Oral history and written accounts are products of memories, which are transformed into text for future civilizations to store and analyze. It is important for different cultures to instigate the importance of retaining memory as it through this trait that their accomplishments and failures will be remembered. Nevertheless, memories face a fatal flaw considering they are the product of humans, who are inevitably driven by specific interests including political, self, and economic to manipulate the past to push their respective ideologies. Hegel, who is a culprit of this, writes Philosophy of History in an attempt to explain Germany's alleged dominance. Hegel bases his text off skewed memories from other writers to construct his own analyze Africa and Asia. Similarly, in the novel Mermaid Madonna by Stratis Myrivilis, the theme of skewed memory presents itself in the citizens of Skala, who attack
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Ironically, the attacks arise from the idea that the refugees threaten Greek culture, while the natives of Skala have no real definition of Greek. The village has forgotten the disasters of Anatolian crisis and the history of Greece and Anatolia, who have shared populations for centuries. Myrivilis, aware of these contradictions, uses his novel to remind the world that rejecting Anatolian culture was ironically discriminating against Greek culture. Thus, the theme of memory becomes vital to both texts as they present the dangers and spillover effects lack of memory has on different populations.
The anti-refugee hostility that emerges with the absence of memories in the Mermaid Madonna, allow misconceptions and prejudice to dominate the identity of other cultures. From the beginning of the story, Myrivilis makes it clear citizens of Skala oppose the arrival of Anatolian refugees as they refer to them as “ spoils of war.”
Ironically, the attacks arise from the idea that the refugees threaten Greek culture, while the natives of Skala have no real definition of Greek. The village has forgotten the disasters of Anatolian crisis and the history of Greece and Anatolia, who have shared populations for centuries. Myrivilis, aware of these contradictions, uses his novel to remind the world that rejecting Anatolian culture was ironically discriminating against Greek culture. Thus, the theme of memory becomes vital to both texts as they present the dangers and spillover effects lack of memory has on different populations.
The anti-refugee hostility that emerges with the absence of memories in the Mermaid Madonna, allow misconceptions and prejudice to dominate the identity of other cultures. From the beginning of the story, Myrivilis makes it clear citizens of Skala oppose the arrival of Anatolian refugees as they refer to them as “ spoils of war.”