естетическите

The famous Ukrainian magazine "Vse Svіt" in its first issue of this year published an article about the great merits of Academician Todor Pavlov in the field of Marxist-Leninist aesthetics. The article emphasizes that the name of the Bulgarian scientist is well known to the Ukrainian reader, who has more than once encountered his philosophical and literary-aesthetic articles in Russian. The article was written on the occasion of the commendable initiative of the State Publishing House for Fiction in Kiev, which for the first time publishes a separate voluminous collection of literary-critical and aesthetic studies in Ukrainian under the general title "Питання теориї та историї літерутури" (Problems of Literary Theory and History).

The need for a thorough study of the nature and interrelations of aesthetic categories has long been apparent. Dr. Yuri Borev, in the second, expanded and revised edition of his book, has made an interesting attempt at their systematic study. His claim is well-founded that the consideration of aesthetic categories has so far remained at a low theoretical level, without a historical approach and especially without studying the connections between them. His efforts are aimed at overcoming these shortcomings and where he has succeeded, his work has a contributing character. The introductory part is an attempt at a historical study of the development of aesthetic categories. The author sought to comply with the dialectics of the logical and the historical. He has created a certain logical system of categories, from which he also proceeds in their theoretical study, “The categories of Marxist-Leninist aesthetics, as well as the categories of Marxist dialectics, are pivotal points in the history of human thought.

The Bulgarian communist Dimitar Gachev, who inherited the theoretical principle and irreconcilability of Blagoev, fully formed himself as an art critic and historian of aesthetics in the USSR. The period from 1930 to 1937 was particularly active for his development. After that, the cult of personality not only slowed down, but also tragically interrupted his creative activity. Gachev felt on his shoulders the impact of forces, essentially alien and hostile to socialism, which inflicted so many defeats not only in the political and economic, but also in the intellectual life of our society. But he remained faithful to communism, to the great Soviet homeland, until his last breath, he went away with the dream of building communism in Bulgaria. The 20th Congress of the USSR and the April Plenum in our country returned, among many others, the cultural values ​​that Gachev created to the treasury of socialist culture.

And so far we have no book on Tolstoy's aesthetic views. It is a pity. Such a book would help us not only to comprehend the artistic consequences and theoretical positions of the brilliant writer, but also to penetrate more deeply into some essential and complex problems of our contemporary art. However, this topic has long attracted the attention of our science. In the works of V. Asmus, B. Bursov, S. Bychkov, K. Lomunov, L. Opulska, V. Malinkovsky and other researchers, many essential aspects of Tolstoy's aesthetic system have been revealed. But it is so broad and contradictory that from time to time it is necessary to re-check or specify some of its boundaries in order to present the general picture as reliably as possible. Only in this case can one clearly understand what of Tolstoy's aesthetic heritage belongs to the past and what continues to live actively now. The aesthetic views of the great artist are always interesting - interesting because we involuntarily connect these views with his living creative practice and in this way we can visually verify their vitality and depth. Therefore, we should far from consider Tolstoy's aesthetics only as "the self-knowledge of a brilliant artist." Such a view, which sometimes exists in our country, narrows and impoverishes its meaning. Tolstoy's aesthetic views summarize not only his own work, but also the artistic experience of Russian and world literature.

During its turbulent and long life, which temporarily faded away during the wars and ended in the tragic year of 1923, the magazine "Novo Vreme" by Dimitar Blagoev invariably devoted a large space to the problems of art and especially fiction. Blagoev was deeply convinced that fiction is one of the best means for society's self-knowledge, that the influence it can exert on life is enormous. This conviction inspired him to tirelessly care for illuminating in "Novo Vreme" the problems of art and literature from a "socialist point of view", to lead a consistent struggle for realistic and progressive fiction.