Constructing the National Canon in Ireland and Macedonia: The Function of Folklore in the Plays The Countess Cathleen and The Land of Heart’s Desire by William Butler Yeats, and Proud Flesh and The Black Hole by Goran Stefanovski and Their Role in Strengthening National Identity

Abstract

The approach to canon formation adopted in this analysis will be to discuss it as a matter of institutionalisation of literature in relation to education and theatre, and in that respect it will be treated more as a phenomenon that distributes cultural ideologies, rather than as something that represents aesthetic principles. Following Raymond Williams who defines art as a set of socio-cultural relationships and the social practices that derive from them, as well as that at given historical circumstances different forms of artistic production are considered to be art, or simply significant works of art perceived as high culture, while others are subordinate, or marginalized forms of (artistic) production, we can argue that it is impossible to detach not only the definition of art, but also its production and reproduction (by means of its canonization), from the ongoing sociocultural and political processes, and that the construction of the canon, and especially the national canon, depends largely on the social context.