Богдан Поповић. Културни образац, књижевно васпитање и друштвена критика (Теорија скоројевића)

Abstract

Bogdan Popović (1864–1944) was a literary critic, aesthetician and literary theorist, and professor of comparative literature at the University of Belgrade. Apart from literature, the area of his interest included morality, the question of cultural models and social criticism. All these interests are closely connected to Popović’s understanding of literary education. He believed the Victorian cultural model of the gentleman to be a universal cultural model of contemporary mankind, modelled on humanistic values and Stoic philosophy. He stressed love of freedom (individual, not egalitarian), patriotism and the right to criticize (legal equality) as three most important English virtues. According to Popović, literary education was the most important because of its educational value: literature influences not only our logical reasoning, but our feelings too. He believed that Herbert Spencer was the greatest philosopher. Thanks to adoption of Montaigne’s scepticism Popović did not accept the radical materialism of his time. He accepted Comte’s criticism of metaphysics and Schopenhauer’s critique of Hegel. He was influenced by French moralists, Montaigne, Pascal, la Rochefoucauld, La Bruyère, de Vigny, Sully Prudhomme, and Alphonse Daudet, his favourite French author. Although Popović pursued his university studies in Paris and introduced the French style into Serbian literature (Belgrade style), he had a strong affinity for British culture, literature (especially Shakespeare) and authors (Alexander Bain, George Eliot, Matthew Arnold etc), and his style of writing was similar to Macaulay’s and Arnold’s. His criticism of political radicalism (Jacobinism) was presumably influenced by Hippolyte Taine, who adopted it from Edmund Burke’s political philosophy. He was intrigued by the phenomenon of the upstart. In the late nineteenth century, with the process of democratization, European societies, including Serbian, faced the cultural phenomenon of upstarts, a phenomenon that became a theme of literature. Popović followed the common definition of an upstart – one who suddenly rises from obscurity or humble position to wealth or honour, especially the one who is unfitted for his position. His early study on Beaumarchais is a study of the rise of the eighteenth-century phenomenon of parvenus. Popović’s concept of the upstart is close to the concept of the semi-intellectual forged by his friend Slobodan Jovanović (1869–1958). Popović thought there were upstart classes and nations. At the end of the Great War, in Paris, Popović anonymously published a study on the psychology of upstart nations, both in English and in French (1919). According to him, the psychology of upstart nations should be constantly borne in mind in all relations with these nations. He argued that characteristic of the perfect type of parvenu are the nations that worship at the shrine of militarism. This paper offers an analysis and critique of Popović’s views, pointing to some contradictions in his deductions.

У раду се разматрају питања која су Богдана Поповића веома заокупљала, а нису у средишту пажње оцена његовог рада – морално питање, културни образац и друштвена критика, односно теорија скоројевића. Ова питања су повезана са Поповићевим схватањем књижевног васпитања и дају објашњење за његову строгост и непопустљивост у појединим књижевним питањима. Поповић нарочиту пажњу посвећује решавању моралних проблема. Наглашава важност књижевног образовања истичући његову васпитну вредност. Критику политичког радикализма Поповић је усвојио од Тена (Hippolyte Taine), који ју је преузео од Берка (Edmund Burke). Теорија скоројевића била је полазна тачка за политичка промишљања. У Поповићево време није, као касније, владало схватање историје и друштвених односа као борбе две економске класе, буржоазије (грађанства) и пролетаријата (радничке класе). Да би се разумели Богдан Поповић и тема скоројевића, неопходно је целовито сагледати друштво његовог времена, избегавајући замке идеолошких шаблона, које су постале праве предрасуде у научној методологији.