A Postcard-Modernist View of History

I return today to a theme that engaged my attention (if not my readers’) on a previous occasion (see Post “Adrift on Land”, 18th. June). In that Post I related some thoughts that I and Ruth had had following our travels through North-Eastern Europe concerning the mutability of frontiers, cultures and moralities. We are now at the marches of the Balkans (the word Balkan is originally Turkish and means “mountains”, seemingly) and, in preparation, I have been reading, fairly arbitrarily, The Break-up of the Soviet Empire in Eastern Europe (Ghita Ionescu), The Penguin Atlas of World History, Vol. 1, The Penguin Atlas of Medieval History (Colin McEvedy), The Penguin Atlas of Diasporas (Chaliand and Rageau), Black Lamb and Grey Falcon (Rebecca West) and Balkan Ghosts by Robert Kaplan. I had been hoping that some of these would fill in some of the many gaps in my knowledge of Balkan history and even, with luck, explain why things turn out as they do.

If in our learning about North-Eastern European history we had difficulty in separating heroes from villains, what I have read about the Balkans almost makes me doubt whether there is any reliable morality at all. The VIth. Century Greek philosopher Stephen of Byzantium wrote that,”Mythology is what never was, but always is”. If you had as much difficulty in the recent former Yugoslav wars in deciding whose side you were on as I had, it looks as though we were in good company. In the latest round of wars in the Balkans, well-meaning Protestants, Catholics, Orthodox and Muslims have set about each other with a ferocious intensity, embraced their enemies and killed their friends. Then they all change places and start again. Kaplan wrote that the Balkans is a place full of small nations which used to be great, remember that greatness and want all of it back. All of it, right?

To me it seems that Europe is like a Coach Station waiting room. Various peoples are sitting around waiting for their time to come – or come again. A group of Poles and Lithuanians come in, occupy the best seats near the fire and then dash out. Ottomans rush in at the door, push the Serbs and Macedonians out of their way and take their seats. The Ottomans leave and there is pushing and shoving between the Greeks and Albanians about taking their places. Chaos reigns for a time as a crowd of Communist school children fill the room arguing about who was in charge of the ideology. Meanwhile a departing traveller has left a small bundle of religious bigotry over by the drinks dispenser. Ah! It’s been picked up by some Romanian Saxons on their way to Frankfurt. From time to time an old Hungarian cleaner comes in and sweeps up some of the leftover culture. Near panic breaks out as a horde of Tartars rush in. No problem, though, they were only looking for the toilets. What's that hanging out of the Ruthenian's rucksack? Although there are some quieter moments in the night when there are few coaches running, the waiting room is never entirely at rest. There is always someone on the move. As you might think, the restless is history.

(I’m not sure that any of this is actually a post-modernist view, but I understand very little of post-modernist theory and like it not a bit.)



Ruth has added a Post-Modern Hat Dance that John performed in on Friday night.