Tyrants Writing Poetry
Tyrants Writing Poetry
Contributor(s): Albrecht Koschorke (Editor), Konstantin Kaminskij (Editor)
Subject(s): History, Poetry, Political Sciences, Sociology of Culture, Sociology of Politics
Published by: Central European University Press
Keywords: Politics and literature; Dictators in literature; Sovereignty in literature;
Summary/Abstract: As conventional understanding would have it, the sometimes brutal business of governing can only be carried out at the price of distance from art, while poetic beauty best flourishes at a distance from actions executed at the pole of power. Dramatically contradicting this idea is the fact that violent rulers are often the greatest friends of art, and indeed draw attention to themselves as artists.Why do tyrants of all people often have a particularly poetic vein? Where do terror and fiction meet? The cultural history of totalitarian regimes is unwrapped in ten case studies, in a comparative perspective. The book focuses on the phenomenon that many of the great despots in history were themselves writers. By studying the artistic ambitions of Nero, Mussolini, Stalin, Hitler, Mao Zedong, Kim Il-sung, Gaddafi, Saddam Hussein, Saparmurat Nyyazow and Radovan Karadzic, the studies explore the complicated relationship between poetry and political violence, and open our eyes for the aesthetic dimensions of total power.The essays make an important contribution to a number of fields: the study of totalitarian regimes, cultural studies, biographies of 20th century leaders. They underscore the frequent correlation between tyrannical governance and an excessive passion for language, and prove that the merging of artistic and political charisma tends to justify the claim to absolute power.
- E-ISBN-13: 978-963-386-203-2
- Print-ISBN-13: 978-963-386-202-5
- Page Count: 286
- Publication Year: 2017
- Language: English
The Tyrant with His Back to the Wall
The Tyrant with His Back to the Wall
(The Tyrant with His Back to the Wall)
- Author(s):Ulrich Gotter
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Politics / Political Sciences, Social Sciences, Literary Texts
- Page Range:1-35
- No. of Pages:35
- Keywords:Nero;poetry;
- Summary/Abstract:Why Nero, actually? Truly, he has already had an unprecedented reception as a prototypical tyrant of the ancient world. Today if one were asked to name any three villains of antiquity, Nero would most certainly be one of them. Under such conditions, it is also consistent to include him as the only “classical” example among the poet-despots of modern times, as a sort of paradigmatic opener. On second look, however, his privileged association with the grand poet-criminals of the twentieth century is more of a cliché, with only a narrow foundation in reality.
- Price: 6.65 €
Poetry and Tyranny
Poetry and Tyranny
(Poetry and Tyranny)
- Author(s):Richard James Boon Bosworth
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Politics / Political Sciences, Literary Texts, Sociology
- Page Range:36-59
- No. of Pages:24
- Keywords:Mussolini;Poetry
- Summary/Abstract:Where words were concerned, Benito Mussolini, fascist Duce lording over Italy from 1922 to July 1943 (and then, restored by his Nazi allies in the troubled role of “puppet dictator” from September 1943 until his death on 28 April 1945), was a fertile creator. His “complete” works have been assembled in forty-four volumes,2 and, despite their length, they exclude much more material. Probably the most lasting image of this Italian dictator is of him orating, his body, face, and hands in constant if jerky movement with the passion of his phrase making, words bellowed from a balcony or some other elevated spot to the crowd below. The audience was a necessary part of this mise-en-scene. The dictator resounds into the present as the conductor of a modern political antiphony, needing and receiving response from a star-struck crowd, chanting “Duce, Duce, Duce,” “Eia, Eia, Eia, alala,” “A Noi,” and the other simple slogans of the regime. The crowd’s place was loyally to fill any pauses in the oration. When, finally, there was silence, regime propagandists claimed (to approval from some contemporary historians) that this staged charisma had fused leader and people into a mystical union. The enactment of the Duce, as it were, had provided a modern political version of sexual orgasm or religious transubstantiation. Here was the full expression of totalitarian rule over the human spirit.
- Price: 4.56 €
Stalin’s Writing
Stalin’s Writing
(Stalin’s Writing)
- Author(s):Eugeniy Dobrenko
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Politics / Political Sciences, Literary Texts, Sociology
- Page Range:60-129
- No. of Pages:70
- Keywords:Stalin;Poetry
- Summary/Abstract:In so far as biographers are willing to bring up Stalin’s humble beginnings as a poet it is usually for the purpose of demonstrating that even in his early years the future dictator was characterized by romanticism and passion for almost Nietzschean fantasies.
- Price: 13.30 €
Ideology in Execution
Ideology in Execution
(Ideology in Execution)
- Author(s):Albrecht Koschorke
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Politics / Political Sciences, Literary Texts, Sociology
- Page Range:130-155
- No. of Pages:26
- Keywords:Hitler;Mein Kampf;
- Summary/Abstract:The first dictatorial book of the twentieth century is Adolf Hitler’s programmatic text Mein Kampf. Unlike later representatives of the same genre, this book has had an impact far outlasting the regime it helped found. It continues to have a remarkably divided reception.
- Price: 4.94 €
Dead Father’s Living Body
Dead Father’s Living Body
(Dead Father’s Living Body)
- Author(s):Suk-Young Kim
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Politics / Political Sciences, Literary Texts, Sociology
- Page Range:156-166
- No. of Pages:11
- Keywords:Kim Il-sung; Poetry
- Summary/Abstract:Kim Il-sung (1912–1994), the founding father of North Korea, lies motionlessly in his crystal coffin in Geumsusan Memorial Palace, a solemn mausoleum made of white marble centrally located in Pyongyang. The expressionless look on his embalmed face captures a sense of immovable eternity, enshrined in the living memory of his children—his biological son Kim Jong-il and countless adopted children, namely the people of North Korea.
- Price: 4.50 €
Mao Zedong’s Poetry
Mao Zedong’s Poetry
(Mao Zedong’s Poetry)
- Author(s):Karl-Heinz Pohl
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Politics / Political Sciences, Philosophy, Literary Texts, Sociology
- Page Range:169-187
- No. of Pages:20
- Keywords:Mao Zedong;Poetry
- Summary/Abstract:Since Stuart Schram and Joachim Schickel’s studies of Mao Zedong’s poetry,many share the view that Mao’s poems are the best—indeed, the most vivid and lively—evidence of his ability to combine tradition and modernity, Chinese and Western tradition. In short, they demonstrate his ability to “Sinicize Marxism.”
- Price: 4.50 €
A Poor Despot Descends to Hell
A Poor Despot Descends to Hell
(A Poor Despot Descends to Hell)
- Author(s):Heiner Lohmann
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Politics / Political Sciences, History, Literary Texts, Sociology
- Page Range:188-217
- No. of Pages:30
- Keywords:Muammar al-Gaddafi;Writings
- Summary/Abstract:If we follow the lyrical alter ego who intones the above sentences penned for him by the real despot Muammar al-Gaddafi, then despots are a political species, defenseless, persecuted, and threatened in their existence.What is more, in the story “Escape to Hell” which begins with the passage just quoted, it is never once mentioned what is so “shameful” about the tyranny of an individual. Tyrants are not tyrants at all there: they are innocent,and they do not oppress others; they are the oppressed ones.
- Price: 5.70 €
The Principle of Single-Handed Tyranny
The Principle of Single-Handed Tyranny
(The Principle of Single-Handed Tyranny)
- Author(s):Burkhard Müller
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Politics / Political Sciences, Literary Texts, Sociology
- Page Range:219-231
- No. of Pages:13
- Keywords:Saddam Hussein;literary works
- Summary/Abstract:Huddled around a table, the three of us struggle to translate the short text into German. It’s not just that I don’t understand it, or that I am unable to read the Arabic script—I can’t even recognize the individual letters.“Penned by Saddam Hussein in his prison and given to his lawyer for publication.Here it comes.…” We are ready to begin.
- Price: 4.50 €
Saparmyrat Niyazov’s Ruhnama
Saparmyrat Niyazov’s Ruhnama
(Saparmyrat Niyazov’s Ruhnama)
- Author(s):Riccardo Nicolosi
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Politics / Political Sciences, Literary Texts, Sociology
- Page Range:232-249
- No. of Pages:18
- Keywords:Saparmyrat Niyazov; Poetry
- Summary/Abstract:An unusual monument can be found in the Turkmen capital of Ashgabat.In a vast park that celebrates the post-Soviet independence of the country,in the middle of a broad fountain, there stands a monumental ten-meterhigh copy of a book. The cover consists of its title, Ruhnama, as well as the name and likeness of the author, Saparmyrat Türkmenbaşi, in gold relief.Ruhnama (literally, “The Book of the Spirit”) is the main work of the first president of Turkmenistan, Saparmyrat Niyazov (1940–2006), who had himself given the title “Türkmenbaşi” (head of the Turkmen) by the Turkmen People’s Council (Halk Maslahaty) in 1993. The most peculiar thing about this monumental book is the fact that it can be “flipped open” mechanically:When thus opened, a multimedia spectacle begins in which the portrait of Türkmenbaşi’s, manuscript pages of the book and propagandistic films on the “glories” of Turkmen history are projected on the inside of the monument, accompanied by the strains of Turkmen music. The scenes displayed are based on passages in the Ruhnama; the solemn reading is transmitted through loudspeakers for everyone in the park to hear.
- Price: 4.50 €
“Nothing Is Forbidden in My Faith”
“Nothing Is Forbidden in My Faith”
(“Nothing Is Forbidden in My Faith”)
- Author(s):Slavoj Žižek
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Politics / Political Sciences, Literary Texts, Sociology
- Page Range:250-260
- No. of Pages:11
- Keywords:Radovan Karadžić;poetry;
- Summary/Abstract:When Radovan Karadžić, the leader of the Bosnian Serbs accused of organizing ethnic cleansing, was arrested, it was discovered that in his last years as a fugitive, he was “hiding in plain sight” as a spiritual healer, taking part in forums and lectures that gathered up to several hundred people, and writing as contributor for the Zdrav Život (Healthy life) magazine. Can we then also say that “Radovan Karadžić is Dragan Dabić”? The latter is not merely a mask of the former, but his “inner truth.” In other words, the relationship between the two is that of a genuine parallax.
- Price: 4.50 €
Contributors
Contributors
(Contributors)
- Author(s):Konstantin Kaminskij, Albrecht Koschorke
- Language:English
- Subject(s):Essay|Book Review |Scientific Life
- Page Range:261-264
- No. of Pages:4
- Summary/Abstract:List of contributors to Tyrants Writing Poetry
- Price: 4.50 €
