Epilogue

The survivors of the post-1878 generation of Bulgarian literati and artists navigated a difficult cultural landscape in the People’s Republic of Bulgaria, which saw arts and literature as tools of social control and propaganda. While the Bulgarian Communist Party democratized the arts and generously funded cultural production, it also imposed rigid ideological constraints. Writers faced a dilemma: conform and be celebrated, or resist and face isolation. While many members of the post-1878 generation found themselves pushed to the side, their values and legacies persisted through their translations, memoirs, and informal interactions with younger intellectuals. Personal networks of several generations of writers and scholars enabled the transmission of their values, contributing to the preservation of national cultural memory.