"There Once Was A Country"

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“There once was a country” are the mysterious ending words to Emir Kusturica’s 1995 film Underground (10/10 would recommend watching). Even without seeing it, a quick explanation of the main trope can lead to a pretty interesting discussion of postmodern ideas about the blending of history and fiction - ideas that relate to Ragtime and its portrayals of nationalism as well.

Quick(ish) plot summary: Two friends, gangsters Marco and Blacky, are partisans (like sort-of communist-y nationalists, but specifically Yugoslav nationalists) in Belgrade during WII. They, along with their extended family and friends, spend much of the war in an underground bunker, and towards the end Blacky gets injured in a battle. Marco, and their mutual love interest Natalija, lie to both him and everyone else that the war is still going on for the next 45 years, while they become citizens of the communist Yugoslavia formed after the war. Marco tells everyone that Blacky was killed in a heroic battle against the Nazis, and is remembered with a statue and a film is made about him. However, when Blacky emerges from the underground, he comes to the set of the movie but not knowing that the scene is fake, proceeds to kill an actor playing a Nazi soldier. The movie fast-forwards to the Yugoslav civil wars of the 90s, where brutal fighting in Bosnia ensues. Blacky goes completely solo, while Marco and Natalija become war profiteers.

Essentially, the whole film uses a very explicit (and creative) plot to demonstrate how the various characters were living in their own realities, either lying to themselves or others about the very nature of the setting. Marco lives through communism and his dedication dies slowly, while Blacky stays an aggressively dedicated Yugoslav partisan; but both of them are living in their own conceptions of reality, and cannot cope when they “emerge” into the new world. In the final scenes of the war of the 90s, UN soldiers walk around asking everyone whether they are Serbian, Bosnian, or Croatian, and Blacky angrily replies “I’m Yugoslavian!”, only for the soldier to respond that “Yugoslavia no longer exists''.

The film ends with all of the characters reuniting on a piece of land that breaks away and forms an island, all of them having a big party. Again, the phrase “there once was a country” appears. It’s reminiscent of a fairy tale beginning, playing on this idea of whether or not a Yugoslav nation ever even existed. Of course it did in a literal political sense, but were the divisions which tore it apart always real? What does nationality and ideology mean - in the minds of the people, how does a country “die”? Is a nation defined by political boundaries? Ethnic ones? Ideology? Does time or place define a nation more? Again - all really postmodern ways of deconstructing the definition of something that felt very familiar.

Ragtime dabbles in many of the same questions of nationality and patriotism - when the novel starts, we get an image of a nation full of patriotic spirit - Doctorow could have also said “there once was a country” to evoke the same sense of a mythologized nation/era - but the phrase “there were no immigrants or Negroes” as well - which is quickly undercut. The patriotic ideals that we associate with the early part of the 20th century hint to a nation which felt homogenous, and the perception of who is American changed as African Americans, women, workers, and immigrants status in society evolved. What did the American dream mean to the family, or to Tateh? Who got power and status in society? How far apart were black and white society - and what does this say about the definition of a nation?

Doctorow wrote Ragtime in the 1970s, a time when American patriotism was being questioned, and again a time when the rights of various minorities were changing. Doctorow begs the question - what is America? Where does it start, where does it end? Is the 1970s America the same as the 1900s America? If you replace every part of a boat over time, is it still the same boat when every piece has been replaced?). What underlying elements of American society emerge in the 1900s, and again in the 1970s?

Repetition is perhaps another element of the postmodern conceptions of history. Both of these works employ various imagery to make a point about history’s repeatability - in Ragtime, as we discussed during panel presentations, there are various ways in which mechanical objects and factories symbolize history’s cyclic nature. At the end of Underground, Blacky finds Marco and Natalija huddled together and being burned alive in a wheelchair as they circle a cross with a fallen Jesus - they cannot escape themselves or their own ideas of their nation, and this is how they die, going in a circle. There’s also a lot of water imagery - people get lost in vast underground wells or drown in rivers - all very chaotic scenes, but related to this idea that everything is connected by these underground waterways which are in themselves cyclic. Both of these works not only make a postmodern point about how we conceive of history, but also about how the present relates to the past - how history is cyclic, lives on, and interacts with us on a day-today basis.

Comments

  1. Alex HynesFebruary 9, 2020 at 1:29 PM

    That sounds like an interesting movie. You mention that in Underground, the character Blacky saying that he is Yugoslavian even though it no longer exists. I think that it is similar to Father in Ragtime who is stuck in his 19th century mentality and despite all of the changes around him, never seems to accept the changes. I think that the cyclic idea from having "there once was a country" both before and after could be related to Ragtime too. While we see a lot of changes in the mentalities of the main characters through the book, the world itself doesn't change too much despite the radical actions taken by Coalhouse. Similar to the question you mention about whether Yugoslavia ever existed brought on by the movie, in Ragtime everyone forgets about the radical actions of Coalhouse and just move on with their lives.

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  2. Anya Kaplan-HartnettFebruary 14, 2020 at 1:46 PM

    I really like your idea about how these two stories deconstruct nationalism. Americans like to ascribe timeless ideals to our nation: fairness, patriotism, work ethic, etc. However, these ideals have morphed so much over time and most developed from oppressive regimes. (This reminds me of the historical argument Maza references that claims the Constitution itself was written to preserve economic status rather than "establish liberty and justice for all"). What does it mean to believe in an American dream that is constantly in flux?

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