Kanon i književnost
Canon and Literature

Summary/Abstract: Displaying artistic values as a symbolic but not economic, therefore material, capital is first prerequisite to existence of literary canon. Its existence might not perpetuate, not form, without endorsing its status through institutions, magazines, literary critique, publishers, order of influential persons inside institutions like academies or universities, but originating and existence of canon doesn’t allow anyone of these instances, yet system of relationships between all the actors, which needs to be looked at as fighting for monopolization where the value of literary work, as well as belief in its undoubted existence, are always renewed. Although it sounds like a platitude, big discussion about canon can be traced only from the moment when the problem of existence of canon has started to be awakened, and with that problematized. In Croatian literature science big discussion about canon (Guillory 1993, Herrnstein Smith 1988, Bloom 1994) actually didn’t encounter bigger response. When there were staffs broken in English, German and French intellectual discussions around intensity, aspects and sort of influence on generally recognized canon lists, Croatian canons were being formed again. Croatian textbooks were enthroning literary authors again, disregarding sometimes traditional texts from ex Yugoslavia so they can be replaced by “pure” Croatian texts. From the old textbooks only two novels from Ivan Cankar were left, some texts from Ivo Andric, and none of the texts from other Bosnian-Hercegovian, Serbian or Macedonian authors. Textbooks were divided into texts which are Croatian and those which represent canon of the world literature. Discussion about canon was raising questions about ideological conditioning of the canon texts. Canon of Great artwork is quite certainly less conditioned by its quality and more by the politics of power (Foucault 1966). Problem of Croatian canon also raises question on relationships between small and great literatures, question of national identity and literary work, relationship of national literature towards related literatures and opens problem in the relationship of institutions and the literature.

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