Medea from Colchis to Kolkhoz: Post- and De-Colonial Aspects

Abstract

Givi Margvelashvili in his postmodernist book - "Colchis in Medea Kolkhoz" - takes us into an interesting artistic game, which develops in the author's imagination, in the field of meta-realism. Here Medea is the symbol of ancient Georgia), while "Kolkhoz" is the symbol of Soviet Georgia.

In Kolkheti, on the Black Sea coast, a statue of Medea erected near the territory of the "Soviet Citrus Farm" ("Citrus Zovkhoz") comes to life and engages in dialogues saturated with irony, with the author.

From the many masks and interpretations of Medea, the postmodernist writer’s Medea is distinguished by the fact that, following the famous German writer Christa Wolf's "Medea", she develops the rare version of an innocent Medea who did not kill her children (they were killed by Greeks who put the guilt of the horrible crime on the shoulders of a barbaric woman from an unknown tribe ); the writer (real and unreal, Vakushi #1 and Vakushi #2), in fact, achieves to prove Medea's innocence, purification from sin, and consequently liberation from her complexes. It replaces the endless centuries-old sorrow, mediocre sadness and pain expressed in Medea Stone, with a funny dance that is Medea's catharsis, an attempt to change her tragic fate.

The postmodernist writer tries to free the heads of Homo Sovietikus from the Soviet Kolkhoz ideology and their complexes, by one imaginary character Polyp-Polimat’s (a flying vacuum cleaner with an attached EU flag) tentacles. It is difficult for a writer to get used to such a reality: how did the ancient civilization end its existence in the Soviet reality, in the Kolkhoz?! It is also unacceptable for him to present the symbol of the greatness of Colchis - Medea as an archetypal model of cruelty! That is why he is trying so persistently change the character’s tragic fate, petrify the tragic seconds!

The experimental game full of humor and irony of the postmodernist writer is aggravated by deep philosophical ideas and existential problems, "anti-thematic" and "meta-thematic" reflections.