This book analyzes the ideology-based reception of Adam Mickiewicz in Communist Poland and of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe in East Germany, the dynamics of that process and the strategies used to exploit the iconic status of the poets for the purpose of reaffirming the legitimacy of the new system.

This anthology of texts on Polish socialist realist literature, written from the early 1980s to date, depicts a comprehensive picture of this literary phenomenon: from its holistic interpretations, analyses of the general poetics and specific literary and political texts, to descriptions of how institutions of literary life functioned in this era.