Three undiscovered utopias in German-language literature from the Czech periphery: Moravian Wallachia and Zlín

This study examines three literary utopias from the margins of German literature, namely German-language literature from Eastern Moravia. The works chosen for analysis are the dramatic cycle The City of People (Die Stadt der Menschen) by Moravian-born Austrian writer and visionary Susanne Schmida (1894–1981), the novel The Imperial City (Die Kaiserstadt) by the Austrian writer and diplomat Paul Zifferer (1879–1929), and the text “The City of the Future” (“Die Stadt des Kommenden”) by the German-speaking Czechoslovak author Walter Seidl. In all the texts examined, the model of urban landscape is used as the location of utopia: the prototype of an abstract futuristic city (Schmida), Vienna as an exemplar of political utopia (Zifferer), and Zlín as a fully realized social utopia (Seidl). These three sites show a complementary gradation in the sense of the (potential) realization of utopian ideas, i.e. the belief that, put simply, “it was once good” (Zifferer), “it is good” (Seidl), and “it will be good” (Schmida).

Adaptation of social utopia in post-modern society

As a result, the authors make a conclusion that the classical utopia crisis has been overcome and there is a trend for further development of utopian discourse due to adaptive transformation of utopian invariants in the society after modernism.

“TANGYRA” OF MIKHAIL ATAMANOV AND “YUGORNO” OF ANATOLIY SPIRIDONOV: COMPARATIVE AND TYPOLOGICAL ASPECT

The article examines the artistic and aesthetic parallels in the Mari epic “Yugorno” and the Udmurt “Tangyra” - the heroic legends of the peoples of the Finno-Ugric world. The idea is that the poetic commonality between them is a consequence of folklore and cultural typology and historical connection. The similarity of motives and plots is manifested in the pantheon, in views on the world order, in the nature of the relationship between gods and people, in the types of characters. By their poetic nature “Tangyra” and “Yugorno” occupy a place among the classical European epics, with which they are brought together by themes, socio-cultural status of heroes (cultural and social demiurges), views on the ancestors, descriptions of clashes between princes as representatives of the highest level and relations with neighboring peoples, philosophical views of the Udmurts and Mari on the past, present and future. It is about the main differences between the epics “Yugorno” and “Tangyra”, which lie in the peculiarities of plots and composition, poetics and aesthetics of works, their ethnic philosophy and social utopia.

El Derecho en la Utopía: Una interpretación moderada del ideal social de Tomás Moro

Utopía y Derecho son conceptualmente compatibles. Para mostrarlo se hace un estudio del lugar que ocupa el Derecho en el autor utópico por antonomasia: Tomás Moro. Se abordan tres aspectos clave de su obra: Primero, se describe el lugar de Utopía en el marco de su vida y pensamiento, resaltando sus tensiones. Segundo, se analiza el libro I de Utopía en el cual se detallan algunos lineamientos de una teoría de la justicia y del rol de los intelectuales en su defensa. Tercero, se analizan las instituciones jurídicas y políticas del libro II destacando sus limitaciones. En conclusión, se defiende una interpretación moderada de Utopía en la cual Moro emplea su obra como una crítica social. Utopía es interpretada como un experimento mental destinado a ejercer la crítica del presente, en el cual el Derecho juega un rol insoslayable.

“MASTORAVA” AND “DORVYZHY”: POETIC PARALLELS

The article discusses the artistic and aesthetic parallels in the Erzya epic “ Mastorava ” and the Udmurt epos “ Dorvyzhy ”, which are heroic epics of the peoples of the Finno-Balto-Ugric world. The idea is being made that the poetic community between them is a consequence of the folk-cultural typology, although historical ties are also not excluded. The similarity of motives and plots is manifested in the pantheon, in views on the world order, in the nature of the relationship between gods and people, types of characters. It is stated that by the poetic nature Dorvyzhy takes a place among the classic European epics, he is related to them by themes, the socio-cultural status of the heroes (cultural and social demiurges), views on the first ancestors (giant people and people of a modern type), a description of the military clashes between princes as representatives of the highest level of Udmurt statehood and relations with neighboring peoples, the philosophical views of the Udmurt people on the past, present and future. We are talking about the main differences between “ Mastoravoi ” and “ Dorvyzhy ”: they consist in the features of the plots and composition, poetics and aesthetics of works, their ethnic philosophy and social utopia. “ Mastorava ” is optimistic about the future; in “ Dorvyzhy ”, the views on tomorrow are contradictory.

Between Social Utopia and Totalitarian Reality: “Children of Milky Way” by Dokiia Humenna

The paper considers the novel “Children of Milky Way” by Dokiia Humenna in the context of the postwar Ukrainian diaspora’s literary process. The focus is on the issues of relations between fiction and documentary writing, the individual and collective experiences. The literary Kyiv, being one of the central images in Dokiia Humenna’s novel, appears not only as a page from individual or national histories, a sample of the Kyiv text in the Ukrainian diaspora’s prose, but also as a generalization based on such texts and made due to various forms of intertextuality, which absorb the history and atmosphere of the Kyiv 1920s. The problem of interrelations between the writer and government, art, politic, and ideology is one of the most essential in the novel: Dokia Humenna reveals various aspects of the writer’s life and work in conditions of the totalitarian state and culture – from suicide to madness, from resistance to adaptation and collaboration. A future person and society in “Children of Milky Way” are represented in a commune. The histories of the two characters-antipodes Taras Saragola and Seraphym Carmalita are connected to its progress and decline; in the world of totalitarian repressions and control they choose different life strategies and roles. The memory about Soviet terror and repressions, as well as the Holodomor-genocide, “killing the Ukrainian peasantry as a foundation of the nation and destructing intellectuals as a brain of the nation” is important in the novel. The history of collectivization is related to the traumatic memory of the serfdom times, which affects the second and third generations and deepens the trauma caused by disintegration of a family, destruction of the patriarchal peasant world. This process was accompanied by desacralization of the Father’s figure as a personification of power, by infantilization of masculinity. The writer associates totalitarian reality with the metaphor of Night, which acquires different ambiguous meanings in the Ukrainian anti-totalitarian discourse.