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To get some idea of ​​the "murky whirlpool of problems" in which the aesthetes of the United States and Canada have found themselves today, it would be enough to leaf through the latest issues of the representative American quarterly "The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism." It is the organ of the American Society of Aesthetics. Its editor is the director of the Cleveland Museum of Art, Professor Thomas Munro, the universally recognized leader of contemporary American aesthetes. In the March issue, in an article entitled "A Criterion for Art Criticism in Contemporary Art," Lester D. Longman says: "It is not clear what we value most in art today. . . Since we fear that any clearly defined Criterion in art would seem dogmatic, we prefer anarchy in critical thinking."

Humanity is facing new great prospects, illuminated by the decisions of the 22nd Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. The Congress demonstrated the living embodiment of the creative thought of Marxism-Leninism in guiding ideas. Since its adoption of a program for economic construction, for the development of social relations and culture, we feel how today's socialist society is gradually approaching communism. With its decisions, the Congress raised to a great height precisely that active work of thought that transforms theory into practice, and practice into theory. With the program for the construction of the communist society long dreamed of and suffered by mankind, the grandiose vision is connected in a single whole with the creative daily work, with the organizational work that is currently necessary. The program expands and enriches our concrete ideas about the shape of future society. It points to the enormous progress that will be made in the field of economics and social relations. It continued the scientific development of the questions of socialist democracy, of the role and significance of Marxist-Leninist ideology, of the political, moral, and aesthetic re-education of the people. One of the important tasks of the congress was practical measures for the final elimination of the harmful consequences of the cult of Stalin's personality. It is impossible to move forward, to new conquests, without eliminating everything that was layered during the cult of Stalin's personality and which prevented the creation of normal conditions for the creative activity of the masses and the individual, for the development of the forces and capabilities of the collective in the construction of communist society.

The "Selected Novels" library at the "Narodna Kultura" publishing house is entering its fifth anniversary. This period is quite sufficient to assess its achievements and weaknesses to date, to point out some shortcomings in the selection of contemporary novels. It is hardly necessary to emphasize how useful an undertaking it has proved to be. The best evidence of this is the great interest of readers in it. It could have been born and realized in the new and serene atmosphere after the 20th Congress of the CPSU, after which the cult barriers and stifling dogmas collapsed, in an environment of an objective view of the artistic values ​​of world literature. Through it, our reader is connected to everything good in literature, created by various peoples around the world.

The long-standing exceptional interest shown in our country in Soviet literary studies is beyond doubt. For the representatives of Marxism in the previous few decades it has been so obvious that it would be possible to point out to Dali at least one question of a methodological nature that concerned them and which had not previously been discussed in Soviet literary life. This is so easily explained that it is enough to simply recall it.

Gorky is already a classic of world literature. The strict augurs of literary history are careful not to immortalize him, but they have already assigned him a place alongside Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Chekhov... It is not a question of who is greater or lesser. Here, among the mighty shadows of the past, the role in the spiritual development of humanity, the place in the literary process, is important. Gorky is a classic. In this dearly won title is both the recognition and the love of generations for the great writer-humanist. But there is also something unusual in it. This is still a "posthumous award", and for us Gorky is so alive, so relevant.

Dr. Todor Zhivkov's new speech "Carry and raise our pure, holy and victorious banner even higher!", delivered on March 14, 1969 before the sixteenth reporting and election conference of the capital's organization of the DCMS, as well as all his speeches and reports, found a lively response among our entire public. It was perceived as a very timely party document, a logical continuation of the "theses" for creative work among the youth, as a vivid manifestation of exceptional care and complete trust in the youth of the homeland and in the artistic intelligentsia, which was particularly moved by the fact that the main part of the speech was devoted to current problems related to the current state of the ideological front. This remarkable speech once again emphasizes the need to raise the role of social sciences and ideological disciplines, which are gaining in importance today, when a fierce battle is being waged between communist and bourgeois ideology to win the minds and hearts of people all over the world. That is why the party's call to young communists to take up the proud banner of Dimitar Blagoev and Georgi Dimitrov in their own hands, to raise it even higher and to carry it pure, holy, victoriously - through all trials and difficulties is so categorical.

Habit nullifies surprise. However, there are comparisons that never cease to surprise us even when we should already be used to them. On the eve of the 25th anniversary of the September 9th People's Uprising, these comparisons are inevitable. After all, the meaning of every anniversary is to tear us away from the myopia of everyday worries - to raise us to a height from which the path we have traveled is embraced with a glance: to provoke us to reflect on near and distant prospects. And then repeatedly repeated statements begin to amaze us with their truthfulness. Things that we are used to surprise us again - by the way, also with the fact that they have become commonplace for us so quickly.