Mehanizacija čovjeka i oduhovljenje stroja u talijanskome futurizmu i u ruskoj proleterskoj književnosti
The Mechanization of Man and the Animation of the Machine in Italian Futurism and Russian Proletarian Literature

Summary/Abstract: The idea of the convergence of man and machine is characteristic for the Italian futurism as well as for the Russian proletarian literature. The role of electricity and neoanimism which is relevant in both cases may be traced back to romantic vitalism. On the one hand Marinetti ascribes animation and emotion to inanimate matter and, on the other, he calls for the reduction of human psychology. Similar features can be found in proletarian poetry in Russia. But whereas the futurist body-machine is distinguished by aggressive dynamics and the stimulation of vital energy, the metaphorical fusion of man and the machine in Russia emerges from the ideology of collectivism and “productionalism”. In proletarian poetry, the affinity of the worker and the machine is described in terms of friendship and family relations while for Marinetti it has an erotic bias.

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