Идеологът Раковски и неговият експеримент "Хиндистан"
The Ideologist Rakovski and His "Hindustan" Experiment

Summary/Abstract: The current essay introduces representative points of view towards the relation between The European and The Bulgarian during the period 1762-1865. The first part of the paper is focused on the work done by Paisiy, Sofroniy, N. Bozveli, and V. Aprilov; the second part presents Rakovski’s attempt to rewrite the established concept of cultural metropolis and cultural “colonies”. The effort of Paisiy’s works is to contradict Bulgarians to the other peoples, emphasizing the Bulgarian merits. During the first decades of the 19th century (Sofroniy, N. Bozveli, etc.) the real construction of the Bulgarian stereotype of Europe begins, the latter being perceived as attractive, but frustrating social and cultural model. V. Aprilov introduces a new point of view, which spares the Bulgarian self-confidence by limiting the competition within the framework of the Slavonic Orthodox community. He also rearranges the civilizing paradigm and puts the Bulgarian in the “classical” Slavonic beginning. Furthermore, Rakovski, trained at the Greek Enlightenment tradition, copies its matrix of formation of a national identity. On the other hand, using the achievements of the contemporary humanitarian science, he strives to prove that the beginning of the Hellenic Antiquity and that of the (Indo-) European civilization may be searched in the Aryan heritage, whose most authentic successors are the modern Bulgarians. That turns Hellas, as well as Europe, into Bulgarian cultural “colonies”.

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