Having considered the historical and personal Golgothas, let us reflect further on Krleža’s literary Golgotha. Biblical themes, and especially the topos of Golgotha, form one of the main focuses of his entire body of work. His obsession with the theme of Golgotha during the First World War led Krleža to draw closer spiritually to the pictorial work of Ljubo Babić, who was also the set designer for the first performance of the play Golgotha in 1922, directed by Branko Gavella—the very first performance of any work by Krleža. On 9 May 1916 (a diary entry in Olden Days), writing of Ljubo Babić’s pictorial poetics, Krleža pointed out that Babić, with his cosmopolitanism, had been able to free himself from Meštrović’s secessionist ornamentalism, from that enhanced anatomy that “seeks to be colossal, but in fact is only Viennese and secessionist, with exaggerated bulging muscles.”51 Krleža drew attention to Babić’s distance from the Messianic ideologemes and the chaos of the Viennese Secession-influenced work of Ivan Meštrović (for example, in Babić’s Udovice [Widows], 1912, or Narikače—[Women mourning the dead], 1913), who had taken on the fatal role of the prophet52—a distance which led Babić to symbolize the tragedy of war with the macabre motifs of black flags (Black Flag, 1916).
Thus, Krleža himself acknowledges the closeness of the motifs of his own art to Ljubo Babić’s painterly motifs, like the black flags and crucifixes of his Rembrandtesque Golgotha (Babić, Golgotha, 1916, 1917)—crucifixes which “extend like the mast of a sinking ship, which is being sucked into
50 the narrator of the diary ironically accuses his own Salome (which was completed, let it not be forgotten, only 49 years later) and the literary debate on scheherazade and heliogabalus as being merely variations in the manner of Wilde, and refuses to transform them into finished works, leaving them as mere incrustations in the body of his diary.
51 miroslav krleža, Dnevnik 1914–17: Davni dani I, op. cit., 153. regarding krleža’s repudiation of the messianic ghosts of meštrović’s art at that time, see suzana marjanić, Glasovi “Davnih dana”: transgresije svjetova u Krležinim zapisima 1914–1921/22 (zagreb: naklada mD, 2005), 58-64.
52
the roaring vortex of an incomprehensible historical flood,”53 and which re-emerged in discursive or iconographic forms of artistic expression as warnings in the immediate post-war period.54
With regard to Olden Days, the Golgothan motif is explicitly referred to in the aphoristic diary entry Golgotha, as well as in the entry entitled
“The first performance of ‘Golgotha’ on 3 November 1922 (written on 4 November 1922),”55 along with numerous anamorphic Golgothan motifs which appear throughout the Olden Days, such as Krleža’s above-mentioned reflection on the affinity of his own poetics with the symbolism of Ljubo Babić’s crucifixes.
In his aphoristic diary entry, Golgotha (from the aforementioned
“book of aphorisms” Mnogo pa ništa),56 which was written following in the footsteps of Max Stirner’s individualist anarchism and creative Nothing—
and here I would like to mention the etymology of Golgotha from gulgoleth in Hebrew (skull), and that of Calvary from the Latin calvaria (empty skull)—Krleža developed an anamorphic Stirnerian analysis of power, according to which man, in an era of politics and of political liberalism in particular, does not act according to his own interests, but only in accordance with the interests of the State and the nation, which have been declared to be “his [thing].”57 Krleža’s Calvary in 1916 served the interests of
53 miroslav krleža, Dnevnik 1914–17: Davni dani I, op. cit., 242, 298.
54 Aleksandar flaker, Riječ, slika, grad: hrvatske intermedijalne studije (zagreb: hAzU, 1995), 163.
the motif of golgotha arises often in krleža’s work (cf. tomislav ladan, “lirska topika miroslava krleže,” Kolo 6 [1968]: 42-51; Darko gašparović, Dramatica krležiana [zagreb: Cekade, 1989], 71). in this instance, we can recall, in particular, the prose poem Golgotha (Književnik, 1928, 2), a lyrical variation on the death of Christ, who is named, in an expressionist manner, man (with a capital “m”). the howling of a dog, as well as the motif of the leper seen as a jester, form the backdrop to this work on the theme of golgotha: “somewhere below the castle walls, a hound howled, and the leper’s bell could be heard. silence reigned” (miroslav krleža, Poezija [zagreb: zora, 1969], 451).
55 miroslav krleža, Dnevnik 1918–22: Davni dani II, op. cit., 381-392. this entry concludes the diary of 1922, and was published for the first time in the Borba magazine (v/1965), and krleža included it in the second edition of Olden Days (cf. velimir visković, ed., Krležijana 2, op. cit., 232).
56 miroslav krleža, Dnevnik 1914–17: Davni dani I, op. cit., 177.
57 max stirner, in his work The Ego and Its Own (Der Einzige und sein Eigentum, 1844), distinguished
“the twenty-fifth regiment” under a grandiose and cynical Church pardon:
“We’re going to the front, we will be shot in the arms and in the legs, but afterwards, with mathematical certainty, eternal apotheosis will follow.”
To Stirner’s revelation of the attributes of political freedom (subjugation to the State)—with the ideological call of Die for the nation—Krleža added his own thoughts on the eternal return of Golgotha: “And yet, to remain on Golgotha and to know that this is the same variation as ever, on the same equally repulsive subject, almost from the beginning: the law of the universe and of God.” And just as the universe is the result of mechanics in the sense of the Kant-Laplace nebular hypothesis published in 1796, so, in the same way, one dies “in the context of pure geometric combinations” for mere chimeras: “As things stand today, it could be said of the universe that it is the masterpiece of a complete idiot, who didn’t have a single human thought in his head other than the laws of mechanics.”58
Faced with a dog’s life as “cannon fodder,” and in the face of the cynical attitude of the forces in power,59 Krleža established the figure of the free man who will rebel against the Idea of this sanguinary world zoo. The only thing that can save us from the shipwreck of the world (Krleža uses the metaphor of a shipwreck to represent the apocalyptic disintegration of humanity in Crime) is steadfast faith in the victory of human reason. The tiger (a Krležian zoometonym which stands for all the animalizations of the miles gloriosus), which in heraldic symbolism represents fury and power, like Mr Götz and Bramarbas (Mr Götz, in the subalterns’ room, seems like a tiger among mice),60 will cynically send the mice of the people, the
and the nation); social liberalism (drawn from the idea of society) and human liberalism (critical) which completes the make-up of the “lump” and the new faith in humanity (man becomes the god of all). karl marx pointed out that what stirner—or, as he calls him in his polemics, “saint max”—called social liberalism was, in fact, communism (karl marx, Nemačka ideologija. Kritika najnovije nemačke filozofije u licu njenih predstavnika Fojerbaha, B. Bauera i Štirnera i nemačkoga socijalizma u njegovim različitim prorocima, vol. 1 [Belgrade: kultura, 1964], 224).
58 miroslav krleža, Dnevnik 1914–17: Davni dani I, op. cit., 177, 187, 194.
59 Cf. peter sloterdijk, Kritika ciničkoga uma (zagreb: globus, 1992).
60 Cf. miroslav krleža, Dnevnik 1914–17: Davni dani I, op. cit., 165, 177. the rights which götz von Berlichingen insists upon are taken from the era of the rights of the iron fist, as glorified in the works of Justus möser. goethe depicted the historical götz as a man consumed with the
subaltern-mice, to the battlefields of Golgotha, of Galicia (on the Eastern Front): “That which, for this dull-witted ox who is about to be transported, ought to seem ‘totally lighthearted’, this crocodilian imbecilic delirium that—God permitting—he will not kick the bucket, that too is war!”61
Krleža’s Golgotha is the first work in his dramaturgy to have a dis-tinctly political tone, a trait which can also be seen in his dedication “to the shades of Richmond and Fortinbras,” Shakespearean characters who carry the torch of rebellion against violence.62 The proletarian play of Golgotha is usually considered to be part of a dramatic triad written between the end of World War I and 1923; along with Golgotha, this triad includes the war play Galicija (Galicia) and the “pastoral” expressionist play Vučjak.63
In the above-mentioned diary entry, “The first performance of
‘Golgotha’ on 3 November 1922,” Krleža mentions the writer Zofka Kveder-Demetrović, describing her as a poet and wife of Juraj Kveder-Demetrović, “well-known ideologist and Marxist leader, now acting as royal commissioner to the former provincial government.” Demetrović was convinced that Golgotha was “an animadversion against him personally as a lapsed socialist.”64 On the circumstances of this hearsay, Krleža noted: “Out of nothing, a rumour arose that spread about the city as such rumours do, that beneath the mask
the protagonist of the play (Jakob von Tyboe or the boastful soldier, 1723) by ludvig holberg, the father of Danish theatre, and serves as krleža’s metonym for the character of the miles gloriosus. With regard to the pedagogic-military characters of the A(u)strojaguaric monarchy [Translator’s note: krleža used the jaguar to symbolise the Austro-hungarian empire’s Balkan policies]—Corporal frišt, Captain götz, and lieutenant tomašević, see miroslav krleža, Dnevnik 1914–17: Davni dani I, op. cit., 66, 73, 77; and suzana marjanić, Glasovi “Davnih dana,”
op. cit., 83, 222, 223, 420.
61 miroslav krleža, Dnevnik 1918–22: Davni dani II, op. cit., 42.
62 Darko gašparović, Dramatica krležiana, op. cit., 70-71.
63 Translator’s note: this play is set in the fictive village of vučjak (representing Duga rijeka, where krleža lived from the autumn 1920 to summer 1921); the name (from the Croatian—vuk [wolf ]) suggests the eternal wolfishness of Croatian villages (in krleža’s oriental metaphor—
“the Croatian village like Central Asia”) at that time.
64 According to Dunja Detoni-Dujmić, zofka kveder’s ultimate spectacular enthusiasm for the yugoslav ideal and for the pan-serbian hegemony was, in part, the consequence of her marriage with Juraj Demetrović, “man of politics and Croatian regent, and fervent supporter of the ideology of a single yugoslav nation” (Dunja Detoni-Dujmić, Ljepša polovica književnosti
of Kristijan was hidden Juraj Demetrović, and he himself was convinced that it was so.”65 While Zofka Kveder-Demetrović, in the above-mentioned entry “A drunken night in November 1918” (Pijana novembarska noć 1918), is sarcastically described as one of the three tricolour Vestal Virgins (the fairy Ravijojla) representing the Kingdom of SHS,66 her husband, Juraj Demetrović, is correlated to the yellow denial of Christ in the diary entry The first performance of ‘Golgotha’ on 3 November 1922. Indeed, Golgotha depicts the conflict within the labour movement between the red line (Pavle as a representation of Christ), inspired by the ideals of the October Revolution, and the yellow line, accused of opportunism (Kristijan as a representation of Judas), whose supporters asked only for improvement of their living conditions.67 Krleža wrote the play in the period between 1918 and 1920/1921, when he was active in the SRPJ(k)—the Yugoslav Socialist Workers’ Party (of the Communists), later called the KPJ (the Yugoslav Communist Party)—and often gave speeches during public meetings.68
In short, Golgotha deals with the situation created within the European labour movement after the October Revolution, and with the conflicts and divisions within the Second International and the Third International.
It was mentioned at the beginning of this text how disappointed Krleža was
65 miroslav krleža, Dnevnik 1918–22: Davni dani II, op. cit., 384. it is interesting to note that, in this diary entry, krleža does not mention the fact that Golgotha inspired the admiration of stanislavskij and his fellow artists of the moscow Art theatre (mhAt) (cf. foretić, Dubravko.
Borba sa stvarima. Krležin teatar 1972–1986. Bilješke kazališnog suputnika [zagreb: hrvatsko društvo kazališnih kritičara i teatrologa, 1986], 13). to the contrary, he noted only that
“stanislavskij has come to us with Čechov. Čechov today—we have already experienced these things, and yet he triumphantly resists, against all logic” (miroslav krleža, Dnevnik 1918–22:
Davni dani II, op. cit., 388-389).
66 Translator’s note: kingdom of serbs, Croats, and slovenes from the Croatian Kraljevina (Kingdom) Srba, Hrvata i Slovenaca. king Alexander i changed the name to kingdom of yugoslavia in 1929.
67 in this regard, Golgotha shows both kristijan’s refusal of direct action in a Bakuninist sense of collectivist anarchism (he describes his own concept in marxist terms) and, at the same time, the individualist anarchism actions of pavle (miroslav krleža, Drame (Vučjak, Galicija, Golgota) (sarajevo: niŠro oslobođenje, 1988), 294, 281).
68 velimir visković, ed., Krležijana 1, op. cit., 301. see the diary entries Kraljevica 18. IV.1920, iz govora pred Hreljinskom Gradinom (miroslav krleža, Dnevnik 1918–22: Davni dani II, op. cit., 315-321) and 23. IV. 1920. Kraljevica, Brodogradilište (ibid., 330-331). Cf. also nikola Batušić,
about the crisis in the Second International, from which ensues an ethical interpretation of Golgotha on the subject of betrayal. The biblical archetype is also found here in the case of Ksaver, representing Ahasuerus, who does not offer help to Pavle (the representation of Christ) in a critical moment, just as, in medieval tradition, Ahasuerus refused to give Christ the water he requested on the way to Golgotha. These parallels (Pavle—Christ, Kristijan as a problematic leader, a betrayer—Judas, and Ksaver as a coward—
Ahasuerus) and that of Andrej, who takes over Pavle’s role (as Christ) after his death, suggest that Krleža went beyond the proletarian naturalism of the play by introducing elements of mystical expressionism, where ideology, as recognized by the literary critic, Mirjana Miočinović, is placed in a symbolic relationship with theology.69 Or, as Darko Gašparović observes with respect to Ksaver’s spiritual catharsis when he becomes aware of the burden of the betrayal, Golgotha, which takes place in Central Europe before Easter of 1919, “with regard to the dominant structural element, ceases to be a political play in the strict sense of the term, and becomes a drama of naked human existence.”70 In other words, Mirjana Miočinović states that with that play, very early on, Krleža was among the first to have a presentiment that the disoriented masses could easily become prey and victim to any sort of ideology that promised them salvation from the hell of social injustice.
Just as Klara Zetkin emphasized at the executive meeting of the Communist International held in Moscow in 1923: “observed from the historical standpoint, Fascism is a phenomenon that emerges because the Proletariat does not know how to continue its revolution”; for Zetkin, Fascism is an ideological and political victory over the working class movement.71
69 mirjana miočinović, Pozorište i giljotina. Rasprave o drami (Belgrade: edicija reČ, 2008), 266.
Cf. also radovan vučković, Krležina dela, op. cit., 161, 163, 171 and ivica matičević, Raspeti Juda: pristup biblijskom predlošku u drami hrvatske avangarde (zagreb: matica hrvatska, 1996), 129.
70 Darko gašparović, Dramatica krležiana, op. cit., 80.
71
3. Conclusions on Krleža’s Negation of the Apocalypse