Today history unites and divides us, inflames and stirs us as never before. Not least, of course, because “who controls the past controls the future.”
In his latest novel, Rana (Wound), Zachary Karabashliev turns to Bulgarian history, to some of its most dramatic and important moments. To the wounds the past inflicts on us, to the ancestors whose path we continue. The novel peers into several of the great themes of the last 150 years in a moving and authentic way. The writer has been my guest before, and we meet again to talk about the past.
This interview continues the series of historical Digital Stories. In it we have talked about the way history is taught, and in the coming days we will discuss whether some of the most widespread clichés about our past have any basis, and tell the story of some of the biggest historical hoaxes online.
The challenge I put to you is still open. Can you tell facts from Bulgarian history apart from ones invented by artificial intelligence? Try here.
– If you could travel in time, in which historical period of Bulgaria would you want to live, and why?
– 2024.
Because it is the best time for Bulgaria. And at the same time the most cursed.
Because good and evil are now “on the scales.” And because everything you do can matter.
– Can a nation understand the mistakes of the past through literature and art?
– No. Nations can't understand anything, nor can they read. The individuals within nations, however, can. And my hope is that some of those individuals who read and understand—who, as the teachers say, “read with comprehension”—may at some point find themselves in high positions, positions of power, on which important things depend. Then, and only then, would it matter what those particular individuals have read and understood, learned and absorbed.
– What do you think of the idea that history is “the science of lessons,” and can it influence the future of society?
– History is not an “exact” science like mathematics, nor a “natural” science like physics and chemistry. History can be a science only if the people working in it are individuals with a scientific way of thinking. It can be viciously abused as a pseudoscience, as was the case with the history of Bulgaria after 1944, when history was in the hands of semi-literate pseudo-partisans, lecturers wrapped in the communist mantle and ordinary charlatans.
– The three questions above used the formal “you,” even though we've known each other for a long time and address each other informally—Bulgarian, like French, keeps the two apart. Can you guess why?
– Out of some kind of respect for the chosen format, I suppose?
– Almost. These are the first three questions ChatGPT suggested I ask you in an interview on a historical theme. But what's interesting is that even without it I was planning to ask along those lines. Things in this area are impressive: a few days ago I submitted AI-generated poems and ended up among the prizewinners of a renowned poetry competition. Right now I'm running an experiment—can people tell real historical facts apart from ones invented by artificial intelligence (here). Do you think the guests who take it on will manage?
– I don't think so.
– Do we, as a people, know our history well?
– No. As I said above,
peoples neither know nor don't know their history. Only individuals can.
And only if they study it not through an ideological frame, but in a free search.
– Except that, in my view, for the moment there's no way to do it outside something that is an ideological frame, or at least by every measure can't be told apart from one… Which raises the question: why is it important to know it, to search for it?
– Because it holds answers (not the answers, but some answers) about the future.
– Should history be an impartial science? And can it be at all?
– It doesn't have to be impartial. But it does have to work solely in the field of truth—that is, with facts, documents, sources…
– What are your favorite Bulgarian historical novels?
– I don't have many. My favorite history book is Notes on the Bulgarian Uprisings by Zahari Stoyanov, but it isn't a novel. Otherwise, Under the Yoke, perhaps, stands the test of time. Certainly Tobacco by Dimitar Dimov; I liked Doomed Souls; The Peach Thief by Emiliyan Stanev, which is a novella… I remember that as a child I liked Svatbite na Yoan Asen (The Weddings of John Asen), and now I'm not even sure who the author is.
– I don't know either. For my part I'd add Dimitar Talev and Fani Popova-Mutafova… It seems to me an enormous challenge to peer into the past. What is the hardest thing about writing a historical novel? How important is it to render real events precisely?
– The hardest thing is finding the right literary language for the novel, so you can use it to build the world you want to bring readers into.
To “hear” how your characters speak, to get inside their thoughts, to act in their bodies…
The real events—for me, at least—have to be historically accurate. And seen through the eyes of a particular character, through his sensibility and his situation at that given moment.
– Alek Popov once told me that the great division in Bulgarian society begins with the death of Vazov—Ivan Vazov, the national poet, who died in 1921. That strikes me as a very insightful judgment. Is he right, in your view?
– No.
– Why?
– He isn't right.
There has never been a great division in Bulgarian society. Neither before nor after Vazov's death. Because our society has never been “united,”
except in moments of deep crisis—at the start of wars—or of supreme triumph, like the 1994 World Cup, when Bulgaria reached the semifinals.
In general, the myth of some “united” society is quite persistent, but like every myth it does not match historical truth. No modern society in the free world is “united.” United, presumably, were the smaller primitive societies of long ago and the totalitarian regimes of the last century—communist and Nazi.
– Still, rifts can have different depths, and in my view right now they are critically deep. And in some way so are the ideals—personal, group and national alike.
Can history be the path to us starting to talk to each other as a society again? To finding what unites us rather than what divides us?
– It can. But that can't happen in this toxic linguistic environment. First the culture of communication has to change, and it is completely compromised—from school to parliament.
– And through the social networks, which in my view have contributed a great deal to that. But we've gathered to talk about history. How is your novel Rana being received around the country? Did the reception surprise you in any way?
– It's being received wonderfully.
What surprised me was the purity with which it's received. And the age of the readers—from 9 to 90. So far…
– Did you hear interesting personal stories from readers?
– Many. Literally
in every town and village I heard some personal story connected with the wars
for national unification—the Balkan Wars—or with the First World War, or a story of Bulgarian refugees from the pogroms after the wars…
In Vienna, for example, I was surprised by the story of the great-grandfather of one of the people present, who came back after 10 years as a prisoner of war, and
everyone thought he had been killed, except his own bride, who kept repeating that he would come back,
that he was bound to come back, because he was alive. Because of this they decided she was mad… Or the many stories of people fleeing the terror of the bashi-bazouks, the Ottoman irregulars, in 1913, stories with infants crying so loudly that their mothers had to do the most unthinkable thing—leave them in the forest to save the others… There are stories of miraculous rescues, of deliverance… My wife and I even considered making a separate site or group for sharing personal stories…
– A very worthwhile idea, in my view. We really all have such stories, and they're worth telling, not least because they make us who we are.
I consider myself a fairly well-read person, and for me the ending of the novel is one of the most memorable I've read. Historical wounds, Bulgarian ones at least, look a lot to me like life traumas. They can explain many of the problems we have at a later stage. Is there something like that?
– Thank you for those words!
Modern neuroscience and psychology show the deep connections between physical traumas and the wounds of the soul. Also the connections between collective (national) and individual wounds. Many of the difficulties we meet along our way are the result of traumas that haven't healed, haven't been treated, or have been neglected.
– What heals the wounds of history?
– Reason. Words. Awareness.
– How do you explain the boom of historical themes in literature? In recent years many of the most successful Bulgarian books—from Vazvishenie (Exaltation) to Nishka (Thread)—have been historical. Can this help us heal our historical wounds?
– I don't know whether we can call the appearance of these few books a “boom.” But it's good that they exist. And each of them looks at a different historical period, from a perspective of its own.
I'm glad that a “family” novel like Rana opened the important conversation about the First World War, about the tragedy of the Bulgarians
left outside the borders of the kingdom during the blackest summer of 1913, when the Second Balkan War was lost, about violence and war in general—without digging into the wound, but rather healing it. I'm glad this novel turned readers' attention to their own families, their family past, their personal fate…
– But I see an enormous interest in history far beyond literature. My site is about technology, yet out of the 400 texts on it so far, the two most-read are about history. How do you explain this phenomenon?
– I grew up in the socialist era, and as children we were taught that the “bright future” lay ahead of us and that everything good was somewhere out there. Now it's as if the pendulum of collective expectations has swung the other way, and I see a fixation on the past, which for many people is a “bright past.” In fact both views reveal the same thing—dissatisfaction with the present. If you can't find meaning in “now,” you look for it somewhere in “tomorrow” or “yesterday” or “once upon a time.” The human mind is built to always search for meaning. And if it can't find the strength to search for it every day (because that takes a special effort), it usually takes it ready-made in simple, flat “truths,” usually from the mouths of manipulators.
There are always “leaders” who point out the problems, define them and offer simple solutions. The trouble is that these easily digestible solutions are ruinous for the collective organism, because they cause historical cataclysms such as Nazism, communism, vicious chauvinism, and in the end they don't solve the problems but deepen them.
– Although after the “bright future” came talk of “the end of history.” Maybe we've just postponed it? In the historical series of Digital Stories I've already had a history teacher as a guest, and a remarkable one. But how, in your view, should history be taught? So that it kindles, gives meaning… So that it's a source of pride and patriotism, not jingoism and hatred.
– History can foster a love of freedom, patriotism and respect for everyone's individual rights, but
only if it is taught by freedom-loving, intelligent and authoritative teachers.
They are often strict, and very important apostles of free will. Necessarily interesting, even entertaining. They are rare, but if you come across one, they leave a mark for life.
Their most important function in the short stretch of time they spend with us, however, is to direct us to the greater and permanent history teacher—our own reason.
