Socialističeskij realizm i problema mirovozzrenija i metoda (di I. Nusinov) [1934] - [D144]

Concise description of the directive:

Isaak Nusinov, a literary critic and linguist, and one of the main theorists of the Marxist method of literary analysis, devotes his contribution to the relationship between socialist realism, worldview, and artistic method.
Socialist realism, Nusinov explains, is an ideologically unified and socially coherent literary current. As an expression of a society engaged in the construction of socialism, its style must likewise be unified and organic. Non-proletarian writers may also contribute to its development, but only insofar as they approach an understanding of reality consistent with the proletarian perspective. Revolutionary events and characters, Nusinov notes, do not automatically lead to a progressive transformation of a work’s ideological orientation; on the contrary, they may sometimes accentuate its reactionary character. The successes of socialist construction, on the literary front, provoke an intensification of class resistance. It is in this context that divergent phenomena emerge: on the one hand, the shift of democratic writers to proletarian positions; on the other, the ‘fascistisation’ of reformist and humanist authors, as in the case of H. G. Wells. These dynamics reflect the objective significance of events and characters in reality, but—as Nusinov emphasises—it is essential to distinguish between the content of reality itself and its literary representation: what gives meaning to narrative material is not the content per se, but the writer’s worldview and ideological orientation. These determine both the choice of material and the ways in which it is elaborated. The struggle for an authentic Marxist-Leninist understanding of reality, and for the affirmation of a socialist worldview, thus emerges as one of the fundamental tasks of Soviet literature.

Ilaria Aletto, Maria Zavyalova