Conference paper
EUGEN KVATERNIK IN THE INTERPRETATION OF THE CROAT LEFT INTELLIGENTSIA
Zorica Stipetić
; Institute of Contemporary History, Zagreb, Croatia
Abstract
The article demonstrates that Eugen Kvaternik (and Ante Starčević) is an enduring national treasure for the Croat left intelligentsia. In the youthful »nationalistic-revolutionary« phase, the left had an emotional relationship with him, since Kvaternik was symbol of purity and firmness of conviction, the only revolutionary of the epoch. In the new state after the World War I, the interest became cultural-historical, but Kvaternik became more meaningful as Croat national identity was increasingly denied in Yugoslavia. In an intensified political situation in the thirties, Kvaternik and Starčević, as founders of Croat national consciousness, became the subjects of political identity for many. In a series of literary and other publications, Croat left intelligentsia (Krleža, Cesarec, Keršovani) denied to their contemporary inheritors of the Party of Right the legitimacy of claiming them as their spiritual predecessors. It was in fact a fight against connecting the symbols of Kvaternik and Starčević to fascist forces in solving the Croat national question, because the fascist politics stands opposite of Kvaternik's and Starčević's democratic convictions.
Keywords
Hrčak ID:
206689
URI
Publication date:
2.4.1992.
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