ABSTRACT
A latecomer even in its regional context, the Bulgarian project of national revival was based on an acute sense of an asymmetric relationship to Europe. The underlying assumption was that the actual Bulgarians were barbarians; however, they had a potential of becoming true Europeans if they embarked on a rigorous process of self-education. It is not by chance that the national educational system, which was one of the most belatedly formed in the region, had a spectacular growth by the turn of the century and produced a broad layer of state-employed teachers and bureaucrats who constituted the strongest group of supporters of the nation-state building project and were the principal mediators, and often the main producers, of the national discourse. Consequently, the national ideology transmitted by these social groups was centred on concepts such as culturedness (kulturnost) and development. 1 Raised in the 1880–90s, the first post-liberation generations were profoundly influenced by the positivist cultural atmosphere, which at this point was pervading the ‘most advanced’ Western countries, to which Bulgarians turned for cultural models (mostly Germany and France). This discourse was in line with the representation of Bulgaria in international scientific and popular literature. This can be seen in Karl Kassner’s sympathetic portrayal of Bulgaria from 1916, 2 which describes it as a country craving for the German civilizing mission, as well as in Albrecht Wirth’s overview of the Balkans, written on the eve of the First World War, describing it as a state in almost natural conditions, with an enlightened small academic elite making huge efforts to Europeanize the country. 3
