Boris Lijesevic: The citizens are both a problem and the key solution
Boris Lijesevic, theater director, believes that this time will be remembered only for its inclemency and desolation, because it does not nurture the values of the educational culture and does not celebrate virtues, but the cult of blood and longing for the past, instead. In an interview with the SEEcult.org, Lijesevic also talks about civic immaturity, which causes threats of an explosion of a new “powder keg” in these areas. According to him, cultural policy during the pandemic is reduced to survival only. But he sees current geopolitics and the chaos that arises during a simple business trip to another country as a much more terrifying problem - due to the non-recognition of vaccines of certain manufacturers and a series of meaningless rules, which have enslaved us.
Lijesevic often deals with the topic of guilt in his plays, and he sees it as a story of his generation, which he does not tackle to convince others, but for himself - to understand his life and what the time in which he lives had brought to his generation.
According to Lijesevic, the world is ruled by mysticism, the cult of blood, violence, darkness, nationalism, the longing for the past…
“This time will be remembered only for its inclemency and desolation. Nothing else”, believes Lijesevic.
“Things are not repeating themselves, they are changing within new circumstances. Life itself, as well as the evolving human and animal species. Evil changes shapes. It does not repeat itself, so that we do not recognize and accuse it. Today, evil is carried out in the context of political correctness. With clean hands. The devil is smart. He destroys the world with the illusion of rights and justice. (He) Takes away your freedom while teaching you lessons about the free world. Where is the correctness today? Justice is always on the side of the stronger or the more numbered. The one that is more interesting in the election campaign.” stated Lijesevic.
Boris Liješević, Upotreba čoveka
When asked whether art in these parts manages to essentially testify to life and whether the theater, for example, has the strength to represent all the dystopia of Serbian reality, Lijesevic said that he thinks that it is not a question of strength, but talent.
“(Branislav) Nusic and (Jovan Popovic) Sterija did it elegantly but sharply. No one was sharper in their criticism than they were. Through compelling comic situations and characters, they said the most terrible things about the world around them. People would die laughing while realizing in what kind of environment they live in. We all get affected today when we deal with that madness. It devours us, swallows us. We turn out to be ridiculous. Like some quasi-revolutionaries, Spanish civic warriors. And we are none of that, because we are just looking for our share of the cake and we are afraid of being forgotten and left behind “, stated Lijesevic.
Lijesevic sees the responsibility for the situation in the society in citizens themselves.
“We are the authors of our own reality. We agree. We raise loans when banks offer us. We respond when we are invited to celebrate victories. We are the ones who agree to hate. We want to hate. Hate is enjoyable. It makes you feel alive and strong. If all of us in this region decided to stop the hostilities, not to buy (tabloid) newspapers, not to listen, not to fall for incitement, things would change - these countries would become more pleasant to live in, safer, healthier” said Lijesevic.
*The entire interview (in Serbian) can be found on this link.
(SEEcult.org)
Funded by the International Relief Fund for Organisations in Culture and Education 2021 of the German Federal Foreign Office, the Goethe-Institut and other partners, goethe.de/relieffund
