Is art dead, and is it woke that has killed it?

The International Literature Award of the Haus der Kulturen der Welt was awarded to Mohamed Mbougar Sarr in May this year, a decision which shook up the Hungarian cultural discourse and was still echoing in June. Two jury members, Juliane Liebert and Ronya Othmann, wrote about the selection process in Die Zeit and discussed how the evaluation of some authors included arguments about race and origin, which either helped or hindered the author in the judging of their work – with Péter Nádas, a Hungarian-born author of international acclaim, a case in point. This was first reported in Hungary on PRAE.hu and was almost immediately picked up by both the independent and the pro-government press outlets. The article incites against political correctness (for instance, in its subtitle, When political correctness overcomes literary quality), but it also uses distortions, implying, for example, that Nádas was excluded from the prize simply because he was a white European man. According to Liebert and Othmann, political correctness (PC) was indeed a factor that emerged during the deliberations, but the aesthetic assessment had already been made. Nádas did not therefore miss out on recognition because of PC.

However, the outcry that erupted in the wake of the article brought about, on the surface, a fusion of the Hungarian right and left,[1] and presented us with the false image that the only point of intersection of political and aesthetic opinions that do not seem to overlap in everyday life was our great Hungarian writer Péter Nádas. The incident also rallied the public against woke – in this case appropriated by both sides and used in a pejorative sense much like the US alt-right does, although woke is the awareness of the existence of racial and gender discrimination, while political correctness is the practical and theoretical manifestation of woke – while also sharpening the tension between the older and younger generations in the Hungarian literary scene.

There is a difference between woke and woke

‘Hungarian Europe’ or Eastern Europe in general (however diverse it may be) is not the same Europe as Western or Northern Europe, not only because of its economic history and the contemporary public climate. It is mostly extreme news that reach us under the banner of woke, such as the case of the black student who accused his white, dreadlocked peer of cultural appropriation, John Cleese’s self-cancellation over the cancellation of a British art historian, or the child who self-identified as a cat, examples that unanimously shock the Hungarian reading public. And, of course, in such an environment, many would immediately blame PC for preventing a well-respected Hungarian from gaining further professional recognition.

It would be important to understand more precisely what is causing the resentment surrounding woke. First of all, it is important to discuss woke from a Hungarian or even Eastern European perspective, as the phenomenon is rarely mentioned in cultural life in Hungary. It is questionable whether the pejorative, supposedly dictatorial woke even exists in a country where it is almost impossible to cancel (i.e., deprive of their financial, relational, professional support) demonstrably harmful individuals (e.g., harassers, abusers, etc.), where paedophile scandals do not hinder the careers of politicians and clergymen and where it is part of our everyday reality that public servants cannot be made to resign even after making seriously questionable remarks.

If we look at the German jury’s decision-making process in this light, we can in fact characterise it as the dilemma of a Western European, distinctly privileged milieu, in which postcolonial guilt was acutely at work in some decision-makers, and in which origin, skin colour, sexual identity and aesthetic quality were all treated as equal. I experienced this kind of guilt myself when travelling in Cambridge last year with the Society of Hungarian Authors (an oppositionist professional and advocacy literary association). One of the researchers invited, a British middle-class man, referred to the museums in the city as places where we keep stolen artefacts, while a local retired professor handed me a copy of Fury by David Morley with the comment that the Roma are finally being well-represented in literature (of course, I might add, if the women of the Roma community are fortune-tellers sipping whisky by the moonlight). All this was a theoretical manifestation of woke, but not reflected in practice: at dinner, the same people mostly talked about the political battles in Britain and praised each other’s studies instead of engaging in conversation with us, who were basically invited to talk about freedom of speech for Cambridge students as ‘sufferers’ of the Orbán regime.

I could mention a recent personal experience: in the spring, some of us were invited to read in Berlin in the name of freedom of expression and resistance to Orbán’s propaganda. At the end of the reading, I half-jokingly remarked – something I have long thought, by the way – that we were only exotic to them because of Orbán, and that, if not for him, they would not necessarily be interested in our language, culture or literature. The audience laughed, as if there could be no doubt that I was being serious. Of course, it must be added, the glass is half full: we were, after all, invited because of the domestic situation; because of it, we have received and continue to receive international invitations, the doors of residency programmes open to us and we receive a little more attention on the international literary scene, which (let us admit) would be a waste not to take advantage of.

In other words, the decision of the jury of the Haus der Kulturen der Welt is, in my opinion, a reflection of a Western, theoretical and, if you like, reified version of woke. Moreover, woke in our country, at least in the literary scene, follows different paths than in developed European societies. In many European countries, for example, the concept of ‘women’s literature’, or even ‘national literature’, is noninterpretable, as poetry in these countries now mostly carries an eco-poetic stake. Make no mistake: the climate crisis has not suppressed feminist aspirations, but it is rather the confluence of the two that has given rise to eco-feminist voices. Meanwhile, here in Hungary, every single female author is asked – twelve times in my case, I have counted – the familiar questions in interviews, such as whether ‘there exists such a thing as female literature’ and whether the author considers herself a ‘female author or authoress’, while female authors are still afraid to come forward with manuscripts on traditionally female themes, as they do not fit into the patriarchal literary traditions of the country. It is thus different when women do not dare to write about something because of the conservatism of Hungarian literary criticism and its frustration with the feminine advancement, than when this problem is, so to speak, a bygone issue.

In Hungary, where the Istanbul Convention has not been ratified and the morning-after pill is still only available on prescription (the last such country in Europe), it is important to have some, however weak, elements of what is called woke in the West, and it would be even more important to incorporate these elements into Hungarian cultural practices. This principle has in fact had at least a small influence in recent years on whether women authors are taken into account when deciding on awards and grants, and we can also see that, as a result of this, women authors are now more likely to stay in the literary field after giving birth.

Historically, it has generally been the case that feminist organisations are the first to react to many social issues affecting minorities. Hungary is no exception: we have vocal and broadly responsive feminist organisations. It is therefore no coincidence that the works of most women authors deal with social themes. For example, female authors under 35 years of age who apply for the prestigious Mastercard Alkotótárs (Creative Companion) award in Hungary often compose their volumes or novels around themes such as women’s relationships, abortion, self-determination in old age, etc. Yet the projects submitted for the grant, as well as many of the works published in Hungary, have been criticised for being created in response to a trend (or, more precisely, woke) and for being too trauma-centred and overtalked. Most often, the comments suggest that the younger generation is turning to social issues in the hope of winning prizes, and this phenomenon, perceived or real, indicates that the quality of the text is no longer important – what is important are the themes and/or the origin, colour, sexual identity, gender, etc. of the author. Nevertheless, such statements that trivialise a given subject, ignoring the aesthetic value of the work, illustrate the shift towards the (far) right of literary figures who essentially consider themselves left-wing and, in many cases, liberal.

Generational differences

But for the generations of writers born in the 1990s and 2000s, it is not just a pose to draw inspiration from social issues. On the one hand, these generations strive to consume content that is more sensitive to social issues, and this shift in thinking naturally also affects authors. For them, social engagement has become a given, just as the idea that the goal of the written text was deconstruction and pushing the boundaries of language was a matter of course for the first and second wave of Hungarian postmodernists. In the context of postmodern ‘navel-gazing’, an important question could therefore be raised: ‘Hasn’t it rather been the blinkered works of literature that have contributed to our inattention to the social and political problems around us?’

One is particularly perplexed by the condemnatory comments that declare certain themes to be trendy, directed by some people at what they disparagingly brand as ‘trauma literature’ that deals with the disadvantaged situation of women and children, violence, abuse, abortion or even homophobia and racism. It should be remembered that, when we label young or activist literature as woke, we are actually saying that we are upset by the struggle for equality and by sensitive psychological perspectives, and that we miss the male-driven literary canon, in which male heterosexual perspectives, male heterosexual stories and male heterosexual genres prevail.

Furthermore, it is necessary to distinguish what is at stake in the works of young domestic authors compared to those from the West: in an atmosphere in which books on queer topics and sexuality are only allowed to be sold in shops in foil, pursuant to a 2023 decree, and bookstores can expect heavy fines for failure to do so, and when the civil society in general has withered away in this country, and when the rights of women and minorities are being systematically dismantled, it is essential to stand up for discourse that breaks taboos. For this reason, literature and literary works with a social message are essential in Hungary, and thus serve as a kind of platform for silenced voices.

The mendacity of literary prizes and grants

But back to the International Literature Award, where the jury was criticised for not basing its decision solely on aesthetic criteria. Even the young (Y- and Z-) generation of writers, or those who strongly believe in woke, do not think that a literary work is good if the author writes with unvarnished honesty about their life, their traumas or even the discrimination they have suffered – that is, that the subject matter is the only thing that makes the work valuable. At the same time, the perception of aesthetics varies from culture to culture, from era to era, from reigning power to reigning power, and is shaped only by privileged groups (with economic, political or cultural capital), so it is not only hypocritical to claim that the jury of the German prize should have relied on some pure aesthetic ideal when awarding the prize to Nádas, but also mendacious to suggest that the awarding of the prize was corrupted by the extreme ideology of woke.

Every prize seeks – and has always sought – to satisfy some political, economic, individual or collective demand which is inseparable not only from aesthetic considerations, but often also from the topic or the identity of the author. Moreover, domestic prizes are not free from complex external expectations, which is perhaps not so surprising when one considers that the committees that decide on most prizes and scholarships are made up of members of the current government, or if not, then they are set up to counterpoint state-subsidised prizes. However, even if the latter define themselves as independent, in many cases the question of nepotism and bias towards, for example, male authors, arises. According to annual statistics, the number of female authors published in Hungary almost doubled between 2021 and 2023 (from 27% to 41%), but the distribution of prizes awarded to women only increased to 22% in 2023, while no women won any literary prizes in 2022. But we can also talk about the prestigious state-funded Térey grant which offers outstanding financial benefits and is known for trying (unsuccessfully) to avoid suspicions of political bias by taking into account authors both from the right (pro-government) and the left (opposition).

International awards, even retrospectively, can be subject to similar criticism. The Nobel Prize for Literature has so far been awarded to 121 authors, only 18 of whom are women, and, of course, very few of whom are non-Western or non-world language speakers (which, for a long time, no one saw as a problem), and it is questionable whether the concept of international literary prizes is valid at all, when every nation, culture and language has different concepts of aesthetics and literary quality. It is also problematic that most awards, even if they include Eastern European or Eastern authors in the selection process, focus exclusively on those with Western connections (gained through residency programmes, dedicated translator friends or sheer luck), who have books published in a world language and have thus become eligible for foreign (Western) awards. This does not necessarily exclude authors from the nations east of the West, although it clearly does not favour them, but only keeps the elite in a position of power – colour, origin, gender and sexual identity aside, Péter Nádas is in a similarly privileged position, as is the Senegalese-born laureate, the Goncourt Prize winner Mohamed Mbougar Sarr, who studied in France, as both have an extensive network of contacts, a foothold in the Western literary scene and an excellent command of languages (German and French), something not all authors have.

Nádas and his generation are also in a privileged position for the reason that Hungarian authors (especially under 35) have little or no chance of being published internationally, and therefore also little or no chance of being nominated for prizes. This is due to the destruction of Hungarian culture under Orbán, since the only organisation in the country that is currently engaged in the active promotion of Hungarian authors abroad is under government control, and there is a painful lack of literary agencies in Hungary to export quality literature. This means that only a select group of authors have the chance to get their work promoted in the West. And as I have mentioned above, although I believe that because of the Orbán regime, the Hungarian authors working in a repressive cultural-political environment are currently considered exotic, the spotlight is mostly on the author, not on the work. Moreover, despite the efforts of the publishing industry to platform as many authors living in post-colonial or wartime conditions as possible, it does not seem profitable to publish writers living under illiberal regimes. Doing so may make the publishers appear to be supporting the oppressive regime itself, so they favour authors who distance themselves from the regime they live under, express a strong critique of it in their works, or explore historical traumas.

Takeaway

So, is art really dead, and is it woke that has killed it? The controversy stirred up by the case of Nádas demonstrates the tensions and conflicts in the Hungarian and international literary community, far from independent of political views. It is important to understand that woke is not a homogeneous phenomenon and is present in different forms and with different degrees of intensity in different parts of the world. While in Western Europe and the United States, postcolonial guilt and identity politics may strongly influence cultural choices, in Eastern Europe, including Hungary, these discourses often have different emphases. So, when we, as Hungarian oppositionists, speak out against political correctness and use the term in the same way that the Hungarian right uses the term liberal (‘libsi’, ‘libernyák’, ‘libbant’), we are merely testifying that our views have in recent years shifted to the right (Orbán), or even the extreme right. It should also be added that, in order to maintain objectivity, it is essential to criticise all extremist positions, including extreme cases of woke.

The mission of literature and art is not only one of aesthetic, it is also to promote social dialogue and change. The Nádas affair and the controversies surrounding woke have, in their absurd way, once again highlighted the role that literature and art, as well as the awards system, play in how we view social problems. They have also illuminated the way in which the elites or institutions of each nation formulate their judgments of literary value, and the role of abstract aesthetic ideas or indeed the background and private life of the author in this. Literature is also a knowledge-producing life-world technology that can convey the problems of our time to future generations and inspire understanding and empathy in the readers of today. In this sense, art is not dead, but alive and dynamic, able to adapt and respond to a changing social context and assert its importance.

The original article can be found here. The current publication appears with minor changes, some of which are attributed to Mónika Ferencz. Editors of the original article: Mónika Ferencz, Ferenc Kőszeghy, Gáspár Papp.

[1] The terms right and left, conservative and liberal, have now been stripped of their original political and economic meaning in Hungary as a result of illiberal polarisation. In the Hungarian vernacular, leftism and liberalism include people who fight for equal rights and those who criticise capitalism and the government, in effect, all individuals in opposition to the current government. The terms ‘right-wing’ and ‘conservative’ are used to refer both to people who support the government and to people who believe in the importance of preserving national traditions, but more often in the former sense.