Oh, You, Whoever You Are...

Initially, actress Paraskeva Djukelova suggested creating a recital based on Vazov's love poems, and then the idea expanded, and work on the lyrical narrative about love began with incredible dedication and passion. Vazov's intimate poems are his most vulnerable side – first and foremost from an artistic perspective. Vazov began writing at the age of 19, inspired by his love for Katerina; he had not yet developed a lyrical style, there were no models, if you will, nor even a literary language, and his poems were merely a sensual force. Most of them burned during the fire in Sopot, while some survivors, as well as those written later in Ruse, were included in "May Bouquet". Much later, only in 1919, in his personal anthology "My Lullaby Has Smelled," we encounter constructed, well-structured and mastered intimate poems – but even the most successful among them do not reach the power and might of his true masterpieces. Vazov's intimate poems are his most vulnerable side also because in a special way we have denied him this belonging to the sensual, personal essence of life, and he himself was more than restrained, laconic and discreet on the matter, here and there letting slip some painful word before Prof. Shishmanov or in a letter. Regarding the writer's personal existence, only guesses circulate, an unhealthy interest in his death and almost no understanding of the era, mission, patriarchal upbringing and value consistency that predetermine his huge, though trembling from infatuations, loves and inspirations, SOLITUDE. Alone and shared with everyone, with his people. "Oh, You, Whoever You Are..." is a lyrical collage that, with much theatrical imagination and reverence, attempts to answer the questions: Who are the beloved, mysterious women who inspired the poet? Who are the women behind his majestic bearing? What is the presence of Suba Vazova – the mother, watching over until the end of her life like an eagle not only over her firstborn son Ivan, but also over all her nine children? Nevertheless, it is known how loved and loving the poet was – from the first love with Katerina to the twilight one – towards Evgenia Mars, to whom he silently dedicates his anthology "My Lullaby Has Smelled" in 1919. The unshared love with the baptized Turkish woman Pesho in Berkovitsa, to whom Vazov gives the poetic name Zihra, as in the eponymous poem dedicated to her, and the shaking, fateful meeting, and the two-year experienced happiness with Pelagia in Plovdiv, are among the significant events in the lyrical narrative about the poet, inspired by many of his poems, excerpts from letters and memories... Mirela Ivanova