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p The fact that in recent years problems connected with realism have been constantly appearing on the agenda and attracting the attention of a wide range of social groups, scholars and art historians in many countries, is in itself evidence of the tremendous ideological importance which this, it would appear purely academic, problem has assumed. It gives rise to the most heated debate and argument. Behind the dispute of scholars and artists in literature and the press and at international symposia and conferences on the subject of whether realism has become outdated in the modern world, what are its limits and scope, the main cause of this disagreement is clearly discernible. Discussions about realism invariably include reflections on the destiny and purpose of art in our extremely complex and critical age.

p The leading artists of our day are inevitably faced with the following alternative: is art, which provides an historically concrete reflection of life, to serve the cause of self-knowledge and the transforming of human society, or is it to take flight from reality at this critical point in history and turn in on itself, thereby becoming a segregating and alienating force. On close examination these questions together with many others which are of direct relevance to defining the purpose of art in the life of present day society, appear like so many communicating vessels linked with the arguments concerning realism.

p The problem of realism is a complex one. It is made even more complex by the fact that today representatives of artistic trends which are essentially non-realist have somehow or other come to realise the importance and 300 Emacs-File-stamp: "/home/ysverdlov/leninist.biz/en/1969/POMA347/20070812/347.tx" attraction of realism and hoisted its banner themselves. As early as 1916 Kazimir Malevieh advanced a special sort of realism, "artistic form for its own sake".  [300•1  The supporters of surrealism and later also abstract expressionism believed that the only possible role for art was the expression of the subconscious world of the artist. Realism is also compromised by those artists who proclaim their mediocre, naturalistic works products of the realist method. The founders and theoreticians of the anti-novel also give a wrong in tcrpretation of realism. Kobbe Grillet maintains that realism in its classical form only "obscures the shape of things: they must exist independently of theory whatever form it may take".  [300•2  The Polish writer, Maria Dabrowska, considers that classical realism is concerned with "artistic order and arrangement" and is, therefore, very remote from an "accurate reproduction of reality”. The absurd, inconsequent behaviour of Beckett’s and lonesco’s characters is. in her opinion, "a more accurate picture of reality" and constitutes true realism.  [300•3 

p With the problem so obscured by divergent opinions, the only possible approach is to define the nature of realism, thereby removing all that is alien to it.

p Soviet aesthetics has made a close study of this question in recent years. Its most important conclusion is the recognition of realism as an historical phenomenon in the process of development, based on reality in the form of imagery and drawing its artistic, forms and ideals from life.  [300•4 

p In this connection there is one extremely important factor that must be emphasised: the absolute dependence of art upon life (like that of all other human activity) does not justify giving the name of realism to any work 301 of art which reflects life to some degree or another. In recognising the connection between art and life we are not asserting that all art to some extent gravitates towards realism. It is quite clear, on the contrary, that in addition to realism there exist other forms of art which are also historically conditioned.

p Even Aristotle in those ancient days before realism had developed as an artistic method, distinguished between various possible approaches to the portrayal of reality in art. He wrote that the artist "must . . . represent things . . . either as they were or are, or as they are said or thought to be or to have been, or as they ought to be".  [301•1  This statement distinguishes between I wo fundamental types of art: art which aims at reproducing life and art which aims at re-creating it.

p This basic distinction may be traced throughout the whole history of art.

p In the course of the Mariette excavations (last century) Arab peasants unearthed an ancient Egyptian wood- carving which had been buried in the ground for some five thousand years and were amazed to see a striking resemblance between it and their village elder. This carving of a kind elderly man stepping forward leaning on his stick was remarkably true to life. Next to this figure in the museum arc many stone and bronze carvings of pharaohs. also Egyptian but entirely different in character. Khai’re of the 4th dynasty is portrayed by an unknown sculptor not as a living person but as a god-like figure endowed with impassiveness and immortal strength. He represents the idea of power embodied in stone, a symbol of God’s deputy on earth.

p Art just as life cannot be confined to even the most perfect of systems. We frequently come across a combination of contradictory artistic aims in one and the same work. The Iliad, for example, contains descriptions of nature, everyday life and numerous battles which are entirely authentic. Side by side with "fleet footed”, " shining helmeted”, “all-conquering”, “storm-like” earthly heroes and the even more elevated inhabitants of the heavens we find the figure of Thersites "squinting and 302 crippled”, whose "completely hunched up shoulders" ’"met on his bosom" whilst his down-covered head ”rose up like a blade".  [302•1 

p These two tendencies, the “ideal” and the “real”, which were first formed i’ar back down the centuries can be clearly traced throughout the whole of human history with its never-ending change of epochs, artistic quests and achievements, sometimes diverging from one another and sometimes appearing in one and the same work.

p Medieval art gives a particularly vivid illustration of tinway the artist transforms the objects and phenomena of the real world in order to embody his design, and how he makes them serve religious ideas. This is true of the figures on the has relief "The Apocalyptic Vision" on one ot the tympana of the portals of St. Peter’s Abbey in Moussac which dates back to the beginning of the twelfth century. These very figures which greet you as you walk in, the excessively large Christ, the slightly smaller seraphim and evangelists, represented in the form of symbolical, winged creatures, and lastly the elders, minute by comparison, embody the church hierarchy in their proportions. But this is not all. The exaggerated foreshortening of the elders, the strikingly irregular folds of their clothing, the ethereal bodies of the seraphim and the elders and the calm figure of Christ, the only peaceful element in this chaos of move ment, all these serve to embody the idea of an omnipotent divinity and the inevitability of retribution for the sins of life on earth.

p Medieval theological aesthetics saw true beauty first and foremost in the soul which renounced the ’sinful vanity" of bodily beauty for its own ends. Even the purely formal characteristics of the carving and fashioning of the stone figures and ornaments on the facade of the church in the St. Peter’s Abbey at Moussac bear witness to this aesthetic theory which dates back to the works of St. Augustine in the first century B.C.

p Many works of medieval art lost direct touch with life through this tendency to express "celestial ideas" by changed forms.

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p The deliberate distortion of living forms for Ihe sake of a biased and false idea is not the only feature of nonrealist art. There are more complex manifestations. Modern existentialist art often makes use of finely authentic elements and causation of reality to advance philosophical concepts which distort reality.

p In cases such as these the external features of realist portrayal and expression, which give the illusion of being true to life whereas in fact they are simply a substitute for profound study, turn out to be a most convenient means of embodying and substantiating an artistic method which has nothing whatsoever in common with realism.

p Albert Camus’s novel L‘t’lruni/er is an excellent example of this.

p The aim of this short novel is to prove the absurdity and poinllessness of human existence. Man’s only way out of the impasse into which he has been driven by nature and society is for him to acknowledge the irreversible fatality of the absurdity of life. It is this absurdity which gives each of us the moral right to assert himself outside the agreed framework of good and evil.

p The strikingly vivid and finely drawn portrayal of nature and human feelings is used solely as a device for putting over the author’s philosophical and psychological views. An example of this is the totally plastic description of the tense atmosphere on the beach outside the town when Meursault kills the Arab who drew a knife on him. The plastic description reinforces the episode which is a central one, and provides a motive for the committing of a senseless crime by a man whose behaviour was activated solely by the desire to desist from any sort of independent action.

p The cross-examination at the trial and Meursault’s talk with the priest, together with the descriptions of his state of mind when he realises that he stands defenceless and doomed before the apparatus of the law are all used by Camus to give psychological substantiation to the enlightened consciousness of a man indifferent to the world. Having made the reader believe in the events in which Meursault is involved the writer proceeds to expound his philosophical creed.

p On careful examination L’etranyer turns out to be 304 similar in kind to the "Apocalyptic Vision”. In the ’“Vision” a religious idea is expressed through openly del’ormed real figures, whereas Camus’s irrationalism is supported by an "authentic portrayal oi’ life”. The conclusion is obvious: the conscious or unconscious distortion of life subordinated to a single idea is the distinctive feature of non-realist art.

p Any definition of the essence of realism must distinguish between the realism of art and the realist method. The first concept expresses the initial link between art and the material world, the property of giving an objective reflection of reality as one of the forms of social consciousness. The second concept concerns the conscious aim of the artist to reflect the causal relationships of phenomena.

p The realist method presupposes the existence of a special, historically determined way of seeing life on the part of the artist. The desire to understand the world by proceed ing from it makes the realistic work a means of understanding reality and revealing man’s attitudes towards it.

p Let us draw a small comparison to give a clear idea of the contrast between the religious, mystical attitude to life, for example, and the realist attitude in direct relation to art.

p In his letter to Nebridius Saint Augustine contrasted the "soul and body”. "Which of them is best?" he asked. And replied: "The soul, of course. What is the body praised for? I can see nothing other than beauty. What is bodily beauty? Well-proportioned parts with a certain pleasantness of colour. Is this form better where it is true or where it is false? ... And where is it true? In the soul,” etc.

p Having declared "bodily beauty”, the beaut}’ of natural forms, to be false, Augustine proceeds to a dogmatic categorical renunciation of the aesthetic pleasure which people obtain from “sensual” objects. "What is to be done,” he says, "if sensual objects provide too much pleasure?" His reply is: "They must not be allowed to.”  [304•1 

p In the apocryphal story about St. John the saint rejects a portrait of himself on the grounds that it is only a " bodily likeness”.

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p “That which you have made,” said .John, "is child’s play, imperfection. You have drawn the dead likeness of dead flesh.”  [305•1 

p Almost the whole of early Christian ail is infused with the desire to stress man’s spiritual essence, "the divine spark”.

p The views on nature and art of Leonardo da Vinci, one of the most consistent realists of the Renaissance, show an entirely opposite approach. As a scientist and artist he concentrated first and foremost on revealing the causal relationship of phenomena.

p “There is no action in nature without a cause,” he wrote in his essays About Myself and My Science, "find the cause and you will not need an experiment.”  [305•2 

p In his view the artist should be not only scientist and philosopher but teacher. The aim of the painter is to penetrate constantly into the very essence of the structure of objects.

p “’A painter who simply copies relying on experience and the evidence of his own eyes,” he wrote at another point in his tract on painting, "is like a mirror which simply reflects everything facing it without knowing anything about them.”  [305•3 

p Leonardo’s method of painting is best illustrated in the "Last Supper" which he painted in the refectory of the monastery of St. Maria delle Grazie. The painter’s realistic perception of the world is expressed in the psychological interrelations between all the thirteen figures in the painting.

p The painter juxtaposes goodness and treachery by portraying the reactions of the twelve disciples to the words just uttered by Christ: "One of you shall betray me.”

p This elucidation of the causal relationship and the urge to give material, plastic expression to the spiritual state of mind of the figures in the painting by means of mime and gesture recall certain passages in the Tract. In spite of the fact that the connection is a remote and oblique one, 306 it helps us to understand the logic behind this great realist’s artistic thought. "If you want to show someone talking in a crowd of people you must have a clear idea of the subject which he is to discuss and make all the gestures correspond to it___

p ’"Show an old man astounded at what he has heard, with his mouth drooping at the corners drawing the cheeks into a multitude of furrows; the brows should be slightly raised at the point where they meet so that they form many wrinkles on the forehead. .. .”  [306•1 

p In this way the realistic method shows itself in the general principles used in selection, evaluation and portrayal by the artist of reality and in his desire to reveal the natural laws inherent in contradictory, real phenomena. As a rule the realist makes use of the real forms of the object being portrayed, but he may also have recourse to generalised or even symbolic forms provided always that they serve to reveal the objective essence of the real phenomena portrayed.

p Since both the approach to reality and even the motivation of character development may be the same in the case of various writers, but their expression takes a different form, we speak about the existence of many historically concrete realist styles.

p Realism reached its peak in the nineteenth century.

p Being unaware of the future course of the development of society, the great European and Russian masters of realism saw their main task as that of providing a true, comprehensive analysis of social life. In Balzac’s own words he aimed in writing La comedic humaine at drawing up an inventory of vices and virtues and selecting the most important events of social life. The sober analysis of the contradictory reality towards the middle of the nineteenth century, rich in tragic social contrasts, and the intensifying struggle between the people and their exploiters, inevitably led to criticism. At the pen of the most talented, reflective writers realism naturally assumed a critical character and became critical realism. "What is art in our time?" asked the theoretician of Russian realism, V. Belinsky, and gave 307 the reply: "It is the judgement and analysis of society; consequently, criticism.”  [307•1 

p At that period a deeper understanding of reality was required for a critical examination of it than that possessed by the romantics, for example. The realists explained their characters in relation to life and their dependence on their environment. The basic features of the realistic method are the absence of subjective arbitrariness, the true-to-life motivation of human character and the conscious striving for authenticity. They can be seen in literature, in the paintings of Courbet, Daumier and the Russian peredvizhniki and in the art of those actors who, in the words of one of the pioneers of realism in the Russian theatre, Mikhail Shchepkin, did not impose their own personality on the dramatic role, but strove to "get into the skin" of the character.

p Social history, the history of the morals of contemporary society is the main theme which won nineteenth century critical realism a place in world culture. The mainspring of the action was the conflict between the individual and society, the predominant artistic principle was truth to life, and the most widely used plot in prose and drama became the private lovers’ or family conflict. Whether the writer chose to portray “superfluous” or “small” people, or deal with village life or the "women’s question" the action very frequently took the form of a love story or family history, even though this might have only external significance. Only in rare cases the intertwining of political intrigues and banking or commercial operations, or philosophical, religious, moral and aesthetic conflicts took the place of the usual eternal triangles. This striving for careful motivation of action and characterisation together with a socio-economic altitude towards life brought a psychological, even physiological approach to the fore. In the beam of the author’s projector which picked out individual episodes of real life, and the hero’s solitary reflections it was only natural that one should find that which formed an organic part of a love intrigue, the mainspring of the action.

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p Profound, many sided portrayal of contemporary life was the great achievement of critical realism. From depicting typical representatives of vices, passions, social groups and even professions, the writer proceeded to a portrayal of man in a constant slate of movement. Whereas in Gogol’s Dead Souls the writer’s set of literary devices is used to show various typical specimens of landowners and government officials, the typical clement of Lev Tolstoi’s characters is completely dissolved in the diverse descrip tion of changing spiritual stafes of mind. The life stream at the end of the nineteenth century cleansed art of rationalism in the organisation and treatment of material stemming from the classical tradition, and of the excessive whirlpool of romantic passions to be found in writers’ impassioned digressions, in exciting twists in the plot, in the conventional sighing lovers, daemonic villains and noble fathers. Art became the true mirror of life, but the nearer this mirror came to the individual, the more its grasp on reality became limited to small themes. If art was to attain a comprehensive understanding of the world it would have to acquire a general, sharply defined conception of life which was in accordance with its historical development. It could not simply rely on descriptions of everyday life or mere compassion for the good and condemnation of the bad. This is illustrated by the separate existence of philosophical and moral treatise in the works of Lev Tolstoi or the philosophical dialogues and monologues which form an organic part of Dostoyevsky’s novels, where various “pros” and ’“cons” are discussed ad infmilum.

p By searching for the link between their characters and life and connecting their art with the natural course of events, critical realist writers came close to an understanding of the processes which determined the course of hist or}’.

p It was on this path, however, that their artistic method, unbeknown to the writers themselves, came into conflict with the popular myths and fantasies which had grown up out of a narrow or simply false analysis of reality.

p The words of one of the great realist writers of our time, Thomas Mann, are most relevant to this point. Referring to his work on the novel Buddcnbrooks which tells the story of the decline of the upper strata of bourgeois society, 309 Mann said: "The problem which absorbed me and forced me to write was a biological, psychological problem, not a political one. I was interested in the spiritual, human element and dealt with the sociological, political implications en passant and half-consciously.”  [309•1 

p One only needs to compare Buddenbrooks with another novel on the same subject, The Artamonous by Maxim Gorky, to see how Thomas Mann’s premise restricted the problem with which he was faced.

p Only a truly scientific conception oi’ history and the artistic method of socialist realism which is indissolubly connected with it, generated by the period of transition from capitalism to socialism, was able to provide realist art with an integral, forward-looking understanding of man and the world. Socialist realism is characterised by a conscious, consistent materialistic approach to the life which is being reproduced. Life is reflected in art in the light of the laws of development of life itself discovered by Marxist-Leninist philosophy. In portraying life socialist realism fights for its transformation in accordance with general humanitarian, communist ideals.

p In the present day this striving for an effective, everwidening artistic range always associated with intelligible artistic form has become a characteristic feature of every artist who does not isolate himself from the people. Such was the poetic career of Vladimir Mayakovsky who devoted all the "ringing strength" of his poetry to the attacking class of the proletariat. Intelligibility strengthens rather than detracts from the value of realist works, in that it demands clear imagery, precise use of language and artistic devices and the subjection of form arid content to the clear expression of the meaning of reality itself.

p By reproducing reality realist art learns to apprehend it. This process of apprehension includes the thoughts, feelings and strivings not only of those who create valuable works of art but of the people who appreciate them. The mobile frontiers of realism are drawn by the degree to which reality is mastered by art and not by formal devices completely remote from reality. It is precisely this 310 profound portrayal of life and broad range which distinguishes the socialist realist method from oilier historically conditioned methods.

p Reading the theoretical writings of the prominent masters of socialist realism on their artistic method one sees that in their statements of general, indisputable theses. such as the portrayal of life from a socialist position and the desire not only to understand reality but to change it. emphasis is placed on an individual interpretation of the method, taking into account the nature of this or that form of art.

p In the case of Alexei Tolstoi, for example, the leading principles were the laws of realist typiiicalion: "Realism,” he said, "is the generalisation of individual events which bear characteristic features. Realism discards the accidental and integrates characteristic quantities. Realism takes the current facet of life and turns it into a constant phenomenon containing the essence of that which is current, i.e., life, whereas naturalism, for example, simply gives an indifferent picture of it. Realism means a social theme and generalised social types. Realism does not wander about the age, nor does it dress up the heroes of ancient tales in Soviet leather jackets. Realism makes a frontal attack on the new life. And then, depending on their skill, it is up to each one to take what he is able to lay his hands on and make off with, to take that which is alive and not an empty shadow. The latter we leave to the formalists.”  [310•1 

p A different attitude to this question was expressed by the brilliant modern poet, Nazim Hikmet. lie conceded the use by socialist realism of the widest range or artistic forms, even including those which made a complete break with traditional principles as he put it "of the purely external portrayal of natural events and the human soul".  [310•2  Proceeding like Alexei Tolstoi from the predominant importance of content in art, Hikmel firmly opposed the idea that any certain artistic forms should be considered as exclusively inherent in socialist realism. "To conceive of serving the party and people by picking out any one 311 particular form is to transform this service into a self- contained problem of form- -and this is formalism pure and simple.”  [311•1 

p We have paused to consider only a few of the tendencies in defining socialist realism, of which some veer away from a true representation of life and others do not conceive of socialist realism outside the strict observance of the "forms of life itself”.

p To our mind Brecht provides a very clear definition of the frontiers of socialist realism in his theses entitled "Socialist Realism in the Theatre”. We find here a whole aesthetic programme in which the principles of the new method are given an extremely individual Brechtian interpretation.

p “Socialist realism is the reproduction of life and human relationships in accordance with reality by artistic means from the socialist standpoint.”  [311•2 

p Here Brecht is emphasising that the "truth of life" is attained by "artistic means”.

p “This reproduction.” he writes, "makes it possible to penetrate into the very core of social processes and arouses spiritual impulses of a socialist kind.”

p It is clear not only from these quotations but from an analysis of Brccht’s ideas in dramatic form that the " artistic means" make it possible to select and generalise the essential aspect of the processes and phenomena of life. There can be no question here of artistic forms which are true to life in the strict external sense.

p This becomes evident if we examine any episode from the parable play The Good Woman of Sezuan which is fantastic in subject matter but strictly realist in essence. Let us take the following scene. The rich barber has struck the water-carrier Vang with his longs and broken his arm. The heroine of the play, Shen Te, has just found out about it.

p Shen Te: What’s the matter with your arm?

p Shim: The barber broke it with his longs right in front of us.

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p Shen Tc (horrified at her inattention): And I didn’t notice anything. Go to the doctor’s straight away, or else it will set like that and you won’t ever be able to work properly again. What a dreadful thing to happen! Get up quickly. Come on!

p Unemployed man: He wants a judge, not a doctor. He’s got the right to demand compensation i’or injury from the rich barber.

p Vang: Do you think I stand a chance?

p Shim: Only if it’s good and broken.

p Vang: I think it is. Look, it’s all swollen up. Do you think it’s enough for a life pension?

p Shim: You’ll need a witness, just in case.

p Vang: But you all saw him do it. You can all say so. (Looks all round.)

p The unemployed man, the girl and the sister-in-law are sitting by the wall of the house eating. No one looks up.

p Slien Te (to Shim): But you saw it happen!

p Shim: I don’t like having dealings with the police.

p Shen Te (to the sister-in-law): Then what about you!

p Sister-in-law: Me? I wasn’t looking.

p Shim: What do you mean? I saw you looking. You’re just afraid because the barber has power.

p Shen Te (to the grandfather): I’m sure you won’t refuse to be a witness.

p Sister-in-law: They won’t take any notice of anything he says. His number’s up.

p Shen Te (to the unemployed man): But there could be a life pension at stake.

p Unemployed man: I’ve already been cautioned twice for begging. My testimony would only harm him.

p Shen Te (mistrustfully): So none of you have got the courage to say what happened. You see a man’s arm broken in broad daylight and keep your mouths shut. . . .

p The scene which we have quoted is designed to show how hunger and poverty corrupt. The situation chosen for this is an extremely acute one. The laconic rejoinders of the characters are motivated by the given circumstances and reveal the type of people which they are.

p This scene, however, is essential for the play not in order to advance the action but to affirm the writer’s general intention and the special message of this particular 313 incident. This is the reason why Shell Te’s lines suddenly change from prose into poetry in which the voice of the writer himself is clearly heard.

p Unhappy men!
Your brother is assaulted and you shut your eyes.
He is hit and cries aloud and you are silent?
The beast prowls, chooses his victim.
And you say: He’s spared us
          because we do not show displeasure.

p What sort of a city is this? What sort of people are you? When injustice is done there should be revolt in the city. And if there is no revolt, it were better that the city should Perish in fire before night falls!  [313•1 

p It is extremely typical that this should be followed by a return to prose. We now have a continuation of Shen Te’s speech from "and keep your mouths shut”.

p “. . .Vang, if the people who actually saw it refuse, I’ll say that I saw it.”

p This psychological motif is developed further. One of the women witnesses not only refuses to bear testimony but also intends to betray Shen Te.

p Unemployed man: She’s rushed off to the barber to make up to him.

p Sister-in-law: We can’t change the world.

p Shen Te (despondently): I didn’t mean to tell you off. I just got scared. No, I did mean it. Get out of my sight!

p The unemployed man, the sister-in-law and the grand father go away chewing and pouting.

p Shen Tc (to the audience):

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p They no longer answer.
Where one puts them they stay.
And if one sends them away, they quickly go.
Nothing moves their hearts. Only the smell of food
Can make them look up.  [314•1 

p It is quite clear that the sister-in-law’s words assume a generalised, symbolic meaning in the given context. They represent the conclusion of people who are not capable of fighting. The author’s resume, dealing not with the problem of “non-interference” but the socio-psychological make-up of the modern lumpen-proletariat, is again put into the mouth of Shen Te and again expressed in verse.

p The setting of the action of the play in China is a pure convention. The characters are also conventional, but at the same lime they do not by any means give the impression of being empty symbols or personified ideas. This is explained by the fact that the main action of the play, that is, the socio-philosophical problems, are given very skilful psychological motivation by Brecht.

p All the conventional, dramatic devices used in the play, such as the dual figure of Shen Te, the visit of the gods to earth, the poetic interludes and the scenes which are not important for the unified development of the action are all points of departure for the comprehension of the social processes which take place in life. The whole dramatic texture of "The Good Woman" leads inevitably to the conclusion that it is essential for the world which disfigures man to be changed, although the writer leaves it to the audience to reach this conclusion on their own and strives to arouse their active participation.

p This is the purpose of the play’s epilogue which is addressed by an actor standing in front of the curtains to the public.

p My audience, my very reverend friend!
I know this isn’t quite a happy end.
. . . . . . . . . . . . .
The curtain falls and here, perplexed, we stand,
No problems have been solved, we understand 315

p And yet there must exist a true solution.
Go try and think of one for money or for love!
To change the hero? Or to show his evolution?
Wouldn’t it do to change the powers above?
Or do without them?
                    I am silent, flustered,
So friends, do help me! Let all minds be mustered
And let us try and find, as best we can
Good ways to good for a good man.
A poor end is excluded out of hand.
It must,
        it must,
              it must be happy,
                    understand?

p Brecht’s plays deliberately avoid all "true to life" fortuitousness. Its place is taken by "the natural order" the essence of which are the natural laws of historical social development “regulated” and generalised by art. Whilst not being the only possibility, this was a perfectly acceptable form of the realistic portrayal of reality in its revolutionary development.

p Whereas in Gorky’s novel Mother the author’s ideas are revealed to the reader predominantly by means of extremely concrete descriptions of Nilovna’s psychological states of mind linked with details of everyday life, Brecht’s dramatisation of the novel presents her with practically none of Gorky’s character traits.

p True to his artistic principles Brecht praised Helene Weigel. the actress who played the role of the mother, first and foremost for the fact that out of all Nilovna’s character traits she "selected those which justified the widest possible political interpretation of the Vlasovs (and which were, consequently, completely individual, unique and unrepeatable!) ; in other words she acted as if she had politicians sitting in front of her, although this did not detract from her as an actress and did not prevent her acting from being art".  [315•1 

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p The nature of the indi\ idualisation oi’ the character of Nilovna cannot he called into question. The essential touches for a psychological portrait necessary in order to give material expression to the political situation were drawn hy the actress primarily from her personal experience of life.

p As we sec Brccht was not trying to make the audience identify themselves with that which was heing enacted on the stage (as Stanislavsky tried to do) to such an extent that they forgot they were in the theatre. In this the playwright and director was following in the hold attempts at innovation and traditions of Soviet art in the twenties, linked with Mcyerhold’s search for new forms in the theatre, Mayakovsky in poetry and Eisenstein in the cinema. From this point of view we are hound to regard Brechl as a most brilliant example of the never-ending link between certain tendencies in the socialist realism of the twenties with that of the thirties and then the forties and fifties.

p The typical significance of Nilovna which Gorky conveyed by the individual character trails of the heroine and which convinced the reader of its unbreakable link with life in Russia and the specific period of the 1905 revolution was broadened by Brecht in the interests of his aesthetic aims into showing the general laws of the revolutionary workers’ movement on an international scale.

p In spite of the fact that Brceht’s dramatisation was different from the original in many respects Gorky authorised it in 1932. He was not disturbed by the unusual principles of typification, and conventional devices employed to explain the meaning of realistic things and phenomena. The most important aspect of Brechl’s dramatisation was in full accordance with Gorky’s aims and conceptions; in such a context any device fulfilled the required aim.

p Both Gorky’s and Brecht’s Mother bears out the fact that the most important aspect of a socialist realist work of art is its general conception of life which makes use of the most varied and, in the case of true artists, original devices and means to achieve realisation.

p Let us return to Brecht’s theses.

p “The joy which every form of art should give takes the shape in socialist realism of joy al the knowledge that so ciety is capable of determining (mcistert) man’s destiny.

317

p “A work of art created in accordance with the principles of socialist realism reveals the dialectic laws of social development the knowledge of which helps society to determine man’s destiny, and shows people and events as being historically determined, capable of being changed and contradictory by nature.”  [317•1 

p The idea of the perception of beauty has always been associated in materialist aesthetics with the comprehension of the world. In the passage which we have quoted Brccht is emphasising the special contribution which socialist realism makes to an aesthetic understanding of life. Having reached an understanding of the laws of social development, man is then able to start determining his own fate. It is precisely this that constitutes the initial cause of the optimistic catharsis contained in socialist art, which may find expression in the most various styles, including those which are very far removed from Brechtian generalisation.

p Brecht’s art is based on the belief that the world can be understood and changed in the light of communist ideals. The principle of party commitment in the arts helped him in his search for new representational devices. Following the path of socialist realism Brecht was the sworn enemy of that type of bourgeois drama in which, to quote the well-known English theatre critic, Ronald Peacock, "the individual is overshadowed by the conflict of impersonal forces of which he is more and more the victim and less and less the agent".  [317•2 

p Art is not, of course, limited to one single type of realism and the forms of realism change with the times and strain ahead to the future. It should be realised, however, that behind the changing nature of the arts in general and realism in particular there exist clearly defined boundaries. Thus art must never break away from its maker, man, and the material of art has always been and will always be reality which has passed through the artist’s consciousness and become imprinted in his work. Even when reality has been changed almost out of recognition losing all meaning and completely de-humanised, it still continues to exist both 318 in the pictures of the non-objective or abstract painter and in tbe meaningless phrases of trans-sense poetry.

p Whether or not we accept such works as belonging to the world of art is another question. The fact remains that the only form of material for any human activity is that which we receive from life. As far as realism, one of the great highroads of art, is concerned it would be pointless to discuss it. once its bounds have been obliterated and the historically determined frontiers of its schools and trends destroyed.

p Like any other artistic method realism is distinguished by certain special features which it modifies in relation to the actual object of reflection and the artist which perceives it. But no matter how the world and man’s vision of it may change, realism, if it is to retain its inherent meaning, cannot change its primary aim and renounce its main task which is the comprehension of the essence of objective reality by artistic means. It follows that those artistic forms within which realistic art develops are not subjective and arbitrary, but rather directed towards the understanding of life. They are subject not to the dictates of uncontrolled feeling and not to artistic chaos, but to the expression of a definite content drawn from life itself and throwing light on ils natural laws.

p The new artistic method of socialist realism is distinguished by the vast range of artistic possibilities at its command. It has embraced the highest aspirations of the romantics, elements of the grotesque and the portrayal of reality in symbolic, allegorical generalisation.

The true value of socialist realism, which is in a constant state of development and artistic quest, lies in its striving to understand life’s truth and not blind dogma, and in its active, revolutionary, by no means passive humanism.