Aare Pilv received the annual article award of the journal Keel ja Kirjandus

Today the annual awards of the of the journal Keel ja Kirjandus were announced. The award for the best article in literary studies went to Aare Pilv, researcher at the Under and Tuglas Literature Centre for his article “Barbarus (ja Semper) ning “modernim ahvisugu”” (On the aestheticist roots of the intellectual Left in the first half of the 20th century) (Keel ja Kirjandus 2024, No 1-2, pp 144–157).

The article explores how the works and activities of close intellectual companions Johannes Barbarus and Johannes Semper reconcile their alignment with a decadent and aestheticist artistic stance with their leftist views (leading to collaboration with Soviet power and the writing of propagandistic poetry). The discussion begins with Barbarus’ poem “Journey” (Teekond), where the individualistic poet contrasts with the “modern apes”, representing progressivist and calculating bourgeois modernity. The article delves into the internal ambivalence expressed in Barbarus’ poetry, revealing simultaneous attraction and repulsion towards large revolutionary crowds; the poet likely perceives the masses primarily as a source of aesthetic sublimity akin to other natural elements. The use of Verhaeren’s name in this poem and elsewhere in the works of Barbarus and Semper is then examined. The second half of the article broadens the discussion, exploring the shared grounds of decadence/aestheticism and utopian avant-gardism – an aesthetic resistance to modern progressivist society that ultimately leads to ideological transformation through the actualization of utopia and the internal collapse of initial aspirations. Barbarus and Semper’s mid-­century choices can also be seen as artists’ aesthetic decisions, the fulfilment (but also failure) of aesthetic aspirations originating from decadence. The article concludes with the suggestion that aestheticism rooted in the attitudes of decadence may still be a viable approach to overcome the miseries of modernity – not by merging into revolutionary utopianism, but by assuming the form of “dark ecology”.

Keel ja Kirjandus (‘Language and Literature’) is a monthly journal of the Estonian Academy of Sciences and Estonian Writers’ Union. Aare Pilv’s article was published in the journal’s special issue on literary decadence. The substantial issue was compiled by the lead researcher Mirjam Hinrikus and the senior researcher Merlin Kirikal, both members of the decadence project at the Under and Tuglas Literature Centre. The special issue, including the award-winning article as well as all the other articles with concise summaries in English are available HERE.