Яни Милчаков

The present study deals with the meaning of the term "paraliterature". It is acknowledged as a common designation of various literary genres that paradoxically could be observed from "within and without" the mainstream literary standards. Moreover, paraliterature ranges over "the category of written works, as a whole, relegated to the margins of recognized literature and often dismissed as subliterary despite evident resemblances to the respectable literature of the official canon". The authors undertake the interpretation of two unidentified hand-written collections from the Bulgarian "Belle Epoque": "Album of various songs to remember" (1896-1901) (created, written and copied by the classmates and friends of Lubomir Targovski - Boyan Penev is also among them) and "Album" by Nikola Sapundjiev (1909-1911) (in the city of Razgrad and in the village of Slavyanovo). Generally, these albums are essential for the self-identification of certain social groups - the military, prisoners, girls, bohemians. Both collections are included the concept "album poetry" . The values in these works are concerned with "the multiculturalism" of Razgrad`s high school. The biographies of their respective owners are also of interest. As a literature of personal documents the works in these collections belong to different genres: songbook, scrapbook, hand-written book in the complicated relations between "high" and "low" cultural strata. The goal, which this study pursues, is to ask some questions, such as where, when, how and into what axiologic perspective these albums and other para-literary forms may find their place in academic periodisations and the history of Bulgarian literature.

Повторението на опита и сътворението на смисъла

The paper offers an attempt to analyze the meaning of the notion 'anti-totalitarian literature' per se and in its Bulgarian context. This is a complex phenomenon embracing several different trends, different types of writing, different political affiliations and aesthetic views. Also, there were writers that are still difficult to classify in the main types of 'anti-totalitarian literature': political emigrants, dissidents, communists that opposed the status quo, etc. One such author was Asen Christoforov (1910-1970). A graduate of London University, a young Bulgarian professor of economics in the first post-war years, he was dismissed from the University of Sofia, later accused of being a British spy and sent to the concentration camp in Belene. Christoforov lived a lonely life for many years near the village of Govedartsi, at the foot of Rila mountain. Nevertheless, in the late 1950s and later Chistoforov published several books. Almost all of them described the mountain and its inhabitants and especially the people of Govedartci. The paper traces the author's percecution for political reasons discretely mentioned in his work, claiming that their literary merits are greater than their 'anti-totalitarian' criticism.