Kritika i lozung socialističeskogo realizma (di M. Rozental’, E. Usievič) [1933] - [D137]

Concise description of the directive:

For Mark Rozental – editor-in-chief of “Literaturniy kritik” – and Elena Usievich, one of the leading voices in the theoretical reflection on socialist realism in the 1930s, the limitations found in literary criticism manifest themselves in a too narrow and insufficiently in-depth approach to the problem of socialist realism, as well as in an insufficient analysis of individual literary works.
Proletarian theory is founded on methodological rigour and coherence, rejecting any form of dispersion or vagueness. Consequently, Marxist critics are called upon to adopt the same stance towards socialist realism, whose definition represents one of the main militant tasks of criticism today.
An example of the absence of a broad approach to the question is offered by the issue of “Literaturnaya gazeta” of 23 June 1933, where the idea of the uselessness – or even the harmfulness – of theoretical reflection on literature is conveyed in more or less explicit forms.
The uncompromising fight against those who blindly imitate the bourgeois and petit-bourgeois writers of Western Europe in no way excludes the need for a thorough knowledge of the most recent currents in European literature. One of the great and complex challenges awaiting our criticism consists, the authors conclude, in the scientific and rigorous study, in the light of current historical requirements, of the authors of the past; in the analysis of the processes of development and transformation of the main styles, trends and methods of literature; as well as in the careful observation of the phenomena at work in Western European literature and their interpretation through a Marxist-Leninist perspective.

Ilaria Aletto, Maria Zavyalova