« Vladimir » – a modern campus -roman
« Vladimir » by Julia May Jonas
trans. from English Hope Rose, Orange Books, S., 2025
The Campus Roman genre is generally characteristic of the English-language tradition. In it, the action takes place on a university campus and the focus is life in departments and colleges. The first such novel is considered the « Forests of the Academy » by Mary McCarthy, published in 1952. Usually these types of novels are satirical with regard to the figures of university professors. Among the most famous authors in the genre are David Lodge with « Exchange. A story about two universities » and « Small World. Academic Romance », as well as Kingsley Ais. The genre is also more broader-spectrum novels, with a clear political cause like Philip Roth’s « human spot » and J. M. Kutsi.
Julia May Jonas’s « Vladimir » seems to be in the tradition in question, responding to the changes with which the genre today marks. For The plot is under the sign of the #Metoo phenomenonas well as topics such as academic freedom today in the context of political correctness, self -determination of young people and talking about the variable identity, as – of course – and the traditions of power in educational institutions, its uses, but also the social causes that the world is facing at the moment.
It is no coincidence that in interviews the writer says that her intention with her debut was to write a novel that commented on the problems of sexuality, gender and power.
Alec Popov and contemporary Bulgarian literature
Focusing on a teacher who has power and exercises it to sleep with his students is a relatively worn plot. The new, which is added in the case and which is in tune with today’s policies, is the organization of the victims and their unwillingness to remain silent, leading to accusations, hearing, loss of academic position and removal from teaching. In short, if such novels lack the reimbursement, punitive measures here are a fact.
| It seems that Jonas’ novel is for the present, and he talks about the organized power of women and the rights they have won to defend their freedom. |
But the novel actually goes beyond this topic. It focuses mainly on the images of women who swallow such a situation or because they do not see a problem in it, or because they are offended that others are noticed. Key in this regard is the image of the wife of accusations, also a professor, a supporter of a free marriage, who is rather looking to protect himself from the damage from what happened And somehow unspoken, he does not condemn her husband, does not want a divorce, etc., does not talk to his students about the situation, at least until at least a moment.
Her indifference to what happened, the thought that the girls were also not innocent because they were attracted to the power position of their teacher, enhances this look at the missing female solidarity. Here, too, Jonas seems to open to the generational gaps to show that what was the norm for the older is unacceptable to the new ones.
We will also be tempted to define « Vladimir » as a novel that belongs to postfheimistic attitudes. Postfeminism, which, according to many researchers, has replaced classical feminism, often presents femininity as a state of vitality as a symbolic « deadly » social and economic areas of modern Western culture.
A modern replica of ST Coleridge
The heroine here is vital, playful, young, and in general – successful. For older women, the only way to vitality and femininity – as it is, is through transformation (the idea of rejuvenation: sex with a young partner, plastic surgery, etc.). We mention this because Jonas’s heroine, who has no name, perhaps as a sign of the invisibility of the losing the beauty of youth women, is possessed by a mania for youth, competition with the students, and not just wishes a younger partner, but is convinced that this is his desire.
The Vladimir in question, of Russian origin, a promising writer and a teacher, concentrates all the thoughts of the aggravated professor, becomes the reason for her to return not only to passion, but also to the passion in writing. And to cross the boundaries to achieve what is desired.
However, the point is that young or older, women at Jonas inhabit a world where they, despite attempts to free themselves from restrictions, face norms that do not benefit them. Perhaps that is why the finale, which is quite implausible and sweet, which is a weakness of the novel, kills in teaching, and as some critics say – it looks like a finale of a strange conservative moral tale.
Despite this weakness, however, Vadimir is a strong debut, in which we find references to Vladimir Nabokov’s « Lolita » and « Pinn », and who delves into the topic of female pain and her fetishization in art.
