Dimitrije Mitrinovic

Dimitrije Mitrinović

Dimitrije Mitrinović Serbian Cyrillic Димитрије Митриновић (1887–1953) – philosopher, poet, revolutionary, mystic, theoretician of the modern painting, globetrotter and cosmopolite.

Dimitrije Mitrinović was born in Bosnia during Austro-Hungarian occupation. As a young student he took a leading part in the movement of Young Bosnia (Mlada Bosna) in his country's struggle for independence from the Austrian Empire and in the moves to create a united Yugoslavia. During this period Mitrinović had edited a Serbian literary paper, Bosanska Vila.

Having studied art history in Munich he came to England in 1914 to work for the Serbian legation in London and moved among influential cultural circles in this country. Late 1914 early 1915, there was an exhibition of work by the Serbian sculptor/architect in the Victoria and Albert Museum, included a model of a monument he had designed, named Kosovo, to commemorate the Battle of Kosovo.

A mysterious personality of the Serbian and European history of culture began his work in the field of art by translating Rig-Veda and Virgil into the Serbian. Attended irregularly the studies of philosophy and the history of arts while staying in Rome, Madrid, Paris, Munich, Thibingham,.. One of the first advocates of the avant-garde artistic group Plavi jahač (The Blue Rider) and the distinguished lecturer in the German language of the works of Wassily Kandinsky.

Being the author of the universal utopia, together with the leading minds of his time, he wrote about the inevitable creation of the Pan-European community based on humane experience. Ten years before Ortega's work Pobuna masa (Ortega y Gasset: La rebellion de las masas, 1930) Mitrinović prophesied: "Being different from the other races, the population of Europe has always given birth to its contradictions and always with the chances of their solution in some ultimate synthesis."

Regular associate of the epoch-making periodical The New Age (the author of the regular column "World Events"), alongside with Ezra Pound, and – according to the statements of Edwin Moor, Mitrinović "has erupted with wild and profound contemplations..., not looking several ages ahead, like Shaw or Wells, but several millennia ahead.

The Utopian and messiah's ideas of the philosophical writer Mitrinović (incorporated in the philosophical concepts of Husserl or Peter Demianovich Ouspensky, theosophical doctrine of G.I. Gurgiev, and psychoanalytical school of Freud, Jung and Adler) were made public not only in the periodical The New Age but also in the periodical The New Atlantis (the editor-in-chief of which was himself) and The New Albion (edited by him together with A.R. Orage).

At the same time, he is the magnetic power of Adler's Society (1926) and of the Group New Europe (1926) – even though Adler and himself went different ways due, allegedly, to "politicizing of his scientific concepts". In 1927, Mitrinović founded the English Branch of the International Society for Individual Psychology (the Adler Society)

Even through being, the intellectual novice and loyal follower of the metaphysical Utopia (based on Plothin, Clement of Alexandria, Lao Tze, Jacob Boeme) the humanist Dimitrije Mitrinović has lent his ear to the political pragmatism and to political pathology. That is also the cause of his direct letters to Adolf Hitler in 1933 in which he accused Hitler of " behaving and acting as an evil superman... possessed with some weird vision" which is "uncomprehendable by the human mind and belief and quite certain, and in all forms and essence, directed against the Orthodox soul."

The works of Dimitrije Mitrinović have remained scattered in numerous European periodicals (like the provoking texts based on the cognition of the psychological and philosophical theories, such as: Frojd prema Adleru (Freud versus Adler), Značaj Jungovog dela (The Importance of Jung's Work), Marks i Niče kao istorijska pozadina Adlera (Marx and Nietzsche being the Historical Background of Adler), Načela genija (The Principles of a Genius), Carstvo snova (The Dream Land), however, the number of them is no smaller in the Serbian periodicals either (like the poems, or the unavoidable study Aesthetic Contemplations).

Except for the selected works of Dimitrije Martinović (published in the Serbian language, a number of years after his death) and the special study by Predrag Palavestra on this open-minded philosopher (under the title Dogma i utopija (Dogma and Utopia), in the Serbian language in 1977) we would particularly like to draw the attention of the readers to the two books distributed by Columbia University Press, New York; the first of them was published in 1984 and the second one in 1987. The authors of these books are Andrew Rugby (Initiation and Initiative, An Exploration of the Life and Ideas of Dimitrije Mitrinović) and H.C. Rutherford (Certainly Future, Selected Writings by Dimitrije Mitrinović).

It is quite interesting to point out to the future explorers or the works of Dimitrije Mitrinović, that in 1914, wishing to establish the movement "The Fundamentals of the Future" (as well as the annual publication Aries Europe), Mitrinović maintained the correspondence with the following potential associates: Giovani Pacpini, Stanisław Przybyszewski, Martin Bobber, Gersh Shoal, Upton Sinclair, Henri Bergson H.G. Wells, Dimitri Mereshkovski, Leonid Andreyev, Maxim Gorky, Morice Metrlnich, Pablo Picasso, F.T. Marinetti, Anathol France Bernard Shaw, Knut Hamsun...

Mitrinović's Library and Archive

The Mitrinović Library contain collection of over 4,500 volumes, based originally on Mitrinović's library. The Library thus reflects Mitrinović's very wide range of interests and command of languages. Particular areas of strength are philosophy, politics, society, religions and esoterica. The collection includes rare books on art history, literature, psychology, history, science, oriental studies, astrology, Freemasonry, theosophy and more. Most material is from the nineteenth and early twentieth century; the main languages used are English and German, with some French and Far Eastern and Eastern European languages.

The library was bequeathed to the Belgrade University Library Svetozar Marković in 1956, and the part of it donated to University of Bradford in 2003 and 2004.

The archive, which was donated to the University of Bradford by the Foundation of New Atlantis in 2003 and 2004, includes published and unpublished writings of Dimitrije Mitrinović and documents and correspondence produced by members of Mitrinović's circle, members of the New Europe Group and members of the New Atlantis Foundation.

External links

Categories: Serbian writers | 20th Century philosophers