Zhelyu Avdzhiev

Populist ideas penetrated Bulgarian literature in the late 1980s and mainly in the 1990s. Under the influence of the populist ideology, adopted by Russian public figures and populist writers, some writers created works that make up our populist literature. This literature is limited in scope and not particularly rich in the variety of genres, ideas and images. There are not always strictly defined "pure" populist frameworks. And with the gradual experience of populist ideas in the first decade of the new century, it ceases to be a topical issue in our literary reality. Therefore, the term "populist literature" should be accepted and understood quite conditionally and with reservations. The important thing is that the works of populist writers excited contemporaries. Created in that era when the overall national appearance of our post-liberation realistic literature was taking shape, they diversified its ideological and aesthetic wealth, contributing to the strengthening of democracy and humanism within it.

Vlaykov belongs to those creators of our native literature who did not dazzle contemporaries with the relevance of the ideas or the monumentality of the images in their works. And readers did not discover new worlds in Vlaykov's works, they could not feel in them the "heroism" of the era. Slowly and silently, the writer presented to his contemporaries - and with somewhat outdated even for the time fiction techniques - joyful and more often sad pictures of everyday life, of relations in the patriarchal family. The ideological-emotional, aesthetic impact came not from the exceptional events and characters, but from the truthfulness, warmth and immediacy of the image. For literary historians and critics today it is not difficult to prove that the creative experience of the fiction writer Vlaykov is a lived and overcome stage. Indeed, the author's ideas and hopes, which found embodiment in his artistic works, have long lost their meaning. The softness and naivety of the writer's narrative tone is far from the dynamism and drama of both our time and the complex psyche of the contemporary, etc. Despite the convincingness of scientific-critical arguments, one cannot help but admit that we, today's readers, continue to be respected in Vlaykov's novels and stories, to be moved by the fate of the uncles and aunts dear to the author's heart, by the tragedy of the peasants and small owners crushed by the chorbadjis and by the new economic relations. And when he speaks of the past, the writer also extends his hand to us along the bright and tender threads of memories, in order to direct us to the charm of childhood years and experiences... It is true that in Vlaykov we will not find the expressiveness and dynamism of today's authors. But his works have not completely lost their charm on us, because in them the fullness of the former patriarchal way of life flows. And most importantly - the unadulterated truth of the life phenomena in his works is deeply morally meaningful and emotionally saturated. In his works, we, the contemporaries, also find such moral traits and national virtues, which are the basis of our national psychology. Therefore, Vlaiko's creative work still has many living elements. The writer is not one of the "companions", but one of the leaders of our Artistic Prose.

It is known that Strashimirov traveled constantly throughout Bulgaria and got to know all corners of the country. Since his childhood and adolescence, he wandered around Northeastern Bulgaria. Later, as a tireless storyteller and political orator or as a simple observer and researcher of folk life and nature, he did not leave a single corner of his homeland where his foot had not set foot. During these trips, the writer was always among the people, studying their lives, delving deeply into their fate, and drawing material for his artistic works. And in most cases, he documents his diverse impressions in the most direct travel notes. Strashimirov describes with extraordinary vividness and fiction that which his eye has noticed in nature or in public life. He shares his thoughts on the most current political and literary problems in the most direct and sincere way, and often quite boldly. With the civic-patriotic pathos and fervor of his travel notes, Strashimirov appears to be the closest continuation of the work of such major representatives of travel writing in our country as Ivan Vazov and Aleko Konstantinov. Strashimirov's travel notes are very interesting and valuable pages in his very figurative literary work, which, however, due to the fact that they have not been republished, remain almost unknown to the wide circle of readers to this day.

"PROLETARIAN REVOLUTIONARY SOLIDARITY IS NOT AN EMPTY WORD!" The September Uprising in Bulgaria of 1923 was the first anti-fascist uprising, the first assault of the working masses to block the barbaric march of fascism that was coming after the First World War. With the blood of the Bulgarian workers and peasants, who colored the waters of the Ogosta and Maritsa rivers more than forty years ago, the opening pages of the magnificent anti-fascist struggle of the European peoples, which lasted more than two decades, were written. The heroic and bloody battle of our working people with the fascist gangs of Tsankov was a signal, a warning and a lesson for the workers and peasants in other countries. After the uprising, the working masses strengthened their revolutionary readiness and determination to resist and attack the fascist plague, which was stretching its sinister hand over Europe. As is known, the heroic uprising of the popular masses, however, failed. For a number of reasons, it suffered defeat and was suppressed in the most cruel and barbaric way. But this was a defeat that prepared the people's victory on September 9, 1944, when the prophetic words of the heroic singer of the uprising, Geo Milev, came true - September became May!

From the years when the first "songs", "sighs" and "trembles" appeared, which speak of the youthful intoxication of the twenty-year-old poet (1894-97), to the "last fires" of the creative fire of his restless lyre (1944), five whole decades passed. In this half-century rich and complex period of the development of our literature, Kiril Hristov was a very active creator.

This is the title of Georgi Tsanev's new book. Compared to "Writers and Problems" (ed. 1961 and 1965) or the latest editions of "Pages from the History of Bulgarian Literature", "Tradition and Innovation" is not as complete, not as representative of the literary work of our prominent literary critic and historian, who turns seventy this year. However, it contains works - first of all, the study "Tradition and Innovation in Bulgarian Literature", as well as the essays on Nikola Furnadzhiev and Asen Raztsvetnikov - which, with their theoretical summaries and the persuasiveness of literary analysis, and with the breadth of literary erudition and the pathos of Marxist critical thought, appear among the best that Georgi Tsanev has left in the last two decades, among the best in our literary history and criticism of that time. He never stood as a dispassionate observer at his literary post, but always perceived the new in Soviet and our literary studies, boldly corrected his own views on the basis of his excellent knowledge of Bulgarian literature. Therefore, he gave his own solution to a number of current literary issues.

Dimitar Dimitrov - a name that says almost nothing to the modern reader. One by one, those who, in their unfaded memories from more than six decades ago, could restore something of the image of this enthusiastic idealist - with the fragile physical figure of a restless workers' organizer, with the restless and temperamental pen of a talented publicist, with the searching thought of a promising socialist literary critic and scholar - are leaving. Dimitar Dimitrov is from the phalanx of the first socialist activists who, even in that early era, saw the need for a practical struggle for the liberation of the working class and participated directly in this struggle. And as writers, they are not contemplatives, but fighters who clear the way for socialist ideology and literature. For about 5-6 years of public and literary activity, he leaves an interesting and meaningful legacy that has its own definite place in our Marxist criticism since the end of the century. His social and literary work, his life, was very quickly put to an end by the "yellow guest", which suppressed so many young socialist forces.

Sixty years ago, on November 16, 1907, the very next day after his arrival, Konstantin Velichkov died in Grenoble. Not only the last days, but the entire life and writing destiny of this public figure and writer of ours is connected with French culture and literature, with France in general. Let us recall the more important facts, adding some less known data about his death, extracted from the French press. Velichkov's first and at the same time the deepest and most lasting impressions of French literature, and indirectly also of the freedom-loving French spirit, were from the time of his studies at the French Lyceum in Constantinople. When the authorities asked for a young man from Pazardzhik to study at state expense, the city government unanimously proposed and sent Velichkov - who had already shown himself to be a capable and diligent student. And in September 1868, he entered the Lyceum Imperial Ottoman. At the same time and later, the following people studied here: Stoyan Mihaylovski, Georgi N. Zlatarski (the later famous professor-geologist), Hr. Genadiev, An. Frangia (political figures) and others. Organized according to the French model and with French teachers and educators, the lyceum gave its graduates the opportunity not only to learn French excellently, but also to become acquainted with French literature, with the rich and instructive history of the struggles of the French people for freedom.

"September poetry" - this is how Georgi Bakalov first, and then Ivan Meshekov and others called the poems and stories of Nikola Furnadzhiev, Angel Karaliychev and Asen Raztsvetnikov, which appeared in "Nov Pat" as the first poetic echo of the majestic and terrible September days. Over time, literary critics began to add to the "September" artists Geo Milev and the other poets from "Plamak", Krum Kyulyavkov and the other collaborators of "Zvanar", Anton Strashimirov and the budding poets and writers from "Vedrina".... For more than four decades, September has been a constant and ageless theme in our poetry and prose, and September literature - as a new, aesthetically distinct moment in literary development - one of the important problems of literary history and criticism. The most vivid and characteristic, truly "September" stage is taken (it was this that contemporaries called "September") to be the period from 1923, immediately after the uprising until the April assassination attempt of 1925. However, starting from the specific historical moment itself, from the approximately equal illumination of the September theme, from the similar or identical aesthetic positions and artistic tasks of the September artists, one could add to this characteristic stage a year or two later - after the April assassination attempt until 1927 - with Strashimirov's activity in "Vedrina".

The first contacts between Bulgarians and French people are lost somewhere in the Middle Ages... After the Great French Revolution, which shook the minds of the whole world, more echoes can be found in our country (due to slavery, they are distant and indirect) of the struggles of the French people for freedom and social justice, of the ideological searches of French society. But the facts of the indirect and concrete acquaintance with French literature and the first contacts and visible influences on individual public and literary figures, mainly those who studied or lived in France, date from the middle of the 19th century. And these contacts and influences are very diverse, go through different stages, have their own interesting history. In the present notes, we focus on those of our writers from the period after the Liberation of Bulgaria from Turkish slavery until the First World War, who studied in French schools, lived in France and began their creative path in a French environment with direct acquaintance and influence of French culture and literature. And one more thing that interests us above all is the concrete facts of this acquaintance: the respective city and university, the student environment and first meetings with foreign writers, the collaboration in the French press, etc., necessary both for enriching the civil biography of the writers, and, of course, for a more complete clarification of their first literary steps and their creative image in general. The impressions are the result mainly of visiting the places where the Bulgarian writers lived and studied, of those few traces that the past decades have spared... The following could be noted in advance: both with the most direct impact of the French social and cultural environment, and with the strongest influence of the diverse French literature on our writers, they do not lose their own national and individual appearance as creators. Even when, especially in the years immediately before the First World War, in the verses of our poets, carried away by symbolism, tones sound or images appear that are very similar to those of their French teachers, they still manage to preserve their Bulgarian face.