The individual-society conflict in the place of the skull and invitation to a beheading

Abstract

It is possible to follow the effect of the totalitarian regimes that marked the 20th century on the masses and the individual in literary works. In this context, besides the works that exemplify the criticism of a particular regime, it is possible to say that in some works, similar critical approaches are displayed in a dystopian design with indirect narrations and references. In order to exemplify this finding, this article reviews Vladimir Nabokov's Invitation to a Beheading which indirectly criticizes the totalitarian regimes of his own age in the dystopian design and Cengiz Aytmatov's The Place of the Skull which includes the critique of a particular regime. In these two novels, criticism is directed directly or indirectly to totalitarian regimes in the 20th century. The individual has to face and collide with a repressive regime and its social structure. This struggle of the individual against the organized society will result in defeat and it will not be possible for him to live in such a society and to continue his life as he wishes. This whole process is discussed in both works with different details. In this article all these issues are examined in detail. © 2019 Cyprus International University. All rights reserved.