Serapion Brothers
During the Cold War Lunts was known to professors and students of Russian literature abroad as the author of daring polemical articles that aroused the most powerful Bolshevik critics against him. The chief articles are “Why We Are the Serapion Brothers,” “On Ideology and Promotional Literature” and “Go West!,” all from 1922. Their message was simple: ideological regimentation produces bad literature, writers must have the freedom to write what they want, such writing is more alive and exciting to readers than what is dictated from above. The Serapion Brothers, said Lunts, accepted all literature that was written well, regardless of its ideology, and debated the merits of each work from their individual perspectives. Toward the end of the first article, which was often taken as the manifesto of the group, Lunts declared: