Фракове и мундири, дипломация и война: литературни стереотипи
Tailcoats and Uniforms, Diplomacy and War: Literary Stereotypes

Summary/Abstract: The article traces the creation of literary stereotypes on diplomacy and war as a problem of cultural anthropology. “Each war represents a failure of diplomacy” (T. Benn) “The only real diplomacy ever performed by a diplomat is in deceiving their own people after their dumbness has got them into a war.” (W. Roggers) “Be polite; write diplomatically; even in a declaration of war one observes the rules of politeness.” (Otto von Bismarck) “Diplomacy is a disguised war, in which states seek to gain by barter and intrigue, by the cleverness of arts, the objectives which they would have to gain more clumsily by means of war.” (R. Bourne) These proverbs and a number of similar ones from the Enlightenment to the present day outline the discursive line of opposition and unity between diplomacy and war. The author (with special emphasis on the history of the Balkans) provides a short survey of stands about similarities and differences in their methods, goals, signs and professional representatives in their common perception in the literature, where both of these activities provoke often moral disagreements.

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