Atanas Dalchev

Atanas Dalchev introduced into Bulgarian poetry the philosophical problematic, the subject of which is the individual man and his relations with the whole rest of the world - human, earthly, universal, infinite. He created his own concept of the meaning, possibilities, goals and value of the individual human life. In the poetry of Atanas Dalchev, the abstract problems of the fate and existence of man have a very concrete, necessary life, because they are his natural interest, they are his inalienable fate and daily pain. In its entirety, Dalchev's poetry presents a psychological autobiography, a diary of the changing communication between man and the outside world, in other words, there is an element of the epic in it. This is the first and main feature. In Dalchev's poetry, only that spiritual content that is not irrevocably imposed finds a place, only that which necessarily lies at the foundations of mental life and subsequently becomes decisive for behavior, feelings, thoughts. It is one thing to know, another to understand, and quite another to feel the essence of things. An individual person reaches the essences not only through logical knowledge. Only the conditions of life, internal interests, and a peculiar combination of many factors simultaneously force or lead an individual person at certain moments of his life to what he knows, what others talk about, but which only at that moment with its essence becomes truly personal, appearing as a revelation, as a conviction - forever. These are the moments Dalchev reflects in his poetry. He knew about social injustice, from an early age he showed compassion for the poor, and yet he understood and felt social injustice with all its ugliness and cruelty only in Paris. This is prepared by the profound understanding of other fundamental truths and by the entire spiritual experience of the poet before he went to Paris. Dalchev's poetry is not a means of sharing, trusting, suggesting thoughts and feelings - it is a means of naming the most primordial. With such an approach, the poet could easily pay tribute to ambition, self-deception, or fantasy, because it is very difficult to separate within oneself only the manifestations of pure essence and avoid everything accidental and alien.