Hvar City Theatre Days, Vol. 51 No. 1, 2025.
Original scientific paper
War and Collective Memory
Renate Hansen-Kokoruš
orcid.org/0000-0001-5496-6079
Abstract
The article is based on theoretical considerations of the complex relationships between collective and communicative memory. Even if it is generally assumed that collective memory is strictly separate from the dominant discourse, a change in collective memory would not be grateful without such a reciprocal influence. The theme of war has existential significance and is often associated with traumatic experiences, which is why a critical and subversive attitude is evident in literature and drama. Five dramas by contemporary playwrights (Neva Lukić i Viktor Radonjić, Edi Matić, Nina Mitrović, Tonka Mršić and Ivan Vidić) are at the center of the study, with the aim of identifying common traits and similarities in relation to war. The threat to people in everyday life, the fear of war as a form of violence, the ethical deformation of people through war, doubts about war heroism as well as the ideology of black and white stereotypes and the fundamental threat to human existence through war are aspects that are common and relevant in the analyzed dramas.
Keywords
collective and communicative memory; contemporary Croatian drama with war themes; existential threat; fear; doubts about war ideology
Hrčak ID:
330807
URI
Publication date:
14.5.2025.
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