Препрочитане на текстове от 1956: критически полета срещу сталинизма
Rereading 1956 Texts: Critical Areas against Stalinism

Summary/Abstract: In terms of meaning and events, 1956 was among the most significant years after the fall of the Iron Curtain. At the Union of Bulgarian Composers that year began as a time of protest letters, of an initial expression of resistance against the ideological canon. An overview of the musicology of March 1956 unleashes unexpectedly severe criticisms of the Zhdanov Decree against musical formalism of 1948 by both renowned historians, humanitarians, musicologists and classical composers in an attempt to put an end to the Stalinist regime. It was the first recorded effort ever made by Bulgarian musicians to denounce the Decree of 1948 as seen from the shorthand reports of the Review of Musicology and Criticism. The year 1956 saw the most stringent control over twelve-tone music and the works of Konstantin Iliev and Lazar Nikolov, who established a ‘creative under-ground’ by withdrawing their participations in the 1956 Third Review of Musical Oeuvre held in December, which occurred in the wake of the Plenary Meeting of the Bulgarian Communist Party in April 1956. The Review attempted to promote a young generation of composers such as Tsvetan Tsvetanov, Dimiter Christoff, Zdravko Manolov, who were in quest of a contemporary language outside the twelvetone system (except for Vassil Kazandzhiev). One of the goals of the official discussion held after the Review was to reaffirm the Decree of 1948 in setting new limits to socialist innovation. Konstantin Iliev’s article Ignorance or Malevolence of 1957 rekindled but did not finalise the 1956 discussions, making yet another attempt to ideologically criticise the dogmatic cannon. The plethora of 1956 texts is multidirectional. They evince, first and foremost, an act of rebellion against dogmatism, illiteracy, gross simplification, and ultimately, represent an attempt to break down the ideological canon.

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