The satirical image of Aleko Konstantinov

Bulgarian history after the Liberation is dramatic and oppressive. The selfless patriotism of the Bulgarian National Revival was replaced by ruthless partisan struggles, which brought to the surface unscrupulous careerists and gangsters, dark characters like Vazov's Gorolomov and Alekov's Bai Ganyo. With bitter irony, Vazov called this period an era that nursed great people. In vain did his Kardashev seek romantic plots. Reality offered him only vulgarity, vulgar accounting, and crime. No matter how biased Irecek's assessments may be in places, in his diary he still faithfully captured the degeneration of political morals in the young principality, the rampant passions for power and material well-being. "People are ready with inner rage to throw stones at anyone, recklessly;..." "A person who does not lie and does not slander others, here is something extraordinary, a miracle of the world..."2 The young Czech scientist was shocked by the selfishness of the rulers with whom he was in constant contact. On the pages of his diary we repeatedly encounter such statements: "A person will become dull. .No longing, no idealism, no enthusiasm. I have fallen away. A desperate struggle against stupidity... A person becomes a misanthrope". Of course, in this miserable world there also live bright personalities, with Renaissance idealism, such as Petko Slaveykov, Vasil Drumev, Petko Karavelov, Vazov, Pencho Slaveykov, Aleko Konstantinov, Svetoslav Milarov, Olimpiy Panov, Trayko Kitanchev and others. They actively participate in political life, but its appearance is given by self-forgetful tyrants like Stambolov and Stoilov. The power is in their hands and with the most brutal means they neutralize their ideological enemies. Because of his love for Russia, boldly expressed in a church sermon, Metropolitan Kliment (Vasil Drumev), is threatened with a death sentence, which is commuted to 15 years in prison and eternal exile. Petko Karavelov spent years in the Black Mosque, Svetoslav Milarov, Atanas Uzunov, Olimpiy Panov, Alexander Karagyulev and others. They perish at the will of Stambolov, and later a villainous bullet from an ambush pierces Aleko's heart. Stambolov had found a brazen justification for the lawlessness and murders - that he was committing them out of inner conviction, and his successor Konstantin Stoilov called the violence of his district governors and gendarmes "exerting a moral influence on citizens". In the young principality there are no obstacles to the development of capitalism. But due to its lateness, due to the lack of democratic traditions, this development takes on the most ugly forms.