THE SOVIET LITERARY PURGE
that "every theater should during every season perform at least two
or three plays of a good standard about modern Soviet themes"
(Pravda,
2.9.46)? What is to be done
if
such plays are not written–
cannot be written?
Nobody would seriously claim that a great artist must be a great
personality, of "good" character, etc. Goethe and many others would
not have come up to these standards. But there are certain minimum
requirements: he must have a minimum of character, a minimum
of artistic freedom and of possibilities for development. A great
many works of
art
were created by order ("social" or "direct") .
However, in England of the sixteenth century (Shakespeare), in Hol–
land of the seventeenth century (Rembrandt), in Austria of the eight–
eenth century (Haydn, Mozart) as well as in Weimar around 1800
(Goethe and Schiller), these minimum requirements were fulfilled.
In Russia, under the GPU dictatorship, this has not been the case.
One can easily foretell what will be the tasks of Soviet literature
in the five-year plans to come: articles and sketches on the "socialist
construction," popular poems, translations from Uzbek and Turk–
menian.
If
they wisl:;t to distinguish themselves, authors may write
historical novels (in the style of Sir Walter Scott or possibly Alexey
Tolstoy senior-in the best of cases), since it is less risky to write
about the past than about the present. It is the task of the five-year
plans to transform Russia into the greatest industrial power of the
world. Whether this is possible we do not know. Too many factors
are involved. However, the bureaucracy will undoubtedly achieve one
thing: it will make Soviet literature the poorest, dullest, and most
worthless in the world.
It
is approaching this goal today-another
one or two little purges-and it will be attained!
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