances were completed, there came the third phase of re-aggregation, where the order of the community was restored, and those who successfully completed the passage were celebrated in their new role.  /LPLQDOLW\ RQO\ FRPHV LQWR EHLQJ RQFH WKH SUHYLRXVO\ VWDEOH VWUXFWXUHV RI VRFLDO RUGHU DUH WHPSRUDULO\ GLVVROYHG 7KHUH LV DQ DI¿QLW\ EHWZHHQ WKH SRZHU structure characteristic of tyranny or any other type of mass-subordination, and the temporary situation that emerges between the initiands and the masters of ceremonies in a rite of passage. During such rites there is an absolute division between the rulers and the ruled; there is no opportunity for any resistance or dialogue. Strict binary divisions temporarily replace the manifold criss-crossings of social life usually characteristic of small-scale societies. The difference between the two cases lies not in the character of power differentials but their

Mythology and the Trickster 39 duration: while in tribal societies such binary divisions and absolute power are present only for the period of the ritual, in the case of tyranny they are maintained for several decades. The aim of these rites of separation is to render individuals who would undergo the test ‘malleable’. It is only in this way that they can proceed, in a small and closed community, from one stage of their life to another. However, those human beings who enter a liminal situation due to an event like a war are SDUWLFXODUO\VXVFHSWLEOHDQGUHFHSWLYHWRYDULRXVLQÀXHQFHVLUUHVSHFWLYHRIWKHLU stage of life in which they were without any purpose. They are especially in dire need of peirar, or signs, indications, guide-marks (Detienne and Vernant 1978: 287–288), in the passage out of the liminal extremity; a quick and effective solution for the problems of reconstruction in a post-war situation, a return to normality. But the opening up of a path does not guarantee safe arrival. These same SHRSOH FDQ EH YHU\ HDVLO\ IRUPHG LQÀXHQFHG DQG JXLGHG WRZDUGV D SDWK WKDW instead, moves only further away from any normal structure and order. This is an outcome that nobody would wish for, and nobody in their right mind would VXSSRUWXQGHUQRUPDOFRQGLWLRQV+RZHYHUOLPLQDOFRQGLWLRQVDUHE\GH¿QLWLRQ not normal. This is the condition that provides unprecedented opportunities for the Trickster.  7KHWULFNVWHU¿JXUHVDUHRPQLSUHVHQWPDQLIHVWDWLRQVRIGLVRUGHURUµOLPLQDOity’. Turner’s characterization of liminality as ‘anti-structure’ is particularly appropriate to describe the situation proper for the Trickster, who is ‘never wholly subdued, ruled by lust and hunger, forever running into pain and injury, cunning and stupid in action’ (Kerényi 1956: 185). The Trickster operates RXWVLGH WKH ¿[HG ERXQGDULHV RI DQ\ FXVWRP DQG ODZ RQ WKH WKUHVKROG 7XUQHU 1967) where both invention and stealing becomes possible, and the enormous difference between the two vanishes. The Trickster performs his activities as if in a ‘no man’s land’, symbolized by the magic wand of Hermes the master thief, by which he can enchant, deceive and steal, hiding away reality, leading the soul as a psychagogos, but also stealing it and carrying it into the underworld, the world of Hades. The trickster patterns are few and given, limited to deploying a FXQQLQJ GHYLFH LQ RUGHU WR JHW RXW RI LPSRVVLEOH VLWXDWLRQV /HIW RQ KHU RZQ 0HWLV WKH SHUVRQL¿FDWLRQ RI OLPLQDOLW\ FDQQRW GR DQ\WKLQJ RWKHU WKDQ UHSHDW endlessly the scenes of hunting down, entrapping and catching in her/his net the victims who are reduced to impotence. But Zeus swallowed Metis and thus eliminated her mischievousness. This was the way in which their graceful daughter Athena could come into being. Cunning intelligence emerges in order to solve dangerous situations, but dangers are inherent in the very process of its use. Without a respite Metis constitutes a threat to the fundament of human life, gobbling up every existing network of meaning and relationship and replacing them instead with her one, which in the next turn is devoured again. She always operates between two opposites until one disappears into the other or vice versa, until black and white, each valuable and necessary in themselves, merge in dull nondescript greyness that is of no use whatsoever and no longer attractive for Metis either.

40 A. Horvath The birth and growing up of Hermes gives us a perfect example for this process. Hermes possesses the power of sorcery. By his magic he can put a spell RQSHRSOHWKLVGHLW\UHSUHVHQWVDOOWKDWWKHµGHPRQLFQLJKW¶VLJQL¿HV0DQQDQG Kerényi 1975: 41). The Trickster has an irresistible, sinister power, a hypnotizing force making his victim follow his intentions, which – save in very few exceptions – naturally lead to his own territory, into Death. In the Homeric HymnsWKH¿JXUHRI+HUPHVWULFNVWHUPRFNVKLVYLFWLPZKHQPDNLQJDPXVLFDO instrument from the shell of a tortoise, laughing at his sufferings, blatantly abusing him for his own pleasure: ‘I shall take thee into my house: be thou of service to me!’ (ibid.). Hermes is playful and cheerful. He is laughing at the sufferings of the tortoise in its dying moments, thus proclaiming the absurd ridiculousness of mortality. The only redeeming quality of the tortoise’s existence on earth is that by dying it could become a pleasure-giving instrument to the Trickster. In general terms Hermes is the initiator or guide who leads us towards the sweet and imaginary death-state, where the pleasure of irresponsibility pulls down and drowns us. This is pleasant for both sides, as Hermes can satisfy his greed and man can be IUHHGIURPWKHWRUPHQWLQJUHVSRQVLELOLWLHVRIOLIH6LJQL¿FDQWO\+HUPHVDSSHDUV in the story due to his lust for pleasures, and thus for his carnality. He is always \HDUQLQJ IRU ÀHVK DV KLV FRQFXSLVFHQFH FDQQRW EH VDWHG +HUPHV LQFLWHV WKH basic instincts, arousing hope, desire, curiosity, but without ever giving satisfacWLRQ+HLVLPSRWHQWDQGSDVVLYH7KLVFDQEHVHHQLQKLV¿UVWWKHIWLQWKHFDWWOH UDLGLQJGRQHVRRQDIWHUKLVELUWKZKHQKHVWROH¿IW\FRZVIURP$SROOR¶VKHUG 7KH7ULFNVWHUEHJXLOHVWKLQJVLGHDVDQGLQVWLWXWLRQVEXW¿QGVQRFRPSHQVDWLRQ as he is alone, the cold one. Hermes is restless, as he can never satisfy his GHVLUHVKHLVDQLQEHWZHHQFRQ¿JXUDWLRQRIDJJUHVVLYHEXWXQFHUWDLQYLULOLW\+H is lonely, single, a cool sterile disease; this is why he is always lurking after what is warm, thus giving many children to Olympus, among others Eros and HerPDSKURGLWXV+LVPRVWGHVLUHGWDUJHWZDVRIFRXUVH$SKURGLWHZKRSHUVRQL¿HG beauty and was thus just perfect to balance Hermes. The Trickster all alone, without the balance of his opposite, is lethal, as he reduces all forms of cooperation and reciprocity to their barest minimum. This is why he has to hide his nature and make himself look desirable in order to reach the objects of his desires, covering his furious rage and thirst for vengeance with tenderness and gaiety, being charming and attractive. Still, this mechaniota never FKDQJHV +H EULQJV KXPDQV LQWR WKH VDFUL¿FLDO VWDJH RI GHDWK E\ VWHDOLQJ WKHLU souls and transporting them to his realm, the Otherworld, where they are serving him. The Trickster does not learn, change, develop or cooperate; Hermes is the living web of interweaving, the poikilómetis or poikilóboulos, ‘full of inventive ploys’ (Detienne and Vernant 1978: 18–19), the one who is continuously conceiving schemes: ‘Thy father begat thee to be a sore vexation to gods and men’ (Kerényi 1958: 146). His thoroughly asocial nature never changes, only the stages of his imitation plays are alternating. Hermes is distrustful, lying, volatile and instrumental, animated with a profound despising of both man and god: ‘I shall go to Pytho and

Mythology and the Trickster 41 burgle his house. There I shall have enough tripods and basins, gold, gleaming iron and many robes to plunder. That thou shalt see, if thou so desirest!’ (ibid.: 147).  7KH¿QDOFRQWUDGLFWLRQRIWKH7ULFNVWHULVWKDWZKLOHKHLVOXUNLQJDIWHUEHDXW\ and would like to catch her, the ‘prince of thieves’ carries a particularly strong rancour and resentment against grace. Being its exact opposite, it must consume and destroy everything that is graceful. Hermes embodies the liminal phase in which all kinds of marginal, disorderly, unlawful activities and experiences are possible, like robbing, stealing, cunning, deceit, prowling, stalking, hiding near our houses during the night, trying to avoid being seen. But even more characteristic is his hostility to and envy of his opposite. He is a deeply ego-centred EHLQJ¿QGLQJVDWLVIDFWLRQRQO\LQKLPVHOIDQGZRXOGYHU\PXFKOLNHWRHOLPLQDWH the warm, active principle of his opposite, whose very existence continuously reminds him, and everyone else, of his own shortcomings and utter failure. This is why he is mocking with impotence and also brings sterility among the Olympians. He does not give easily, so even this is unintentional. Hermes is not even D ¿QDO LQGH[ RI WKHVH VLJQV VXFK DV LPSRWHQFH RU VWHULOLW\ DV KH FDQQRW EH crammed into any stable identity, but is always in an intermediate state, halfway between ridicule and the sacred caduceus (Kerényi 1958).  +HUPHV LV D ¿JXUH RI UHSUHVVLRQ DQG VXIIHULQJ +H ZDV FDVW RXW IURP WKH company of the gods, and his mother was never allowed to enter their blessed assembly. After a time, tired of sulking on his bad luck, Hermes chose a new trick, trying to put up a good face by declaring that the Olympian order is irreleYDQWIRUKLP1HZUXOHVPXVWEHIROORZHGPDGHXSRIKLODULRXVMR\IXOQHVVÀLUWing love and sweet dreams. But once inaugurated, all this is immediately transformed into the ‘as if’ attributes of a stylized life, where trick-ful methods, like indirectness, approximation and double-talk are considered more invigorating than simply following the obvious, denigrated as dull routines of order. It is intricacy that is valued during playfulness, not visibility.11 Torn out of the company of the gods, Hermes neither sinks into Hades, nor becomes a man. He remains the divine Trickster, who has no home but is at home in his homelessness, continuously moves back and forth between the immortals and the mortals, using all kinds of tricks and deceptions to enchant ERWKRIWKHP%XWKLVPDLQDFWLYLW\LVWRGHOXGHDQGHQWUDSVRXOV¿UVWLQDPLOG soft, hardly perceptible manner, guiding them through ever more irreversible and terrifying stages of corruption towards nothingness. Hermes wilfully leads the mortals who accidentally became entangled in the shadowy night of liminality into the territory of an unconscious, mechanical existence and then to death.

Conclusion It can be shown by mathematical modelling that it is enough for a single zero to enter a closed system so that eventually all the other numbers would be transformed into zeros. In social life this means a nullity existence that can only imitate, due to its lack of any inner substance. The nulla here does not simply

42 A. Horvath produce collapse and death, rather a replacement of genuine human relationships, whether good or bad, by their mere copy. Institutional and legal arrangements do not solve the problem of the nulla, once it gains a social ascendancy. The nulla can very well imitate the logic of democracy, playing the role of the responsible citizen, just as it earlier feigned concern for the fate of the downtrodden, or the survival of the nation. Being the eternal outcast and outsider, the nulla cannot participate from the inside in the value and meaning of social life. Yet, for those who are outside the community emptied by the Trickster and participate in other social networks this very quality of the nulla is not visible. Exactly from the external position the difference between the genuine and the false cannot be seen. The type of quasi-existence brought about by the communist Mime can therefore be protracted well beyond the collapse of its original host regime. It might take up a nationalist or fascist mask, if new destructive energies can be liberated by some groups which could still provoke hatred. This, however, is not necessary; a soft, lukewarm kind of democratic regime could be the ideal postFRPPXQLVWFRQWH[WIRUWKHIXUWKHUÀRZHULQJRIWKHnulla. For a different outcome, the possibility of a meaningful life, it is not enough to pick up handbooks on rational choice theory or try to engineer institutional UHIRUPV$VWKHJUHDWWKLQNHUVRIWKHUHJLRQOLNH3DWRþND+DPYDVRU%LEyNQHZ well, this would require a turning around, not outside, at the level of legalistic manipulations, but at the heart of the personality: an awakening from slumber and a return to the ways of the ‘care of the self’. Otherwise, the former victims of the communist regimes might only perpetuate their identity as eternal sufferers.

Notes 1 2 3 4

The term was used by Monnerot (1953) and Talmon (1985). The term is from René Girard (1977: 39–64); see also Girard (1978). Seneca, Moral Epistles, as quoted in Nicoll (1963: 88). About absolute secrecy, see Radin (1956: 111). Evans-Pritchard states the seeming opposite, that trickster tales are ‘essential stories for children’ (Evans-Pritchard 1967:  EXWWKLVDJDLQRQO\FDSWXUHVWKHDPELYDOHQWELSRODULW\RIWKH¿JXUHDVMRNLQJDQG the telling of stories at one level incorporates the easy entertainment of children, at another the most fearful undermining of existential certainties.   7KHSRLQWWKDWWKHPDLQDSRVWOHVZHUHVLPSOH¿VKHUPHQLVPDGHTXLWHHPSKDWLFDOO\LQ the New Testament, just as the use of parables by Christ is compared to the throwing out of the net. 6 The chapter by Thomas Grob in this volume on Mazepa could be considered a perfect example for the Trickster in this sense.   6HH WKH FODVVL¿FDWLRQ RI WKH :LQQHEDJR FLUFOH E\ %DEFRFN$EUDKDPV %DEFRFN Abrahams 1975).   7KLV SRLQW KDV EHHQ HPSKDVL]HG E\ VXFK FODVVLFDO ¿JXUHV RI (DVW &HQWUDO (XURSHDQ SROLWLFVDQGWKRXJKWDV9iFODY+DYHO-DQ3DWRþNDRU%pOD+DPYDV)RUPRUHGHWDLOV see the chapter by Szakolczai in this volume. 9 Marsilio Ficino on Plotin, as cited in Bodei (1995: 94). 10 The Trickster often takes up the role of a shaman or a medicine man; see Guenther (1999). 11 On the aggressive, ego-centred and agonistic aspect of play see also Turner (1968).

Mythology and the Trickster 43

Bibliography Arne, A. and Thompson, S. (1995) 7KH7\SHVRIWKH)RONWDOH$&ODVVL¿FDWLRQDQG%LEOLography, Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Babcock-Abrahams, B. (1975) ‘A Tolerated Margin of Mess: Trickster and his Tales Reconsidered’, Journal of Folklore Institute 11, 147–186. %LHGHOPDQ72   µ5LJKW DQG /HIW +DQG DPRQJ WKH .DJXUX$ 1RWH RQ 6\PEROLF &ODVVL¿FDWLRQ¶Africa 3, 250–257. Bodei, R. (1995) Le forme del bello, Bologna: Il Mulino. Bright, W. (1993) A Coyote Reader, Berkeley: University of California Press. Brown, N.O. (1969) Hermes the Thief, New York: Vintage Books. Detienne, M. and Vernant, J.P. (1978) Cunning Intelligence in Greek Culture and Society, Brighton: The Harvester Press. Douglas, M. (1966) ‘The Social Control of Cognition: Some Factors in Joke Perception’, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 3, 361–376. Eisler, R. (1921) Orpheus – The Fisher/RQGRQ:DWNLQV Evans-Pritchard, E.E. (ed.) (1967) The Zande Trickster, Oxford: Clarendon Press. )UREHQLXV/ The Voice of Africa/RQGRQ+XWFKLQVRQ *DWHV+/ The Signifying Monkey: A Theory of African-American Literary Criticism, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Girard, R. (1977) Violence and the Sacred, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Girard, R. (1978) Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Guenther, M. (1999) Tricksters and Trancers, Bloomington: Indiana University Press. +DPPRQG 1*/ DQG 6FXOODUG ++ HGV    The Oxford Classical Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press. Handelman, D. (1990) Models and Mirrors, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hesiod (1924) The Homeric Hymns and Homerica, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. +ROPHV/ Politics in the Communist World, Oxford: Clarendon Press. +ROPHV/ Post-Communism: An Introduction, Cambridge: Polity Press. +\GH/ Trickster Makes this World, New York: North Point Press. Jensen, A.E. (1963) Myth and Cult Among Primitive Peoples, Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Kerényi, K. (1944) Hermes the Guide of the Souls: The Mythologem a Male Source of Life, Zurich: Albae Vigilae, N.S.I. Kerényi, K. (1951) Gods of the Greeks, Harmondsworth: Penguin. Kerényi, K. (1972) ‘The Trickster in Relation to Greek Mythology’, in Radin, P. (ed.) The Trickster/RQGRQ5RXWOHGJHDQG.HJDQ3DXO Kerényi, K. (1958) Gods of the Greeks, Harmondsworth: Penguin. /HYLQH/: µ6RPH*R8SDQG6RPH*R'RZQ7KH0HDQLQJRIWKH6ODYH7ULFNster’, in Elkins, S. and McKitrick, E. (eds) The Hofstadter Aegis, New York: Alfred Knopf. Mann, T. and Kerényi, K. (1975) Mythology and Humanism: The Correspondence of Thomas Mann and Karl Kerényi, Ithaca, NJ: Cornell University Press. Mauss, M. (1972) A General Theory of Magic, /RQGRQ5RXWOHGJH Mauss, M. (1992) ‘A Sociological Assessment of Bolshevism [1924–5)]’, in Gane, M. (ed.) The Radical Sociology of Durkheim and Mauss/RQGRQ5RXWOHGJH 0LáRV]& The Captive Mind, New York: Vintage.

44 A. Horvath Monnerot, J. (1953) Sociology of Communism/RQGRQ$OOHQ 8QZLQ Nicoll, A. (1963) Masks, Mimes and Miracles, New York: Cooper. 2¶6XOOLYDQ/ µ7KH7ULFNVWHU¶LQ(OLDGH0HG The Encyclopedia of Religion 15, New York: Macmillan. Pelton, R. (1980) The Trickster in West Africa, Berkeley: University of California Press. Pemberton, J. (1975) ‘Eshu-Elegba: The Yoruba Trickster God’, African Arts 9, 20–92. Radin, P. (1956) The Trickster: A Study in American Mythology, New York: Schoken. 5LFNHWWV 0/   µ7KH 1RUWK $PHULFDQ ,QGLDQ 7ULFNVWHU¶ History of Religions 5, 327–350. Rooth, A.B. (1961) Loki in Scandinavian Mythology/XQG&:.*OHHUXSV)RUODJ Sakwa, R. (1989) Soviet Politics/RQGRQ5RXWOHGJH Sakwa, R. (2006) ‘From Revolution to Krizis: The Transcending Revolutions of 1989–91’, Journal of Comparative Politics 38, 4, 459–478. Talmon, J. (1985) Political Messianism: The Romantic Phase, Boulder, CO: Westview Press. Tismaneanu, V. and Shapiro, J. (eds) (1991) Debates on the Future of Communism, /RQGRQ0DFPLOODQ Turner, V.W. (1967) The Forest of Symbols, New York: Cornell University Press. Turner, V.W. (1968) ‘Myth and Symbol’, in Sills, D. (ed.) International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, New York: Macmillan. Turner, V.W. (1986) The Anthropology of Performance, New York: PAJ Publication. Welsford, E. (1966) The Fool, His Social and Literary History/RQGRQ)DEHU )DEHU

2

The non-being of communism and myths of democratisation Arpad Szakolczai

The three terms communism, democracy and myth open up among themselves a whole universe of fertile interplays, most of which are not explored in the contemporary social sciences, still much dominated by varieties of criticism and positivism. Both communism and democracy have their myths, though usually not thought of along these terms; and myth itself is a thoroughly ambivalent word. Even further, while today these myths would seem to be radically different, it is more than worthwhile to explore what these myths of communism and democracy might share with each other. This is all the more so as social scientists seem to have an extremely short memory span these days. They especially seem to forget that, after all, communist regimes called themselves ‘People’s Democracies’, and a great part of the Western intellectual elite was for a long time more than willing to take such claims at face value, ready to denounce the hypocrisy of ‘mere’ liberal democracy. From this perspective it is of much more than historical interest to ask how this could have been possible; and what long-term consequences this has entailed, present if not visible in the contemporary social world. It is too easy today to be ‘for’ democracy and ‘against’ communism. An understanding of how widespread intellectual support for communism was possible in the past can help us to diagnose what actually ‘stinks’ in contemporary democracies as democracies, with their time being still ‘out of joint’, even if exactly those people who supported various forms of (mostly left-wing) totalitarianism in the past are scandalised even by the thought that democracy as it is usually understood today may not be the perfect form of polity. This chapter selects and tries to discuss in a coherent manner three aspects of this manifold problematic. First, it will argue that communism was not simply hopelessly utopian and mythical in this negative sense, but also profoundly unreal; an effective absurdity with an enormous and very real lasting effect. In order to argue this point it will use the ideas of Béla Hamvas, whose work is still little known outside Hungary, but who was without doubt the most important WKLQNHU OLYLQJ LQ WKH FRXQWU\ LQ WKH ¿UVW FRPPXQLVW GHFDGHV 6HFRQG LW ZLOO address the question of how this absurd, nonsensical regime could have been considered as the avant-garde of progress for long decades. In this perspective WKH FKDSWHU ZLOO QRW VLPSO\ UHÀHFW RQ WKLV SDWKRORJ\ RI PRGHUQLW\ EXW E\

46 A. Szakolczai suggesting a typology of democratisation processes, will argue that the experience of communism helps us to come to terms with deep-seated and little recognised problems concerning the very ideals of modern democracy. Finally, the DUWLFOHZLOOVKRUWO\VNHWFKKRZWKHLGHDVRI-DQ3DWRþNDRQHRIWKHPRVWLPSRUtant East Central European thinkers, help us to move beyond this ideological black hole at the intersection point of critical thought and modern democracy.

Introduction: on political spirituality 7KLVFKDSWHUEHORQJVWRD¿HOGWKDWFRXOGEHGH¿QHGDVµSROLWLFDOVSLULWXDOLW\¶,WV perspective is Weberian, in so far as it is an attempt at an interpretive understanding of communism, in the tradition of verstehen, as Weber developed it XVLQJWKHZRUNVRI'LOWKH\DQG6LPPHOZLWK1LHW]VFKHDQG.LHUNHJDDUGLQWKH EDFNJURXQG %XW LV DOVR UHFRJQLVHV VWURQJ DI¿QLWLHV ZLWK WKH SURMHFW RI (ULF 9RHJHOLQDVGH¿QHGLQWKHNew Science of Politics and in Science, Politics and Gnosticism, and with Michel Foucault’s concerns with the ‘history of the present’ and the ‘genealogy of modern subjectivity’, as the aim will not be simply to understand the past, but to bring out its relevance for the present moment. Finally, it is deeply informed by the creative fermentation that took SODFH EHWZHHQ 7KRPDV 0DQQ .iURO\ .HUpQ\L DQG &DUO *XVWDY -XQJ LQ WKH 1930s.1  6WLOO HYHQ WKRXJK WKH DQDO\VHV RI SRZHU E\ :HEHU RU )RXFDXOW DUH ZHOO known by the students of politics, the Voegelinian expression of ‘political spiritXDOLW\¶ VHHPV SX]]OLQJ DOPRVW VHOIFRQWUDGLFWRU\ 3ROLWLFV LV VXSSRVHG WR EH dealing with ‘real’ things, ‘tough’ realities, struggles motivated by ‘objective’ interests, and not with ‘spiritual’ matters. And yet, there are two meanings of the ZRUG µVSLULWXDO¶ WKDW DUH RI GLUHFW SROLWLFDO UHOHYDQFH 7KH ¿UVW FRQFHUQV WKH ‘moving force’ of human conduct; what mobilises and motivates people, what generates a following, thus constituting a ‘breakthrough force’ in historical change. Weber’s Protestant Ethic in this sense still constitutes both a milestone and a methodological example, taken up by, among others, Voegelin, Eisenstadt DQG 1RUPDQ &RKQ LQ H[SODLQLQJ UHYROXWLRQDU\ PRELOLVDWLRQ (LVHQVWDGW   One could still argue that it is exactly interests that move people; everything else is only illusion, mirage or false consciousness. But, as the classic work of Albert Hirschman (Hirschman 1977) has shown, the meaning of the word ‘interest’ can by no means be taken for granted: it has been constructed, and furthermore as part of a political programme. Perhaps the most decisive proof for the widespread recognition of the continuous presence of ‘spiritual’ factors in politics is provided by the Weberian concept of charisma, one of the three types of legitimate domination. The second meaning of ‘spirituality’ is the transformation of the mode of being of the individual. It is this meaning that was close to Michel Foucault, especially in his interest in ascetic techniques, technologies of the self, the care of the self and the practice of parrhesia (the courageous and risky telling of a SHUVRQDOO\EHOLHYHGWUXWK 6]DNROF]DL 

The non-being of communism 47

The unreality of communism While the linking of contemporary Eastern Europe and ‘communism’ with ‘myth’ is a relatively recent phenomenon, it is not so distant from attempts to characterise this peculiar entity with expressions like ‘utopia’ or ‘eschatology’. Common to all these notions is the recognition of a fundamental ‘reality gap’. Communism was not simply an oppressive regime and a clear-cut historical failure; it was even absurd to the point of being unreal. It was a peculiar type of political system that was profoundly ‘without being’ in Plato’s sense of ‘notbeing’ (Plato, SophistH±H   7KLVFODLPVRXQGVSX]]OLQJRQD¿UVWUHDGLQJ$IWHUDOOWKHUHDOLW\RIFRPPXQLVPZDVDVVXUHGLQWKH¿HOGRILQWHUQDWLRQDOUHODWLRQVE\RQHRIWKHWZRVXSHUpowers, while internally maintained by a powerful oppressive machinery, occasionally turning into outright terror. But it is exactly the fact of this terror that further underlines the unreality of the entire system. Terror is surrealistic, and the system, in fact, uniquely in history, eventually collapsed under its own weight, not leaving anything else behind but debris. The nullities and non-entities that the communists always were simply vanished into the thin air, out of which they had somehow materialised in the starting years of the twentieth century. The proper representation of communism at the level of mythical, subconscious symbols is not the ‘evil Empire’ of Star Wars, rather Michel Jackson’s ‘Thriller’.  6LPLODUYLHZVZHUHQRWIDUIURPWKHSHUVSHFWLYHVRIWKHPRVWVHQVLWLYHPLQGV of the region. The absurdity of the regimes was widely recognised by intellectuals in Eastern Europe, present in various works of the absurd and grotesque, so SRSXODU LQ WKH UHJLRQ WKH SOD\V RI 0URĪHN RU .DUDGMDOH WKH VKRUW VWRULHV RI gUNpQ\RU5DGLFKNKRYWKHQRYHOVRI+UDEDORU(VWHUKi]\WKH¿OPVRI)RUPDQ RU 0HQ]HO WR QDPH MXVW D IHZ  DQG KDG LQ IDFW EHHQ IRUHFDVW ZLWK SURSKHWLF YLVLRQLQQRYHOVE\-RVHSK&RQUDG¿UVWDQGIRUHPRVWLQUnder Western Eyes. However, it is exactly with the ‘Western eyes’ that we enter the next series of problems. It is all too easy to deride communism now. But were they not some of the best minds of the West who, for much of the twentieth century, considered communism as the model society and the example of the bright future, with Marxism (and Leninism) in the background? If communism was a case of non-being, if it turned out to be just a deception, a mimetic illusion, then it should have been recognisedDVVXFKDQG¿UVWRIDOO H[DFWO\ E\ WKH PRVW LPSRUWDQW DQG LQÀXHQWLDO LQWHOOHFWXDOV RI WKH FHQWXU\ 7KLV evidently did not happen. Much of the intellectual history of the past century can EHZULWWHQDFFRUGLQJWRWKHGDWHLQZKLFKYDULRXVSHUVRQV¿QDOO\UHFRJQLVHGLWV PLPH6RPH±OLNH$UWKXU.RHVWOHUDQG)UDQ]%RUNHQDX±GLGLWDOUHDG\LQWKH VVWLOORWKHUVLQRUDQGLQZLWKWKHSXEOLFDWLRQRI 6RO]KHQLWV\Q¶V Gulag Archipelago in France being a particularly crucial mileVWRQH 4XLWH D IHZ RQO\ GLG VR LQ  %XW DOO WKLV LV EHVLGH WKH SRLQW If the entire thing was a hoax from the start, as it has in fact proved itself to be, then how was it that people did not recognise it right away? Even more, that this was considered as the avant-garde, the bright future to come?

  A. Szakolczai It is here that, as if against itself, the phenomenon of communism can be UHVWRUHGWRLWVULJKWIXOSODFHLQWKHJHQXLQHDYDQWJDUGHLQPRGHUQKLVWRU\1RW of course, as, after all, containing a grain of positive truth, as people like Derrida RUäLåHNZRXOGOLNHWRKDYHLWVWLOOWRGD\DIWHUDQGLQVSLWHRIHYHU\WKLQJ7KH spirit of Marxism never had a grain of truth in it, and those who ever believed the contrary still owe the world an admission of their profound errors. Rather, as GHPRQVWUDWLQJ E\ WKLV YHU\ EOLQGQHVV WKHLU FRQWLQXLQJ QLKLOLVP DQG WKH QHHG ± SDUDSKUDVLQJ )RXFDXOW ± RI D FULWLTXH RI WKH FULWLFDO WUDGLWLRQ )RXFDXOW   7KHVRFDOOHGJUHDWLQWHOOHFWXDOVRIWKHSDVWFHQWXU\OLNH6DUWUH/XNiFV*UDPVFL Adorno, just to name a few, were led, as so many Marios, by trickster-magicians DQGWULFNVWHUFORZQV±LQFDVHWKH\ZHUHQRWRQHRIWKHP Thus, the twentieth century was not just the century of world wars and of totalitarian dictatorships, but was also the century of blindness, of un-recognition, of loss of sensitivity, of WKH SRZHU RI GLVFULPLQDWLRQ DQG RI D VHQVH RI MXGJHPHQW 6WLOO IROORZLQJ 1LHW]VFKHDQWUDFNVLIWKHJUHDWHVWEOLQGQHVVRIWKHWZHQWLHWKFHQWXU\LVUHODWHGWR communism, then one can perhaps expect that a proper, possibly eye-opening thematisation of this phenomenon would also be done in the region of ‘existing communism’, and with relevance extending well beyond this time, place and topic. This is in fact what has happened with the work of Béla Hamvas, the Hungarian essayist philosopher, which targeted exactly the elusive concern with the reality of the ‘world’, the ‘realness’ of reality, the awakening out of the slumber, and the thematisation of a sense of distinction or discrimination. The life-work of Hamvas $VWKHZRUNHYHQWKHQDPHRI%pOD+DPYDV± LVSUDFWLFDOO\XQNQRZQ RXWVLGH+XQJDU\DQGXSWRWKHPLGVZDVDOOEXWXQNQRZQHYHQWKHUH,PXVW start with a few words detailing his career. Hamvas can be considered the Hungarian Borges, or the Hungarian Eliade, or a peculiar, unique combination of both, SHSSHUHG E\ WKH YLFLVVLWXGHV RI WKH FRPPXQLVW H[SHULHQFH 8S WR  +DPYDV worked as a journalist and then a librarian, never wanting to enter academic life, but tolerated and even appreciated on the margins, relentlessly critical of the regime that existed between the two World Wars. In 1935, together with his friend .iURO\.HUpQ\L± WKHZRXOGEHZRUOGIDPRXVVWXGHQWRIP\WKRORJ\ they started a periodical entitled Sziget (Island), with the aim of renewing Hungarian intellectual life. The journal managed to attract as contributors some of the PRVW LPSRUWDQW ¿JXUHV RI WKH FRXQWU\¶V DUWLVWLF DQG DFDGHPLF VFHQH EXW KDG WR FORVHGRZQDIWHUWZR\HDUV$IWHUWKLVH[SHULHQFH.HUpQ\LZRXOGLQFUHDVLQJO\GLVWDQFHKLPVHOIIURP+XQJDU\VHWWOLQJGRZQHYHQWXDOO\LQ6ZLW]HUODQGDQGH[FKDQJLQJ LGHDV ¿UVW RI DOO ZLWK &* -XQJ DQG 7KRPDV 0DQQ ZKLOH +DPYDV ZRXOG withdraw into an internal emigration. This did not prevent him, however, being FDOOHG IRU PLOLWDU\ VHUYLFH GXULQJ WKH 6HFRQG :RUOG :DU HYHQ WKRXJK KH KDG already served his duties on the front in the First World War. During the last days of the battle of Budapest in the winter of 1945, his house was hit by a bomb and completely destroyed, together with all his books, notes and documents.

The non-being of communism 49 After 1945, with the hope of some new openings he started to edit a book VHULHV SXEOLVKLQJ ZRUNV E\ 1LHW]VFKH +HLGHJJHU DQG 0D[ :HEHU DPRQJ RWKHUV%XWWKLVG\QDPLFZDVFXWVKRUWE\DFULWLFDODUWLFOHE\*HRUJ/XNDFVZKR in 1947 branded him a fascist, due solely to the support Hamvas gave to abstract PRGHUQDUW,Q+DPYDVZRXOGVXEVHTXHQWO\ORVHKLVMREDQGEHIRUFHGWR VHWWOHLQDGHVRODWHDUHDRIWKH1RUWK(DVWHUQFRUQHURIWKHFRXQWU\ZRUNLQJLQD new ‘socialist town’ as a stock-keeper of a factory, until his retirement in 1964. All this did not stop Hamvas working on his own life-project, which was an DWWHPSW EDVHG RQ KLV DPD]LQJ OLQJXLVWLF VNLOOV WR EULQJ WRJHWKHU WKH ZLVGRP FRQWDLQHGLQDOOWKHVDFUHGERRNVRIWKHZRUOG±QRWDVSDUWRIDQHQF\FORSDHGLF undertaking, but in order to diagnose and understand the crisis of his age, and HYHQSRLQWWRZDUGVWKHZD\RXW,Q±DWWKHKHLJKWRIWKH6HFRQG:RUOG :DUKHFRPSOHWHGWKHPDQXVFULSWRIWKH¿UVWSDUWRIKLVScientia Sacra, devoted to the ancient sacred books, focusing on the changes brought about by the spiritXDOPRYHPHQWVRIWKHVL[WK±¿IWKFHQWXU\ BCWKXV\HDUVEHIRUH.DUO-DVSHUVDQG Lewis Mumford started to talk about the ‘axis time’ or ‘axial age’. Between  DQG  KH ZURWH D QRYHO HQWLWOHG The Carnival, an opus magnum ¿UVW SXEOLVKHGLQDQGUHSXEOLVKHGLQLQWKUHHYROXPHVDQGSDJHV which is widely considered today as the key novel of its time and place. But his less than ideal working conditions did not prevent him from continuing work on his project either. Every month he carried suitcases full of books from Budapest DQGEDFNDQG±DFFRUGLQJWRWKHUHFROOHFWLRQVRIKLVIULHQGV±WKHGUDZHUVRIKLV RI¿FHGHVNZHUHDOZD\VKDOISXOOHGRXWIRUPLQJDVLWZHUHDVWDLUZD\HDFKFRQtaining a different open book, usually of a different age and language. Hamvas ZDVQRWDQLGHDOVRFLDOLVWZRUNHU±ZKLOHKHZDVVWXG\LQJ+HUDFOLWXVLQ*UHHN $XJXVWLQHLQ/DWLQWKH8SDQLVKDGVLQ6DQVNULWDQGSHUKDSVDFDEEDOLVWLFZRUNLQ Hebrew, anyone might well have stolen anything from the factory stock. It was in this way that he managed to complete the second part of Scientia Sacra, devoted to the place of Christianity in the sacred tradition, a multi-volume colOHFWLRQ RI WUDQVODWLRQV DQG FRPPHQWDULHV HQWLWOHG µ7KH *UHDW )RUXP RI WKH Ancients’, and a two-volume series of essays entitled Patmosz ± DOOXGLQJ QR doubt not only to the place where the Apocalypse was supposedly written, but also to the poem by Hölderlin.3 The characteristics of the project of Hamvas can be illuminated by his readings and preferences from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He states that KLV PDLQ µUHDGLQJ H[SHULHQFH¶ ZDV .LHUNHJDDUG¶V The Present Age, which he read when he was about 19 years old, while the most important effect on his HQWLUHWKRXJKWKDGEHHQH[HUWHGE\1LHW]VFKH7KHRWKHUWZR¿JXUHVRIWKHQLQHteenth century that were most highly regarded by him are Dostoevsky and 7ROVWR\7KHVLWXDWLRQLVVLPLODUFRQFHUQLQJWKH¿UVWKDOIRIWKHWZHQWLHWKFHQWXU\ He speaks most highly of the so-called ‘existentialist’ philosophers, Heidegger, -DVSHUV*DEULHO0DUFHODQGDOVR-DFTXHV0DULWDLQDQGRIWKH5XVVLDQµP\VWLF H[LVWHQWLDOLVWV¶OLNH%HUG\DHY0HUHVKNRYVN\6KHVWRYDQG6RORYLHY Just as sharp an impression can be gained of his stand through the authors he dismissed. Thus, while in general the ‘existentialists’ were his preferred modern

50 A. Szakolczai DXWKRUV KH KDG RQO\ VFRUQ IRU 6DUWUH FRQVLGHUHG WKH LQÀXHQFH RI 0DU[ DQG )UHXGGLVDVWURXVDQGIRUKLP+HJHOZDVMXVWDQHJDWLYHFRXQWHUSDUWWR1LHW]VFKH Even further, Hamvas thought that European philosophy, from the sixteenth FHQWXU\ XS WR .LHUNHJDDUG DQG 1LHW]VFKH KDG SURGXFHG KDUGO\ DQ\WKLQJ RI lasting value (exceptions being Vico and Pascal), and had an especially low opinion of Descartes, but held modern art in high esteem (Baudelaire, Mallarmé, 0DQHW .DQGLQVN\ 0RQGULDQ .OHH +HQU\ 0RRUH 4 Concerning the sacred ERRNVKHZDVUHO\LQJDSDUWIURP*UHHN+HEUHZ,QGLDQDQG&KLQHVHWKRXJKW and spirituality, not only on the Egyptian and Mesopotamian traditions but even RQWKHZLVGRPRIWKHSUH&ROXPELDQ$PHULFDV±WKHRQO\SLHFHFRQVSLFXRXVO\ DEVHQWLQKLVZRUNEHLQJWKH.RUDQ5 Hamvas on the ‘realness’ of reality It is with this armature at hand that Hamvas tackled the most elusive problem of WKHµUHDOQHVV¶RIUHDOLW\±EXWZLWKVRPHFDYHDWV6XFKDQXQGHUWDNLQJGLI¿FXOW in itself under any conditions, in the present age must face three extra hurdles. First, because such a distinction implies a high degree of sensitivity, and it is exactly this sensitivity, this sense of distinction or judgement that is most threatHQHG LQ RXU DJH ± RFFDVLRQDOO\ HYHQ SURJUDPPDWLFDOO\ DV LQ WKH FDVH RI Bourdieu. Thus, the analysis must be started by thematising the conditions of SRVVLELOLW\ RI VXFK VHQVLWLYLW\ 6HFRQG EHFDXVH DQDO\VLV PXVW DIWHU DOO UHO\ RQ words, but in the age of Hamvas these have lost much of their meaning and transparency, becoming corrupt, so Hamvas suggests that one must start by UHWXUQLQJWRWKHLURULJLQDOPHDQLQJ±DQXQGHUWDNLQJQRWVRGLIIHUHQWIURPWKDWRI 6RFUDWHVRU&RQIXFLXV6,,, 6$QG¿QDOO\WKHWDVNLVGLI¿FXOWEHFDXVHRI an explicit resistance of such attempts; because the world has become ‘inaddressable’ (P I: 114); because a key aspect of that contemporary public ‘mood’ is that nothing should be taken seriously (P I: 337); and simply because in the every ‘man for himself’ [sic LQ RULJLQDO@ ZRUOG RI WRGD\ ZKHUH ± DFFRUGLQJ WR &DPXV ± ZKDW ZDV HDUOLHU FRQVLGHUHG D VLQJOH DQG XQXVXDO DFW RI NQDYHU\ LV simply taken for granted, ‘[n]othing is more obsolete than to become shocked. Today this is the absolute comical’ (P I: 34). With this, we have arrived at the central concern of this chapter. How can a given reality, the world in which one is living, be a ‘no-being’? For Hamvas, this must start by recognising that this age was not simply ‘in’ crisis, but ‘unreal, REVROHWHLQYDOLG¶6,,, 7 There are two terms in the above paragraph that require special elaboration. 7KH¿UVWFRQFHUQVWKHWHUPµUHFRJQLWLRQ¶+DPYDV¶VFRQFHUQLVQRWµFRJQLWLYH¶ not related to knowledge, observation, theory, abstraction, but re-cognitive: it starts with an illumination, a sudden look at the familiar world in a different light. It has the character of an awakening from a deep sleep. In this context +DPYDV IUHTXHQWO\ UHIHUV WR +HUDFOLWXV WKH SUH6RFUDWLF SKLORVRSKHU ZKR FRQsidered the waking out of a state of slumber one of the main tasks of philosophy.9 In this context Hamvas also made use of the Vedas, especially in its

The non-being of communism 51 rejecting of a mere dichotomy between being asleep and being awake. The Vedas made a distinction between four different states: deep sleep without dream; a dreamful sleep; being awake without being fully awakened; and the VWDWHRIIXOOZDNHIXOQHVV6,±  But how can this fourth state of awakening be related to a situation of crisis? 2QD¿UVWORRNFULVHVDUHKLVWRULFDOHYHQWVZKLFKPRUHWKDQDQ\WKLQJHOVHDZDNHQ people, shake them out of their everyday life, force them to search for a solution. 7KHFKDUDFWHURIWKHWLPHVRI+DPYDVLVWKDWWKHFULVLVKDGEHFRPHSHUPDQHQW6 ,,, 7KHVHUHQHFDOPQHVVRIµEHLQJ¶KDVEHHQUHSODFHGE\µOLIH¶IUHQHWLF hurry, lust and desire; in one phrase, a ‘hunger for life’.10 The difference between peace and warfare vanishes. In the language of Victor Turner, one can talk about DSHUPDQHQWVLWXDWLRQRIOLPLQDOLW\6]DNROF]DL±  Coming up with such a recognition is easier when living in a country, or UHJLRQZKHUHWKH6HFRQG:RUOG:DUGLGQRWUHDOO\HQG%XW+DPYDVHPSKDWLcally did not restrict the scope to world wars and totalitarianism. For him the state of crisis is much more extensive, both in space and time. Thus begins a VHDUFKIRUWKHRULJLQVRIWKHFULVLVDFRQWLQXRXV±DQGIURPPDQ\DQJOHVIDPLOLDU ±EDFNZDUGVKLIWRIWKHWLPHKRUL]RQXQWLOWKH\HDUBC is reached.11 Hamvas is not alone in such an effort. One can again refer to Heidegger and his discovery RI WKH SUH6RFUDWLFV DQG WKH HQWLUH OLWHUDWXUH RQ WKH VRFDOOHG µD[LDO DJH¶ IURP -DVSHUV WKURXJK 0XPIRUG DQG 9RHJHOLQ WR (LVHQVWDGW $UQDVRQ DQG *LHVHQ gaining increasing prominence today in social theory and historical sociology VHH 6]DNROF]DL E  ,Q WKH WHUPLQRORJ\ RI FRQWHPSRUDU\ VRFLDO WKHRU\ ZH FRXOGWDONDERXWD¿UVWDJHRIJOREDOLVDWLRQ6]DNROF]DL  The model case and reference point for such an analysis in social theory is the ZRUNRI0D[:HEHUZKR±WUDFLQJWKHOLQHDJHRIThe Protestant Ethic both as a GHVFHQWDQGDVDGLIIHUHQFH±DOVRUHWXUQHGWRDFRPSDUDWLYHVWXG\RIWKHULVHRI ancient religion, and came up with the crucial concepts of ‘salvation religions’ and the ‘religious rejections of the world’. But it is exactly here that Hamvas begs to differ, and fundamentally, not only with Weber, but with Heidegger and 1LHW]VFKHDVZHOO)RU+DPYDVWKHJUHDWPHWDSK\VLFDOWKRXJKWLQKLVWHUPLQROogy emphatically not ‘religion’) of India, China and Ancient Israel, as well as (J\SW0HVRSRWDPLD3HUX7LEHWDQGWKHSUH6RFUDWLFSKLORVRSKHUVGLGQRWUHMHFW ‘the’ world, they rather rejected illusions and mirages, and especially the illusionary reality of a type of existence which had slid into a permanent state of crisis. He evokes with particular stress a passage of the Vedanta which, through the intermediary of René Char, was also quoted most emphatically by Foucault LQ WKH SUHIDFH RI KLV ¿UVW µUHDO¶ ERRN Histoire de la folie: ‘I withdrew from things the illusion they produced in order to preserve themselves from us and OHIWWKHPWKHSDUWZKLFKWKH\\LHOGHGXV¶)RXFDXOWYRO,±  Democracy beyond symmetry: two myths of democratisation The point today does not concern the criticism of communism. It is rather why WKLVDEVXUGLW\ZDVQRWUHFRJQLVHGHDUOLHUDQGVXI¿FLHQWO\IURPWKHRXWVLGHKRZ

  A. Szakolczai LWFRXOGKDYHEHHQFRQFHLYHGRIDVDVDYLQJZRUOGKLVWRULFDOSRZHU±DQDEVXUGity just as great as the regime itself. This question is still of extreme actuality WRGD\DVZLWK6KDNHVSHDUHZHFDQVD\WKDWVRPHWKLQJLVVWLOOURWWHQLQ'HQPDUN DQGQRWMXVWGXHWRDµGHPRFUDWLFGH¿FLW¶DQGZLWK'DQWHWKDWZHDUHVWLOOLQD ‘selva scura’, very far from seeing the way out. What is wrong with the greatest RIDOOVDFUHGFRZV±PRGHUQPDVVGHPRFUDF\" This can be seen if we do not take democracy as a simple idea, and not even DVPHUHO\DIRUPRISROLWLFDOJRYHUQPHQW±DVFRQWHPSRUDU\PDVVGHPRFUDFLHV DUHPXFKPRUHWKDQWKDW±UDWKHUDVDZD\RIOLIHWKDWKDVEHHQIRUPHGE\ORQJ term social processes. From this perspective, instead of simply posing the normative question of ‘democratisation’, we should rather attempt to sketch a typology of democratising processes, taking as the starting point the classical works of Tocqueville, Ostrogorski and Max Weber. This can help us to see more clearly the stakes involved in various kind of democratisation processes, instead of being drawn into an ideological argument for or against ‘democracy’. A static typology of democratising processes In the following only a very rudimentary and purely formal sketch of such democratisation processes will be attempted. The process of democratisation in a sociological sense means that in a community the previously taken for granted DQG±LQD3DUVRQLDQVHQVH±µDVFULSWLYH¶LQVWLWXWLRQDOKLHUDUFKLHVUHSUHVHQWHGLQ the very structure of the political system are eliminated. All this leaves open the TXHVWLRQRIKRZH[DFWO\WKLVLVWDNLQJSODFH6XFKDTXHVWLRQRIµKRZ¶KRZHYHU LVIXQGDPHQWDODV±IDUIURPDVVLJQLQJDXQLYHUVDOO\DQGXQHTXLYRFDOO\SRVLWLYH YDOXH WR DOO NLQG RI GHPRFUDWLVDWLRQ SURFHVVHV ± WKH PHDQLQJIXO HIIHFW RI VXFK processes will depend exactly on their mode. In an ideal-typical sense, such processes might develop in three different ways. Democratisation might mean the levelling of everyone towards the mean. This might seem the most simple solution, which could be reached by a simple equalisation of both formal political rights and of economic power and resources; in fact, it might even seem the ‘natural’ or only possible mode of democratisation. However, formally, such a levelling of conditions might also be reached by reducing everyone to a relatively low, or even the lowest possible state; just as one could conceive of ‘democratisation’ as an attempt to lift up the rest of the SRSXODWLRQWRWKHKLJKHVWOHYHOV2QD¿UVWORRNLWPLJKWVHHPWKDWWKHODWWHUVROXWLRQLVKRSHOHVVO\XWRSLDQZKLOHWKH¿UVWVLPSO\GRHVQRWPDNHVHQVHLWLVHYHQ absurd. However, in light of the demonstrated absurdity of the communist regimes, or of ‘People’s Democracies’, we should be rather careful of dismissing such situations without further examination. A dynamic typology of democratising processes 7KHVLJQL¿FDQFHRIWKLVWKUHHIROGIRUPDOPRGHOOLQJFDQEHUHFRJQLVHGE\WXUQLQJ WR D G\QDPLF DQDO\VLV +HUH WKH SUREOHPDWLF FKDUDFWHU RI RXU ¿UVW VHHPLQJO\

The non-being of communism 53 self-evident case becomes visible. Reducing everyone suddenly to the mean implies that half the population is bound to lose, thus could be questioned to support the idea of democratisation in a full social and economic sense. However, problems emerge even concerning the other half, the evident winners. In their case, while they would seem to win, and often a great deal, immediately, with the ‘democratic revolution’, the problem is that this improvement would only happen once and for all, but would not be sustained. Putting it crudely, they would win in year one, but would be frustrated in year two. Having already become equal, there is no further gain from equalisation. This point, in itself, seems so trivial as not to merit explicit attention. Yet, it was exactly this kind of extremely crude egalitarian reasoning that maintained belief in the avant-garde status of communist and similar regimes. The trivial evidently was not so trivial then. And this is still far from being the full story, as the dynamics of this type of levelling processes does not stop, but continues. The logic of these dynamics requires those who move above the mean to be continuRXVO\ SXOOHG GRZQ DQG GLVFRXUDJHG 6XFK D PDLQWDLQHG GRZQZDUG PRYHPHQW would eventually not simply pull them towards the mean, but would simply keep them going downward. At the opposite end, those who were low and thus are raised would feel encouraged to repeat the experience of being suddenly lifted up, but for this they would need to maintain the claim that in fact they are still in some way discriminated against. Thus, in such a system there would be rather a sustained long-term tendency by all social groups to gravitate towards the bottom; to keep moaning about their own state of being a suffering victim. Here the purely hypothetical dynamic model can be reconnected to the actual reality of the communist experience. The ideal of democratisation as equalisation and full symmetry in fact turned out to be a sustained de-classing of the entire population. It is this process that has been called, for example by Ivan 6]HOpQ\L DV WKH µSUROHWDULVDWLRQ¶ RI WKH SRSXODWLRQ 2XU VWXGLHV ZLWK $JQHV Horvath among the apparatus of the Communist Party also brought out support IRUWKLVLGHD7KXVZKLOHLQPRVWPHPEHUVRIWKHORZOHYHODSSDUDWXVZHUH quite young, born and raised in the communist system, mostly from the relatively better educated part of the population, they still preferred to present themVHOYHV DV LQGLYLGXDOV ZLWK D YHU\ GLI¿FXOW FKLOGKRRG KLVWRU\ +RUYDWK DQG 6]DNROF]DL± &RPPXQLVPLVDUHJLPHIRUWKHVXIIHULQJPDVVHVWKXV in order to ‘merit’ life in a ‘People’s Democracy’, people evidently must keep on suffering. The completely absurd idea of a downward nivellation thus turns out to be the actual reality of communism, or the system devoted to the genuine full-scale HTXDOLVDWLRQ RI DOO FRQGLWLRQV ± D V\VWHP ZKLFK LQ IDFW LV WKH OLYLQJ DEVXUGLW\ And this absurdity was now shown to be the direct consequence of the substanWLYH GHPRFUDWLF LGHDO ± WKH JHQXLQH LGHDO RI WKH OHIW ZLQJ RI WKH GHPRFUDWLF scenery. We are getting closer to understanding the striking oversight on these intellectual and political forces of the tragic, and at the same time absurd, tragicomic reality produced by the Bolshevik ‘experiment’. However, while the seemingly self-evident idea of equalisation turned out to

54 A. Szakolczai produce a nightmare result, leading to the realisation of the absurd reduction of everyone to the lowest common denominator, through a dynamic analysis we can also show that the opposite end is much less utopian than it seemed to be. Of course, it is not possible to make everybody rich, powerful and happy with the stroke of a pen. Yet it is possible to envision a kind of democratisation process that does not start by the simple geometric ideal to reduce everyone to the centre, but rather inaugurates a dynamic in which everyone is being pulled upwards. This implies two things. First, that nobody must necessarily lose immediately, and not even in the long run; and second, that there is, and always will be, an ‘above’ where people who are lower can be drawn to and pulled up. Thus, radiFDOO\RSSRVHGWRWKHUHDOLW\RIµSUROHWDULVDWLRQ¶WKLVSURFHVVFDQUDWKHUEHGH¿QHG as a progressive ennobling of the entire population; an idea very close to the µFLYLOLVLQJSURFHVV¶RI1RUEHUW(OLDVRUWKHµFDUHRIWKHVHOI¶IRUPXODWHGE\3LHUUH +DGRWRU0LFKHO)RXFDXOWQRGRXEWLQVSLUHGE\1LHW]VFKH¶VLGHDVHVSHFLDOO\LQ Beyond Good and Evil DERXW µZKDW LV QREOH¶ DQG WKH µ*RRG (XURSHDQ¶ 7KH price, or the condition of possibility of such a process of ennobling, however, is that the ideal of full substantive equality, or the geometrical logic of symmetry, must be given up. A society must possess a genuine elite who can elevate the rest of the society by showing an example and performing acts of leadership. The denial of the need for an elite and of the possibility of a continuous civilising process is truly nihilistic, as it deprives the society of a workable and uplifting, forward-moving ideal. It hides its nihilism under the seemingly self-evident ideal of full, substantive equality. However, a dynamic analysis has revealed that the static ideal of full-scale symmetry, through the logic of expectations necessarily leads through a spiralling movement towards not the mean but the lowest common denominator.  2XURULJLQDOWKUHHIROGFODVVL¿FDWRU\VFKHPHLVWKXVUHVXPHGLQWRDG\QDPLF GLFKRWRP\RIWZRVSLUDOVHLWKHUDGRZQZDUGPRYLQJVSLUDOWKDW±GULYHQE\WKH LGHDORIV\PPHWU\DQGHTXDOLW\±GUDZVWKHHQWLUHSRSXODWLRQLQWRDGHJUDGLQJ proletarising, de-civilising abyss; or an upward-moving spiral of ennobling where the dynamics is kept alive by the positive example and the meaningful values of the elite. Wherever the elite loses its own conviction and values, the HOHYDWRU\ G\QDPLFV FDQQRW EH PDLQWDLQHG DQG WKH GRZQZDUG LQÀH[LRQ RI WKH spiral cannot be avoided. Human life in society cannot stay still. It either keeps improving itself, under the guidance of ‘graceful’ persons, or it descends into the abyss. Laws, custom, regulations and all kinds of prescriptions might prevent full-scale collapse, but RQO\ DW WKH SULFH RI FRPSOHWH RVVL¿FDWLRQ WKH VXEVWDQWLYH ULWXDOLVDWLRQ RI DOO aspects of culture and society and a kind of spiritual and mental death. Democratisation therefore is not equal simply with the extension of formal rights. As a social process, it only takes place because it manages to capture the imagination of people and thus moves them to act. In this ‘spiritual’ sense democratisation is always and everywhere driven by powerful myth. We have LGHQWL¿HGWZRVXFKSRZHUIXOP\WKVDVEHLQJFHQWUDOWRPRGHUQGHPRFUDFLHV7KH

The non-being of communism 55 ¿UVW LV D P\WK DFFRUGLQJ WR ZKLFK LQ WKH µLGHDO¶ VRFLHW\ HYHU\RQH VKRXOG EH ‘equal’ in a not well circumscribed way with everyone else, proposing the symmetry of human relationships as the model of social life; a myth that turned out to possess nihilistic consequences. There is, however, an alternative myth focusing on ennobling, a myth that has the power to motivate conduct at the personal and collective level by offering a gradual improvement of the ordinary lot of mankind, but that nevertheless recognises that a demagogic full equality is not only never possible, but is even profoundly undesirable. The rediscovery of the European civilising process and the role of elites While expressed not in the terminology of a formal, dynamic model but in the language of the phenomenological and hermeneutical philosophies of Husserl and Heidegger, the same ideas can be found in one of the most important thinkHUVRIWKHUHJLRQDQGRIWKHHQWLUHFRQWLQHQW-DQ3DWRþND± 7KHH[SHULence of undergoing profound deculturing and decivilising processes under FRPPXQLVW UXOH PDGH 3DWRþND OLNH RWKHU LPSRUWDQW LQWHOOHFWXDO ¿JXUHV RI WKH UHJLRQ UHÀHFW RQ WKH QDWXUH RI WKH SKHQRPHQRQ DQG WKH HQWLUH G\QDPLFV RI European civilisation. This led him to the realisation that the single most imporWDQWIHDWXUHRI(XURSHGH¿QLQJLWVLGHQWLW\LVQRWWREHVHDUFKHGIRULQWKHLQVWLtutional arrangements or at the level of socio-economic structures, rather in the ‘care of the soul’. In his words, the care of the soul is ‘at the basis of the EuroSHDQ KHULWDJH¶ 3DWRþND    LQ WKLV µSKLORVRSK\ RI WKH FDUH RI WKH VRXO >OLHV@QRWMXVWWKHVSHFL¿FLW\WKHDXWRQRP\EXWDOVRWKHFRQWLQXLW\RIWKH(XURSHDQ>IRUPRI@OLIH¶LELG WKXVµ(XURSH±:HVWHUQ(XURSH¿UVWRIDOOEXW DOVR ZKDW LV FDOOHG WKH ³RWKHU (XURSH´ ± LV LVVXHG IURP WKH FDUH RI WKH VRXO¶ (ibid.: 99). The discovery of the soul, and the need for its care, lies at the centre of classiFDO*UHHNSKLORVRSK\HVSHFLDOO\3ODWR,WLVIURPWKHUHWKDWLWFDPHWREHWUDQVPLWWHGWR&KULVWLDQLW\WKURXJK6W$XJXVWLQHDQG6W7KRPDV$TXLQDV±DQGDOVR ZH VKRXOG DGG HPSKDWLFDOO\ WKURXJK 6W %RQDYHQWXUH 3DWRþND JRHV RXW RI KLV way in emphasising that this is not an idealistic thesis: the care of the soul was an effective answer to a situation of crisis. This can best be seen in the fact that Plato’s discovery of the reality of the soul is associated in the famous cave metaphor with the activity of turning around (periagoge) and leaving the cave, the (under)world of illusions mistaken for the real world. The discovery of the soul thus starts with the reality of conversion, the unique ability of human beings to tear themselves away from their habitual, customary, taken for granted ways when they realise that these ways led them astray, into vagrancy in error, and UHWXUQWRWKHZD\VRI7UXWK%HDXW\DQGWKH*RRG The care of the soul, however, while starting with such an experience of conversion, is not identical with it. It rather requires a constant activity, thus maintaining the new direction and preventing the human being from relapsing into the previous modes of living and of experiencing the world. It is here that

56 A. Szakolczai 3DWRþNDLQVHUWVRQHRIKLVPRVWWKRXJKWSURYRNLQJFRQWURYHUVLDOEXWDOVRSRWHQWLDOO\HSRFKDOLGHDWKHµFRPPXQLW\RIWKHVKDWWHUHG¶3DWRþND $FFRUGLQJ to this, the experience of going through a crisis under certain conditions can LQGHHGEHFRPHDEHQH¿FLDOFRPPXQLW\IRUPLQJSULQFLSOH&HUWDLQO\QRWLQWKH Marxist sense of ‘the worse the better’. Rather, quite on the contrary, a deep crisis and experiences of suffering can provoke a reckoning if, instead of glorifying the experiences of suffering, building an identity around it and looking for a MXVWUHZDUGRU±HYHQZRUVH±MXVWLI\LQJYLROHQFHLWEHFRPHVWKHVWDUWLQJSRLQWWR an at once personal and collective conversion process through the overcoming of suffering.  3DWRþND¶V LGHDV DERXW WKH FDUH RI WKH VRXO DV DFWLYLW\ DUH YHU\ FORVH WR WKH ideas of two of the most important social theorists of the past century: Michel )RXFDXOWDQGKLVLGHDVDERXWWKHFDUHRIWKHVHOIDQG1RUEHUW(OLDV¶VYLHZRIWKH civilising process. This connection was explicitly recognised by Foucault, who LQRQHRIKLVODVWOHFWXUHVDWWKH&ROOqJHGH)UDQFHGH¿QHG3DWRþNDDVWKHRQO\ contemporary philosopher who read the history of European thought in the same ZD\DVKLP6]DNROF]DL   +RZHYHULQVSLWHRIWKHLPSRUWDQFHRIWKHVHSDUDOOHOVWKHWKRXJKWRI3DWRþND KDVWZRVSHFL¿FIHDWXUHVLQWKLVUHJDUGLQFRQWUDVWWR)RXFDXOWRU(OLDV)LUVWLW makes a more pronounced emphasis on the soul±DWKHPHZHFDQQRWHODERUDWH here.136HFRQG3DWRþNDH[SOLFLWO\UHFRJQLVHVWKDWWKHWUDQVIRUPDWLRQRIDFROOHFtive experience of suffering into a genuine community able to overcome the vicissitudes requires the leadership of a genuine elite. A crisis touches everyone, and in the heart of his or her being, but in itself does not provide a solution, a way out. The profound bankruptcy of Marxist thought is thus revealed at its very core: while Marx was correct in arguing that his thinking was not utopian, it was actually worse, not being able to offer even a utopia, only tricking those listening to it into the vortex of an apocalyptic destruction of the world, failing even to suggest a guidance out of the debris left over by its destructive tempest. In many regards the most faithful disciple of 0DU[ FRXOG EH FRQVLGHUHG *HRUJHV 6RUHO ZKR LQGHHG IRUPXODWHG DQ H[SOLFLW P\WKRORJ\RIUHYROXWLRQDU\YLROHQFHZLWKHQRUPRXVUHDOFRQVHTXHQFHV3DWRþND starts to think exactly here, in searching for a way out of the ruins of postMarxist nihilism, and argues that this can only be done within a small circle of people who start to care for their soul and thus build up the foundations of a genuine elite. This elite can thus eventually act as the leader of their people, guiding them out of the crisis provoked by the Marxist-nihilist myth of democracy as a general process of levelling (the would-be society without state, law, classes, economy, etc.) through a different, at once real and mythical process of democratisation as a process of ennobling.

Notes   )RUVLPLODUUHFHQWDSSURDFKHVVHHHVSHFLDOO\WKHZRUNVRI+DUYH\*ROGPDQ*ROGPDQ  DQG$JQHV+RUYDWK+RUYDWK 

The non-being of communism 57   $ERXWWKLVVHH+RUYDWK¶VFKDSWHULQWKLVYROXPHDQGDOVR6]DNROF]DLD 3 The three volumes of Scientia SacraDUHDEEUHYLDWHGLQWKHWH[WDV6,6,,DQG6,,, The two parts of Patmosz as P I and P II. 4 This list is quite strikingly close to the assessment of modern art by Foucault. 5 This on the other hand recalls Voegelin, who greatly appreciated not only the prophHWV DQG WKH SUH6RFUDWLFV EXW +LQGX P\VWLFLVP DQG &KLQHVH DQG (J\SWLDQ SRHWU\ DV ZHOOEXWZDVRXWULJKWGLVPLVVLYHRIWKH.RUDQ,QERWKFDVHVH[FHSWLRQLVPDGHIRU 6X¿P\VWLFLVP 6 This was a central concern for Voegelin and also for the late period of Foucault, see HVSHFLDOO\WKH&ROOqJHGH)UDQFHOHFWXUHRQWKH$SRORJ\RI6RFUDWHVGLVFXVVHG LQ6]DNROF]DLFK   6LPLODU FRQWHPSRUDU\ YLHZV DUH FRQWDLQHG LQ 6DPL$OL¶V GLVFXVVLRQ RI WKH ‘banal’, *LRUJLR$JDPEHQ¶VFRQFHSWRIWKHirreparabile; or recent research on ‘alexithymia’; which talks about ‘selves without a self’, using the metaphor of empty shells. I owe WKHVHLQVLJKWVWRWKH3K'WKHVHVRI.QXW0LWWHQGRUIHU0LWWHQGRUIHU DQG0RQLFD *UHFR*UHFR    $ERXW UHFRJQLWLRQ VHH HVSHFLDOO\ WKH ZRUN RI $OHVVDQGUR 3L]]RUQR 3L]]RUQR      6HHIRUH[DPSOH3,6,7KLVFRQFHUQZDVDOVRVKDUHGERWK by Voegelin and by Foucault.  +DPYDVRIFRXUVHZDVQRWWKH¿UVWRUWKHRQO\WKLQNHUWRFRPHXSZLWKDVLPLODU diagnosis. The terminology is clearly Heideggerian, and another major East European WKLQNHU-DQ3DWRþNDDOVRFDPHXSZLWKDVLPLODULGHDLQDSLHFHSXEOLVKHGDOPRVWD GHFDGHDIWHU+DPYDVGLHG3DWRþND   ,WVKRXOGEHUHFDOOHGWKDWWKH¿UVWSDUWRIScientia SacraZDV¿QLVKHGLQ±WKXV GXULQJWKH6HFRQG:RUOG:DU  )RU+DPYDVVHH3,,7KHSDVVDJHLQ)RXFDXOWLVSDUWLFXODUO\HPSKDWLFDVWKH quotation is preceded by the following text: ‘As of rule and method, I kept only one, ZKLFKLVFRQWDLQHGLQDWH[WE\&KDUZKHUHRQHFDQDOVRUHDGDGH¿QLWLRQRIWKHWUXWK ZKLFK LV WKH PRVW SUHVVLQJ DQG SUHVHUYHG¶ 1HHGOHVV WR VD\ WKLV SDVVDJH ZDV DOVR edited out of the English edition.  )RUIXUWKHUGHWDLOVVHH6]DNROF]DLD

Bibliography (LVHQVWDGW 61   Fundamentalism, Sectarianism, and Revolution: The Jacobin Dimension of Modernity, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (OLDV1 The Court Society, Oxford: Blackwell. (OLDV1 The Civilizing Process, Oxford: Blackwell. Foucault, M. (1994) Dits et écrits  YROV HG E\ 'HIHUW ' DQG (ZDOG ) 3DULV *DOlimard. Foucault, M. (1996) Discorso e veritá nella Grecia antica)ORUHQFH'RQ]HOOL *LUDUG5 Des choses cachés depuis la fondation du monde3DULV*UDVVHW *ROGPDQ+ Max Weber and Thomas Mann: Calling and the Shaping of the Self, Berkeley: University of California Press. *ROGPDQ +   Politics, Death and the Devil: Self and Power in Max Weber and Thomas Mann, Berkeley: University of California Press. *UHFR0 Illness as a Work of Thought: A Foucauldian Perspective on Psychosomatics, London: Routledge. Hamvas, B. (1993) PatmoszYROV6]RPEDWKHO\(OHWQN$EEUHYLDWHGLQWKHWH[WDV3 I and P II.)

  A. Szakolczai Hamvas, B. (1995/1996) Scientia SacraYROV6]HQWHQGUH0HGLR$EEUHYLDWHGLQWKH WH[WDV6,6,,DQG6,,, Hirschmann, A.O. (1977) The Passions and the Interests, Princeton: Princeton University Press. Horvath, A. (1997) ‘The Political Psychology of Trickster-Clown: An Analytical ([SHULPHQWDURXQG&RPPXQLVPDVD0\WK¶:RUNLQJ3DSHUV636'HSDUWPHQW)ORUence. +RUYDWK$ µ7ULFNLQJLQWRWKH3RVLWLRQRIWKH2XWFDVW¶Political Psychology 19, ± +RUYDWK$ µ7KH1DWXUHRIWKH7ULFNVWHU¶V*DPH$Q,QWHUSUHWLYH8QGHUVWDQGLQJ of Communism’, PhD thesis, European University Institute, Florence, Italy. +RUYDWK$DQG6]DNROF]DL$ The Dissolution of Communist Power: The Case of Hungary, London: Routledge. .HUpQ\L. µ7KH7ULFNVWHULQ5HODWLRQWR*UHHN0\WKRORJ\¶LQ5DGLQ3HG The Trickster/RQGRQ5RXWOHGJHDQG.HJDQ3DXO .HUpQ\L .   +HUPpV] D OpOHNYH]HW| $] pOHW IpU¿ HUHGHWpQHN PLWRORJpPiMD +HUPHVWKH*XLGHRIWKH6RXOV7KH0\WKRORJHPRIWKH0DOH2ULJLQVRI/LIH %XGDpest: Európa. 0LWWHQGRUIHU. µ0LPHVLVDQG&KULVWLDQ6SLULWXDOLW\¶3K'WKHVLV(XURSHDQ8QLversity Institute, Florence, Italy. 3DWRþND -   µ:DUV RI WKH WK &HQWXU\ DQG WKH WK &HQWXU\ DV :DU¶ Telos 30, ± 3DWRþND- Platon et l’Europe, Paris: Verdier. 3DWRþND- Heretical Essays in the Philosophy of History, Chicago: Open Court. 3L]]RUQR$ µ3ROLWLFV8QERXQG¶LQ0DLHU&6HG Changing Boundaries of the Political&DPEULGJH&DPEULGJH8QLYHUVLW\3UHVV± 3L]]RUQR$ µ2QWKH,QGLYLGXDOLVWLF7KHRU\RI6RFLDO2UGHU¶LQ%RXUGLHX3DQG &ROHPDQ-6HGV Social Theory for a Changing Society, Boulder and Oxford: Westview Press. 3L]]RUQR$ µ5LVSRVWHHSURSRVWH¶LQGHOOD3RUWD'*UHFR0DQG6]DNROF]DL A. (eds) Identità, riconoscimento e scambio: Saggi in onore di Alessandro Pizzorno, %DUL/DWHU]D Radin, P. (1956) The Trickster: A Study in American Mythology1HZ
The non-being of communism 59 Voegelin, E. (1956) Israel and Revelation, vol. 1 of Order and History, Baton Rouge: /RXLVLDQD6WDWH8QLYHUVLW\3UHVV 9RHJHOLQ( Science, Politics and Gnosticism, Chicago: Henry Regnery. Voegelin, E. (1974) The Ecumenic Age, vol. 4 of Order and History, Baton Rouge: LouiVLDQD6WDWH8QLYHUVLW\3UHVV :HEHU0 Economy and Society, Berkeley: University of California Press.

3

The power of second reality Communist myths and representations of democracy Harald Wydra

The authority of second reality The story of modern democracy is inextricably linked to the age of democratic revolutions at the end of the eighteenth century. As R. Palmer has shown in his classical work The Age of the Democratic Revolution, the revolutions in America and France knew no ‘democrats’ and no ‘aristocrats’ (Palmer 1959: 13–21). Nevertheless, these revolutions changed the meaning of democracy from a term of virtual abuse into a dynamic form of revolutionary expectation. The late twentieth century saw the triumph of mass democracy, which is regarded by many as possibly the most consequential political development of the last century. In a similar vein, Eastern Europe before 1989 knew no democrats in the accepted mainstream sense of the word. Nevertheless, democracy became a powerful state of expectation, a heartfelt desire and an empire of the mind. In many ways, GHPRFUDF\KDVWULXPSKHG¿UVWDWWKHOHYHORISROLWLFDOLPDJLQDWLRQEHIRUHEHFRPing a constitutional form of government. My argument is that representations of democracy in Eastern Europe were a product of a constitutive imagination that was not simply anti-communist but developed within communism and its mythological constructions of reality. I shall introduce the concept of second reality, which refers to a discursively constructed framework of authority, which projects a programme of truth. Its underlying character is a type of consciousness, which distorts reality with regard to future expectations but also fabricates meanings of past experiences by mythological constructions of reality. Taking the examples of the imaginary worlds constructed in literature such as in Thomas More’s Utopia, Cervantes’ Don Quixote, or Robert Musil’s Man without Qualities, Eric Voegelin argued that the emergence of second reality is tightly linked to how man’s consciousness is transformed in response to pervasive uncertainty in crisis situations (Voegelin 1999: 239–56). Men start to refuse the perception of reality, projecting fantasies and imaginary realities onto their everyday existence. This selective consciousness may become socially relevant once it attracts the attention of more or less LPSRUWDQWVRFLDOJURXSV6XFKDVSOLWEHWZHHQD¿UVWDQGDVHFRQGUHDOLW\FDQEH characterised as a deliberate desire not to understand, as an alienation from a WUXHPHDQLQJIXOOLIHLQRUGHU8QGHUVSHFL¿FFLUFXPVWDQFHVDPLQRULW\JURXSPD\

The power of second reality 61 impose selective consciousness by force in order to establish second reality as the authoritative frame of political existence. These may range from projects of expectations for new social and political frameworks of organisation to eschatoORJLFDOIRUPVRIµVDOYDWLRQRQHDUWK¶7KHLQÀXHQFHRIVHFRQGUHDOLWLHVLQSROLWLFV can hardly be proved empirically by measuring the activities of objective givens such as, say, an election, a parliament, or a constitution. The ‘test’ can only be attempted by sensing the spell that images, beliefs, and fantasies have on philosophers, political leaders, and ordinary people. It is the argument of this chapter, that political aspirations for democracy in Eastern Europe were not simply framed against the pursuit of second reality created by revolutionary communism but within it. The formation of democratic identity was not so much a matter of building institutions but required overcoming the profound irreality of communism by transformations of consciousness, counter-narratives, and LPDJHVWKDWZRXOGVXSSRUWYLVLRQVRIDQGDVSLUDWLRQVWRGHPRFUDF\DVIXO¿OOLQJ desires of freedom and equality. Political imagination conveys only a small degree of realism, which may make us doubt its relevance for the analysis of power arrangements in states. The power of political imagination has indeed been all but forgotten in current political analysis, where power is predominantly seen as an objective force by which governments, elites, or institutions control the behaviour of people. Political analysis tends to look at regime types with regard to the intentions of leaders, bureaucratic rationalisation, organisation, and institutional differentiation. Such a positivist conception of politics conceals the complexity of the socio-genesis of political order. Although modern democracy undoubtedly has its roots in revolutions and long-term institutional reforms, these account for only one side of reality. In institutional accounts, the revolutionary force comes from outside, DVLWUHVWVXSRQWHFKQLFDOPHDQVWKDWDIIHFWWKHRUGHURIWKLQJV¿UVWEHIRUHPRGLfying and increasing the conditions of adaptability of human beings to the external world by means of rational goal-setting. Conversely, Max Weber argued that charismatic authority consists of beliefs of revelation and heroic creativity (Weber 1980: 657–8). Such beliefs revolutionise from inside as they grasp the spirit of human beings before shaping institutional order and the material world. Acts of resistance by individuals or groups may revolutionise in that they make credible claims for existential representation. The opposition between external and internal spheres is not in the person or the experiences of the creator of ideas or deeds. Rather, the differences are in the modalities of how they are internally appropriated by the dominated and led, how they are lived through. In a masterly discussion of the anthropological forms of the concept of power, Heinrich Popitz distilled four fundamental conditions (Popitz 1992: 11–39). A ¿UVWRQHLVWKHSRZHURIDFWLRQE\ZKLFKPDQLQÀLFWVLQMXULHVDQGUHPDLQVYXOQHUable to physical attacks. A second type is instrumental power, when the potentiality of punishment and reward can be used for the establishment of controlling behaviour or permanent subordination. Yet, the capacity of imposing one’s will on others by instrumental power has natural limits. Even total or absolute power can be constrained by acts of martyrdom or tyrannicide. A third condition relies

62 H. Wydra upon the distinction between ‘external’ and ‘internal’ power. Internal power does not need the externalisations of legal or military threats, but also enforces conformity in situations where actions cannot be controlled. This type of power relies upon the anthropological need for orientation, the need for yardsticks (MaßstabsBedürftigkeit) or markers of certainty. Even if this type of power can lose its transcendental legitimation, secularised forms of setting markers of certainty are omnipresent. Beyond the political impact of external markers of certainty, ‘interQDO¶SRZHUDOVRVHHNVFRQ¿UPDWLRQWKURXJKUHFRJQLWLRQ)LQDOO\DIRXUWKFRQGLtion draws on the power of data-setting, systematic control, and trimming of nature for human purposes. Any new artefact of technological action, planning, or HQJLQHHULQJDGGVDIXUWKHUUHDOLW\WRKXPDQOLIHLQÀXHQFLQJSHRSOHQRWRQO\E\ objects or material constructions, but primarily by the will of the producer to exercise power over the conditions of human life. Modern politics relies upon a powerful merger of the third and fourth condition.  $OWKRXJKEXUHDXFUDWLFVFLHQWL¿FGDWDVHWWLQJSRZHULVFRQVWLWXWLYHIRUPRGHUQ politics, this type of power requires symbolic markers of certainty to sustain it. As Claude Lefort has suggested with regard to the French Revolution, the birth of modern democracy can be seen in the dramatic context of the downfall of DEVROXWLVW PRQDUFK\ DQG WKH UHYROXWLRQDU\ FRQÀLFW RI DQWDJRQLVWLF IRUFHV RYHU political domination (Lefort 1986). In the uncertainty of this ‘empty space of power’, institutional and structural markers of certainty are dissolved. Whereas before the nineteenth century, political society relied on largely determined relations between corporate parts of society, the ‘democratic moment’ introduced radical indeterminacy by disentangling the legitimate basis of political power, the sources of moral and legal norms, and the production of knowledge. Thus, at the root of democratisation are not developmental goals of a system to come but processes of structural and symbolic transformations under anti-democratic conditions. Historical ruptures create a constitutive imagination, which becomes essential to the formation of identities. Historically, the French Revolution was arguably the event whose cataclysmic consequences dissolved existing certainties of power most radically. The political consciousness of French revolutionaries between 1789 and 1792 adopted a utopian bent but needed to recast the past by detaching itself from a present condition considered to be unsatisfactory or obsolete. In this profound uncertainty about meaning and purpose, mythical representations became markers of certainty. While the French Revolution headed for a new future, it cast a spell on the imagination of later generations in terms of a myth of identity and of origin (Furet 1981). As Emile Montégut put it in 1871, the French Revolution was ‘un fait d’imagination, un mirage magique où il voit distinctement un nouveau ciel et une nouvelle terre qu’il salue de cris de joie dans ses bon jours, qu’il s’irrite de ne pouvoir atteindre dans ses jours de désespoir’ (Montégut 1858: 297). The fatal impact was that with increasing temporal distance, the memory did not recede but rather increased in terms of its imagined presence. For the idea of progress to materialise, revolutionaries were obliged to break

The power of second reality 63 with all previous experience and to open the horizon of expectation as an alternative reality. As Reinhart Koselleck showed, the growing gap between spaces of experiences and horizons of expectations can be seen as a central feature of modernity (Koselleck 1985: 270–85). Experience and expectation are not simply mirroring past and future. Each category is of a different substance, as experience is concentrated, while expectations are scattered, uncertain. Moreover, in politics prior experience is not simply translated into expectations. The crucial point is that political change based on mobilisation of power and technology is driven by the dissolution of former experience, meanings, and based on insecurity and the formulation of new expectations. Big events such as the Crusades, colonial expansion, the Reformation, but also the French Revolution testify to the discrepancy between spaces of experiences and newly discovered and attainable horizons of expectations. Preceded by enlightened aspirations for human emancipation, it was the disruptive experience of the French Revolution that provided new horizons of expectation that had been simply inexpressible before the event. Since 1989, it has been common to highlight, for instance, the integrative aspect of ‘European identity’, of ‘democratic identity’, or of ‘capitalist identity’. Here, identity is taken as one of many inputs into a political system, as a delineated set of attributes of political culture. It is problematic to assume identities with ‘communism’, the ‘nation’, with ‘democracy’ or ‘Europe’. While identities in a political or social system in relative equilibrium are relatively stable and WKXVSULRUWRLQWHQWLRQVLQVLWXDWLRQVRIH[LVWHQWLDOXQFHUWDLQW\LGHQWL¿FDWLRQVDUH contingent upon the contextual intentions of the agents that do the identifying. This contingency requires going ‘beyond identity’ (Brubaker and Cooper 2000: ±  ,GHQWL¿FDWLRQ ± RI RQHVHOI DQG RI RWKHUV ± DV LQWULQVLF WR VRFLDO OLIH DQG reality will not necessarily result in the internal sameness and coherent, bounded JURXSQHVVWKDWSROLWLFDOOHDGHUVPD\VHHNWRDFKLHYH,QWKLVYHLQWKHLGHQWL¿FDWLRQZLWKGHPRFUDF\FDQQRWEHFRQ¿QHGWRWKHDGRSWLRQRIGHPRFUDWLFYDOXHVRU institutions of government. Rather, it needs to be related to processes of meaning-formation that arise out of existential uncertainty and often in response to the situational premises of action. Given the disruptive nature of political reality, it has been suggested that collective identities must be conceived in a triadic structure, where between inside and outside lies the boundary; between left and right is the centre; between past and future is the present (Eisenstadt and Giesen 1995). In Eastern Europe, the imperial growth of Russia and the formation of the modern state in the west proGXFHG LQ WKLV PLGGOH UHJLRQ D QXPEHU RI YDULDQW PRGHOV LQVWHDG RI RQH XQL¿HG one, making identity-formation dependent on double binds. After the Second World War, Polish intellectuals, for example, were thrown into a double bind between a sentiment of becoming Russia’s victim and their unrequited love IRUWKH:HVW0LáRV] %DOWLFFRXQWULHVVXFKDV/LWKXDQLDIRULQVWDQFH seem to have two relevant ‘others’, Soviet Russia and the West. The desire to belong to Western Europe, to achieve economic wealth and political liberty was shared by elites in Eastern Europe long before 1918, 1945, or 1989.

64 H. Wydra 5HSUHVHQWDWLRQVRIGHPRFUDF\UHÀHFWHGGLIIHUHQWIRUPVRIVHFRQGUHDOLW\SUHJnant with the contagion through Western commodities, values, and expectations. ,Q7RFTXHYLOOH¶VWHUPVWKHFRQÀLFWEHWZHHQULFKDQGSRRUUHYHDOVWKDWVRFLDOGLVWDQFHLQWHQVL¿HVWKHORQJLQJIRULGHQWL¿FDWLRQDQGUHFRJQLWLRQ The heart of man is not so much caught by the undisturbed possession of DQ\WKLQJYDOXDEOHDVE\WKHGHVLUHDV\HWLPSHUIHFWO\VDWLV¿HGRISRVVHVVLQJ it, and by the incessant dread of losing it. . . . In communities of this kind, the imagination of the poor is driven to seek another world; the desire of acquiring the comforts of the world haunts the imagination of the poor and the dread of losing them that of the rich. (Tocqueville 2000: 653–4) The democratic age of the masses at the beginning of the twentieth century had the positive effect of endowing Europe with an unprecedented vitality, mainly based on the rise of equality in different aspects of social, political, and juridical life. This ‘Americanisation of Europe’ happened as a subconscious process of imitation and rising psychological appeal (Ortega y Gasset 1998: 142–4).

The revolutionary messianism of Soviet communism 7KH DQLPDWLQJ P\WK RI 5XVVLDQ PRQDUFK\ IURP WKH ¿IWHHQWK WR WKH ODWH QLQHteenth centuries legitimised the ruler and the elite by linking tsarism to foreign images of political power, taking the distant and civilised as mythical sources of presenting itself as profoundly European. While tsarism opposed the European liberal tradition by the exercise of an authoritarian regime, it relied on the theatrical self-presentation of tsarist rule as a mirror image of Europe (Wortman 2000: 5–7). Despite excluding the people (narod) from educated society and political elites, tsarism maintained the myth of social monarchy with the tsar’s special care for the peasantry, although the peasant community’s devotion to the tsar considerably declined after the 1905 revolution (Wortman 2000: 525). The role of myth in the theatre of power of the Russian court was to maintain the LGHQWL¿FDWLRQ EHWZHHQ WKH WVDU DQG WKH 5XVVLDQ VWDWH DQG VLPXOWDQHRXVO\ NHHS up the separation between the ruling classes and the ruled. At the same time, however, the objective of tsarist power was to become a bulwark against the modern Europeanised Russian intelligentsia whose aim was to weaken Russian monarchy. Conversely, revolutionary thinkers from different social origins such as Bakunin, Kropotkin, and Tolstoy were united by the spell of European civilisation (Borkenau 1971: 28–9). The Russian intelligentsia as a ‘transformer class’ lived in a no man’s land between two extremes: on the one hand, its own backward society, which it aspired to emancipate but from which it had increasingly alienated itself, lacking recognition for its efforts; on the other, the ‘model society’, from which it derived its expectations but which would never accept it as an equal partner. Unlike their Western counterparts, members of the Russian

The power of second reality 65 intelligentsia only reluctantly specialised in their careers as they dedicated much of their energy to the obligation to achieve a wholesale transformation of their countries. In a double bind between the perception of belated domestic development and the attraction by the mythic concept of ‘the West’, the intelligentsia and revolutionary thinkers were at the same time resentful and endowed with a sense of inferiority. The two major revolutionary projects in tsarist Russia relied upon an idealisation of a social class. Russian populism of the narodniki tradition idealised the peasantry as the society that had to be awakened in order to make social and political reforms possible. Marxism in Russia rejected the populist project with its idealisation of the peasantry by claiming that only the working class would be capable of resolving the historical struggle between antagonistic forces. Marxism merged radical currents of Russian nihilism with messianism and the absolutism of modern rational design by means of ‘revolution’. Marx’s vision of a classless society was born out of deep dissatisfaction with the exploitative nature of the modern economic process and the growing gap between technological progress and social pauperisation. Based on the idea that all transformations in human arrangements rely upon material force, he claimed that new modes of production and wage earning led to relationships of oppression where the workers were inevitably alienated and enslaved. The state as a compound of bureaucracy, police, and military structures crushes the people it pretends to represent. His idea was to turn the reality of degradation of manual labour through machinery and modern industry into a second reality, by which the workers would convert from the cogs in the factories into the ‘ruling class’. The denial of reality lay in the downward move by which the specialised functions performed by policing, administration, bureaucracy, and the state should be replaced by the myth of the proletariat revolution. In psychological terms, Marx’s messianism can be understood as ‘fantasy thinking’, which analytical psychology distinguished from ‘directed thinking’ (Jung 1959: 10–22). Directed thinking can be seen as ‘reality thinking’, guided by the logical pursuit of an initial idea and is structured by language. Directed thinking is the principal means by which we manage the laborious achievement of adaptation to reality as the images inside our mind follow one another in the same strictly causal sequence as the events taking place outside it. Conversely, fantasy thinking lacks any leading ideas and the sense of direction emanating from them. Here, images pile on images, feelings on feelings, with a strong tenGHQF\WRVKXIÀHWKLQJVDERXWDQGDUUDQJHWKHPQRWDVWKH\DUHLQUHDOLW\EXWDV one would like them to be. Marx’s fantasy is less striking in his account about how mechanisms of oppression can be overcome. Rather, it consists of the formidable prediction that the overthrowing of the old class will not only abolish classes but domination as such (Marx 1971: 548). Mirroring Pisarev’s commitment to dreaming, Lenin subscribed to the necessity of dreaming, a claim he remained faithful to even later in his life (Lenin 1989: 229–30). Lenin’s messianic vision of a vanguard party as the expression of the true will of the people and acting as an instrument of history was not an afterthought and an excuse, but

66 H. Wydra rather the point of departure (Talmon 1952: 424). The dreams about a new man, a new society, and the withering away of the state should lead to Trotsky’s ‘red paradise’. The pursuit of second reality was not only an alternative political programme to Western capitalism but fed into the religious sources of Russian political culture and the spiritual sources of the revolutionary tradition. In Nikolai Berdyaev’s view, the puzzle of why Marxism as an atheistic vision of the world could be so successful in a deeply religious country such as Russia can only be explained by the religious elements of Salvationism (Berdyaev 1961). Lenin’s lifelong fascination with the revolutionary messianism of the democrats of the VVXFKDV&KHUQ\VKHYVN\3LVDUHYDQG7NDFKHYLVUHÀHFWHGLQKLVDGKHUHQFH to the Revolutionary Catechism of 1871, which emphasised the true revolutionary’s total self-denial, renunciation of worldly attachment and morality, or property (Schapiro 1987: 195–6). While the February Revolution de-sacralised the symbolic universe of the tsarist order and tried to recreate worlds of meaning drawing on new powerful myths such as the French Revolution, the coup d’état in October 1917 would inaugurate a range of myths such as the dictatorship of the proletariat as the salvation of mankind, the cult of worship of Lenin and Stalin, or the eschatological myth of a transition to communism. The Bolsheviks’ aim was to prove the inexorable march of history projected by Marxism–Leninism through the cultivation of symbolic imagery of the collective hero of world history, the proletariat (Bonnell 1999). The revolutionary messianism relied upon the downward spiral of democratic equality. For Lenin, majority is based on the sociological conception of the people as the proletarian class, which potentially participates in the collective work of government. Against the liberal conception of democracy as representation in a parliamentary system, the vanguard party and the proletarian people are seen as identical. Conversely, the new power as the dictatorship of the overwhelming majority could and did maintain itself only by winning the FRQ¿GHQFH RI WKH JUHDW PDVVHV RQO\ E\ GUDZLQJ LQ WKH IUHHVW EURDGHVW DQG most energetic manner, all the masses into the work of government. Communist regimes crafted their legitimacy on the basis of ideological indoctrination and coercion, which not only dispensed with the provision of commodities, property, or liberty but also undermined meaningful relations of social trust, accountability, or loyalty. Unlike routine politics, liminal situations of war or social revolution suspend ‘normal’ goal-oriented, rational directed thinking and let fantasy thinking come to the fore, which project a future based on hazy but powerful dogmatic visions, often sustained by mythologised versions of history. The institutionalisation of utopia foreclosed reference to real events in the present or in the past as it could endanger the doctrine of an irreversible political order.  7KHVHSDWWHUQVRILGHQWLW\IRUPDWLRQUHÀHFWHGWKHODFNRIDVHQVHRIUHDOLW\DV a central feature of communism.1 The communists subjugated citizens to the collective illusion of an identity of the ‘People-as-One’, which was confronted with SHUPDQHQWDWWDFNVE\µHQHPLHVRIWKHSHRSOH¶6RFLDOUHDOLW\ZDVµGH¿QHG¶E\D dream world, where the daily life of shortage, delusion, and victimisation was

The power of second reality 67 tolerated due to the eschatological vision of a better world. The political authority of communism relied heavily on compensating uncertainty with promises about a radiant future, a ‘transition to communism’. The institutionalisation of utopia concerned not only material capacity of monopolising the state and economic institutions but also the control of consciousness, language, and identity (Wydra 2007: 72–3). The myths of the ‘deepening class struggle’, of ‘enemies of WKHSHRSOH¶µLPSHULDOLVWDJHQWV¶RUVSLHVMXVWL¿HGDJHQHUDODWWLWXGHRIYLJLODQFH suspicion, and a vast security apparatus including a huge military arsenal. The canonisation of a cult of Lenin turned the revolutionary leader into an object of religious worship (Tumarkin 1997). Similarly, the building of a socialist society was anchored in a wholesale mythology of a Stalin cult, which was constructed as a set of new myths within the framework of another body of myths, which had already been established. The revolutionary messianism of Bolshevik communism aimed not only at the re-engineering of social relations but, fundamentally, at the transformation of human nature. The relentless power of data-setting DQGVRFLDOHQJLQHHULQJE\LQGXVWULDOLVDWLRQDQGFROOHFWLYLVDWLRQFRXOGQRWEHHI¿cient without what Stalin called ‘the engineering of human souls’. Portraying the Soviet Union as the highest form of democracy, Stalin argued that in the USSR there were only two classes, workers and peasants, whose interests – far from being mutually hostile – were, on the contrary, friendly. In his view, ‘Soviet democracy is democracy for the working people, i.e., democracy for all’. This self-assessment as true democracy and the simultaneous legitimacy crisis was not a paradox but the background before which communism’s double bind as a ruthless power system and its political symbolism of the People-as-One in a transition to communism coalesce. This permanent struggle relied upon radical shifts in symbolic representation and upon constitutional myths, which sustained the myth of democratic equality in a society that in reality established a new class.

The realities and myths of the Cold War The Second World War and its aftermath left many Eastern European countries in a liminal confusion between victory and defeat (Wydra 2007: 145–8). Socially and economically devastated, they came under Soviet control but for all the despair and hopelessness this experience of victimisation also furthered expectations of national liberation, initially expressed in the symbolic belonging to another type of civilisation. The ideological divide between the ‘liberal democracies’ and the ‘people’s democracies’ operated with culturally determinist views according to which Western democracy was individualist and free, while communism was collectivist and totalitarian. The question is not so much whether this was empirically true or not. The political antagonism between communism and democracy during the Cold War diverted attention from the fact that the hostile blocs shared the profound desire to recreate not only an institutional but also a symbolic order. Both sides declared their political and economic system to be of universal scope, representing the spearhead of modernity. Similarly, liberal

68 H. Wydra and people’s democracies shared the conviction to be the better, if not the best form of democracy. Western democracies, especially the United States, turned WKH SROLWLFDO FRQÀLFW LQWR D YLWDO FRQWHVW EHWZHHQ JRRG DQG HYLO D GLYLVLRQ WKDW peaked in the moral crusade of the Reagan-era (Gleason 1995: 190–210). The concept of totalitarianism became, in George F. Kennan’s words, a doctrine, an indestructible myth (Rossbach 1999: 213). Furthermore, during the Cold War the concept of democracy was extended over the boundaries of a constitutional form of government into a social category, which discarded the changes after Stalin’s death and presented Western democracy as a morally superior form of a ‘good’ society. Conversely, people’s democracies stressed their democratic credentials by opposing themselves against what they claimed to be the historical continuity of fascist regimes in the West. The public defence by a strong centralised state DJDLQVW ± HVVHQWLDOO\ XQGH¿QHG ± IDVFLVW HQHPLHV EHFDPH WKH IRUHPRVW FRQWHQW GH¿QLQJ QHZ SRSXODU GHPRFUDFLHV DIWHU  7KH DQWLIDVFLVW P\WK LQ (DVWHUQ Europe after 1945 did not destroy the desire for national independence, for forms of mental and cultural resistance, and for the symbolism of popular sovereignty. %HVLGHVWKHLGHQWL¿FDWLRQRIHQHPLHVZLWKLQWKHDQWLIDVFLVWP\WKZDVWKHPDMRU symbol for giving meaning and stability to new people’s democracies. Supported by constant elite purges, the history of the Second World War was dealt with selectively, leaving out any mention of the fate of Jews. Soviet communism was not only anti-democratic in terms of monopolising the political space, but it also carried a potential threat to the stability of liberal democracies in the West. In this vein, the aggressive anti-communism of the 8QLWHG6WDWHVLQWKHDEVHQFHRIDFRQFUHWHPLOLWDU\FRQÀLFWZLWKWKH6RYLHW8QLRQ was based on the pervasive fear of contagion with the disease of communism (Wydra 2007: 291). It should not be forgotten that democracy at the end of the Second World War in other parts of Europe was far from being ‘consolidated’, if any measure of comparison is applied. Given the strong communist parties in France and Italy, fears of domestic struggles between communists and noncommunists were very real. This potentiality of contagion had become apparent in different waves of fascination and support of Soviet communism, mainly through Western intellectuals and writers. Externally, Soviet communism presented one’s own camp as the point of attraction for those disaffected in the other system. Internally, mythical represenations of the ‘other’ as evil should provide meaning, unanimity, and loyalty. 'HYRLGRID¿QDOSHDFHWUHDW\H[FHSWIRUVRPHDJUHHPHQWVZLWKPLQRUEHOOLJHUents, signed in Paris in 1946, the Second World War petered out in a string of ever more contentious and unproductive meetings of foreign ministers. In Eastern Europe, this confusion between victory and defeat failed to produce a ‘Stunde Null’, a new start, which would have symbolically separated war from peace time. While the aftermath of the Second World War separated Eastern Europe from the West by the Iron Curtain, it also bequeathed an ambivalent heritage of manipulations of meaning through myths. Nevertheless, the intense degree of material destruction, physical extermination, genocide, and forced

The power of second reality 69 migration could also generate genuine solidarity and community, shared in the equality of miserable conditions. Although it left Eastern European political societies powerless, it also produced symbols, meanings, and memories that ZRXOGVXVWDLQKRSHVIRUQDWLRQDOVHOIDI¿UPDWLRQ  7KHURRWVRIWKH&ROG:DUZHUHQRWFRQ¿QHGWRDFRQWHVWRYHUPDWHULDOJRRGV economic wealth, territory, technological competition, or revenge for historical defeats. The deep uncertainty about political and economic choices in immediate SRVWZDU (XURSH FU\VWDOOLVHG LQ D 0DQLFKHDQ FRQÀLFW EHWZHHQ JRRG DQG HYLO (Rossbach 1999). The major assault by communist ideology on public discourse, the streamlining of education, or the restrictions of the freedom of the press and historiography came along with the streamlining of public discourse in the West. While people in West Germany equated Nazi Germany with Eastern totalitarianism, East Germans associated fascism with capitalism. For the American High Commissioner in Germany, General Clay, the ideological contest between East DQG :HVW *HUPDQ\ ZDV SHUKDSV PRUH HI¿FLHQW WKDQ DOO $PHULFDQ HIIRUWV RI democratisation of post-war Germany (Mettler 1975: 85–6). The policy of containment was an attempt to avoid contagion of weakened Western economies ZLWKWKHVRFLDOO\LPSRYHULVKLQJDQGHFRQRPLFDOO\KD]DUGRXVLQÀXHQFHRIFRPmunism and the political instability resulting from it. In this vein, the Marshall Plan was supposed to constitute a beginning, the foundation of a new sense of purpose in Western society, by means of counteracting political passions by the creation of interests.

Representations of democracy While Stalin’s regime masterfully constructed a myth of the Great Fatherland War, which would present communism in the light of a national revolution, the aftermath of the Second World War brought about a new wave of weeding out enemies after 1945 (Weiner 2002: 33–5). The cult of the Great Fatherland war, however, exuded a profound falseness as it had been purposeful manipulated, twisted, and tinselled over to serve the political needs (Tumarkin 1994: 155). Although Stalin could not place a taboo on the war as he had done with the terror of the 1930s, he avoided popular commemoration by demoting Victory Day from a state holiday to a regular working day in 1947.  &RQYHUVHO\ WKH H[SHULHQFH RI WKH ZDU LWVHOI ZLWQHVVHG D ¿UVW VSRQWDQHRXV wave of de-Stalinisation characterised by a genuine sense of liberation. As a result of the German attack, the repressive political control by Soviet secret SROLFHFUXPEOHGDQGIUHHGPDQ\6RYLHWRI¿FLDOVPDQDJHUVDQGVROGLHUVIURPDQ atmosphere of passivity and fear of responsibility (Overy 1997: 329–30). Thus, patriotic warfare was genuinely experienced from below, giving people a greater sense of greater individual responsibility, which caused a paradoxical sense of freedom and moral strength. It was a period of spontaneous de-Stalinization. We were in full crisis. . . . People suddenly were forced to make their own decisions, to take responsibility

70 H. Wydra for themselves. Events pressed us into becoming truly independent human beings. . . . Strange as it may sound, 1941 was more of a liberation than was 1945. (Quoted in Tumarkin 1994: 65) Not unlike Russia’s victory over Napoleon’s armies more than a century earlier, the Great Fatherland War also stimulated free thought and autonomy that accomSDQLHGWKHDFWLYLWLHVRIPDVVHVRISHRSOHWRJHWKHUULVNLQJRUVDFUL¿FLQJWKHLUOLYHV in defence of their country (Urban et al. 1997: 30). In this vein, the post-war period saw the rise of myriad counter-narratives that represented different accounts of the past in response to the communist technique of an organised ‘annihilation of the past’. Popular representations of the Second World War in the Soviet Union, or of the failed revolutions in Hungary in 1956 and the Prague Spring of 1968, sustained popular memory of acts of GH¿DQFH UHVLVWDQFH DQG DWWHPSWV DW SROLWLFDO LQGHSHQGHQFH IURP D IRUHLJQ invader. Thus, even failures to produce democratic outcomes in terms of regime FKDQJH PD\ EH LQÀXHQWLDO LQ SURYLGLQJ P\WKV DQG EHOLHIV ZKLFK FRQVWLWXWH D spirit for overcoming autocratic rule (Agh 1998: 20). In Hungary, for instance, the power of the social memory of the 1956 revolution extended the period of WKHµORQJ¿IWLHV¶LQ+XQJDULDQKLVWRU\XSWRWKHODWHVDQGEHFDPHFUXFLDOIRU the disarticulation of communist power. Deprived of channels of political articulation and resources for collective protest and resistance, Hungarian society maintained a type of silent pressure and stood as a reminder of what might happen if the Stalinist methods and practices were to be repeated. The narrative of the Hungarian revolution was crucial in maintaining hope for regime change and also in persuading power incumbents to opt for a reform path in spring 1989. 7KH3ROLVK6ROLGDUQRĞüUHYROXWLRQLQFRQQHFWHGWKHVSLULWXDOUHYLYDORILQGLviduals and their self-realisation with the collective revival of the nation, identical with the recovery of independence and, consequently, with the reconstruction of society. The initial months after August 1980 witnessed the eruption of unof¿FLDORULQGHSHQGHQWV\PEROVRIZKLFKWKHSULPDU\V\PEROZDVWKHUHGVORJDQ µ6ROLGDUQRĞü¶ 0HUJLQJ IHHOLQJV RI IUHHGRP ZLWK URPDQWLF P\WKV 6ROLGDUQRĞü generated a mentality of eschatological relativism that did not refer to the current state or present-day concerns but anticipated a state of full freedom (Kowalski 1990: 76). The often short-lived independent statehood such as in the Baltic countries, Czechoslovakia, or Poland retained a high moral value, sustained by symbolism and collective memory, which maintained the – albeit precarious – time of independence as a goal to be restored. The preservation of physical existence of nations was crucial for providing identity but also for fuelling desire for national independence after 1945. Thus, resistance against communist rule had been in JHVWDWLRQ ORQJ EHIRUH WKH ¿QDO GLVUXSWLRQ 7KH 3UDJXH 6SULQJ IRU LQVWDQFH GLG not arise as a spontaneous happening but was the result of a gradual awakening, a sort of creeping opening of the ‘hidden sphere’ of society (Havel 1985: 43). For Havel, communism had caused the centre of gravity of any potential politi-

The power of second reality 71 cal threat to shift towards the existential and the pre-political. In the absurd world of post-totalitarianism under late Soviet communism the emperor was naked but kept citizens in a ritualistic circle of compliance and self-censorship. The true endeavour to be accomplished was to break self-censorship by attempting to overcome the corruption of everyday life. Paradoxically, realistic options IRUUHVLVWDQFHUHTXLUHGWKHµGHVWDWL¿FDWLRQ¶RIVRFLDOUHDOLW\FUHDWHGE\WKHWRWDOLW\ RI FRPPXQLVW SRZHU µ%HFDXVH SROLWLFV KDV ÀRRGHG QHDUO\ HYHU\ QRRN DQG FUDQQ\RIRXUOLYHV,ZRXOGOLNHWRVHHWKHÀRRGUHFHGH:HRXJKWWRGHSROLWLFL]H our lives, free them from politics as from some contagious infection’ (Konrád 1984: 229). The idealisation of democracy should not be confused with a deliberate ‘rational’ choice based on stable individual preferences for a well-articulated model of ‘liberal democracy’. Rather, representations between East and West UHÀHFWHGWKHSRZHURIP\WKE\HVWDEOLVKLQJWZRGRPLQDQWSDUDGLJPVRIFRPPXnication and discourse across the Iron Curtain (Hankiss 1994: 115–26). By dismantling established institutions and purging national elites, the communist regimes destroyed social networks, identities, dignity, and self-esteem, thus developing the ‘paradigm of the prisoner’. After de-Stalinisation, however, the power of the authorities would increasingly rely upon the desire of the governed to leave the social community temporarily, and upon the principle of doing little WKDW ZRXOG FRXQWHUDFW WKH IXO¿OPHQW RI WKLV GHVLUH $W WKH VDPH WLPH WKH H[LVtence of Eastern communism helped people living in the West to develop the ‘paradigm of the missionary’ (ibid.). The fate of the prisoners behind the Iron Curtain was an indispensable source of meaning for Western identity, reinforcing its missionary zeal towards the East. Eastern Europe’s desire to become the West’s or Europe’s equal has perhaps been the most pervasive, albeit most vague realm of second reality. National forms of resistance and dissidence would create pockets of freedom and spheres of reality that allowed spaces of parallel societies, second economies, or second polities. Opposition groups, dissident movements, and political leaders did not have a rational conception of implementing Western-style democratic institutions but rather were driven by quite undifferentiated images of democracy and capitalism. Similarly, the myth of an ‘originally humanist Marxism’, supposedly betrayed by Lenin and Stalin, helped the critical Marxists of East Central Europe – the ‘revisionists’ – formulate their rejection of bureaucratic socialism, and contributed to the dispelOLQJ RI WKH RI¿FLDO KLHURSKDQ\ 7LVPDQHDQX    $W ERWWRP WKH GHHS disillusionment with revolutionary messianism was replaced by a pervasive perception of a different hypothetical ideal world that kept a double imagination alive in which the future was imagined in terms of paradise (Škvorecký 1988: 136–8). The popular representation of communist power as the enemy of the people was reinforced by images of alternative realities such as the ‘West’, ‘democracy’, or ‘Europe’. The West was admired for its superiority but also expected to recognise the dissidents’ effort of self-extrication. Central Europeans learnt to refuse the callous post-totalitarian condition by trying to embrace a distant

72 H. Wydra ‘elsewhere’ reality (Kundera 1986: 176). The idea of democracy developed into an empire of the mind precisely because of its mythical connotations, representing the ideal society, total freedom, or a moral good. The West appeared to be a set of hazy images rather than a rationally constructed policy directed at outcomes. People in the East did not pursue clear-cut models or institutionalised logic but wanted to belong to the ‘West’, the reality that was most withheld but most ardently desired. ‘People yearned for Western political institutions, a Western standard of living, Western freedom . . . but not for capitalism’ (Szacki 1995: 120). Yet, as the Yugoslav example suggests, the constitutive imagination of second reality has not been determined externally from the West but has been narratively constructed according to one’s own historical experiences. As Yugoslavia’s tragic disintegration shows, the constitutive imagination of intellectuals in Serbia as well as in Croatia engaged in the social construction of imaginary HQHPLHV(PLU.XVWXULFD¶V¿OPHSRVUnderground captured well how in the perceptions of Yugoslavs the Second World War had not ended and how the potenWLDOLW\RIEHLQJWKUHDWHQHGH[LVWHQWLDOO\E\HWKQLFHQHPLHVSUH¿JXUHGWKHZDUVLQ WKHHDUO\V7KLV¿OPKDVDVLWVSURWDJRQLVWVWZR6HUELDQIULHQGVZKR¿JKW the German occupation from their base in an underground bunker in town. At some point one of the two friends leaves their hideaway and realises that the war has ended. However, he keeps on suggesting to the other one – who remained in WKHEXQNHUZLWKDEXQFKRISDUWLVDQV±WKDWWKHZDUKDVQRW\HW¿QLVKHG)RUWZR GHFDGHVRUVRWKLVJURXSRIDQWLIDVFLVW¿JKWHUVIRUWKHIUHHGRPRI<XJRVODYLD keeps adhering to the illusion of living in war-like conditions. Setting the war experiences of the early 1990s in Croatia and Bosnia in the wider perspective of <XJRVODYLD¶V KLVWRU\ LQ WKH WZHQWLHWK FHQWXU\ .XVWXULFD¶V ¿OP LV D SRZHUIXO allegory about how the consolidation of Yugoslav communism relied on the second reality of encirclement by enemies. The fragmentation of memories in ethnically divided societies such as Yugoslavia played a paramount role for the shift from a salient national identity to a divided identity. While Tito subordinated memories of the civil war to the dominant collective memory of the antifascist myth, the myth of the unifying partisan experience, and to the heroic ¿JXUHRI7LWRWKHQDUUDWLYHVRIWKHVVWUHVVHGWKHLGHQWL¿FDWLRQRILQGLYLGXDO republics with myths of victimisation and vengeance for the inter-ethnic civil war between 1941 and 1945.

Post-communist democracy and the return of myth Democratic consciousness has not been the innate preference of enlightened democrats but should be seen as a concept that has been formed in reaction to communism’s ideological prescription of totality. The rejection of totality, however, produced a vision of totality of a different kind. Terms such ‘market’, ‘democracy’, ‘capitalism’, or ‘Europe’ were characterised by the dissolution of any possible substantive or semantic meaning and tinged with an explosive mix of eschatological hope and haziness. As Adam Michnik put it:

The power of second reality 73 I think that we know precisely what we do not want, but none of us knows precisely what we do want. There is no language which could correctly describe our aspirations. . . . The values whose presence we sense intuitively – and to which we want to be faithful – are values existing at the meeting point of different spheres of our human condition, and hence the language in which they could be described cannot be internally homogeneous. Hence we are looking for another language which would pinpoint the inexpressible. (Michnik 1987: 42–4) In the post-communist era, democracy assumed the quality of a social end, a goal of development, marking the end of the struggle between competing ideologies and political systems. Casting a universal spell of concepts such as ‘constitutionalism’, ‘capitalism’, or ‘liberalism’, the idea of a universal democracy to come has swept aside communism by introducing a new master narrative. Ironically, much of the literature on transitions to democracy has transposed the deterministic historicist account of Marx’s idea about the inevitability of a transition to communism by ‘liberalising’ the Marxist paradigm and projecting a WHOHRORJ\RIWKH¿QDOYLFWRU\RIOLEHUDOGHPRFUDF\*XLOKRW±  The initial spell of alternative realities such as ‘capitalism’, ‘liberalism’, ‘Europe’, or ‘Central Europe’ as representing an all-encompassing alternative to the perceived communist enemy has been subject to confusion, distortion, and disillusionment ever since. Liberalism in post-communist countries has been characterised more by a lack of substantive rationality and images than by knowledge or expertise (Szacki 1995; Weigle 1996). Deprived of a normal situation, the development of state–society relations on the basis of the liberal model supported by the middle class and the liberal political parties seems to be precluded. Despite the momentous changes in political practice, political legitimacy, and social organisation, there seems to be a pervasive lack of endogenously created political formulas, ideologies, or classes. Mythological constructions of reality underpin economic issues such as post-communist liberalism (Williams 1997: 132–40). Linking the economic transformation after 1989 to national revival in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries is to portray liberalism as fundamental to the constitution of Czech identity, to a return to what is natural. A mythologised reading of Czech history suggests a vision of the Czech nation as Europeans ‘naturally’ inclined to democracy, commerce, and self-reliance, thus erasing awkward facts such as panslavism or the acquiescence to authoritarian rule. It is no surprise that the Yugoslav case de-mythologises the triumphalist ‘victory of liberal democracy’ after 1989. The Bosnian catastrophe can be taken as paradigmatic for a profound crisis challenging international relations and security but also symbolising the dark sides of Western models of democracy (Isaac 1998). Furthermore, Bosnia is not only a reproach to democracy but also in some ways its future because massive expulsion not only from there but also from numerous places threatens immigration into Western democratic countries. Bosnia stands also for the crisis of democratic humanism because the very

74 H. Wydra knowledge about what was happening did not enable Westerners to prevent it from happening. Finally, Bosnia is the symbol both of mass violence and of the impossibility of compensation. Rather than implying that Bosnia belongs to the non-democratic part of the world, this proves how marginal democracy has remained even quite close to the centre of Europe. Myths of vengeance, victimisation, or national purity indeed hamper the ZRUNLQJ RI GHPRFUDWLF SROLWLFV LQ WKH VHQVH RI IRFXVLQJ RQ LGHQWLW\ FRQÀLFWV DW the expense of interest-based politics. Conversely, however, the recovery of mythical representations of national history has been crucial for attempts to create civic identity in order to legitimise the state and democratic institutions. The quest for democratic legitimacy thus requires the discursive reconstitution of master-narratives about one’s own past. While the myth of a historical mission of the Soviet people was progressively deconstructed, political discourse in Russia re-mythologised the state by putting forward the patriotic myth of a Russian mission (Urban 1998). These attempts to re-mythologise the Russian state draw heavily on the inspiration of state patriotism linked with a mixture of Soviet symbolism and traditional religious symbolism. As Richard Sakwa’s chapter in this volume underscores for the Russian case, the idea of breaking with myths of the past requires the re-establishment of a new myth of normality.

Conclusion This chapter has linked representations of democracy to the mythological constructions of communism. The point is not to blur the crucial institutional and spiritual differences between communism and democracy as systems of government but to understand that any new reality of power builds largely on the need for markers of certainty in the exceptional politics of enchantment. Only if comPXQLVPLVFODVVL¿HGDVDV\VWHPRIJRYHUQPHQWIRUPDOO\RSSRVLQJ:HVWHUQW\SH governments, it appears to be anti-democratic in its refusal of fair, open, and UHJXODU HOHFWLRQV DFFRXQWDELOLW\ RI RI¿FH RU FRQVWLWXWLRQDOO\ ERXQGHG H[HUFLVH of power. Yet, if it is seen as a social organism in gestation, challenges to the authority of communism generated new meanings and myths, which made democracy desirable as an empire of the mind. If the lack of democratic politics before 1989 is simply discarded as a ‘myth of democracy’, one misrepresents the power of political imagination in Eastern Europe. Rejecting the second reality erected by communism introduced democracy as the empire of the mind by which the communist claim to totality was rejected. Democratic consciousness has not emerged in individuals and social groups immune against practices of communism, but within new forms of constitutive imagination, which would break the spell of the irreality of communist power by proposing counter-realities. Now, such mythical sources of democracy are at odds with views that only accept ‘realist’ politics based on interests and power, while discarding the idea that story-telling or symbols can remove autocracy, let alone introduce democracy. This means to see power as a regulated process of predictable moves by players who abide by the rules of the game. Power,

The power of second reality 75 however, is also symbolically articulated, as it is the meanings that give our actions legitimacy in the view of our co-citizens. In this second sense, the mythiFDOUHSUHVHQWDWLRQVRIRQH¶VRZQQDWLRQDO¿JKWIRULQGHSHQGHQFHDVZHOODVWKH representations of a democracy’s state of full freedom were essential to breakthrough.

Note 1 See the contributions by Agnes Horvath and Arpad Szakolczai in this volume, which point out the not-being, the absurdity of communism.

Bibliography Agh, A. (1998) Emerging Democracies in East Central Europe and the Balkans, Cheltenham and Northampton: Edward Elgar. Berdyaev, N. (1961) The Russian Revolution, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Bonnell, V. (1999) Iconography of Power, Berekeley and London: University of California Press. Borkenau, F. (1971) World Communism: A History of the Communist International, Ann Abor: University of Michigan Press. Brubaker, R. and Cooper, F. (2000) ‘Beyond “Identity” ’, Theory and Society 29 (1), 1–47. Eisenstadt, S.N. and Giesen, B. (1995) ‘The Construction of Collective Identity’, European Journal of Sociology 36, 72–102. Furet, F. (1981) Interpreting the French Revolution, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Gleason, A. (1995) Totalitarianism. The Inner History of the Cold War, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Guilhot, N. (2002) ‘The Transition to the Human World of Democracy: Notes for a History of the Concept of Transition, from Early Marxism to 1989’, European Journal of Social Theory 5 (2), 219–43. Hankiss, E (1994) ‘European Paradigms: East and West, 1945–1994’, Daedalus 123 (3), 115–26. Havel, V. (1985) ‘The Power of the Powerless’, in Keane, J. (ed.) The Power of the Powerless: Citizens Against the State in Eastern Europe, London: Hutchinson & Co. Isaac, J.C. (1998) Democracy in Dark Times, Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press. Jung, C.G. (1959) The Basic Writings of C.G. Jung, ed. with an Introduction by Violet Staub de Laszlo, New York: The Modern Library. Konrád, G. (1984) Antipolitcs. An Essay, San Diego, New York and London: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. Koselleck, R. (1985) Futures Past: On the Semantics of Historical Time, Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press. Kowalski, S. (1990) .U\W\NDVROLGDUQRĞFLRZHJRUR]XPX, Warsaw: Wydawnictwo PEN. Kundera, M. (1986) Life is Elsewhere, New York and London: Penguin Books. Lefort, C. (1986) Essais sur le politique, Paris: Seuil. Lenin, V.I. (1989) What is to be Done?, London: Penguin. Marx, K. (1971) Die Früschriften, ed. by Siegfried Landshut, Stuttgart: Kröner.

76 H. Wydra Mettler, B. (1975) Demokratisierung und Kalter Krieg. Berlin: Zur amerikanischen Informations- und Rundfunkpolitik in Westdeutschland 1945–49, Berlin: Verlag Volker Spiess. Michnik, A. (1987) Polskie pytania, Paris: Zeszyty Literackie. 0LáRV]& =QLHZRORQ\8P\Vá, Kraków: Krajow Agencja Wydawnicza. Montégut, E. (1858) Essais sur l’époque actuelle: Libres opinions, morales et historiques, Paris: Poulet-Malassis & de Broise. Ortega y Gasset, J. (1998) La rebelión de las masas, Madrid: Castalia. Overy, R. (1997) Russia´s War, London: Penguin Books. Palmer, R. (1959) The Age of the Democratic Revolution, vol. 1, Princeton: Princeton University Press. Popitz, H. (1992) Phänomene der Macht, Tübingen: Mohr. Rossbach, S. (1999) Gnostic Wars, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Schapiro, L. (1987) Russian Studies, ed. by Ellen Dahrendorf, New York: Viking. ĝNYRUHFNê- Talkin’ Moscow Blues, London and Boston: Faber and Faber. Szacki, J. (1995) Liberalism After Communism, Budapest: Central European University Press. Talmon, J.L. (1952) The Origins of Totalitarian Democracy, London: Secker & Warburg. Tismaneanu, V. (1998) Fantasies of Salvation. Democracy, Nationalisms, and Myth in Post-Communist Europe, Princeton: Princeton University Press. Tocqueville, A. de (2000) Democracy in America I & II, New York and London: Bantam Classic. Tumarkin, N. (1994) The Living & the Dead: The Rise and Fall of the Cult of World War II in Russia, New York: Basic Books. Tumarkin, N. (1997) Lenin Lives! The Lenin Cult in Soviet Russia, enlarged edition, Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press. Urban, M. (1998) ‘Remythologizing the Russian State’, Europe–Asia Studies 50 (6), 969–92. Urban, M., Igrunov, V. and MitroKhin, S. (1997) The Rebirth of Politics in Russia, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Voegelin, E. (1999) Hitler and the Germans, transl., ed., and with an Introduction by Clemens, D. and Purcell, B., Columbia and London: University of Missouri Press. Weber, M. (1980) Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft, 5th edn, Tübingen: Mohr. Weigle, M.A. (1996) ‘Political Liberalism in Postcommunist Russia’, The Review of Politics 58 (3), 469–503. Weiner, A. (2002) Making Sense of War: The Second World War and the Fate of the Bolshevik Revolution, Princeton: Princeton University Press. Williams, K. (1997) ‘National Myths in the New Czech Liberalism’, in Hosking, G. and 6FK|SÀLQ*HGV Myths and Nationhood, London: Hurst, 132–40. Wortman, R. (2000) Scenarios of Power: Myth and Ceremony in Russian Monarchy from Peter the Great to the Abdication of Nicholas II, Princeton: Princeton University Press. Wydra, H. (2007) Communism and the Emergence of Democracy, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Part II

Literature and representations of democracy

4

‘MD]HSD¶DVDV\PEROLF¿JXUHRI Ukrainian autonomy Thomas Grob1

+LVWRULFDOP\WKVEHWZHHQLGHRORJ\DQGQDUUDWLRQ Historical ‘myths’ have been the subject of much debate in the past two decades, among others in the German-speaking world.2 The neo-nationalism which emerged after 1990 in former communist countries focused this debate particularly on Central and Eastern Europe (Gehrlich et al. 1996; Behring et al. 1999) DQGWKXVRQFRQÀLFWVLQZKLFKKLVWRULFDOEDFNGURSVSHUFHLYHGWRKDYHEHHQRYHUFRPHORQJDJRZHUHUHDFWLYDWHG+RZHYHUMXVWL¿HGLWPLJKWEHWRVSHDNRIµKLVtorical myths’ in this respect, such myths are politically fabricated and often reveal a certain bias and fuzziness. As it happens, this blurring is due not only to DQ LQHYLWDEOH PHWDSKRULFDO LQÀHFWLRQ WKDW LV SDUW DQG SDUFHO RI UHIHUULQJ WR modern, non-religious phzenomena as ‘myths’. Drawing loosely on Roland Barthes, myths as a rule are conceived as superordinate, implicit semantic structures which confer meaning upon events and shape their understanding (Barthes II )ROORZLQJ(XJHQ.RWWH¶VGH¿QLWLRQIRULQVWDQFHDµP\WK¶FDQEH XQGHUVWRRG DV D KLVWRULFRSROLWLFDOO\ RSHUDWLYH WHUP VSHFL¿FDOO\ DV D µV\PEROLFDOO\HIIHFWLYHVWUXFWXUHHQVXULQJWKHSHUPDQHQWIXQFWLRQVRIDI¿UPDWLRQOHJLWLmation, and regulation required to safeguard and reproduce society’ (Kotte 1999: 4). It follows that such ‘myths’ help furnish the past with meaning with a view to the present and future; moreover, they are often enlisted to organise and legimitate political intentions. While I will not take issue with this view here, I cannot help but suggest that the concept of ‘myth’ has become so blurred in UHFHQW\HDUVWKDWLWFDQKDUGO\EHOLQNHGZLWKWKHGHEDWHVRQP\WKLQRWKHU¿HOGV $V VXFK WKH QRWLRQ LV HTXDWHG YLUWXDOO\ ZLWK JURXSVSHFL¿F LGHRORJHPV RI DOO kinds and various arbitrary degrees of abstraction. This raises the question, however, whether it would not make sense to introGXFHDWOHDVWRQHIXUWKHUVSHFL¿FDWLRQLQLGHQWLI\LQJPRGHUQKLVWRULFDOP\WKVDQG in examining their genesis and transmission, namely that of a narrative which transcends any single text. Kotte mentions that myths interpret events ‘in the shape of originary stories’ (ibid., emphasis added). Anthropology and literary studies rightly emphasise the narrative structure of myths. Hans Blumenberg refers to them as ‘stories featuring a profoundly consistent narrative core and equally marked marginal variability’ (Blumenberg 1986: 40). Distinguishing

80 T. Grob what are more or less historical myths – at least in metaphorical terms – from abstract ideologems along these lines brings into view semantic structures constituted and reproduced by narrated units, that is, by ‘texts’, where narration can occur in various media, including visual ones. Literature and art can therefore SOD\DVLJQL¿FDQWUROHLQWKHGHYHORSPHQWDQGUHFHSWLRQKLVWRULHVRIVXFKP\WKV it follows, too, that discursive boundaries often become blurred in this context, such as between literature and art on the one hand, and historiography on the other. In the following, I will conceive a historical myth as a complex of narrated UHSRUWVWKDWLVDVµLPDJHV¶RIKLVWRULFDO¿JXUHVDQGHYHQWVWKLVFRPSOH[LVWUDQVmitted in relatively consistent forms, and the way in which it assumes meaning LVIRFXVHGRQWKHSUHVHQW$OWKRXJKWKH\FRQVWLWXWHZKDW/HV]HN.RáDNRZVNLKDV referred to as ‘secondary constructions’ rather than ‘primary’ or ‘religious P\WKV¶ .RáDNRZVNL    ERWK RSHUDWH DV WKH IXQFWLRQDOFRUH RI D FXOWXUDO JURXS¶VVHOIGH¿QLWLRQ2QHFDQKHQFHVSHDNRIµP\WKRORJLVLQJ¶LQWKDWVXFKQDUrative units must legitimate themselves beyond themselves: they procure their constitutive authority from a source beyond the text and thus refer to a ‘larger’, superordinate narrative presumed to constitute common knowledge. This reference can extend to the point where this hyper-narrative is merely alluded to or named so that the subject of the text cannot be understood without this reference. 0\WKL¿HGQDUUDWLYHVGHSHQGRQDQDXUDRIDXWKHQWLFLW\ZKLFKFDQQRWEHEDVHGRQ ¿FWLRQDOIDQWDV\DORQH,QWKHPRGHUQFRQWH[WDµVFLHQWL¿F¶H[SODQDWLRQDKLVtorical one in our present example) often takes the place of the religious substantiation of an ‘old’ myth. Science itself can thus become part of the myth: KLVWRULFDOP\WKVFRPHWRRFFXS\WKHJUH\DUHDEHWZHHQ¿FWLRQDXWKHQWLFDWHGE\ history, on the one hand, and narrated historiography, on the other.  7KLVFKDSWHUZLOOGLVFXVVWKHFRPSHWLWLRQDQGFRQÀLFWEHWZHHQGLIIHUHQWP\WKLFDO UHSUHVHQWDWLRQV RI WKH KLVWRULFDO 0D]HSD ¿JXUH DQG WKHLU FRPSDWLELOLW\ Moreover, I will bring into view an aspect innate in other narrative units, if not LQ QDUUDWLRQ DV VXFK GH &HUWHDX  I  QDUUDWLYHV GUDZ ERXQGDULHV whether explicitly or implicitly; in our present case, these boundaries are cultural. And since their legitimation leads beyond the merely aesthetic, extra¿FWLRQDODXWKRULW\LVDWWULEXWHGWRWKHVHERXQGDULHV$VZHZLOOVHHWKLVJHVWXUH of drawing – and transgressing – boundaries will become central in Mazepa’s case.

The ‘historical’ Mazepa and the construction of a ‘myth’ 7KH SRVWFRPPXQLVW DQG VWURQJO\ LGHRORJLFDO FRQÀLFW EHWZHHQ 8NUDLQH DQG 5XVVLDRYHUQDWLRQDODI¿OLDWLRQVDQGKLVWRULFDOGHPDUFDWLRQVIRFXVHVODVWEXWQRW least on how to interpret a common past. The outstanding role of literature and DUWDQGRIOLWHUDU\VWXGLHVDQGKLVWRULRJUDSK\LQWKLVFRQÀLFWFRQ¿UPV+HUIULHG 0QFNOHU¶V REVHUYDWLRQ WKDW LW LV µFKLHÀ\ LQWHOOHFWXDOV >  @ ZKR >  @ HQWUHDW national identity in political myths’ (Münckler 1994: 25). How nation-states deal ZLWK V\PEROV LV DQRWKHU VLJQL¿FDQW IDFWRU KRZHYHU ,YDQ 0D]HSD WKH

‘Mazepa’ as a symbol of Ukrainian autonomy 81 seventeenth-century Cossack Hetman (‘leader’), is one of a core set of historical ¿JXUHVHQOLVWHGERWKE\WKHVWDWHDQGLQWHOOHFWXDOVLQWKHSDVW¿IWHHQ\HDUVWRV\PEROLVH WKH 8NUDLQLDQ ZLOO WR IUHHGRP WKH IDFW WKDW 0D]HSD¶V LPDJH DV D WUDLWRU has persisted in Russian (and then Soviet) history has only reinforced this symbolisation.  7RGD\0D]HSDDGRUQV8NUDLQLDQEDQNQRWHVDQGVWDPSV%HKLQGWKLV¿JXUH however, lies a complex history, as yet unravelled in many aspects, together with DUDPL¿HGKLVWRU\RIUHSUHVHQWDWLRQLQ(XURSH,ZLOO¿UVWDWWHPSWWRVNHWFKDVHW of historical circumstances that sparks controversial and heated debate to this GD\ )URP  WR  ,YDQ 0D]HSD ZDV WKH +HWPDQ RI WKH VRFDOOHG /HIW EDQN&RVVDFN8NUDLQHWKHWHUULWRU\O\LQJRQWKHOHIWEDQNRIWKH'QLHSHU>'QHSU@ River), which had been associated with Russia since the treaty of 1654. Mazepa entered history largely because, shortly before the decisive battle between the 6ZHGLVKDQG5XVVLDQDUPLHVDW3ROWDYDLQKHIRUVRRNKLVDOOHJLDQFHZLWK Peter the Great by joining forces with Charles XII of Sweden. It is far from REYLRXVWKDW0D]HSDVKRXOGIHDWXUHLQWKHJDOOHU\RI8NUDLQLDQIUHHGRP¿JKWHUV Peter’s devastating defeat of the Swedish army resulted largely in annihilating WKH DOUHDG\ OLPLWHG DXWRQRP\ RI WKH &RVVDFN WHUULWRULHV DQG LQ LQÀLFWLQJ EUXWH force on the Cossacks to subject them to direct Russian authority. In factual terms, Mazepa’s change of sides brought the long phase of Cossack (partial) DXWRQRP\ LQ 8NUDLQH WR DQ HQG WKDW LV KH ZDV XQDEOH WR SUHYHQW WKH ORVV RI autonomous Cossack territories in the face of the ongoing territorial expansion and rounding off undertaken by his people’s strong neighbours. Mazepa was born around 1640; like so many other biographical details, his \HDURIELUWKLVGLVSXWHG+LVIDPLO\ZDVSDUWRIWKHVPDOO2UWKRGR[QRELOLW\RI the Right-bank Cossack territory, then under Polish control. Mazepa enjoyed an extraordinary education, attending the Kiev Academy and the Jesuit College in :DUVDZ+HVHUYHGDWWKHFRXUWRIWKH3ROLVKNLQJ-RKQ,,&DVLPLU>-DQ,,.D]LPLHU]@)URPKHSUREDEO\VSHQWVRPHWLPHLQ:HVWHUQ(XURSH*HUPDQ\ Italy, France, and the Netherlands) to further his education. The brilliant young Mazepa was soon entrusted with diplomatic assignments – particularly in Cossack matters – until he was forced to leave Poland in 166 for reasons that have remained unclear to this day. In the eighteenth century and particularly in the nineteenth, rumours spread by Voltaire that Mazepa’s departure was due to DQLOOLFLWORYHDIIDLUJDYHULVHWRDQXPEHURI¿FWLRQDODGDSWDWLRQV/HJHQGKDVLW that Mazepa was tied naked to a horse by the husband of a noble lady and driven out of Poland. The proliferation of this story in literature and art, which I will return to below, meant that Mazepa (still written ‘Mazeppa’ in the West) became ZLGHO\NQRZQLQ(XURSHXSXQWLOWKHWZHQWLHWKFHQWXU\7KH¿JXUHVRIWKHZLOG Cossack or of the young man bound naked to the back of a horse, however, often EHDUOLWWOHUHODWLRQWRWKHDFWXDOKLVWRULFDO¿JXUH Mazepa reappears in historical sources in 1669. He serves under the Rightbank Hetman Doroshenko, quickly rising through the ranks to become his deputy, presumably on account of his outstanding education and diplomatic H[SHULHQFH 'XULQJ D PLVVLRQ WR WKH &ULPHD LQ  KH LV FDSWXUHG E\ WKH

82 T. Grob Zaporozhian Cossacks, Doroshenko’s antagonists. Remarkably, his life is not taken, although he was travelling with Christian slaves as gifts for his Crimean hosts, but is handed over to the Left-bank Hetman Samojlovich, Doroshenko’s rival; he becomes Samojlovich’s right-hand man and is put in charge of foreign relations. In Muscovy, Mazepa meets his future sponsor V.V. Golitsyn, a favourite of Sof’ja from the beginning of her regency in 1682. There are legitimate claims that Mazepa played a part in Samojlovich’s downfall. When the latter ZDVGHSRVHGDQGEDQLVKHGLQDW5XVVLDQLQVWLJDWLRQ0D]HSDVXFFHHGVKLP EHQH¿WLQJ IURP 5XVVLDQ SURWHFWLRQ KH KDV 6DPRMORYLFK¶V VRQ EHKHDGHG 7KH new contractual conditions he is obliged to enter into are far less favourable for WKH 8NUDLQLDQ VLGH WKDQ WKRVH RI  ZKLFK QHLWKHU VLGH KDG DELGHG E\  ,Q 1689, Mazepa happened to be in Muscovy during Peter’s rise to power and the disposition of Sof’ja and Golitsyn. Much to the surprise of his later biographers, Mazepa the crafty diplomat once again survived a dramatic change in political circumstance. What is more, a relationship of steadfast and long-standing mutual trust ensued between Peter I and Mazepa, notwithstanding considerable friction. Mazepa, who is reported to have been an enthusiastic reader of Machiavelli and an admirer of Louis XIV, established virtually absolutist power despite corporative Cossack traditions and despite his dependency on Russia, which secured KLV SRZHU +H ZDV XQSRSXODU DPRQJ 8NUDLQLDQ SHDVDQWV DQG WKH ORZHU RUGHUV even the starshina, the upper class he helped strengthen, mistrusted his openly DEVROXWLVW WHQGHQFLHV ZKLFK FRQÀLFWHG ZLWK WUDGLWLRQ 0D]HSD SUHVHQWHG WKH emerging nobility with estates, had himself protected by Russian troops, massively increased the dependency of the peasants (including those not indentured) on the owners of large estates, and levied new taxes – which enabled him (Mazepa also owned latifundia on Russian territory) and the starshina, which had evolved into an increasingly stable upper class, to accumulate immense ZHDOWK 7KH VRFLDO FRQGLWLRQV RI WKH 8NUDLQLDQ SHDVDQWU\ DSSURDFKHG WKRVH LQ Polish and Russian lands and amounted to factual serfdom; Mazepa was said to be one of the richest people in Europe at the time.3 The lower orders suspected him of being a ljach (Pole); some historians have suggested that this supposition ZRXOGH[SODLQKLVPDVVLYHVXSSRUWIRUWKH2UWKRGR[FKXUFK0D]HSDDOVRVSRQsored educational institutions, such as the Kiev Academy. Notwithstanding economic prosperity, growing social discontent led to uprisings which were brutally crushed and entailed increasingly repressive government. The most famous insurgency occurred in 1690–1693 under Petro Ivanenko, known as Petryk, who took action aided by the Sich and the Crimean Khanate.  ,Q0D]HSDWRRNDGYDQWDJHRIWKH5LJKWEDQNLQVXUJHQF\DJDLQVW3RODQG to occupy this territory against the will of Muscovy, thereby uniting the Cossack lands; he exiled Palij, the leader of the uprising (who became a popular heroic IUHHGRP ¿JKWHU DQG WKH VXEMHFW RI PDQ\ VRQJV  WR 0XVFRY\ 'XULQJ WKH *UHDW Northern War, the tsar mounted increasing pressure on the Cossack lands; the Cossacks were dispatched on military campaigns waged in ever more remote places, causing severe losses. There were rumours that Peter wanted to integrate 8NUDLQHHQWLUHO\LQWR5XVVLD7KHGHWDLOVRIWKHQHJRWLDWLRQVZKLFK0D]HSDFRQ-

‘Mazepa’ as a symbol of Ukrainian autonomy 83 GXFWHGWKURXJKLQWHUPHGLDULHVZLWK.LQJ6WDQLVáDZ/HV]F]\ĔVNLRI3RODQGZKR had been installed by Sweden, remain unclear: to what extent Mazepa would KDYHDOORZHG3RODQGWRLQFRUSRUDWH8NUDLQHWKDWLVZKDWKHZRXOGKDYHJDLQHG from this incorporation, remains unclear (some believe Mazepa would have been granted a small principality of his own). Another episode in this late phase (which in turn is also relevant in literary terms) is that Mazepa ordered the execution of Kochubey, his chief judge, for betraying his secret negotiations with Charles and with Poland, to Peter, even though his daughter had been Mazepa’s lover for some time (Mazepa was her godfather). Peter, accustomed to allegations launched against Mazepa, was not prepared to forfeit his trust in him and turned Kochubey over to Mazepa instead.  :KHQ &KDUOHV ;,, RI 6ZHGHQ HQWHUHG 8NUDLQLDQ WHUULWRU\ XQH[SHFWHGO\ Mazepa, who had hesitated for a long time and had apparently not even informed his inner circle about his plans, turned against Peter and joined the Swedish troops. The tsar’s response was swift and bloody: Russian troops destroyed Baturin, Mazepa’s fortress, and massacred its inhabitants; the previously independent Zaporogian Sich was razed and a loyal, factually powerless Hetman was LQVWDOOHG WKHUH 0D]HSD ZDV H[HFXWHG LQ HI¿J\ DQG KH ZDV DQDWKHPDWLVHG ,Q &KDUOHVZDVGHIHDWHGLQWKH%DWWOHRI3ROWDYD±LQSDUWEHFDXVH0D]HSD despite unexpected support from the Sich, could mobilise only a small number of his troops; Peter’s propaganda had been successful. Following the defeat, 0D]HSDÀHGWRJHWKHUZLWK&KDUOHVDQGDJURXSRI&RVVDFNVWRWKH7XUNLVKIRUWUHVVRI%HQGHU\ZKHUHKHGLHGVKRUWO\DIWHUDUULYLQJWKHUHLQ2FWREHU:LWKWKH DSSRLQWPHQWRI3\O\S2UO\NKLVIROORZHUVFKRVHDµVXFFHVVRU¶ZLWKRXWDQ\LQÀXHQFHZKDWVRHYHU2UO\NGUHZXSDQDOPRVWGHPRFUDWLFSROLWLFDOSURJUDPPHIRUD IXWXUH&RVVDFN8NUDLQHDQGDWWHPSWHGWRVHFXUHPLOLWDU\VXSSRUWLQWKHUHJLRQ DQGDWVHYHUDO(XURSHDQFRXUWVDJDLQVWWKH5XVVLDQµ\RNH¶2UO\N¶VVRQZDVRQH RI9ROWDLUH¶VVRXUFHV7KH8NUDLQLDQWUDGLWLRQRIH[LOHRULJLQDWHVLQWKHVHHYHQWV

The Western European construction of the ‘Mazeppa’ myth 0D]HSD¶V JUHDWHVW KLVWRULFDO DFKLHYHPHQWV DUH WKUHHIROG ¿UVW KH PDQDJHG WR secure the country’s relative stability between the ‘Age of Ruin’ in the midV HYHQWHHQWKFHQWXU\DQGWKHGLVDVWHURIVHFRQGKHVXFFHHGHGLQVDIHJXDUGLQJ LWV DXWRQRP\ XQGHU GLI¿FXOW FLUFXPVWDQFHV DQG WKLUG FXOWXUH ÀRXULVKHG during his time. Western mythologising, however, neglects these achievements. The history of Western Maze(p)pa-images, which touches upon various areas of FXOWXUHLVULFKDQGUDPL¿HGLWFDQRQO\EHVNHWFKHGKHUH4 Notably, the origin of this history of representation is already balanced precariously between historiRJUDSK\DQGWKHSURGXFWLRQRIOLWHUDWXUH,Q0D]HSDDSSHDUVLQ9ROWDLUH¶V account of Charles XII. The brief passage on Mazepa, which mentions the SUREOHP RI 8NUDLQLDQ µQDWLRQKRRG¶ LV OLPLWHG ODUJHO\ WR WKH DQHFGRWH RI WKH young page strapped naked and lashed to the back of a horse. Voltaire is sympaWKHWLFWR0D]HSD¶VFKDQJHRIVLGHVZKLOH8NUDLQHKDGDOZD\VGHVLUHGIUHHGRP its geographical position between three powerful empires called for guardians,

84 T. Grob who had oppressed it in turn; against these odds, Mazepa had aspired to establish DµSRZHUIXO8NUDLQLDQUHDOP¶9ROWDLUH  In 1812, Heinrich Bertuch modelled a play about man’s struggle for freedom on the Mazepa material, very much in Schiller’s spirit (Bertuch 1831). Lord %\URQ¶VQDUUDWLYHSRHPµ0D]HSSD¶KRZHYHUDFFRXQWVIRUWKHSUROL¿FWUHDWPHQW of this material among the Romantics; Byron has the old Mazeppa report his youthful ride across the vast plains to Charles XII following their defeat at Poltava. Subsequent adaptations in French literature and art since the late 1920s are all indebted to Byron. Victor Hugo’s ‘Mazeppa’ (dated May 1828), a poem forming part of the Les Orientales cycle, cites Byron and is dedicated to Louis Boulanger, who rose to prominence with his painting Le supplice de Mazeppa   2WKHU DUWLVWV ZKR DGDSWHG WKH PRWLI LQFOXGH +RUDFH 9HUQHW 7KpRGRUH &KDVVpULDX (XJqQH 'HODFURL[ DQG SDUWLFXODUO\ 7KpRGRUH *pULFDXOW 0DUFLXN   2QO\ LQ H[FHSWLRQDO FDVHV LV 0D]HSS D¶V FDSWLYLW\ GHSLFWHG RQ FDQYDV rather, artists prefer to show him on horseback in scenes adapted from Byron’s poem. The motif was soon popularised, ranging from theatrical circus numbers and trivial graphics to adornments on consumer goods and decorative items. 2IWHQ WKH PRWLI RI WKH µZLOG PDQ¶ ± LW LV KDUGO\ DFFLGHQWDO WKDW µ0D]HSSD¶ DSSHDUVLQWKH8QLWHG6WDWHVLQWKHµ:LOG:HVW¶0RRUH&ROHPDQ – is comELQHG ZLWK WKH DFUREDWLF 7KLV FRQFHSWLRQ DOVR LQÀXHQFHG PXVLFDO DGDSWDWLRQV SDUWLFXODUO\)UDQ]/LV]W¶VHDUOLHUSLDQRpWXGHµ0D]HSSD¶RIZKLFKH[SOLFitly invokes Hugo.  2QHQHHGQRWZDLWXQWLO/LV]WKRZHYHUZKRDOLJQVKLVKRPRQ\PRXVPoème symphonique ZLWKWKHOLNHVRI2USKHXVRU3URPHWKHXVWRLGHQWLI\0D]HSS D¶V emergence into the mythologising process. The Western mythic images and narratives discussed above draw cultural boundaries through narrative means.5 In the eighteenth century, as the concept of a half-civilised Eastern Europe becomes HVWDEOLVKHG0D]HSDUHSUHVHQWV8NUDLQHZKLFK9ROWDLUHFRQFHLYHGDVDFLYLOLVDtional border, or a transit zone; the mythogenic element resides in the fact that Mazeppa was allowed to bridge otherwise insurmountable (cultural) boundaries. Voltaire’s Mazepa becomes a Polish nobleman capable of enlightening the civiOLVDWLRQDOSHULSKHU\EHFDXVHRIKLVH[SXOVLRQWRWKHVDYDJH8NUDLQH&RQYHUVHO\ &RQWDQW G¶2UYLOOH Mémoires d’Azéma   HPSKDVLVHV WKLV ELFXOWXUDO moment but brings the pathos of freedom into a curious association with Mazepa’s subjection of his people to discipline, conceiving civilisation as regimented PLOLWDU\RUJDQLVDWLRQ%RWKZULWHUVIRFXVWKHLPDJHRIWKHµXQFLYLOLVHG¶8NUDLQH on the description of the Zaporogian Sich; for Voltaire, this is the ‘strangest people of the world’, a mixture of peoples with ‘a kind of Christianity’ and predatory customs, which chooses and deposes its own leaders and tolerates no ZRPHQ LQ LWV UDQNV 7KH =DSRURJLDQ &RVVDFNV DUH IHDUOHVV ¿JKW RQO\ IRU WKH sake of looting, and are always drunk (Voltaire 1996: 345). Romantic representations of the westernised Mazepa are closely associated ZLWK DQ LQWHUHVW LQ WKH 2ULHQW KHUH 8NUDLQH RQFH PRUH XQIROGV LWV WKUHVKROG character. These accounts place emphasis on the moment of freedom captured by the oxymoronic image of the bound hero lashed to the wild steed. This

‘Mazepa’ as a symbol of Ukrainian autonomy 85 becomes increasingly programmatic in aesthetic terms. Byron introduces his Mazepa as an old warrior fused with nature and particularly with his horse, who looks back not without irony to the young, impetuous hero unable to restrain himself at any time and for whom a gallop to the verge of death is an iconic experience. Hugo conceives this ride to the edge of existence as the freedom of the poet’s fantasy. This transformation reveals how the boundary to the cultural 2WKHU DQG LWV LPDJHU\ EHFRPHV D PLUURU LQ ZKLFK WKH (XURSHDQ :HVW PLUURUV itself and its cultural identity. It is hardly accidental, then, that ‘Mazeppa’ soon GHJHQHUDWHV LQWR D KDUPOHVV SRUFHODLQ ¿JXUH D GHFRUDWLYH HWFKLQJ D SLHFH RI decoration on a grandfather clock, or even a cigarette brand.

5XVVLDQHFKRHVEHWZHHQWKHSDWKRVRIIUHHGRPDQGLPDJHVRI betrayal The development of the Mazepa images in Eastern Europe cannot be understood without reference to the Western context. It is the romantic Western European mythologising of Mazepa, and his thematic representation in the Western imagination, that construct an echo chamber in Eastern Europe, thereby returning him WRWKHOLWHUDU\LPDJLQDWLRQLQ5XVVLD3RODQGDQG8NUDLQH-XVWDVLQQLQHWHHQWK century German literature (Gottschall 1865), the romantic enthusiasm for IUHHGRP KLVWRULFLVHV DQG SROLWLFLVHV WKH PDWHULDO 8QGHU %\URQ¶V LQÀXHQFH Bohdan Zaleski wrote a poem about Mazepa in 1824 which introduced the WKHPH RI D IUHH 8NUDLQH DQG RI WKH ZLOG EHOOLJHUHQW &RVVDFN LQWR 3ROLVK 5RPDQWLFLVPDQGFRIRXQGHGWKHP\WKRI8NUDLQHLQ3RODQG,Q=DOHVNL0D]epa’s ride across the vast plains is likened at once to the dynamism involved in OLEHUDWLQJ WKH RSSUHVVHG 8NUDLQLDQ SHRSOH DV ZHOO DV WR WKH HQJLQH RI SRHWLF expression which appears to override the alienation between Poland and Mazepa again.  -XOLXV]6áRZDFNL¶VGUDPDµ0D]HSD¶RIPDUNVDODWHUHÀH[WRWKH5RPDQtic version in that Mazepa virtually sheds all Romantic features, not to mention SROLWLFDORQHVLQIDYRXURID3URWHDQUROHFKDQJH6áRZDFNL¶VSOD\DOVRWDNHVXS Western motifs but develops into a family drama set in the Polish nobility before Mazepa’s punishment. Here, Mazepa is intangible, changeable, and not caught up in a rigid web of human relations; he causes the action to catalyse, thereby triggering various desires that lie beyond control and ultimately lead to disaster 5LW]   :KLOH 6áRZDFNL¶V SOD\ RFFXSLHV DQ H[FHSWLRQDO SRVLWLRQ LQ WKH canon of Mazepa texts, it does, however, position itself precisely between the various cultural perspectives. The mythologem of the wild Cossack unmasks LWVHOIDVDUHÀH[WRWKHµ:HVWHUQ¶LQWKLVFDVH3ROLVK JD]HZKLFKDOOHJHGO\KDG EURXJKW LW IRUWK LQ WKH ¿UVW LQVWDQFH IRU LW LV QRW WKH DOPRVW SDVVLYH ¿JXUH WKDW UHSUHVHQWVWKHµZLOG¶HOHPHQWEXWWKHIDFWWKDWJD]LQJDWWKHFXOWXUDO2WKHUHYRNHV unrestrainable ‘wildness’, indeed mania, in those looking on.  ,VKRXOGQRZOLNHWRIRFXVRQ5XVVLDQDQG8NUDLQLDQLQWHUSUHWDWLRQV$PRQJ Russian work, Kondraty Ryleev’s verse poem ‘Voinarovskii’ presents the romantic, politicised version. It focuses not on Mazepa, the ambiguous traitor,

86 T. Grob but on his comrade-in-arms Voinarovskii, meanwhile exiled to Siberia. The ODWWHUDQDUGHQW¿JKWHUIRUKLVKRPHODQGDJDLQVW5XVVLDQW\UDQQ\GRXEWVLQUHWrospect whether he was right to betray Russia – after all his betrayal plunged his homeland into destruction (Ryleev 1956: verse 619). Nor is he sure whether Mazepa intended to save his country or simply aspired to seize power (ibid.: YHUVH II  7KURXJK D WUDQVSRVLWLRQ RI WKH P\WKRORJLVHG UROH LW LV 9RLQarovskii rather than Mazepa who loses his way in the vast plains during a military campaign, who sees the wolves under which his horse collapses, and who is subsequently found by a Cossack girl who becomes his wife. The most famous Russian text on Mazepa is Pushkin’s verse poem ‘Poltava’ (1828/29); its semantic complexity should not be gauged under reference to Tchaikovsky’s operatic version of 1884. Pushkin focuses on Mazepa’s seduction of Kochubey’s daughter and on the old man’s relationship with the very young Mariia, who was his god-daughter. Notwithstanding some temporal deferral, the action remains fairly faithful to the historical facts (particulary in the eyes of contemporary historians): infuriated by Mazepa’s breach of trust – after all, it DPRXQWVWRLQFHVWLQ2UWKRGR[WHUPV±.RFKXEH\EHWUD\V0D]HSDWR3HWHUZKR rejects the betrayal and hands Kochubey over to Mazepa. The fact that her beloved Mazepa, for whom she has abandoned her family, orders her father’s execution drives Mariia insane. The Byronic element in this treatment, that Mazepa cannot control his passion, is transposed onto the old, historical Mazepa, fuelling a personal disaster which escalates into a national one – in the shape of a fratricidal war. Although there is no doubt about Mazepa’s treacherous characWHUKHQRQHWKHOHVVUHPDLQVDGD]]OLQJ¿JXUHZKRLVHYHQJLYHQFHUWDLQµURPDQtic’ traits (such as writing poetry, his fervour, and so forth). Mazepa’s P\WKL¿FDWLRQLQWKH%\URQLFDQG5\OHHYHDQVHQVHLVFRQWUDVWHGZLWKKLVWRU\WKDW is, with the historical as such; the tragic nature of the action unfolds in the PRXQWLQJFRQÀLFWEHWZHHQKLVWRU\DQGWKHSULYDWHDVZHOODVWKHµSRHWLF¶  3XVKNLQ E\ QR PHDQV HTXDWHV 8NUDLQH ZLWK 0D]HSD¶V EHWUD\DO EXW XSKROGV KLVIXQGDPHQWDOFRQQRWDWLRQRIORYHIRUIUHHGRP8NUDLQH¶VUHEHOOLRQ±DQGWKLV is the jab against Western interpretations – is aimed at Mazepa himself, not because of his ‘betrayal’ but, on the contrary, because he follows Peter’s orders and rejects Charles for so long. And yet, despite all his sympathy with the 8NUDLQLDQDVSLUDWLRQWRµIUHHGRP¶3XVKNLQQHYHUWKHOHVVDVVXPHVWKDWLWZDVWKH FRXQWU\¶VQDWXUDOIDWHWREHFRPHSDUWRI3HWHU¶V5XVVLD2WKHUVVXFKDV)DGGH\ Bulgarin in his novel Mazepa (1834), made this case much more directly, couching it in explicitly chauvinistic terms, to level the distinctions that literature had LQWURGXFHG LQWR WKH RI¿FLDO LPDJH RI WKH µWUDLWRU¶ (PEHGGHG LQ D FRQVLVWHQWO\ LGHRORJLFDOVWUXJJOHDJDLQVWDOOIRUPVRI8NUDLQLDQµVHSDUDWLVP¶WKLVXWWHUO\QHJative image subsequently persisted throughout Russian and then Soviet Russian KLVWRULRJUDSK\ODUJHO\XQPRGL¿HG

‘Mazepa’ as a symbol of Ukrainian autonomy  

1DWLRQDOUHZULWLQJ0D]HSDLQWKHFRQWH[WRI8NUDLQLDQ ‘separatism’ Both Mazepa strands, the ‘legendary’ (focused on the episode from Mazepa’s youth) and the ‘historical’ (focused on the events prior to the Battle of Poltava), DUHPXFKPRUHLQWHUWZLQHGWKDQRQHPLJKWH[SHFWDW¿UVWJODQFH$OWKRXJKPRVW texts focus on either one or the other, there are few that employ the motif of the young Mazepa without reference to his older counterpart – and vice versa. The suffering romantic hero assumes his authority by the fact that it is always clear who he will become. Thus, a decisive passage in Hugo’s poem reads: ‘il court, il YROHLOWRPEHHWVHUHOqYHURL¶>KHULVHVKHÀHHVKHIDOOVDQGKHULVHVDJDLQWR EHFRPHNLQJ@+XJR  Voltaire, subsequently cited by Byron, had already described the entire trajecWRU\IURP0D]HSD¶VHDUO\ORYHDIIDLUWRWKHµ3ULQFHGHO¶8NUDLQH¶%\URQVKLIWV the account of the young man’s adventure to a later historical context and connects both situations through the motif of untamed passion, which the young lover and the old warrior have in common. For Pushkin, who depicts old Mazepa as a youth reeling in love, such fervour is perverted; he employs it to fuel historical events. In Rudolf Gottschall’s ‘Mazeppa’ (1860), the youthful episode is integrated into the dominant political action: ‘Der Hetman ist noch, was der Page war,/Den einst gerechter Zorn ans Roß gebunden/Noch lebt die alte Glut in seiner Seele  ¶ >7KH +HWPDQLV ZKDW WKH SDJH ZDV%RXQG E\ MXVW ZUDWK WR WKHKRUVH$QGWKHROGIHUYRXUVWLOOEXUQVLQKLVVRXO  @*RWWVFKDOO   $ JHQXLQH 8NUDLQLDQ LQWHUHVW LQ WKH ¿JXUH RI 0D]HSD HPHUJHV UDWKHU ODWH 7ZHQWLHWKFHQWXU\8NUDLQLDQUHP\WKRORJLVLQJVUHFDOOWKHOHJHQGDU\\RXWKWLPH and again even though they are focused entirely on the old, political Mazepa. The established, implicitly romantic hero is adopted in his Western ‘authority’ DQGWKHQUHLQWHUSUHWHGLQWHUPVRI8NUDLQLDQQDWLRQDOWKLQNLQJ7KLVµ8NUDLQLVDtion’, outlined below, unfolds in the liminal zone between history and literature, and largely from the vantage point of exile; it is rekindled after 1991 within the IUDPHZRUNRIRI¿FLDOVWDWHSROLF\  7KHSUHFXUVRUVRI0D]HSD¶VµQDWLRQDO¶P\WKL¿FDWLRQDVUHÀHFWHGE\WKHWHUP ‘Mazepians’, for instance (ukr. mazepynci, russ. mazepincy),6 go back a long time; the beginnings, however, are inconsistent and not accepted in the entire 8NUDLQLDQ FRPPXQLW\ DQG DUH OLPLWHG WR FRUUHFWLQJ WKH 5XVVLDQ LPDJH RI WKH anathematised traitor. The Istoriia Rusov WKH ¿UVW FRPSDFW SDWULRWLF EXW LQ DFWXDOIDFWXQUHOLDEOHKLVWRU\RI8NUDLQHZULWWHQDURXQGFRSLHVEHJDQWR FLUFXODWHIURPWKHVDQG¿UVWSXEOLFDWLRQIROORZHGLQ FDVWVDFRQWURYHUVLDO OLJKW RQ 0D]HSD ZKR LV VDLG WR EH D 3ROH IROORZLQJ 9ROWDLUH  2Q WKH one hand, it mentions his ‘despicable plan’ to switch sides, stemming from a personal desire for vengeance and failing to serve ‘national interests’; it also mentions the ‘extreme brutality’ Mazepa exercised to eliminate his rivals and his XQSRSXODULW\ZLWKKLVVXEMHFWV2QWKHRWKHUKDQGHQWLUHSDJHVDUHFRPPLWWHGWR µFLWLQJ¶WKHVSHHFKLQZKLFK0D]HSDMXVWL¿HVKLVDOOHJLDQFHZLWK&KDUOHVWRRYHUthrow the ‘despots’ in order to attain the largest possible autonomy; this is

88 T. Grob SDUWLFXODUO\VLJQL¿FDQWLQWKHFRQWH[WRIDERRNWKDWSXWVDXWKRULDORSLQLRQLQWKH PRXWKVRIKLVWRULFDO¿JXUHVWKURXJKRXW  7KHLPDJHVRI0D]HSDGUDZQE\µ8NUDLQRSKLOH¶5XVVLDQDQG8NUDLQLDQKLVWRrians remained largely negative until the late nineteenth century. The most important nineteenth-century work on Mazepa is without doubt a study pubOLVKHGLQE\WKHKLVWRULDQ1.RVWRPDURY± ZKRVHHQWKXVLDVP IRU WKH 8NUDLQLDQ FDXVH LV EH\RQG UHSURDFK %DVHG RQ ULFK VRXUFH PDWHULDO D ‘populist’ historical method, and a position basically loyal to the Russian state, Kostomarov concludes that far from representing ‘any national idea whatsoever’, Mazepa had been an ‘egotist in the true sense of the word’ (Kostomarov 1992:  DQGKDGEHWUD\HGHYHU\RQHKHDVVXPHVWKDWWKH8NUDLQHZRXOGKDYHIDOOHQ to Poland in case of Charles’s victory. Kostomarov bases his conclusion on the ‘people’, whose instinctive dislike of Mazepa bore witness to the dishonesty of his ideology of freedom, opting for Peter as the lesser of two evils. Kostomarov MXGJHV 0D]HSD WR EH QRW D WUDLWRU WR 5XVVLD EXW UDWKHU WR 8NUDLQLDQ VRFLHW\ ZKRVHGHPRFUDWLFVWUXFWXUHKHGHVWUR\HG2QHPDMRUOLQHRIDUJXPHQWLVWKHFULWLFLVP.RVWRPDURYOHYHOVDWWKH5XVVLDQSROLF\RIFKRRVLQJQRWWRUHZDUG8NUDLQian loyalty at this decisive historical juncture. Michajlo Hrushevsky (1866–1934), a historian and politician originally from *DOLFLDZDVWKHORQJVWDQGLQJV\PEROLF¿JXUHRIWKH8NUDLQLDQQDWLRQDOPRYHPHQWKHVHUYHGDV3UHVLGHQWRIWKHVKRUWOLYHG3HRSOH¶V5HSXEOLFRI8NUDLQHLQ 1918. He casts a comparable, albeit more positive light on Mazepa (Hrushevsky 1943). Hrushevsky emphasises Mazepa’s patriotic intentions and reinterprets his personality without straying very far from Kostomarov’s representation of facts, however. He also stresses social imbalance and widespread impoverishment as well as the repressive means deployed during Mazepa’s rule. He takes a critical view of social development under Mazepa and his predecessor, noting that ‘serfdom had been introduced and legalised with the aid of Muscovy’. He states, moreover, that previously democratic structures were abolished under Mazepa: ‘the incompletely developed system of democracy was replaced by an autocracy, which destroyed the last remnants of national freedom’ (ibid.: 352, 348). Furthermore, he argues that Mazepa had purposefully allowed Russian troops to enter the country to keep the people in check, that he eliminated his enemies without fail, and that he supported the Russians in their efforts to crush Cossack uprisings; he is even said to have advised Peter to destroy the Sich. For Hrushevsky, Mazepa’s ‘national’ intentions were inseparable from his claim to absolutist power. Yet, unlike Kostomarov’s, Hrushevsky’s account no longer earmarks Mazepa as a traitor, and aligns him with a continuous history of 8NUDLQLDQHIIRUWVWRVHFXUHDXWRQRP\UHJDUGOHVVRIDQ\DPELYDOHQFH Notwithstanding this new interpretation and the purposeful departure from the overpowering Russian image of the ‘traitor’, Hrushevsky’s Mazepa would hardly have provided the basis for a ‘national’ mythologising process. This state of affairs remained unchanged until the twentieth century. In view of major SROLWLFDOWUDQVIRUPDWLRQVVXFKDV8NUDLQH¶VVHSDUDWLRQDIWHULWVVKRUWOLYHGLQGHpendence from 1918 to 1919 and the disastrous Second World War, where

‘Mazepa’ as a symbol of Ukrainian autonomy 89 8NUDLQHQRWRQO\VXIIHUHGIURP1D]LWHUURUEXWZDVDOVRWZLFHDQG  invaded and ravaged by Soviet troops, the myth appeared as historical even though literature continued to play a decisive role in interpreting it further. In the VWKH*DOLFLDQZULWHUDQGOLWHUDU\VFKRODU%RKGDQ/HSN\M± SXElished a trilogy of novels entitled Mazepa, punctuated with ample descriptions of the protagonist’s day and age and employing a strong dose of ‘romanticising’ to shape him as a positive historical hero. Concurrently, individual historians sought to justify this new image on the basis of careful historical research; DOWKRXJK QR H[SOLFLW UHIHUHQFH LV PDGH WR 8NUDLQLDQ OLWHUDU\ DGDSWDWLRQV these OHDYH WKHLU PDUN RQ WKH KLVWRULFDO ZRUN eOLH %RUVFKDN¶V ,O¶NR %RUãþDN  DQG 5HQp0DUWHO¶VKLJKO\LQÀXHQWLDOVie de Mazeppa, published in Paris in 1931, is a SDUWLFXODUO\ LQVWUXFWLYH FDVH LQ SRLQW %RUVFKDN DQG 0DUWHO   D 8NUDLQLDQ translation appeared soon thereafter in Kiev and was republished in the 1990s. This book became a milestone in popularising a ‘nationalised’ image of Mazepa. Even though it was written by two historians, it is explicitly literary; Borschak referred to it as a biographie romancéeLQWKHQRWHVWRWKH8NUDLQLDQ edition. Not that Borschak and Martel renounce their claim to history; on the contrary, they attack ‘servile’ Russian historiography, stating that ‘Russian hisWRULDQV DUH DV VHUYLOH WRZDUGV WKRVH LQ SRZHU DV WKH 2UWKRGR[ FKXUFK DQG WKDW WKLV VWDQFH HYHQ LQÀXHQFHG µWKH EHVW 8NUDLQH SDWULRWV¶ LELG   7KHLU approach lies not in presenting new facts or reinterpreting those on hand. Critical aspects established since Kostomarov are mentioned but they are overwritten by narrative. The delineation of Mazepa’s personality thus shifts its ground, in that recurrent reference is made to what he ‘actually’ thought and wanted (ibid.: 32,   %RUVFKDN DQG 0DUWHO HYHQ FODLP WKDW 0D]HSD EDVLFDOO\ VKDUHG 3HWU\N¶V objectives. Following the tendency established by Hrushevsky, negative aspects DUHDWWULEXWHGFKLHÀ\WRWKHZLOORI0XVFRY\ZLWKZKLFK0D]HSDZDVFRPSHOOHG to comply. Borschak and Martel adopt the image of the legendary, exceptional personality from the Western Mazepa myth. Whereas the Western view conceived him in YDULRXVZD\VDVD¿JXUHWUDQVFHQGLQJERUGHUVDWWKHIURQWLHURIFLYLOLVDWLRQ%RUschak and Martel emphasise Mazepa’s education and sophistication, and how this impressed Charles XII of Sweden. While Mazepa represented the civilisational superiority of the Poles over the Cossacks at the outset of his career as a VXEMHFWRIQDUUDWLYHDFFRXQWVDVVHHQPRVWFOHDUO\LQG¶2UYLOOHKHVRRQEHFDPH a representative of the ‘European savage’; Borschak and Martel reverse his role DQGKHFRPHVWRVWDQGIRUWKHFXOWXUDOVXSHULRULW\RI8NUDLQLDQFXOWXUHRYHU0XVcovite ‘barbarism’.87KLVYLHZLVWKHQWUDQVSRVHGRQWRWKHLPDJHRIDOO8NUDLQLDQ FXOWXUHDQGHYHQWKRXJKWKH8NUDLQLDQVDUHUHIHUUHGWRDVDQµLJQRUDQWPDVV¶WKH fact that they failed to follow Mazepa still remains to be accounted for. Just what Borschak’s and Martel’s account is aiming at becomes clear at the last when they discuss the Battle of Poltava, which they characterise as a ‘clash of civilisations’ (ibid.: 40); Charles’s and Mazepa’s defeat amounts to a ‘step backwards WDNHQ E\ ZHVWHUQ FLYLOLVDWLRQ DV UHSUHVHQWHG E\ .LHY DQG WKH 8NUDLQH¶ LELG 183) and a step towards the ‘enslavement’ of Eastern peoples (ibid.: 155). In two

90 T. Grob other passages, Borschak and Martel align these events with the contemporaneous inter-war period in the 1930s, where they identify a comparable scenario. The distortions made out in the Russian image of Mazepa are politically motivated and part of the history of oppression, whereas the positivised image becomes an element of the struggle for freedom. Mazepa’s ideas, as Borschak and Martel note at the end of their book, had survived two centuries of ‘terror DQG SHUVHFXWLRQ¶ DQG KDG SURYHQ WR EH MXVWL¿HG DV D SHRSOH¶V ZLOO WR OLYH LQ freedom. The anti-Russian gesture is not performed without glancing at the West, as Mazepa becomes the advocate of Western culture against Eastern barbarism. This makes him a true representative of his people – against its better judgement, if need be. Whereas his own Cossacks hardly heed his call, the patriotic Zaporogian Sich do (ibid.: 138). Borschak and Martel argue that this allegiance helps VXUPRXQWVRFLDOGLIIHUHQFHVLQWKHQDPHRIWKHVKDUHGFDXVHRI8NUDLQLDQQDWLRQhood; that the Sich are hardly suited to representing European culture is left unmentioned. The higher interest of standing against Muscovy elevates Mazepa WRRQHµHOHFWHGE\WKHQDWLRQE\WKH8NUDLQLDQSHRSOH¶WRDµV\PERO¶RIDXWRQRP\ LELG   ZKRVH VLJQL¿FDQFH LV JDXJHG IURP WKH YDQWDJH SRLQW RI WKH present. The end of the book is steeped in pathos: Borschak and Martel declare 0D]HSDDµV\PERORI8NUDLQLDQLQGHSHQGHQFH¶DQGFRQFOXGHWKDWKHZDVµULJKW¶ after all, thereby having recourse once more to a central myth of Western European romanticism in that poets, painters, and musicians had all perceived the irresistible fascination and ultimate victory of this man’s ideas (ibid.: 183f.).  8NUDLQLDQKLVWRULDQVKDYHVLQFHSRLQWHGRXWWKHODFNRIUHOLDELOLW\LQKHUHQWLQ Borschak and Martel; Borys Krupnyckyj, for instance, refers to their work as a VXFFHVV LQ OLWHUDU\ WHUPV ZKLFK µODFNV VFLHQWL¿F YDOXH¶ .UXSQ\FN\M   Nevertheless, Borschak and Martel, two trained and well-informed historians, IRUPXODWHGZKDWKDYHODUJHO\EHFRPHWKHSDUDGLJPVIRUXQGHUVWDQGLQJWKH¿JXUH RI0D]HSDLQSDUWLFXODUWKHLPDJHVRI0D]HSDGUDZQXSRQE\8NUDLQHLQWKH VKDYHUHFRXUVHWRWKHLUZRUN,WLVVLJQL¿FDQWWKDW%RUVFKDN¶VDQG0DUWHO¶V account was already reprinted several times in the early 1990s, together with Lepkyj’s and Sosiura’s literary adaptations, or Khotkevych’s literarising portrait, whereas the more complex and differentiated large-scale works of exiled historiRJUDSKHUVZKLFKDOVRVXEVFULEHWRDµQDWLRQDO¶8NUDLQLDQSHUVSHFWLYHIROORZHG much later.9 The form of discourse situated in the cracks between literary and historical narration is typical of these texts, which are enjoying widespread reception. Their frequent references to Western mythologising on the one hand, and to a no less mythical Russian ‘demonisation’ on the other, authorises Mazepa for contemporary political discourse and serves as a basis for his positive mythical role as a national hero.

Why Mazepa? :LWKLQ WKH P\WKRORJLVHG KLVWRU\ RI WKH 8NUDLQLDQ VWUXJJOH IRU IUHHGRP ZKLFK elevates ‘the people’ to the yardstick of historical assessment, one must ask how

‘Mazepa’ as a symbol of Ukrainian autonomy 91 it came about that Palij or Petryk, two heroes already mythologised in popular accounts, were not chosen but instead gave way to their contemporary Mazepa, whose unpopularity was widely acknowledged and whom even nationally PLQGHG 8NUDLQLDQV KDYH UHFXUUHQWO\ EODPHG LQ SDUW IRU WKH ORVV RI GHPRFUDWLF traditions. At least four aspects of this choice need to be mentioned. 1

2

3

Compared to his contemporaries, who both took action in different coalitions and constellations, Mazepa is much more suited to a form of narraWLRQDFFRUGLQJWRZKLFKWKHµ8NUDLQLDQ¶LVVHSDUDWHGIURPZKDW LVH[WHUQDO to the ‘nation’. The historiographical shift that occurs in the early twentieth century homogenises the national interior (by equating Cossacks and 8NUDLQLDQV IRU LQVWDQFH DV PHQWLRQHG DERYH  DV WKH FRQFHSW RI VHSDUDWH 8NUDLQLDQ VWDWHKRRG DVVHUWV LWVHOI WR EHFRPH WKH REMHFWLYH RI D QDWLRQDOLVW movement, the social paradigms operating in historiography are covered LQFUHDVLQJO\ E\ WKRVH RI µQDWLRQKRRG¶ QRZ UHGH¿QHG  /DWH QLQHWHHQWK century and early twentienth-century territorially-bound national thinking QRZUHFRJQLVHVDKLVWRULFDO¿JXUHZKRIRUWKHODVWWLPHVDZDQRSSRUWXQLW\ WR LQFOXGH WKH &RVVDFN 8NUDLQH LQ WKH IRUPDWLRQ RI DEVROXWLVW  WHUULWRULDO states. Another aspect is worth mentioning together with the projection of the PRGHUQ FRQFHSW RI WKH QDWLRQ DV D WHUULWRULDO SRZHU GH¿QHG LQ HWKQLF DQG FXOWXUDOWHUPVRQWRWKHSHULRGDURXQG±DFRQFHSWZKRVHFDWDVWURSKLF impact on Central Europe some astute minds had predicted long beforehand.10 1DWLRQDO 8NUDLQLDQ LGHQWLW\ FRXOG EH HVWDEOLVKHG RQO\ E\ UHMHFWLQJ colonialist models of the ‘big and smaller brother’ – the central ideological concept of Russian imperialism – and by explicit separation from everything ‘Russian’. Given the political-ideological preconditions resulting from the First World War (which were even more pronounced for exiles in the wake RIWKH6HFRQG:RUOG:DU WKHV\PEROLFFRQWHQWVRIDQDWLRQDO¿JXUHKDGWR be directed primarily against ‘Muscovy’; correspondingly, Soviet research ZDVSDUWLFXODUO\NHHQWRJORULI\WKH5XVVLDQ±8NUDLQLDQSDFWHQWHUHGLQWRE\ Hetman Chmel’nyc’kyj in 1654, deployed symbolically against Poland. :KLOHDQDQWL5XVVLDQHOHPHQWFRXOGEHGHWHFWHGLQRWKHU¿JXUHVWKHLQVXUgencies led by Palij and Petryk were aimed also or even predominantly DJDLQVW WKHLU RZQ 8NUDLQLDQ OHDGHUVKLS 7KLV LQWHUHVW HYHQ RYHUWXUQV WKH argument advanced by earlier historians that Mazepa had never prompted Russian complaints – with the exception of his ultimate decision to switch sides – and that he used Russian power purposefully to safeguard his posiWLRQ 7KH MXGJHPHQW PHWHG RXW WR WKLV KLVWRULFDO ¿JXUH LV QRZ GHWHUPLQHG almost exclusively by the action which the old Mazepa takes shortly before his death. Besides the territorial aspect, another begins to emerge in this new national thinking, one that had hardly been of any concern to historians previously: the status of the leader’s personality now rises to prominence and replaces the former emphasis placed on fundamentally democratic Cossack

92 T. Grob



traditions. An increasing focus on the leadership principle becomes apparent in these views of history. The powerful Mazepa lends himself much better to this principle than his unfortunate rivals who were, moreover, less suited to representing Western culture. Mazepa’s education is highlighted in particular in this respect; equally, his pomp and his self-serving Machiavellianism are considered more and more positively. The absolutist leadership principle thus did not become the organisational model of the nationalist exile movement by chance (Subtelny 1994: 442). 2QHODVWSRLQWUHPDLQV,WLVVLJQL¿FDQWWKDWWKHYLHZWDNHQE\%RUVFKDNDQG Martel did not emerge in the Galician milieu, for instance, but among the 3DULVLDQH[LOHFRPPXQLW\0D]HSD¶VP\WKL¿FDWLRQTXLWHSODLQO\LQYRNHVWKH Western ‘Mazeppa’; it builds on his popularity (which was still intact in the early twentieth century) and on the mythologising layers already inscribed in his image by art and literature. Not untypically of Russian and 8NUDLQLDQ FXOWXUDO PRGHOV WKLV VXJJHVWV WKDW WKH VHOIDI¿UPDWLRQ RI WKH 8NUDLQLDQQDWLRQFRQVWLWXWHVLWVHOILQWKHH\HVRIWKRVHLWZLVKHVWREHORQJWR that is, in the presumed gaze of the West.

0\WKQDWLRQDOLGHQWLW\H[LOH All the factors mentioned above are associated with the ideological development RIWKH8NUDLQLDQLQGHSHQGHQFHPRYHPHQWSDUWLFXODUO\DPRQJH[LOHVVHWDJDLQVW the backdrop of the radicalisation of the nationalist exile movement following the defeat against Poland in Galicia, which peaked in its rubbing shoulders with German fascism in the 1930s. Such hopes were disappointed after 1941 when it became increasingly clear that Hitler was by no means suited to protecting an LQGHSHQGHQW 8NUDLQH %RU\V .UXSQLFN\M¶V KLVWRU\ RI WKH 8NUDLQH SXEOLVKHG LQ German in 1939 and 1943 (Krupnyckyj 1943), SRUWUD\V0D]HSDGH¿QLWLYHO\DVD leader who consolidated his realm and whose key objective lay in furnishing his WHUULWRU\ZLWKGH¿QLWLYHERUGHUVE\LQFRUSRUDWLQJWKH(DVWEDQN8NUDLQHDQGWKH Sich); while he promoted the starshina, he did not do so at the expense of other FODVVHV:KHUHDV.UXSQLFN\MGHSLFWV3HWU\NDVDPDUJLQDOHYHQULGLFXORXV¿JXUH (ibid.: 139f.), he argues that Palij was forced to yield to the great master’s tactics LELG   .UXSQLFN\M UHWUDFHV WKH WUDMHFWRU\ RI WKH 8NUDLQLDQ VWUXJJOH IRU freedom up to its ‘provisional outcome’ in the present and commends the 8NUDLQLDQOLEHUDWLRQDUP\DVWKHPRVWUHOLDEOHEXOZDUNDJDLQVW%ROVKHYLVP7KLV LGHRORJLFDOVKLIWLVGHVFULEHGLQDµ¿QDOQRWH¶WRWKH¿UVWHGLWLRQRI A large-scale ideological swing occurred in an age of enhanced nationalist consciousness; while epithets such as liberal, democratic, or even Marxist6RFLDOLVW DSSO\ WR ROGHU 8NUDLQHGRP WKH \RXQJHU JHQHUDWLRQ KDV JURZQ XS XQGHU WKH LQÀXHQFH RI /\S\QVN\M¶V DQG 'RQFRY¶V LGHDV DQG RI WKH authoritarian corporative state and modern nationalism. Today, nationalist ideologies of statehood, which lean towards the traditions of autonomous VWDWHKRRG IURP D SDWULRWLF SDVW SOD\ D FUXFLDO UROH ± XQOLNH WKH 8NUDLQ-

‘Mazepa’ as a symbol of Ukrainian autonomy 93 ian movement in the nineteenth century whose role was limited to raising QDWLRQDOLVWFRQVFLRXVQHVV7KHLGHRORJLFDOHIIRUWVXQGHUWDNHQE\8NUDLQLDQV in the twentieth century are therefore situated on a higher level, involving the synthesis of the people and the state. Mazepa now serves this synthesis as a mythologem, and this function in turn determines his image. Dmytro Doncov, the militant chief ideologist of an ‘exclusive, aggressive nationalism’ (Kappeler 1994: 210) mentioned here, had already written an essay on Western literary adaptations of Mazepa in 1913. He noted that their poetry perhaps contained more historical truth than a multi-volume hisWRULFDOLQYHVWLJDWLRQ'RQFRY  Doncov’s position and the anti-Russian orientation both experienced a revival LQ SRVW6RYLHW 8NUDLQH ,Q WKH ZDNH RI 8NUDLQLDQ LQGHSHQGHQFH WKH OLWHUDU\ historical and mythologised Mazepa spearheaded, among others, the symbolism now deployed by the state and the media to legitimate the new statehood in historical terms. Much as in the early twentieth century, the current interest taken in 0D]HSDUHVLGHVLQDQWL5XVVLDQVHQWLPHQWVDQGWKHTXHVWIRUSUHFXUVRUVRI8NUDLQLDQVWDWHKRRG$VD¿JXUHV\PEROLVLQJWKHVWDWHRQEDQNQRWHVVSHFLDOLVVXHFRLQV and stamps, or as commemorated by memorials and featuring as the subject of patriotic children’s books, Mazepa serves as a strong face to turn towards the RXWVLGHZRUOGDVZHOODVWKHJOXHRILGHQWL¿FDWLRQIRULQWHUQDODIIDLUV+HGHPDUcates a boundary towards Russia in particular (and hints at the possibility of alliance with the West); his twentieth-century version, moreover, blots out domestic GLIIHUHQFHV WKURXJK LWV HPSKDVLV RQ XQL¿HG VWDWHKRRG WKHUHE\ HIIDFLQJ LQWHUQDO VRFLDO DQG FXOWXUDO GLIIHUHQFHV 'LDPHWULFDOO\ RSSRVHG WR RI¿FLDO 5XVVLDQ DQG 6RYLHWDVVHVVPHQWVWKH8NUDLQLDQLPDJHRI0D]HSDLVFXUUHQWO\HQMR\LQJKLVWRULcal substantiation: the literary and historical texts mentioned above are being reHGLWHGWKHZRUNRIH[LOHG8NUDLQLDQKLVWRULDQVLVEHLQJSXEOLVKHGDQGEURFKXUHV are being written – all in a combined effort to vindicate Mazepa as a national hero. The mythologised image of Mazepa occupies a central position in the national UHDOP RI V\PEROV LQ FRQWHPSRUDU\ 8NUDLQH 7KH WH[WV WKDW KDYH FRQVWUXHG WKLV image over time dominate the current discourse on this historical period. A cursory survey of websites devoted to Mazepa reveals that this discourse is a SROLWLFDOLVVXH RI WKH ¿UVW RUGHU 0D]HSD LV DWWUDFWLQJLQWHUHVW RQ WKH QDWLRQDOLVW 5XVVLDQ VLGH WRR SDUWLFXODUO\ LQ 2UWKRGR[ FLUFOHV WKXV UHNLQGOLQJ WKH LVVXH RI betrayal. As both complementary mythologisations accuse each other of ideoORJLFDO ELDV WKH FRQÀLFW EHWZHHQ WKHP ZLOO QRW EH UHVROYHG E\ D SDLQVWDNLQJ recourse to historical facts on all sides, since this material will never be able to provide uncontroversial answers to the questions being raised today.

0\WKHQWUDSSHGE\QDUUDWLRQWKH8NUDLQLDQ0D]HSDP\WK EHWZHHQQDWLRQEXLOGLQJDQGPRGHUQSRVW6RYLHWVRFLHW\ The issue of a historical ‘myth’ does not arise (at least not primarily) as one that FRQFHUQV KLVWRULFDO µWUXWK¶ DQG LWV IDOVL¿FDWLRQ 5DWKHU LW DULVHV DV RQH RI WKH

94 T. Grob inevitable interpretations of the material at hand, as a plugging of gaps so to speak. It would make little sense to make a precise distinction between the emplotment customary in historical accounts and what can be referred to as a historical myth. In our present case, however, various elements come to mind WKDW FRXOG VXJJHVW VXFK D GLVWLQFWLRQ 2QH VXFK HOHPHQW LV LWV IXQFWLRQ LQ WKH laboured process of inventing tradition within the context of the defensive stance RI D 8NUDLQLDQ OLEHUDWLRQ PRYHPHQW DV ZHOO DV WKDW RI WKH QHZ VWDWHKRRG DIWHU  ERWK VWULYLQJ LQ WKH ¿UVW LQVWDQFH IRU KLVWRULFDO OHJLWLPDF\ 0D]HSD WKXV operates as a semantic complex ordered in narrative terms and assuming historical legitimacy, although the shape and form he assumes is ultimately steered by SROLWLFV2QRFFDVLRQKHGRHVDFWXDOO\DSSHDUDVDµP\WK¶LQWKHFODVVLFDOVHQVH VXFKDVLQWKHP\VWLI\LQJDQGVWURQJO\DQWL5XVVLDQ ¿OPA Prayer for Hetman Mazepa ZKHUHWKHKLVWRULFDO0D]HSDLVDQLQÀDWHGQDWLRQDO¿JXUHVHUYLQJ DVDEDFNGURSIRUDP\WKL¿HGGLVFRXUVHRQ8NUDLQLDQKLVWRU\  7KLV UDLVHV WKH TXHVWLRQ RI 0D]HSD¶V UHOHYDQFH LQ QHZ 8NUDLQLDQ VRFLHW\ which can only be answered, however, somewhat speculatively. Although myth DQGUHÀHFWLRQFDQQRWEHVHSDUDWHGDVQHDWO\DQGWLGLO\DVZHPLJKWZLVKVLQFH UHÀHFWLRQXQHQFXPEHUHGE\P\WKLVXQDWWDLQDEOHLQµQDWLRQDO¶GLVFRXUVHVHYHU\ politically tainted myth will efface certain distinctions, that is, it will replace them by clear antinomies. In Mazepa’s case, the process of mythologising coincides with the projective transfer of social criteria and domestic social issues onto the antinomy of national unity and the claims staked by external powers. The structure of these Mazepa narratives is bound up with the ideologems of impeded nation-building, of victimisation, on the dependence of the elite on a ‘foreign’, dominating culture, and of pillaged liberty still to be attained (thereby revealing its romantic origin). It is obvious that the semantic structure of these QDUUDWLYHV LQÀXHQFHG SROLWLFDO VWUXJJOHV GXULQJ WKH V D WLPH RI VRFLDO WHQsions as well as of nationalism promoted by the ruling factions of society. As VXFKDQDQWLGHPRFUDWLFHOHPHQWLQKHUHVLQWKH0D]HSDQDUUDWLYHVDQGLWLVGLI¿cult to assess its impact. Turning the question on its head is more productive: can one step around the myth-making factor? This step is far from easy. Within the framework of narrative, there appears to be no ready ‘solution’ since reconciling narratives about ‘traitors’ with ones about ‘liberators’ is impossible on a structural level. Scholars of narrative within V. Propp’s tradition suggest that no great narrative can exist without preliminary decisions being taken about its main protagonist, his or her REMHFWLYHV DQG WKH YLFWLP 2QO\ GHQDUUDWLYLVDWLRQ ZRXOG DSSHDU WR SUHVHQW D µVROXWLRQ¶'LVSDVVLRQZRXOGKDUGO\VXI¿FHLQWKHSUHVHQWFDVHKRZHYHUZKHUH P\WKRORJLVLQJ RFFXUV OHVV LQ RSSRVLWLRQ WR WKH IDFWV WKDQ ZLWKLQ WKH ¿VVXUHV RI meagre evidence and particularly in the act of overwriting Mazepa’s personality and its intentions, about which we lack reliable knowledge. De-narrativisation would thus have to focus on the contrariness of the ‘facts’. This would mean that one would recognise the history of writing history and narratives about Mazepa, acknowledging its essentially narrative character once again; that is, it is not merely a matter of re-historicising Mazepa but also the narratives shaping him.

‘Mazepa’ as a symbol of Ukrainian autonomy 95 Mazepa’s historical relevance would not suffer real loss as a result, although he would probably lose his role in contemporary political discourse, and his fascination for its associated imaginary worlds would diminish. De-narrativisation would amount to circumventing the ‘myth’; such efforts might in turn come up DJDLQVWWKHGLI¿FXOWLHVLQYROYHGLQUHPRYLQJWKHFRPPHPRUDWLYHSUDFWLFHVVXUrounding him, many of which are still too current, such as issuing money, erecting statues of him, enshrining him in the mass of textbooks and reprinted literary and historical texts. A great deal appears to suggest, however, that the national component of these historical discourses will level off, if only because they are becoming less UHOHYDQW LQ WKH PRVW UHFHQW SROLWLFDO HYHQWV DQG FRQÀLFWV ZKLFK DUH IRFXVLQJ much more on social issues, questions concerning the distribution of power and goods, and democratic participation. Whether Mazepa lends himself to a ‘democratised’ debate on his own past – Cossack tradition would provide ample PDWHULDOKHUH±UHPDLQVWREHVHHQ,WZRXOGQRWEHWKH¿UVWWLPHKRZHYHUWKDW Mazepa would save himself from what appears to be a hopeless situation.

Notes 1 Translated by Mark Kyburz and John Peck. 2 For instance, see Frindte and Pätzolt (1994); Berding (1996); von Saldern (1996); and Flacke (1998). 3 For one of the best and largely unbiased historical accounts of Mazepa, see Nordmann  2Q0D]HSD¶VODFNRISRSXODULW\DQGKLVSROLWLFDOROLJDUFK\VHHSSII)RUD PXFKPRUHGLIIHUHQWLDWHGYLHZRI0D]HSDWKDQWKDWFRPPRQLQHDUOLHU8NUDLQLDQH[LOH historiography, see Subtelny (1994). 4 For a comprehensive history of Western accounts of Mazeppa, see Grob (2006). 5 I have developed this view in a previous account of the history of the Mazeppa image in the West; it is therefore not reiterated here. In that essay, I have discussed, among others, the various musical and pictorial adaptations, see Grob (2006).   7KHQRWLRQUHIHUVWRWKHOLQHRILPSRUWDQWSROLWLFDO¿JXUHVWKDWFDQEHWUDFHGEDFNWR Mazepa, who all fought for independence and were directly associated with exile folORZLQJWKHGHIHDWDW3ROWDYDVHHIRULQVWDQFH.UHVLQ 2ULJLQDOO\µ0D]HSLDQV¶ ZDVDQRI¿FLDO5XVVLDQWHUPIRU8NUDLQLDQµVHSDUDWLVP¶   7ZR DGDSWDWLRQV ZRUWK PHQWLRQLQJ KHUH DUH 9RORG\P\U 6RVLXUD¶V YHUVH QDUUDWLYH Mazepa (written 1929) and Hnat Khotkevych’s sketch Get’man Ivan Mazepa (Khotkevych 1991). 8 (Ibid.: 39) Later nationalist (exile-) historians will conceive this as the decisive feature RI8NUDLQLDQKLVWRU\DQGOD\H[FOXVLYHFODLPWRWKHROG.LHYHPSLUHIRU8NUDLQLDQWUDdition. Since the nineteenth century, the Russian view has tended in the opposite direction, arguing that there is hardly any continuity from Rus’ to contemporary 8NUDLQH WKRXJK YHU\ PXFK WR WKH 0XVFRYLWH HPSLUH %RWK YLHZV DUH UHODWHG WR WKH largely unresolved question concerning the origin of the Cossacks, particularly the KLVWRU\RIVHWWOHPHQWLQWKH8NUDLQLDQUHJLRQDQGLWVFRQWLQXQLW\   /LNH %RU\V .UXSQ\FN\M¶V VWXG\ 2OHNVDQGHU 2KOREO\Q¶V VXEVWDQWLDO Het’man Ivan Mazepa ta joho doba 2KOREO\Q   ZKLFK DOVR IRUHJURXQGHG 0D]HSD¶V SRVLWLYH QDWLRQEXLOGLQJHIIRUWVZDV¿UVWUHSULQWHGLQ 10 See, for instance, Alfred Döblin’s polemic against national tendencies and the state as a ‘cultural beast’ on his trip to Lemberg in the 1920s (Döblin 1968: 190ff.).

96 T. Grob

%LEOLRJUDSK\ Barthes, R. (1964) Mythen des Alltags, Frankfurt: Suhrkamp. Behring, E., Richter, L. and Schwarz, W.F. (1999) Geschichtliche Mythen in den Literaturen und Kulturen Ostmittel- und Südosteuropas, Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag. Berding, H. (ed.) (1996) Mythos und Nation: Studien zur Entwicklung des kollektiven Bewusstseins in der Neuzeit, Frankfurt: Suhrkamp. Bertuch, H. (1831) ‘Alexei Petrowitsch: Ein romantisch-historisches Trauerspiel in fünf Aufzügen’, Deutsche Schaubühne 19, 159–306. Blumenberg, H. (1986) Arbeit am Mythos, 4th edn, Frankfurt: Suhrkamp. Borschak, E. and Martel, R. (1931) Vie de Mazeppa3DULV&DOPDQQ/pY\ Certeau, M. de (1988) Kunst des Handelns, Berlin: Merve. Döblin, A. (1968) Reise in Polen2OWHQ)UHLEXUJ:DOWHU Doncov, D. (1994) ‘Hetman Mazepa v zachidnoevropejs’kij literaturi’, in Bondarenkon, L. (ed.) Ivan Mazepa i Moskva. Istorychni rozvidky i statti.LHY5DGDSS± Flacke, M. (ed.) (1998) Mythen der Nationen: Ein europäisches Panorama >([KLELWLRQ FDWDORJXH@%HUOLQ'HXWVFKHV+LVWRULVFKHV0XVHXP Frindte, W. and Pätzolt, H. (eds) (1994) 0\WKHQGHU'HXWVFKHQ'HXWVFKH%H¿QGOLFKNHLten zwischen Geschichte und Geschichte2SODGHQ/HVNHDQG%XGULFK Gehrlich, P., Glass, K. and Serloth, B. (eds) (1996) Mitteleuropäische Mythen, Vienna7RUXĔgVWHUUHLFKLVFKH*HVHOOVFKDIWIU0LWWHOHXURSlLVFKH6WXGLHQ Gottschall, R. (1865) ‘Mazeppa: Geschichtliches Trauerspiel in fünf Aufzügen’, in Gottschall, R. (ed.) Dramatische Werke: Zweites Bändchen, Leipzig: Brockhaus, 1–189. *URE 7   µ'HU LQQHUH 2ULHQW 0D]HSSDV 5LWW GXUFK GLH 6WHSSH DOV 3DVVDJH ]XP Anderen Europas’, Wiener Slawistischer Almanach 56 (2005), 33–86. Hrushevsky, M. (1943) A History of UkraineHGE\)UHGHULNVHQ2-1HZ+DYHQ0RVFRZ@.LHY']YLQ Kostomarov, N.I. (1992) Mazepa, Moscow: Respublika. Kotte, E. (1999) ‘Die Funktion historischer Mythen bei der Konstituierung europäischer Nationen: Ein Kommentar zur Ausstellung “Mythen der Nationen” des Deutschen Historischen Museums in Berlin’, Orbis Linguarum 12, 1–21. .UHVLQ2 Mazepynci.LHY8QLYHUVLW\RI.LHY Krupnyckyj, B. (1942) Hetman Mazepa und seine Zeit (1687–1709), Leipzig: Harrassowitz. Krupnyckyj, B. (1943) Geschichte der Ukraine, 2nd edn, Berlin: Harrassowitz. Marciuk, C. (1991) Mazeppa: Ein Thema der französischen Romantik: Malerei und Graphik 1823–18270XQLFK3UR¿O Moore Coleman, M. (1966) ‘Mazeppa Americain’, in Moore Coleman, M. (ed.) Mazeppa: Polish and American: A Translation of Slowacki’s “Mazeppa”, Together with a Brief Survey of Mazeppa in the United States&KHVKLUH&1&KHUU\+LOO%RRNV± Münckler, H. (1994) ‘Politische Mythen und nationale Identität: Vorüberlegungen zu einer Theorie politischer Mythen’, in Frindte, W. and Pätzolt, H. (eds) (1994) Mythen GHU 'HXWVFKHQ 'HXWVFKH %H¿QGOLFKNHLWHQ ]ZLVFKHQ *HVFKLFKWH XQG *HVFKLFKWH, 2SODGHQ/HVNHXQG%XGULFK±

‘Mazepa’ as a symbol of Ukrainian autonomy   Nordmann, J. (1958) Charles XII et l’Ukraine de Mazepa, Paris: Pichon & DurandAuzias. 2KOREO\Q2 Het’man Ivan Mazepa ta joho doba, New York, Paris, Toronto: Vyd. 22&68±/LJL9L]YROHQQMD8NUDwQ\ Ritz, G. (2001) ‘Mazepa als romantische Figur des Anderen’, in Kubanov, I. (ed.) Polonica. Rossica. Cyclica. Professoru R. Figutu k 60-letiju, Moscow: Dom Intellektual’noj NQLJL± Ryleev, K. (1956) ‘Voinarovskii’, in Ryleev, K., Stichotvorenija. Stat’i. Ocherki. Dokladnye zapiski. Pis’ma0RVFRZ*RV,]GFKXGOLWHUDWXU\± Saldern, A. von (1996) Mythen in Geschichte und Geschichtsschreibung aus polnischer und deutscher Sicht, Münster: LIT Verlag. 6XEWHOQ\2 Ukraine: A HistoryQGHGQ7RURQWR7RURQWR8QLYHUVLW\3UHVV Voltaire (1996) Histoire de Charles XII, The Complete Works of Voltaire, Vol. 4, ed. by YRQ3URVFKZLW]*2[IRUG9ROWDLUH)RXQGDWLRQ

5

Misoteutonic myths Lopping noses in Hussite nationalism and love’s sweet cure Robert B. Pynsent

Introduction For 200 years, German noses constituted a major motif in Czech literature, espeFLDOO\ OLWHUDWXUH ZLWK SROLWLFDO PHVVDJHV 7KLV PRWLI KDG LWV KH\GD\ LQ WKH ¿UVW WZRWKLUGVRIWKH¿IWHHQWKFHQWXU\DSHULRGZKLFKDFFRUGLQJWRQLQHWHHQWKDQG twentieth-century mythopoets saw a blossoming of the Czechs’ natural urge for GHPRFUDF\,QWKLVFKDSWHU,VKDOOEULHÀ\WUDFHWKHKLVWRU\RI&]HFKPLVRWHXWRQLF rhinectomy and suggest how modern variants of the theme survived in a society passionately wedded to their democracy. Straight away I note that the most successful of all Prague executioners, an early sixteenth-century man who lopped a IXOOKHDGVERUHWKHQDPH-DQ%H]QRVê-RKQ1RVHOHVV ýRUQHM  The trouble began with a thirteenth-century account of the reign of Duke 6REČVODY,,± DPDQZKRPLVWUXVWHGKLVQREOHVDQGPRVWRIDOO*HUPDQ speakers. He refused invitations to attend imperial congresses, attempted to VWDXQFK*HUPDQFRORQLVDWLRQRI%RKHPLDDQG¿QDOO\JRW)UHGHULFN%DUEDURVVD¶V JDOO E\ OHDGLQJ D SDUWLFXODUO\ GHYDVWDWLQJ LQFXUVLRQ LQWR $XVWULD ,Q  %DUEDURVVDUHFRJQLVHG6REČVODY¶VFRXVLQ)UHGHULFN3ĜHP\VOLGDVGXNHWKDWLVGH IDFWR GHSRVHG 6REČVODY 6REČVODY GLG QRW VXUUHQGHU KLV WKURQH HDVLO\ DQG GHIHDWHG)UHGHULFNDWWKH%DWWOHRI/RGČQLFHLQ-DQXDU\VRRQDIWHUZDUGVKH ZDVKLPVHOIGHIHDWHGMXVWRXWVLGH3UDJXHDQGKHGLHGLQH[LOHLQ7KHZKROH rhinectomic literary motif appears to have been born in the brief Latin chronicle of the abbot of the Premonstratensian monastery in Milevsko, Gerlachus (d. c ZKRGHVFULEHVWKH%DWWOHRI/RGČQLFHDVIROORZV an immensely bloody battle ensued. Count Sezema, father of Lord HrozQDWD$KQD DQG PDQ\ RWKHUV IHOO &RXQW9tWHN ZDV FDSWXUHG WRJHWKHU ZLWK OHDGLQJ*HUPDQVIURPDPRQJWKRVHZKRKDGFRPHWRWKHDLGRI)UHGHULFN many of these [Germans] were killed and the rest had their noses cut off [multi quoque excis occisi, residuique nasos praecisi]. +HĜPDQVNê The account of the battle given here is taken to be authentic by the most recent KLVWRULDQRIWZHOIWKFHQWXU\%RKHPLDäHPOLþND DQGWKHUHLVQR

Misoteutonic myths   UHDVRQ IRU D OLWHUDU\ KLVWRULDQ WR GRXEW KLP LQ IDFW WKH VXEVHTXHQW HPEHOOLVKPHQWRIWKHDFFRXQWSURYLGHVD¿UVWUDWHH[DPSOHRIDIDFWWXUQLQJLQWRDPDMRU element of national mythology and, indeed, a source of literary and civic forgery. The Hussites, however, did not learn of traditional Czech rhinectomy from *HUODFKXV EXW IURP WKH DQRQ\PRXV DXWKRU RI WKH ¿UVW YHUQDFXODU FKURQLFOH written in verse, an author who has been known since the seventeenth century as Dalimil. In Dalimil, lopping German noses becomes a patriotic act, part and parcel of the author’s general desire to ‘cleanse’ Bohemia of Germans. Dalimil’s ChronicleZDVFRPSOHWHGLQZDVWKH¿UVW2OG&]HFKWH[WWREHSULQWHGLQD VFKRODUO\ HGLWLRQ LQ   DQG QR GRXEW ¿WWLQJO\ VDZ D UHHGLWLRQ RI D  WUDQVODWLRQLQWR0RGHUQ&]HFKLQVRRQDIWHUWKH&]HFK5HSXEOLF¶VDFFHVsion to the European Union. For all its misoteutonism, the Dalimil Chronicle was translated into German twice, into verse in the fourteenth century, prose in WKH¿IWHHQWKFHQWXU\DIUDJPHQWRID/DWLQWUDQVODWLRQKDVDOVRVXUYLYHG1XPHUous Czech fragments and (more or less) complete manuscripts survive, the oldest of which is held in the Wren Library at Cambridge. There is no doubt whatsoever that, apart from basic liturgical texts, it was the most widely read work in 2OG&]HFKOLWHUDWXUH,WLVWKHQQRWVXUSULVLQJWKDW'DOLPLO¶VH[SDQVLRQRI*HUODFKXV¶V DFFRXQW RI WKH %DWWOH RI /RGČQLFH LQWR WKH VWDWHPHQW RI D IXQGDPHQWDO WHQHW RI 6REČVODY¶V IRUHLJQ SROLF\ KDG VXFK DQ LPSDFW LQ WKH +XVVLWH SHULRG 6REČVODY,, ordered anyone who saw a German to bring him to him and then he cut off his nose. . . . When others saw Germans walking along, copying the ruler’s behaviour, they called out at them as if they were wolves and cut off their HDUV DQG QRVHV >6REČVODY@ LPPHGLDWHO\ JDYH  WDOHQWV WR DQ\RQH ZKR brought him a shield full of German noses. 'DĖKHONDet al. And that is by no means the only passage in the Chronicle lauding misoteutonic UKLQHFWRP\3\QVHQW 

Hussite calls for rhinectomy ,VKDOOQRZORRNEULHÀ\DWIRXUZRUNVIURPWKH+XVVLWHSHULRGWKDWDUHLQGLUHFWO\ or directly associable with Dalimil’s somewhat brutal form of nationalism. The ¿UVWWKUHHZHUHZULWWHQVRPHWLPHEHWZHHQDQGWKHODVWLQ7KH ¿UVWLVZULWWHQLQ/DWLQWKRXJKLQPDQXVFULSWLWEHDUVD&]HFKWLWOHZápis AlexDQGUD9HOLNpKRVORYHQVNpPXMD]\NXDþHVNpPXQDEXG~FLHþDV\ (The Privilege of $OH[DQGHUWKH*UHDWIRUWKH6ODYDQG>"@%RKHPLDQQDWLRQLQWKHIXWXUHKHQFHforth The Privilege). It is just possible that this forgery was completed as early DVWKHVRUHYHQHDUOLHUEXWâPDKHOFDXWLRXVO\DQG*UDXVPRUHFRQ¿GHQWO\ SODFH LWV RULJLQV LQ WKH +XVVLWH SHULRG âPDKHO   *UDXV    Given the terminology employed and the brand of xenophobia expressed, it is

  R.B. Pynsent pretty certain that The Privilege FRPHV IURP WKH V RU HDUO\ V 7KDW depends on when the second work was written, a work with which, incidentally, the earliest manuscript of The Privilege was bound. That is the lengthy pamphlet arguing for the election of a king of Czech blood, the Krátké sebránie z kronik þHVNêFK N YêVWUD]Č YČUQêFK ýHFKyY (Brief epitome of the Bohemian chronicles DV D ZDUQLQJ WR WUXHEHOLHYHU %RKHPLDQV KHQFHIRUWK Brief Epitome). The third work is the forged 3UiYD 6REČVODYVNi 6REČVODY¶V ODZV  WKH HDUOLHVW RI ZKRVH ¿IWHHQ YHUVLRQV LV IURP  7KH IRXUWK LV WKH %UHVODX 06 UHGDFWLRQ RI WKH FKURQLFOH FRPSLODWLRQ WKDW KDV EHHQ NQRZQ VLQFH WKH 5RPDQWLF QDWLRQDOLVW )UDQWLãHN)UDQ]3DODFNê± ¿UVWHGLWHGVHYHUDOYHUVLRQVDV6WDĜtOHWRSLVRYpþHãWt2OG&]HFKDQQDOV WKLVFRPSLODWLRQZDVFRPSOHWHGLQWKRXJK VXEVHTXHQWO\HGLWHGLQWKHHDUO\V From a literary historical point of view The Privilege had a probably unique IDWHGXULQJWKH1DWLRQDO5HYLYDOFRQYHQWLRQDOO\± LWVHOIDIRUJHU\LW ZDVVRWRVSHDNUHIRUJHGE\9iFODY+DQND± +HWUDQVODWHGLWLQWR Middle Czech, passed it off as the original, and attached it to the Brief Epitome as an appendix to his edition of the Dalimil Chronicle+DQND $OWKRXJK The Privilege displays no rhinectomy, it does rationalise misoteutonism. It UHÀHFWVWKHQDWLRQDOSULGHHQJHQGHUHGE\+XVVLWHV¶YLFWRULHVRYHUWKHFUXVDGHUV VHQW WR TXHOO WKHLU KHUHV\ DQG E\ WKH IDFW WKDW DW OHDVW DIWHU  PDQ\ ULFK EXUJKHUV PRVW RI WKHP *HUPDQ KDG ÀHG 3UDJXH ,Q The Privilege Alexander bequeaths all lands from the north of Europe to the southern border of Italy WRWDPSODJDPWHUUHDEDTXLORQHDG¿QR,WDOLHPHULGLRQDOLV WRWKH6ODYVLQSHUSHtuity. The text continues by declaring that no one should dare remain [in that territory], settle there, or look for somewhere to live there except your [Slav] peoples. And if someone different [non-Slav] should be found there, let him be your servant and his descendents servants of your descendents. +DQND) Although The Privilege manifests strong Slav consciousness, it is unsafe to translate the words of the Czech title, slovenskému . . .DþHVNpPX, as ‘Slav and Bohemian’ because the conjunction a very often stands for a comma (in English convention) and this phrase was used to mean ‘Bohemian Slavs’. It does not QHFHVVDULO\GRVRKHUHEXWRQHUHPHPEHUVWKDWWKHSRSXODUSURVHFKURQLFOH RI3ĜLEtN3XONDYD]5DGHQtQDGEHWZHHQDQG VDZ%RKHPLDDVWKH VRXUFHRI6ODYGRPBoh (God) was alleged to be the root of the Latin ‘Bohemia’ and ‘slovo’ (word) the origin of the label ‘Slav’. Thus, the word was with God in Bohemia, in the beginning.2 Dalimil manifests little Slav consciousness except an awareness that all Slavs (‘Serbs’) ultimately originated in the confusion of WRQJXHVDURXQGWKH7RZHURI%DEHO±DQGWKDW3RODQGKDGEHHQIRXQGHGE\6ODYV ZKRKDGRULJLQDOO\FRPHWR%RKHPLDZLWKIRUHIDWKHUýHFK&]HFK 0RUHLPSRUtant than Slav consciousness or the meaning of the labels in the title is the implicit message of The Privilege. For the Czech audience a non-Slav threatening to settle

Misoteutonic myths   on Slav land was German, and so one might suggest that claiming that the destiny of such Germans was to be slaves makes for a humiliation akin if not identical to nose-lopping. Furthermore, The Privilege may well constitute the ¿UVW&]HFKDWWHPSWDWDUHIXWDWLRQRIWKHQRWLRQWKDWWKHWHUPSclavus indicated that Slavs were destined to be slaves. Michael McCormick has pointed out that the use of the old word for slave, servus, gradually died out with the spread of Christianity and consequent phrases like ‘servant of God’, let alone ‘servus servorum’. It had been replaced by mancipia for slaves belonging by descent and agrarian activity to the land and captivi (caitiffs) for slaves who has been ‘subjugated by violence’. McCormick considers that sclavus had become the standard, generic term for slaves in the tenth century, although others had found the word LQWKDWPHDQLQJLQGRFXPHQWVIURPDVHDUO\DV0F&RUPLFN±  The Arabic 6DTƗOLEDDOVRPHDQV6ODYDQGVODYH0LVKLQ  The author of the Brief Epitome knew and used The Privilege, but he gives us no hint that he used it to refute the slave notion. It is more likely that The Privilege VLPSO\ VHUYHG WR VXSSRUW KLV FHQWUDO DUJXPHQW WKDW WKH *HUPDQV DUH WRR base and too dangerous to be allowed onto the throne of Bohemia. The Brief Epitome draws together ample direct quotation as well as paraphrase from 'DOLPLO DQ XQLGHQWL¿HG ODWHU FKURQLFOH The Privilege DQG D V SROLWLFDO pamphlet, De Theutonicis bonum dictamen. In this pamphlet the cowardly and IDOVH *HUPDQV KDG TXLWH DSDUW IURP EHLQJ ZROYHV DPRQJ VKHHS DOVR LQÀLFWHG WKHYLFLRXVLQVWLWXWLRQRIJXLOGVRQRWKHUV*UDXV :KHQWKHDXWKRURI the Brief Epitome quotes Dalimil, he normally re-arranges the order of lines, sometimes rather ineptly, in order to strengthen his message. Dating the Brief EpitomeDFFXUDWHO\LVGLI¿FXOWEHFDXVHLQWKHRQHH[WDQWPDQXVFULSWQRSHUVRQDO names are used and because the only clue to dating is the version of Dalimil in the same codex. Before the Second World War, one of the most erudite scholars RI+XVVLWLVP5XGROI8UEiQHNFRQVLGHUHGWKDWWKHSDPSKOHWFRQFHUQHGWKHHOHFWLRQRI$OEHUW+DEVEXUJDVNLQJLQ'HFHPEHUZKHQWKHULYDOFDQGLGDWHSXW XS E\ QREOHV DQG EXUJKHUV LQ 0D\  ZDV &DVLPLU -DJLHOORQ QRQH WKH OHVV $OEHUWZDVFURZQHGLQ-XQH7KHBrief Epitome refers to the possibility of the Bohemians taking a Slav king even if he were not rich, and Casimir was QRWRULRXVIRUKLV¿QDQFLDOGLI¿FXOWLHV$IWHUWKHZDU8UEiQHNFKDQJHGKLVPLQG GHFLGHG WKDW WKH SDPSKOHW FRQFHUQHG WKH HOHFWLRQ RI *HRUJH RI 3RGČEUDG\ HOHFWHG0DUFK +HIRXQGWKHPHQWLRQRIDµPLJKWLHVW¶%RKHPLDQFRQYLQFLQJHYLGHQFHWKDWWKHZULWHUZDVDVXSSRUWHURI*HRUJH8UEiQHN±  All critics have noticed that in the Brief Epitome, nouns and adjectives for ‘Bohemian’ and ‘Slav’ always have initial capital letters, whereas the ‘N’ in German (1ČPHF) is always lower case. That device also goes for 6REČVODY¶V Laws DQG ZRXOG EHFRPH IDVKLRQDEOH DJDLQ LQ  DQG  QRW RQO\ LQ WKH 5RPDQ &DWKROLF GDLO\ EXW DOVR LQ SRHWV OLNH 9ODGLPtU +RODQ ±  DQG 9tWČ]VODY 1H]YDO ±  DQG HYHQ WKH SUROL¿F PLQRU ZULWHU 4XLGR 0DULD 9\VNRþLO± 7KLVRUWKRJUDSKLFQRUPLQWKHBrief EpitomeUHÀHFWVWKH fury of the author’s misoteutonism. The most frequent word/concept with which he characterises Germans is lest (deceit, deviousness), which echoes Dalimil’s

  R.B. Pynsent mythopoeic rhyme þHVW lest, where þHVW (honour) is associated with Bohemians and deceit with Germans. The second sentence of the Brief Epitome prepares the UHDGHUIRUWKHFRQWHQWVRIWKHZKROHZRUNµ$VWKH%RKHPLDQFKURQLFOHVDWWHVW >WKH*HUPDQ@QDWLRQLV¿HUFHVWLQLWVDWWHPSWVWRYDQTXLVKWKH%RKHPLDQDQG>"@ 6ODY QDWLRQ¶ .ROiU    7KH DXWKRU WKHQ JRHV RQ WR IXVH 'DOLPLO The Privilege and De Theutonicis LQ KLV YHUVLRQ RI WKH FRQIXVLRQ RI WRQJXHV HDFK nation had been given a leader, a king or duke or prince or margrave, or even just a common-or-garden lord, who would take them to the lands they had been allotted. The Germans, however, had been given Teucades as their leader, but no land for him to lead them to. In a manner that foreshadows portrayals of Gipsies and Jews in later centuries, the author declares that the Germans were a nomadic people (národ . . . VYČWREČåQê), normally called PDQQê, that is, a nation created at Babel to serve other nations. New to Czech nationalism is the fact that the author KDVQRWLPHIRUWKH/X[HPERXUJG\QDVW\DWDOO±WKRXJKKHRPLWV:HQFHVODV,9 ±  SUHVXPDEO\ EHFDXVH KH KDG WR D GHJUHH VRPHWLPHV EHHQ RQ WKH right (Church reform) side and had been despised and humiliated by the papists. :HQFHVODV¶V JUDQGIDWKHU -RKQ RI /X[HPERXUJ ±  KDG QHJOHFWHG Bohemia, but had milked the country in order to support his campaigns in the 5KLQHDUHDLQGHHGKHKDGKDGVROLWWOHUHVSHFWIRU%RKHPLDWKDWKHKDGZDQWHG WRH[FKDQJHLWIRUWKH5KLQHODQG3DODWLQDWH7KHDXWKRU¶VDWWLWXGHWR&KDUOHV,9 ±  LV SHUKDSV PRUH VXUSULVLQJ JLYHQ WKH H[WHQW WR ZKLFK KH KDG EHHQ JORUL¿HGHDUOLHURQWKHRWKHUKDQG&KDUOHVKDGVWRRGIRUPXFKQR+XVVLWHFRXOG endure. He had done some good, like building the Prague New Town and founding Prague University, but in his desire to enrich Bohemia he had ‘multiplied *HUPDQVDOORYHUWKHODQG¶.ROiU )XUWKHUPRUHWKHDXWKRULQGXOJHVLQ something like the haematic nationalism of an Ernst Moritz Arndt or a Jahn, in peremptorily declaring that because Charles was of German stock (plemene) he had wanted to populate Bohemia with Germans and be rid of Czechs. The author also exhibits much of the mentality of 6REČVODY¶V Laws when describing the SUHYDOHQFHRI*HUPDQVLQSRVLWLRQVRIDXWKRULW\GXULQJ&KDUOHV¶VUHLJQ Who were the mayors and aldermen of almost all royal boroughs in Bohemia? Germans. Who were the justices? Germans. Where did the Germans hear sermons in their own language? In the main churches. And where Czechs? In graveyards or private houses. (ibid.) All these things threaten the Czechs now if a German king is elected. Largely OLQNHG WR TXRWDWLRQV IURP 'DOLPLO WKH DXWKRU SUDLVHV 6REČVODY ,, DQG OLNH 'DOLPLO HUURQHRXVO\ PDNHV KLP VRQ RI 9ODGLVODY ,, %HFDXVH 6REČVODY µORYHG the Czech nation so much that, together with the Bohemian lords, he drove his RZQIDWKHU9ODGLVODY,,.LQJRI%RKHPLDRXWRIWKHODQGDQGWKHQFXWRIIWKH *HUPDQV¶QRVHV¶LELG  Most important for this author’s nationalism is, however, that a German king would threaten the Czechs’ right to take Communion in both kinds. Here we

Misoteutonic myths   have something that became a mythic topos of Czech literature and politics in WKH QLQHWHHQWK DQG WZHQWLHWK FHQWXULHV WKDW IRUHLJQ UXOHUV WKH µ*HUPDQ¶ Habsburgs, had removed the Czechs’ ancient democratic right to the Chalice and WKDW WKH &RXQWHU5HIRUPDWLRQ KDG WKXV HPERGLHG DQ DWWHPSW WR DQQLKLODWH WKH Czech nation. The author of the Brief Epitome asserts that the Czechs had to defend their love for the Blood of Christ, which they love more than all other SHRSOHV WKH *HUPDQV DUH WKH ¿HUFHVW HQHPLHV RI XWUDTXLVP LELG ±  +H FOLQFKHVKLVDUJXPHQWZLWKDVOLJKWO\DEULGJHGYHUVLRQRI'HXWHURQRP\ 7KRX VKDOW LQ DQ\ ZLVH VHW KLP NLQJ RYHU WKHH ZKRP WKH /25' WK\ *RG VKDOO FKRRVH RQH IURP DPRQJ WK\ EUHWKUHQ VKDOW WKRX VHW NLQJ RYHU WKHH thou mayest not set a stranger over thee, which is not thy brother. The Brief Epitome ends with another biblical quotation, this time concerning KHUHWLFV WKDW LV 3DSLVWV  D SDUDSKUDVH RI -RKQ ,, µ,I WKHUH FRPH DQ\ XQWR you, and bring not this doctrine [in the Bible primarily the doctrine of the Incarnation], receive him not into your house, neither bid him God speed.’ If you let Germans into your house, the author comments, they will soon take it over and drive you out of it. That constitutes an echo of the fourteenth-century rhymed Aesop. The extent to which the third Hussite work, 6REČVODY¶V /DZV, constitutes a IRUJHU\LVFRPSOH[7KH¿UVWVL[DUWLFOHVWKRVHWKDWUHYHDOWKH'DOLPLOVSLULWPRVW clearly, are forged through and through. That goes for the preamble to the subseTXHQW PRUH WKDQ  DUWLFOHV WRR 7KH PDMRULW\ RI WKH DUWLFOHV LV KRZHYHU DXWKHQWLFLQWKDWRUVRRIWKHPDSSUR[LPDWHDUWLFOHVLQDEULHIERRNRIDOGHUPHQ¶VODZIURPDQGVXSSOHPHQWDU\DUWLFOHVIURPDQG6FKUDQLO ± VRPHDUWLFOHVFRQVWLWXWHUHFRUGVRIFXVWRPDU\ODZDQGVRPHSDUWLFXODUO\WKRVHFRQFHUQLQJWKH3UDJXH2OG7RZQ¶VUHODWLRQVKLSZLWKWKHPRQDUFK and with other Bohemian royal boroughs are based on wishful thinking rather than on the author’s desire to deceive, wishful thinking that arose from the fact that the royal boroughs were illicitly excluded from the diet that elected Albert +DEVEXUJNLQJLQ6REČVODY¶V/DZV also appeared in print, most notably in 9iFODY +iMHN¶V G  Kronika þHVNi %RKHPLDQ FKURQLFOH   DQG LQGHHGDUHLQFOXGLQJWKH¿UVW¿YHDUWLFOHVUHFRUGHGDVJHQXLQHDVODWHDV LQWKH¿UVWHGLWLRQRI-RVHI-XQJPDQQ¶V± KLVWRU\RI&]HFKOLWHUDWXUH The late Enlightenment scholar Josef Dobrovský/Joseph Dobrowsky ±  ULGLFXOHG -XQJPDQQ IRU WKLV LQ KLV UHYLHZ :KHQ .DUHO -DURPtU (UEHQ ±  LQFOXGHG 6REČVODY¶V /DZV LQ KLV  DQWKRORJ\ RI PDLQO\ Middle Czech literature, he omitted the offending articles. Whatever the extent RIWKHLUIRUJHU\WKHWKLUGUHGDFWLRQRI6REČVODY¶V/DZV, was accepted as YDOLGE\2OG7RZQEXUJKHUVDQGDSSHDUHGLQDOPRVWDOO&]HFKOHJDOPDQXVFULSWV EHWZHHQ  DQG  LELG   ,Q DSSUR[LPDWHO\ WKDW \HDU 6REČVODY¶V /DZV EHJDQWREHSXVKHGLQWRWKHEDFNJURXQGE\%ULNFt]/LFND¶V"± DQG .ULVWLiQ].ROGtQD¶V"± ERRNVRIWRZQODZV No one appears to have taken 6REČVODY¶V/DZVVHULRXVO\IURPWKHSXEOLFDWLRQRI.ULVWLiQ¶VERRNXQWLOWKH

  R.B. Pynsent  LG1DWLRQDO5HYLYDOZKHQWKH\FRXOGVHUYHWRDXWKHQWLFDWHWKHJURZLQJPLVRP teutonism of the national movement. The writing of 6REČVODY¶V /DZV was LQVSLUHG ¿UVW E\ WKH (PSHURU 6LJLVPXQG¶V SULYLOHJH RI  WKDW JUDQWHG WKH 2OG 7RZQ VHQLRULW\ RYHU DOO RWKHU UR\DO ERURXJKV LQ %RKHPLD VHFRQG E\ WKH IDFW WKDW LQ WKH FRXUVH RI WKH +XVVLWH :DUV WKH 2OG 7RZQ KDG DFTXLUHG WKDW status anyway, indeed had become the only more or less stable centre of Bohemian life, and, third, by the fact that after the defeat of the radical Hussites at the %DWWOHRI/LSDQ\0D\ WKH+XVVLWHDQGSDSLVWHVWDWHV¶DFFHSWDQFHRIWKH Compacts of Basle, and the Hussites’ recognition of Sigismund as King of %RKHPLD-XQH±$XJXVW WKH2OG7RZQKDGWRHQGHDYRXUWRUHVWRUHRUGHU to burgher life. The preamble to 6REČVODY¶V/DZV is even more historically confused than the DFFRXQWRI6REČVODY,,¶VSXUVXLWRIUKLQHFWRP\LQWKHBrief Epitome,QKLV µFKURQLFOH¶+iMHNZDVHYLGHQWO\GLVWXUEHGE\WKDWDQGVRGDWHGWKHODZV WKDWLVGXULQJWKHUHLJQRI6REČVODY,7KHWRZQFOHUNDXWKRURI6REČVODY¶V/DZV KDV 6REČVODY ,, SURFODLP WKHVH UHJXODWLRQV DIWHU WKH EDWWOH QHDU 3UDJXH WKDW KH KDGORVWUDWKHUWKDQDIWHUWKHEDWWOHWKDWKHKDGZRQ/RGČQLFH)XUWKHUPRUHZH learn that after the Prague battle he had imprisoned his brother (that is, cousin) )UHGHULFN EHFDXVH WKH ODWWHU KDG JLYHQ *HUPDQV KLJK RI¿FHV 7KH ¿UVW DUWLFOH of the law book appears to distinguish between a foreign and a Bohemian German (although I believe that the term QČPHF cizozemec might not mean a ‘foreign German’, but that the cizozemec (foreigner) might simply function as DQDXJPHQWDWLYH LQ P\ WUDQVODWLRQ IRU DUJXPHQW¶V VDNH , SURYLGH ZKDW PD\ amount to the conventional understanding of the phrase, but may be a comproPLVHµ1R*HUPDQIRUHLJQHUPD\WDNHRI¿FHVHFXODURUVSLULWXDOLQWKHFLW\RI Prague or the regnum RI %RKHPLD XQGHU SDLQ RI KDYLQJ KLV QRVH FXW RII WKH\ must be treated as foreigners [hosty@¶ 6FKUDQLO    +iMHN XQGHUVWDQGV QČPHF cizozemec differently, neither as a ‘foreign German’ nor as ‘a German DQG  IRUHLJQHU¶ ZKLFK VXJJHVWV WKDW WKH SKUDVH ZDV LQGHHG DPELJXRXV µQR *HUPDQ RU DQ\ RWKHU IRUHLJQHU¶ +iMHN ] /LERþDQ    $IWHU WKH VL[WK article, the author of 6REČVODY¶V /DZV provides a commentary (reduced to one EULHI VHQWHQFH E\ +iMHN  WKDW FRPSULVHV FKLHÀ\ D OLVW RI %RKHPLDQ UXOHUV ZKR KDGFRQ¿UPHGWKHSULYLOHJHVJUDQWHGWRWKH2OG7RZQE\6REČVODY,,KHLQFOXGHV the names of three dukes or kings who never existed, Jaroslav, Domaslav and Nadslav. Here once again I am reminded of the nineteenth-century forger Hanka, IRU KH LQYHQWHG DQFLHQW &]HFK QDPHV WZR RI WKHVH KDYH EHFRPH PRUH RU OHVV QRUPDO /XERU DQG /XPtU D WKLUG =iERM UHPDLQV D FRGH QDPH IRU YDOLDQW misoteutonists.  $SDUWIURPWKHFULPHRIEHLQJD*HUPDQDQGDVVXPLQJDQRI¿FHDUWLFOH  no crime is punished by rhinectomy in 6REČVODY¶V/DZV/LNHWKH¿UVWVRPHDUWLcles manifest misoteutonism, but also probably demographic change in Hussite %RKHPLD7KRXJKWKDW¿UVWDUWLFOHHPERGLHGUDEEOHURXVLQJRIWKHW\SHHYLGHQW in the Brief Epitome, other articles are more realistic. For example, in treating the composition of the town council, in the oldest version there should be twelve &]HFKDOGHUPHQDQGVL[RWKHUVµZKRDUHDEOHWRVSHDN*HUPDQ¶LQODWHUYHUVLRQV

Misoteutonic myths   WKDW UHDGV µVL[ *HUPDQV ZKR DUH DEOH WR VSHDN &]HFK¶ 6FKUDQLO    $QRWKHU DUWLFOH KRZHYHU LV SRVLWLYHO\ OLEHUDO µ1R *HUPDQ IRUHLJQHU >QČPHF cizozemec@ZKRGRHVQRWNQRZ&]HFKPD\EHFRPHPD\RU¶LELG *HUPDQV ZHUHWREHFRQ¿QHGWRDJKHWWRDURXQG6W%HQHGLFW¶VFKXUFKWRGD\¶V1D3RĜtþt LELG   LQ RWKHU ZRUGV PXVW QRW EH DOORZHG WR FRQWDPLQDWH &]HFKV 7ZR RWKHUDUWLFOHVFRQ¿UPWKDW*HUPDQVDUHWKHHQHP\WKH2OG7RZQVKRXOGQHYHU pay taxes directly into the royal treasury unless the king is conducting a camSDLJQDJDLQVWWKH*HUPDQVLELG DQGWKH2OG7RZQKDVDGXW\WRSURYLGH soldiers only when a war is being waged against the Germans or to protect the IURQWLHULELG  6REČVODY¶V/DZV, like the Brief Epitome, concerns itself only with Bohemia, but the fourth Hussite work, the Breslau MS redaction of the Old Czech Annals, FRYHUV %RKHPLDQ DQG 0RUDYLDQ KLVWRU\ IURP  WR  DOEHLW EHFDXVH RI the domicile of a large proportion of its mostly eye-witness authors, and because it was the royal seat, Prague remains the work’s primary focus. The Annals survives in over twenty different manuscripts, some of which take Czech history up WRDQGDWOHDVWWZRRIZKLFKZHUHUHHGLWHGDWWKHEHJLQQLQJRIWKHVHYHQWHHQWKFHQWXU\2QHFDQQRWVSHDNRIDQ\IRUJHU\LQWKHHDUO\HGLWLQJRIWKHZRUN but the various editors have clearly made a reasonable attempt at ensuring chronological and, to some degree, stylistic and linguistic consistency. Forgery of a VRUWGRHVHQWHUWKHVFHQHKRZHYHULQWKH1DWLRQDO5HYLYDO:KHQ3DODFNêFRPpiled his variorum edition based on the seventeen versions he knew, he changed WKH ODQJXDJH RI WKH ODWHU PDQXVFULSWV LQWR ZKDW KH FRQVLGHUHG ODWH ¿IWHHQWK FHQWXU\ &]HFK ýRUQHM  ±    , VKDOO ORRN DW WKH Old Czech AnnalsRQO\YHU\EULHÀ\PHQWLRQRQO\WZRSDVVDJHVOLQNHGZLWKPLVRWHXWRQLVP DQGUKLQHFWRP\2QHSDVVDJHLQSDUWLFXODUPLJKWKDYHVHUYHGWKHGDWLQJRIWKH Brief Epitome, since the pamphlet’s content is paraphrased in the chapter treatLQJWKHGHDWKRI6LJLVPXQGDQGWKHHOHFWLRQRI$OEHUW+DEVEXUJ the other side were working to have the Polish King Casimir king of Bohemia, for they did not like the idea of being subject to German power, which could lead to great evil now and in the future. Furthermore, it would bring harm and shame to the whole Slav nation, for it has always been and can be found in all old chronicles that Germans have been and do not cease to be the chief enemies of Bohemians, Poles and the whole Slav nation. âLPHN± Especially towards the end, the misoteutonism of the Old Czech Annals is intense. For the purposes of this chapter, the most useful passage comes when WKHODVWVHYHQWKDXWKRUDGGUHVVHV.LQJ*HRUJHRI3RGČEUDG\ZKRKDGPDUULHG PRVWRIKLVFKLOGUHQWR*HUPDQVDQGVRORVWWHUULWRULHVJDLQHGFKLHÀ\E\&KDUOHV ,9 $W WKLV SRLQW WKH DXWKRU GRHV QRW PHQWLRQ WKDW *HRUJH KDG DOVR PDUULHG D daughter, Kunka, into Hungary, to Matthias Corvinus, who subsequently requisiWLRQHG0RUDYLD+HUHWKHDXWKRULVGLUHFWO\XQGHUWKHLQÀXHQFHRI'DOLPLOUDWKHU than of the Brief EpitomeVLQFHKHPHQWLRQVRWHFWRP\DVZHOODVUKLQHFWRP\

  R.B. Pynsent 2K GHDU .LQJ *HRUJH \RXU *HUPDQ LQODZV WKRVH \RX WRRN LQWR \RXU family, really did behave in a friendly manner! If only you had remembered WKH¿UVWGXNHVDQGNLQJVRI%RKHPLDDQGKRZWKH\GHDOWZLWK*HUPDQVZKR SLFNHGDTXDUUHOZLWKWKHPWKH\FXWRII*HUPDQV¶QRVHVDQGHDUVDQGGURYH them out of the country back to their own lands so that they could avoid any close relationship with them. For they well knew that the Germans had never done anything good for them and, whenever they could, they had tried to subjugate the Czechs, just as they do today. LELG

Why noses? It is now high time for me to suggest a reason for so many medieval Czech writers’ advocacy of misoteutonic rhinectomy. I have found two little clues. )LUVW*HUODFKXVJDYHDPRWLYHWR6REČVODYWKH*HUPDQVKDGµWKHLUQRVHVFXWRII VRWKDWWKHUHVWRIWKHZRUOGFRXOGPRFNWKHP¶+HĜPDQVNê 6HFRQG ZH¿QGLQ3XONDYD¶VSURVHFKURQLFOHZKLFKLVQRWLQWKHVOLJKWHVWPLVRWHXWRQLFD SLFWXUHRI&]HFKV0RUDYLDQV KDYLQJWKHLUQRVHVORSSHGE\$XVWULDQVµWKH\FXW off the noses and ears of many of them so that they could thenceforth do no KDUPWRWKH$XVWULDQV¶*HEDXHU 7KH¿UVWSRVVLELOLW\RILQWHUSUHWDtion is medical. Cutting off a man’s nose not only made him look hideous or worthy of mockery, but could easily bring about untimely death from, for H[DPSOHVHSWLFWKURPERVLVPHQLQJLWLVDFHUHEUDODEVFHVVRUHQGRFDUGLWLV9iOND    'HDG WKRVH 0RUDYLDQV ZRXOG FHUWDLQO\ QRW EH FDSDEOH RI KDUPLQJ Austrians, but this interpretation appears inadequate. A second possible interpreWDWLRQ ZRXOG EH EDVHG RQ WKH OLVW RI VHPLRXWFDVWV LQ /HYLWLFXV  ZKLFK UHDGVµ)RUZKDWVRHYHUPDQKHEHWKDWKDWKDEOHPLVKKHVKDOOQRWDSSURDFK>WR RIIHUWKHEUHDGRIKLV*RG@DEOLQGPDQRUDODPHRUKHWKDWKDWKDÀDWQRVHRU DQ\WKLQJVXSHUÀXRXV¶7KHWHUPµÀDWQRVH¶LVGHULYHGIURPDSUREOHPIRUWUDQVODWRUV 7KH HDUOLHVW H[WDQW YHUVLRQ RI WKH SKUDVH LQ &]HFK LQ WKH  2ORPRXF %LEOHLVµZLWKDVPDOORUODUJHQRVH¶.\DV 0RGHUQWUDQVODWLRQVKDYH D µPXWLODWHG IDFH¶ 0DU\ 'RXJODV SRLQWV RXW WKDW /HYLWLFXV ± HTXDWHV SK\VLFDOEOHPLVKZLWKµEOHPLVKHGMXGJHPHQW¶'RXJODV 7RPHGLHYDO man the passage would suggest primarily that sacred duties are forbidden to someone with a physical blemish, but that would have been extended to any duty WKDW EHVWRZHG KRQRXU RU UHSUHVHQWHG D PDUN RI KRQRXU /HYLWLFXV  FRXOG account for Gerlachus’s statement that being noseless made men a laughingstock, but not with the Pulkava statement unless the soldiers described are meant to be knights. In any case, the un-nosed German bore a mark of shame indicating that he had behaved shamefully. The third possible interpretation is sexual, and PRUHFRQYLQFLQJWKDQWKH¿UVWWZRWKRXJKLWPD\RYHUODSZLWKWKH/HYLWLFXVEDQ on blemishes. We do not have to consider back-to-back mountain-top courtship in the East Indies, let alone Krafft-Ebing’s association of the erectile hairs in the nose with genitalia or the late twentieth-century discovery of Jacobson’s organ LQWKHQRVHWKHRUJDQWKDWVHUYHVWRUHFHLYHSKHURPRQHV2QHPLJKWKRZHYHU

Misoteutonic myths   think of the Czech proverb ‘SRGOHQRVDSR]QiãNRVD’ (You can tell the blackbird by its nose), or, as Malcolm Jones informs us, a precept of the most respected medieval medical school, the Salernian, ‘It is known by his nose how big a man’s “spear” is.’ In the Middle Ages the Latin nasutus, (big-)nosed, meant µJHQLWDOO\ZHOOHQGRZHG¶-RQHV ,WLVWKHQSUREDEOHWKDWUKLQHFWRP\ was a euphemism for castration, or penial abscission, that is an unmanning, which could explain both Gerlachus’s and Pulkava’s comments. Furthermore, IRU WKH PHGLHYDO QDWLRQDOLVW FDVWUDWLRQ ZRXOG EH DQ HI¿FLHQW ZD\ WR SUHYHQW Czech women copulating with Germans and thus threatening that purity of Czech blood that Dalimil and the author(s) of the Brief Epitome so desired. Naturally, one cannot be entirely sure that all those who wrote about rhinectomy knew this genital meaning, but the majority surely did. This third interpretation gives a whole new dimension to the pan-European idiom ‘to lead someone by the nose’.

Misoteutonism from the Revival onwards, particularly since 1945 ,VXVSHFWWKDWZKHQLQÀXHQWLDO5HYLYDOLVWVOLNH'REURYVNêDQG3DODFNêH[SUHVVHG their disapproval of Dalimil, they had not registered the genital meaning of rhinectomy, and as intellectuals simply disapproved of his brutally misoteutonic message. In fact, it will seem to any reader that Dalimil’s national stance, as well DVWKDWRIWKH+XVVLWHVZKRIROORZHGLQKLVIRRWVWHSVKDGDFRQVLGHUDEOHLQÀXHQFH on Palacký’s conception of Czech history, although his standard history of the Czechs tends to be read as more anti-German than it actually is. Certainly, misoWHXWRQLVPUHJUHZLQ5HYLYDOOLWHUDWXUHSDUWLFXODUO\IURPWKHPLGVRQZDUGV DQGLWLVE\QRPHDQVTXLWHGHDG\HWLQWKHPLGV,QGHHGWKH5HYLYDORQO\ partly because of the Josephine reforms that introduced German as the language of instruction and administration, turned to medieval misoteutonism as an inspiration for what the national programme should be. Hanka’s forged medieval manXVFULSWV FKLHÀ\ WKH QDUUDWLYH SRHPV LQVSLUHG ODUJHO\ E\ 'DOLPLO DQG RWKHU 2OG Czech works, express earnest misoteutonism, and in one case misopolonism of the Pulkava brand. In their blind condemnation of virtually everything written on &]HFK VRLO GXULQJ WKH &RXQWHU5HIRUPDWLRQ SHULRG FRQFHLYHG RI E\ WKHP DV D SHULRG RI GHFD\  WKH 5HYLYDOLVWV ZHUH DOVR UHMHFWLQJ %DURTXH FRVPRSROLWDQLVP In this context it is safe to assert that when the leading vernacular Czech Baroque KLVWRULDQ-DQ)UDQWLãHN%HFNRYVNê± UHSHDWHG+iMHN¶VYHUVLRQRIWKH ¿UVW DUWLFOH RI 6REČVODY¶V Laws (‘no German nor any other foreigner’) (BeckoYVNê WKLVLVVXHGIURPSDWULRWLFDQWLTXDULDQLVPUDWKHUWKDQ[HQRSKRELD let alone a desire to applaud Czechs’ misoteutonic violence.  $VODWHDVWKHVGXULQJWKHSHULRGRIQHRDEVROXWLVPYLOODLQVLQ&]HFK literature tended to be Italians or Jews. In fact, anti-Semitism, replacing anti-XGDLVPEHJDQWREXUJHRQLQWKHV,QGHHGVLQFHDWWKHWLPHWKHYDVWPDMRUity of urban Jews were German-speaking, writers all too frequently exploited ingrained anti-Jewish prejudice as a weapon of misoteutonism. Although it was

  R.B. Pynsent strictly speaking anti-Habsburg feeling that burst forth with new energy after the Hungarians’ success and the Czechs’ failure to achieve autonomy or more in LWEHFDPHWKHUHDIWHUHYHUPRUHGLI¿FXOWWRGLVWLQJXLVKDQWL+DEVEXUJIURP DQWL*HUPDQVHQWLPHQWV9HU\EURDGO\VSHDNLQJWKHOLWHUDU\H[SUHVVLRQRIPLVRteutonism came in three main waves, that following the failure of Casimir BadeQL¶V ODQJXDJH RUGLQDQFHV WR EH LPSOHPHQWHG LQ WKH PLGV DQG WKH SHULRGV immediately following the First and Second World Wars. The intention of this part of this chapter is selectively to examine the development of literary misoWHXWRQLVPIURPWKH3UDJXH8SULVLQJRI0D\WRWKH6RYLHWHVWDEOLVKPHQWRI WKH*'5DQGWKHPRGL¿FDWLRQRIQDWLRQDOLVWLGHRORJ\WKDWFDPHVRRQDIWHUWKH deaths of Stalin and his Czechoslovak counterpart, Klement Gottwald (both   7KH \HDU  GLG PDUN D WXUQLQJ SRLQW IRU PLVRWHXWRQLVP WRR /LNH *HUPDQ KLVWRULDQV &]HFK GLVVLGHQWV DQG SRVW H[LOHV KDG EHJXQ VHULously writing about the post-war expulsion of Germans beforehand, but it was only after the fall of the Communist Party regime that historians and some writers began publicly to reconsider not only the expulsion but also the Prague Uprising. It was as if (only as if) Czech intellectuals had suddenly become aware WKDW DW WKH HQG RI WKH 6HFRQG :RUOG :DU WKH\ KDG IXO¿OOHG 'DOLPLO¶V LGHDO RI UKLQHFWRP\ $IWHU  D SHULRG RI H[SLDWLRQ EHJDQ LW UHPDLQV WR EH VHHQ whether the intellectuals involved will have had a lasting impact on the populace with their broadcasts, articles and books.  $PDQWUDRIWKH¿UVWWZRRUWKUHH\HDUVIROORZLQJWKHIDOORI&RPPXQLVPZDV WKH SRVVLELOLW\ QRZ WR SLFN XS WKH GHPRFUDWLF WUDGLWLRQV RI WKH )LUVW 5HSXEOLF ±  7KDW µGHPRFUDF\¶ LWVHOI KDG VRXJKW LWV µWUDGLWLRQ¶ LQ WKH +XVVLWH period and in the ‘natural democraticality’ of the Czechs, an essential element of QDWLRQDOP\WKRORJ\DWOHDVWIURPWKHODWHVRQZDUGV,IWKDWHOHPHQWKDVQRZ EHHQGHOHWHGDWOHDVWIURPRI¿FLDOSROLWLFDOZULWLQJVWKHQWKDWKDVKDSSHQHGRQO\ VLQFH9iFODY.ODXV¶VDFFHVVLRQWRWKHSUHVLGHQWLDOWKURQH Klaus is an avowed 7KDWFKHULWHWKDWLVDFULWLFRIWKHµGHPRFUDWLFGH¿FLW¶RIWKH(XURSHDQ8QLRQDQG an anti-intellectualist believer in the ‘classless society’. Before the Second World :DUWKHVLQJOHPDMRUFULWLFRIERWKWKHQRWLRQRI)LUVW5HSXEOLFGHPRFUDF\DQG of Dalimilian and Hussite misoteutonism was the biologist and thinker Emanuel 5iGO ±  ,Q KLV 9iOND ýHFKĤ V 1ČPFL (The Czechs’ war with the *HUPDQV KHUHPLQGVWKHUHDGHUWKDWKHKDGµIUHTXHQWO\H[SUHVVHGKLVGLVDJUHHPHQWZLWKWKHDQWL*HUPDQSROLWLFVRIWKH&]HFKRVORYDNVWDWH¶5iGO   DQG KH EODPHV 3DODFNê¶V FRQFHSWLRQ RI KLVWRU\ IRU PXFK &]HFK±*HUPDQ DQWDJRQLVP,QWKH0LGGOH$JHVKHPDLQWDLQVDIRUPRIUDFLVPSUHYDLOHGµ,Q Bohemia, racial antipathies, i.e. essentially biological forces, became the driving force of history, while the common people were meant to follow the ideal¶LELG  ,Q'DOLPLODQGZULWHUVRIWKH+XVVLWHSHULRGKHVHHVDSULPLWLYHQDWLRQDOLVP their ‘instinct of belonging also gives rise to an antipathy towards anything “foreign” whether by blood, by appearance, custom or by originality. At this WLPH IULHQGVKLS DQG KRVWLOLW\ DUH IRXQGHG RQ LQVWLQFW QRW RQ WKH LGHDO¶ LELG  5iGOFRQVLGHUVWKDWWKHSUHVHQWODFNRIOR\DOW\WRWKHQHZVWDWHRI&]HFKRVORYDNLDLVVXHVIURPWKLVVDPH&]HFKWULEDOLVPLELG 7KRXJK&]HFKVQRZ

Misoteutonic myths   speak and write of Communism and Fascism as the greatest threats to democUDF\ KH GRXEWV ZKHWKHU WKH SROLWLFDO WKLQNLQJ RI ODWH V &]HFKRVORYDNV LV µYHU\GLIIHUHQWIURP&RPPXQLVPDQG)DVFLVP¶LELG 5iGOXQGHUVWDQGVWKH root cause of the lack of democracy in the new state to lie in the tribalist, organicist conception of the new state. Inter-war Central Europe was, he writes, IRXQGHGRQWKLVFRQFHSWLRQ According to it, the nation is a mystical force that has prevailed through WKHDJHVWKHQDWLRQLVDQDXWKRULW\WRZKLFKHYHU\WKLQJHOVHLVVXEMHFWWKH state is the climax of the national idea and religion, scholarship, industry, WKHVRFLDOV\VWHPKDYHRQO\RQHVLJQL¿FDQFHWRJLYHWKHQDWLRQWKHPHDQVWR assert itself. This tribal nationalism, like Fascism, demands that everyone uncritically submit WRWKHP\VWLFDODXWKRULW\RIWKHµQDWLRQ¶LELG± %\IDUWKHPRVWVRSKLVWLcated inter-war Czech political novel levels this same criticism at the state and institutional anti-semitism, indeed suggests that Fascist-minded state bureaucrats and industrialists held an unassailable position amongst the Czechoslovak elite. 7KLVQRYHO%HQMDPLQ.OLþND¶V± 1DYLQLFL3iQČ (In the Lord’s vine\DUG ZULWWHQIURPDOLEHUDOE\QRPHDQVVRFLDOLVWSRVLWLRQZDVFRQ¿Vcated by the Czechoslovak authorities after the Munich Agreement, and has QHYHUEHHQUHSXEOLVKHG±WKRXJK.OLþNDZDVQRWRQHRIWKRVHLQWHUZDUZULWHUV the Communists proscribed.  7KHWUXQFDWLRQRIWKH&]HFKRVORYDNVWDWHLQ2FWREHUDQGWKHVXEVHTXHQW RFFXSDWLRQRI%RKHPLDDQG0RUDYLDLQ0DUFKIROORZHGLPPHGLDWHO\DIWHU the war by the public revelation of Hitler’s intention to expel most Czechs to the East and to liquidate or germanise the rest, led to increased misoteutonism, and, amongst politicians and many intellectuals, to the conviction that Dalimil had EHHQ ULJKW HWKQLF FOHDQVLQJ ZDV WKH RQO\ DQVZHU WR µDQFLHQW¶ &]HFK±*HUPDQ hostility. Indeed, ethnic cleansing constituted the only means to re-establish Czech ‘natural democraticality’. Together with expelling the Germans, however many hundreds of years their families had been living there, came the need to SXQLVKFROODERUDWRUVWKH&]HFKQDWLRQLWVHOIQHHGHGSXUJLQJ2QHPD\FRPSDUH that with Dalimil’s assertion that nasty foreign (which means German) habits like tourneying and keeping dogs in the house had brought general military ZHDNQHVV DQG D SUROLIHUDWLRQ RI JDPH OHJV WR WKH &]HFKV 5HWULEXWLRQ EHJDQ GXULQJWKH3UDJXH8SULVLQJ±0D\ DQGLQWHQVL¿HGLQLWVDIWHUPDWK/DZ GHFODUHGOHJDODOODFWVRIUHWULEXWLRQSHUSHWUDWHGEHIRUH2FWREHU Although this law did not in fact offer general impunity for all the raping, torturing and brutal killing of innocents that had taken place, it did de facto declare EUXWDOLW\ SDWULRWLF ,W PXVW KRZHYHU EH VDLG WKDW LQ  WKH &]HFKRVORYDN authorities did start investigations into one of the most blatant crimes attending WKHH[SXOVLRQWKHPDVVDFUHRI*HUPDQVQHDU3RVWRORSUW\DQGDOVRLQWRWKH brutality committed at one of the notorious internment camps for Germans and DOOHJHGFROODERUDWRUVWKDWVLWXDWHGLQ.ROtQ)URPPHU 7KH8SULVLQJ

  R.B. Pynsent LWVHOI LQYROYHG H[WUHPHO\ ¿HUFH ¿JKWLQJ PXFK RI LW LQ WKH FHQWUH RI 3UDJXH 1HDUO\  &]HFKV ZHUH NLOOHG FKLHÀ\ PHPEHUV RI WKH ORZHU PLGGOH FODVV (shopkeepers, tradesmen, clerks and so forth), not of the working class (Soukup    WKRXJK LW DSSHDUV WKDW D ODUJH QXPEHU RI ZRUNHUV GLG MRLQ LQ DV µEHODWHG UHYROXWLRQDULHV¶ RQ  0D\ WKDW LV DIWHU WKH *HUPDQ FDSLWXODWLRQ RQ  0D\ RIWHQ PHPEHUV RI WKH 5HYROXWLRQDU\ *XDUG XQLWV VHW XS E\ WKH &]HFK National Council in accordance with pre-Uprising plans. The expulsion of *HUPDQV DQG VRPH +XQJDULDQV  EHJDQ VRRQ DIWHUZDUGV ,Q %UQR RQ  0D\ %HQHãGHFODUHGRI*HUPDQVµ,QWKHFRXUVHRIWKLVZDUWKLVQDWLRQFHDVHGWREH human at all, ceased to be humanly tolerable and appears to us to be one single KXPDQPRQVWHU¶0O\QiULN %HQHã¶VVHFUHWDU\WKHIXWXUH0LQLVWHURI -XVWLFH 3URNRS 'UWLQD GHFODUHG LQ 3UDJXH DOVR LQ PLG0D\ µ:H VKDOO VWDUW GULYLQJ RXW WKH *HUPDQV VWUDLJKW DZD\ ZH VKDOO XVH DOO PHDQV VKDOO VWRS DW QRWKLQJ¶ LELG   6XFK VWDWHPHQWV E\ OHDGLQJ SROLWLFLDQV ERWK UHÀHFWHG DQG encouraged Czech atrocities. During the Uprising the Germans, particularly the Waffen-SS, perpetrated atrocities as well, and way beyond their most frequently recorded practice of using human shields for their tanks as they attacked barricades (the Czechs had HUHFWHG RYHU   7KH HQWKXVLDVP ZLWK ZKLFK WKH &]HFKV KDG HUHFWHG WKHVH barricades and the courage with which they had defended them, combined with the limited amount of arms and ammunition they had at their disposal, led to the minting of a cliché for belles-lettres about the uprising, ‘holejma rukama’ (with [our] bare hands). As far as Czech brutality is concerned, the Dalimilian rhinecWRP\ KDV D PRGHUQ UHSODFHPHQW WKRXJK RQH QRWHV WKDW IURP /0 3DĜt]HN ± ZHGRKHDURI66PHQFXWWLQJRIIWKHQRVHVDQGJRXJLQJRXWWKHH\HV RI&]HFKSULVRQHUVEHIRUHNLOOLQJWKHP3DĜt]HN 7KHPRGHUQIRUPRI rhinectomy consisted in suspending Germans (normally SS, Gestapo or judges) by their legs, dousing them in petrol and setting light to their hair. These ‘living WRUFKHV¶ EHFDPH D VWDQGDUG PRWLI LQ ¿FWLRQ ZULWWHQ E\ &]HFKV LQ &]HFK RU German, abroad or during the Thaw, when criticism of Czech brutality became admissible.7KDWWKLVLVQR¿FWLRQEXWEDVHGDVPXFKRQUHDOLW\DVWKHPHGLHYDO FDVWUDWLRQRI*HUPDQVDWWKH%DWWOHRI/RGČQLFHLVFOHDUIURPDUHSRUWRIDQ62( agent, Colonel Harold Perkins, who witnessed this atrocity and others immediDWHO\DIWHUWKH8SULVLQJ±DQGZDVGLVJXVWHGUHPDUNLQJWKDWKHKDGEHHQ¿JKWLQJ DZDUDJDLQVWSUHFLVHO\VXFKEHKDYLRXU6PHWDQD 7KHVFHQHLVSDUWLFXODUO\ IUHTXHQW LQ WKH ZULWLQJ ¿FWLRQ DQG PHPRLUV RI $UQRãW /XVWLJ ERUQ  DQG2OJDYRQ%DUpQ\LERUQXQWLOµ2OJD%DUpQ\LRYi¶LQERWK &]HFKDQG*HUPDQZRUNVµ2OJD%DUpQ\L¶XQWLOc. ,QKHUVRPHZKDWPHORdramatic German novels concerning the Uprising and its aftermath, Prager Totentanz 3UDJXH GDQVH PDFDEUH   DQG Das tote Geleise (The siding,  VKHGHVFULEHVRWKHU&]HFKDWURFLWLHVWKDWFRPSRUWZLWK3HUNLQV¶VDFFRXQW though I have not met one of them, one that comes closer to rhinectomy, elseZKHUH&]HFKVTXHXLQJIRUDFDQDSpFRQVLVWLQJRIDVPDOOFKXQNRIÀHVKFXWRXW of a young German soldier while he was still alive. However taboo writing about Czech brutality may have been at the time, one is still surprised to read in a

Misoteutonic myths   Social Democratic Party electioneering pamphlet seeking to instruct the reader on the topicality of T.G. Masaryk’s conception of democracy that the Uprising KDGEHHQµEHDXWLIXO¶*|UOLFK  Although neither the novel concerning the Czechs’ defence of Masaryk 6WDWLRQLQ3UDJXH%UDQDOG¶VERUQ /D]DUHWQtYODN (Hospital train), one of WKHVWDUVRI8SULVLQJOLWHUDWXUHLQVRFLDOLVWPLQGVQRU6YDWi¶V± JHQHUally ‘parteitreu’3ČWGQĤ(Five days) spends anything but a brief paragraph on it, WKH3DUW\JUDGXDOO\UHSODFHGWKHJORUL¿FDWLRQRIWKH3UDJXH8SULVLQJDQGLQGHHG RIWKHH[SXOVLRQRIWKH*HUPDQVE\WKHJORUL¿FDWLRQRIWKH6RYLHWOLEHUDWLRQ7KH KLVWRULFDOIDFWRIWKHPDWWHULVWKDWZKHQWKH6RYLHWVDUULYHGLQ3UDJXHRQ0D\ the Germans had capitulated, the Czechs won the battle for control of Prague and all that was left to the Soviets was to mop up the few remaining pockets of 66WURRSVZKRLWPXVWEHVDLGZHUHVWLOORIIHULQJ¿HUFHUHVLVWDQFH7KHUHDOLW\ WKDW WKH $PHULFDQV KDG QRW DUULYHG LQ 3UDJXH ¿UVW WKDQNV WR DQ DJUHHPHQW between the Soviets and the Western Allies, and that they had liberated western Bohemia soon disappeared from the history books and political writings. As far as I know, it was never treated in belles-lettres, apart from in odd references in novels concerning the resettlement of the former Sudetenland, where nasty Germans or collaborators sometimes succeeded in escaping into the American ]RQH2QHRIWKHDXWKRUVRIWKHRI¿FLDODFFRXQWRIWKH$PHULFDQRFFXSDWLRQZDV later to become the Czech editor of The Black Book of Communism, Karel Bartošek. In this repetitious work the Americans are not much better than the *HUPDQVLQFRQWUDVWWRWKH6RYLHWVWKHRQO\FXOWXUHWKH$PHULFDQVFDQRIIHUWKH Czechs is that epitomised by the depraved King Kong$PHULFDQVROGLHUVDSSHDU to gang-rape Czech girls, to buy others with chocolate and, apparently worst of DOO SURWHFW *HUPDQV IURP &]HFK PREV %DUWRãHN DQG 3LFKOtN   ±  $IWHUDOOWKH$PHULFDQVKDGDOUHDG\VKRZQLQ.RUHDWKDWWKH\ZHUHµ+XQV RIWKHPRGHUQDJH¶LELG ,QVWHDGRIWKH$PHULFDQFXOWXUHRISRUQRJUDSK\ and night-clubs, the Czechs had been blessed with fraternally Slav socialist culture. The Slav consciousness of Pulkava’s chronicle and of The Privilege and the Brief Epitome WKDW KDG EHHQ LGHRORJLVHG DV 6ODY 5HFLSURFLW\ RU SDQVODYLVP LQ WKHHDUO\QLQHWHHQWKFHQWXU\HVSHFLDOO\E\-DQ.ROOiU± KDGUHPDLQHG a part of nationalist ideology with varying degrees of intensity up to the First :RUOG:DUDQGKDGWKHQEHHQUHLGHRORJLVHGE\(GYDUG%HQHãGXULQJWKHZDU KHFRQFHLYHGRIWKH*UHDW:DUDVDZDUEHWZHHQWKH6ODYVDQG*HUPDQV±DQG 0DJ\DUV%HQHã ,Q/RQGRQGXULQJWKHQH[WZDUKHEHJDQDJDLQWRGHYRWH himself to things Slav while the Soviets had set up a Slav Committee, for Stalin KDGGHFLGHGWKDWSDQVODYLVPZRXOGEHDXVHIXOSURSDJDQGLVWLFVWUDWHJ\2QFHWKH ZDUZDVRYHUPXWXDOIULHQGVKLSVRFLHWLHVZHUHVHWXSIRUH[DPSOHWKH%XOJDULDQ± &]HFKRVORYDN 7KLV QHZ SDQVODYLVP IRUPHG SDUW RI WKH QHR5HYLYDOLVP WKDW DVVDLOHG&]HFKFXOWXUHGXULQJWKHVDQGVDQGQHYHUFRPSOHWHO\GLVDSSHDUHGEHIRUHWKHIDOORI&RPPXQLVP±WKRXJKLWZDVE\QRPHDQVPDLQVWUHDP IURP WKH EHJLQQLQJ RI WKH V RQZDUGV ,W LV KRZHYHU VRPHWLPHV IRUJRWWHQ WKDW WKH 6RYLHW RFFXSDWLRQ RI &]HFKRVORYDNLD WKDW EHJDQ LQ $XJXVW  ZDV

  R.B. Pynsent ‘fraternal’ in a racial and political sense. Slav consciousness did not die emotionDOO\LQRQHWKLQNVRIVRPH&]HFKLQWHOOHFWXDOV¶6ODYUHDFWLRQVWRWKH1$72 ERPELQJ RI 6HUELD  EXW LW FHUWDLQO\ GLHG SROLWLFDOO\ 3UHVLGHQW 9iFODY .ODXV made a point of that in the speech he gave on the occasion of the opening of a new building for the School of Slavonic and East European Studies in London in 2FWREHU+HFODLPHGWKDWLQDOOWKHVSHHFKHVKHKDGHYHUJLYHQKHKDGSUDFtically never employed the term ‘Slav(onic)’.  7KDW LV PRUH RU OHVV WUXH RI KLV SUHGHFHVVRU 9iFODY +DYHO DV ZHOO :KLOH Havel was still a dissident he had written to President Weiszäcker of West Germany to apologise for the Czech treatment of Germans during the expulsion DQG KLV ¿UVW SUHVLGHQWLDO WULS DEURDG KDG EHHQ WR *HUPDQ\ .ODXV¶V DWWLWXGH WR Germany is slightly more complex, though I doubt that is why he used the SVHXGRQ\P µ'DOLPLO¶ LQ D OLWHUDU\ ZHHNO\ LQ WKH ODWH V %\ WKH V Dalimil’s ChronicleVWRRGIRU&]HFKQHVVDQGLQGHSHQGHQW&]HFKWKLQNLQJPLVRWHXWRQLVPZDVQRORQJHUWKHFHQWUDOWKHPHH[FHSWLQVRIDUDV0DU[LVW±/HQLQLVW critics associated it with Dalimil’s hatred of the rising economic and political SRZHURIWKHEXUJKHUV,QIDFW'DOLPLODWQRSRLQWOLQNVWKHEXUJKHUV±ZKRPKH KDWHV EHFDXVH RI WKHLU PRQH\PLQGHG EDQNPDQDJHU EHKDYLRXU ± ZLWK WKH *HUPDQV7KHHFRQRPLVW.ODXVKDGSUHVXPDEO\QRWQRWLFHGWKDWHLWKHU,Q however, Dalimil was revived as a guide for the Czechs. The widely respected SURIHVVRURI&]HFKDQG6ORYDNOLWHUDWXUH$OEHUW3UDåiN± ZKRKDG been president of the Czech National Council that strove to administer the 3UDJXH8SULVLQJHYLGHQWO\VDZLQWKH8SULVLQJDQGWKHH[SXOVLRQDIXO¿OPHQWRI the policy of ethnic cleansing advocated by Dalimil. He concludes his monumental work on Czech literary resistance against Germany and the Germans with WKHZRUGV Strong against the enemy without and within and capable of overcoming ERWKWKHHQHP\DQGRXURZQQHJDWLYHFKDUDFWHULVWLFVZHFRQ¿GHQWO\JUHHW our future in our secured frontiers and believe in our ever increasing pioneering development, particularly once our ancient enemy is no longer in RXUFRXQWU\DQGZKHQDIWHUFHQWXULHVZHDUH¿QDOO\our own masters in our borderlands, too. 3UDåiN 3UDåiNOLNHWKHYDVWPDMRULW\RI1DWLRQDO&RXQFLOSUHVLGLXPPHPEHUVEHFDPHD political nonentity within a few weeks of the liberation. Unlike other members ZKR ZHUH WHPSRUDULO\ VDWLV¿HG ZLWK EHLQJ NLFNHG XSVWDLUV 3UDåiN OHIW WKH Council as soon as he realised that not the Czechoslovaks, but the Soviets, were PDNLQJ DOO LPSRUWDQW GHFLVLRQV LQ  :KHQ DQRWKHU D¿FLRQDGR RI 'DOLPLO =GHQČN1HMHGOê± WKH0LQLVWHURI&XOWXUHSURXGO\DSRORJLVHGE\WKH JUDYHVLGHRI%HGĜLFK6PHWDQDWKDWKLVPXVLFKDGEHHQSOD\HGGXULQJWKH3URWHFWRUDWH3UDåiNREMHFWHGHTXDOO\SXEOLFO\IRU6PHWDQD¶VPXVLFKDGEHHQDVRXUFH RISDWULRWLFUHVLVWDQFHGXULQJWKHZDU3UDåiNZDVULJKW1HMHGOêDGLVWLQJXLVKHG PXVLFRORJLVWWXUQHGSRZHUIXOLGHRORJLVWZDVRQHRIWKHZULWHUV5iGOKDGODEHOOHG

Misoteutonic myths   DP\VWLFDOQDWLRQDOLVWUHYHUHURIWKHVWDWH5iGO $FFRUGLQJWR1HMHGOê the common people (lidové vrstvy) had been the bearers of the national tradition DQG LQ SUH+XVVLWH WLPHV WKH ORZHU QRELOLW\ KDG SHUIRUPHG WKLV IXQFWLRQ WKH upper nobility had even germanised their names. He labels Dalimil a ‘poor knight’, as if that were actually known, and extols him for having ‘written one of the most zealously anti-German works ever to have come out of this country, but he also directed his chronicle against the upper nobility as an unnational IRUFH DOLHQ WR WKH QDWLRQ¶ 1HMHGOê  ±  ,W PD\ EH VKHHU FRLQFLGHQFH WKDWRQH¿QGVLQ8SULVLQJOLWHUDWXUHDFHUWDLQFRQFHQWUDWLRQRQWKDWGHYLRXVQHVV (lest) that Dalimil had mythologised. For example, the whole narrative tension of Branald’s /D]DUHWQtYODN depends on the deviousness of the commandant of the German hospital train. It is explicitly mentioned as a national or racial charDFWHULVWLFRQO\RQFHDQGWKDWLQDÀDVKEDFNFRQFHUQLQJDSDUWLVDQJURXSKHUHWKH answer to lest is not Dalimil’s þHVW (honour), but counter-lestµ³,I\RXZDQWWR get the better of Nordic deviousness,” Broum used to say, “you have to have TXLWHDIHZWULFNVXS\RXUVOHHYH´¶%UDQDOG $QH[DPSOHIURP6YDWi unconsciously echoes the fourteenth-century Aesop even more clearly than it echoes Dalimil and the Brief Epitome. It concerns a Prague German in a house of patriotic Czechs, who is discovered to have been a sniper with no compuncWLRQDWNLOOLQJD&]HFKFKLOGµ2KKRZKLVPLOGIDFHKDGDFWXDOO\PDQDJHGYHU\ deviously, very circumspectly to deceive the whole block, the whole street, and WKH FRXQWU\ WKDW KDG JLYHQ KLP D KRPH¶ 6YDWi    7KLV VHQWLPHQW UH emerges in those who were frightened by the post-communist internationalisaWLRQ RI 3UDJXH 7KH EHVW NQRZQ RI WKH GLVVLGHQWV DSDUW IURP +DYHO /XGYtN 9DFXOtN ERUQ   ZULWHV VRPHZKDW K\VWHULFDOO\ LQ KLV LQWURGXFWLRQ WR D volume concerning the idyllic Bohemia represented in the Czech national DQWKHPµ2QO\WHPSRUDU\WDFWLFDOUHDVRQVFRXOGPDNHPHYRWHIRUDJRYHUQPHQW that allows or tolerates, for example, native homeless and selling land with pinewoods nestling on crags to Germans as if it were cement.’ And exhibiting sheer [HQRSKRELD For whom is today’s newly liberated Prague opening herself up, to whom is she giving precedence? The historical Prager is pushed out into the peripheries, even though it would be just and progressive if, on the contrary, the foreigner were stopped on the edge of the city, housed there, and once he had started paying rates, he could enter the centre in the same way as an ordinary Prager. 9DFXOtN± 9DFXOtNLVQRWSDUWLFXODUO\IRQGRIWKH(XURSHDQ8QLRQDQGKHLVVRPHWKLQJRID royalist, but, like the author(s) of the Brief Epitome, he declares, ‘I am strongly DJDLQVW D IRUHLJQHU DFFHGLQJ WR WKH WKURQH RI %RKHPLD¶ 9DFXOtN    7KHQRWHQWLUHO\LOOLEHUDO.ODXVDOVRHFKRHVWKH'DOLPLO±$HVRSOLQHZKHQZULWLQJ about uncontrolled immigration in response to the linguist and journalist 'RPLQLN/XNHãERUQ 

  R.B. Pynsent '/XNHãDFFXVHVPHRIµIHDURIWKH2WKHU¶  It is not a matter of fear of the Other for me, but only, solely a matter of putting the Other where s/he belongs. Does he acknowledge the right of any entity to be itself and leave µ2WKHUQHVV¶ QH[W GRRU" ,V IRU H[DPSOH D IDPLO\ VXFK DQ HQWLW\" 6KRXOG they move their neighbours into their home? Get rid of locks and doors and permit free passage into their home? Does the same go for the nation, the land, the state? .ODXV± 2QHGRXEWV.ODXVLVZULWLQJRI*HUPDQVKHUH  %HWZHHQ  DQG WKH HVWDEOLVKPHQW RI WKH *'5 *HUPDQV DUH QRUPDOO\ referred to as Germans/germans. The term Nazi referred just to the Party and its LGHRORJ\$IWHULWJUDGXDOO\EHFDPHWKHQRUPWRGLVWLQJXLVKEHWZHHQ(DVW and West Germans, where the latter were ‘revanchists’, and war-time Germans ‘Fascists’. Gradually the war-time occupation also acquired an ideologised interpretation, became known as the Nazi occupation. That result of the Marxist ideologisation of history soon became the norm among at least left-wing intellectuals in the West. Even in the writing of Klaus, who has otherwise abandoned most of the mechanical nationalist rhetoric of previous presidents of &]HFKRVORYDNLDWKH &]HFK 5HSXEOLF RFFDVLRQDOO\ ZULWHV µ1D]L¶ RFFXSDWLRQ rather than ‘German’.8 It is as if the Guardian began writing of the Conservative war against Argentina over the Falkland Islands. After the death of Stalin, most PDUNHGO\LQ.DUHO3WiþQtN¶VERUQ ¿UVWQRYHO5RþQtNMHGHQDGYDFHW (Born LQ¶ WKHZDULWVHOIUDWKHUWKDQWKH*HUPDQVEHFDPHWKHFKLHIHQHP\ and the Western Allies’ bombing of German cities more of an atrocity even than the concentration camps. The ‘peace’ movement, the Cold War and the H[LVWHQFHRIWKHJRRGVRFLDOLVW*'5KDGUHVXOWHGLQDFHUWDLQRI¿FLDOUHYLVLRQRI &]HFK±*HUPDQ UHODWLRQV 1DWXUDOO\ WKDW GLG QRW PHDQ WKDW SROLWLFDO UKHWRULF DJDLQVW *HUPDQ µ)DVFLVWV¶ FHDVHG LQGHHG LW FRQWLQXHG LQ YDU\LQJ GHJUHHV throughout the communist period. It did, however, become impossible to make the propagandistic distinction between Germans and human beings that occurs in Branald’s /D]DUHWQt YODN and constituted an uncomfortable echo of the 1D]LV¶GLVWLQFWLRQ EHWZHHQ $U\DQV DQG -HZV %\ DQDORJ\ ZH ¿QG LQ D VSHHFK E\9iFODY +DYHO D VRPHZKDW FRQGHVFHQGLQJ GLVWLQFWLRQ EHWZHHQ WKH %XQGHVUHSXEOLNDQGWKH*'5LQWZRVHQWHQFHVZKHUHZHPLJKWDOVRKHDUDGLPHFKR RI 'DOLPLOLDQ PLVRWHXWRQLVP µ)LIW\ \HDUV DJR WKH $OOLHV FRQTXHUHG *HUPDQ\ and today one could say that Germany has conquered Germany. That is, democratic, liberal Germany has conquered nationalist, Communist Germany’ (Havel  Havel, an outspoken critic of the Czechoslovak expulsion of the Germans, makes a point that remains valid today, except possibly among the younger genHUDWLRQRIDGXOW&]HFKVKHUHRQHQRWLFHVKLVROGORYHIRUWKHFROOHFWLYLVWQRWLRQ of ‘identity’, a notion and term that continues to bedevil serious political thinking all over the world, one that Klaus also exploits. The relationship between Czechs and Germans constitutes

Misoteutonic myths   a component of our fate, indeed, of our very identity. Germany is our inspiration and our pain, the source of understandable traumas, and of much prejudice and error, just as of standards by which we measure ourselves. Some consider Germany our chief hope, others the chief danger to us. It is possiEOHWRVD\WKDW&]HFKVGH¿QHWKHPVHOYHVSROLWLFDOO\EXWDOVRSKLORVRSKLFDOO\ by their attitude to Germany and the Germans, and that by the type of that DWWLWXGHWKH\GH¿QHQRWRQO\WKHLUUHODWLRQVKLSWRWKHLURZQKLVWRU\EXWDOVR the type of their national and state self-understanding. LELG± However much he regrets the brutal expulsion of the Germans, he writes that no RQH FDQ EODPH WKH HQG RI QRUPDO &]HFK±*HUPDQ UHODWLRQV LQ WKH %RKHPLDQ /DQGVVROHO\RQWKDWWKHIDFWUHPDLQVWKDWµDODUJHSURSRUWLRQRIRXUFLWL]HQVRI German nationality had demonstrated a preference for dictatorship, confrontation and violence as embodied in Hitler’s National Socialism over democracy, GLDORJXHDQGWROHUDQFH¶LELG ,QDVSHHFKGHOLYHUHGWRWKH%XQGHVWDJWKUHH PRQWKVDIWHUWKHSULPHPLQLVWHU9iFODY.ODXVDQGWKHFKDQFHOORU+HOPXW.RKO KDGRQ-DQXDU\VLJQHGWKH&]HFK±*HUPDQ'HFODUDWLRQRQ0XWXDO5HODtions, Havel maintained that this Declaration had liberated both nations, given them the chance to be entirely free because they ‘can and may know the truth about their own histories’ and ‘empathise with each other’s situations’ (Havel  +HPHDQVWKDWZHOOEXWLVSUHVXPDEO\VSHDNLQJPRUHDERXWKLVIHOORZ countrymen than the Germans, given the extent to which Germans had indeed been writing the truth and the fact that, given the necessity of research into archives only recently opened and forty years’ indoctrination, the Czechs had RQO\MXVWEHJXQWREHDEOHWRZULWHWKHWUXWK2QFHDJDLQZHKDYHVRPHWKLQJWKDW looks like well-meaning condescension.

Conclusion: love’s sweet cure For all his courageous analyses of the debilitating dishonesty of Communist Party ideology and practice while he was a dissident, Havel actually not only embodies a rejection of misoteutonic rhinectomy mythology, but also comes close to abiding by a mythology that centred on the notion of the Czechs as a dove-like nation and its later emanation as a doctrine of love. The origin of the GRYHOLNHQDWLRQP\WKHPHOLHVLQ$GDP+DUWPDQ¶VGLHGEHIRUH Historia o >IURPWČåNêFK] SURWLYHQVWYtFKFtUNYHþHVNp (History of the [grievous] tribuODWLRQVRIWKH%RKHPLDQ&KXUFK/DWLQHGLWLRQ(QJOLVKDQG*HUPDQHGLWLRQV&]HFKH[LOHHGLWLRQSRVWK¿UVWSXEOLVKHGLQ%RKHPLD  ZKHUHZHOHDUQRIWKHµVLPSOLFLW\RIRXUGRYHOLNHQDWLRQ¶+DUWPDQ  Generally the origin of the notion has been wrongly associated with Herder, with his portrayal of the peace-loving, singing agrarians constantly threatened by the Germans in his Ideen 6R IRU H[DPSOH 5DN ZULWHV WKDW µ+HUGHU FRQVLGHUHG ³D dove-like character” a special character trait of the Czechs, from which he derived his belief in the universal vocation of Slavdom as the bearer of

  R.B. Pynsent Humanität¶ 5DN    +HUH 5DN LV SHUSHWXDWLQJ D OHJHQG WKDW VHUYHG WR VXSSRUW QRW RQO\ WKH 5HYLYDO PRYHPHQW EXW DOVR WKH SDQVODY LQWHUSUHWDWLRQ RI the historical justice of Soviet domination in Eastern Europe. Herder actually wrote that the Slavs would be able to celebrate their former ‘industriousness and trade’, if only they would ‘cultivate all their land and on that basis develop trade’, and that then they would further ‘peaceful industriousness and the undisWXUEHGLQWHUFRXUVHRIQDWLRQV¶QRPHQWLRQRIHLWKHUHumanität or doves (Herder  7KHSRLQWKHUHLVQRWWKDW\HWDJDLQDQKLVWRULDQKDVJRWLWZURQJ but that a legend about Herder and the Slavs has become so embedded in the Czechs, partly because of Jungmann’s deliberately inaccurate translation from -XQJPDQQ± 7KLVHPEHGGHGQHVVLVHYLGHQWLQDZRUNE\WKH SK\VLFDO DQWKURSRORJLVW -LQGĜLFK 0DWLHJND ±  ZKRVH DLP LV DFWXDOO\ to ‘prove’ by statistics and skull measurements that the Czechs are the brainiest, most valorous and healthiest (least suffering from tuberculosis and venereal disease) Austro-Hungarian soldiers. Matiegka lists as Czech characteristics an RQO\VOLJKWO\PRGL¿HGYHUVLRQRIWKRVH+HUGHUKDGDWWULEXWHGWRWKH6ODYV Morally, the Czechs are generally religious, often almost to the point of superstition, devoted to the religion of their fathers, to the ancient monarchic V\VWHP DQG WKHLU ROG PRUHV DQG FXVWRPV WKH\ DUH LQGXVWULRXV WHQDFLRXV overcome all, including military, obstacles, and yet they are peace-loving, merry, amenable, charitable and loyal. 0DWLHJND *HQHUDOO\VSHDNLQJDWOHDVWIURPWKHVRQZDUGVHVSHFLDOO\ZLWKWKHLQWHQVL¿FDWLRQ RI WKH -RKQ +XVV DQG +XVVLWH FXOW &]HFK QDWLRQDOLVWV GLVOLNHG EHLQJ FDOOHG D GRYHOLNH QDWLRQ (GXDUG /HGHUHU ±  SURYLGHV D W\SLFDO example of that and falsely berates the philologist and historian Pavel Josef âDIDĜtN± IRUWKHVOXU 2XU ROG OHDGLQJ LQWHOOHFWV    PLQWHG D FRLQ ZLWK WKH REYHUVH *HUPDQ expansionism, and reverse, the Slavs’ dove-like nature, and believed they KDGWKXVGHDOWZLWKWKHFRQXQGUXP,WKLQNâDIDĜtNZDVWKHPLQWPDQRIWKLV motto. But the devil take this false coin. /HGD 6WLOOVRPHWKLQJRIWKHWRSRVUHPDLQVLQ.ODXV 7KH &]HFK QDWLRQ KDV QHYHU EHHQ D W\SLFDO QDWLRQ RI ¿JKWHUV ZDUULRUV ,W secured its place in Europe much more by means of its skill, inventiveness, wit and pertinacity. Perhaps that is why there appear to be few heroes in Czech history. .ODXV Dalimil gives a different picture.

Misoteutonic myths    $IWHU  D QHZ WRSRV LQYROYLQJ D VWULYLQJ IRU ORYH LQVWLJDWHG E\ +DYHO with his, unfortunately rather sickly, little red-heart logo, emerged. The message of love was to counteract not merely the old misoteutonism embodied in the H[SXOVLRQDQGWKHDIWHUPDWKRIWKH3UDJXH8SULVLQJEXWFKLHÀ\KDWUHGDVD6WDOLQLVWYLUWXHDQGWKHPRGL¿FDWLRQRIWKDWKDWUHGWKDWIROORZHGWKH7KDZ7KHUHG KHDUWDOVRVLJQL¿HG&]HFKRVORYDNLD3UDJXHRUWKH&]HFK5HSXEOLFDVWKHKHDUW of Europe, and endeavoured to lend this old cliché new meaning. How old the cliché is I do not know, but in a Latin poem in praise of the Czech language IURP  2QGĜHM )UDQWLãHN GH :DOGW ±  ZURWH RI *HUPDQ\ DV WKH KHDUWRI(XURSHDQG%RKHPLDWKHKHDUWRI*HUPDQ\3UDåiN ,QKLV XQSXEOLVKHG DFFRXQW RI ± Böhmische Chronik unter der Regierung des römischen Kaisers und Königs von Böhmen Josephus II (Bohemian chronicle XQGHUWKHUHLJQRIWKH+RO\5RPDQ(PSHURUDQG.LQJRI%RKHPLD-RVHSK,,  )UDQ] 0DUWLQ 3HO]HO)UDQWLãHN 0 3HOFHO ±  ODEHOOHG %RKHPLD µWKH KHDUWRIWKH>+RO\5RPDQ@(PSLUH¶3HOFO 7KHFOLFKpWKDWVXUYLYHVLV probably derived from the opening chapter of Palacký’s history of the Czechs *HUP  &]   µWKH ODQG RI %RKHPLD LWVHOI LV VLWXDWHG LQ WKH YHU\ middle, the heart of Europe’ (Palacký c. 7KHPHDQLQJKDVH[SDQGHGE\ WKHWLPH0LORã0DUWHQ± ZURWHKLVLQÀXHQWLDOGLDORJXHRQWKHQDWXUH RI&]HFKQHVVµ,VDZRQDPDSDKHDUWVKDSHGFRXQWU\DWWKHFHQWUHRI(XURSH¶ 0DUWHQ    %\  WKH HVVD\LVW DQG MRXUQDOLVW )HUGLQDQG 3HURXWND ± ZDVLURQLVLQJWKHFOLFKpLQKLVVWXG\RQWKH&]HFKFKDUDFWHUµ+RZ could we, of whom it is said that we are in the heart of Europe, resist the attracWLRQ RI >:HVWHUQ (XURSH@ LI WKH -DSDQHVH KDG QRW"¶ 3HURXWND    7KDW LURQ\GLGQRWKHOSVRWKHOHDGLQJ&]HFK1D]L(PDQXHO0RUDYHF±  claims that the Czechs formed ‘a small nation in the heart of Central Europe’ 0RUDYHF DQGVR3UDåiNZULWHVWKDWEHFDXVHWKH&]HFKVZHUHVHWWOHG ‘in the heart of Europe on the crossroads of the nations, our existence was DOZD\V DW ULVN¶ 3UDåiN    ,Q WKH VDPH SHULRG RWKHU ZULWHUV ZHUH VWLOO PRUHRUOHVVFRS\LQJ3DODFNê¶VZRUGVIRUH[DPSOHµDVPDOOQDWLRQSODFHGLQWKH PLGGOH LQGHHG ULJKW LQ WKH KHDUW RI (XURSH¶ .OLPHQW    RU µD FRXQWU\ O\LQJVRWRVSHDNLQWKHKHDUWRI(XURSH¶6NXWLO $QGLWVWLOOSHUVLVWV WKH&DUROLQH8QLYHUVLW\FKDSODLQ+DOtNERUQ ZULWHVRIµ&]HFKR*HUPDQ FRH[LVWHQFHLQWKHKHDUWRI(XURSH¶-DQGRXUHN DQGHYHQ3UHVLGHQW .ODXVFDQQRWJHWLWRXWRIKLVV\VWHP.ODXV   ,W WDNHVQR LPDJLQDWLRQWR DVVRFLDWHWKHKHDUWZLWK ORYHVHH 0RUDYHF   EXW WKH &]HFK JRVSHO RI ORYH PLJKW XOWLPDWHO\ EH GHULYHG IURP E\ IDU WKH PRVW IUHTXHQWO\ UHSULQWHG QRYHO LQ &]HFK %RåHQD 1ČPFRYi¶V "±  %DELþND *UDQGPRWKHU   $Q LQNOLQJ RI WKH +DYHO YHUVLRQ LQ ZKLFK ORYH will vanquish Communist hatred is to be found in a patriots’ vade-mecum from  In matters concerning personalities and causes, the most repulsive partisan weaponry often reached for is slander, suspicion, lies! We would be a thousand leagues closer to the happiness of our nation if there were more

  R.B. Pynsent sincerity, more truth, more love in our lives! Let us love one another – we are of one blood. (Štech c. DQGWKLVLVWZHQW\\HDUVEHIRUHµ9HULWDVYLQFLW¶KDVEHHQWDNHQXSE\0DVDU\NIRU WKHSUHVLGHQWLDOVWDQGDUG)RUWKHQRYHOLVW+DQD.OHQNRYi± ZKHQKHU XQFOH(GYDUG%HQHãZDVHOHFWHGSUHVLGHQWLQµ8QLW\WULXPSKHGRYHUKDWUHG DQGWUXWKRYHUIDOVHKRRG¶.OHQNRYi ,QFRQQHFWLRQZLWKWKLVORYHRQH UHFDOOV WKH ZRUGV RI -RVHI IURP  &DUGLQDO %HUDQ ZKR KDG VSHQW KDOI WKH war in Theresienstadt and Dachau and whose internment by the communists EHWZHHQDQGOHGWRWKHIRXQGLQJRI$PQHVW\,QWHUQDWLRQDO%HIRUHWKH takeover he wrote that he was not surprised that the Slavs had been called a ‘dove-like nation’, for ‘Terror and violence do not comport with the Slav spirit. . . . The Slav can love, love with a love no non-Slav is capable of’ (Beran  3HUKDSVPRUHWRWKHSRLQWDQGFHUWDLQO\FORVHUWR+DYHODUHWKHZRUGV RIWKHEUDYHSUHODWH%RKXPLO6WDãHN± LQDSDWULRWLFVHUPRQDWWHQGHG E\ZHOORYHU&]HFKVIURPDOORYHUWKH3URWHFWRUDWHRQ$XJXVW a sermon as a result of which he spent the whole war in prison and a concentraWLRQ FDPS µ, EHOLHYHG WKDW WUXWK ZRXOG WULXPSK RYHU IDOVHKRRG ODZ RYHU ODZOHVVQHVV ORYH DQG FRPSDVVLRQ RYHU YLROHQFH¶ 6WDãHN    6WDãHN LV alluding to the Nazis, but Havel’s oft-repeated words are not. I cite just the bestknown version of them, uttered when he knew his audience had by now probably heard them too frequently, and while he was recovering from a major operation. The gentle self-parody does not detract from his sincerity in this, his New Year’s PHVVDJH IURP  µHYHU\ GD\ , EHFRPH PRUH FRQYLQFHG WKDW LW ZRXOG GR QR harm at all if we did something to make sure that truth really did triumph over IDOVHKRRG DQG ORYH RYHU KDWUHG¶ +DYHO    :LWK WKH SRVWFRPPXQLVW call for love, the Communists’ cult of radical Hussite violence disappeared.

Notes  7KH +XVVLWH SHULRG LV QRUPDOO\ XQGHUVWRRG DV WKH ¿UVW WKUHHTXDUWHUV RI WKH ¿IWHHQWK century. What the ‘Hussite tradition’ represents depends on a writer’s politics. Sometimes it refers to a golden age when the Czechs laid the foundation for the Lutheran UHIRUPDWLRQ2IWHQKRZHYHULWUHIHUVSDUWLFXODUO\WRWKHUDGLFDOZLQJRIWKH+XVVLWHV WKH7DERULWHVDQGWKHVXFFHVVRIWKHLUDUPLHVWKHQRWLRQRIµ+XVVLWHGHPRFUDWLFDOLW\¶ was based on a legend that all distinctions of estate were abolished by the Taborites âPDKHO   ,KDYHZULWWHQLQGHWDLODERXWWKLVLQ3\QVHQW   %ULNFt ] /LFND 3UiYD PČVWVNi   DQG 3DYHO .ULVWLiQ ] .ROGtQD 3UiYD PČVWVNi .UiORYVWYtþHVNpKR 6HH6FKUDQLO   ,XVHWKHWHUPVµDFFHVVLRQ¶DQGµWKURQH¶DGYLVHGO\8QOLNHSUHVLGHQWVRIRWKHUFRXQWULHV the Czechoslovak/Czech president ‘abdicates’, does not resign.  )RUGHWDLOVRIWKHWKUHHGUDIWVRIWKLVODZVHH)URPPHU± )RUDQDFFRXQW RIVRPH&]HFKEUXWDOLW\GXULQJRXWVLGHLQWHUQPHQWFDPSVVHH6WDQČN   6HH IRU H[DPSOH +UXEtQ  ±  3DĜt]HN    %UDQDOG     'UGD 6YDWi +RĜHF   %XWVHHEHIRUHWKH7KDZ-RVHI0KOEHUJHU 

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6

The myth of the dialogue of myths Russia and Europe Walter Koschmal

The Russian conception of Europe: an introduction In Russia, there are neither conceptions nor myths about Europe that do not also LQFOXGH$VLD,WLVWKHUHIRUHQHFHVVDU\¿UVWWRFRQVLGHU5XVVLDQP\WKVDERXW$VLD From a Russian perspective, Europe dominates in this discourse and these myths, ZKLOH $VLD LV VXEGRPLQDQW 1HYHUWKHOHVV P\ ¿UVW DUJXPHQW LV WKDW 5XVVLD¶V ambivalence towards Europe and Asia is fundamental. This is the Russian view RI WKLQJV 7KH (XURSHDQ SHUVSHFWLYH VXFK DV LW LV SRUWUD\HG LQ QLQHWHHQWK DQG WZHQWLHWKFHQWXU\:HVWHUQ(XURSHDQHVVD\VRQ(XURSHLVXVXDOO\GLIIHUHQWKHUH Russia and Asia are simplistically equated with one another. In contrast, Russia FRPHV WR XQGHUVWDQG LWVHOI DV D (XURSHDQ FXOWXUH E\ ZD\ RI $VLD DQG 5XVVLD¶V RZQ $VLDQ FKDUDFWHULVWLFV 7KH ZD\ 5XVVLD SHUFHLYHV LWVHOI LWV VHOI XQGHUVWDQGLQJ LV XQLPDJLQDEOH ZLWKRXW WKH IRUHLJQ (XURSHDQ SHUFHSWLRQ RI Russia.  0\ VHFRQG DUJXPHQW LV WKDW 5XVVLDQ GLVFRXUVH RQ (XURSH DV D UXOH LV D GHULYHG GLVFRXUVH LH D GLVFRXUVH WKDW GRHV QRW RULJLQDWH LQ 5XVVLD ,W LV D UHVSRQVH WR :HVWHUQ (XURSHDQ DVVHUWLRQV RU VWDWHPHQWV DERXW 5XVVLD 5XVVLDQ GLVFRXUVHRQ(XURSHDGDSWV(XURSHDQP\WKVDERXW5XVVLDE\FKDQJLQJWKHPLQWR WKHLU RSSRVLWH 7KLV PD\ EH D VHPDQWLF DV ZHOO DV DQ D[LRORJLFDO UHYHUVDO $Q example for the second type of inversion may be seen in the myth of the collec WLYH)URPD(XURSHDQYLHZ5XVVLDQFXOWXUHLVSHUFHLYHGQHJDWLYHO\DVDFXOWXUH of the collective, of the masses. In contrast, the collective, be it in its economic VRFLDO IRUP LQ WKH YLOODJH DV LQ WKH mir  RU WKH UHOLJLRXV IRUP sobornost’, is viewed in Russia as a positive, essential part of Russian culture. The positive European view of the individual and individual freedom is also reversed in 5XVVLD LQ WKH QLQHWHHQWK FHQWXU\ 'DQLOHYVNLL 'RVWRHYVN\ DQG RWKHUV  DQG GHVFULEHG DV D µGLVHDVH¶ bolezn’). Russian myths about Europe are secondary P\WKVP\WKVDERXWP\WKVZKLFKRQO\IXO¿OWKHLUSXUSRVHLQDFHUWDLQLGHRORJL FDOIUDPHZRUN  0\WKLUGFRQVLGHUDWLRQFRQFHUQVWKHZLGHO\ODFNLQJGLIIHUHQWLDWLRQLQZULWLQJV RQ5XVVLDDQG(XURSH9DULRXVDXWKRUVGHWHFWµ(XURSHDQLVDWLRQ¶LQHYHQWKHPRVW GLYHUVHSKDVHVRI5XVVLDQKLVWRU\7KH\VHHLWLQ.LHYDQ5XV¶WKHUHLJQRI,YDQ WKH 7HUULEOH WKH UHOLJLRXV VFKLVP RI WKH VHYHQWHHQWK FHQWXU\ µRaskol¶  LQ WKH

The myth of the dialogue of myths 123 HLJKWHHQWK FHQWXU\ RI 7VDU 3HWHU , LQ WKH µ:HVWHUQLVHUV¶ µzapadniki¶  RI WKH QLQHWHHQWKFHQWXU\XSWRWKHµ(XUDVLDQV¶RIWKHVµSHUHVWURLND¶DQGLQWKH µWUDQVIRUPDWLRQV¶LQWKHUHFHQWSDVWDQGSUHVHQW  ,WLVLPSRUWDQWWRUHFRJQLVHWZRDVSHFWVRIWKLV(XURSHDQLVDWLRQ)LUVWRIDOO LQDOORIWKHVHFDVHV:HVWHUQ(XURSHDQSDUDGLJPVDUHRQO\SDUWLDOO\DGRSWHGLQ 5XVVLDDQGXVXDOO\DIIHFWRQO\FHUWDLQRIWHQYHU\VPDOOVRFLDOJURXSV6HFRQGLQ connection with this fact, Europeanisation only affects certain types of discourse. ,QWKH1RYJRURGRI,YDQ*UR]Q\MGLVFRXUVHZDVRQO\FRQFHUQHGZLWKWKH(XUR peanisation of the economy. The Raskol EURXJKW 5XVVLD FORVHU WR :HVWHUQ FKXUFKHVERWK3URWHVWDQWDQG&DWKROLFDQGWKHUHIRUHD(XURSHDQLVDWLRQLQUHOL JLRXV GLVFRXUVH 3HWHU ,¶V (XURSHDQLVDWLRQ KDG RQO\ OLPLWHG VXFFHVV EHFDXVH LW GLGQRWLQFOXGHUHOLJLRXVGLVFRXUVH5DWKHULWFRQFHQWUDWHGDERYHDOORQSROLWLFDO GLVFRXUVH DQG WKHQ HVSHFLDOO\ RQ PDULWDO SROLWLFV 6FKXO]H:HVVHO   7KH (XURSHDQLVDWLRQRI5XVVLDLVDP\WKDQGPXVWEHGLVWLQJXLVKHGDFFRUGLQJWRGLI ferent levels of discourse.  6LQFH 5XVVLDQ P\WKV RI (XURSH DUH DOO P\WKLFDO GHULYDWLRQV LW LV QHFHVVDU\ both to describe European myths about Russia and simultaneously analyse Russian myths about Europe. A study that is restricted to the European point of YLHZVXFKDV/DUU\:ROII¶VInventing Eastern EuropeFDQRQO\UHYHDO5XVVLD¶V µ¿FWLRQDO¶FKDUDFWHULVWLFVDQGGHSLFWWKHLURIWHQYHU\UHDOEORRG\UHVXOWV:ROII   2XU DSSURDFK FRPSOHPHQWV :ROII¶V VWXG\ ZLWK D PRUH FRPSUHKHQVLYH YLHZRQ5XVVLDQVHOISHUFHSWLRQVDQGWKHLUP\WKLFDOUHSUHVHQWDWLRQV  :KHQGLVFXVVLQJ5XVVLDQFXOWXUHLWLVSRVVLEOHWRGLIIHUHQWLDWHEHWZHHQIRXU IRUPV RI LQWHUDFWLRQ EHWZHHQ D IRUHLJQ (XURSHDQ SHUFHSWLRQ RI 5XVVLD DQG 5XVVLDQ VHOISHUFHSWLRQ )LUVW 3HWHU ,¶V DWWHPSW WR (XURSHDQLVH 5XVVLD LQ WKH HLJKWHHQWKFHQWXU\LVDQH[DPSOHRIDPHWRQ\PLFFRQFHSWLRQWKDWLQFOXGHGRQO\ the rather limited sphere of the state. The reforms excluded both the common SHRSOHDVZHOODVDPDMRULW\RIWKHQREOHVDQGWKHFKXUFK'HVSLWHWKLVIDFWWKH myth prevails that all of Russia was Europeanised in the HLJKWHHQWK FHQWXU\ DOWKRXJKLPSRUWDQWSDUWVRIVRFLHW\UHPDLQHGµ$VLDQ¶6HFRQGLQWKHQLQHWHHQWK FHQWXU\WKHµ:HVWHUQLVHUV¶µzapadniki¶ WHQGHGWRSRUWUD\5XVVLDDVXQFXOWXUHG $VLDQEDUEDULDQV,QWKLVZD\WKH\IROORZHGWKHHTXDOO\PHWRQ\PLF3ROLVKSRVL WLRQZKLFKUHIHUUHGWRWKH5XVVLDQVDVµ$VLDQ0XVFRYLWHV¶7KHLQFUHDVLQJLGHQ WL¿FDWLRQ RI WKH (XURSHDQ (DVW ZLWK WKH 2ULHQW LQ WKH QLQHWHHQWK FHQWXU\ DOVR caused Russia to be equated with Asia and not with Europe. Third, the ‘Eura VLDQV¶ RI WKH V DUH DQ H[DPSOH RI D V\QWKHWLF FRQFHSWLRQ RI 5XVVLD DV D (XURSHDQ±$VLDQ ZKROH 7KLV UHODWLYHO\ VPDOO JURXS RI HPLJUDQWV XQGHUVWRRG (XUDVLD DV DQ DXWRQRPRXV µFRQWLQHQW¶ ORFDWHG EHWZHHQ (XURSH DQG $VLD 7KLV SHUFHSWLRQ LV EHFRPLQJ UHOHYDQW DJDLQ IRU ULJKWZLQJ UDGLFDOV WRGD\ $OWKRXJK such conceptions have made little impact historically, they are often considered WRKDYHJHQHUDOYDOLGLW\IRUWKHHQWLUHVHOIGH¿QLWLRQ7KH(XUDVLDQVUHSUHVHQWD V\QWKHWLFFRQFHSWLRQRI5XVVLDFRQVLGHULQJ5XVVLDWREHDWKLUGDQGDXWRQRPRXV VSDFH ZKLFK PHGLDWHV EHWZHHQ $VLD DQG (XURSH 3XWL (YUD]LL    Fourth, this synthetic form also appears as an antithetical form. Russia then DSSHDUV GLYLGHG ,Q WKH QLQHWHHQWK FHQWXU\ WKH µ:HVWHUQLVHUV¶ ZHUH FRQIURQWHG

  W. Koschmal ZLWKWKHFRXQWHUFXUUHQWRIWKHVODYRSKLOHVµVODYLDQR¿O\¶ 5XVVLDQFXOWXUHZDV divided. Those who themselves understood Russia to be European, stressed Rus VLD¶V UROH LQ FRORQLVLQJ $VLD HJ 6LEHULD  ZKLOH RWKHUV ODPHQWHG WKDW 5XVVLD LWVHOIGHVSHUDWHO\UHTXLUHGDQHQOLJKWHQHGµFRORQLVDWLRQ¶IRUH[DPSOHDWHFKQLFDO UHYROXWLRQIURP(XURSH$OOIRXUIRUPVKRZHYHUDUHLGHRORJLFDOFRQVWUXFWLRQV which are also endorsed at different levels of historical discourse.

The dialogue of myths as a myth 2QH VKRXOG QRW RQO\ SD\ DWWHQWLRQ WR P\WKLFDO VWDQGDUGV DQG WKH IXQFWLRQV RI P\WKVDVIRUH[DPSOH6FK|SÀLQGRHVEXWDOVRFRQVLGHUWKHLUJHQHVLV12WKHUFXO WXUHV¶H[SHFWDWLRQVWRZKLFKRQHUHVSRQGVSOD\DUROHLQWKLVGLDORJXH6RPH WLPHVQHJDWLYHH[SHFWDWLRQVDUHDOVRIXO¿OOHGEHFDXVHWKHVHDUHUHSHDWHGO\YRLFHG ,QUHIHUHQFHWRP\WKVDERXWHQOLJKWHQPHQW:ROIIPDLQWDLQVWKDW¿FWLRQVVRPH WLPHV FDXVH UHDO EORRG\ IDFWV ,I (XURSH FRQVLGHUV 5XVVLD WR EH D WKUHDWHQLQJ EHDUORQJHQRXJKWKHQ5XVVLDZLOODOVREHFRPHWKLVWKUHDWHQLQJEHDU6FK|SÀLQ    ,QWKLVZD\ZHFDQUHFRJQLVH5XVVLDQP\WKVDERXW(XURSHDVEHLQJGHULYHG 0\WKVQRWRQO\KDYHDQDWXUDOWHQGHQF\WRZDUGVKRPRJHQLVDWLRQEXWDOVRVHUYH WRHVWDEOLVKLQWHJULW\DQGFRKHUHQFHLQFRPPXQLWLHV7KH\DUHRIWHQDUHDFWLRQWR H[FOXVLRQDVLQWKHFDVHRI5XVVLD¶VH[FOXVLRQIURP(XURSHLQ:HVWHUQ(XURSHDQ VRFLDOWKRXJKWDQGOLWHUDWXUHLQWKHQLQHWHHQWKDQGWZHQWLHWKFHQWXULHV$VDFRQ VHTXHQFHLQWKHGLDORJXHEHWZHHQ5XVVLDDQG(XURSHIURPWKH5XVVLDQSHUVSHF tive, rationality is only a European characteristic. This is mainly due to the fact that from a European perspective, Russia and Asia are characterised by unpre GLFWDEOHHPRWLRQV)URPWKHYHU\EHJLQQLQJ(XURSHVHHV5XVVLDDQG5XVVLDVHHV LWVHOI LQ WHUPV RI WKLV P\WK &RQIURQWHG ZLWK D UDWLRQDO (XURSH 5XVVLD JODGO\ ZLWKGUDZVLQWRWKHUHDOPRIHPRWLRQV+DUW 7KHP\WKLVDWWKHVDPHWLPH YDOXHGPRUHKLJKO\EXWRQO\IURPWKH5XVVLDQSHUVSHFWLYH  ,WLVWKHUHIRUHQHFHVVDU\WRSUHFLVHO\GH¿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of this, the transcendence that allows people to more readily bear earthly burdens LV KLJKO\ YDOXHG LQ 5XVVLDQ FXOWXUH /RWPDQ FDOOV WKLV FXOWXUDO W\SH µVHPDQWLF V\PEROLF¶$WWKHVDPHWLPHV\PEROVFUHDWHWKHEULFNVRIWKHP\WKLFDOEXLOGLQJ ,QVLJKWLVWKXVQRWUHDFKHGRQWKHKRUL]RQWDOEXWUDWKHURQWKHYHUWLFDOD[LV,Q 5XVVLDQFXOWXUHWKHPRYHPHQWIURPOHVVHUWRJUHDWHULPSRUWDQFHLVWKHDVFHQVLRQ from one part to the whole. This whole is always more valuable than the part. 7KDWLVZK\IRUH[DPSOHWKHFROOHFWLYHLVUDQNHGKLJKHUWKDQWKHLQGLYLGXDO

The myth of the dialogue of myths    )RU/RWPDQWKHGLDORJXHEHWZHHQ5XVVLDDQG(XURSHLVPRUHLPSRUWDQWWKDQ WKH 5XVVLDQ±$VLDQ GLDORJXH +HQFH 5XVVLDQ FXOWXUH UHDFWV SULPDULO\ WR (XUR SHDQVHOGRPWR$VLDQLGHDVDERXW5XVVLDQFXOWXUH5XVVLDUHVSRQGVVRWRVSHDN SUDJPDWLFDOO\WRWKHSDUWLFXODULQWHQVLW\RIWKH(XURSHDQVLGHRIWKHFRQYHUVDWLRQ E\RIIHULQJDUDWKHUODUJHQXPEHURIDQVZHUV,QWKLVSURFHVV$VLDSOD\VWKHUROH RIDVHFRQGDU\REMHFWDV5XVVLDHVWDEOLVKHVLWV(XURSHDQLGHQWLW\ZLWKWKHKHOSRI Asia. Asia allows Russia to compensate for its subordination to Europe by allow LQJ5XVVLDWRFRQFHSWXDOLVHLWVHOIDVVXSHULRUWR$VLD$VLDXVXDOO\EHFRPHVUHOH vant in the context of Europe – above all in the HLJKWHHQWKFHQWXU\  1HYHUWKHOHVV$VLDLVDFHQWUDO¿HOGZKHUHFODVKHVZLWK(XURSHDQG(XURSHDQ culture arise within Russian culture. The Asian elements allow the fundamental GLIIHUHQFHVEHWZHHQ5XVVLDQDQG(XURSHDQFXOWXUHWRFU\VWDOOLVH,WLVDUJXHGWKDW 5XVVLDXQOLNH*UHDW%ULWDLQRU)UDQFHGLGQRWGHVWUR\RWKHUFXOWXUHVGXULQJWKH FRORQLVDWLRQRI$VLDIRUH[DPSOHLQ6LEHULDEXWUDWKHUDVVLPLODWHGWKHPSHDFH IXOO\2QFHDJDLQZKHQRQHVSHDNVRI$VLDRQHLVRQO\GLVFXVVLQJ(XURSH$VLD is, as it were, an ‘inoskazanie¶DOOHJRU\ IRU(XURSHLWKDVQRUHDOLQGHSHQGHQW YDOXH:KHQ'RVWRHYVN\VHHVDQRULHQWDWLRQWRZDUGV$VLDDV5XVVLD¶VFKDQFHIRU renewal, this too, is a reply, a myth of rebirth that is aimed at old Europe. In 5XVVLD WKHUH ZDV D WHQGHQF\ WR ORRN WRZDUGV (XURSH IRU GLUHFWLRQ )URP D Russian perspective, however, Europe was always understood as culture, Asia more as nature. Russia, as an intermediary European–Asian culture, was thereby LQDSRVLWLRQWRWUDQVIRUPFXOWXUHLQWRQDWXUH5RODQG%DUWKHVKRZHYHUVHHVDQ HVVHQWLDOP\WKRORJLFDOIXQFWLRQLQWKLVWUDQVIRUPDWLRQ  7KHP\WKLVDPDUNHURIGLIIHUHQWLDWLRQZKHQZHSHUFHLYHWKHZRUOGFRJQL tively and therefore only partially. From the Russian perspective, Europe appears WREHDUDWLRQDOKRPRJHQHRXVSODFHIUHHRIP\WKVMXVWDV5XVVLDDSSHDUVWREHD place devoid of rationalism from a European point of view. This Russian percep tion of Europe is in itself a myth, an answer to a European myth about Russia. 7KH P\WK RI 5XVVLD UHGHHPLQJ (XURSH PD\ EH FRQQHFWHG ZLWK WKLV 6FK|SÀLQ  %HIRUHZHHQJDJHLQDVHPDQWLFGLVFXVVLRQRIP\WKLFDOFRQWHQWLWLV LPSRUWDQWWRQRWHWKDW5XVVLDVHSDUDWHVLWVHOIIURPWKHUDWLRQDORQO\FRJQLWLYHO\ GH¿QHG(XURSHDQVSDFHE\GH¿QLQJLWVHOIDVDP\WKLFDOVSDFH1RQHWKHOHVVDV WKH ODVW VWHS RI P\WKL¿FDWLRQ 5XVVLD PHDQV WR SRVVHVV D KLJKHU NQRZOHGJH RQ WKHYHUWLFDOSODQHFODLPLQJWREHVXSHULRUZKLFKSRLQWVWRLWVLVRODWLRQ The isolation of the subject or the discourse of separation )RUPDQ\FHQWXULHV(XURSHFRQVLGHUHG5XVVLDWREHEDUEDULF6F\WKLDQ$VLDWLF Muscovites. Europe thus cultivated its fears and excluded Russia from Europe, PRYHG LW WRZDUGV $VLD VHH :ROII   7KH SUHUHTXLVLWH IRU WKLV LV ERWK WKH KRPRJHQLVDWLRQ RI (XURSHDQ DV ZHOO DV 5XVVLDQ VHPDQWLF UHJLRQV 7KH QRQ ZHVWHUQSDUWRI(XURSHLVXVXDOO\FDOOHGµ5XVVLD¶)URPWKHQLQHWHHQWKXQWLOWKH middle of the twentieth century both Eastern Europe as well as Asia were called µ5XVVLD¶LQHVVD\VRQ(XURSH&HQWUDO(XURSHD(XURSHEHWZHHQWKH:HVWDQG 5XVVLDGRHVQRWH[LVW7KLVLVDIRUPRIGRXEOHKHWHURJHQHLW\2QWKHRQHKDQG

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Russia’s superiority In myth, the formerly isolated character of Russia was destroyed and then trans IRUPHG EHIRUH UHWXUQLQJ WR WKH FRPPXQLW\ ZLWK D KLJKHU VWDWXV 7KH SRRU JLUO EHFRPHVDSULQFHVV5XVVLDDOVRJDLQVDKLJKHUVWDWXVWKDQNVWRDZLGHUDQJHRI processes of transformation. This becomes clear when Russia proclaims itself to EH WKH LQWHUPHGLDU\ EHWZHHQ (XURSH DQG $VLD LQ WKH HLJKWHHQWK FHQWXU\ 2QH characteristic of this superiority is that Russia postulates the completeness of its RZQ FXOWXUH ZKLOH (XURSH LV VHHQ DV RQO\ GHDG SDUWV DQG IUDJPHQWV RU DV DQ µRXWZDUGO\GHDGZKROH¶.LUHHYVN\ 'DQLOHYVNLLEHOLHYHVWKDWRQO\ WKHFRPSOHWHO\QHZ5XVVLDQRU6ODYLFFXOWXUHIXO¿OVDOOWKHIXQGDPHQWDODVSHFWV RIDFXOWXUDOW\SH2XWRIDOOWKHGLYHUVHFXOWXUDOW\SHVRQO\WKH6ODYVVLPXOWDQH RXVO\GHYHORSHGµDOOIRXUVSKHUHVRIKXPDQDFWLYLW\¶QDPHO\UHOLJLRXVFXOWXUDO SROLWLFDO DQG VRFLRHFRQRPLF FRPSOHWHQHVV DQG ZKROHQHVV DUH DOVR FULWHULD IRU VXSHULRULW\IRU'DQLOHYVNLL,QFRQWUDVWWKHRQHVLGHGSUHGRPLQDQFHRIUHDVRQLQ (XURSH LV FULWLFLVHG LELG   ,Q 5XVVLD LW LV EHOLHYHG WKDW WKH HPSKDVLV RQ IHHOLQJFUHDWHVDQRUJDQLFRQHQHVVRIERG\UHDVRQDQGVRXO  $FFRUGLQJWR.LUHHYVN\WKLVFRPSOHWHZKROHµpolnota¶ PDLQWDLQVWKHUHDVRQ why Russian culture is superior to European culture. The topos of superiority is FHQWUDO WR D[LRORJLFDO GLVFRXUVH DQG D PLUURU LPDJH RI WKH :HVW¶V GLVFRXUVH RQ 5XVVLD,WFRXQWHUDFWVDIRUHLJQSHUFHSWLRQZLWKLWVRZQYLHZ:ROIIFOHDUO\VKRZV WRZKDWDJUHDWH[WHQWWKH:HVW¶VEHOLHILQLWVRZQVXSHULRULW\VKDSHGLWVSHUFHS tion of Eastern Europe in the HLJKWHHQWK FHQWXU\ 7KH (XURSH RI WKH (QOLJKWHQ PHQWUHFUHDWHV(DVWHUQ(XURSHDVVRPHWKLQJJHRJUDSKLFDOO\DQGSKLORVRSKLFDOO\ QHZDQGVHHVLWVHOIDVVXSHULRUGXHWRWKHYLFWRU\RIUHDVRQ7KHLGHDRI5XVVLD¶V VXSHULRULW\ ZLWK UHJDUG WR (XURSH GXH WR LWV µZKROHQHVV¶ tsel’nost’), spiritual XQLW\DQGFDSDFLW\WRIHHOHQWLWOHVLWWRVDYHDQGUHGHHPWKHIUDJPHQWHG(XURSH  8QOLNH LQ *HUPDQ WKH ZRUG µXQLW\¶ µedinstvo¶  KDV D OH[LFDO FRPSDUDWLYH form in Russian, ‘vseedinstvo¶µXQLW\RIHYHU\WKLQJ¶ 7KLVIRUPHPSKDVLVHVWKH H[WUHPHKRPRJHQHLW\E\DK\SHUEROHWKDWLVDOVRXVHGLQUHOLJLRXVFRQWH[WVHJ ‘vsevyshniaia¶DVDQH[SUHVVLRQIRUWKH0RWKHURI*RG &RPPXQLVPFRQWLQXHV WR XVH WKLV K\SHUEROH 7KH (XUDVLDQV DWWULEXWH D VWULYLQJ IRU µvseedinstvo¶ WR 2UWKRGR[\ 7KH\ EHOLHYH WKDW (XUDVLD IRUPV D JHRJUDSKLF DQG FXOWXUDO ZKROH 7KH\ FRQVLGHU WKH VHOIDGHTXDWH GLVWLQFW DUHD µRossiia-Evraziia¶ WR EH D µV\P SKRQLFSHUVRQ¶DQGµDVHSDUDWHVXEMHFW¶7UXEHW]NR\ 7KH:HVWZKLFK KDG RQFH EHHQ µ5RPDQ &DWKROLF (XURSH¶ LV FULWLFLVHG IRU KDYLQJ QR UHOLJLRQ 8QLW\ LV DERYH DOO SURSDJDWHG LQ UHOLJLRXV GLVFRXUVH µ5XVVLDQ 2UWKRGR[\¶ µrusskoe pravoslavie¶  LV VHHQ DV WKH µprinciple of Eurasian–Russian culture¶ µkak princip evraziisko-russkoi kul’tury¶3XWL(YUD]LL   ,W EHFRPHV FOHDU WKDW VXFK GLYHUJHQW SHUFHSWLRQV DQG HYDOXDWLRQV HVVHQWLDOO\ DULVH LQ WKLV GLVFXUVLYH H[FKDQJH :ROII FRQVLGHUV JHRJUDSKLFDO DQG SROLWLFDO SKLORVRSKLFDOGLVFRXUVHWREHGRPLQDQWZKLOH.LUHHYVN\'DQLOHYVNLLDQGRWKHUV HPSKDVLVH UHOLJLRXV GLVFRXUVH 7KH 5XVVLDQ SKLORVRSKHU 9 6RORY¶HY PDNHV QDWLRQDOLGHQWLW\WUDQVFHQGHQWDOE\XVLQJUHOLJLRXVGLVFRXUVH7KHGRPLQDQFHRI UHOLJLRXV RU SVHXGR WUDQVFHQGHQWDO GLVFRXUVH LQ 5XVVLD LV VHOGRP UHFRJQLVHG

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Notes 1 European myths about Russia and Russian myths about Europe are in a constant dia ORJXH LQ ZKLFK HDFK UHIHUV WR WKH RWKHU 7KLV GLDORJXH EHWZHHQ P\WKV LV LWVHOI D VXEMHFWRIP\WKL¿FDWLRQ$FFRUGLQJWR(0HOHWLQVNLL¶VWKHRU\RIP\WKVDVXEMHFWLQ RXUFDVH5XVVLDLVLQD¿UVWVWHSUHPRYHGIURPLWVFRQWH[W,QWKHVHFRQGVWHSWKLVLVR ODWLRQPHDQVWKHGDPDJHRUGHVWUXFWLRQRIWKHVXEMHFW7KHVXEMHFWLVKRZHYHUWUDQV IRUPHGDQGWKHUHIRUHVDYHGLQWKHP\WK¶VWKLUGVWHS7KHVXEMHFWUHWXUQVZLWKDKLJKHU VWDWXVLQWKHIRXUWKVWHSRIWKLVSURFHVVRIP\WKL¿FDWLRQLQZKLFKWKHFRVPRVGHIHDWV FKDRV 7KH GLDORJXH RI P\WKV EHWZHHQ 5XVVLD DQG (XURSH DOVR WDNHV SODFH LQ WKHVH four steps.   ,WLVLQWHUHVWLQJWKDWDFFRUGLQJWR/HPEHUJLWLVHVSHFLDOO\WUDYHOOLWHUDWXUHZKLFKFRQ ¿UPVWKHFRQFHSWLRQRIWKH1RUWKEHFDXVH:ROIIDOVREDVHVKLVVWXG\DERYHDOORQWKLV JHQUH   +HUPDQQ +HVVH ZULWHV LQ  /W]HOHU   LQ µ7KH %URWKHU .DUDPDVRY >sic@ RU 7KH'HPLVHRI(XURSH¶WKDW.DUDPD]RY¶VLGHDOLVDQµ$VLDQRFFXOWLGHDO¶,WLVEHJLQ QLQJWRµFRQVXPHWKHVSLULWRI(XURSH¶)RUKLPWKH$VLDQLVµWKHFKDRWLFZLOGGDQ JHURXVDPRUDO¶   7KHSODFHRI5XVVLDWKH(DVW LVJHQHUDOO\WKHSODFHRIGHPRQLVDWLRQZKLOHWKHLGHDO LVHG$VLDH[WHQGVWRRWKHUFXOWXUHVH[FHSWLRQVDUH%DDGHU++HVVH VXFKDV,QGLDRU DVSLULWXDO&KLQD/W]HOHU 7KLV$VLDDSSHDUVDVDUHDODOWHUQDWLYHWRDGHF adent Europe.   ,W LV LQWHUHVWLQJ WR QRWH WKDW 'DQLOHYVNLL ERUURZV WKH WHUP µFXOWXUDO KLVWRULFDO W\SH¶ IURP*HUPDQ\IURP+HLQULFK5FNHUW/W]HOHU    7KHUHLVHYHQDKLQWRIWKHEHDULQ'DQLOHYVNLL ZKHQKHDOOXGHVWR5XVVLD LQWHUPVRIWKHEHDU¶VµHQRUPRXVQHVV¶µnedorosl’ v gromadnych razmerach¶    7KLVWZRIROGLQWHUPHGLDU\IXQFWLRQLVQRWPHQWLRQHGE\0%DVVLQRURWKHUV   ,QFRQWUDVWWRWKLVVHH*HRIIUH\+RVNLQJ¶VWKHVLVNation und Imperium; 1552–1917. %HUOLQ6LHGOHUSDVVLP   7KH µ*HUPDQ P\WK RI WKH (DVW¶ /HPEHUJ    RVFLOODWHV EHWZHHQ WKUHDWHQLQJ EDUEDULDQLVPDQGD\RXWKZLWKDSURPLVLQJIXWXUH7KRPDV0DQQLQ/W]HOHU  FDOOV7ROVWR\¶Vµ$VLDQLVP¶µDQWL3HWULQHXU5XVVLDQ±KRVWLOHWRFLYLOLVDWLRQLQ VKRUWEHDUOLNH¶LELG 

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Bibliography %DVVLQ 0   µ5XVVLD EHWZHHQ (XURSH DQG $VLD 7KH ,GHRORJLFDO &RQVWUXFWLRQ RI *HRJUDSKLFDO6SDFH¶Slavic Review± %DVVLQ0 µ$VLD¶LQ5]KHYVN\1HG  The Cambridge Companion to Modern Russian Culture&DPEULGJH&DPEULGJH8QLYHUVLW\3UHVV± %DVVLQ 0   µ0\VOLW¶ SURVWUDQVWYRP (XUDVLD DQG (WKQR7HUULWRULDOLW\ 3RVW6RYLHW 0DSV¶Wiener Slawistischer Almanach± 'DQLOHYVNLL1 Rossiia i Evropa6W3HWHUVEXUJ,]GDW*ODJRO¶>XD@ *UHHQIHOG /   Nationalism: Five Roads to Modernity &DPEULGJH 0$ +DUYDUG 8QLYHUVLW\3UHVV *XUD$9 Simvolika zhivotnych v slavianskoi narodnoi traditsii0RVFRZ,QGULN +DUW 35   µ7KH :HVW¶ LQ 5]KHYVN\ 1 HG  The Cambridge Companion to Modern Russian Culture&DPEULGJH&DPEULGJH8QLYHUVLW\3UHVV± +RVNLQJ* µ7KH5XVVLDQ1DWLRQDO0\WK5HSXGLDWHG¶LQ+RVNLQJ*DQG6FK|S ÀLQ*HGV Myths and Nationhood/RQGRQ5RXWOHGJH± .DQWRU9 ‘. . .Est’ evropeiskaia derzhava, Rossiia: trudnyj put’ k civilizacii; istoriosofskie ocherki0RVFRZ5RVVSơQ .LUHHYVN\,9 Izbrannye stat’i0RVFRZ6RYUHPHQQLN .OMXFKHYVN\92 Polnoe sobranie sochinenii9RO0RVFRZ0\VO¶ .OXJ( µ'DV³DVLDWLVFKH´5XVVODQGhEHUGLH(QWVWHKXQJHLQHVHXURSlLVFKHQ9RU XUWHLOV¶Historische Zeitschrift± /HPEHUJ+ µ=XU(QWVWHKXQJGHV2VWHXURSDEHJULIIVLP-K9RP³1RUGHQ´]XP ³2VWHQ´(XURSDV¶Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas ± /RWPDQ -0   µ=HLFKHQ XQG =HLFKHQV\VWHP LQ %H]XJ DXI GLH 7\SRORJLH GHU UXV VLVFKHQ .XOWXU  ELV -DKUKXQGHUW ¶ LQ /RWPDQ -0 HG  Kunst als Sprache, /HLS]LJ5HFODP± /W]HOHU 30   Die Schriftsteller und Europa: Von der Romantik bis zur Gegenwart0XQLFKDQG=ULFK3LSHU 0HOHWLQVNLL(0 Poetika mifa0RVND9RVWRFKQDMD/LWHUDWXUD5$1 0F'DQLHO7 The Agony of the Russian Idea3ULQFHWRQ1-3ULQFHWRQ8QLYHUVLW\ 3UHVV 3XWL(YUD]LL Russkaia intelligenciia i sud’by Rossii0RVFRZ5XVVNDLD.QLJD 6FKOHJHO )ULHGULFK  Über die Sprache und Weisheit der Indier ein Beitrag zur Begründung der Alterthumskunde; nebst metrischen Uebersetzungen indischer Gedichte+HLGHOEHUJ0RKUXQG=LPPHU 6FK|SÀLQ* µ7KH)XQFWLRQVRI0\WKDQG7D[RQRP\RI0\WKV¶LQ+RVNLQJ* DQG6FK|SÀLQ*HGV Myths and Nationhood/RQGRQ+XUVW± 6FK|SÀLQ * DQG:RRG 1 HGV    In Search for Central Europe 2[IRUG 3ROLW\ 3UHVV 6FKXO]H:HVVHO0 µ=XP2N]LGHQWYHUVWlQGQLVGHUUXVVLVFKHQ6WDDWVHOLWHXQGGHV UXVVLVFKHQ$GHOVLQGHU=HLW3HWHUV,¶LQ'LHWULFK8DQG:LQNOHU0 HGV Okzidentbilder, Konstruktionen und Wahrnehmungen /HLS]LJ /HLS]LJHU 8QLYHUVLWlWVYHUODJ ±

  W. Koschmal 7UXEHW]NR\16 Russland – Europa – Asien: Ausgewählte Schriften zur Kulturwissenschaft9LHQQD9HUODJGHUgVWHUUHLFKLVFKHQ$NDGHPLHGHU:LVVHQVFKDIWHQ :ROII/ Inventing Eastern Europe: The Map of Civilization on the Mind of the Enlightenment6WDQIRUG6WDQIRUG8QLYHUVLW\3UHVV :RUWPDQ 56   From Peter the Great to the Death of Nicholas I, Scenarios of Power: Myth and Ceremony in the Russian MonarchyYRO,,1HZ+DYHQ3ULQFHWRQ 8QLYHUVLW\3UHVV

7

Myths and democratic attitudes in Poland and Russia An intermedial comparison Alexander Wöll

7KHQDPHVRIKXQGUHGVRIULYHUVDUHZRYHQLQWRWKHWH[W,WKLQNLWÀRZV James Joyce to Harriet Shaw Weaver1 Poetry – the short-circuiting of meanings between words, the sudden regeneration of original myths. Bruno Schulz, Mythologisation of reality2

Among Slavic countries, Russia and Poland are usually regarded as the two cultures in which mythologization and stereotyping are particularly prevalent.3 While stereotypes are clearly structured along sharply delineated axiological lines (black-and-white, good-and-evil), myths are more complex: they conceal the causal origins of those people and actions that are key to a nation’s selfGH¿QLWLRQ DQG LGHQWLW\ 8QOLNH topoi ZKLFK DUH ¿[HG DQG XQLYHUVDO LPDJHV RI KXPDQFXOWXUHP\WKVDUHWLHGWRVSHFL¿FFXOWXUHV4 Thomas Grob’s contribution to the present volume shows that a clear distinction should be made between elementary or religious myths (“primary myths”) and narrative myths (“secondary myths”).5 This essay does not focus on histories of creation or of gods; rather, it brings into view a “secondary level” in which archetypes afford opportunities IRU LGHQWL¿FDWLRQ WR LQWHUSUHW H[LVWHQFH RQ D OLWHUDU\ RU QDUUDWLYH OHYHO 6XFK RSSRUWXQLWLHVIRULGHQWL¿FDWLRQFDQXOWLPDWHO\DPRXQWWRFROOHFWLYHworldviews and philosophies of life. It is thus very important not to amalgamate the concept of myth with groupVSHFL¿F LGHRORJHPV >  SDUWLDO LGHRORJLHV@ 7KH FRQFHSW RI ³LGHRORJ\´ IURP Greek eidos, appearance or form or type, and logos ZRUG >FDQ DOVR PHDQ WKRXJKW VSHHFK UHDVRQ SULQFLSOH RU ORJLF@  HPHUJHG GXULQJ WKH FRXUVH RI WKH period of Enlightenment, which aimed at overcoming superstitions, fallacies, prejudices, and myths that all served medieval rulers to legitimize their power. Placing itself in the service of enlightenment, a critique of ideology attempts to demonstrate that ideology strives to elevate to general interest that which in actual fact only serves one part of society which is either dominant or aims at dominance.6 Liberating ideologies from intrinsic contradictoriness becomes possible in part by blanking out opposing notions, points of view, and experiences.

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For the most part, ideologies claim the truthfulness of their premises; hence they posit certain theses, dogmas, or basic ideas in axiomatic terms. Totalitarian political ideologies, laying all-encompassing claims to the truth, often reveal elements of mythologization, historical misrepresentation, disavowals of the truth, DQG GLVFULPLQDWLRQ DJDLQVW FRPSHWLQJ QRWLRQV 8QOLNH LGHRORJLHV KRZHYHU P\WKVHPERG\DIIHFWLYHVWDWHVWKDWVXEVHTXHQWO\UHPDLQXQWRXFKHGE\UHÀHFWLRQ and commentary. Modern myths as such assume importance for the present to the extent that they confer an irrational-supernatural aura upon the mytholoJL]HG REMHFW WKH\ UHSUHVHQW WKHUHE\ ³GHLI\LQJ´ LW LQ D ¿JXUDWLYH VHQVH 9HUEDO myths should be set apart as narrative myths in analysing the other, related modes (pictorial, ritual, musical, cinematic) of human expression and communiFDWLRQ%\GH¿QLWLRQsagas are short narratives of objectively untrue, extrasensory, fantastic events, meant as accounts of the truth that presuppose their audience’s faith. In almost all cases, however, they lack the constitutive element of a myth, namely the intervention of a supernatural, metaphysical force in everyday, secular human affairs. Moreover, they are mostly conceived and handed GRZQIRUDVSHFL¿FSROLWLFDOSV\FKRORJLFDORUVRFLDOSXUSRVH  7KLVFKDSWHUMX[WDSRVHVD3ROLVKSRHPZLWKD5XVVLDQ¿OP7KHIRUPHURSHUDWHV ZLWK ZRUGV WKH ODWWHU FKLHÀ\ ZLWK LPDJHV DQG JHVWXUHV ,Q D VHQVH WKHVH pictorial and linguistic levels are co-dependent. Harmut Heuermann notes that myths render in language (make poetic) that which rites celebrate (through gestures, dance, pantomimic dramatization), and vice-versa. For magicalmythical consciousness, the linguistic gesture is the natural counterpart of ritual gesture, just as the sacral act requires sacred narrative to explain and legitimize itself. The act of safeguarding both the natural and social orders presupposes that what the gods or ancestors originally created is renewed through both ritual action and the myth as word. Rites would remain ineffective if they were not based on the explanations conferred upon them by myth, just as myths would remain “theory” if they were not associated with ritual action.7 +DQV %OXPHQEHUJ KDV REVHUYHG WKDW WKH FUHDWLRQ RI P\WKLFDO VLJQL¿FDQFH involves a desire to develop a “structure against the insufferableness of time and space”.8 “Mythogenesis” VLJQL¿HVWKHWUDQVFHQGLQJRIWKHH[SHULHQFHRIQHJDWLYity to attain such structuring. For Blumenberg, the opportunity for UHP\WKL¿FDtion depends precisely on the absence of history, and on a hostility towards it, since the loss or suppression of the historical consciousness of time favours the validity claim of myth.97KXVP\WKV¿UVWRIDOORSSRVHinnovation and renewal, two popular concepts these days.10 Below, I shall examine how myth and innovation are related in selected works of Polish and Russian culture in order to frame a comparison of Poland and Russia. This cultural-typological comparison aims to reveal how Poland valorizes innovation and Russia valorizes renewal, and how these cultures differ in their perceptions and evaluation of the new. Such analysis will afford insight into the different notions of democracy and

Myths and democracy in Poland and Russia 143 myth that live on in both cultures, particularly since Russia’s mythological pictorial traditions are fundamentally distinct from Poland’s.  $VD¿UVWVWHS,VKDOORIIHUDFORVHUHDGLQJRIWZRWH[WVD3ROLVKSRHPDQG then a Russian one, before conducting two media analyses. Then I shall draw certain conclusions about culture, based on a Polish comparison of a text with an DUWLQVWDOODWLRQDQGDFRQWUDVWLQJ5XVVLDQFRPSDULVRQRIDWH[WZLWKD¿OP

0LURQ%LDáRV]HZVNLKaruzela z madonnami (Carousel with madonnas) The following section examines Karuzela z madonnami, a poem by the Polish ZULWHU 0LURQ %LDáRV]HZVNL ±  7KH ³FDURXVHO´ FDQ EH YLHZHG DV DQ image of the democratic exchange between high and popular culture, between the elite and the masses.11 7KH¿JXUHULGLQJRQWKHFDURXVHOLVLQDUHVWLQJSRVLtion. It moves while sitting. Subject to the intoxication induced by rotation, what WKH¿JXUHEHKROGVUHFXUVLQVKRUWLQWHUYDOV0RGHUQLW\KDVEHHQGH¿QHGWKXVWLPH and again – we should not ride on the carousel, but set out for new shores. Riding on a carousel, and thus experiencing the never-ending recurrence of the same, which can be associated with “myth” and its circular structure, never became unfashionable despite or precisely because of this ideology, which doubtlessly dominated the twentieth century. What value does a mid-twentieth century Polish poem attach to repetition and renewal? Karuzela z madonnami Wsiadajcie, madonny madonny 'REU\NV]HĞFLRNRQQ\FK    ĞFLRNRQQ\FK .RQLHZLV]ąNRS\WDPL  QDG]LHPLą One w brykach na postoju  MXĪGU]HPLą .DĪGDEU\NDPDORZDQD w trzy ogniste farbki ,WU]\VąNRĔVNLHPDĞFL  RGVX¿WX  RGGĊEX od marchwi. 'UJQĊá\PDGRQQ\ I orszak konny 5XV]\á]NRS\WD /DWDGRNRáD Gramofonowa 3á\WD Taka  Sá\WD

Carousel with madonnas Come aboard, madonnas, Madonnas $ERDUGWKHFDUULDJHVGUDZQE\VL[KRUVHV    UVHV 7KHKRUVHVKDQJZLWKWKHLUKRRIV  DERYHWKHJURXQG In those carriages that stand still  WKH\DUHDOUHDG\VOXPEHULQJ (DFKFDUULDJHEHDUV three blazing colours $QGWKHKLGHVFRPHLQWKUHHFRORXUV  IURPWKH\HOORZHGFDURXVHOFHLOLQJ  IURPWKHRDNWUHH from the carrot. 7KHPDGRQQDVWUHPEOH And the harnessed team %XUVWVVXGGHQO\LQWRDWURW 7KHJUDPRSKRQH record WXUQV What a  UHFRUG

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0LJDMąZNUąJDQJOH]\JU]\Z ,ODPEUHNLQ\VLRGHá ,JRUHMąFHZ]RU\EU\N Kwiecisto-laurkowe. $ZNDĪGHMEU\FHYLVjYLV Madonna i madonna W nieodmienionej pozie tkwi Od dziecka odchylona ±ELDáHNRQLH – bryka – czarne konie – bryka – rude konie – bryka 0DJQL¿NDW

7KHWUHVVHVRIPDQHVÀDVKLQWKHGDQFH circle $QGVRGRWKHSRPPHOVRIWKHVDGGOHV $QGVRGRWKHEOD]LQJSDWWHUQVRQWKH carts Floral felicitations. $QGLQHDFKFDUVLWYLVjYLV Madonna beside madonna Poised unchanged Turned askance from the child ±ZKLWHKRUVHV – carriages – black horses – carriages – red horses – carriages 0DJQL¿FDW

A one w Leonardach min, In Leonardo’s miens, W obrotach Rafaela, In Raphael’s gyrations, :RNUąJá\FKRJQLDFKZNODWNDFKOLQ ,QURXQGFLUFOHVRI¿UHLQFDJHVPDGHRI rope, :SU]HGPLHĞFLDFKLQLHG]LHODFK ,QVXEXUEVDQGRQ6XQGD\V ,ZNDĪGHMEU\FHYLVjYLV $QGLQHDFKFDUVLWYLVjYLV Madonna i madonna. Madonna beside madonna. ,QLHZLDGRPRNWyUDĞSL $QGQRRQHNQRZVZKLFKLVDVOHHS A która jest natchniona And which ecstatic – szóstka koni – six horses – one – they – szóstka koni – six horses – one – they – szóstka koni – six horses – one – they =DNUĊFRQH 7XUQLQJURXQGDQGURXQG I coraz wolniej karuzela Puszcza refren I peryfe rafa elickie madonny przed  PLHĞFLD Z\PLHQLDMą  NRQQHSLĊWUR

And the carousel turns ever more slowly The refrain runs And periph rapha elite Madonnas On  KDQG 0RYH  WRDQRWKHUWLHURIKRUVHV

Myths and democracy in Poland and Russia 145 –––––– Wsiadajcie  ZV]HĞFLR   “Obroty rzeczy 1956”

––––––– Aboard,  JHWRQQXPEHUVL[   “Turns of Things 1956”

The poem’s sound and rhythm affords the reader the experience of riding on a FDURXVHOLQDVPDOOSURYLQFLDO3ROLVKWRZQ7KH¿UVWVWDQ]DFORVHVE\FRPSDULQJ the turning carousel with a gramophone record. Zygmunt Konieczny’s chanson YHUVLRQ RPLWV WKHVH ¿YH OLQHV RU WR SXW LW GLIIHUHQWO\ WKH VRQJ FRQYH\V WKLV accompanying music directly to the human ear and so does not require the lyrics.  7KHFDURXVHOULGHLVRQHH[DPSOHRIKRZ%LDáRV]HZVNLFUHDWHVHYHUQHZFRQtexts for words and groups of words: “Puszcza refren” (thus the refrain), it says in the poem. Sentence structures, words, and images are repeated refrain-like: ±ELDáHNRQLH – bryka – czarne konie – bryka – rude konie – bryka

±ZKLWHKRUVHV – carriages – black horses – carriages – red horses – carriages

The alternation of white-, black-, and red-painted horses with the carriages is repeated like a refrain. The colours become blurred as the carousel picks up speed. The yellowed carousel ceiling, the bronze oak tree, and the fox-coloured carrot all blend into one colour during the ride. While this colour remains undescribed, it gradually emerges through representation: the madonnas appear to be ÀRDWLQJ RQ D KLJKHU SODQH ZKLFK H[SODLQV WKH DEVHQFH RI FRORXUV DV WKH SRHP continues: – szóstka koni – one – szóstka koni – one – szóstka koni – one =DNUĊFRQH

– six horses – they – six horses – they – six horses – they 7XUQLQJURXQGDQGURXQG

Rereading the poem’s rhythms and repetitions aloud several times recalls the chanting customary of rap and hip hop music, which plays an important role in FRQWHPSRUDU\3ROLVKOLWHUDWXUHVXFKDVLQ'RURWD0DVáRZVND¶VZRUN7KHVPDOO FRORXUHGZRRGHQFDURXVHOKRUVHVDUHPRXQWHGRQSLYRWV7KHLUKRRIVÀRDWDERYH the ground, the horses being attached to the carousel ceiling. Madonnas carved in the style of Leonardo and Raphael stand facing each other in the three carriages, each drawn by three teams of horses.  %LDáRV]HZVNLRIIHUVXVDQHSLJRQLFLPLWDWLRQRIKLJKDUW±PDGRQQDVÀRDWLQJ

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above the ground on a small-town merry-go-round. Raphael’s and Leonardo’s madonnas have given way to the craft madonnas of everyday culture. And so has WKH 0DJQL¿FDW RULJLQDOO\ LW ZDV VXQJ LQ FKXUFK OLWXUJ\ DQG \HW LW DOVR IRUPV part of the high musical culture of Bach, Penderecki, and other composers. Here, WKH 0DJQL¿FDW KDV EHFRPH PXVLF SOD\HG E\ D JUDPRSKRQH UHFRUG IRU 6XQGD\ entertainment. The echo in the third and fourth lines refers to this echoing of high culture in its everyday counterpart: 'REU\NV]HĞFLRNRQQ\FK     ĞFLRNRQQ\FK

$ERDUGWKHFDUULDJHVGUDZQE\VL[KRUVHV     UVHV

The Polish echo fails to make sense on the poem’s verbal surface, but just as in painting it introduces semantic polysemy: on the one hand, the poem describes DVSHFL¿FFDURXVHOULGHHQMR\HGE\DPRWKHUDQGKHUFKLOGRQD6XQGD\RXWLQJ but on the other, the madonnas simply become beautiful women. Without any children, these damsels and the carousel proprietor put the horses through their paces. Such erotic variants have been taken up by the bestselling Polish writer Tomasz Raczek – and also by pop culture. Contrary to these concrete meanings of a young woman with or without child, WKH PDGRQQDV LQ WKH SRHP FRXOG DOVR EH GHSLFWLRQV RI WKH 9LUJLQ 0DU\ 5DShael’s Sistine Madonna plays with combining various different movements to afford perception of the new, which transcends the depicted. Raphael’s painting consists of several planes. This procedure resembles the positioning of horses on several planes in the fourth line from the bottom in %LDáRV]HZVNL¶V SRHP 7KH KRUVHV DSSHDU WR KDYH EHHQ PRXQWHG DW GLIIHUHQW heights, and the riders are able to hold on to the fastening rods of the carousel’s structure. In Raphael, the boundaries between the different imaginary spaces are cleverly blurred. The viewer beholds at the top what looks like a real curtain together with an entirely unheavenly twisted curtain rail. The claim to reality ODLGE\WKHFXUWDLQFRQIHUVLWVHOIXSRQWKH¿JXUHVSRVLWLRQHGRQWKHVDPHSODQH This produces a reality effect similar to that induced by the gracious females riding on their horses on different planes.12  ,QVLPSOLVWLFWHUPV5DSKDHO¶V9LUJLQLVSRVLWLRQHGQRWLQWKHZRUOGEHKLQGWKH window but rather in the window itself. She appears to descend from a heavenly space, through the picture plane, out into the real space in which the painting is hung. She can no longer be viewed through the window of the painting. She steps out of the picture plane to enter into communication with the viewer. Such revalorization comes from securalizing and making her profane. The painting limits itself not merely to static thematic representation, but EHFRPHVDFWLYHDQGÀH[LEOHZLWKLQLWVUDQJHRISRVVLELOLWLHVDVDWZRGLPHQVLRQDO SDQHO%LDáRV]HZVNL¶VSRHPDSSHDUVLQDFROOHFWLRQHQWLWOHGObroty rzeczy – Turns of Things7KHFROOHFWLRQDOVRSUHVHQWVDQXPEHURISHWUL¿HG3ROLVKVD\LQJVZKLFK %LDáRV]HZVNL GLVVRFLDWHV IURP WKHLU FRQYHQWLRQDO PHDQLQJ DQG UHFRQWH[WXDOL]HV them. Painting and literary techniques are applied alongside each other.13

Figure 7.1 Tomasz Raczek: .DUX]HOD ] 0DGRQQDPL  EDUG]R ]DNUĊFRQ\FK NRELHW LOOXVWU 0DUFLQ 6]F]\JLHOVNL  1LHSRUĊW ,QVW\WXW :\GDZQLF]\ ³/DWDUQLN´ 2003. Book cover.

Figure 7.2 Pop Madonna. Photo and model: Brigitta Erdödy, Munich, 2007.

Figure 7.3 Raffaello Sanzio o Santi: La Madonna Sistina (1512/13), Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Dresden. Permission: Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Dresden.

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Figure 7.4 Jakob Sztaba: Raffael. Die Sixtinische Madonna. Eine gemalte himmlische Vision. Seminar paper submitted at the Hochschule für Gestaltung, Karlsruhe.

5REHUW5XPDV0DWND%RVND±RU]HFKMDVQ\ĞUHGQLFLHPQ\ (Virgin Mary – ZDOQXWOLJKWPHGLXPGDUN It is a small step from such close readings to interpreting visual art. This section shifts from the medium of writing to the image and its iconographic message. 7KHZRUNEHORZ)LJXUH IHDWXUHGLQWKHH[KLELWLRQ³2JOąGU]HF]\6LFKW der Dinge” at the Regensburg Ostdeutsche Galerie14DQGLQ/DV9HJDVRYHUOHDI Figure 7.6).  ,PDJHV DQG VWDWXHV RI WKH 9LUJLQ 0DU\ DUH XELTXLWRXV LQ 3RODQG :RRGHQ ¿JXUHVLQSDUWLFXODUVHUYHWRWUDQVSRUWV\PEROLFDQGHPRWLRQDOPHDQLQJWKDWKDV JURZQRYHUWLPH7KH¿JXUHVRI0DU\E\WKH'DQ]LJYLVXDODUWLVW5REHUW5XPDV are no longer made of wood, but of plaster (which is more apt to break). While 5XPDVFLWHVDIDPLOLDUIRUPDQGSRVWXUHRIWKHEHDXWLIXOKH¿OOVWKHLQVLGHVRIKLV ¿JXUHVZLWKDGLIIHUHQWPDWHULDO7KHVHPRXOGVDUHVXEMHFWHGWREUXWDOWUHDWPHQW Rumas immerses them in water, douses them with industrial paint, showers them with coins, and explodes them from within using plastic. And yet whatever he GRHVWRWKHVH¿JXUHVWKH\DUHQRWGHSULYHGRIWKHLUFKDUPDQGPHVVDJH7KHUDZ alienated materials that Rumas applies are themselves timeless. Rumas’s repreVHQWDWLRQVRIWKH9LUJLQ0DU\KRZHYHUDUHHPEOHPVRIWKHHIIHFWRIWLPH±KHQFH DOVRRIIRUJHWWLQJDQGUHQHZDO$VLQ%LDáRV]HZVNL¶VSRHPWKH\DUHSXOOHGEDFN LQWR WLPH 6R UDWKHU WKDQ GHVWUR\LQJ ZKDW DUH FRQYHQWLRQDOL]HG ¿JXUHV RI WKH 9LUJLQ0DU\5XPDVUHVXVFLWDWHVWKHPIURPWKHLUSHWUL¿HGVWDWH

Myths and democracy in Poland and Russia 151

Figure 7.5 Robert Rumas: 0DWND %RVND ± RU]HFK MDVQ\ĞUHGQLFLHPQ\ 9LUJLQ 0DU\ ± EULJKWQXW9LUJLQ0DU\±PHGLXPQXW9LUJLQ0DU\±GDUNQXWWKUHH objects, each 220  50 FPDUWL¿FLDOPDUEOHVWDWXHVHOHFWULFLQVWDOODWLRQ RLOSDLQWFDQV>RLOSDLQWVXVHGLQ3ROLVKLQVWLWXWLRQVSULYDWHKRXVHVLQRUGHUWR FRYHU DQG UHQRYDWH ZDOOV ÀRRUV GRRUV ZLQGRZ IUDPHV FKXUFK EHQFKHV HWF@  3KRWR .U]\V]WRI ,]GHEVNL FROOHFWLRQ RI WKH 1DWLRQDO 0XVHXP LQ Poznan. In: 2JOąGU]HF]\6LFKWGHU'LQJH. Miscellany published by the Ostdeutsche Galerie Regensburg 2005, p. 49. Permission: Robert Rumas.

2VLS0DQGHO¶VKWDPɍɦɵɜɚɥɫɹɧɨɱɶɸɧɚɞɜɨɪɟ(I was ZDVKLQJRXWVLGHLQWKHGDUNQHVV The effect of time and oblivion lets us take up works of Russian culture where WKH LPDJH RI WKH 9LUJLQ 0DU\ DSSHDUV WR SOD\ D OHVV SURPLQHQW UROH WKDQ LQ Poland. And yet Russian culture is imbued with profoundly religious sentiment, although other traditions are called upon as well. I should like to illustrate this point with a poem by Osip Mandel’shtam from 1921:15 ɍɦɵɜɚɥɫɹɧɨɱɶɸɧɚɞɜɨɪɟ± Ɍɜɟɪɞɶɫɢɹɥɚɝɪɭɛɵɦɢɡɜɟɡɞɚɦɢ Ɂɜsɡɞɧɵɣɥɭɱ±ɤɚɤɫɨɥɶɧɚɬɨɩɨɪɟ ɋɬɵɧɟɬɛɨɱɤɚɫɩɨɥɧɵɦɢɤɪɚɹɦɢ

,ZDVZDVKLQJRXWVLGHLQWKHGDUNQHVV WKHVN\EXUQLQJZLWKURXJKVWDUV DQGWKHVWDUOLJKWVDOWRQDQD[HEODGH 7KHFROGRYHUÀRZVWKHEDUUHO

Figure 7.6 Robert Rumas: MadonnaIURPWKHF\FOHHQWLWOHG³/DV9HJDV´LQZKLFK WKH¿JXUHRI0DGRQQDLV³FU\LQJZLWKJROGHQFRLQV´PL[HGWHFKQLTXHSRO\ester, coins, laminatem board, electric installation, plexi box). Photo: Maciej Kosycarz, private collection. Permission: Robert Rumas.

Myths and democracy in Poland and Russia 153 ɇɚɡɚɦɨɤɡɚɤɪɵɬɵɜɨɪɨɬɚ ɂɡɟɦɥɹɩɨɫɨɜɟɫɬɢɫɭɪɨɜɚ± ɑɢɳɟɩɪɚɜɞɵɫɜɟɠɟɝɨɯɨɥɫɬɚ ȼɪɹɞɥɢɝɞɟɨɬɵɳɟɬɫɹɨɫɧɨɜɚ

7KHJDWH¶VORFNHG 7KHODQG¶VJULPDVLWVFRQVFLHQFH ,GRQ¶WWKLQNWKH\¶OO¿QGWKHQHZ weaving, ¿QHUWKDQWUXWKDQ\ZKHUH

Ɍɚɟɬɜɛɨɱɤɟɫɥɨɜɧɨɫɨɥɶɡɜɟɡɞɚ ɂɜɨɞɚɫɬɭɞsɧɚɹɱɟɪɧɟɟ ɑɢɳɟɫɦɟɪɬɶɫɨɥsɧɟɟɛɟɞɚ ɂɡɟɦɥɹɩɪɚɜɞɢɜɟɣɢɫɬɪɚɲɧɟɟ

6WDUVDOWLVPHOWLQJLQWKHEDUUHO LF\ZDWHULVWXUQLQJEODFNHU GHDWK¶VJURZLQJSXUHUZDWHUVDOWLHU WKHHDUWK¶VPRYLQJQHDUHUWRWUXWKDQGWR dread

ɈɫɢɩɆɚɧɞɟɥɶɲɬɚɦ

7UDQVE\:60HUZLQDQG&ODUHQFH Brown, 1974)

The poem initially appears to develop what is a concrete image of a farmyard: the bolted gate denies access to the domestic sphere; night has fallen and a sheet shines brightly in the moonlight; the water blackens ever more, sadness prevails, and all is heavy and entrapped . . .  7KHD[HHYRNHVWKH5XVVLDQLGLRP³ɦɭɠɢɤɜɡɚɥɫɹɡɚɬɨɩɨɪ´³7KHSHDVDQW picks up the axe”). This idiom also refers to political, pogrom-like revolts in the FRXQWU\7KHD[HPRUHRYHUUHFDOOVERWKWKHSXEOLFH[HFXWLRQRI3XJDFKsY±WKH peasant leader and bogus tsar – and Raskol’nikov’s slaying of an old woman with an axe in Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment.  7KH SRHP FRQMRLQV WKLV V\PERO RI HYLO IURP 'RVWRHYVN\¶V ¿FWLRQDO PLFURcosm with the sublimity abiding in the macrocosm. The salt on the axe commingles with the twinkling stars. Salt symbolizes old Russian customs of hospitality applying to the house and farm. In Russia, strangers are welcomed with bread and salt. In popular belief salt tossed by the right hand over the left shoulder is deemed to ward off the devil. In Mandel’shtam, the small butt standing in the yard mirrors the great macrocosm. Water freezes in the butt, and the stars mirrored therein become small, icy saline crystals. As the speaker washes himself in what constitutes an instance of obliteration and cleansing, he destroys the mirror image on the surface. The more powerfully the past is obliterated, the worse poverty becomes and the more VDOW\WHDUVDUHVKHGVHH³ɫɨɥsɧɟɟɛɟɞɚ´LQWKHSHQXOWLPDWHOLQH $VWKHVDOWGLVsolves, the domestic sphere and its old customs lose their protective function. In Slovo i kul’tura (“Word and Culture”), an essay he wrote in 1920, one year before ɍɦɵɜɚɥɫɹɧɨɱɶɸɧɚɞɜɨɪɟ, Mandel’shtam develops his notion of culture. On the linear axis of time, every culture is itself history. Mandel’shtam, however, discards such chronological notions of time.16 Identifying it with a destructive and devouring principle, he refers to it as “hungry time”. Irrespective of the nature of time, from which humankind can never escape in ontological terms, he is concerned with the elimination of history, that is, linear time. The change that WLPHHIIHFWVRQREMHFWVDQGZRUGVLVUHSUHVVHG8QOLNH5DSKDHO¶V9LUJLQ0DU\

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Mandel’shtam’s stars denote a static symbol that lies beyond the window in the UHPRWHGLVWDQFH±UDWKHUWKDQQHDUE\RQWKHEDOXVWUDGH7KHZRUOGLVEXWDUHÀHFtion of absolute values.17 Mandel’shtam draws upon the tradition in Russian philosophy established by Chaadaev. In his famous philosophical letters of 1829, Chaadaev developed the ideal of spatial synchronicity: This is an old truth, I know; and yet it still appears to be quite new for the most part in our fatherland. One of the saddest traits of our strange civilization is that we discover truths that have long become truisms in other places and even amongst those peoples that lag behind us in many respects. Rather this has to do with the fact that we have never proceeded hand in hand with other peoples; we belong to none of the large families of the human species; we belong neither to the West nor the East; and we dispose of nothing that has been handed down by either culture. Existing beyond time as it were, we KDYHUHPDLQHGXQWRXFKHGE\WKHXQLYHUVDOHGL¿FDWLRQRIWKHKXPDQVSHFLHV18 Culture is inhabited “beyond time”, as a constructed place. Meanings from different periods and eras converge in the habitable space of the word. In this context another aspect can be seen in Mandel’shtam’s poem: whereas he refers to Greek and Roman antiquity in his earlier poetry, the door to extra-Russian cultures is now bolted shut. The poem contains not one single foreign word and dwells entirely on a Russian theme.19  :KLFK FXOWXUDO GLIIHUHQFHV H[LVW EHWZHHQ 0DQGHO¶VKWDP DQG %LDáRV]HZVNL¶V carousel ride? Both awaken and remodify universal topoi. The Polish example emphasizes peripheral locations and their varicoloured, kitschy everyday life. In %LDáRV]HZVNL¶VWUDQVQDWLRQDOFDURXVHOULGHGLDFKURQLFLW\LVQRWREOLWHUDWHG)RUHLJQ words, such as “Anglaise” and “Lambrequin”, suggest an opening up of cultural space. While art brings forth existence in the childlike-playful carousel ride, motion gives rise to perception. Time as dynamic change generates meaning. Starting out from cubo-futurist art, the Russian formalists referred to this phenomenon as “sdvig”. Sdvig denotes in the broadest sense any interleaving or interlocking of two or more orders or their elements. In a more restricted sense, “sdvig” refers to the shifting of word boundaries.20  %LDáRV]HZVNLFORVHVKLVFDURXVHOSRHPZLWKQHDUSHUIHFWHQMDPEPHQWWRHIIHFW line breaks. Such graphic shifting of syllable breaks in the fourth and last stanza induces semantic shifts:21 Puszcza refren I peryfe rafa elickie madonny przed  PLHĞFLD

The refrain runs And periph rapha elite Madonnas On  KDQG

Myths and democracy in Poland and Russia 155 :\PLHQLDMą  NRQQHSLĊWUR

0RYH  WRDQRWKHUWLHURIKRUVHV

The ending of “peripheral” is absent in the Polish original. Enjambment abbreviates both “Raphael” and “peripheral”, which gives an impression of graphic and semantic rotation. Time is accelerated to such an extent that the reader only recognizes scraps of words, which are combined with new matter. 7KH PDGRQQDV QR ORQJHU KDYH D ¿[HG SODFH WKH\ QRZ H[LVW RQO\ LQ SHUSHWXDO motion. The re- and devalorization of horses riding either high or low becomes DQLQGLVWLQJXLVKDEOHÀRDWLQJ22 By contrast, “faktura” dominates Mandel’shtam’s poem as that which is made DQGVWDQGVXSULJKW7KLVLVKRZWKHIRUPDOLVWVGH¿QHGWKHWDQJLEOHTXDOLW\RIDZRUN of art as a spatial object.23:KLOH%LDáRV]HZVNLHPSKDVL]HVWKHWLPHERXQGQDWXUH of the carousel ride, Mandel’shtam broaches the timeless surface of the water butt ZKRVH VPRRWK VXUIDFH LV GHVWUR\HG E\ WKH ¿JXUH¶V DEOXWLRQ  7KH D[H LV RQH example of faktura. Like the stars, the axe is rendered timeless and made absolute. Whereas “sdvig” prevents anything from establishing itself as a symbol, faktura protects the symbols and their meanings. Old symbols stemming from another, dehistoricized time invade the world of readers and manipulate their ideologies.  $Q\ DWWHPSW WR ¿QG %LDáRV]HZVNL¶V OLJKWIRRWHG DQG FKHHUIXO WRQH LQ Mandel’shtam is to no avail. Mandel’shtam’s ɍɦɵɜɚɥɫɹɧɨɱɶɸɧɚɞɜɨɪɟsubstantiates Chaadaev’s claim that the concept of Russia is untranslatable and that Russia, moreover, can only be translated into its own images. Notably, this view is still held today.

Andrei Zviagintsev: Vozvrashchenie (The Return) /HW PH FORVH E\ WUDQVSRVLQJ WKH ¿QGLQJV RI WKH SUHYLRXV FORVH UHDGLQJV RQWR D FLQHPDWLF H[DPSOH WKH \RXQJ 5XVVLDQ ¿OPPDNHU $QGUHL =YLDJLQWVHY¶V ¿UVW ¿OPVozvrashchenie (The Return, 2003), whose characters – father, mother, and WZRVRQV±DUHDOOP\WKRORJLFDOO\LQÀDWHG¿JXUHV=YLDJLQWVHYLQWURGXFHVRFFLdental triadic thinking as a theme from the outset, though not with reference to the family alone, but as having a more profound mythical provenance: . . . simply the old trinity, taken over from the Christian theology, as the Christians had taken it from Plato. It was the mythical and magical triangle which from the time of Pythagoras and before had stood as a symbol of certainty and power. . . . Certainly the one-in-three, three-in-one of the Thesis, Antithesis, and Synthesis has had upon Marxists a compelling effect which it would be impossible to justify through reason.24 Vozvrashchenie takes up such mythological trinities and dualities, and examines the Russian cultural myth.25 It is the story of a father who returns to his family after twelve years. He emerges from the darkness of an aeonic time to enter his sons’ lives (who know him only from a single black-and-white photograph).

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Notably, the boys are looking for this very photograph in the attic on the day of their father’s homecoming. In doing so, they come across a Bible and open it WR D SDJH IHDWXULQJ D FRSSHU HQJUDYLQJ GHSLFWLQJ $EUDKDP¶V VDFUL¿FH RI ,VDDF This mythological theme – of unconditional obedience – subsequently runs WKURXJKWKHHQWLUH¿OP26  :KHQRQHJOLPSVHVWKHIDWKHUIRUWKH¿UVWWLPHXSRQKLVUHWXUQLWLVWKHLPDJH of a man lying on a bed with his feet projecting out towards the viewer. Zviagintsev has explained that the scene orients itself on the unusual perspective chosen by the Italian Renaissance artist Andrea Mantegna for his painting The Lamentation over the Dead Christ. Through such images Zviagintsev introduces the religious theme, and a preRFFXSDWLRQ ZLWK :HVWHUQ FXOWXUH LQWR WKH KHDUW RI KLV ¿OP27 Similarly to %LDáRV]HZVNLWKH¿OPKDVDWRQFHDQDOOHJRULFDODQGUHDOHIIHFWLQDOOLWVGHFLVLYH moments. The father introduces historical time into the world, or as Mircea Eliade observed: We may note that, just as modern man considers himself to be constituted by History, the man of the archaic societies declares that he is the result of a

Figure 7.7 Andrea Mantegna: Cristo Morto e tre dolenti/The Lamentation over the Dead Christ (c.1490; Tempera on canvas, 68  81 cm Pinacoteca di Brera, Milano). Permission: Pinacoteca di Brera.

Myths and democracy in Poland and Russia 157

Figure 7.8 Andrei Zviagintsev’s: Vozvrashchenie (The Return, 2003), movie picture.

certain number of mythical events. . . . While a modern man, though regardLQJ KLPVHOI DV WKH UHVXOW RI WKH FRXUVH RI 8QLYHUVDO +LVWRU\ GRHV QRW IHHO obliged to know the whole of it, the man in the archaic societies is not only obliged to remember mythical history but also to re-enact a large part of it SHULRGLFDOO\,WLVKHUHWKDWZH¿QGWKHJUHDWHVWGLIIHUHQFHEHWZHHQWKHPDQ of the archaic societies and modern man: the irreversibility of events, which is the characteristic trait of History for the latter, is not a fact to the former.28  $JDLQVWWKHEDFNGURSRIWKHIDWKHU¶VP\WKLFDOUHWXUQWKH¿OPRSHQVZLWKDWHVW of courage among adolescents, which Ivan, the youngest, fails. Only the vertiginous Ivan fails to jump into the water off the towering structure of a coastal dike.29 Quivering with cold and shame, he remains at the top of the structure until KLVPRWKHUFDOOVRXW³9DQMDP\VRQ´DUULYLQJWRVDYHKLPIURPKLVSUHGLFDPHQW She consoles him, soothes him with words and wraps him – as Raphael’s 0DGRQQD GRHV KHU FKLOG ± LQ KHU HPEUDFH ,YDQ KRZHYHU UHPDLQV PRUWL¿HG

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WKXV QXUWXULQJ D UHEHOOLRXV GH¿DQFH ZKLFK FU\VWDOOL]HV LQ KLV UHVSRQVH WR KLV IDWKHU 7LPH DQG DJDLQ ,YDQ PXVW PDNH KLV PRUWL¿FDWLRQ IRUJRWWHQ WKURXJK GH¿DQWJHVWXUHVVLJQDOOLQJKLVVHOIDVVHUWLYHQHVV+HUHWKHIDWKHUFDQEHVHHQWR HPERG\WKH:HVWKHHQWHUVWKHIDPLO\DVWKHQHZH[WUDQHRXVHOHPHQW+LV¿UVW appearance is a cinematic copy of Andrea Mantegna’s Dead Christ. The children cannot live up to their father’s new and harsh rules and demands. This might be understood as a new illustration of the struggle of Russian culture against the allegedly more aggressive West.30 The father’s wristwatch symbolizes the strictures of Western-rational time PDQDJHPHQW DQG GLVFLSOLQH 2Q RQH RFFDVLRQ ZKHQ WKH\ DUH RXW ¿VKLQJ WKH children, who cannot keep up with their adult father, are oblivious to time and UHWXUQKRPHWRRODWH7KLVHSLVRGHOHDGVWRWKHFDWDVWURSKLFFOLPD[RIWKH¿OP after having been brutally punished by his father, Ivan tries to kill him with an axe, but cannot muster the courage to do so. Instead he runs away, climbing the lighthouse. In an attempt to rescue his son, who suffers from vertigo, from this dangerous situation, the father falls off the lighthouse and dies. This event thus VLJQL¿HVWKDWWKHIDWKHU¶VUHWXUQLVFRPSOHWHGDQGDVLQ0DQGHO¶VKWDPWKHJDWH is bolted to prevent the father from leaving again under any circumstances. Following the father’s death, we see a three-minute sequence of the children’s return home. Vozvrashchenie closes with a shot of the children looking at the photographs they took on family trips and outings. In this sequence, these blackand-white photographs are faded in in a very calm and steady rhythm. Initially, YLHZHUVDSSHDUWRH[SHULHQFHDGpMjYXRIVRUWVDQG\HWQRWHIIHFWLYHO\VLQFHDOO

Figure 7.9 Andrei Zviagintsev: Vozvrashchenie (The Return, 2003), movie picture.

Myths and democracy in Poland and Russia 159 SLFWXUHV DUH PDUNHG E\ WKH IDWKHU¶V DEVHQFH 7KH ¿OP¶V ODVW VKRW KRZHYHU explodes diachronicity in a surprising – and startling – manner. It ushers in another period, one when Ivan was still a baby. This photograph shows the young father balancing Ivan on his arm.

Figure 7.10 Madonna Hodigitria (Madonna, showing the way). Painted by Brother Christopher, icon in the Church of the Studits Monastery. Photo and permission: Josef Schmitz.

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In iconographic terms, the father assumes the position and role of the “protecWLYHPRWKHU´$VVXFKWKLVFDQEHUHDGDVD¿QDOHPSKDVLVRIDQGFRXQWHULPDJH to, his merciless hardness. Echoing the story of Abraham and Isaac, Ivan calls out in his response to his father’s ultimate demand for obedience: “I could love \RX LI \RX ZHUH GLIIHUHQW´ 7KLV DUWLFXODWHV WKH QHHG IRU D QHZ ZD\ 7KH ¿OP IDLOVWRDI¿UPWKH5XVVLDQPRGHOEXWLQVWHDGUHYHDOVLWDVDSUREOHP,YDQKDG GHQLHGKLVIDWKHUDFFHVVWRWKHWRZHUE\EROWLQJWKHGRRU8QOLNHWKHPRWKHUDW the outset, the father cannot embrace his son; he falls to his death from the WRZHU¶VXSSHUGHFNZKLOHWU\LQJWRSUHYHQW,YDQIURPMXPSLQJ 7KH¿OP¶V¿QDO VKRWEUHDFKHVWKHP\WKRORJLFDOFLUFOHRIWKHLQLWLDODQG¿QDOWRZHUV,WSRLQWVWR another way. The icon shows a type of Madonna very widespread in Russia: the 9LUJLQDVD³VLJQSRVW´31 The icon indicates a linear path leading beyond mythical circles.32 At the end RI =YLDJLQWVHY¶V ¿OP WKH VWDWLF FRSSHU HQJUDYLQJ RI $EUDKDP DQG ,VDDF OHDGV over into a linear photographic sequence where each picture strives to establish itself in a timeless, absolute manner. The sequence of images, however, prevents this.33 Only one single paradigm of action abides: “hero” or “coward”. The fundamental trauma of Russian culture resides in such oppositions, that is, in its preoccupation with the vertiginous heights of the West. Russia’s authoritarian and hierarchical tradition is pitted against Poland’s dynamic democratic tradition. The icon breaks through the mythical circles drawn from tower to tower, bringing into view a linear path.34 Only at this point does a conscious exchange of roles become possible. The bolt securing the Raphaelite window between heaven and earth, between high and everyday culture, between West and East, is prized open.

Conclusions The above typological analysis of Polish and Russian culture has revealed a characteristic distinction: in Russia, elitist high culture is mostly strictly separated from everyday culture. Popular Russian folklore is also divorced from high culture – on account of Russia’s orientation to the West, which results in a traumatic state of feeling overwhelmed because the West tends to be quicker on its toes as regards most cultural innovations. Orientating itself towards the presumed “height” of Western culture, Russia constantly threatens to suffer a mythological relapse into this traumatic state and thereby into sealing itself off from the West. In its concept of the Eurasian, Russia appears to make a virtue of necessity (i.e. its alleged backwardness). In Russian culture, space rules over diachronic time, which is considered Western. The axe symbolizes the different shapes this break has assumed. The Polish examples examined here, however, endorse a different notion of culture: old art trails off into everyday culture. As time passes, what constitutes defamiliarized old art can be resuscitated as new work. The new thus upgrades and gives new value to what was previously considered worthless. Artistic inno-

Myths and democracy in Poland and Russia 161 YDWLRQWKXVFRQVLVWVRIWKHRQJRLQJUHGH¿QLWLRQRIWKHERXQGDU\OLQHEHWZHHQWKH “profane” – which has no value apparently – and “culture” – which is awarded value.35 The madonna symbolizes such renewal, which proceeds from revalorizing the everyday by making it profane and then attaching new meaning to it. $QGUHL =YLDJLQWVHY¶V ¿OP Vozvrashchenie is an instance of “mythopoeisis” in that it implicitly assimilates affective and collective experiences of culture.36 In %LDáRV]HZVNLE\FRQWUDVWDHVWKHWLFL]DWLRQLVVRIDUDGYDQFHGWKDWLWFURVVHVIURP the “terror” of basic mythical experience into the “play” of poetic composition.37 It is precisely this dynamic capability of changing hierarchical structures that enables democratic culture.

Notes 1 See Blumenberg, Hans: Arbeit am Mythos. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp 1979, 40.   ³3RH]MD±WRVąNUyWNLHVSLĊFLDVHQVXPLĊG]\VáRZDPLUDSWRZQDUHJHQHUDFMDSLHUZRWQ\FK PLWyZ´ 6FKXO] %UXQR ³0LW\]DFMD U]HF]\ZLVWRĞFL´ ,Q 6FKXO] % DQG -DU]ĊEVNL-Opowiadania wybór esejów i listów:URFáDZ2VVROLQHXP 3 See Schultze, Brigitte: “Mythen, Topoi, Kulturthemen und andere sinntragende Ordnungen in neueren Identitätsdebatten. Am Beispiel der russischen, polnischen und tschechischen Kultur”. In: Turk, Horst, Schultze, Brigitte and Simanowski, Roberto (eds): Kulturelle Grenzziehungen im Spiegel der Literaturen. Nationalismus, Regionalimus, Fundamentalismus. Göttingen: Wallstein 1998, 220–238. 4 Even more subtle distinctions apply here: Cultural themes are currently the subject of comprehensive discussion, such as the ongoing debate on “Eurasianism” (Evraziistvo) in Russia. Keywords have steered behaviour for centuries, such as the “sobornost’ ” principle, which is rooted in Orthodox religious beliefs. Key concepts, however, such as the notion of Moscow as a “Third Rome”, provide less scope for interpretation and development. Key scenarios are instances of historical decisions and turning points, such as the procedure involved in religious choice in “Nestor’s Chronicle”. Cultural terms DUH XVHG WR GHQRWH WKH VPDOOHVW FODVVL¿FDWRU\ RUGHUV among others, these include “dusha” (soul), “sud’ba” (fate), “toska” (desire, longing) or “poshlost’´ WULYLDOLW\ EDQDOLW\  DQG WKHLU VSHFL¿FDOO\ 5XVVLDQ FRQQRWDWLRQV 6HH 6FKXOW]H%ULJLWWH³6FKOVVHONRQ]HSWH7RSRL.XOWXUWKHPHQXQGDQGHUHNODVVL¿NDWRUische Ordnungen in der Russland-Debatte seit den achtziger Jahren”. In: Behring, Eva, Richter, Ludwig and Schwarz, Wolfgang (eds): Geschichtliche Mythen in den Literaturen und Kulturen Ostmittel- und Südosteuropas. Stuttgart: Steiner 1999, 33–52. 5 See Kolakowski, Leszek: Die Gegenwärtigkeit des Mythos. Trans. from Polish by P. Lachmann. Munich: Piper 1984, 3. edn, 7f. See also Strenski, Ivan: Four Theories of Myth in Twentieth-Century History. Cassirer, Eliade, Lévi-Strauss and Malinowski. London: Macmillan 1987. 6 Heuermann, Hartmut: Mythos, Literatur, Gesellschaft. Mythokritische Analysen zur Geschichte des amerikanischen Romans. Munich: Fink 1988, 47. 7 Heuermann, Hartmut: Mythos, Literatur, Gesellschaft. Mythokritische Analysen zur Geschichte des amerikanischen Romans. Munich: Fink 1988, 30. 8 Blumenberg, Hans: Arbeit am Mythos. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp 1979, 110. 9 Blumenberg, Hans: Arbeit am Mythos. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp 1979, 113. 10 Boris Groys offers an original discussion of the fact that in the context of postmodern UHP\WKL¿FDWLRQ³LQQRYDWLRQ´WHQGVWRFDUU\SHMRUDWLYHFRQQRWDWLRQV6HH*UR\V%RULV Über das Neue. Versuch einer Kulturökonomie 0XQLFK DQG 9LHQQD +DQVHU  9–51.

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11 See Cudak, Romual: &]\WDMąF%LDáRV]HZVNLHJR.DWRZLFHĝOąVN± 12 Sztaba, Jakob: Raffael. Die Sixtinische Madonna. Eine gemalte himmliche Vision. Seminar paper submitted at the Hochschule für Gestaltung (Karlsruhe): http://www. binaryblood.com/biblio/raffael.pdf.  6HH *RáąE 0DULXV] -Ċ]\N L U]HF]\ZLVWRĞü Z WZyUF]RĞFL 0LURQD %LDáRV]HZVNLHJR. àyGå:\GDZQLFWZR8QLZHUV\WHWXàyG]NLHJR 14 2JOąG U]HF]\6LFKW GHU 'LQJH. Miscellany published by the Ostdeutsche Galerie Regensburg 2005, 49 and 51, 46 and 48. 15 Mandel’shtam, Osip: Sobranie sochinenii v dvukh tomakh. Pod red. G.P. Struve and %$ )LOLSSRYD 9RO  6WLNKRWYRUHQLLD :DVKLQJWRQ ,QWHUODQJXDJH OLWHUDU\ DVVRFLDWHV  VWU  >5D]GHO ³±´@ 6HH 0DQGHOVWDP 2VVLS +XIHLVHQ¿QGHU Gedichte. Russisch–Deutsch. Leipzig: Reclam 1993, 6. edn, 54–57. For the English translation, see Osip Mandelstam: Selected Poems, trans. Clarence Brown and W.S. Merwin. New York: Athenaeum 1974, 40. 16 Mandel’shtam: Slovo i kul’tura. See also Mandelstam: The Complete Critical Prose and Letters. Ed. by Jane Gray Harris, trans. Jane Gray Harris and Constance Link. Ardis: Ann Arbor 1979, 112–116. 17 Nivat, Georges: 9HUVOD¿QGXP\WKHUXVVH(VVDLVVXUODFXOWXUHUXVVHGH*RJROjQRV jours. Lausanne: Ed. L’Age d’Homme 1982, 362–370.  &KDDGDHY 3HWU FRPSRVHG  SXEOLVKHG @ ,Q Schriften und Briefe. Translation and introduction by Dr Elias +XUZLF]0XQLFK'UHL0DVNHQ±7KHRULJLQDOUHDGV³əɡɧɚɸɱɬɨɷɬɨ ɫɬɚɪɚɹ ɢɫɬɢɧɚ ɧɨ ɭ ɧɚɫ ɨɧɚ ɤɚɠɟɬɫɹ ɢɦɟɟɬ ɜɫɸ ɰɟɧɧɨɫɬɶ ɧɨɜɢɡɧɵ Ɉɞɧɚ ɢɡ ɫɚɦɵɯɩɪɢɫɤɨɪɛɧɵɯɨɫɨɛɟɧɧɨɫɬɟɣɧɚɲɟɣɫɜɨɟɨɛɪɚɡɧɨɣɰɢɜɢɥɢɡɚɰɢɢɫɨɫɬɨɢɬɜ ɬɨɦɱɬɨɦɵɜɫɟɟɳɟɨɬɤɪɵɜɚɟɦɢɫɬɢɧɵɫɬɚɜɲɢɟɢɡɛɢɬɵɦɢɜɞɪɭɝɢɯɫɬɪɚɧɚɯɢ ɞɚɠɟɭɧɚɪɨɞɨɜɝɨɪɚɡɞɨɛɨɥɟɟɧɚɫɨɬɫɬɚɥɵɯȾɟɥɨɜɬɨɦɱɬɨɦɵɧɢɤɨɝɞɚɧɟɲɥɢ ɜɦɟɫɬɟ ɫ ɞɪɭɝɢɦɢ ɧɚɪɨɞɚɦɢ ɦɵ ɧɟ ɩɪɢɧɚɞɥɟɠɢɦ ɧɢ ɤ ɨɞɧɨɦɭ ɢɡ ɢɡɜɟɫɬɧɵɯ ɫɟɦɟɣɫɬɱɟɥɨɜɟɱɟɫɤɨɝɨɪɨɞɚɧɢɞɪɭɝɨɝɨɆɵɫɬɨɢɦɤɚɤɛɵɜɧɟɜɪɟɦɟɧɢɜɫɟɦɢɪɧɨɟɜɨɫɩɢɬɚɧɢɟɱɟɥɨɜɟɱɟɫɤɨɝɨɪɨɞɚɧɚɧɚɫɧɟɪɚɫɩɪɨɫɬɪɚɧɢɥɨɫɶ´&KDDGDHY3HWU Yakovlevich: Polnoe sobranie sochinenii i izbrannye pis’ma. Tom 1, Moscow: Nauka 1991, 323. 19 For a discussion of such cultural stonewalling, see also Lachmann, Renate: “Remarks on the Foreign (Strange) as a Figure of Cultural Ambivalence”. In: Russian Literature 36 (1994), 335–346. For a discussion of myths in Russia in this respect, see the section “Russia’s Destruction” in Walter Koschmal’s contribution to the present volume. 20 See Hansen-Löve, Aage: Der russische Formalismus. Methodologische Rekonstruktion seiner Entwicklung aus dem Prinzip der Verfremdung9LHQQD9HUODJGHUgVWHUreichischen Akadmie der Wissenschaften 1978, 90–93. 21 Sadowski, Witold: 7H[WJUD¿F]Q\%LDáRV]HZVNLHJR:DUVDZ8QLZHUV\WHW:DUVDZVNL 1999.  1R¿NRZ(ZD0HWD¿]\F]QHJRVSRGDUVWZR0LURQD%LDá\VWRN7RZDU]\VWZR/LWHUDckie, Adama Mickiewicza 2001. 23 See Hansen-Löve, Aage: Der russische Formalismus. Methodologische Rekonstruktion seiner Entwicklung aus dem Prinzip der Verfremdung9LHQQD9HUODJGHUgVWHUreichischen Akadmie der Wissenschaften 1978, 93–96. 24 Wilson, Edmund: “The Myth of the Dialectic”. In: To the Finland Station. Garden City, NY: Doubleday 1953, 190.  2Q FRQVWUXLQJ QDWLRQDO FKDUDFWHUV VHH '|ULQJ 6DELQH $ ³9RP µQDWLRQEXLOGLQJ¶ ]XP,GHQWL¿NDWLRQVIHOG=XU,QWHJUDWLRQVIXQNWLRQQDWLRQDOHU0\WKHQLQGHU/LWHUDWXU´ In: Turk, Horst et al. (ed.): Kulturelle Grenzziehungen im Spiegel der Literaturen. Nationalismus, Regionalismus, Fundamentalismus. Göttingen: Wallstein 1998, 63–83, here 75ff. 26 Writing about the effect of myth as an unconditional truth, Panikkar notes:

Myths and democracy in Poland and Russia 163 A living myth does not allow for interpretation because it needs no intermediary. The hermeneutic of a myth is no longer the myth, but its logos. Myth is precisely the horizon over against which any hermeneutic is possible. Myth is that which we take for granted, that which we do not question; and it is unquestioned because de facto it is not seen as questionable. The myth is transparent like the light, and the mythical story – mytholegomenon – is only the form, the garment in which the myth happens to be expressed, enwrapped, illumined. Panikkar, Raimundo: Myth, Faith, and Hermeneutics. Cross-Cultural Studies. New York: Paulist Press 1979, 7 27 For a discussion of such “everyday myths”, see also Boym, Svetlana: Common Places. Mythology of Everyday Life in Russia. Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard 8QLYHUVLW\3UHVV 28 Eliade, Mircea: Myth and Reality. New York: Harper & Row 1963, 12f. 29 Zviagintsev here opts for a phallic symbol of power; as regards the father, this can be read as a symbol of the power the state has over the individual. See also Arvidsson, Claes and Blomqvist, Lars Erik (eds): Symbols of Power. The Esthetics of Political Legitimation in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell 1987. 30 See Groys, Boris: 'LH (U¿QGXQJ 5XVVODQGV 0XQLFK DQG 9LHQQD +DQVHU  19–36. 31 While Zviagintsev cites some of Andrei Tarkovsky’s numerous mythical arrangements of space, at the end he breaks with the latter’s conception; as Detlef Kremer has argued, the crossing of the swimming pool with a burning candle in “Nostalghia” H[HPSOL¿HVWKLVFRQFHSWLRQ >7DUNRYVN\@ OHWV WKLV FURVVLQJ XQIROG LQ D VHTXHQFH ODVWLQJ URXJKO\ VHYHQ minutes, without any cuts whatsoever, as a kind of cinematic allegory of the PHGLWDWLYH UHWUDFWLRQ RI PRWLRQ DQG RI H[WHUQDO OLIH DQG DV DQ HPEOHP RI ¿OP aesthetics, whose exposed slowness pits the hermetic and resistent statics of culture, myth, and mystic self-obliteration against the void time of civilization and industry. See Kremer, Detlef: Zeit-Räume. “Kultische Choreographien in Andrej 7DUNRZVN\¶V )LOP µ1RVWDOJKLD¶´ ,Q *ULPPLQJHU 5ROI and Hermann, Iris (eds): Mythos im Text. Zur Literatur des 20. Jahrhunderts. Bielefeld: Aisthesis 1998, 173–193, here 179. 32 One of these mythical circles is the topos of Russia’s alleged cultural and historical singularity. On this, see Wachtel, Andrew Baruch: An Obsession with History. Russian Writers Confront the Past 6WDQIRUG &DOLIRUQLD 6WDQIRUG 8QLYHUVLW\ 3UHVV 1994, passim.  2Q WKH IDWKHU±VRQ FRQÀLFW VHH %UXQR 6FKXO]¶V FROOHFWLRQ RI VWRULHV Sklepy cynamonowe (Cinnamon Shops), published in 1933. In Schulz, as Dorothee Gelhard has noted, the fantastic plays a remythifying role, keeping images in motion: Schulz attributes to poetry, that is to the mythopoetic discourse of the fantastic, a particular function, that of a mnemonic conservation of images which, since it is able to bring forth ever new combinations, prevents torpor. Tzvetan Todorov has made clear that the fantastic involves a particular use of images. Freud explained this by arguing that fantasy and childhood memories belong together and are the continuation of child’s play, the child’s correction of reality. See Gelhard, Dorothee: Spuren des Sagens. Studien zur jüdischen Hermeneutik in der Literatur. Frankfurt/Main: Lang 2004, 67.  )RU.RáDNRZVNLUHWUHDWLQJLQWRP\WKSUHVXSSRVHVWKHVKRUWIDOORIKLVWRU\,Q=YLDJintsev, history returns with its linear-timebound path and breaks through the

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P\WK 6HH .RáDNRZVNL /HV]HN Die Gegenwärtigkeit des Mythos. Munich: Piper 1972, 94f. 35 This can be also be interpreted in terms of the concept of “hybridity”. On this, see :lJHQEDXU7KRPDV³+\EULGH+\EULGLWlW'HU.XOWXUNRQÀLNWLP7H[WGHU.XOWXUWKHorie”. In: Arcadia 31 (1996), 27–38. See also Bhabha, Homi K.: The Location of Culture. London, New York: Routledge 1994. 36 See Heuermann, Hartmut: Mythos, Literatur, Gesellschaft. Mythokritische Analysen zur Geschichte des amerikanischen Romans. Munich: Fink 1988, 72. 37 See Nieraad, Jürgen: “Literatur und Gewalt”. In Nieraad, Jürgen: Die Spur der Gewalt. Zur Geschichte des Schrecklichen in der Literatur und ihrer Theorie. Lüneburg: zu Klampen 1994, 18–25.

Bibliography Arvidsson, C. and Blomqvist, L.E. (eds) (1987) Symbols of Power. The Esthetics of Political Legitimation in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell. Bhabha, H.K. (1994) The Location of Culture, London and New York: Routledge. Blumenberg, H. (1979) Arbeit am Mythos, Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp. Boym, S. (1994) Common Places. Mythology of Everyday Life in Russia, Cambridge, 0$+DUYDUG8QLYHUVLW\3UHVV &KDDGDHY 3   3KLORVRSKLFDO /HWWHU ¿UVW  >³(UVWHU SKLORVRSKLVFKHU %ULHI´@ FRPposed 1829, published 1836), in Schriften und Briefe, translation and introduction by Dr Elias Hurwicz, Munich: Drei Masken, 35–36. Cudak, R. (1999) &]\WDMąF%LDáRV]HZVNLHJR.DWRZLFHĝOąVN±%LEOLRWHNDLQWHUpretacji; 3). '|ULQJ 6$   ³9RP µQDWLRQEXLOGLQJ¶ ]XP ,GHQWL¿NDWLRQVIHOG =XU ,QWHJUDWLRQVfunktion nationaler Mythen in der Literatur”, in: Turk, Horst, Schultze, B. and Simanowski, R. (eds): Kulturelle Grenzziehungen im Spiegel der Literaturen. Nationalismus, Regionalismus, Fundamentalismus, Göttingen: Wallstein, 63–83. Eliade, M. (1963) Myth and Reality, New York: Harper & Row. Gelhard, D. (2004) Spuren des Sagens. Studien zur jüdischen Hermeneutik in der Literatur. Frankfurt/M.: Lang. *RáąE 0   -Ċ]\N L U]HF]\ZLVWRĞü Z WZyUF]RĞFL 0LURQD %LDáRV]HZVNLHJR àyGå :\GDZQLFWZR8QLZHUV\WHWXàyG]NLHJR Groys, B. (1992) Über das Neue. Versuch einer Kulturökonomie 0XQLFK DQG 9LHQQD Hanser. Groys, B. (1995) 'LH(U¿QGXQJ5XVVODQGV0XQLFKDQG9LHQQD+DQVHU Hansen-Löve, A. (1978) Der russische Formalismus. Methodologische Rekonstruktion seiner Entwicklung aus dem Prinzip der Verfremdung9LHQQD9HUODJGHUgVWHUUHLFKLschen Akadmie der Wissenschaften, 90–93. Heuermann, H. (1988) Mythos, Literatur, Gesellschaft. Mythokritische Analysen zur Geschichte des amerikanischen Romans, Munich: Fink. .RáDNRZVNL /   Die Gegenwärtigkeit des Mythos, trans. P. Lachmann, 3rd edn, Munich: Piper. Kremer, D. (1998) “Zeit-Räume. Kultische Choreographien in Andrej Tarkowskijs Film µ1RVWDOJKLD¶´LQ*ULPPLQJHU5ROIDQG+HUPDQQ,ULVHGV Mythos im Text. Zur Literatur des 20. Jahrhunderts, Bielefeld: Aisthesis, 173–193. Lachmann, R. (1994) “Remarks on the Foreign (Strange) as a Figure of Cultural Ambivalence”. In: Russian Literature 36, 335–346.

Myths and democracy in Poland and Russia 165 Mandel’shtam, O. (1964) Sobranie sochinenii v dvukh tomakh, Pod red, G.P. Struve i B.A. Filippova, T.1; Stikhotvoreniia, Washington: Inter-language literary associates. Mandel’shtam, O. (1974) Osip Mandelstam: Selected Poems, trans. Clarence Brown and W.S. Merwin. New York: Athenaeum. Mandel’shtam, O. (1979) “Slovo i kul’tura”, in Gray Harris, J. (ed.) Mandelstam: The Complete Critical Prose and Letters, trans. Jane Gray Harris and Constance Link, Ann Arbor: Ardis, 112–116. Mandel’shtam, O. (1993) +XIHLVHQ¿QGHU*HGLFKWH5XVVLVFK±'HXWVFK, 6th edn, Leipzig: Reclam. Nieraad, J. (1994) “Literatur und Gewalt”, in Nieraad, Jürgen (ed.) Die Spur der Gewalt. Zur Geschichte des Schrecklichen in der Literatur und ihrer Theorie, Lüneburg: zu Klampen, 18–25. Nivat, G. (1982) 9HUVOD¿QGXP\WKHUXVVH(VVDLVVXUODFXOWXUHUXVVHGH*RJROjQRV jours, Lausanne: Ed. L’Age d’Homme, 362–370. 1R¿NRZ( 0HWD¿]\F]QHJRVSRGDUVWZR0LURQD, %LDá\VWRN7RZDU]\VWZR/LWHUDFkie, Adama Mickiewicza. 2JOąG U]HF]\6LFKW GHU 'LQJH (2005), miscellany published by the Ostdeutsche Galerie Regensburg. Panikkar, R. (1979) Myth, Faith, and Hermeneutics. Cross-Cultural Studies, New York: Paulist Press. Sadowski, W. (1999) 7H[WJUD¿F]Q\%LDáRV]HZVNLHJR:DUV]DZD8QLZHUV\WHW:DUVDZVNL 6FKXO]% ³0LW\]DFMDU]HF]\ZLVWRĞFL´LQ6FKXO]%DQG-DU]ĊEVNL-Opowiadania wybór esejów i listów:URFáDZ2VVROLQHXP%LEOLRWHNDQDURGRZD6HULD  Schultze, B. (1998) “Mythen, Topoi, Kulturthemen und andere sinntragende Ordnungen in neueren Identitätsdebatten. Am Beispiel der russischen, polnischen und tschechischen Kultur”, in Turk, H., Schultze, B. and Simanowski, R. (eds) Kulturelle Grenzziehungen im Spiegel der Literaturen. Nationalismus, Regionalimus, Fundamentalismus, Göttingen: Wallstein, 220–238. 6FKXOW]H %   ³6FKOVVHONRQ]HSWH7RSRL .XOWXUWKHPHQ XQG DQGHUH NODVVL¿NDWRULsche Ordnungen in der Russland-Debatte seit den achtziger Jahren”, in Behring, E., Richter, L. and Schwarz, W. (eds) Geschichtliche Mythen in den Literaturen und Kulturen Ostmittel- und Südosteuropas, Stuttgart: Steiner, 33–52. Sztaba, Jakob, Raffael. Die Sixtinische Madonna. Eine gemalte himmliche Vision. Seminar paper submitted at the Hochschule für Gestaltung (Karlsruhe). Online: http:// www.binaryblood.com/biblio/raffael.pdf. Wachtel, A.B. (1994) An Obsession with History. Russian Writers Confront the Past, 6WDQIRUG6WDQIRUG8QLYHUVLW\3UHVV :lJHQEDXU 7   ³+\EULGH +\EULGLWlW 'HU .XOWXUNRQÀLNW LP 7H[W GHU .XOWXUWKHRrie”, Arcadia 31, 27–38. Wilson, E. (1953) “The Myth of the Dialectic”, in Wilson, E. To the Finland Station, Garden City, NY: Doubleday.

Part III

Myths, legitimacy, and civic identity in post-communist democracies

8

Contested traditions? The usage of three national holidays in contemporary Hungary Heino Nyyssönen

Introduction 1DWLRQDO KROLGD\V DUH SRSXODU DQQLYHUVDULHV WKDW UHSUHVHQW DQ RI¿FLDO VHOI understanding of the state and political elites. They can be found, except for VRPH FDVHV LQ HYHU\ VWDWH ,Q WKH ¿UVW SDUDJUDSK RI WKH )UHQFK &RQVWLWXWLRQ RI 1791, revolutionaries declared that ‘national celebrations will be established to SUHVHUYHWKHPHPRU\RIWKH)UHQFK5HYROXWLRQ¶/H*RII± ,Q /pRQ *DPEHWWD ZURWH WKDW D IUHH QDWLRQ QHHGV QDWLRQDO FHOHEUDWLRQV LELG  ,Q  D ELOO ZDV LQWURGXFHG E\ ZKLFK WKH )UHQFK 3DUOLDPHQW GHFODUHG WKDW WKH organisation of a series of national celebrations to remind people of memories linked to the existing political institution is a necessity that all governments have UHFRJQLVHGDQGSXWLQWRSUDFWLFH/H*RII±$PDOYL±  The aim of this chapter is to study national holidays and their relation to GHPRFUDF\DQGGHPRFUDWLVDWLRQVLQFHWKHODWHV7KHFDVHRI+XQJDU\SUR YLGHVDQH[FHOOHQWH[DPSOHDVLWKDVWKUHHRI¿FLDOQDWLRQDOKROLGD\V7KHIRFXVRQ WKHDQQLYHUVDULHVDQGIHVWLYDOVVLQFHRSHQVXSWKHTXHVWLRQRIZKDWNLQGRI political traditions Hungary likes to maintain and how they are celebrated. What is their relation to the historical emergence of democratic consciousness before  DQG WKH LQVWLWXWLRQDOLVDWLRQ RI GHPRFUDWLF JRYHUQPHQW DIWHU WKH IDOO RI communism?  7KHWKHVLVRIWKLVFKDSWHULVWKDWWKHGHEDWHVRQKLVWRULFDODQQLYHUVDULHVUHÀHFW different mythical accounts of Hungarian history that had been neglected and distorted by the communist regime. On the one hand, these traditions referred to independent statehood, popular control of government and national liberation. On the other hand, they also connect to traditions that prevailed before the com munist regime. In this sense holidays represented a struggle for the appropriation RI PHDQLQJV RI WKH SDVW 6LQFH WKH V WKHVH GD\V KDYH RIIHUHG D SROLWLFDO UHSHDWLQJ 7LPH6SDFH ± FRQQHFWLQJ WLPH DQG VSDFH LQ WKH VDPH GLPHQVLRQ RI experience – in which these traditions are not only celebrated but also contested and politicised. However, myths also limit democratic politics. National holidays with rigid FRPPHPRUDWLRQ ± SDUWLFXODUO\ E\ SROLWLFLDQV ± PLJKW QRW EH WKH EHVW ZD\ RI teaching critical history. It is striking to note that in the third republic of Hungary

  H. Nyyssönen there are three national holidays, but none of them refers to earlier republican forms of government. Instead, all of these days commemorate great historical events and political traditions. Here we argue that, in the strict sense of the word, parliamentary democracy LQ +XQJDU\ EHIRUH  LV D P\WK $OWKRXJK WKH ¿UVW +XQJDULDQ JRYHUQPHQW DFFRXQWDEOHWRDSDUOLDPHQWZDVQRPLQDWHGDVHDUO\DVVWLOOQRPRUHWKDQ around 7 per cent of the population had the right to vote. Between the two World Wars open ballots were customary in rural areas, where the majority of the pop XODWLRQOLYHG1HYHUWKHOHVVLQDGGLWLRQWRWKHUHZHUHVHYHUDOVKRUWDWWHPSWV WR GHPRFUDWLVH +XQJDU\ LQ   DQG  ZKLFK ZHUH DOO VXSSUHVVHG sooner or later.  ,QD¿UVWVWHSZHVKDOOIRFXVRQWKHUHODWLRQEHWZHHQP\WKGHPRFUDF\DQG KLVWRULFDODQQLYHUVDULHV,QDVHFRQGVWHSZHZLOOWXUQWRWKHGHEDWHVLQ3DUOLD ment throughout 1991, when the law concerning national holidays was enacted. )LQDOO\DOOWKUHHQDWLRQDOKROLGD\VZLOOEHLQYHVWLJDWHGVHSDUDWHO\E\ORRNLQJDW their recent history and political meaning. We will concentrate on the narratives by which they have been remembered and mythologised, but also conduct a FORVHHQTXLU\LQWRKRZSXEOLFGHEDWHKDVLQWHUSUHWHGDQGV\PEROLVHGWKHVHDQQL YHUVDULHVVLQFH

Myth, historical anniversary and democracy 2XUVWDUWLQJSRLQWLQWKLVFKDSWHULVWRIRFXVRQKLVWRU\DQGPHPRU\$FFRUGLQJ to Bo Stråth, myth and memory are already history, but in ceaseless transforma tion and reconstruction. In this sense history is an image of the past, which is FRQWLQXRXVO\UHFRQVLGHUHGLQWKHOLJKWRIDQHYHUFKDQJLQJSUHVHQW+LVWRU\FRQ sists of images, translations and representation as well as of myths, memory and REOLYLRQ)URPWKLVSRLQWRIYLHZWKHNH\TXHVWLRQLV:KDWLVWKHUROHWKDWP\WK DQGPHPRU\SOD\LQWKHFRQVWUXFWLRQRIFRPPXQLWLHV6WUnWK " The term history has many different meanings, and even in a traditional sense KLVWRU\LVPRUHWKDQMXVWDQDFDGHPLFGLVFLSOLQH%HVLGHVWKHVFLHQWL¿FGLPHQVLRQ RI KLVWRU\ D +XQJDULDQ GLFWLRQDU\ IURP WKH FRPPXQLVW SHULRG SXEOLVKHG LQ   GH¿QHV WKH ZRUG KLVWRU\ DV D VXFFHVVLYH VHULHV RI WKH PRVW LPSRUWDQW events, but also refers to history as local stories, to facts, school subjects and also WRWKHIXWXUHLQZKLFKKLVWRU\ZLOODFWDVDWULEXQDO1\\VV|QHQ +LV torical anniversaries as events can be studied by historical methods, but when we GHDOZLWKWKHLPSDFWWKH\PDNHRQSROLWLFDOWKRXJKWZHDUHDOUHDG\LQWKH¿HOG of myths, politics and political science.  )URPDPRGHUQLVWVWDQGSRLQWP\WKLVGHHPHGDKLVWRULFDOXQVFLHQWL¿FLOORJL FDOLUUDWLRQDODQGV\QRQ\PRXVZLWKµXQFLYLOLVHG¶)RU/pYL6WUDXVVWKHTXHVWLRQ was not whether a myth is true or false but why people have believed and will believe it. Myth was something which gave order and meaning to the universe, SURGXFLQJ D FHUWDLQ LOOXVLRQ WKDW ZH XQGHUVWDQG LW /pYL6WUDXVV  ± :KLWH 7KXVP\WKRUJDQLVHVNQRZOHGJHSURYLGHVDPDWUL[RUDSORW IUDPLQJ DQG HYHQ OLPLWV WKRXJKW DQG XQGHUVWDQGLQJ 3DUWLFXODUO\ LQ SROLWLFV

Contested traditions? 171 HDUOLHUH[SHULHQFHV±SHUVRQDOO\P\WKLFLVHGRUPHGLDWHG±SOD\DUROHLQH[SHFWD WLRQVDQGYLVLRQVRIWKHIXWXUH.RVHOOHFN :ULWLQJKLVWRULHVHYHQVFLHQ WL¿F KLVWRULHV LV QRW LQGHSHQGHQW IURP P\WKRORJLVDWLRQ HLWKHU +LVWRULDQV ± DV ZHOODVVRFLDOVFLHQWLVWV±SOD\DUROHLQWKHSURFHVVRIUHPHPEHULQJDQGIRUJHW ting, in other words in the politics of memory. When we study commemoration and memory, we cannot underestimate the TXHVWLRQDERXWWKHXVDJHRIPHPRU\LQWKHFRQVWUXFWLRQRIFROOHFWLYHVDQGFRO OHFWLYH LGHQWLWLHV 7KH TXHVWLRQ RI who UHPHPEHUV UHPLQGV XV RI +DOEZDFKV¶ LGHD RI JURXSV ZKR UHPHPEHU DQG FRPPHPRUDWH LQ WKH SUHVHQW +DOEZDFKV  +DOEZDFKV¶DQVZHULPSOLHVWKDWVRFLDOPHFKDQLVPVRIWUDGLWLRQIRUPDWLRQ DQG µFROOHFWLYH PHPRU\¶ GR QRW GHQ\ WKH LGHD RI LQQHU SHUVRQDO PHPRU\ EXW stress the idea of a collective. However, we argue that the existence of ‘collec WLYHPHPRU\¶LVLWVHOIDP\WKEXWLVPHGLDWHGPDLQWDLQHGDQGXVHGE\GLIIHUHQW collectives. Therefore, we further problematise the idea of inner memory and ask KRZSHUVRQDOH[SHULHQFHVPDWFKSXEOLFDQGµFROOHFWLYHPHPRU\¶,QZKLFKVHQVH DUHWKH\DGDSWHGRULQWHUWZLQHGWKURXJKWKHSURFHVVRILGHQWL¿FDWLRQ"7KXVWKH TXHVWLRQRIKRZSHRSOHJDWKHUXQGHUGLIIHUHQWÀDJVLQWKHQDPHRIFRPPHPRUD WLRQKDVWRGRZLWKLGHQWL¿FDWLRQDQGJURXSEHORQJLQJZKLFKZHVXSSRVHWREHD political process. Hence, the concept of collective memory presupposes a con crete group who commemorates. The concept of the nation is too vague for this SXUSRVHDVLWUDLVHVWKHTXHVWLRQRIZKRKDVWKHULJKWWRVSHDNLQWKHQDPHRIWKH nation and which tradition should then represent the nation or national holiday. Hayden White distinguishes two kinds of information upon which ‘communal PHPRU\¶LVEDVHG2QWKHRQHKDQGWKHUHLVWUDGLWLRQDOLVHGPHPRU\FRQVLVWLQJ RILQIRUPDWLRQODWHQWO\VWRUHGLQWUDGLWLRQDOORUHIDEOHVIRONWDOHVJQRPLFFRP PRQSODFHVMRNHVSUHMXGLFHVHWF 0\WKVWKHQSURYLGHWKHRUJDQLVLQJSULQFLSOHV of its traditional lore. On the other hand, rationalised memory contains informa WLRQDERXWDQGDFFRXQWVRIDFRPPXQLW\¶VSDVWDYDLODEOHLQLWVDUFKLYHVDQGFDWD ORJXHG LQ WKH IRUP RI ZULWWHQ RU YLVXDOLVHG µKLVWRULHV¶ µDFFHVVHG¶ RQ GHPDQG :KLWH± ,QWKHFDVHRI+XQJDU\¶VQDWLRQDOKROLGD\VWKHUHDUHHOH ments from both traditionalised and rationalised memory. These elements could then be commemorated in particular lieux de mémoire, realms of memory by SDUWLFXODUJURXSVRUWKHµQDWLRQ¶  1DWLRQDO KROLGD\V DUH V\PEROLF UHVRXUFHV RI WKH VWDWH PXFK DV D ÀDJ RU D national anthem. In general, they are representations of memory which com PHPRUDWHKLVWRULFDOHYHQWVDWDIDLUO\RI¿FLDOOHYHO:HLQWHUSUHWWKHVHDV7LPH Spaces as they connect time and space in the same unit, repeat memories DQQXDOO\ KLJKOLJKW KLVWRULFDO HYHQWV DQG OHDYH RWKHUV LQ WKHLU VKDGRZ %R\DULQ ± $VDVWDUWLQJSRLQWZHFDQGLYLGHQDWLRQDOKROLGD\VLQWRWKUHHFDWH JRULHV LQGHSHQGHQFH GD\ GD\V FRQQHFWHG WR RWKHU KLVWRULFDO HYHQWV DQG D GD\ FRQQHFWHGWRWKHUXOHU±ZKHWKHUFXUUHQWRUDV\PEROLFIRXQGHURIWKHQDWLRQ,Q approximately half the countries of the world, the main national holiday refers to VWDWHLQGHSHQGHQFH1\\VV|QHQ 7KLVW\SHRIQDWLRQDOKROLGD\LVPRVW FRPPRQ LQ $IULFD ZKHUH WKH PDMRULW\ RI FRXQWULHV JDLQHG LQGHSHQGHQFH DIWHU 7KHUHDUHVHYHUDOH[DPSOHVLQWKH$PHULFDVVLQFHWKHQLQHWHHQWKFHQWXU\

  H. Nyyssönen as well. The day itself, however, is rather based on agreements, as some coun tries celebrate the gaining of independence, while others commemorate declara tions or even the beginning of the independence movement. In the second group WKHUH DUH GD\V ZKLFK UHIHU WR WKH FRQVWLWXWLRQ RU WKH UHSXEOLF LWVHOI )LQDOO\ LQ VHYHUDOµROGHUQDWLRQV¶±DVLQ(XURSHDQG$VLD±QDWLRQDOKROLGD\VDUHIUHTXHQWO\ FRQQHFWHGWRWKHELUWKGD\RIWKHUXOHURUWKHPRQDUFKVHHIRUH[DPSOHWKH1HWK HUODQGVRU7KDLODQG   $WERWWRPQDWLRQDOKROLGD\VGRQRWRIWHQPDNHUHIHUHQFHWRWKHGHPRFUDWLF IRUP RI JRYHUQPHQW LQ D FRXQWU\ EXW IUHTXHQWO\ H[SUHVV QDWLRQDO VHQWLPHQW related to the founding events of state independence. In a paradoxical way GHPRFUDF\KDVQRWEHHQFRQVLGHUHGZRUWKFHOHEUDWLQJ1RWHYHQLQ*UHHFHPD\ ZH ¿QG D 'D\ RI 'HPRFUDF\ DV WKH PRVW LPSRUWDQW VWDWH KROLGD\ UHIHUV WR JDLQLQJLQGHSHQGHQFHLQWKHV,Q)LQODQGWKHUHZDVDQDWWHPSWWRFHOHEUDWH WKH'D\RI'HPRFUDF\LQWKHVEXWLWGLGQRWEHFRPHSRSXODUDQGZDVDERO ished from calendars.  ,Q DGGLWLRQ WR RI¿FLDO PHPRU\ DQG FRPPHPRUDWLRQ QDWLRQDO KROLGD\V however, could represent folk traditions, folklore and narratives such as carni vals and features of traditionalised memory. In Hungary, for instance, the tradi tion of new bread is connected to the most important national holiday. On the whole, Hungary differs from many other countries because, rather than com memorating a day of independence or constitution, the focus here is on the memory of revolutionary events and social upheavals. $V ZLOO ODWHU EHFRPH FOHDUWKHPHPRU\RIWKHVHPRYHPHQWVDQGµPDVWHUQDUUDWLYHV¶OLNH RUSOD\HGDUROHGXULQJWKHFRPPXQLVWHUDDQGLQWKHV\VWHPLFFKDQJHDIWHU DVZHOO,QWKHVWKHSROLWLFDOVWUXJJOHRYHUQDWLRQDOKROLGD\VGHDOWZLWK WKHTXHVWLRQRIZKLFKRIWKHVHWUDGLWLRQVVKRXOGEHIROORZHGDQGPDLQWDLQHGLQ the new democracy.

National holidays and the Parliament ,QWKHQHZ+XQJDULDQ3DUOLDPHQWWKHGLVFXVVLRQRIQDWLRQDOKROLGD\VWRRNSODFH LQ 0DUFK  $ WRWDO RI WKUHH DOWHUQDWLYHV  0DUFK  $XJXVW DQG  2FWREHUZHUHVXJJHVWHG7KH3DUOLDPHQWZDVIRUFHGWRGHFLGHZKLFKRQHRIWKH three would be made the state állami  KROLGD\ DQG ZKLFK WZR ZRXOG UHPDLQ nationalnemzeti KROLGD\V,QWKH¿QDOYRWHWKHZLQQHU$XJXVWUHIHUULQJWR 6W6WHSKHQWKH¿UVWPHGLHYDONLQJRI+XQJDU\ ZDVVXSSRUWHGLQWKHUDQNVRIWKH FHQWUHULJKW JRYHUQPHQW DQG  0DUFK UHIHUULQJ WR   E\ WKH RSSRVLWLRQ $XJXVW  IRU  DJDLQVW  DEVWHQWLRQV 0DUFK ±± 2FWREHU ±±   5HSUHVHQWDWLYHVRIWKHOHDGLQJSDUW\LQWKHJRYHUQPHQWWKH+XQJDULDQ'HPR FUDWLF )RUXP 0')  DUJXHG WKDW 6W 6WHSKHQ¶V 'D\ EHVW H[SUHVVHG WKH LGHDV RI WKH+XQJDULDQVWDWHDQGFRQVWLWXWLRQ0RUHRYHU&KULVWLDQ'HPRFUDWVSRLQWHGWR WKH &KULVWLDQ FKDUDFWHU RI WKH GD\ ,PUH .yQ\D 0')  UHIXVHG UDQNLQJ WKHVH WKUHHEXWVXJJHVWHGWKDW$XJXVWUHSUHVHQWVEHVWWKHLGHDRI+XQJDULDQVWDWH KRRG3DUWLHVLQWKHRSSRVLWLRQWKH/HDJXHRIWKH)UHH'HPRFUDWV6='6= DQG

Contested traditions?  
Contested traditions?   when the new organisations arranged their own celebrations. They published a PDQLIHVWRZKLFKLQFOXGHGSRLQWV±DVLQDQG±LQZKLFKWKH\DUJXHG that the Hungarian people would like to have a free, independent and democratic +XQJDU\DPXOWLSDUW\V\VWHPIUHHHGXFDWLRQWKHULJKWWRVWULNHDQGIUHHPDUNHWV National integrity was also demanded, as was the disclosure of the truth regarding  DQG ¿QDOO\ WKH DEROLWLRQ RI WKH KROLGD\V RI  1RYHPEHU DQG  $SULO LH GDWHV UHIHUULQJ WR WKH 2FWREHU 5HYROXWLRQ LQ  DQG OLEHUDWLRQ RI +XQJDU\ LQ $SULO 0+D 7KHPDQLIHVWRFKDOOHQJHGWKHLQYLWDWLRQRIWKH3DWULRWLF 3HRSOH¶V )URQW DV WKH LQGHSHQGHQW RUJDQLVDWLRQV ZDQWHG WR LQYLWH SHRSOH WR an independent celebration of 15 March and a peaceful demonstration. The new organisations managed to gather popular support on the anniversary and found OHJLWLPDWH UHDVRQV IRU WKHLU IXUWKHU DFWLRQV ± WKH URXQG WDEOH RI WKH RSSRVLWLRQ which coordinated these organisations, was established a week later.  'LIIHUHQWVLWHVVXFKDVWKH3DUOLDPHQWWKH1DWLRQDO0XVHXPDQGWKHVWDWXHRI 6iQGRU3HWĘ¿EHORQJHGWRWKHPRVWHVVHQWLDOVSDFHVLQWKHVDVZHOO&HUH PRQLHVOLNHUDLVLQJWKHÀDJEHJLQLQIURQWRIWKH3DUOLDPHQWIURPZKHUHDSUR FHVVLRQPRYHVWRZDUGVWKH1DWLRQDO0XVHXP$IWHUWKHFRPPHPRUDWLRQVDWWKH PXVHXPWKHSURFHVVLRQPRYHVWRWKH0DUFKWK6TXDUHDWWKHVWDWXHRI3HWĘ¿ The municipality of Budapest usually organises speeches and the laying of ZUHDWKV7KHRI¿FLDOSURWRFRORIWKHGD\DOVRLQFOXGHVHQWHUWDLQPHQWVXFKDVIRON GDQFLQJDQGPXVLF,QWKH3DUOLDPHQWSOD\HGDSDUWLFXODUUROHDVDVHVVLRQ ZDV KHOG WR FRPPHPRUDWH WKH WK DQQLYHUVDU\ ± LQ SDUWLFXODU WKH .RVVXWK 3UL]HZLOOEHDZDUGHGDQQXDOO\IRUSURPLQHQWDUWLVWVLQWKH3DUOLDPHQW  $V0iWp1\XV]WiO\PDGHFOHDULQLQDQDUWLFOHIRUWKHQHZVSDSHUNépszabadság, there had been no one year when the anniversary was not instrumen WDOLVHG E\ SROLWLFDO JURXSV IRU WKHLU RZQ SDUWLVDQ SXUSRVHV )URP  WKHVH tasks changed from democratic socialism to elections, democratic charter, Trianon, demands for the dismissal of ministers, freedom of the press, etc. 'XULQJWKH¿UVW\HDUVRIWKHQHZGHPRFUDF\WKHUHZHUHVWLOOVLJQVRIFHOHEUDWLQJ together as in 1991, when the parties published a joint declaration that the anni YHUVDU\VKRXOGQRWEHXVHGIRUSROLWLFDOSXUSRVHV+RZHYHUVLQFHWKHSRODU LVDWLRQRI+XQJDULDQSROLWLFVKDVOHGWRWKHXVHRI0DUFKIRUFXUUHQWSROLWLFDO FRQWURYHUV\1\\VV|QHQ16=D   ,QIDFWVSHHFKHVRQ0DUFKGRQRWRQO\FRPPHPRUDWHDQDWLRQDOGD\EXW also have a political content enrolled either in communal memory or other P\WKV7KHSDVWDQGWKHSUHVHQWLQWHUDFWDVSDUDOOHOVOHVVRQVDQGPHVVDJHVIURP WKH SDVW DUH UHSHDWHG LQ WKH VSHHFKHV ,Q  IRU H[DPSOH 7DPiV 'HXWVFK )LGHV] GUHZDSDUDOOHOEHWZHHQDQGDQGDUJXHGWKDWWKHSHRSOH ZDQWHG WKH VDPH QRZ DV GXULQJ WKRVH \HDUV 01   7KXV VSHHFKHV DQG UHDOPVRIPHPRU\GRQRWRQO\FRPPHPRUDWH0DUFKEXWJLYHDEDFN JURXQGIRUQHZµ\RXQJVWHUVRI0DUFK¶WRDFWLQWKHIUDPHRIFRPPXQDOPHPRU\ to pursue present political aims. The day is widely commemorated by Hungarian PLQRULWLHV LQ QHLJKERXULQJ FRXQWULHV DV ZHOO ± LQ 5RPDQLD DQG 6ORYDNLD WKH WKDQQLYHUVDU\ZDVHYHQPRUHVDOLHQWDQGµVDFUHG¶WKDQLQ+XQJDU\%UXEDNHU DQG)HLVFKPLGW 

  H. Nyyssönen  6LQFH  WKH RSSRVLWLRQ DQG WKH JRYHUQPHQW KDYH EHHQ GLYLGHG RYHU which territories and areas to commemorate. The use of the National 0XVHXPZDVHVWDEOLVKHGE\WKHFXUUHQWJRYHUQPHQW$WWKH3HWĘ¿VWDWXHWKH atmosphere tends to favour socialists and free democrats as they have had the majority in Budapest city council, and the main speaker, the mayor of Budapest, represents liberals. Nevertheless, other gatherings have also taken SODFH LQ WKH QDPH RI 3HWĘ¿ IRU H[DPSOH RQ WKH HYH RI WKH DQQLYHUVDU\ LQ  ZKHQ WKH H[WUHPH ULJKW JURXS µ%ORRG DQG +RQRXU¶ 9pU pV %HFVOHW  ODLG D ZUHDWK DW WKH VWDWXH 8VXDOO\ ULJKWZLQJ SDUWLHV KDYH KDG WKHLU RZQ FRPPHPRUDWLRQV DW WKH %XGD &DVWOH RU WKH KLVWRULFDO PLOLHX RI +HURHV 6TXDUH ZKLFK LV RFFXSLHG E\ WKH KXJH 0LOOHQQLDO 0RQXPHQW UHSUHVHQWLQJ WKH\HDUKLVWRU\RI+XQJDULDQV  $SDUWLFXODUPRWWRKDVIUHTXHQWO\GH¿QHGWKHHYHQWDQGWKHFRQWHQWRIWKHFHO HEUDWLRQV,QLWZDVµ7KH5HSXEOLFRI)UHHGRP¶D\HDUHDUOLHUDWWKHGRRU RI(8PHPEHUVKLSLWZDVDUJXHGWKDWµWKHGUHDPRIWKH0DUFK\RXQJVWHUVZLOO EHIXO¿OOHGQRZ¶,QWKHUHZDVµ)DWKHUODQGDQG3URJUHVV7KHQDQG1RZ¶DW a time when polarisation between the government and the opposition had UHDFKHG D SRLQW ZKHQ ERWK FDPSV KDG WKHLU RZQ  SRLQWV 16= D 16= E $OWKRXJKERWKXVHGWKHIUDPHZRUNRIKLVWRU\WKHLUFRQWHQWZDVGLIIHU ent and served particular political goals.

August: Saint King and the origins of the state ,QFRPPXQDOPHPRU\$XJXVWLVXQGRXEWHGO\WKHROGHVWRIWKHWKUHHQDWLRQDO holidays. In particular its religious role has been passed on from generation to JHQHUDWLRQ $FFRUGLQJ WR WUDGLWLRQ WKH ¿UVW NLQJ GHYRWHG +XQJDU\ WR 6W 0DU\ EHIRUHKLVGHDWKLQ±WKHGD\UHIHUVWRKLVFDQRQLVDWLRQRQ$XJXVW .LQJ/DGLVODXV,GHFODUHGLQWKDWLWVKRXOGEHREVHUYHGDQGPDLQWDLQHGDV a saint feast. In 1771 Maria Theresa converted it into a compulsory feast, ZKRVHFKDUDFWHU ZDV IXUWKHU GH¿QHG E\ WKH JRYHUQPHQW LQ  DQG  Nevertheless, Hungary between the World Wars maintained the state idea of St 6WHSKHQ SDUWLFXODUO\ LQ  2Q WKH WK DQQLYHUVDU\ RI KLV GHDWK WKH GD\ became a national holiday and was enacted in law.  ,QWKHNLQJGRPZDVLQUXLQVDQGWKHROGVWUXFWXUHRIWKHVWDWHFDPHWRDQ HQG $IWHU WKH ZDU WKHUH ZHUH VWLOO FRPPHPRUDWLYH SURFHVVLRQV RQ  $XJXVW XQWLO WKH\ ZHUH EDQQHG LQ  &RPPXQLVWV IXOO\ DZDUH RI WKH UHOLJLRXV DQG even revisionist background of the day, renewed and changed its content by LQWURGXFLQJWKHQHZVRFLDOLVWFRQVWLWXWLRQZKLFKFDPHLQWRIRUFHRQ$XJXVW  ,Q WKH IROORZLQJ \HDU WKH 0LQLVWU\ &RXQFLO LVVXHG D GHJUHH ,  DFFRUGLQJWRZKLFKWKHGD\EHFDPHNQRZQDVWKH&RQVWLWXWLRQ'D\RIWKH+XQ JDULDQ3HRSOH¶V5HSXEOLFDQGµDWXUQLQJSRLQWLQWKHOLIHRI+XQJDULDQZRUNLQJ SHRSOH¶ 7|UYpQ\HN   )RON WUDGLWLRQV VXFK DV WKH IHDVW RI WKH QHZ EUHDG ZHUH VWUHQJWKHQHG GXULQJ WKH FRPPXQLVW UHJLPH 2Q WKH WK DQQLYHUVDU\ RI KLVGHDWKLQ6W6WHSKHQZDVDJDLQZLGHO\FRPPHPRUDWHGPHPRULDOFRP PLWWHHVZHUHHVWDEOLVKHGDQGWKH+XQJDULDQ$FDGHP\RI6FLHQFHVKDGDVSHFLDO

Contested traditions? 177 FRPPHPRUDWLYHPHHWLQJ)LQDOO\LQWKHGD\ZDVDJDLQFHOHEUDWHGDVWKH GD\RIWKH¿UVW.LQJ6WHSKHQ  &XUUHQWO\ WKH GD\ KDV ERWK VDFUDO DQG SURIDQH PHDQLQJV DFFRUGLQJ WR D UHFHQW SROO PRVW SHRSOH  SHU FHQW  UHPHPEHU WKH IRXQGLQJ RI WKH VWDWH WKH FRQVWLWXWLRQSHUFHQW WKHFRPPHPRUDWLRQRI6W6WHSKHQSHUFHQW DQG WKHQHZEUHDGSHUFHQW 16=   ,Q±WKH6W6WHSKHQ
  H. Nyyssönen WKH SUHVHQW ERUGHUV 1HYHUWKHOHVV WKH FRQVHTXHQFHV RI WKHVH ERUGHUV DUH VWLOO present today as indicated by the recent debates on the status which the Hungar LDQ UHSXEOLF VKRXOG JUDQW WR +XQJDULDQV OLYLQJ EH\RQG LWV ERUGHUV 'XH WR WKH ORVVRIWZRWKLUGVRIWHUULWRU\LQWKHWUHDW\RI7ULDQRQLQ+XQJDULDQHWKQLF minorities beyond the national borders play a role in Hungarian politics. However, the anniversary makes surprisingly few references to daily politics, XQOLNHWKHRWKHUWZRKROLGD\VLQWKHSUHVHQW+XQJDU\16= )ROORZLQJWKLV OLQH RI WKRXJKW WKH PRVW LPSRUWDQW FRQWHQW ± WKH HVWDEOLVKLQJ RI WKH +XQJDULDQ µVWDWH¶LQWKH\HDU±LVVRIDUDZD\WKDWLWQRORQJHUUDLVHVHPRWLRQDODQG personal debates. In addition, the day is commemorated in the middle of the summer, when many people leave the capital.

October: 1956 and 1989 ,Q WKH /DZ 9,,, RI   2FWREHU ZDV GH¿QHG DV KDYLQJ HVVHQWLDOO\ WZR PHDQLQJV DVµWKHGD\RIWKHEHJLQQLQJRIWKH5HYROXWLRQDQGWKH¿JKW IRUIUHHGRPDQG DVWKHGD\RQZKLFKWKH+XQJDULDQ5HSXEOLFZDVGHFODUHG LQ¶7|UYpQ\HN 2QWKDWGD\LQXQLYHUVLW\VWXGHQWVRUJDQLVHGD demonstration in Budapest, which turned into an armed uprising against the 6RYLHWSUHVHQFHDQGWKHH[LVWLQJFRPPXQLVWUXOH,QDIHZGD\VWKHPXOWLSDUW\ V\VWHP ZDV UHHVWDEOLVKHG 3ULPH 0LQLVWHU ,PUH 1DJ\ GHFODUHG VRYHUHLJQW\ RI WKHFRXQWU\DQG+XQJDU\OHIWWKH:DUVDZ3DFW$VWKHXSKHDYDOODVWHGRQO\WZR weeks and was violently suppressed, its political objectives have been debated HYHUVLQFH,QJHQHUDOLWFRXOGEHGLYLGHGLQWRIRXUPDLQVWUDLQVUHIRUPHGVRFLDO LVWRUGHUSHDVDQWµQDWLRQDOGHPRFUDWLF¶DFRQVHUYDWLYHPDLQO\&DWKROLFJURXS DQG¿QDOO\DQH[WUHPHULJKWZLQJDQWLFRPPXQLVWJURXS/LWYiQ±  2Q1RYHPEHU6RYLHWIRUFHVEHJDQWKHVHFRQGLQWHUYHQWLRQDQGFUXVKHG WKHUHYROXWLRQDU\DWWHPSWUDLVLQJ-iQRV.iGiUWRSRZHU  ,Q.iGiU¶V+XQJDU\RSHQFRPPHPRUDWLRQRIWKHHYHQWVZDVQRWDOORZHGEXW P\WKVDQGOHJHQGVOLYHGRQLQFRPPXQDOPHPRU\0\WKVRIQRWRQO\KDG DQLPSDFWRQEXWERWKDQGKDGDQLQÀXHQFHRQDVZHOO )RU H[DPSOH LQ  WKH SDUW\ RUJDQ Népszabadság published a statement by WKH%XGDSHVWSROLFH$FFRUGLQJWRWKHSROLFH)LGHV]DQGRWKHUJURXSVDQQRXQFHG SODQVWRRUJDQLVHDSURFHVVLRQWRFRPPHPRUDWHWKHHYHQWVRI2FWREHU but the police did not allow any kind of public meeting, processions or demon strations in the streets. Two days later newspapers reported that ‘there was no GLVRUGHURQUG2FWREHU¶DQGµWKRURXJKFRPSOHWHSHDFHDQGRUGHUUHLJQHG¶$ IHZGD\VODWHUWKH¿UVWVHFUHWDU\RIWKHUXOLQJ+XQJDULDQ6RFLDOLVW:RUNHUV¶3DUW\ +6:3  .iURO\ *UyV] VWDWHG WKDW WKH\ ZHUH QRW DOORZHG WR FRPPHPRUDWH WKH PHPRU\ RI D FRXQWHUUHYROXWLRQ EXW DOVR XUJHG WR UHYLVLW WKH VRXUFHV DV WKLV UHVHDUFK ZRXOG OLNHO\ EHQH¿W ERWK VRFLHW\ LQ JHQHUDO DQG DOO SROLWLFDO OHDGHUV 16=DE0+DE   7KXVEHWZHHQDQGWKHWUDGLWLRQRIDSSHDUHGLQPDQ\ZD\VLQ WKH+XQJDULDQSXEOLF2QWKHRQHKDQGZHFDQ¿QGDQHZEDVLVRIOHJLWLPLVDWLRQ DQGDQLGHDOEXWDOVRVLJQVRIQHZULWHVDQGUHYHDOLQJWKHµWUXWK¶DWODVW$OVRWKH

Contested traditions? 179 YLHZSRLQWRIWKHUXOLQJSDUW\HVVHQWLDOO\FKDQJHG2QWKHRWKHUKDQGZHFDQ¿QG symbolic struggles with regard to the meaning of the past and the usage of PHPRU\ LQ SROLWLFV )RU H[DPSOH WKH V\PEROLF DFFHSWDQFH RI WKH PXOWLSDUW\ V\VWHPDQGWKHQHZLQWHUSUHWDWLRQRI±DVDQXSULVLQJ±WRRNSODFHLQWKH VDPHVHVVLRQRIWKH&HQWUDO&RPPLWWHHLQ)HEUXDU\6HFRQGWKHUHDUHUHI HUHQFHV WR  LQ WKH JDWKHULQJ RI WKH RSSRVLWLRQ RQ  0DUFK DV QRWHG E\ 7RPiV+RIpU   3ROLWLFDOSULQFLSOHVIRUWKHSHDFHIXOWUDQVLWLRQZHUHQHJRWLDWHGLQWKH1DWLRQDO 5RXQG 7DEOH EHWZHHQ -XQH DQG 6HSWHPEHU  DQG PDGH ODZ E\ WKH HQG RI 2FWREHU7KHQHZHOHFWLRQV\VWHPZDVDFFHSWHGRQ2FWREHUDQGDGRSWHGRQ WKH UG 2Q WKDW GD\ WKH IRUPHU &KDLUPDQ RI WKH 3DUOLDPHQW 0iW\iV 6]ĦU|V GHFODUHG+XQJDU\DUHSXEOLF±WKH¿UVWLQWKHIRUPHU(DVWHUQ%ORF,QKLVVSHHFK 6]ĦU|V DOVR XVHG KLVWRULFDO H[DPSOHV WR FODULI\ WKH SUHVHQW VLWXDWLRQ +XQJDU\ was following in the footsteps of the previous republics, which he connected to WKH QDPHV RI /DMRV .RVVXWK   0LKiO\ .iURO\L   DQG =ROWiQ 7LOG\  +HVSHFL¿FDOO\PHQWLRQHGWKHXSULVLQJRIDQGWKHQDWLRQDOPRYH ment on which the republic would be based.  $V WKH +XQJDULDQ UHSXEOLF ZDV GHFODUHG RQ SUHFLVHO\ WKH VDPH GDWH DV WKH XSULVLQJLQWKHGD\DOVREHORQJHGWRVXFKV\PEROLFVWUXJJOHVDV0DUFK DQGWKHUHEXULDORI,PUH1DJ\6KRXOG2FWREHUEHFHOHEUDWHGUHFRQFLOHGRU commemorated? In September representatives of the opposition demanded that the day should become a free holiday and a time of national celebration. $VD FRPSURPLVH0iW\iV6]ĦU|VQRWHGWKDWWKHGD\RIWKHXSULVLQJVKRXOGEH a common celebration for national reconciliation'HVSLWHDSURSRVDOE\DQLQGH SHQGHQW03WKH3DUOLDPHQWGLGQRWKDYHWLPHWRSUHSDUHDQDWLRQDOKROLGD\LQWKH EXV\DXWXPQRI7KHUHIRUPFRPPXQLVWJRYHUQPHQWGHFODUHGWKHGD\DVD QDWLRQDO KROLGD\ MXVW EHIRUH WKH HOHFWLRQ LQ 0DUFK  16= E F 1\\VV|QHQ   7KH ¿UVW IUHHO\ HOHFWHG 3DUOLDPHQW LQ  VWDUWHG E\ GH¿QLQJ WKH V\PEROLF PHDQLQJRIWKHUHYROXWLRQ:KLOHHQDFWLQJWKHPHPRU\LQWRODZLQWKH¿UVW SDUDJUDSKWKHVHFRQGSDUDJUDSKGHFODUHG2FWREHUDQDWLRQDOKROLGD\$WWKDW WLPHWKHQHZVSHDNHURIWKH3DUOLDPHQWDSURIHVVLRQDOKLVWRULDQFRQVLGHUHG to be the most important connection to the historical past, and the most impor WDQWEDVLVIRUWKHFUHDWLRQRIWKHIXWXUH0116=D   )LQDOO\WKHODZFRQFUHWHO\GH¿QHGWKHQDWXUHRIQDWLRQDOKROLGD\V:KLOH LW DVVLJQHG WZR PHDQLQJV WR  2FWREHU  DQG   LQ SUDFWLFH RQO\ WKH ¿UVW KDV EHHQ FRPPHPRUDWHG ,Q  WKH PDLQ FHOHEUDWLRQ ZDV KHOG DW WKH 7HFKQLFDO 8QLYHUVLW\ ZKHUH VWXGHQWV KDG JDWKHUHG LQ  WR GHPDQG SROLWLFDO IUHHGRPV3DUOLDPHQWKHOGDQKRQRUDU\VHVVLRQDWZKLFKUHODWLYHVRIWKHPDUW\UV DQG KHURHV RI WKH UHYROXWLRQ ZHUH SUHVHQW 7KHUH 3ULPH 0LQLVWHU -y]VHI $QWDOO JORUL¿HGDVDSDUWRIQDWLRQDOP\WKRORJ\LQXQLWLQJ+XQJDULDQVDQGRYHU coming the current political crisis. Since then commemorations have taken place LQWKHJUDYH\DUGVDQGRQWKHXUEDQEDWWOH¿HOGVRIWKHWLPH$SURFHVVLRQXVXDOO\ GHSDUWV IURP WKH XQLYHUVLW\ SURFHHGV WR WKH VWDWXH RI WKH 3ROLVK *HQHUDO %HP ZKR LQ  VXSSRUWHG +XQJDULDQV EHIRUH JRLQJ WR WKH 3DUOLDPHQW 2Q WKH

  H. Nyyssönen IRXUWLHWKDQQLYHUVDU\LQWKHPDLQFRPPHPRUDWLYHHYHQWZDVPRYHGWRWDNH SODFHLQIURQWRIWKH3DUOLDPHQWZKHUHWKHVWDWXHZLWKWKHÀDPHRIWKHUHYROXWLRQ ZDV EXLOW 0+  16=   7KHVH UHDOPV RI PHPRU\ KDYH EHFRPH WKH PRVWW\SLFDOSODFHVGXULQJWKHDQQLYHUVDU\DQGZUHDWKOD\LQJEHVLGHVWKHHYHQLQJ reception at the opera.  3ROLWLFDOLQFLGHQWVKDYHWDNHQSODFHHYHU\QRZDQGWKHQDQGHYHQEHIRUHWKH ¿IWLHWKDQQLYHUVDU\LQDQXPEHURIULJKWZLQJHUVDQGVNLQKHDGVPDUFKHG WRWKHUDGLREXLOGLQJDQGLQWURGXFHGWKHLURZQSRLQWVZKLOHLQJURXSVRI QHR1D]LV ZKLVWOHG 3UHVLGHQW ÈUSiG *|QF]¶V VSHHFK 2Q WKH EDVLV RI WKLV LQFL GHQWWKHOHDGLQJSDUW\LQWKHJRYHUQPHQWFUHDWHGDSURSRVDOWRSURKLELW)DVFLVW DQG %ROVKHYLVW V\PEROV ,Q  VRFLDOLVWV DQG IUHH GHPRFUDWV UHSUHVHQWHG WKH JRYHUQPHQWDWWKHRI¿FLDOFHUHPRQLHVDQGIRUWKH¿UVWWLPH*\XOD+RUQ3ULPH 0LQLVWHU =ROWiQ*iO&KDLUPDQRIWKH3DUOLDPHQW DQGÈUSiG*|QF]3UHVLGHQW RIWKH5HSXEOLF ODLGDZUHDWKWRJHWKHUZLWKVRFLDOLVWVDQGOLEHUDOVVWUHVVLQJWKH QHHGIRUQDWLRQDOXQLW\2WKHUµPHVVDJHV¶UHJDUGLQJFXUUHQWSROLWLFVFRXOGDOVREH IRXQGLQWKHVSHHFKHVLQWHUSUHWLQJWKHP\WKLFDOSDVWWKHUHZDVQRH[FOXVLRQLQ ZHQHHGDXQLW\VLPLODUWRWKDWRIHWF,WLVDOVRVWULNLQJKRZVRFLDO LVWVKDYHVWUHVVHGWKHLULGHQWL¿FDWLRQZLWKWKHOHJDF\RI,PUH1DJ\01D 0+16=   ,IRIDOOWKHWKUHHQDWLRQDOKROLGD\VUHIHUVWRPRVWUHFHQWHYHQWVLWLV DOVR SROLWLFDOO\ WKH PRVW FRQWHVWHG RQH LQ  KLVWRULDQV &VDED %pNpV DQG 0HOLQGD.DOPiUVSHFXODWHGRQZKHQZRXOGWXUQLQWRµKLVWRU\¶$WWKDWWLPH KDGEHFRPHWKHIRFDOSRLQWRIFRPSDULVRQRIHYHU\WKLQJEHIRUHDQGDIWHU WKDWGDWH&ULWLFDOYRLFHVZHUHUDLVHGSDUWLFXODUO\GXULQJWKHVRFLDOLVWOLEHUDOJRY HUQPHQWVEHWZHHQDQGDQGDJDLQVLQFH)RUVRPH+XQJDULDQV VRFLDOLVWVDQGOLEHUDOV DUHWKHKHLUVRIWKRVHZKRVXSSUHVVHGWKHUHYROXWLRQ,Q WKLVVHQVHJHVWXUHVDQGWKHPHDQLQJRIKLVWRU\EHFRPHVLJQL¿FDQWDVWRZKRKDV WKHµULJKW¶WRFRPPHPRUDWHDQGOD\DZUHDWKDQGZLWKZKRP0+01 16=   2QHRIWKHP\WKSOD\HUVKDVEHHQWKH)LGHV]OHDGHU9LNWRU2UEiQZKRVLQFH  KDV VWDUWHG WR FXOWLYDWH WKH FRQFHSW RI polgári Magyarország FLWL]HQV¶ µERXUJHRLV¶  +XQJDU\ IRU KLV YLVLRQ IRU WKH IXWXUH +H DUJXHG WKDW +XQJDULDQ people had demanded these ‘polgári¶WUDGLWLRQVEDFNLQ,Q2UEiQ¶VYLHZ +XQJDULDQVZHUHFRQGHPQHGWRSHDFHIXOFRH[LVWHQFHLQVWHDGRIUHFRQFLOLDWLRQ $VWKHQHZ3ULPH0LQLVWHULQ2UEiQFRQWLQXHGWKHVDPHOLQHRIWKRXJKWLQ WKH RSHQLQJ VSHHFK RI WKH QHZ 3DUOLDPHQW 7KH LGHD ZDV IXUWKHU VWUHVVHG E\ )LGHV]RQWKH2FWREHUDQQLYHUVDU\7ZR\HDUVODWHUWKH\DUJXHGWKDWWKHDLPLQ ZDVDV\VWHPLFFKDQJHQRWWKHUHQHZDORIVRFLDOLVP01EF16=    /HDGLQJ politicians did not lay a wreath together in 1999 but as private SHUVRQVRQHDIWHUDQRWKHU,QWKHPDLQFRPPHPRUDWLYHHYHQWZDVSODQQHG WREHKHOGLQWKH3DUOLDPHQWZKLFKUHVXOWHGLQDVFDQGDODVWKHJUHDWHVWRSSRVL WLRQSDUW\)LGHV]GLGQRWSDUWLFLSDWHLQWKHHYHQW7KHQHZVRFLDOLVWOLEHUDOJRY ernment planned a private action at the cemetery, which did not materialise EHFDXVHRIWKHERRLQJDQGZKLVWOLQJDXGLHQFH7KH3ULPH0LQLVWHUJDYHXSWKH

Contested traditions?   tradition of being personally present, and his successor followed along the same SDWKLQ16=G01   7KLVSROLWLFDOµWKHDWUH¶DQGWKHVWUXJJOHRIPHPRU\KDYHUHSHDWHGO\OHGWRDQ DQQXDOGLVFXVVLRQRIPHPRU\DQGFRPPHQWVLQQHZVSDSHUV,QDQRSLQLRQ SROOUHÀHFWHGYLHZVWKDW+XQJDULDQVVKRXOGFRPPHPRUDWHWRJHWKHU%HVLGHSROLW LFDOVFDQGDOVWKHVWURQJFRPPHPRUDWLYHDQGµVHULRXV¶QDWXUHRIWKHDQQLYHUVDU\ might be the reason why the October anniversary is not nowadays more popular WKDQWKHRWKHUWZRKROLGD\V3HUKDSVZLWKWKLVLQPLQGWKHQHZ3ULPH0LQLVWHU )HUHQF*\XUFViQ\DQGWKHOHDGHURIWKH6RFLDOLVW3DUW\,VWYiQ+LOOHUERWKERUQ LQWKHVWRRNDQHZVWDQGLQGH¿QLQJWKHSUHVHQW SROLWLFDOPHDQLQJDQGWKH FRQWHQWRIWKHGD\,QERWKHPSKDVLVHGWKHQDWXUHRIDVDUHYROXWLRQ RIµ\RXQJVWHUV¶*\XUFViQ\DQG+LOOHUVXUPLVHGWKDWWKHGD\FRXOGEHDFRPPRQ GHQRPLQDWRU DQG D PRGHO IRU +XQJDULDQ SURJUHVVLYH WKRXJKW $FFRUGLQJ WR +LOOHUWKHGD\FRXOGEHµDXWXPQWK0DUFK¶DWLWVEHVW,QWKLVVHQVHLWFRXOGEH DOVRDOHIWLVWIHVWLYDOFRQWUDU\WRULJKWZLQJDWWHPSWVWRPRQRSROLVHLW01 16=G 

Democracy and symbolic politicking with myth and memory This chapter has looked at the mythical elements in the discourse and symbolism of national holidays and interpreted them with regard to the ‘democratic creden WLDOV¶RIWKHHYHQWVWKDWOD\DWWKHVRXUFHRIWKHKROLGD\V8VXDOO\QDWLRQDOKROL GD\V UHIHU WR XQLTXH KLVWRULFDO HYHQWV ZKLFK EHFRPH P\WKV LQ SROLWLFDO XVH E\ repeating and representing them. In this sense a national holiday is a strong form of historical representation, as it repeats annually, people prepare for it and expectations vary concerning why and how the national holiday should be cele brated. In the Hungarian case, even particular symbolic laws have been enacted ERWK EHIRUH DQG DIWHU  ZKLFK GHDO ZLWK WKH PHDQLQJV RI WKHVH KLVWRULFDO events. In practice every state has a national holiday connecting the state to some myth of origin or great historical events. However, we must also ask the critical TXHVWLRQLQZKDWVHQVHWKHVHGD\VFRQWULEXWHWRGHYHORSLQJDGHPRFUDWLFLGHQ WLW\ DV WKH\ KDYH VRPH UHYROXWLRQDU\ DVSHFWV DV ZHOO 7KH HYHQWV RI  DQG QRGRXEWKDGWKHLULOOXVLRQVEXWDOVRFKDQFHVIRUDPRUHGHPRFUDWLFSROLWL FDO RUGHU ZKLFK DOVR VWUHQJWKHQHG GHPRFUDWLF FRQVFLRXVQHVV EHIRUH  7KH PHPRU\ RI WKHVH GD\V LV RI¿FLDOO\ UHPHPEHUHG LQ WKH SUHVHQW 5HSXEOLF RI +XQJDU\+RZHYHUWKHVHHYHQWVDUHQRWWKHRQO\IRUHUXQQHUVRIGHPRFUDF\LWLV QRWDEOHWKDWWKHUHSXEOLFVRIDQGDUHQHLWKHUFHOHEUDWHGRI¿FLDOO\QRU ZDV WKHUH DQ\ VLJQL¿FDQW SXEOLF GLVFXVVLRQ UHJDUGLQJ WKHP EHWZHHQ  DQG  3DUWLFXODUO\ LQ ULJKWLVW SROLWLFDO WKRXJKW WKHUH LV DQ LGHD WKDW WKHVH VKRUW µOLEHUDO¶ SHULRGV ZHUH D SUHOXGH WR GLFWDWRUVKLS 7KLV OLQH RI WKRXJKW DLPV WR diminish efforts to democratise an aristocratic and conservative state. This has OHGWRSROLWLFDOFRQWHVWIRUOLEHUDOVDQGOHIWLVWVWKHDQQLYHUVDU\RIWKHUHYR OXWLRQKDVRIIHUHGDFKDQFHIRUSROLWLFDOJDWKHULQJVDWWKH0LKiO\.iURO\LVWDWXH WRµSURWHFW¶WKHUHSXEOLFIURPULJKWZLQJSRSXOLVP

  H. Nyyssönen  $OWKRXJKGHPRFUDF\ZDVQRWWKHRQO\JDPHLQWRZQDIWHUWKH:RUOG:DUVLQ IDFW+XQJDU\KDVWZLFHLQDQG FKDQJHGLWVIRUPRIJRYHUQPHQWIURP D NLQJGRP WR D UHSXEOLF 7KLV GLG QRW KDSSHQ LQ  DQG  DOWKRXJK WKH revolutionaries superseded the ‘ancien régime¶IRUDZKLOH0RUHRYHUIUHHHOHF WLRQVDW\SLFDOFULWHULDIRUGHPRFUDF\UHPDLQHGRQO\DSROLWLFDOSURPLVHLQ DQG,QSDUOLDPHQWDU\HOHFWLRQVZHUHKHOGDQGDOWKRXJKWKHIUDQFKLVH exceeded the British one of the times, it was still far from the universal suffrage NQRZQ LQ WKH WZHQWLHWK FHQWXU\ ,Q  SDUOLDPHQWDU\ HOHFWLRQV DOUHDG\ WRRN place before the declaration of the republic and were considered the freest in Hungarian history.  $OO+XQJDULDQVFHOHEUDWHWKHVHWKUHHQDWLRQDOKROLGD\VEXWDVDQRSLQLRQSROO IURPVKRZVWKH$XJXVWKROLGD\KDVDVHULRXVFRPSHWLWRULQ0DUFK,QWKH HQTXLU\SHUFHQWRIWKRVHDVNHGPHQWLRQHG$XJXVWDVWKHPRVWLPSRUWDQW ZKLOH  SHU FHQW IRXQG  0DUFK DV WKH PRVW DSSURSULDWH QDWLRQDO KROLGD\ 2FWREHU  VHHPHG WR EH OHVV DSSURSULDWH DV RQO\  SHU FHQW FRQVLGHUHG LW WKH ELJJHVWQDWLRQDOKROLGD\16=   $OWKRXJK ZH VKRXOG QRW GUDPDWLVH WKHVH GLIIHUHQFHV WKLV HQTXLU\ UHLQIRUFHV ideas about two contested traditions, a republican tradition with democratic fea WXUHV DQG DQ LPSHULDO RQH DQG WKHLU LPSDFW RQ SROLWLFDO WKRXJKW ± 0DUFK DQG 2FWREHU ZHUH WRJHWKHU DV SRSXODU DV WKH $XJXVW KROLGD\ ,Q FRQWHPSRUDU\ +XQJDU\ERWK0DUFKDQG2FWREHUKDYHDSODFHLQWKHµQDWLRQDOSDQWKHRQ¶ and narrative, but the most important day of the republic refers to a medieval NLQJGRPDQGWRWKHRULJLQVRIWKHVWDWH,Q$XJXVWWKHPHPRU\RIWKHKLVWRULFDO Hungary is also present as the realm of St Stephen was essentially greater than the present Hungary. Nevertheless, during the last few years political polarisation between the main parties affected the modalities of the celebrations more than the status of the GD\VWKHPVHOYHV*URXSLGHQWLWLHVLQWKHPDNLQJKDYHDOVROHGWRPRQRSROLVLQJ WHQGHQFLHV DQG GLI¿FXOWLHV LQ FRPPHPRUDWLQJ WRJHWKHU 1R GRXEW +XQJDULDQ democracy has enough strength to cope with this but at the same time it takes a lot of time and energy to play time and again with these myths. In Hungary this political use of national holidays is criticised but in fact accepted. The spectacu lar nature of these historical anniversaries and their commemoration has brought DSHFXOLDUDQGLQWHUHVWLQJµ+XQJDULDQ¶V\PEROLFÀDYRXUWRWKHQHZGHPRFUDF\  ,WKDVEHHQVDLGWKDWV\PEROLFSROLWLFNLQJLVVRPHWKLQJµYHU\+XQJDULDQ¶±DV H[HPSOL¿HG LQ WKH V\PEROLF SRZHU RI EXULDOV DQG UHEXULDOV RI SDVW OHDGHUV DQG QDWLRQDOKHURHV2Q0DUFK+XQJDULDQVKDYHDWUDGLWLRQRIZHDULQJDQDWLRQDO FRORXUHGFRFNDGHSUHSDUHGLQVFKRROVRUERXJKWRQWKHVWUHHWV6iQGRU3HWĘ¿KDG XVHGDFRFNDGHLQEXWLQJHQHUDOLWVFRQQHFWLRQWR)UDQFHLQDQGODWHU to Hungary remains unclear. National colours also appeared on arm ribbons, a WUDGLWLRQ NQRZQ LQ  DQG HYHQ LQ DQ HOHFWLRQ FDPSDLJQ RI WKH WZHQW\¿UVW century as well. The second symbol, which is connected to the national holidays, LVWKH+XQJDULDQFURZQNQRZQDOVRDV6W6WHSKHQ¶V&URZQZKLFKLVQRZORFDWHG LQ WKH 3DUOLDPHQW IRU WKH JUHDWHU SXEOLF WR VHH ,WV P\WKLFDO GLPHQVLRQV EHFDPH clear in the political debate of 1999, when the republic debated its relation to

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Bibliography $PDOYL& µ%DVWLOOH'D\)URP'LHV,UDHWR+ROLGD\¶LQ1RUD3HG Realms of Memory: The Construction of the French Past9RO1HZ
Contested traditions?   .XUWiQ66iQGRU3DQG9DVV/HGV  Magyarország Politikai Évkönyve'HEUH FHQ5)RUPD /H*RII- µ0HPRU\¶LQ5HQGDOO6DQG&ODPDQ(HGV History and Memory, 1HZ
9

The paradox of infra-liberalism Towards a genealogy of ‘managed democracy’ in Putin’s Russia Sergei Prozorov

Introduction: who Mr Putin is and is not From the moment of Vladimir Putin’s ascent to power in 1999, marked by the proverbial question of ‘who is Mr Putin?’, studies of the Putin presidency have taken a personalist and frequently sensationalist approach. The persistent referHQFHV WR 3XWLQ¶V UHODWLYHO\ LQVLJQL¿FDQW FDUHHU LQ WKH .*% GXULQJ WKH 6RYLHW period allegedly lend credence to the analysis of the Putin presidency in terms of a facile ‘hermeneutics of suspicion’, whereby the surface level of political processes is dismissed in the attempt to glimpse, behind the curtain of the apparent, WKHµUHDO¶VLWHRI3XWLQLWHSROLWLFVSRSXODWHGE\VXFKSKDQWRP¿JXUHVDVWKHSURverbial ‘siloviki’, a term whose untranslatability helpfully hints at its nonreferential status. One consequence of this intellectual disposition has been the interpretative privilege granted to the exceptional and extreme events or acts of the presidency, be it the military operation in the Chechen Republic or the proseFXWLRQRI0LNKDLO.KRGRUNRYVN\7KHVHHYHQWVLQZKLFKWKHFRXUVHRIµQRUPDO politics’ was manifestly interrupted, allegedly strip the façade of reformism and point to the ‘real’, presumably autocratic and repressive nature of Putin’s politics. In this chapter we shall retain the focus on the exceptional moments of the Putin presidency that manifestly contradict its overall technocratic selfdescription. At the same time we shall attempt to bridge the gap between the ‘façade’ of liberal reformism and the ‘reality’ of authoritarian rule. Instead of postulating a dualism of the real and the apparent in the ‘Putin project’, we shall pose the question of the relation between the norm and the exception in the constitution of the project of the Putin presidency. In this manner, the study of the Putin presidency may abandon the simplistic opposition between ‘liberalism’ and ‘authoritarianism’ and problematise the paradoxes, aporias and, ultimately, ‘illiberalities’ harboured within the liberal project itself. We shall argue that rather than cynically deploying the rhetoric of liberal reform to legitimise a ‘creeping authoritarianism’, the ‘Putin project’ is rather marked by an, indeed, cynical display of the internal aporias of liberalism, which in the more established liberal orders are concealed by such ‘myths of origin’ as the social contract or the ‘homo economicus’.

The paradox of infra-liberalism 187 The concept of infra-liberalism that we shall introduce in this chapter argues for the indispensability of authoritarian or ‘illiberal’ modalities of rule to the constitution of the liberal order as its ‘constitutive outside’. Many of the features of the Putin presidency that presently attract critical commentary are, in our argument, not heterogeneous to the project of liberal reforms but essential to it, or, more precisely, ‘essential-as-heterogeneous’. From this standpoint, it is possible to problematise much of the existing criticism of Putin’s politics as facile DQGVXSHU¿FLDO:KDWLVDWVWDNHLVQRWZKHWKHU3XWLQ¶VUHIRUPVGLYHUJHIURPDQ\ externally posited design for the ‘liberal democratic transition’, whose own claims to prescriptive authority are highly dubious. The ultimate question for the critique of Putinism is whether one remains committed to the liberal project, given its paradoxicality that has little to do with the current presidency, or opts for an alternative form of socio-political order. As we shall argue, the opposition ‘Putin or OLEHUDOLVP¶ LV HQWLUHO\ DUWL¿FLDO DQG ZH UDWKHU RXJKW WR VHULRXVO\ FRQsider the alternative ‘Putin’s infra-liberalism or anti-liberalism’. The next section addresses the co-existence of the normative and the exceptional in the ‘Putin project’, arguing for the indispensability of the illiberal ‘excess’ to the liberal order. The following section theorises this excess in terms of the concept of LQIUDOLEHUDOLVP GUDZLQJ RQ WKH ZRUN RI &DUO 6FKPLWW -DFTXHV 'HUULGD DQG Michel Foucault. In the conclusion, we shall discuss the implications of the infra-liberal conceptualisation of the Putin project for Russian post-communist politics and the political ideal of liberalism.

The obscene lexicon of the sovereign: liberalism and its exterior The discussions of the Putin presidency by both Russian and international commentators rarely fail to invoke a certain ambivalence in his image. At the time of his election, President Putin was relatively unknown politically and his policy plans were subject to intense speculations and suspicions. However, Putin apparHQWO\µUHPDLQVDP\VWHU\DQGDSRLQWRIFRQWURYHUV\¶+HUVSULQJDQG.LSS  HYHQDIWHU¿YH\HDUVLQRI¿FHDQGDIWHUKDYLQJLQLWLDWHGDZLGHUDQJHRIVXEVWDQWLYHVRFLRHFRQRPLFUHIRUPVWKDWFRXOGEHH[SHFWHGWRSURYLGHD¿UPDQVZHU to the proverbial question of ‘who is Mr Putin?’ Even disregarding the interpreWDWLYH H[HUFLVHV WKDW SDQGHU WR WKH &ROG :DU IHDU RI WKH .*% DQG FRQVWUXH complex conspiracy theories about Putin’s rise to power, the reception of the 3XWLQ SUHVLGHQF\ KDV EHHQ JHQHUDOO\ DPELYDOHQW FRPELQLQJ WKH DI¿UPDWLRQ RI his credentials as a liberal reformer with the accusations of the establishment in KLVSUHVLGHQF\RIDVHPLDXWKRULWDULDQUHJLPHRIµPDQDJHGGHPRFUDF\¶*XGNRY +HUVSULQJDQG.LSS :HPXVWUHFDOOWKDWLQLWVRULJLQDODUWLFXODWLRQ LQWKH5XVVLDQGLVFRXUVHWKHSURYHUELDOµPDQDJHGGHPRFUDF\¶KDVQRW¿JXUHGDV an aberration of the mythical ‘true’ democracy, but rather was used to designate the dynamic of socio-political consolidation that does away with the revolutionDU\ ÀX[ DQG WKHUHE\ PDNHV SRVVLEOH µQRUPDO SROLWLFV¶ RI WKH NLQG SUDFWLVHG LQ FRQWHPSRUDU\OLEHUDOGHPRFUDFLHV0DUNRY7UHW\DNRYE ,URQLFDOO\

188

S. Prozorov

the concept of ‘managed democracy’ was originally deployed to designate not the divergence of Russian political practice from the Western ‘standard’ of democracy but rather its painstaking approximation of the latter. However, these connotations have been all but stripped away in the increasing use of the concept by the critics of ‘Putin’s regime’ to ridicule its avowedly democratic selfdescription. In this usage, the term acquires the status of an oxymoron, once again indicating the ambivalent understanding of Putinism. A number of observers have also paid attention to a curious stylistic dualism in the President’s image. On the one hand, Putin’s style has been deprived of any trace of ‘revolutionary’ (or counter-revolutionary) political charisma, so characWHULVWLF RI WKH SROLWLFDO HOLWH RI WKH HDUO\ V 1LFKROVRQ  =XGLQ   Public opinion surveys in Russia have demonstrated that despite extremely high DSSURYDOUDWLQJVWKH3UHVLGHQW¶V¿JXUHVWLUVYHU\OLWWOHSXEOLFHPRWLRQRUSDVVLRQ receives no ‘admiration’ or ‘love’. The public opinion of the President is rather ‘positively indifferent’. The ‘carnival style’ of Yeltsin-era politics, characterised by intense political divisions and mass media controversies has given way to the technocratic and business-like style, thoroughly devoid of the political pathos of the ‘perestroika’ period and early post-communist politics. In a number of interviews and speeches, Putin has repeatedly presented himself as a ‘hired manager’, providing ‘services to the population’.16LPLODUO\WKH3XWLQSUHVLGHQF\ has been marked by the decline of interest in the elevated and elusive ‘national idea’ as the ethico-political foundation for the new Russian state. In a number of public appearances, Putin has offered as his vision of the national idea ‘the idea RI HIIHFWLYH DQG HI¿FLHQW VWDWHKRRG¶ &ULWLFDO FRPPHQWDWRUV KDYH FRUUHFWO\ pointed out that this answer simply evades the question, offering the achievement of desired goals in the least costly manner as the GH¿QLWLRQ of these very goals. The fractured society clumsily asks [the President] how to become whole, and he answers that it must become wealthy 6WULFWO\ VSHDNLQJ WKH SUHVLGHQW¶VUHVSRQVHLVWDXWRORJLFDOKHUHIHUVWRHI¿FLHQF\ZKLOHWKHTXHVWLRQLV DERXWFKDUWLQJWKDWYHU\VRFLDOXQLW\ZKLFKVXEVHTXHQWO\PD\EHIRXQGHI¿FLHQW RU LQHI¿FLHQW. . . . To declare pragmatism as the ideology of power in today’s Russia is merely to put the cart before the horse. 5HPL]RYE As a number of Russian and Western political analysts have pointed out, a wide range of radical reforms in such areas as labour relations, land ownership, the legal system, natural monopolies, the relations of the federal centre and the subjects of the Federation, that have constituted the prime sites of political antagonism during the abortive attempts at their implementation in the Yeltsin presidency, are presently undertaken in a routine and business-like fashion ZLWKRXW PXFK FRQWURYHUV\ RU JHQXLQH SROHPLF RYHU WKHLU JRDOV %XQLQ et al. =XGLQ 7KHLQFUHDVHRIWKHPRPHQWXPDQGHI¿FLHQF\RIWKHUHIRUP process in the absence of political confrontation has been described as the main

The paradox of infra-liberalism 189 achievement of the Putin presidency and a sign of political consolidation and VWDELOLVDWLRQ LQ SRVWFRPPXQLVW 5XVVLD 0RUH VSHFL¿FDOO\ WKLV VWDELOLVDWLRQ KDV been interpreted as the emergence of a hegemonic political discourse that comELQHVWKHLQWHQVL¿FDWLRQRIOLEHUDOUHIRUPVZLWKWKHSURMHFWRIVWDWHVWUHQJWKHQLQJ DQGLVIUHTXHQWO\UHIHUUHGWRDVµOLEHUDOFRQVHUYDWLVP¶3RO\DNRY3UR]RURY D 7KHVXFFHVVRIWKLVKHJHPRQLFSURMHFWLVZHOOLOOXVWUDWHGE\WKHELWWHUQHVV with which it is addressed by Putin’s opponents from the ‘left-conservative’ FDPS3UR]RURYD  7KHGHFDGHRIUHIRUPVZDVVXI¿FLHQWWRFRPHWRWHUPVZLWKµEHLQJWKURZQ into-the-market’ as something inevitable. Two years of Putin’s ‘rule’ were VXI¿FLHQW WR VSRQWDQHRXVO\ OHJLWLPDWH WKH SRVW6RYLHW VWUXFWXUDO GHJUDGDtion of society . . . as a constituted and adequate reality, [i.e.] not in terms of collapse, catastrophe or a chaotic ‘transitional moment’, but as a crystallised reality, with regard to which it is possible to talk about ‘conservation’, ‘reproduction’ and ‘transformation’. 5HPL]RYEHPSKDVLVDGGHG For the left-conservative opposition, it is only with the advent of Putin that WKHPRQVWURXVSKDQWRPRIµSRVW6RYLHW5XVVLD¶FRXOGFODLPLWVULJKWWREHUHFRJnised in its objective positivity, which makes possible the very idea of a ‘liberal conservatism’. Putin’s articulation of liberal reformism with the patriotic rhetoric and its presentation as a ‘logic of normal life’ is taken to have established a hegemonic constellation, within which the opposition is gradually deprived of any discursive capacity. On the other hand, this political stabilisation and technocratic routinisation is regularly punctured by none other than the president himself, known for his curious verbal outbursts that contradict the dispassionate, blank and businesslike style he himself has introduced and championed. The already legendary promise to ‘waste [Chechen terrorists] in their outhouses’, the ominous claim that ‘whoever hurts us has three days left to live’ and the bemusing offer to a French journalist, sympathetic to the cause of Chechen separatism, to undergo ‘a circumcision, after which nothing will grow back on [sic!]’ are merely some of the verbal performances which are stylistically at odds with the technocratic ausWHULW\RIWKHFRQWHPSRUDU\5XVVLDQSROLWLFDOGLVFRXUVH0D[LP%ODQWKDVGUDZQ DQDQDORJ\EHWZHHQ3XWLQ¶VGXDOLVWLFGLVFXUVLYLW\DQG5/6WHYHQVRQ¶VIDPRXV µORVVRILGHQWLW\¶QRYHOODµ'U-HN\OODQG0U+\GH¶ There are moments when the progressive and liberal head of state turns, in VWULFWDFFRUGDQFHZLWK6WHYHQVRQ¶VQRYHOODLQWRKLVRZQH[DFWRSSRVLWH7KH UHDVRQDEOH3UHVLGHQW-HN\OZKRLVZHOODZDUHWKDWWKHUHLVQRDOWHUQDWLYHWR liberal reforms and integration with the West, suddenly turns into the retired lieutenant colonel Hyde with all the prejudices ingrained in his former line of work. %ODQW

  S. Prozorov In the discourse of the left-conservative opposition two interpretations of this dualism have been advanced. On the one hand, there is a facile view of Putin, HQWHUWDLQHGGXULQJWKHHDUO\\HDUVRIWKHSUHVLGHQF\E\VXFK¿JXUHVDV$OH[DQGHU Prokhanov, as secretly ‘one of us’, a ‘secret agent’ in the enemy camp, having a hidden project behind the façade of liberal reformism. In this manner, the oppositional discourse has joined the conspiratorial exercises of the remnants of the 5XVVLDQµGHPRFUDWLFLQWHOOLJHQWVLD¶FRQVWUXLQJDSKDQWDVPLF¿JXUHRI3XWLQDVD ‘latent autocrat’, the one who always ‘says less than thinks’. An opposite and a more nuanced view is offered by Remizov, for whom a hidden or latent political project is a contradiction in terms, the political being necessarily phenomenal rather than noumenal and hence contained without remainder in the actually occurring discursive practices. ‘Putin’s soul’ is a metaphysical prejudice. . . . We simply need to recognise that there is nothing beneath the apparent, even if the apparent hints towards the existence of a secret6HFUHWLYHQHVVLVWKHODVWUHVRUWRISRZHUZKLFKQR longer has anything about it that could deserve being hidden. Thus, Putin ‘wants’ precisely that which he talks about, i.e. nothing. 5HPL]RYD The fact that there is a perception of the existence of ‘another Putin’ behind the surface of technocratic nihilism is merely a blunt proof of the fact that the actual Putin project ‘comes down to nothing’. Putin is thus interpreted as merely the VLJQRIWKHURXWLQLVDWLRQRIWKHQLKLOLVPRIWKHVLWVPRVWORJLFDOFRQFOXVLRQ LI3XWLQLVDSDWULRWKLVµSDWULD¶LVWKHµ1HZ5XVVLD¶RIGHFDGHQWKHGRQLVPWKDW the oppositional observers consider an abominable historical accident. Putin’s  $GGUHVV WR WKH )HGHUDO $VVHPEO\ DSSHDUV WR EH WKH SLQQDFOH RI WKLV GLVSODFHPHQW RI WKH SROLWLFDO LQ WKH 3UHVLGHQW¶V GLVFRXUVH OHIWFRQVHUYDWLYH FRPmentators have noted with repugnance the President’s formulation of the Russian µQDWLRQDOLGHD¶LQWHUPVRIWKHWULDGRIµ6HFXULW\)UHHGRPDQG&RPIRUW¶$FFRUGLQJ WR 6WDQLVODY %HONRYVN\ µWKH VSHHFK SRVLWLRQHG 3XWLQ DV D ¿HUFH DQWL conservative, and consequently as a radical liberal to the core’, so that the DXWKRUZDVDEOHWRHQWLWOHKLVDUWLFOHµ3XWLQ%HFRPHV&KXEDLV¶%HONRYVN\  Thus, Putin’s exceptional discursive quips are either viewed as indicative of the existence of a latent ‘authoritarian’ project or dismissed as non-referential ‘white noise’, which conceals the absence of anything to conceal, i.e. the thoroughgoing QLKLOLVPRIWKHµ3XWLQSURMHFW¶:KDWLQWHUHVWVXVLQWKH-HN\OO±+\GHDQDORJ\LVWKH FRH[LVWHQFHZLWKLQWKH¿JXUHRIWKH3UHVLGHQWRIWKHLPDJHWKDWLVconstitutive and emblematic of the new political order and the image, which stands in a relation of exception and excess to it. While our primary interest is the positive characterisaWLRQ RI WKH µQRUP¶ RI WKH 3XWLQ SURMHFW ZH VKDOO IROORZ &DUO 6FKPLWW LQ VWDUWLQJ with the exception as that which proves the existence of the norm. 7KHH[FHSWLRQLVPRUHLQWHUHVWLQJWKDQWKHUXOH7KHUXOHSURYHVQRWKLQJWKH H[FHSWLRQSURYHVHYHU\WKLQJLWFRQ¿UPVQRWRQO\WKHUXOHEXWDOVRLWVexist-

The paradox of infra-liberalism 191 ence, which derives only from the exception. In the exception the power of real life breaks through the crust of a mechanism that has become torpid by repetition. 6FKPLWWHPSKDVLVDGGHG Let there be no misunderstanding about the function of the exception. The H[FHSWLRQGRHVQRWGHPRQVWUDWHWKHQRQH[LVWHQFHRIWKHUXOHE\YLRODWLQJLWRQ the contrary, it illuminates the existence of the normal order in its totality by assuming a position of exteriority in relation to it. It is not that the President’s eccentric quips contradict his otherwise professed liberal-managerial stance and thus devalue the latter as a mere hypocritical ‘façade’, beneath which one encounters the very opposite of liberalism. It is rather the fact that it is exclusively the President’s own discourse that is punctured by the exceptional forays into the domain of the obscene WKDWVKRXOGLQWHUHVWXV,Q6FKPLWW¶VIDPRXVGH¿nition, ‘sovereign is he who decides on exception¶ 6FKPLWW   HPSKDVLV DGGHG 6RYHUHLJQW\LVWKXVGH¿QHGQRWDVWKHpositivity of the exercise of power, its scope or intensity, but as a negative operation of transgression, the capacity to suspend the normal functioning of order in a constitutive decision. ‘As the decision that establishes the border, the political decision is always itself in excess of that border¶1RUULVHPSKDVLVDGGHG   :HPD\WKXVUHIRUPXODWHWKHGH¿QLWLRQRIWKHVRYHUHLJQDVWKHtransgressor in relation to himself. The sovereign is s/he who is simultaneously inside the space of order as the source of its foundational principles and outside it as something that cannot be subsumed under these principles, a surplus that in relation to the order in question is always unfathomable, monstrous and obscene. The FRQFHSW RI VRYHUHLJQW\ WKDW 6FKPLWW WHUPHG µFRQFUHWH¶ RU µERUGHUOLQH¶ 6FKPLWW  KDVDQDI¿QLW\ZLWKWKH'HUULGHDQQRWLRQRIWKHsupplement, which IDPRXVO\FRPELQHGWKHWZRPHDQLQJVRIWKHWHUPWKHDGGLWLRQRIDVXUSOXVµD plenitude enriching another plenitude’ and the compensation for a certain interQDOODFNZKLFKµLQVLQXDWHVLWVHOILQWKHSODFHRI  ¿OOVWKHYRLG¶'HUULGD   7KH VXSSOHPHQW LV WKXV DQ H[WHUQDO VXUSOXV WKDW PDNHV ZKROH VRPHWKLQJ that ought to lack nothing at all in itself, the condition of possibility of something and simultaneously the condition of the impossibility of its completeness, FORVXUHRUVHOILPPDQHQFH 6RYHUHLJQW\ RSHUDWHV DW WKH RXWHUPRVW VSKHUH LW LV KHUH DW WKH ERUGHUOLQH that it establishes and violates limits. . . . The question of the sovereign is the question of the limit. If sovereignty decides upon its own limits, its decision cannot be bound by those limits. . . . The sovereign is the unlimited power that makes limits, or in other words, the ungrounded ground of the law. 1RUULVHPSKDVLVDGGHG  :HPD\WKXVRIIHUDQRWKHUGH¿QLWLRQRIVRYHUHLJQW\DVWKHobscene double of order. From this perspective President Putin’s regular recourse to the obscene lexicon appears more than a curious eccentricity, though certainly less than a

  S. Prozorov PRPHQWDU\VXUIDFLQJRIKLVGHHSLOOLEHUDOLW\ZKDWZHREVHUYHLQVXFKLQFLGHQWV is the very consummation of sovereigntyWKURXJKWKHPDQLIHVWDWLRQRIWKHLQ¿QLtesimal yet irreducible gap between the President and his positive ‘regime’. We ought to stress that speaking of consummation of sovereignty entails that these acts are, in and by themselves, practices of sovereignty, with no semantic remainder to the scant content expressed in them. The obscene lexicon of the sovereign does not symbolise DQ\WKLQJ RWKHU WKDQ LWVHOI WKHUH LV QR GHHSHU PHDQLQJEHKLQGLWWRGHFRGHQRWUDGLWLRQRUFRQWH[WWRORFDWHLWLQ6FKPLWW 3UR]RURYE  One may even wonder whether such verbal performances mean anything at all other than the fact of their exteriority to the normal order. The limit location of the sovereign in relation to his order is replicated on the level of language in the sovereign’s statements that press language against its limits, blocking it, PDNLQJLWVWXPEOHDQGXOWLPDWHO\FROODSVHLQWKHPDQQHURIWKH'HUULGHDQQRWLRQ RIµGLVVHPLQDWLRQ¶DVWKHIRUFHRIGLVUXSWLRQRIPHDQLQJ'HUULGD  What grounds the positive ‘system’ is the unsystematisable excess that escapes from it, that cannot be expressed in its discourse in any other manner than a monstrous obscenity. Yet, this literally absurd character of the sovereign’s discourse is not the effect of deconstructive criticism, but the manifestation of sovereign power in its full force, unfathomability being the necessary aspect of a properly transcendent character of power. However, recalling Foucault’s understanding of sovereignty as a purely negative form of power that is entirely exterior to the lives of its subjects (Foucault  ZHPD\DOVRQRWHWKDWLWVYHU\WUDQVFHQGHQFHLVVLPXOWDQHRXVO\DµVWXPbling block’ that reduces power to a restrictive, deductive and prohibitive operation that is dissonant with the logic of liberal governance. As Foucault’s and post-Foucauldian studies of governmentality demonstrate, liberal governmentality has been historically constituted by the abandonment of the presupposition of the transcendent exteriority of power in relation to the domain of society. Instead, liberalism is characterised by the modalities of rule that are immanent rather than transcendent to the social body, are decentred, dispersed and disseminated within it. In other words, we may approach liberalism as an immanentist governmental rationality, which conceives of government as guided and deterPLQHG E\ WKH TXDVLQDWXUDO SURFHVVHV LQ WKH VRFLDO UHDOP )RXFDXOW  %XUFKHOO'HDQ :HPD\WKHUHIRUHVXJJHVWWKDWWKHvisibility of WKHVRYHUHLJQH[FHVVLQFRQWHPSRUDU\5XVVLDQSROLWLFVH[HPSOL¿HGE\3UHVLGHQW Putin’s recourse to the ‘obscene lexicon’, marks an interesting contrast between the political discourse of the Putin presidency and the general rationality of liberal governance. In the following section we shall address the question of this ‘minimal difference’ in terms of the concept of ‘infra-liberalism’.

Infra-liberalism: the constitutive illiberality of liberal rule In order to understand the presence of the illiberal excess in the discourse of the Putin presidency, we need to locate the constitutive presuppositions of liberal

The paradox of infra-liberalism 193 governmentality within the temporal context of its institution. At its point of emergence a liberal order faces a set of problems that are distinct from and inaccessible to the naturalistic, securitarian modality of ‘already-existing’ liberalism. While established liberal orders are constituted by what we may term a naturalist mythologeme, according to which liberty is a priori given as an essential attribute of quasi-natural social processes and must merely be secured by state government, the emergent liberal order faces the problems of the constitution of these very processes. Faced with a problem of its own becoming, liberal governmentality operates with a logic of foundation of liberalism, whose relationship to the logic of liberalism itself is that of constitutive exteriority. This means that we should conceive of the problem-space of post-communist liberal reforms in Russia not in terms of the limits to government that are internal to liberalism but rather as a situation of ‘limitation’, that point of emergence of liberalism, where LWLVQRW\HWOLPLWHGE\ZKDWLWLWVHOILQVWLWXWHVDVDOLPLW/HPNH3UR]RURY  7KHQDWXUDOLVWµP\WKRIRULJLQ¶RIOLEHUDOIUHHGRPVDORQJZLWKLWVGHULYDtives such as the ‘homo economicus’ and the social contract, is logically inappliFDEOHLQWKLVVLWXDWLRQDVWKHVHIUHHGRPVPXVW¿UVWEHLQVWLWXWHGLQJRYHUQPHQWDO practices.  7KLVLVWKHSRLQWDWZKLFKOLEHUDOJRYHUQPHQWPXVW¿UVWWUDYHUVHLWVH[WHULRUWR positively fashion it in a way that will subsequently permit its naturalisation as a transcendental a priori of liberal rule. Concretely, this entails the suspension of the naturalist-securitarian ethos and the adoption of a constitutive mode of intervention, which does not merely secure the free social space but actively transIRUPVRUµFRUUHFWV¶LWLQDFFRUGDQFHZLWKDVSHFL¿FYLVLRQRIIUHHGRP2IFRXUVH there is an abundance of examples of such corrective interventions in established :HVWHUQOLEHUDORUGHUVGHSOR\HGZLWKUHJDUGWRVSHFL¿FWDUJHWHGSRSXODWLRQVWKDW DUHWKHUHE\µIRUFHGWREHIUHH¶LPPLJUDQWVGHYLDQWVWHUURULVWVXVSHFWVZHOIDUH UHFLSLHQWV MXYHQLOH GHOLQTXHQWV HWF +LQGHVV  'HDQ   +RZHYHU DW the moment of emergence of liberal government this suspension of the myth of ‘natural liberty’ may not be viewed as a temporary transgression of liberal prinFLSOHV EXW LV UDWKHU WKH FRQGLWLRQ RI SRVVLELOLW\ RI WKHLU LQVWLWXWLRQ ORJLFDOO\ D practice may not be founded on that which it founds, just as the institution of the OLPLWLVQRWLWVHOIOLPLWHG6FKPLWW'HUULGDäLåHN  This founding . . . moment of law is, in law, an instance of non-law. . . . It is the moment in which the foundation of law becomes suspended in the void or over the abyss, suspended by a pure performative act that would not have to answer to or before anyone. 'HUULGD The moment of emergence of liberal governmentality attunes us to the presence, within liberal governmental rationality, of the irreducible illiberal excess that forms the periphery of its more sedimented forms. Let us sum up this thesis by stating that the logic of institution of liberalism is not itself liberal. In a strict sense, this illiberality may not be conceived as ‘anti-liberal’ or ‘opposed’ to the

  S. Prozorov liberal principles of government, since it conditions the emergence of these very principles and is thus anterior to the very opposition between liberalism and antiliberalism. The Putin project, which seeks to ‘modernise’ Russia in accordance with (neo-)liberal socio-economic principles, logically recalls the conditions of emergence of liberalism itself. Moreover, the naturalist mythologeme of liberalism cannot be sustained in the post-communist condition, marked by a radical discontinuity and the experiHQFH RI WKH FRQWLQJHQF\ RI SROLWLFDO IRXQGDWLRQV 1HLWKHU WKH µIUHH PDUNHW¶ QRU the ‘free subject’ can be posited as a natural limit, an aboriginal reality prior to governmental practices that the latter must merely secure. It is rather of necessity cast as a result of practices of reform that seek to mould, shape, fashion, cultivate, construct liberal forms of subjectivity, economy and government itself. The logic of post-communist liberal reforms can thus be termed constructivist 'HDQ as opposed to the naturalist logic of classical liberalism. Thus, the historical condition of the post-communist politics of emergence entails the rise to centrality, within the liberal mode of governmentality, of the constructivist technology that is peripheral to the naturalist-securitarian regime of classical OLEHUDOLVP7KHµ3XWLQSURMHFW¶LVPDGHSRVVLEOHE\DQG¿QGVLWVHQWLUHMXVWL¿FDtion in, the transgression via governmental interventions of the constitutive boundary of liberalism precisely in order to install it. In the simultaneous absence of this constitutive boundary and the presence of its teleological presupposition we shall term the historical problem-space that conditions the possibility of post-communist governmentality infra-liberal (Pro]RURY   $V DQ LQIUDVWUXFWXUDO SUDFWLFH RI OD\LQJ IRXQGDWLRQV SRVW communist infra-liberalism faces most acutely the aporia of producing its own limitations, installing as governmental artefacts the market economy and civil VRFLHW\WKDWLWPXVWVLPXOWDQHRXVO\YDORULVHDVQDWXUDO,Q6ODYRMäLåHN¶VWHUPLnology, infra-liberalism marks a locus of ‘inherent transgression’ in the liberal RUGHUäLåHNFODLPVWKDWµWKHYHU\HPHUJHQFHRIDFHUWDLQYDOXHZKLFKVHUYHVDV WKHSRLQWRILGHRORJLFDOLGHQWL¿FDWLRQUHOLHVRQLWVWUDQVJUHVVLRQRQVRPHPRGH RIWDNLQJDGLVWDQFHWRZDUGVLW±WKHJDSLVRULJLQDODQGFRQVWLWXWLYHLWLVLQKHUHQW WR WKH V\PEROLF RUGHU DV VXFK¶ äLåHN    7KLV JDS HQWDLOV WKDW µQDWXUDO liberty’, a foundational mythologeme of liberal governmentality, can only be SUHVHQWLQDGHIHUUHGREVFXUHVSHFWUDOIRUPVLQFHDQDOOWRROLWHUDOLGHQWL¿FDWLRQ of the present Russian society with a ‘system of natural liberty’ makes both illegitimate and ultimately meaningless the very project of liberal reforms. In the infra-liberal constellation, ‘natural liberty’ is only present in its absence, the absence that makes necessary the constructivist intervention, which in turn renders absent the naturality of the resulting construct. According to Harald Wydra’s argument in the Introduction to this volume, the ‘events of 1989 have remained in a mythical no man’s land’. The notion of infra-liberalism permits us to understand why many of the liberal mythologemes appear manifestly vacuous DQG VXSHU¿FLDO LQ WKH SRVWFRPPXQLVW FRQWH[W :KHQ ZKDW LV DW VWDNH LV WKH active construction of a social order that in the Russian case has no historical SUHFHGHQWLWVSUHVHQWDWLRQDVVRPHKRZµQDWXUDO¶LVUDWKHULOO¿WWHGDVDPRGHRI

The paradox of infra-liberalism   its legitimisation, since the logical consequence of such a claim would be a disavowal of all prior history as ‘contrary to nature’ or outright monstrous. The interventionist and constructivist character of infra-liberalism aligns it with contemporary Western neoliberalism, which is distinguished by the deployPHQWRIDµSHGDJRJLFDOWHFKQRORJ\¶&UXLNVKDQN3UR]RURY RIJRYernment that intervenes in the social domain in order to indoctrinate its subjects into the proper practice of ‘natural liberty’. The neoliberal mode of governmentality is characterised by a downgrading of the naturalist mythologeme and an adoption of a self-consciously constructivist orientation. Economic rationality, ZKLFKGH¿QHGWKHGRPDLQRIµQDWXUDOOLEHUW\¶LQFODVVLFDOOLEHUDOLVPUHPDLQVSHUceived in naturalist terms and, moreover, is universalised to embrace all human conduct, but, due to the perception of the betrayal of liberal principles during the period of ‘social welfarist’ government and the more general observation of the contemporary ‘moral decline’, ‘natural liberty’ is viewed as no longer present in its originary authenticity. It is this ‘spectral’ presence of natural liberty only in the perception of its absence that calls for governmental interventionism that deploys elaborate techniques of the construction of quasi-market domains in the social realm. Thus, neoliberalism may well be conceived as a remythologising project of liberalism ‘beginning anew’ after a period of decline and degeneraWLRQ,QWKHZRUGVRI1HZW*LQJULFKµZHVLPSO\QHHGWRUHDFKRXWDQGerase the slate and start over¶&UXLNVKDQN 7KLVH[SUHVVLRQVXPVXSWKHQHROLEHUDO WDNH RQ WKH IXQGDPHQWDO DSRULD RI OLEHUDOLVP VLQFH WKH FODVVLFDO OLEHUDO ‘system of natural liberty’ has been perverted through ‘social-welfarist’ interventionism, the ‘natural’ situation can paradoxically only be restored through governmental practices that are grounded in the allegedly betrayed ideal. In 'HUULGHDQWHUPVWKHQDWXUDOLVRQO\DFFHVVLEOHE\YLUWXHRIDUWL¿FLDOsupplementarity, i.e. the formation of quasi-market simulacra that ‘rectify’ the system of QDWXUDOOLEHUW\%XUFKHOO   1HROLEHUDOLVPPD\WKXVEHXQGHUVWRRGDVDSXUSRVHIXOreplay of the moment of the emergence of the liberal order, a permanent return to the origin that logically leads to the reduction of the existing social realm to a ‘clean slate’, entirely amenable to a (re)ordering in accordance with the principles of natural liberty. This connection makes it easier to understand why the reform solutions, conditioned by and articulated in contemporary Western neoliberalism, appear so ¿WWLQJ IRU WKH LQIUDOLEHUDO SUREOHPDWLF RI WKH YHU\ FRQVWLWXWLRQ RI WKH OLEHUDO RUGHULQ5XVVLD3UR]RURY 7KHGLIIHUHQFHEHWZHHQFRQWHPSRUDU\:HVWHUQ neoliberalism and the infra-liberalism of post-communist Russian politics is that the ‘sovereign excess’, historically operative in the formation of Western liberal governmentality, is presently effaced and disavowed in the self-immanentist rendition of liberalism as a system without a constitutive outside. In contrast, Russian post-communism offers an example of the explicit and even cynical operation of the sovereign supplement in the formation of liberal governmentality. The obscene sovereign acts of the Putin presidency that contradict the doctrinaire understandings of liberal politics and generate accusations of authoritarianism, from the Yukos case to the military operation in the Chechen

  S. Prozorov Republic, are perfectly conceivable within the infra-liberal logic, which is not limited by that which it brings into being. These sovereign interventions establish the conditions of possibility for the infra-liberal project as such, insofar as they defend the state that is the subject of the liberal transformation of society from the separatist challenge of fragmentation and the oligarchic challenge of its ‘privatisation’. In a more general sense, the sovereign acts of institution of the liberal order need not abide by the precepts of ‘natural liberty’ precisely because the latter may only escape its spectral status and gain positive presence by virtue of constitutive interventions of the sovereign. This is not to say that the positive socio-economic reform programme of the presidency, which is quintessentially liberal, confers a certain retroactive legitimation on the infra-liberal sovereign practices of the forcible reassertion of the state against ‘oligarchic’ business interests or the military retort to violent separatism in Chechnya. The relation between a governmental rationality and its sovereign excess is more complex than either a mere contradiction or a retroactive synthesis. Instead, the positive ‘Putin project’ of neoliberal governmentality remains simultaneously both ‘shaped and undermined by a strange difference which constitutes it by breaching it¶'HUULGD  It is important to stress that this ‘strange difference’ is not a case of Putin’s personal idiosyncrasy or the effect of a particular constellation of circumstances WKDWGH¿QHWKHSUHVHQWPRPHQWLQ5XVVLDQKLVWRU\EXWUDWKHUDQRQWRORJLFDOFRQdition of existence of liberal governmentality itself, repeatedly retrieved in Western critiques of liberalism, particularly Foucauldian genealogies in the studies of governmentality. All liberal government is marked by a persistent aporia of authenticity/artefactuality, a tension between the naturalist mythology that conceives of society as a ‘system of natural liberty’ and the constructivist technology that seeks to mould this space in accordance with an image of what it allegedly already is. The politics of the emergence of a liberal order demonstrates the dependence of liberal governmentality on its own opposite and thus reveals the aporetic nature of liberal political ontology. To pose the question of the illiberality of liberalism we therefore need not UHVWULFWRXUVHOYHVWRREVFHQHH[FHSWLRQDOHUXSWLRQVZLWKLQWKHOLEHUDOHGL¿FHEXW should problematise the constitutive liberal mythologeme of ‘natural liberty’. Insofar as one postulates the existence of ‘natural liberty’, one necessarily renders this freedom positive LQ %HUOLQ¶V VHQVH LH GH¿QHG LQ FHUWDLQ VSHFL¿F terms, required for its legitimate practice. In this manner there opens a space of LQ¿QLWHSRVVLELOLW\RIJRYHUQPHQWDOLQWHUYHQWLRQIRUWKHSXUSRVHRIUHFRQVWUXFWing individual and social practices in accordance with what is allegedly ‘natural’. The very notion of ‘natural liberty’ therefore permits recourse to governmental interventions that cancel out the actual experience of freedom in the name of its ‘true’ acquisition in the practices of indoctrination. At the same time, these ‘pedagogical’ interventions inevitably result in disappointment, as ‘natural liberty’ is UHYHDOHGWREHOLWWOHPRUHWKDQYLROHQWDUWL¿FHZKLOHWKLVGLVDSSRLQWPHQWLQWXUQ DQLPDWHVWKHIXUWKHUUH¿QHPHQWRIOLEHUDOJRYHUQDQFHµ7KHSUHVHQFHWKDWLVWKXV delivered to us is a chimera. The enjoyment of the thing itself is undermined by

The paradox of infra-liberalism 197 frustration. . . . The supplement is maddening because it consequently breaches ERWKRXUSOHDVXUHDQGRXUYLUJLQLW\¶'HUULGD  Thus, the ultimate paradox of Putin’s liberalism is that it does not silence or disavow its own paradoxes, that it is able to unfold as an aporetic synthesis of sovereign and technocratic imperatives with little mythological sustenance. While the constitutive aporias of Western liberalism have been restored to the discourse by virtue of the genealogical and deconstructive labour of critical WKHRU\FRQWHPSRUDU\5XVVLDQSROLWLFVH[HPSOL¿HVboth the assertive deployment of liberal governmentality and the deconstruction of its mythological superstrucWXUHXQGHUWDNHQDWWKHVDPHWLPHDQGHPERGLHGLQWKHVDPH¿JXUH,QWKHFRQclusion, we shall discuss the implications of this paradox for contemporary Russian politics.

Conclusion: depoliticisation and the future of infraliberalism We have argued that rather than indicate the divergence of the politics of the Putin presidency from the liberal ideal or the use of the latter as a façade for authoritarian government, the ‘illiberalities’ of the Putin project may rather be conceived as a cynical display of the ‘obscene supplement’ of liberalism that is the ontological condition of its (im)possibility. The problematic of the institution of the liberal order cannot be conceived in the terms immanent to liberalism but must rather engage its ‘constitutive outside’, the infra-liberal foundational practices that are not limited by the limits they install. Moreover, the problem of the constitutive excess of liberalism is not unique to Russia or any other postcommunist state, but is also highly pertinent to contemporary Western neoliberDOLVP ZKRVH FRQVWUXFWLYLVW RULHQWDWLRQ LQWHQVL¿HV WKH DSRULDV RI OLEHUDO government and problematises the deployment of the naturalist mythologeme. This argument is of course not intended to ‘legitimise’ the Putin project by positing its illiberalities as necessary to its telos. On the contrary, a critique of ‘Putinism’ is certainly possible EXWRQO\DVDFULWLTXHRIOLEHUDOLVP. At the same time, the location of the politics of the Putin presidency within the problematic of the constitutive paradoxes of liberalism does not diminish the VSHFL¿FLW\ RI WKH 3XWLQ SURMHFW 8OWLPDWHO\ WKH GLIIHUHQFH EHWZHHQ WKLV SURMHFW and contemporary Western neoliberalism lies not in the domain of governmental rationality, but in the relations between government and the social realm. While contemporary neoliberalism is characterised by a fervent passion for promoting public participation, active citizenship, empowerment, self-help, learnerPDQDJHG OHDUQLQJ DQG RWKHU IRUPV RI µVHOIJRYHUQPHQW¶ (GZDUGV  0DULQHWWR LWLVLQGLVSXWDEOHWKDWWKH3XWLQSUHVLGHQF\KDVEHHQFKDUDFWHULVHGE\ a profound depoliticisation of social life. Although political participation and, more generally, the interest in politics have been declining since the revolutionDU\WXUPRLORI±WKHFRXUVHRIWKHSUHVHQWDGPLQLVWUDWLRQKDVEHHQWKDW of a purposeful establishment of limits to popular political activity. Among UHFHQWH[DPSOHVZHPD\QRWHWKHODZRQQDWLRQDOUHIHUHQGDZKLFKOHJDOO\

198

S. Prozorov

excluded most of the ‘left-wing’ agenda from becoming the object of a plebiscite, and the highly restrictive law on public demonstrations, which coincided with the rise of social protest over the neoliberal reform of the welfare system in ±7KLVGHSROLWLFLVDWLRQRI5XVVLDQVRFLHW\FRQFXUVZLWKWKHGHSROLWLFLsation of the political class itself that we have discussed above. Mikhail Remizov interprets the basic drive of the Putin presidency in terms of the extreme indifference to the political, whereby political meaning as such evaporates in the unstructured and amorphous space of ‘positive indifference’ towards the presiGHQWRQEHKDOIRIWKHVRFDOOHGµ3XWLQ¶VPDMRULW\¶WKHSHUFHQWRIWKHHOHFWRUate united by little more than a certain mild fondness for the president, who according to the polls is trusted a lot less than one’s relatives and a little more WKDQRQH¶VZRUNFROOHDJXHV5HPL]RYD  This depoliticisation carries serious consequences for the infra-liberal project. ,QIUDOLEHUDOLVP LV ¿UVW DQG IRUHPRVW D SURMHFW RI WKH UDGLFDO reconstruction of society in accordance with liberal precepts. Its success hinges on the involvement of the society in its own ‘self-government’, however asymmetric and hierarchical the settings of this ‘self-government’ may actually be. Liberal mythologemes of natural liberty, social contract and the ‘homo economicus’ are central to this engagement of society, serving both as a source of legitimacy for the new regime and as an inspiration for the society to autonomously sustain liberal practices and norms. Yet, in the case of the Putin presidency we observe, ¿UVWO\DORJLFDOO\QHFHVVDU\GLVSHQVDWLRQZLWKWKHQDWXUDOLVWP\WKRORJHPHDQG secondly, an ever-widening gap between government and society, whereby both VLGHVWUHDWHDFKRWKHUZLWKDSSUHKHQVLRQDQGDEDUHO\GLVJXLVHGKRVWLOLW\-XGLWK 6KNODUKDVIDPRXVO\GH¿QHGOLEHUDOLVPLQWHUPVRIDfear of excessive authority DQGDEXVHRISRZHU6KNODU :KLOHWKLVIHDUQHYHUSUHYHQWHGWKHGHSOR\ment of highly interventionist forms of rule with a view to rectifying the ‘system of natural liberty’, Putin’s infra-liberalism points to a different kind of fear that DQLPDWHV WKH UHIRUP SURMHFW WKH JRYHUQPHQW¶V IHDU RI LWV RZQ SHRSOH 3DUWLFXlarly evident in the ‘cruel and unusual’ persecution of left-wing radicals from the 1DWLRQDO%ROVKHYLNVWRWKH5HG
The paradox of infra-liberalism 199 onism has been reduced to ‘political technologies’ of electoral marketing that are increasingly of interest to no one but their designers. Thus, the politics of Putin’s ‘managed democracy’ is clearly not authoritarLDQ OHW DORQH UHSUHVVLYH ,Q WKH FRQWH[W RI LQIUDOLEHUDOLVP LWV GH¿FLHQF\ PD\ rather be grasped in terms of a contradiction between the demand for the active involvement of the governed in the construction of a liberal social order and the present governmental attempts at a thoroughgoing political demobilisation. Particularly visible during Putin’s second term, the mutual suspicion between the population and the regime that aims at its ‘liberalisation’ threatens to make the infra-liberal project an entirely meaningless and purely simulative political techQRORJ\ WKDW EULQJV WR PLQG 'HUULGD¶V GLDJQRVLV RI WKH µEUHDFK RI ERWK SOHDVXUH and virginity’. Even when liberal reforms apparently succeed, as has arguably been the case with taxation, land and labour reforms, the ‘enjoyment of the thing LWVHOI¶LVLQGHHGXQGHUPLQHGE\WKHIUXVWUDWLRQRYHULWVPDQLIHVWO\DUWL¿FLDOFKDUacter, far removed from any possible vision of ‘natural liberty’. Thus, as we have argued in the introduction, the pertinent political choice WRGD\ LV QRW EHWZHHQ 3XWLQ DQG OLEHUDOLVP DOOHJHGO\ H[HPSOL¿HG E\ VFDWWHUHG groups of political ‘has-beens’ and adventurous oligarchs) but between Putin’s virtual and self-referential infra-liberalism and an alternative political orientation, e.g. ‘left-conservatism’. We may even suggest that the additional efforts of the Putin administration in the depoliticisation of society are motivated by the awareness that any possible ‘return of the political’ in Russia would be disastrous for the infra-liberal project, given its self-deconstructive dissolution of classical liberal mythologies and a self-consciously technological, and thus substantively meaningless, orientation, punctured only momentarily by the President’s recourse to equally meaningless obscenity that serves to mark the gap between the sovereign and his ‘system’. Paradoxically, infra-liberalism is not only undermined but simultaneously made possible by the accompanying depoliticisation, which alone can sustain a governmental project, from which the society has tried to ‘twist loose’ since the initiation of liberal reforms in the early V At the same time, it would be facile and premature to end this discussion on an accusatory tone with regard to Putin’s ‘negation of the political’ and the demobilisation of society. We might rather suggest that the societal exit from politics is a radicalisation, rather than a betrayal of the democratic revolution of 1991, whereby the locus of power as such rather than its concrete occupants is, DV LW ZHUH GHFDSLWDWHG DQG GHVDFUDOLVHG 0DJXQ  3UR]RURY   7KH SLWLIXOH[SLU\RIWKH6RYLHWRUGHUDUJXDEO\WKHPRVWDPELWLRXVSROLWLFDOSURMHFWLQ the history of humanity, which both claimed and exercised unlimited authority in its effort to transform both world history and human nature, teaches a lesson that PD\ZHOOEHXQLYHUVDORQFHWKHVHGXFWLRQRIWKHPDMHVW\RISRZHUUHFHGHVLWLV UHYHDOHGLQLWVXWWHULPSRWHQFH7KHGHPLVHRIWKH6RYLHWRUGHUPD\WKHUHIRUHEH YLHZHGDVWKH¿UVWJHQXLQHO\nihilist revolution, bringing into being a thoroughly disenchanted world, where no one, particularly the myth-makers, believes in any political myths. In the aftermath of the post-communist revolution, politics

  S. Prozorov simply stopped being interesting for Russian society with the consequence of power being ‘left to its own devices’. Rather than society being excluded from participation in politics, it is rather political authority that is presently bracketed off from human existence. It is as if disinterested subjects abandoned the sovereign by manifesting little more than lacklustre acquiescence with their electoral support. The essence of revolution is therefore not the foundation of a better political order on the ruins of its predecessor, nor even the anarchist phantasm of a blissful existence in the absence of any political order, but rather the possibility of living as if the political order was non-existent, suspended both in its force and LWV VLJQL¿FDQFH )URP WKLV SHUVSHFWLYH 3XWLQ¶V DOOHJHG DXWKRULWDULDQLVP LV IXUthest away from the dystopian image of Foucault’s Panopticism or the Orwellian µ%LJ%URWKHU¶ZDWFKLQJXVDOO7KHSHUYHUVLRQDWVWDNHKHUHLVH[KLELWLRQLVWUDWKHU WKDQYR\HXULVWLFLQFKDUDFWHU,WLVDVLILQVWHDGRIZDWFKLQJRYHURWKHUVWKHµ%LJ %URWKHU¶ KLPVHOI ZDV GHVSHUDWHO\ WU\LQJ WR HQWHUWDLQ D GLVLQWHUHVWHG VRFLHW\ through the proliferation of pseudo-political simulacra, eager to be watched so as not to recede into oblivion. The perceived stability of the Putin project is merely DUHÀHFWLRQRIWKHWKRURXJKJRLQJGLVHQFKDQWPHQWRILWVMDGHGDXGLHQFH

Notes 1 This expression was used by Putin to describe his ‘occupation’ during his televised parWLFLSDWLRQLQWKHFHQVXVSROOLQ2FWREHU  )RUWKHGLVFXVVLRQRIWKHVHOILPPDQHQWLVWFKDUDFWHURIQHROLEHUDOJRYHUQPHQWDOLW\VHH %XUFKHOO /HPNH 'HDQ 

Bibliography %HONRYVN\6 µ3DWHUQDOLVP$EDQGRQHG3XWLQ%HFRPHV&KXEDLV¶Moscow Times 0D\  %ODQW0 µ3UH]LGHQW-DFN\OL3RGSRONRYQLN+\GH¶Ezhenedelny Zhurnal %XQLQ , 0DNDUHQNR % 0DNDUNLQ $ DQG =XGLQ $   µ.DUQDYDOD 1H %XGHW 3ROLWLFKHVNLH%XGQL%ROVKRL5HIRUP\¶NG-Stsenarii ± %XUFKHOO *   µ/LEHUDO *RYHUQPHQW DQG 7HFKQLTXHV RI WKH 6HOI¶ LQ %DUU\ $ 2VERUQH7DQG5RVH1 (eds) )RXFDXOWDQG3ROLWLFDO5HDVRQ/LEHUDOLVP1HROLEHUDOism and Rationalities of Government/RQGRQ8&/3UHVV &KDGDHY$ Putin: Ego Ideologia0RVFRZ(YURSD &UXLNVKDQN %   µ0RUDO 'LVHQWLWOHPHQW 3HUVRQDO$XWRQRP\ DQG 3ROLWLFDO 5HSURGXFWLRQ¶ LQ +lQQLQHQ 6 HG  Displacement of Social Policies 8QLYHUVLW\ RI -\YlVN\Ol6R3KL &UXLNVKDQN %   The Will to Empower: Democratic Citizens and Other Subjects, ,WKDFD&RUQHOO8QLYHUVLW\3UHVV 'HDFRQ5 µ7UXWK3RZHUDQG3HGDJRJ\0LFKHO)RXFDXOWRQWKH5LVHRIWKH'LVciplines’, Educational Philosophy and Theory ± 'HDQ0 Governmentality: Power and Rule in Modern Society/RQGRQ6DJH 'HDQ 0   µ/LEHUDO *RYHUQPHQW DQG$XWKRULWDULDQLVP¶ Economy and Society 31  ±

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10 Myth and democratic identity in Russia Richard Sakwa

Introduction Although myth plays an important part in structuring the discursive space of polLWLFV P\WKRSRHLD E\ LWV YHU\ QDWXUH LV DQWLSROLWLFDO %\ GH¿QLWLRQ P\WK LV QRW susceptible to dialogue. Like ideologies, political myths are axiological, suggesting certain basic truths that are not open to critique, challenge or contestation.1 The tendency, moreover, to assume that a myth is untrue while at the same time providing a dramatic representation of the deeper truths that underlie social relations and the relations of a political community to fate and destiny is a contradiction that is the source of considerable power to elites and others seeking to PRELOLVH SRSXODU VHQWLPHQWV 7KH FRQWUDGLFWLRQ DW WKH VDPH WLPH UHÀHFWV WKH ambivalent status of mythology in its entirety. These ambiguities are particularly evident when we discuss politicalP\WKV7KH\UHÀHFWFROOHFWLYHUHSUHVHQWDWLRQV of a nation’s identity and place in the world, becoming collective acts of remembering and imagining while imbuing history and the future with the patina of the sacred. The politics of myth was particularly prevalent in the Soviet Union, where a distinctive ‘Marxist eschatology and millenarianism provided the Soviet polity with historical meaning by situating it in the context of a perceived human destiny’ (Weiner 2001: 18). At the same time, myths are typically applied instrumentally by leadership groups to impose their vision on the nation; and they may EHXVHGKHURLFDOO\WRLQVSLUHDQDWLRQWRDFWVRIVHOIVDFUL¿FHLQWLPHVRIWKUHDW DQGZDU.RáDNRZVNL ,QWKH5XVVLDQFRQWH[WWKHUHODWLRQVKLSRIP\WKDQG politics is a profound one because of the long tradition of messianism, a term that in effect takes a myth and turns it into a national vision and a political programme (Duncan 2000).  0RUHVSHFL¿FDOO\LQRXUWLPHWKHWKHPHRIµGHPRFUDF\DQGP\WK¶VXJJHVWVD contrast between democracy as a set of discursive political practices and myth as a pre-political arena of attitudes and dispositions drawing on tradition and ascriptive identities. Myth is pre-political in that it is regarded as part of the sphere of emoWLRQVDIIHFWDWLRQVDQGLUUDWLRQDOLW\$WLWVPRVWEDVLFP\WKPD\EHGH¿QHGDVWKH sphere in which everyday common-sense appreciations of social reality take on ideological forms. This of course leads us back to the issue of democracy, since in the post-communist world it is clear that democracy itself has, within the frame-

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ZRUNRIRXUGH¿QLWLRQWDNHQRQWKHVWDWXVRIP\WK'HPRFUDF\KDVEHHQP\WKRORgised in the sense that it has assumed some of the naturalistic facets of mythic identity; a sphere that is pre-political, posed as a truth that is not subject to contestation or challenge. Thus paradoxically, those who challenge the new mythologised status of democracy as part of the new natural order of things, even when this is done from the stance of nationalist or leftist mythopoeic perspectives, UHVWRUHWKHSROLWLFDOHVVHQFHRIGHPRFUDF\GH¿QHGDVFKRLFHEHWZHHQDOWHUQDWLYHV With the collapse of overtly ideological alternatives to capitalist modernity, of which communism was the most sustained and the most coherent, culture has become the terrain on which the struggle for systemic alternatives is fought +XQWLQJWRQ ,QWKH5XVVLDQFDVHWKLVLVQRWKLQJQHZ$VZHVKDOO VHHEHORZWKHYHU\LGHDRI5XVVLDIURPWKH7KLUG5RPHWRWKH7KLUG,QWHUQDtional and the Third Way) has long been posed as the antithesis to the alleged barbarism and decadence of the West.2 7RGD\ LQ 5XVVLD WKHUH DUH VLJQL¿FDQW forces that continue to uphold its identity as an alternative to the modernity prevDOHQWLQWKH:HVW3RVW6RYLHWFRPPXQLVWVDQG5XVVLDQSDWULRWVDUJXHWKDW5XVsia’s unique development on the Eurasian plain and its distinctive ‘ethnogenesis’, WR XVH /HY *XPLOsY¶V WHUP *XPLOsY   RI LWV SHRSOHV KDV UHVXOWHG LQ D unique socio-political entity that represents an alternative civilisation. Human relations and the physical qualities of the nation have given rise to an alternative type of modernity.  7KHVHLGHDVZHUHSDUWLFXODUO\VWURQJLQWKHVDQGVWLOOH[HUWDVLJQL¿FDQW LQÀXHQFHLQSROLWLFDOGHEDWHVDQGLQWHOOHFWXDOOLIH+RZHYHURQHRIWKHVRXUFHVRI the power of Vladimir Putin’s presidency is that he has resolutely refused to countenance any version of a SonderwegIRU5XVVLD+LVOHDGHUVKLSLVEDVHGRQ WKH H[SOLFLW UHSXGLDWLRQ RI WKH LGHD RI 5XVVLD DV DQ DOWHUQDWLYH PRGL¿FDWLRQ RU alternative pole in international politics to the West. He has repeatedly argued WKDW 5XVVLD VKRXOG EH WUHDWHG DV D QRUPDO FRXQWU\ H[SHFWLQJ QR IDYRXUV ZKLOH insisting that it be treated fairly and accorded the respect that he believes it GHVHUYHV,QFRQWUDVWWKHUHIRUHWRP\WKVRIFRXQWHUPRGHUQLW\3XWLQSURSRVHGD programme if not a myth of normality in which sovereignty, autonomy and international integration could be combined.

Myth, modernisation and modernity Shcherbinina argues that political myths usually have at least two aspects: a story about the past (the diachronic aspect); and a way of understanding the SUHVHQWWKHV\QFKURQLFDVSHFW 6KFKHUELQLQD +RZHYHUDWKLUGDVSHFW is no less important, namely the representation of the future, the utopian, mesVLDQLF RU DSRFDO\SWLF HOHPHQW ,W LV DV\QFKURQLF EHFDXVH LW UHSODFHV GLVVDWLVIDFtion with contemporary reality with mythic representations of the future. This asynchronic denigration of the present by idealised versions of the future, whether drawn from a spatial source (typically the West) or a temporal vision of a better world (in the twentieth century this was communism and socialist interQDWLRQDOLVP KDVDOZD\VEHHQSDUWLFXODUO\VWURQJLQ5XVVLD

Myth and democratic identity in Russia 205  5XVVLDLWKDVRIWHQEHHQQRWHGKDVEHHQLQDSHUPDQHQWVWDWHRIµWUDQVLWLRQ¶ HYHUVLQFH3HWHUWKH*UHDWVRXJKWWRPRGHUQLVH5XVVLDE\XQPRGHUQPHDQV7KH very measure of developmental standards has been generated not autochthonously but imported from abroad. This displacement has generated a whole VHWRISDWKRORJLHVUHÀHFWHGLQFODVVLFGHEDWHVRYHUGHYHORSPHQWDOSDWKVWKHEHVW known of which was the Westerniser/Slavophile controversy, echoes of which resound and are repeated to this day. The model of ‘transition’ to democracy and WKHPDUNHWHFRQRP\ERUURZHGIURPWKH:HVWLQWKHVRQFHDJDLQSURYRNHG GHEDWHVRYHUFRXQWHUPRGHUQDSSURDFKHVWRGHYHORSPHQW,QWKHPLGVWKH notion of ‘sovereign democracy’ was proposed as an all-encompassing ‘national ideology’, which enshrined aspirations for autonomy while accepting an integraWLYHGHYHORSPHQWDOSDWK6XUNRY± 3ROLWLFDOP\WKVVWUXFWXUHVRFLDO reality and provide an emotional basis for the implementation of a social utopia and the affective basis for authoritative relations in society. Myth can serve as the basis for utopian aspirations and at the same time the erosion of mythological self-representations of society can lead to its downfall. This was particularly in evidence during Gorbachev’s perestroika, when the imaginative power of VRFLDOLVWLGHRORJ\DQGFRPPLWPHQWWRWKHXQLRQRISHRSOHVLQWKH8665KDGERWK clearly become exhausted. Modernisation 7KHVHGHEDWHVFDQEHORFDWHGLQDEURDGHUSDWWHUQQRWRQO\RI5XVVLDQEXWDOVRRI global development. The Enlightenment gave birth to a general view of modernity based on reason and the universal application of a set of societal and political norms. These were the values propounded by Diderot in his encounters with &DWKHULQH,,DQGVKHHPHUJHGWKHQDVWKHGHIHQGHURISDUWLFXODULW\DQGFLYLOLVDtional diversity, while acknowledging certain principles of the Enlightenment DOWKRXJKLQWKHPDLQH[SOLFLWO\UHMHFWLQJWKHLUDSSOLFDELOLW\WR5XVVLD 3DUDGR[Lcally, many of these Enlightenment values (above all linear ideas of development) were subsumed (while ideas about reason were subverted) in the Marxist messianic vision of a universal utopia.  0DU[LVPLQ5XVVLDLPSRVHGDVHWRIXQLYHUVDOXWRSLDQ YDOXHVEXWDWWKHVDPH time actual practices represented an amalgam of ideological universalism and QDWLRQDO SDUWLFXODULW\ 5XVVLDQ PHVVLDQLVP DQG FRPPXQLVW XQLYHUVDOLVP IRU D WLPHEHFDPHIXVHGDVQRWHGE\1LNRODL%HUGLDHY EXWE\WKHHDUO\V the two traditions began radically to diverge as ideological mythopoeism waned DQG 5XVVLDQ µQDWLRQDOLVP¶ UHHPHUJHG DV D SRZHUIXO SROLWLFDO IRUFH ZLWKLQ WKH 6RYLHWUHJLPHLWVHOI%UXGQ\ +RZHYHUHYHQWRWKLVGD\5XVVLD¶VGHIHQFH RI SDUWLFXODULW\ WHQGV WR WDNH RQ SDUDGR[LFDOO\ D XQLYHUVDOLVLQJ IRUP ,Q RWKHU ZRUGVWKHSUHVHQWDWLRQRI5XVVLDDVDQDOWHUQDWLYHUHOHJLWLPLVHVWKHYHU\LGHDRI alternativity, undermines the hegemony of the dominant models, and provides a path that others can follow. Even though Putin’s concern was autonomy, this had a dynamic tendency to grow into system-forming alternativity.

  R. Sakwa Modernity and leadership ,QWKHSRVWFRPPXQLVWHUDLQ5XVVLDWKHUHVRQDQFHRISRVWPRGHUQGLVFRXUVHVKDV a distinctively hollow ring since the debate is often more focused on the problem of completing the modernist developmental agenda, while the patriotic opposiWLRQ¶VDOWHUQDWLYHLVDFRXQWHUPRGHUQLW\¿UPO\URRWHGLQPRGHUQLVWDVZHOODV pre-modern) discourses. Both government and opposition ground their programmes on the nation state, a very modern project. The state-centred view of 5XVVLDQ GHYHORSPHQW WKDW UHVRXQGV WKURXJK DOO WKUHH RI WKH SURMHFWV GLVFXVVHG below, are modernist in form, however much the content may be critical of Enlightenment rationality. The paradox is even more profound, since the Enlightenment itself sought to undermine the mythological basis to political legitimacy but itself fostered the myth of objective political rationality in the pursuit of progress and the repudiation of tradition as the source of authority (Shcherbinina 2002: 5). For Enlightenment thinkers, myth was the source of deception and superstition and was used by old elites to manipulate public conVFLRXVQHVV )RU WKLQNHUV RI 5RPDQWLFLVP KRZHYHU P\WK ZDV VHHQ LQ D PRUH positive light, above all by Herder who stressed the wisdom of nations, while *RHWKHDUJXHGWKDWP\WKRORJ\ZDVSRHWU\UHÀHFWLQJDKLJKHUWUXWKLELG   7KHSHFXOLDUSRZHURIP\WKLQ5XVVLDQSROLWLFVLVSHUKDSVDFRQVHTXHQFHRI its archaic political culture and the weak development of autonomous civic associations, and civil society in general. While myth according to Malinowski is PDLQO\DERXWWKHPDLQWHQDQFHRIVRFLDORUGHULWLVDOVRDERXWWUDQVIRUPDWLRQ,I the idea of metamorphosis lies at the basis of mythological representations of politics, then the agent of this transformation is typically the heroic leader. One of the paradoxes of Putin’s leadership is that while he has resolutely sought to µQRUPDOLVH¶5XVVLDQSROLWLFVKLVOHDGHUVKLSKDVEHHQLPEXHGZLWKDP\WKLFSDWLQD that no leader in the country has enjoyed since Stalin. The mythic representation RI3XWLQ¶VOHDGHUVKLSLVLQSDUWRI¿FLDOO\IRVWHUHGEXWDIDUJUHDWHUSDUWLVJHQHUated spontaneously, drawing in particular on mythologised versions of the leadHUVKLS RI 3HWHU , WKH *UHDW  DV WKH JUHDW WVDUWUDQVIRUPHU 9LHZV RI 3HWHU¶V leadership represent him as both hero and anti-hero, and this also applies to Putin (Shestopal 2004). The legitimacy of Putin’s leadership is grounded in democratic elections, yet democratic proceduralism appears to be too ‘thin’ to sustain DOHDGHUVKLSSURMHFWWKDWLVJURXQGHGLQP\WKVRIQRUPDOLW\WKHHQGRI5XVVLD¶V ‘permanent’ transition, and the country’s reintegration into the international FRPPXQLW\DVDµQRUPDO¶JUHDWSRZHU,WLVDWWKLVSRLQWWKDWTXHVWLRQVRIVRFLDO psychology are raised, above all in attempting to understand the phenomenon of FKDULVPDWLF OHDGHUVKLS :KLOH 3XWLQ VHHNV WR GHP\WKRORJLVH WKH 5XVVLDQ VWDWH his own leadership is being mythologised (Alekseev et al.  8UEDQ   At the same time, it is not clear whether his attempt to constrain particularity to DXWRQRP\ ZLOO QRW RYHUÀRZ LQWR IXOOEORZQ DOWHUQDWLYLW\ PXOWLSRODULW\ DQG WKH emergence of systemic bipolarity. The problem is particularly acute in a country where popular attitudes to political authority have traditionally taken on a sacred aspect. At issue is not

Myth and democratic identity in Russia   only the idea of the ‘Holy Tsar’, but that this tsar would have both a forgiving and a stern face; compassion and coercion have traditionally gone together. While Victor Turner may have argued that national mythology often stresses KRZ WKH SRRU DQG RXWFDVW DUH WKH VRXUFH RI SRSXODU ZLVGRP LQ 5XVVLD WKH leader has also often folded into themselves both popular and sacred sources of authority.

Russia’s path: myths and messianism &RPPXQLVW FRXQWHUPRGHUQLW\ ZKLFK VXJJHVWV WKDW 5XVVLD LV D FLYLOLVDWLRQDO alternative to the West, mythic representations of the East are an alternative to Western modernity, and anti-globalism all in a structural sense perpetuate and VXVWDLQ 5XVVLDQ LPSHULDO DQG 6RYLHW WUDGLWLRQV RI GLIIHUHQW URXWHV WR DGYDQFHG modernity. These three projects are not anti-modern or repudiate received values of progress and development; they are instead ‘counter’ movements that draw LQVSLUDWLRQIURPZKDWWKH\GHQ\7KHQRWLRQRI5XVVLDDVDQDOWHUQDWLYHGRHVQRW VHHNVRPHVRUWRIDUFKDLFRUWUDGLWLRQDOUHYHUVLRQWRDWHPSRUDOXWRSLD5XVVLDDV an alternative remains future-oriented, but with the fall of the dynamic developmental vision of communism the country itself has become the utopia,WRIIHUVD vision of counter-modernity, an alternative path to achieve the integration of society, economy and polity, rather than an anti-modern repudiation of the very premises on which an urbanised, educated and critical society can be constructed. This is not to suggest that there are no alternatives, but to examine the P\WKRORJLFDO JURXQGV RQ ZKLFK WKHVH 5XVVLDFHQWUHG FLYLOLVDWLRQDO DOWHUQDWLYHV are developed.  7KHP\WKRI 5XVVLD DV WKH7KLUG5RPHLV RQHRI WKHPRVWSRWHQWLQKLVWRU\ DQG VWLOO H[HUWV D SRZHUIXO LQÀXHQFH RQ SROLWLFDOGLVFRXUVH 7KH GLYLVLRQ RI WKH 5RPDQHPSLUHLQADEHWZHHQDZHVWHUQDQGHDVWHUQZLQJUHPDLQVRQHRIWKH VLJQL¿FDQW GLYLGLQJ OLQHV LQ FRQWHPSRUDU\ (XURSH ZLWK &RQVWDQWLQRSOH HPHUJLQJDVWKH6HFRQG5RPH7KHIDOORI5RPHLQOHIWLWDVWKHRQO\RQHDQGWKH IDOORI&RQVWDQWLQRSOHWRWKH7XUNVLQOHIWWKH¿HOGRSHQIRU0XVFRYLWHSUHWHQVLRQVWR¿OOWKHYDFDQF\7KHLVVXHKRZHYHULVIDUIURPEHLQJMXVWJHRSROLWLcal but is about different types of spirituality and of a distinctive balance between VHFXODU DQG WHPSRUDO SRZHU 7KH ¿QDO RYHUWKURZ RI 0RQJRO DXWKRULW\ LQ  ZDVIROORZHGE\WKHFDSWXUHRI.D]DQLQDQGWKXV5XVVLDZDVVHWRQWKH path of imperial expansion. The monk Filofei formulated the two key proposiWLRQV RI WKLV P\WK 5XVVLD ZDV WKH FKRVHQ NLQJGRP DQG LW ZRXOG EH WKH ODVW NLQJGRPRQHDUWKWKHUHFRXOGEHQRIRXUWK5RPH+LVWKLQNLQJZDVVWHHSHGLQ Byzantine notions of the apocalypse. Many centuries later the leader of the 5XVVLDQ OLEHUDOV 3DYHO 0LOLXNRY QRWHG WKDW WKH LGHD RI 0RVFRZ DV WKH 7KLUG 5RPH KDG EHFRPH WKH QDWLRQDO LGHRORJ\ FRPELQLQJ D &KULVWLDQ HVFKDWRORJ\ millenarianism and national destiny. The myth was both national and universal, and this characterised the communist experiment (focused above all on the P\WKRI WKH SUROHWDULDW  ZKHUH WKH HPSKDVLV VKLIWHG IURP WKH 7KLUG 5RPH WR WKH7KLUG ,QWHUQDWLRQDO %HUGLDHY WLHG WKH 5XVVLDQ UHYROXWLRQ WR LWV DUFKDLF

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religious-apocalyptic thinking, deeply rooted in ideas of the Jewish apocalypse, UHZRUNHGE\.DUO0DU[LQDPRGHUQLGLRP%HUGLDHY 7KLVFRPELQDWLRQ RIWKHDUFKDLFDQGWKHPRGHUQLVDOVRHYLGHQWLQWKHWKUHHQHZP\WKVRI5XVVLD today. The Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF) and new ideologies of alternativity  RXQWHUPRGHUQLVLQJ WUHQGV LQ 5XVVLD DUH UHLQIRUFHG E\ 6DPXHO +XQWLQJWRQ¶V & LGHD RI µWKH FODVK RI FLYLOLVDWLRQV¶ ,Q D VWUDQJH SDUDGR[ WKH PRVW HQWKXVLDVWLF H[SRQHQW RI +XQWLQJWRQ¶V KDOIEDNHG DOWKRXJK LQÀXHQWLDO LGHD ZDV *HQQDGLL =LXJDQRYWKHOHDGHURIWKH&RPPXQLVW3DUW\RIWKH5XVVLDQ)HGHUDWLRQ&35)  7KHQRWLRQRIFLYLOLVDWLRQDOFRQÀLFWSURYLGHGDUHDG\DUPRXU\RILGHDVWRVXVWDLQ alternativity and multipolarity on the developmental plane. Ziuganov argued that JOREDOLVDWLRQUHSUHVHQWHGDQHZFKDOOHQJHIRU5XVVLDDQGKXPDQLW\LQVLVWLQJWKDW JOREDOLVDWLRQ UHÀHFWHG WKH HPHUJHQFH RI D µQHZ LPSHULDOLVP¶ KHDGHG E\ WKH United States (Ziuganov 2002).  ,QVWHDGRIVRFLDOGHPRFUDF\WKH&35)DGRSWHGDW\SHRIVRFLDOQDWLRQDOFRQservatism. Social democracy represents the adaptation of revolutionary socialism to the needs of nationalGHYHORSPHQWEXWLQWKH&35)WKLVQDWLRQDODGDSWDWLRQ KDVWDNHQUDGLFDOIRUPVLWLVVRFLDODQGQDWLRQDOUDWKHUWKDQGHPRFUDWLF5XVVLD¶V distinctive ‘mode of extrication’ from communism and its status as the successor to the great power ambitions of the imperial and Soviet states in part explains the &35)¶VHYROXWLRQDU\EORFNDJH%HWZHHQFRPPXQLVPDQGVRFLDOGHPRFUDF\OD\ DGLVWLQFWLYHW\SHRI5XVVLDQFRQVHUYDWLVP7KH&35)EHFDPHLQ)LVK¶VZRUGV ‘the leading conservative SDUW\¶ )LVK    LQ 5XVVLD 7KH QDWXUH RI WKLV ‘conservatism’ is highly ambiguous, representing a new type characteristic of SRVWFRPPXQLVP7KH&35)¶VUDGLFDOHFOHFWLFLVPDQGWKHDPELJXLW\RILWVFRQservatism is determined by its attempts to preserve the best of an old regime that ZDV LWVHOI GHGLFDWHG WR WKH GHVWUXFWLRQ RI WKH ROG $V =LXJDQRY SXW LW µ,Q WKH Civil War the whites fought for [a country] “single and indivisible”, while the reds fought for “a world without exploitation”. We need to unite these two ideas’ =LXJDQRY    7KH FLUFOH FRXOG QRW EH VTXDUHG E\ =LXJDQRY¶V IUHTXHQW assertions that the slogan was not ‘back to socialism’ but ‘forward to socialism’; as Jeremy Lester has pertinently commented, ‘No one has done more than Ziuganov to correlate post-communism with pre-FRPPXQLVP¶ /HVWHU    ,Q social terms a population assaulted by radical reforms sought the security of the paternalism of the past, and this was promised by the patrimonial bureaucraticFRUSRUDWLVP RI WKH &35) )RU =LXJDQRY 5XVVLD ZDV OHVV D QDWLRQ DQG PRUH D FLYLOLVDWLRQ=LXJDQRY   $OHNVDQGU7VLSNRKDVDUJXHGWKDWWKH&35)¶VFRQVHUYDWLVPZDVULJKWZLQJLQ HVVHQFH ZLWK WKH LGHRORJLFDO SRVLWLRQ RI WKH &35) UHSUHVHQWLQJ µDQ DWWHPSW WR SDVV 0DU[LVP RQ WKH ULJKW¶ 7KH &35) SUHVHQWHG LWVHOI DV WKH JXDUGLDQ RI D system and civilisation that reform communists like Gorbachev sought to GHVWUR\7KH\WULHGWRGHIHQG5XVVLDDVDQHQWLUHµVRFLDOFRVPRV¶DVHSDUDWHFLYL-

Myth and democratic identity in Russia   OLVDWLRQ7VLSNR %RULV.DSXVWLQQRWHVWKDWZKLOHDGRSWLQJWKHSDWULRWLF LGLRP =LXJDQRY KRSHG WR ¿OO µWKH 5XVVLDQ LGHD¶ ZLWK D SURJUHVVLYH VRFLDOLVW FRQWHQW.DSXVWLQ 7KH&35)¶VDQWLPRGHUQLVPPXVWEHXQGHUVWRRGLQ context. The emergence of the historical left and right were responses to the larger problem of communities (be they based on class or nation) threatened with GLVVROXWLRQ E\ WKH GHYHORSPHQW RI LQWHUQDWLRQDO FDSLWDOLVP ,Q SRVWFRPPXQLVW 5XVVLDWKHVHSUREOHPVKDYHFRPHIXOOFLUFOHDQGDUHQRZSRVHGDVLWZHUHLQD combined and inverted form, giving rise to a movement that simultaneously espoused the revolt of both the left and the right against capitalist modernity while subverting the key principles of both. Part of the explanation for this ideoORJLFDOLQYROXWLRQZDVWKHVWDWLVWRUµUHJLPH¶QDWXUHRISRVWFRPPXQLVW5XVVLDQ GHYHORSPHQW6DNZD± /XGPLOD7HOHQ¶QRWHGWKDWµ5XVVLDVWLOOODFNV a civil society that would digest leftist ideas by turning them from communist LQWR VRFLDO GHPRFUDWLF RQHV¶ 7HOHQ¶   DQG WKXV WKH UHJLPH LWVHOI DQG LWV allied elites, particularly under Yeltsin, legitimated their rule by claiming to act DV WKH EXOZDUN DJDLQVW FRPPXQLVW UHVWRUDWLRQ 5HFRJQLVLQJ WKLV WKH &35) turned towards ‘constructive’ opposition as part of what was called a ‘strategic FRPSURPLVH¶8UEDQDQG6RORYHL DQGWKHUHE\KHOSHGDQFKRUWKHGHPocratic process in political society. The choice was not so much between social democracy and nationalism as WKH HVSRXVDO RI D VSHFL¿F W\SH RI 5XVVLDQ µ7KLUG :D\¶ EHWZHHQ QHROLEHUDOLVP on the one hand and traditional communism on the other. At the base of this ‘Third Way’ was a distinctive type of statist patriotic conservatism, shared by WKH&35)DQG3XWLQDOLNHWKDWVRXJKWWRUHFRQFLOHWKHFRXQWU\WRLWVRZQSDVW They shared a model of the future that would, in Ziuganov’s words, ‘Find a disWLQFWLYH5XVVLDQSDWKRIGHYHORSPHQWDQHYROXWLRQDU\SDWKRIVRFLDOO\RULHQWHG UHIRUPV   ¶ =LXJDQRY    =LXJDQRY LQVLVWHG WKDW µ7KH FRQWHPSRUDU\ SDWULRWLFLGHDLVGHHSO\VRFLDOLVW¶LELG DQGKHZHQWRQWRTXRWH/HQLQWRWKH effect that it was not a matter of indifference to the proletariat in which country LW OLYHG LELG   3XWLQ KRZHYHU ZDV D OLEHUDO SDWULRW ZKHUHDV WKH &35) remained loyal to a more conservative form of patriotism. Ziuganov’s combinaWLRQ RI 5XVVLDQ VWDWH SDWULRWLVP DQG µVRFLDOO\RULHQWHG UHIRUP¶ ZDV WR ODUJH degree shared by Putin, but they disagreed over the historical nature of the 2FWREHU 5HYROXWLRQ DQG WKH UROH RI VRFLDOLVP LQ FRQWHPSRUDU\ 5XVVLD 7KHUH ZHUHOLPLWVHYHQXQGHU3XWLQWRWKHGHJUHHWRZKLFKWKH&35)FRXOGDGDSWLWVHOI to regime politics as long as the regime remained basically liberal in orientation. The East/South as a counter-hegemonic formation The tension between universalism and particularism has been apparent throughRXW5XVVLD¶VW\SLFDOO\GLVDVWURXVHQJDJHPHQWZLWKPRGHUQLW\DQGPRGHUQLVDWLRQ and the post-communist experience is only the latest stage in this ambivalent UHODWLRQVKLSEHWZHHQ5XVVLDDQGWKH:HVWEHWZHHQWUDGLWLRQDQGPRGHUQLW\,Q WKHSDVW5XVVLD¶VPHVVLDQLVPWRRNWKHIRUPRIWKHHVSRXVDORIFRPPXQLVPDVDQ DOWHUQDWLYH URXWH WR PRGHUQLW\ WRGD\ 5XVVLD LV EHFRPLQJ D V\PERO RI WKH

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victims of globalisation, a third-worldist perspective espousing multipolarity and UHVLVWDQFHWR$PHULFDQGRPLQDQFH5XVVLDLQVKRUWDSSHDUVWRKDYHDFKLHYHGD transition from the second to the third world, and politically was in danger of VKLIWLQJIURPWKH(DVWWRWKH6RXWK5XVVLDWKXVHPHUJHVDVWKHFDUULHURIDQHZ ‘third world’ ideology, not simply as the negation of the West based on catch-up development, but as something positive with a distinctive collective identity and LWVRZQJOREDOSURJUDPPH&KHVKNRY $VZHKDYHVHHQWKHUHLVDQLQKHUHQWWHQGHQF\IRUDSURJUDPPHRI5XVVLDQDXWRQRP\WRJURZLQWRRQHHVSRXVLQJ alternativity. Speaking at a conference on the Middle East in Moscow on 1 February 2000 3XWLQDUJXHGWKDWµ,WLVXQDFFHSWDEOHWRFDQFHOVXFKEDVLFSULQFLSOHVRILQWHUQDtional law as national sovereignty and territorial integrity under the slogan of socalled humanitarian intervention’.4 5XVVLD DSSHDUHG QRZ WR VWDQG DV WKH champion of an anti-universalistic agenda. On numerous occasions Putin insisted that the principles of territorial integrity and national sovereignty should take priority over humanitarian intervention. Boris Yeltsin’s attempts to use the ComPRQZHDOWK RI ,QGHSHQGHQW 6WDWHV &,6  DV WKH EDVLV IRU D FRXQWHU(XURSHDQ project had come to nothing, but anti-interventionism and the defence of Westphalian notions of national sovereignty appeared a more viable basis on which to try to build a counter-hegemonic bloc. This in turn relies, however, on the ‘myth RI¶7HVFKNH 7KHDWWHPSWWRFUHDWHµWKH(DVW¶DVWKHFRUHRIDQHZ counter-hegemony does not necessarily have to take an anti-Western form. Putin repeatedly emphasised his aspirations for good relations with the West. The East was conceptualised not as an alternative but as a complementary modernity. This was the way that Gorbachev had conceived of his renewed socialism, and it remains to be seen whether this new variant on the old theme of the third way will be any more successful. As far as geo-ideological considerations are concerned, there is no shortage RI5XVVLDQWKLQNHUVZKRKDYHWULHGWRVHW5XVVLDXSDVWKHUHSUHVHQWDWLYHRIDQ Eastern world. For example, in a recent work the philosopher A.S. Panarin H[DPLQHGFRQWHPSRUDU\5XVVLDQKLVWRU\LQWKHIUDPHZRUNRIWKHPDLQWUHQGVRI world development. Panarin argued that world history has shifted from a Western phase of development to an Eastern one, representing a shift from an emphasis on technological change towards spiritual revival, towards a posteconomic and post-material period. With the exhaustion of socialism and liberalLVPWKH:HVWKDVQRQHZLGHDWRRIIHUWKHZRUOG,QLWVVHDUFKIRUDQHZZD\ 5XVVLDKHDUJXHGZDVUHGH¿QLQJLWVYDOXHVDQGLWVUHVSRQVHWRWKH:HVWHUQFKDOOHQJH3DQDULQ 7KLVZDVQRORQJHUDQ(DVWHUQLVPSURYRNHGE\WKHIDLOXUH to become Western, but an attempt to forge an alternative to Western modernity LQLWVHQWLUHW\,WDOVRUHSUHVHQWHGDPRYHEH\RQGWKHµEULGJH¶PHWDSKRURI5XVVLD linking East and West, typical of post-communist Eurasianist thinking, to an DI¿UPDWLRQWKDW5XVVLDZDVWKHGHVWLQDWLRQLWVHOI  )RU PRVW RI WKH ODWH V 5XVVLDQ GLSORPDF\ VRXJKW WR IRUJH DQ ,QGLDQ± &KLQHVH±5XVVLDQWULDQJOHDVDFRXQWHUEDODQFHWRWKH86DQG1$727KH,QGLDQ link in this chain was always the weakest, but even the Chinese one was beset

Myth and democratic identity in Russia 211 with contradictions. The success of China’s ‘four modernisations’, launched by 'HQJ ;LDRSLQJ LQ  HVSHFLDOO\ LQ FRQWUDVW ZLWK 5XVVLD¶V WUDYDLOV LQ WKH V PHDQW WKDW WKH &KLQHVH SDWK RI PRGHUQLVDWLRQ ZKHUHE\ WKH &RPPXQLVW Party acted as the instrument of capitalist restoration, appeared attractive to PDQ\ LQ 5XVVLD5 Meeting with the Chinese foreign minister, Tang Jiaxuan, in Moscow on 1 March 2000, Putin declared that relations between Moscow and Beijing ‘resolves the problem of stability in the world on a global scale as much as they do in bilateral relations’ (Kedrov and Kosyrev 2000: 1). The establishment of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) in June 2001 as a regional multilateral mechanism for security and cooperation, comprising 5XVVLD &KLQD .D]DNKVWDQ .\UJ\]VWDQ DQG 8]EHNLVWDQ XQGHUVFRUHG WKH VKLIW DZD\IURPDµVWUDWHJLFSDUWQHUVKLS¶EHWZHHQ5XVVLDDQG&KLQDWRZDUGVDPRUH pragmatic relationship based on shared interests and concerns. The SCO was the antithesis of the liberal universalist principles proclaimed by the leading Western powers, and instead took a hard-headed realist approach to international politics based on interests rather than ‘values’. For Putin the SCO was an instrument to enhance the autonomy of its members rather than the kernel of an alternative 6RXWKHUQ SROHWRWKH:HVWHUQRUGHU%\,QGLD,UDQ0RQJROLDDQG3DNLstan had been granted, and Belarus had applied for, observer status, while America’s application for observer status in 2005 was refused. The drift towards alternativity was unmistakeable. China itself feared becoming the champion of an anti-Western coalition. The country has signed at least seventeen international treaties on human rights, and thus any attempt to use China as a battering ram against the emerging universalist consensus on the value of a human rights UHJLPHZDVDWWKHYHU\OHDVWDPELYDOHQW,WZDVQRWWKHSULQFLSOHVRIXQLYHUVDOLVP as such that China criticised but their selective and instrumental application by WKHZRUOG¶VKHJHPRQLFSRZHUVDYLHZVKDUHGE\5XVVLDXQGHU3XWLQ  5XVVLD KDV WUDGLWLRQDOO\ DSSHDUHG WR EH SDUWLFXODUO\ SURQH WR EH SDWKRSK\VLF (the science of imagining solutions) approaches. However, the attempt to avoid being trapped by the new ‘third worldism’ suggested an awareness of the danger RI ¿QGLQJ VROXWLRQV LQ LPDJLQHG DOOLDQFHV DQG (DVWHUQ RU 6RXWKHUQ  SURMHFWV 7KH LGHD RI 5XVVLD DQG WKH (DVW FRPLQJ WRJHWKHU WR IRUP WKH NHUQHO RI D QHZ µWKLUG ZRUOG¶ FKDOOHQJH WR WKH :HVW LV ULYHQ E\ FRQWUDGLFWLRQV DQG FRQÀLFWV 8QGHU3XWLQWKHYHU\QRWLRQRIµWKH:HVW¶DVVRPHWKLQJDOLHQWR5XVVLDKDVEHHQ repudiated. German Gref, the head of the Centre for Strategic Development ZKRVHWDVNLWZDVWRGHYLVHDSODQIRU5XVVLD¶VGHYHORSPHQWIRUWKHQH[WWHQWR ¿IWHHQ\HDUVDUJXHGWKDWµ³WKH:HVW´DVVRPHVRUWRIGH¿QLWLRQGRHVQRWPHDQ much in particular’ (Parkhomenko 2000: 24).,WZDVQRWµWKH:HVW¶DVVXFKWKDW ZRXOGGRWKLVRUWKHRWKHUEXWFRQFUHWHLQYHVWRUV7KXV*UHIUHÀHFWHGRQHRIWKH characteristic features of the new conception of geo-ideological space: the disaggregation of the West from a monolithic unitary actor into a more dynamic conFHSWLRQRIWKH:HVWDVWKHVLWHRIFRQÀLFWVGLYHUJHQWLQWHUHVWVDQGG\QDPLVP%\ the same token, counter-modern myths of the East/South also dissolved.

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Anti-globalism as a counter-modern myth 7KHVHDUFKIRUDQDOWHUQDWLYHPRGHUQLW\LVWRGD\UHÀHFWHGLQWKHUHDG\HPEUDFH of anti-globalising discourses. There is a whole emerging literature that stresses the dangers of globalisation. The key exemplar of this type of thinking is 3DQDULQDQGKHH[SOLFLWO\OLQNV5XVVLDWRWKHHPHUJLQJZRUOGZLGHDQWLJOREDOLVP PRYHPHQW7KXV5XVVLDIRUWKHVHSHRSOH VKRXOGRQFHDJDLQVHHNWRSODFHLWVHOI at the head of an insurgency against the contemporary form of Western moderQLW\%X]JDOLQQRWHVWKHHPHUJHQFHRIWKHµDQWLJOREDOLVW¶PRYHPHQWLQ5XVVLD arguing that it represents ‘a search for a new approach to politics, one that is democratic, internationalist and left-of-center’ (Buzgalin 2002). An international conference called ‘Alternatives to Globalisation’ held in Moscow in June 2002 was attended by over 450 delegates from twelve countries and forty-seven 5XVVLDQUHJLRQV  $ODUJHSDUWRI5XVVLD¶VQDWLRQDOLGHQWLW\LQWKHPRGHUQHUDKDVEHHQEDVHGRQ representations of itself as an alternative, though equally valid, social commuQLW\ WR WKH PRGHUQLW\ SUHYDOHQW LQ WKH :HVW ,Q WKH 6RYLHW SHULRG WKLV WRRN WKH form of the communist alternative, represented as a distinctive civilisation in ZKLFKDQWLFDSLWDOLVWYDOXHVZHUHHQWZLQHGZLWKDVSHFWVRI5XVVLDQFXOWXUDOLGHQtity. Today this essentially binary view of the world is perpetuated in new forms E\ WKH UKHWRULF RI DQWLJOREDOLVP $QWLJOREDOLVP LQ FRQWHPSRUDU\ 5XVVLD SHUIRUPVDWOHDVWWZRIXQFWLRQVDVDZD\RIGHIHQGLQJ5XVVLDQSDUWLFXODULVPDQGDV a way of advancing a great power agenda in an allegedly multipolar world. 5XVVLDQ FRXQWHUJOREDOLVP WKXV SHUIRUPV FHUWDLQ GLVFXUVLYH IXQFWLRQV UHPLQLVFHQWRIWKHROGFRPPXQLVWLGHRORJ\DOORZLQJ5XVVLDWRSODFHLWVHOIDWWKHKHDGRI a new anti-hegemonic coalition encompassing the South and the East against the West. Counter-globalism, it should be stressed, is not opposed to globalisation as such but to its contemporary forms. As in the old days of the Cold War, the language of counter-globalism sustains visions of an alternative modernity. There are very many different visions of this alternative modernity. Among WKH5XVVLDQOHDGHUVKLSKHDGHGE\3XWLQLWWDNHVYHU\DWWHQXDWHGIRUPVUHÀHFWHG LQWKHQRWLRQRIµOLEHUDOSDWULRWLVP¶)RUWKH&35)LWVXJJHVWVDVXVWDLQHGUHSXGLDWLRQ RI PXFK RI FRQWHPSRUDU\ PRGHUQLW\ DQG WKXV WKH &35) PDQDJHV WR combine both the left-wing and the right-wing repudiations of modernity (neoMarxism and anti-cosmopolitanism). For Eurasianists, counter-globalism suggests some sort of unique civilisational path that is more than simply a mid-path between Westernism and Asian authoritarianism, but a sustained alternative mode of living characterised by practices of civility appropriate for a country RFFXS\LQJWKHKHDUWODQGVRI(XUDVLD,QÀXHQWLDODFDGHPLFVOLNH3DQDULQZDUQRI the ‘temptations’ of globalisation while accepting the reality of an objective process of global integration (Panarin 2000). At issue for people like Panarin is the discursive constructed ideology of gloEDOLVDWLRQ+LVDUJXPHQWVDUHORFDWHGLQDUHMHFWLRQRI5XVVLD¶VKLVWRULFDOSDWKRI development as somehow not quite up to the mark. As he argues, ‘the concept of

Myth and democratic identity in Russia   catch-up development is always accompanied by a hidden inferiority complex DQGVHQVHRIJXLOW¶3DQDULQ $VKHDUJXHV 7KH FXUUHQW DWWHPSW WR ZHVWHUQLVH 5XVVLD DXWRPDWLFDOO\ EHOLWWOHV KHU VLQFH RQWKHPDWHULDOPHDVXUHIRLVWHGE\WKH:HVW5XVVLDFDQQRWEXWLQFRPSDULVRQORRNOLNHDµVHFRQGUDWH¶FRXQWU\%XWLIZHHYDOXDWH5XVVLD¶VSRWHQWLDO on an alternative, socio-cultural measure, above all in the light of eastern VSLULWXDOUHOLJLRXV DQG KLVWRULFDO H[SHULHQFH WKHQ RXU DSSUHFLDWLRQ RI 5XVsia’s potential will look very different. 3DQDULQ  7KHDLPZDVWR¿QGDQHZV\QWKHVLVRIµQDWLRQDOGHVWLQ\DQGZRUOGKLVWRU\¶ 3DQDULQ )RU3DQDULQWKLQJVDUHHYHQZRUVHVLQFHWKHIDOORIFRPPXQLVPVLQFHKHDUJXHVWKDWWKH:HVWUHVSHFWHGWKHFRQFHUQVRIWKH8665IDUPRUH WKDQ LW GRHV WRGD\ 5XVVLD¶V QDWLRQDO LQWHUHVWV LELG   ,W LV WKLV VRUW RI VHOI SLW\LQJODPHQWDWLRQDERXWWKHODFNRIUHVSHFWVKRZQIRU5XVVLDWKDWLVW\SLFDORI PXFKRIWKHWKLQNLQJRIWKH5XVVLDQLQWHOOLJHQWVLDDQGLVVRPHWKLQJWKDWLVWKRUoughly alien to Putin’s thinking.

Putin’s repudiation of Russian counter-modernity 3XWLQKDVUHSXGLDWHGP\WKVRI5XVVLDQFRXQWHUPRGHUQLW\+HKDVWULHGWRSXWDQ HQGWRWKHLGHDRI5XVVLDDVDQDOWHUQDWLYHDQGWRP\WKVRIXQUHDOLVHGDOWHUQDWLYHVLQ5XVVLD¶VKLVWRU\ As far as Putin is concerned, the revolution is over and LW LV WLPH IRU 5XVVLD WR VWDUW OLYLQJ LQ WKH SUHVHQW 7KLV PHDQV D YHU\ GLIIHUHQW appreciation of historical time and developmental paths. For a philosopher like Akhiezer, the norm of social development is that of the West. Shcherbinina comments on this as follows: 7KLV QRUP LQ KLV YLHZ KDV EHHQ SUHVHQW LQ 5XVVLD VLQFH WKH VHYHQWHHQWK FHQWXU\EXWHYHU\KLVWRULFDODWWHPSWWRUHDOLVHWKLVQRUPLQ5XVVLDKDVEHHQ short-lived. This norm is defeated by a set of counter-norms, and the latter GH¿QH RXU SDWK RI GHYHORSPHQW 7KH DFWXDO KLVWRULFDO SDWK IRU $NKLH]HU assumes the status of deviancy. The general conclusion therefore is that the ZKROHKLVWRU\RI5XVVLDLVWKHKLVWRU\RIXQUHDOLVHGSRVVLELOLWLHV  WKHQRUP RIWKHKLVWRULFDOGHYHORSPHQWRI5XVVLDLVDGHYLDWLRQ 6KFKHUELQLQD  ,W LV WKLV P\WK RI 5XVVLD¶V SDWK DV SHUPDQHQWO\ GHYLDQW WKDW 3XWLQ VHHNV WR RYHUFRPHEXWDWWKHVDPHWLPHWKHQRUPWRZKLFK5XVVLDQRZDVSLUHVLVWKHYHU\ same one propounded by Akhiezer. Putin’s rule is rooted in a deeply mytholoJLVHG YLVLRQ RI ZKDW 5XVVLDQ µQRUPDOLW\¶ VKRXOG ORRN OLNH 3XWLQ KDV UHMHFWHG GH¿QLWLRQV RI WUDGLWLRQ DV VRPH XQFKDQJLQJ HVVHQFH DQG DFFHSWV WKDW WUDGLWLRQV are reproduced in new forms in response to new social realities. The question of what is authentic is as relevant in politics as it is in cultural studies (for example,

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in the study of folklore). Just as ‘folklorism is the conscious use of folklore in SRSXODU HOLWH RU RI¿FLDOO\ VSRQVRUHG FXOWXUH¶ 2OVRQ    VR WRR WKH DWWHPSWWRGH¿QHD5XVVLDQQDWLRQDOLGHDLVWKHFRQVFLRXVDWWHPSWWRIRUJHDQHZ P\WKDERXW5XVVLD¶VQDWLRQDOLGHQWLW\3XWLQ¶VOHDGHUVKLSKDVH[SOLFLWO\UHMHFWHG WKH
The crash of the future 7KLQNLQJDERXWWKHLGHDRIWKHQDWLRQDQGWKHUROHRIWKHVWDWHLQ5XVVLDWRGD\LV rooted in a retrospective logic in which key concepts and ideas (like Eurasianism) are applied today in a context far removed from the milieu in which these notions were originally generated. Thus the writings of Eurasianists such as Nikolai Danilevskii or Konstantin Leont’ev are applied in a decontextualised ZD\ DQG WKXV UDWKHU WKDQ URRWLQJ 5XVVLDQ WKLQNLQJ LQ HPSLULFDO FKDOOHQJHV renders it rootless and irrelevant to the contemporary challenges of society. This desperate attempt to come to terms with the past by drawing on the past suggests

Myth and democratic identity in Russia 215 that the original experience was never worked through society (digested if you OLNH LQWKH¿UVWSODFHWKDWFLYLOVRFLHW\QHYHUDEVRUEHGWKHVHLGHDVDQGLQVWHDG they remained the playthings of a narrow strata of intellectuals and politicians. ,Q5XVVLDLWLVFOHDUWKHUHFDQEHQRQDWLRQDOLGHDZLWKRXWORRNLQJWRWKHSDVW 7KHSRSXODULW\RI¿OPVOLNHWKDWRI1LNLWD0LNKDONRYThe Barber of Siberia, is evidence of this; it is also evidence of the cynicism and intellectual exhaustion RI WKLV ZD\ RI VHHLQJ 5XVVLD¶V LGHQWLW\ 7KH FKRFRODWHER[ YLHZ RI WKH SDVW DIIHFWVQRWRQO\WKHYLHZRIWKHWVDULVWHSRFK5XVVLD¶VIDLOXUHWRFRPHWRWHUPV with the Soviet era is striking, as evidenced for example in the way that it still LQVLVWVWKDWWKH%DOWLFUHSXEOLFVYROXQWDULO\MRLQHGWKH8665LQ$IWHUWKH ZDU *HUPDQ\ DFFHSWHG UHVSRQVLELOLW\ ZKHUHDV WKH 5XVVLDQ JRYHUQPHQW LV QRW only denying its own role (which is understandable) but also increasingly legitiPLVLQJ UHWURVSHFWLYHO\ 6RYLHW DFWLRQV DV ZHOO 2Q  0D\  WKH 5XVVLDQ Central Bank came out with a commemorative coin showing Stalin sitting at the Potsdam conference with Winston Churchill and Harry Truman. A new set of consolidating myths are emerging, expressed by the movement to get the city of 9ROJRJUDGUHQDPHG6WDOLQJUDG±DOOHJHGO\WRKRQRXUWKHWURRSVZKRGLHGWKHUH but of course with a deeper resonance. The Putinite attempt to return to normality is clearly a mythical construct, since normality is time-bound and episodic. Historical time, according to KoselOHFNLVGH¿QHGE\GLIIHUHQWLDWLQJEHWZHHQSDVWDQGIXWXUHRUDVKHSXWVLW LQ DQWKURSRORJLFDO WHUPV H[SHULHQFH DQG H[SHFWDWLRQ .RVHOOHFN  [[LLL  ,Q SRVWFRPPXQLVW 5XVVLD WKH EDODQFH EHWZHHQ H[SHULHQFH DQG H[SHFWDWLRQ LV heavily weighted to the former as a result of the failure of utopian aspirations YHVWHGLQYLVLRQVRI5XVVLDDVWKH7KLUG5RPHDQGWKHQWKHSHUPDQHQWFLYLOZDU of emancipatory revolutionism. Although demands on the future are structurally LQFUHDVHGJLYHQWKHIDLOXUHRIWKHSDVW WKHH[SHFWDWLRQWKDWWKHIXWXUHZLOOIXO¿O these expectations is decreased. The society in which modernist progressivism reached its apogee is being re-introduced to modernity at a time when social optimism is on the wane. The future is no longer justice but a thin rationalistic technocratism; the price of the pursuit of justice proved too high. Today the weight of the future in social consciousness has decreased.  $OWKRXJK ODVWLQJ D EDUH VHYHQ \HDUV SHUHVWURLND EHWZHHQ  DQG  DSSHDUHGWRZLWQHVVDQDFFHOHUDWLRQRIKLVWRULFDOWLPH,ILQWKHUHUHPDLQHG DUHVLGXDODQWLFLSDWLRQRIWKHFRPLQJ$SRFDO\SVHRIWKHERXUJHRLVLHE\LW was clear that only a bourgeois restoration could provide a way out of a historical dead end, and the way out was backwards. The end of the pursuit of transcendental goals opened the way for the historically located search that we call ‘politics’, concerned with temporal matters of policy rather than the achievement of supra-political goals. The heresies that the Soviet regime called ‘dissent’ now gave way to problems of achieving coherence within the state. History lost its goal and, as Bodin always stressed, politics is concerned with chance and probability. The prophecies of both the Enlightenment and emancipation had been seized by ambitious elites to become dislocated transhistorical experiments imposed upon society as opposed to emerging from within society. Diachronic

  R. Sakwa stories about the past, the synchronic attempt to understand the present, and the asynchronic representation of the future entwined to enlighten and remythologise 5XVVLD¶VLGHQWLW\DQGGHVWLQ\

Conclusion 9DULRXV QRWLRQV RI FRXQWHUPRGHUQLW\ DUH UHÀHFWHG LQ WKH WKLQNLQJ RI SDWULRWLF WKLQNHUVDQGLQWKH&35)OHDGHUVDQGUHSUHVHQWDGLVWLQFWLYHP\WKRORJLFDOLQWHUpretation of the past to sustain contemporary utopian alternatives to the allegedly sordid, commercialised and alienated social practices of the West. Neither the PDUNHWQRUGHPRFUDF\DUHUHMHFWHGEXWWKHLUUHFHSWLRQLV¿OWHUHGWKURXJKDFRQtinuing (although radically reformulated) stream of utopian alternativism. At the same time, various interpretations of ‘the East’, including a revival of Eurasianism as both a geographical and political-spiritual alternative to the West are PRRWHG0DQ\RIWKHSRLQWVDGYDQFHGE\5XVVLDQFULWLFVRIJOREDOLVDWLRQDUHZHOO PDGHEXWWRJHWKHUWKH\UHSUHVHQWDSHUSHWXDWLRQRILGHDOLVHGQRWLRQVRID5XVVLDQ Sonderweg that prevents the country from enjoying the fruits of modernity as they actually exist. By contrast with these three approaches, Putin’s policies explicitly repudiate notions of an alternative modernity. However, the problem RI 5XVVLD¶V SDUWLFXODULW\ UHPDLQV XQUHVROYHG 7KLV LV D TXHVWLRQ WKDW KDV WUDGLWLRQDOO\ IDFHG 5XVVLD DV WKH ¿UVW µWUDQVLWLRQDO¶ VRFLHW\ EHJLQQLQJ ZLWK 3HWHU the Great’s accelerated attempts at Westernisation through to communism and WKH GHPRFUDWLF µWUDQVLWLRQ¶ RI WKH V EXW LV RI XQLYHUVDO VLJQL¿FDQFH DV WKH tension between the global and the national remains unresolved.  3XWLQ¶VOHDGHUVKLSVRXJKWWRUHFRQFLOH5XVVLD¶VFRPSHWLQJWUDGLWLRQVDQGWKXV tried to transcend the contradictions in social development while drawing on the power of these contradictions to sustain its own distinctive brand of developmentalism. Democracy as a project requires pre-political mythological elements to sustain its imaginative dynamism; but equally, critiques of hegemonic democratising discourses are rooted in a counter-mythological terrain. The ideas of liberal patriotism and sovereign democracy are both constitutive of the social actors and political agents required to sustain a liberal democracy, but Putinite constitutive politics at the same time negates the autonomy of these actors. The renunciation of the search for counter-modern alternatives, of spatial and temporal utopias, is LWVHOIDIXQGDPHQWDOFRQVWLWXWLYHDFW,WVHHNVWRRYHUFRPHP\WKVRIH[FHSWLRQDOLVPE\UHFRQFLOLQJWKHSDUWLFXODUDQGWKHXQLYHUVDO,WWKXVVHHNVWRSXWDQHQGWR 5XVVLD¶V SHUPDQHQW WUDQVLWLRQ DQG WR QRUPDOLVH 5XVVLD¶V GHYHORSPHQWDO PRGHO ,WLVWKLVP\WKRIQRUPDOLW\WKDWQRZEHFRPHVWKHIRXQGDWLRQRQZKLFKDGLVWLQFWLYHO\ 5XVVLDQ PRGHO RI FDSLWDOLVW OLEHUDO GHPRFUDF\ LV EXLOW 3XWLQ ZDV DEOH WR exploit the power of contradiction by reconciling various mythical representations RI5XVVLD¶VSDVWDQGFRQWHQGLQJYLVLRQVRILWVIXWXUH2QHRIWKHNH\VWRWKLVLVWKH HQGLQJRIPHVVLDQLFYLVLRQVRI5XVVLD¶VIXWXUH%\UHGXFLQJ5XVVLD¶VDPELWLRQV traditionally couched in universal and messianic terms, Putin was paradoxically DEOH WKHUHE\ WR XQORFN LWV SRWHQWLDO ,W LV KLV UHSXGLDWLRQ RI KLVWRULFDO WLPH WKDW DOORZV5XVVLD¿QDOO\WRHQMR\UHDOWLPH

Myth and democratic identity in Russia  

Notes  7KHGLIIHUHQFHEHWZHHQDSROLWLFDOP\WKDQGDQLGHRORJ\PD\DSSHDULQVLJQL¿FDQWDQG in practical terms they are closely linked. However, the accent in political myth is on the popular reception of ideas, whereas an ideology tends to operate more at the level of theoretical understanding.  )RU WKH FXOWXUDO DVSHFWV RI 5XVVLDQ SROLWLFDO P\WKRSRHLD VHH &ODUN   :RUWPDQ   7KH UROH RI RSSRVLWLRQ SDUWLHV LQ GHPRFUDWLF FRQVROLGDWLRQ DQG KDELWXDWLRQ LV D NH\ theme of much ‘transitological’ analysis. For an early analysis on their role in incorpoUDWLQJGLVDIIHFWHGSDUWVRIWKHSRSXODWLRQVHH+XQWLQJWRQ   5)(5/Newsline, 2 February 2000; The Jamestown Foundation, Monitor, 2 February 2000.  2QH RI WKH PRVW GHWDLOHG DQG EDODQFHG 5XVVLDQ DQDO\VHV ZDV SXEOLVKHG WR FRPPHPRUDWH WKH ¿IWLHWK DQQLYHUVDU\ RI WKH HVWDEOLVKPHQW RI WKH 3HRSOH¶V 5HSXEOLF RI &KLQD 7LWDUHQNR   ,QWHUYLHZ ZLWK 6HUJHL 3DUNKRPHQNR µ6RVWDYLWHO¶V NRQWUDNWD¶ Itogi, 8 February 2000, 24.  2QHRIWKHPRVWHORTXHQWH[SRQHQWVRIWKHDOWHUQDWLYLW\WKHVLVIRU5XVVLDDUHWKHPDQ\ ZRUNVE\$NKLH]HU6HHIRUH[DPSOH$NKLH]HU   7KHµFRQWUDGLFWLRQ¶EHWZHHQ5XVVLDDQG:HVWHUQJHQHUDWHGPRGHOVRIGHYHORSPHQWZDV V\PEROLVHGE\WKHVKLIWRIWKHFDSLWDOIURP5XVVLD¶V0XVFRYLWHKHDUWODQGWR6W3HWHUVburg as a ‘window to the West’; and it perhaps was not accidental that a citizen of St Petersburg sought to resolve this contradiction.

Bibliography $NKLH]HU$6 Rossiia: kritika istoricheskogo opytaYRO,Ot proshlogo k budushchemu, 2nd edn, Novosibirsk: Sibirskii khronograf. $OHNVHHY69.DODPDQRY9$DQG&KHUQHQNR$*HGV  Ideologicheskie orientiry Rossii, 2 vols, Moscow: Kniga i biznes. %HUGLDHY1 The Russian Revolution: Two Essays on its Implications in Religion and Psychology, London: Sheed & Ward. %HUGLDHY1 The Origin of Russian Communism, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. %UXGQ\ <0   Reinventing Russia: Russian Nationalism and the Soviet State, 1953–1991, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. %X]JDOLQ$ µ5XVVLD¶V*HQHUDWLRQ;;,&DXJKW%HWZHHQ3UDJPDWLVP5DGLFDOLVP and . . . Antiglobalism?’, Russia and Eurasia Review  &KHVKNRY0 µ=DSDG±QH]DSDGL5RVVLLDYPLURYRPNRQWHNVWH¶Mirovaia ekonomika i mezhdunarodnye otnosheniia 12. &ODUN. Petersburg: Crucible of Cultural Revolution, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Duncan, P. (2000) Russian Messianism: Third Rome, Revolution, Communism and After, /RQGRQ5RXWOHGJH )LVK06 µ7KH$GYHQWRI0XOWLSDUWLVPLQ5XVVLD±¶Post-Soviet Affairs  ± *DUDG]KD1HG  Suverenitet0RVFRZ(YURSD± *XPLOsY/ Ethnogenesis and the Biosphere, Moscow: Progress Publishers. +XQWLQJWRQ63 Political Order in Changing Societies, New Haven: Yale University Press.

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+XQWLQJWRQ63 µ7KH&ODVKRI&LYLOL]DWLRQV"¶Foreign Affairs ± +XQWLQJWRQ 63   The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order, New York: Simon & Schuster. .DSXVWLQ% µ/HY\LNRQVHUYDWL]P.35)LHJRURO¶YVRYUHPHQQRLSROLWLNH¶Nezavisimaia gazeta (5 March), 5. .HGURY,DQG.RV\UHY' µ3HUY\LYL]LW3XWLQD±Y.LWDL"¶Nezavisimaia gazeta, (2 March), 1. .RKOL$0LJGDO-6DQG6KXH9 State Power and Social Forces: Domination and Tranformation in the Third World, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. .RNRVKLQ $$   Real’nyi suverenitet v sovremennoi miropoliticheskoi sisteme, 0RVFRZ8566 .RáDNRZVNL/ The Presence of Myth, Chicago: University of Chicago Press. .RVHOOHFN 5   Futures Past: On the Semantics of Historical Time, Cambridge, 0$7KH0,73UHVV /HVWHU -   µ2YHUGRVLQJ RQ 1DWLRQDOLVP *HQQDGLL =\XJDQRY DQG WKH &RPPXQLVW 3DUW\RIWKH5XVVLDQ)HGHUDWLRQ¶New Left Review± Migranian, A. (2000) ‘Na simvolakh ne ekonomiat’, Nezavisimaia gazeta (4 April 2000),  Olson, L.J. (2004) Performing Russia: Folk Revival and Russian Identity/RQGRQ5RXWledge/BASEES. 3DQDULQ$6 Rossiia v tsiklakh mirovoi istorii, Moscow: MGU. Panarin, A.S. (2000) Iskushenie globalizmom0RVFRZ5XVVNLLQDWVLRQDO¶Q\LIRQG Parkhomenko, S. (2000) ‘Sostavitel’s kontrakta’, interview with Sergei Parkhomenko, Itogi (8 February 2000), 24. 5DGLR )UHH (XURSH5DGLR /LEHUW\ Newsline, 2 February 2000; The Jamestown Foundation, Monitor, 2 February 2000. 6DNZD5 µ7KH5HJLPH6\VWHPLQ5XVVLD¶Contemporary Politics ± Shcherbinina, N.G. (2002) Politicheskii mif Rossii7RPVN,]GDWHO¶VWYRWRPVNRJRXQLYHUsiteta. Shestopal, E.B. (2004) Obrazy vlasti v post-sovetskoi Rossii, Moscow: Aleteia. 6XUNRY 9   µ6XYHUHQLWHW HWR SROLWLFKHVNLL VLQRQLP NRQNXUHQWRVSRVREQRVWL¶ LQ Garadzha, Nikita (ed.) Suvereinet0RVFRZ(YURSD± 7HOHQ¶0 Moskovskie novosti 1R 7HVFKNH% The Myth of 1648, London: Verso. 7LWDUHQNR0/ HG    Kitai na puti modernizatsii i reform: 1949-1999, Moscow, Vostochnaia Literatura. 7VLSNR $   µ3RFKHPX SDUWLLD *HQQDGLLD =LXJDQRYD PR]KHW SREHGLW¶ QD GHNDbr’skikh vyborakh’, Nezavisimaia gazeta1RYHPEHU  8UEDQ-DQG6RORYHL9 µ.RPPXQLVWLFKHVNRHGYL]KHQLHYSRVWVRYHWVNRL5RVVLL¶ Svobodnaia mysl’ 8UEDQ 0   µ5HP\WKRORJLVLQJ WKH 5XVVLDQ 6WDWH¶ Europe–Asia Studies    ± Weiner, A. (2001) Making Sense of War: The Second World War and the Fate of the Bolshevik Revolution, Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press. :RUWPDQ5 Scenarios of Power: Myth and Ceremony in the Russian Monarchy, 2 vols, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Ziuganov, G.A. (2000) Postizhenie Rossii, Moscow: Mysl. Ziuganov, G.A. (2002) Globalizatsiia i sud’ba chelovechestva, Moscow: Molodaia gvardiia.

Index

Adorno, T. 48 Aesop 103, 113 Agamben, G. 57 Age of the Democratic Revolution 60 Akhiezer, A.S. 213, 217 Albanians 17 Alexander III 136 alternative modernity 212, 226 America 3, 7, 22–3, 29, 32, 60, 171 Antall, J. 179 anti-globalism as a counter-modern myth 212 Apollo 40 A Prayer for Hetman Mazepa 94 Aristophanes 29 Aristotle 35 Arndt, E.M. 102 Asia 18, 122–7, 129–34, 138–9, 172 Athena 36, 39 Austria 98, 174 Babcock, B. 31, 42–3 %DELþND Badeni, C. 108 Bakunin, M. 64 Barbarossa, F. 98 Barthes, R. 3, 5, 22, 79, 96, 134 Bartošek, K. 111, 119 Bassin, M. 191, 138–9 Beckovský, J.F. 107, 119 Békés, C. 180 Belkovsky, S. 190, 200 Bem, J. 179 Beneš, E. 110–11, 118–20 Beran, J. 118–9 Berdiaev, N. 49, 66, 75, 205, 207–8, 217 Berger, P.I. 214 Bergson, H. 30 Berlin, I. 196

Bertuch, H. 84, 96 Beznosý, J. 98 Bibó, I. 92, 173 Blant, M. 189, 200 Blumenberg, H. 79, 96, 142, 161, 164 Bolshevism 4, 7, 10, 43, 92 Borkenau, F. 18, 21–2, 47, 64, 75 Borschak, É. 89, 90, 92, 96 Bosnia 72–4 Bourdieu, P. 50, 58 Branald, A. 111, 113–14, 118–19 Britain 7, 125, 136–7 Buonaccorsi, F. 127 Buzgalin, B. 212, 217 Bulgarin 86 Barényi, O. von 110 Camus, A. 50 care of the soul 55–6 Cassirer, E. 7, 10, 22–3, 101 Certeau, M. 9, 22, 80, 96 Cervantes, M. 60 Charles IV 102, 105 Charles XII of Sweden 81, 83, 84, 86–9, 97 Chile 15 China 51, 126, 138, 211, 217 Chronicle of Nestor 139, 161 Churchill, W. 215 Clay, L. 69 Cohn, N. 46 Cold War 4, 9, 18, 22, 67–9, 75, 114, 187, 212 Communism 2, 4, 8, 10–11, 14–17, 19–21, 24–5, 27–8, 43–8, 51, 53, 58, 60–1, 63–4, 66–76, 108–9, 134, 169, 173, 195, 204, 207–9, 216–17 Confucius 50 Conrad, J. 47 Constitution for Europe 3

220

Index

constitutive imagination 4, 11, 14–15, 20, 24, 60, 62, 72, 74 Corvinus, M. 105 Crimean Khanate 82 cultural identity 85, 212 Czech lands 4 Czechoslovakia 21, 70, 111, 114, 117, 119 Dalimil 101–3, 105, 107–9, 112–13, 116, 119–20 Danilevskii, N. 122, 127–8, 132, 134, 138–9, 214 Das tote Geleise 110 De Theutonicis bonum dictamen 101–2 de Waldt, O.F. 117 Decembrist movement 19 Delacroix, E. 84 democracy: and myth 203; and symbolic politicking 181; as an empire of the mind 4, 72–3; as a set of discursive political practices 203; Day of 172; Hungarian 182; idealisation of 3; in Eastern Europe 1; model of 14; managed 64, 186–8, 199; Marxistnihilist myth of 56; meaning(s) of 2, 21, 60; myth(s) of 15, 18, 74; mythical ‘true’ 187; mythological status of 204; origin of 11, 14; post-communist 72, 167; people’s 1, 45, 52–3, 67; representations of 4, 19, 60, 64, 69, 74, 77; social 208–9; sovereign 205, 216; Soviet 67; totalitarian 1, 14; transition(s) to 2, 73, 205; victory of liberal 73; Western 68 democratic equality 66 democratic identity 61, 63, 203 democratic outcomes 70 democratic revolution 12, 53, 60, 199 democratic transition 11, 14, 187, 216 democratic transition and consolidation 14 democratisation processes 46, 52, 54, 56 Demosthenes 3 Deng Xiaoping 211 Denisov, A. 136 Derrida, J. 48, 187, 191, 193, 196–7, 199, 201 Descartes, R. 33, 50 de-stalinisation 69, 71 Detienne, M. 33, 35–6, 39–40, 43 Deutsch, T. 175 Diderot, D. 205 Dilthey, W. 46 Dionysos 32, 36 Döblin, A. 95–6

Don Quixote 60 Dorian Mime 29–30 Doroshenko, P. 81–2 Dostoevsky, F.M. 49, 122, 125, 135, 153 double bind 63, 65, 67 Douglas, M. 22, 30–1, 43, 106, 119 Drtina, P. 110 Dumézil, G. 7, 22 Durkheim, E. 5, 22, 43 Eisenstadt, S. 46, 51, 57–8, 63, 75 Eliade, M. 8, 11, 22–3, 44, 48, 150, 161, 163–4 Elias, N. 13, 22, 54, 56–7 empty space of power 62 Enlightenment 15, 18, 24, 28, 103, 124, 126–8, 140–1, 205–6, 215 equalisation 52–3 Erben, K.J. 103 eschatology 47, 203, 207 Esterházy, P. 47 Eurasianists 212, 214 Europe 1–5, 8, 11, 14–24, 27–8, 42, 47, 55, 58, 60–1, 63, 64, 68–9, 71–6, 79, 81–2, 84–5, 91, 100, 109, 116–17, 122–40, 163–4, 172–4, 185, 207, 218 Europeanisation 18, 122–3, 127–8, 130, 136 Evans-Pritchard, E.E. 30, 32, 42–3 faktura 155 fantasy thinking 65–6 Fascism 4, 7, 15, 69, 92, 109, 119 February Revolution 66 Ferdinand, king 174, 119 Ficino, M. 42 Fidesz (Ungarischer Bürgerbund) 173, 175, 177–8, 180 First World War 7, 11, 48, 91, 108, 111 Fonvizin, D. 132 Foucault, M. 46, 48, 51, 54, 56–8, 187, 192, 200–1 France 12, 37, 47, 56–7, 60, 68, 81, 125, 127, 136–7, 182, 201 Freud, S. 50, 163 Gál, Z. 180 Gelhard, D. 163–4 *HRUJHRI3RGČEUDG\ Géricault, T. 84 Gerlachus 98–9, 106 Germany 7, 69, 81, 112, 114–15, 117, 138, 215 Get’man Ivan Mazepa (Khotkevych) 95

Index Gingrich, N. 195 Girard, R. 9, 22, 42–3, 57 Glogau, J.von 126 Goethe J.W. von 206 Goldman, H. 56–7 Golitsyn, V.V. 82 Göncz, A. 180 Gorbachev, M.S. 28, 205, 208, 210 Gottschall, R. 85, 87, 96 Gottwald, K. 108 Gramsci, A. 48 Graus, F. 99, 101, 119 Greece 2, 29–30, 172 Greek polis 15 Greenfeld, L. 129, 139 Grob, T. 10, 42, 79, 95–6, 141 Grósz, K. 178 Grozny, I. 123 Gulag Archipelago 47 Gumilev, L. 215 Gyurcsány, F. 181 Habsburg, A. 101, 103, 105 Hadot, P. 54 Hájek, V. 103–4, 107, 119 Halbwachs, M. 171, 184 Halík, T. 117, 120 Hamvas, B. 14, 42, 45, 48–51, 57, 58 Handelman, D. 31–2, 43 Hanka, V. 100, 104, 107, 119 Hartman, A. 119 Havel, V. 17, 21–2, 42, 70, 75, 112–15, 117–20 Hegel, G.F. 50 Heidegger, M. 49, 51, 55, 57 Heraclitus 49–50 Herder, J.G. 16, 22, 115–16, 119–200 Hermes 32–4, 39–41, 43, 58 Hesiod 29, 34, 43 Hesse, H. 138 Heuermann, H. 142, 161, 164 Hiller, I. 181 Hirschman, A. 58 Hitler, A. 7–8, 76, 92, 109, 115 Hobbes, T. 6–7, 22 Hofér, T. 179 Holan, V. 101 Homer 34 Horn, G. 180 Horthy regime 174 Horthy, M. 173–4 Horvath, A. 9, 27, 59, 56–8, 75 Hosking, G. 5, 23, 76, 129, 135–6, 138–9 Hrabal, B. 47

221

Hrushevsky, M. 88–9, 96 Hungarian Democratic Forum 172 Hungarian Revolution 70 Hungarian Revolution of 1956 185 Hungarian Socialist Party 177–8 Hungary 26, 45, 48, 58, 70, 105, 127, 169–85 Huntington, S. 204, 208, 217–18 Husserl, E. 55 LGHQWL¿FDWLRQ± 180, 194 India 51, 126, 138, 211 infra-liberalism 14, 186–7, 192, 194–9 innovation 17, 28, 142, 161 Iran 15, 211 Iron curtain 68, 71 Italy 7, 58, 68, 81, 100 Ivanenko, P. 82 Jackson, M. 47 Jacobinism 28 Jacobson, R. 106 Jagiellon, C. 101 Jahn, F.L. 102 Jaspers, K. 49, 51 Jászi, O. 173 Jesus 32 John of Luxembourg 102 Jones, M. 107, 120 Joyce, James 141 Jung, C.G. 27, 33, 46, 48, 65, 75 Jungmann, J. 103, 116, 120 Kádár, J. 174, 178 Kapustin, B. 209, 218 Károlyi, M. 173–4, 179, 181 Kennan, G.F. 68 Kerényi, K. 27, 33, 39–41, 43, 46, 48, 58 Khodorkovsky, M. 186 Khotkevych, H. 90, 95–6 Kierkegaard, S. 46, 49–50 Klaus, V. 108, 112–17, 119–20 Klenková, H. 118, 120 .OLþND% Kljuchevsky, V.O. 131, 133 Kochubey 83, 86 Kohl, H. 115 Kohn, H. 18, 23 .RáDNRZVNL/± 218 Kollár, J. 111 Konieczny, Z. 209 Konrád, G. 21, 23, 71, 75

222

Index

Koschmal, W. 17, 122, 162 Koselleck, R. 63, 75, 171, 184, 215, 218 Kossuth emblem 173 Kossuth, L. 173–5, 179 Kostomarov, K. 88–9, 96 Kotte, E. 79, 96 Kristián z Koldína 103, 118 .URQLNDþHVNi 103, 119 Kropotkin, P. 64 Krupnyckyj, B. 90, 92, 95–6 Kusturica, E. 72 Kireevsky, I.V. 127–8, 131–2, 134, 137, 139 Lazaretní vlak 111, 113–14, 119 Le Bon, G. 7 Lederer, E. 16, 23, 116 Lefort, C. 6, 12, 23, 62, 75 Lemberg, H. 126–8, 130–3, 138–9 Lenin 7, 65–7, 71, 75–6 Lepkyj 89–90 Lester, J. 208, 218 /HV]F]\ĔVNL6 Lévi-Strauss, C. 8, 10–11, 17, 23, 161, 170, 185 liberal patriotism 212, 216 liminality 37–9, 41, 51 Lincoln, A. 12–13 Lincoln, B. 2, 3, 8, 10, 23 Liszt, F. 84, 97 Lithuania 63, 129 Litván, G. 173, 185 Loki 32–3, 44 Lotman, J. 124–5, 139 Lustig, A. 110 lustration 3 Luther, M. 130 Lypynskyj, V. 92 Machiavelli, N. 7, 82 Malinowski, B. 10, 23, 161 Man without Qualities 60 Mann, T. 40, 43, 46, 48, 57, 138 Maria Theresa, Empress 176 Marshall plan 69 Marten, M. 117, 120 Marx, K. 50, 56, 65, 73, 75, 208 Marxism 47–8, 65–6, 71, 75, 205, 208, 212 Marxism–Leninism 2, 66 Masaryk, T.G. 17, 111, 118 0DVáRZVND' master narratives 15–16, 74, 172 Mauss, M. 5, 22, 28, 49

Mazepa (Bulgarin) 86 Mazepa, J. 10, 42, 79–94 Meletinskii, E. 138 Merezhkovsky, D. 49 Metis (Wisdom) 36–7, 39 Michelet, J. 9 Michnik, A. 72–3, 76 Migdal, J.S. 214, 218 Migranyan, A. 214, 218 Mikhalkov, N. 215 Miliukov, P. 207 mimes (mimesis) 29, 32, 44, 58 misoteutonism 99–101, 104–5, 107–9, 114, 117 Monnerot, J. 42, 44 Montégut, E. 62, 76 More, T. 60 0URĪHN6 Münckler, H. 80, 96 Munich Agreement 109 Musil, R. 60 Mussolini, B. 7 myth(s): and memory 170, 184; anti-fascist 68, 72; as ideology in narrative form 4, 11; as markers of differentiation 7, 62; constitutional 2, 67; eschatological 2, 19, 66; heroic 16, 72; of 1848 78; of an originally human Marxism 71; of communist democracy 14; of democracy 15, 18, 74; of ennobling 14, 55; of equality 14; of normality 74, 204, 216; of social monarchy 64; of the Cold War 67; of social monarchy 64; of the French revolution 3, 62; of the Soviet people 74; of vengeance and victimisation 5, 2USKHXVUHP\WKL¿FDWLRQ 161; trickster 31, 34, 36; mythopoeia of stories 3; mythologem 85, 93, 194–8, 207; mythogenesis 142 1DYLQLFL3iQČ 109 Nagy, I. 174, 178–80 narodniki 65 National Bolshevik 198 Nejedlý, Z. 112–13, 120 1ČPFRYi% Német, Z. 173 Netherlands 81 Nezval, V. 101 Nietzsche, F. 46, 48–51, 54, 130 Nivat, G. 162, 165 Nyusztály, M. 175 Nyyssönen, H. 20, 196, 170–1, 174–5, 179, 185

Index Obroty rzeczy 145–6 October Revolution 20, 133, 175, 209 Odin 7–8 Ohloblyn, O. 95, 97 Old Believers 136 Orbán, V. 180 Örkény, I. 47 Orlyk, P. 83 Orpheus 32, 43, 84 Orthodox church 82, 89, 127, 134 Ostrogorski, M.J. 52 Ostroróg, J. 127 Ottoman Empire 16, 127, 130 Pahlevi, R. 15 Palacký, F. 17, 100, 105, 107–8, 117, 120 Palmer, R. 60, 76 Panarin, A.S. 210, 212–13, 218 3DĜt]HN parrhesia 46 Pascal, B. 50 3DWRþND-± perestroika 123, 133, 188, 205, 215 Pericles 3, 12–13 Perkins, H. 110, 121 Peroutka, F. 117, 120 3ČWGQĤ 111, 121 Peter the Great, Tsar 76, 81–3, 86, 88, 123, 133, 136–7, 139–40, 205–6, 214, 216 3HWĘ¿, S. 173–6, 182 Pinochet, A. 15 Pisarev, D. 65–6 Pizzorno, A. 6, 23, 57–8 Plato 3, 31, 33–6, 47, 55, 58, 155 Plotin 42 Plutarch 33 Poland 4, 19, 23, 70, 81–3, 85, 88, 91–2, 100, 127, 129, 138, 141–3, 150–1, 160 political spirituality 4, 46 Poltava (Pushkin) 86 Poltava (Battle) 81, 83–4, 87, 89, 95 Popitz, H. 61, 76 Poros (Expediency) 36–7 Prager Totentanz 110 Prague Spring 70 Prague Uprising 108–13, 117 3UiYD6REČVODYVNi 100 3UDåiN$ 3ĜHP\VOLG) Prokhanov, A. 190 Prometheus 84 Propp, V. 94 Protestant Ethic 46, 51

223

Prozorov, S. 14, 186, 189, 192–3, 195, 199, 201 3WiþQtN. Pugachëv, J.I. 153 Pushkin, A.S. 86–7 Putin, V. 14, 20, 186–92, 194–202, 204–6, 209–16, 218 Pynsent, R. 17, 98–9, 118, 120 Pythagoras 155 qualities 35, 204 Quinet, E. 6 Raczek, T. 146, 147 Radichkov, J. 47 Radin, P. 32–3, 42–4, 58 Rádl, E. 108–9, 112–13, 121 Rak, J. 115–16, 121 Raphael (Raffaello Santi) 145–6, 153, 155, 157, 160 Raskolnikov 153 reality gap 47 Remizov, M. 188–90, 198, 201–2 representations of memory 171 revolutionary messianism 19 Romania 175, 183–4 Rousseau, J.J. 11–12, 23 Rückert, H. 138 Rumas, R. 150–2 Russia 2, 4, 7, 13–14, 16–20, 22–3, 28, 49, 63–6, 70, 74–6, 80–3, 85–95, 122–39, 141–3, 153, 155, 160–4, 186, 188–90, 193–5, 197, 199, 201, 203–18 Russian counter-modernity 204–5, 213, 216 Russian messianism 20, 65, 135, 205, 209, 217 Russian national idea 88, 188, 190, 214–15 Russian Revolution 7, 14, 75, 207, 217 Ryleev, K. 85–6, 97 âDIDĜtN3- Said, E. 15, 23 Sakwa, R. 21–1, 23, 28, 44, 74, 203, 209, 218 Samojlovich, I. 82 Sarmatia 127 Sartori, G. 12, 23 Sartre, J.P. 48, 50 Schlegel, F. 126, 139 Schmitt, C. 187, 190–3, 201–2 6FK|SÀLQ*± 139 Schulz, B. 141, 161, 163, 165

224

Index

Schumpeter, J. 4, 11–12, 23 6FLHQWLD6DFUD 49, 57–8 sdvig 154–5 second reality 19, 60–1, 64–6, 71–2, 74 Second World War 7, 9, 51, 57, 67–70, 72, 76, 91, 101, 108, 173, 218 VHOIVDFUL¿FH Serbs 17, 100 Shakespeare, W. 52, 129 Shcherbinina, N.G. 204, 206, 213, 218 Shestov, L. 49 Shklar, J. 198, 202 Siberia 19, 86, 124–5, 215 Sigismund, Emperor 104–5 Simmel, G. 46 Sistine Madonna 146, 149–50, 162, 165 Slovakia 175, 184 6ORYRLNXO¶WXUD 153, 165 6áRZDFNL- Šmahel, F. 99, 118, 121 Smetana, B. 110, 112, 121 6ROLGDUQRĞü Sonderweg 20, 204, 216 Sorel, G. 7, 56, 58 Sosiura, V. 90, 95 South Korea 15 Soviet Russia 63, 76, 86, 189, 201 Soviet Union 5, 13, 67–8, 70, 128, 133, 163–4, 183, 203 Spain 15 St Augustine 49, 55 St Bonaventure 55 St Thomas Aquinas 55 Stalin cult 67 Stalin, J. 13, 66–8, 71, 108, 111, 114, 206, 215 Stalinism 183 Stanislavsky, K. 133 Stašek, B. 118, 121 Stephen, King of Hungary 172, 176–7, 182 stereotyping 141 Stevenson, R.L. 189 Stökl, G. 126 Stråth, B. 170, 185 Sweden 81, 83, 89 symbolic laws 181 symbolic politicking 181–2 symbolic politics 4, 12, 173 Symbolism of national holidays 181 Szabó, M. 173 Szakolczai, A. 14, 42, 45–6, 51, 53, 56–8, 75 Szelényi, I. 22, 53 Sztaba, J. 150, 162, 165

Talmon, J. 14, 23, 42, 44, 66, 76 Tarkovsky, A. 163 Tchaikovsky, P.J. 86 Thailand 172 7KH%DUEHURI6LEHULD (Mikhalkov) 215 Third Rome 135, 161, 204, 207, 215, 217 third worldism 211 Thucydides 3 Tildy, Z. 179 Tito, J. 72 Tkachev, P. 66 Tocqueville, A. 6, 14, 23, 52, 64, 76 Tolstoy, L. 49, 64, 138 topoi 141, 154, 161, 165 transition from mythos to logos 3 transition to Communism 66–7 Trianon, Peace Treaty of 175, 177–8, 183 Trickster 10, 27, 28–37, 39–44, 48, 58, 129 Trubetzkoy, N.S. 132, 134, 137, 139 Truman, H. 215 Tsipko, A. 208–9, 218 Turks 17, 138, 207 Turner, V. 9, 24, 31, 37–9, 42, 44, 51, 58, 207 Ukraine 80–92, 93, 95–7 Under Western Eyes 47 United States 3, 7, 12, 15, 68,84, 96, 208 Urbánek, R. 101, 120–1 Utopia 5, 19, 45, 52, 54, 56, 60, 62, 66, 67, 204–5, 207, 215–16 Vaculík, L. 113, 121 9iONDýHFKĤV1ČPFL 108, 121 Van Gennep, A. 37 Vernant, J.P. 33, 35–6, 39, 40, 43 Veyne, P. 10, 13, 24 Vico, G. 50 Vidushaka 30 Vie de Mazeppa 89, 96 Voegelin, E. 6, 46, 51, 57, 59, 60, 76 Voinarovskii 85–6, 97 Voltaire 81, 83–4, 87, 97 Vozvrashchenie 155, 157–8, 161 9\VNRþLO40 Wachtel, A.B. 163, 165 Weber, M. 46, 49, 51–2, 57–9, 61, 76 Welsford, E. 30, 144 West Germany 7, 69, 112 Westernisers, Westernisation 84, 123, 136, 205, 213, 216

Index White, H. 12, 170–1, 185 Wilson, E. 162, 165 Wolff, L. 16, 24, 123–7, 129, 131, 134, 138, 140 Wöll, A. 17, 141 Wydra, H. 1, 4, 21, 27, 60, 194 Yeltsin, B. 188, 209–10, 214 Yugoslavia 72

225

Zaleski, B. 85 =iSLV$OH[DQGUD9HOLNpKRVORYHQVNpPX MD]\NXDþHVNpPXQDEXG~FLHþDV\ 99 Zaporogian Sich 82–4, 88, 90, 92 Zenkovsky, S. 136 Zeus 36, 39 äLåHN6± Zviagintsev, A. 155, 157–8, 161, 163 Ziuganov, G. 208–9, 218