Cultural and Literary Developments: Poland and Hungary

Abstract

By 1950 standardization of cultural life in Soviet-dominated coun tries was nearly complete. This was more easily effected in literature than in painting or music—areas in which the artist's position was less clearly defined. Pressures for conformity caused artists and writers to resort to three main types of behavior. Some collaborated wholeheartedly, others became semi-collabora tors, and still others chose to collaborate not at all. It soon became obvious that the "new literature" was failing to fulfill the task laid down by the party of re-educating men and was instead stifling creative work. The demand for an essentially romantic picture of everyday reality demanded by "Socialist realism" had become anything but real, and to ease the dilemma writers took refuge in the past. The cultural and political thaw which followed Stalin's death was felt most keenly in Hungary and Poland. In the former the full-scale campaign waged by the Rákosi regime against "rightist deviationism" propelled the coun try into revolution. In the latter a greater sensitivity to popular demand on the part of the leaders has helped to avert such a bloody upheaval. In fact, the freedom of creation under Gomulka's regime is still unequalled in all of Eastern Europe.—Ed.