Robert Hayden and Michael Harper: A Literary Friendship

I would like to thank the Slavic Review, and its fair-minded editor, Sidney Monas, for allowing me to break the silence on certain taboo themes and respond to critics—civilities practiced mostly in the breach in the societies we study. Due to space limitations, I shall respond fully to Robert Hayden, who raises many issues, apart from the problem of definition, and trust that in the process I may encompass also Matt Oja's thoughtful remarks. Hayden's critique of my article on Yugoslav camp literature is based on two premises, which he fails to prove: that camp literature is not well defined and hence includes a good deal of official writings, or, alternatively, that it lacks internal consistency; and that the very concept of camp literature “misrepresents the political and intellectual currents in the country.” Much of his commentary is an ad hominem argument. Curiously, much of it, even if inadvertently, substantiates my central thesis: Yugoslav prison and camp literature represents a catalyst in the current processes of liberalization, democratization, and humanization in both politics and culture in post-Tito Yugoslavia.

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Genocide or Partition: Two Faces of the Same Coin?

Slavic Review ◽

10.2307/2501235 ◽

1996 ◽

Vol 55 (4) ◽

pp. 755-761 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

Susan L. Woodward

Keyword(s):

Bosnia And Herzegovina ◽

War Crimes ◽

Ethnic Cleansing ◽

Legal Standing ◽

Nation States ◽

The Holocaust ◽

Robert Hayden ◽

Massive Scale ◽

History Of ◽

International War

Robert Hayden is not alone in wondering why the expulsion of Serbs from Croatia in 1991 and 1995 was labeled a population transfer and even justified by the logic of nation-states, while the expulsion of Muslims by Serbs in 1992-96 from an area of Bosnia and Herzegovina that the Serbs claim for their state was labeled genocide and justified establishing an international war crimes tribunal. Hayden wants to protect the term genocide, and its legal standing internationally, for truly exceptional instances—to wit, the Holocaust, and nothing else until, God forbid, there should be another such instance. By contrast, he argues, population transfers, even on a massive scale and forced, are not pathological. "Ethnic cleansing" of territory in the former Yugoslavia, whether of Croatia or of Bosnia and Herzegovina, is unexceptional, a normal part of the history of the twentieth century. Although final solutions are not inevitable—Hayden criticizes Croatian President Tudjman for writings that seem to have justified the Serb expulsion as such—"ethnic cleansing" is a part of the history even of states that now sit in moral condemnation of the Balkan horrors and the Bosnian Serbs.

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Racial Identity and the Patterns of Consolation in the Poetry of Robert Hayden

The Journal of Baha’i Studies ◽

10.31581/jbs-3.2.4(1990) ◽

1990 ◽

Vol 3 (2) ◽

pp. 35-46

Author(s):

John S. Hatcher

Keyword(s):

Ethnic Identity ◽

Racial Identity ◽

Clear Pattern ◽

Robert Hayden ◽

Points Of View

Few critics have given Robert Hayden’s poetry the careful reading it deserves and demands. As a result, his work has almost inevitably been misinterpreted and misunderstood. A more significant result is that the dramatic tension in his work has often been mistaken for personal ambivalence and confusion with regard to both his ethnic identity and his beliefs as a Bahá’í. However, an accurate and careful reading of his work in light the unmistakably clear allusions in poetry to his beliefs as a Bahá’í reveal neither ambivalence nor confusion, but a clear pattern of consolation that unites both of these points of view.

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