The ethos of the stage: Eustahija Arsic

Abstract

The article examines the work of the first modern writer of the Serbian language, Eustahija Arsic. Undoubtedly, Dositej Obradovic?s student, in her short ethical treatise, published under the title ?Moral Lessons? (1816), presented a kind of list of leading virtues. At the beginning of the 19th century, almost every story about morality responded to the need to shape an intersubjective, national platform. Moral education aimed to create a better man, and a better man was necessary by all means. The 19th century will create it. He or she will appear in the form of an engaged national worker, liberal and cosmopolitan. The author?s profile of Eustahija Arsic testifies to the unusual, almost paradoxical modest courage of our first female writer. In order to illuminate it appropriately, we have firstly considered the configuration of the notion of beginning in the first decades of the 19th century. According to Eustahija, the beginning is a free act, the initiation of sharing, and its reflection points to taking the active life into one?s own hands.