Context N°22
If you happen to be passing through Belgrade, Novi Sad, Nis, Kragujevac, Subotica, or any larger city in Serbia, you shouldn’t miss a chance to visit a local bookstore. By looking at bookstore displays—selections that frequently range from world best-sellers, which Serbian publishers translate and publish at great speed, to a plentitude of books written by domestic authors—you will be able to gain an insight into the dominant trends of Serbian culture and literature. Some of these trends are like those in other parts of Europe—wherever you turn there’s a Harry Potter book staring at you from the shelves. But there are differences as well, and it’s through these differences that the characteristics of time, place, or language—as I’ll call them—show through. The present-day Serbian readership, partly because of already established conventions, and partly guided by its own interests—the exact nature of which is both easy and difficult to describe—still favors fiction over nonfiction. Although the number of nonfiction books published per year has risen sharply in recent times, Serbian readers still seem to prefer finding an escape from a not-very-cheerful reality through reading a charming piece of fiction—which helps transport them to a different place—to reading books that remind them of that very reality. And the novel, like anywhere else in the world, still enjoys an absolute priority over all other forms, whereas novellas and short stories are not really in such high demand, and are read mostly by true booklovers.
Serbian society, during the past twenty years, from the fall of the Berlin Wall and the breakup of Yugoslavia until the present day, has gone through a crisis that no writer, no matter how brilliant or inventive, would be able to completely describe, bring to life, or clarify. This crisis has largely determined and shaped contemporary Serbian literature and at the same time significantly changed its social role. The crisis period, a special chapter in our history that still hasn’t entirely ended, has been characterized by some major changes in the publication and representation of prose fiction, as well as by changes in the value system with which literature is judged (beauty, wisdom, and virtue—those ancient humanist ideals are fine, in their way, but first let’s see how much this is going to cost us!). During the transitional period, the large state-owned publishing houses—ideologically regulated, but also publishing some of the best world literature and theory—completely disappeared, and the control and shape of the market have since been taken over by private publishing houses, which, with a few exceptions, are not very selective when choosing what to publish and, as a rule, publish only what is certain to make them a profit (nonprofit publishing activity requires special financing and support). One of the biggest paradoxes of the Serbian social crisis, and the period of transition that followed it—in which the old system was toppled, replaced by a new one still slowly in the process of being established—was and is the enormous growth of the number of books published each year. On the one hand, this can be explained by the advent of more sophisticated publishing technologies and improvements in graphic design, by the relatively low costs of printing services, and the large number of publishers (when they exist, they naturally need to publish something), but, on the other hand, an explanation for this can also be found in the gradual democratization of the society, a growing cultural standard, and the extremely casual attitude towards the act of writing engendered by modern life: you sit at your desk, you turn on the computer, you start thinking about your life, and there, you’re already working on your new novel.
As such, in present-day Serbia, everybody writes and everybody is a writer, the end result being that, if we count translations, a few thousand literary books are produced a year. Some ten million people speak the Serbian language, another ten million can understand it, and the statistics on this enormous literary output (you don’t create art anymore, you churn it out)—presented every fall at the important and well-attended Belgrade Book Fair—look almost unreal. This growth in production, however, has not been followed by a concurrent growth in the number of readers, nor has it had a very large influence on the already-formed habits and interests of this readership. As anywhere else in Europe, new quality literary works are read by approximately two percent of the population. Imagine two full intercity buses. People are sitting, listening to music, watching movies, reading newspapers, talking to their seat-mates, sitting quietly, sending text messages, chewing on bubble gum, or simply staring out the window. Only two of them have a book in their hands . . . That’s it.
And how do you find your way through so much book production? And who should you trust when you ask the question: What should I read? Some will be full of praise for contemporary Serbian prose writing, saying that it’s one of the best things coming out of Serbia at the moment, as important as ajvar (red pepper spread) and tennis, while some will be morose, saying that you shouldn’t read anything because there’s nothing out there worth your while, Serbian prose writing isn’t what it used to be, you can’t find writers like Miloš Crnjanski, Ivo Andrić, Borislav Pekić, or Danilo Kiš anymore. Some, according to the old human habit—in the present day this may not even be considered a moral lapse but a valid means of self-promotion—will immediately mention their own work and thoughtfully direct you to their web site. Some, trying to hide the fact that they don’t read books at all, will immediately start talking about politics. Serbian society has been politically divided for more than two hundred years, since the establishment of the modern Serbian state, and it’s still divided, even in its literature. Tell me which soccer team you follow and I’ll tell you who you voted for in the last elections (at least two a year), and I’ll also tell you what kind of person you are. The situation isn’t much different with publishers and literary critics. The publishing houses each have their own advertising campaigns and, as a rule, every book that they publish is a “discovery,” something we’ve been waiting for a long time. Literary criticism is still trying to survive as well, and since it has lost its previous influence (still visible through the work of award committees), it is also undergoing the same changes: sometimes turning into a media-publicist-marketing mutant, and sometimes, withdrawn into academic and literary journals that come out in tiny print runs, it enters into a barely audible dialogue and discussion—primarily with itself.
There is no absolutely reliable method of finding your way through this labyrinth, but there are acceptable alternatives to surrender. Stay informed about the new literary output, nourish your curiosity, and consult several different sources if you need advice. Read newspapers and other periodical publications (there are hundreds of them in Serbia), search the Net, read an article or an essay, pay attention to the awards given out—not all of them, of course: it isn’t possible to keep up . . . but at least to the most important ones. In Serbia, a few hundred literary awards are given out every year, and unlike the people who think that there are too many (mostly the ones who’ve never received one), I would say we don’t have enough of them.
In Serbia, as probably in any other country, the novel is the standard-bearer for fiction itself, and so I would recommend acquainting oneself with the list of past recipients of the most prestigious award for the form (and, going back father, the most prestigious award in the territory of the former Yugoslavia). For decades, the weekly newspaper NIN has granted this award, and it gathers without fail the most important names in the history of modern Serbian novel, from Miloš Crnjanski and Meša Selimović to the lions of the present day. For the past two-and-a-half decades, the recipients of this award have been the writers who best represent contemporary Serbian prose: Dragoslav Mihailović, Milorad Pavić, Voja Čolanović, Miroslav Josić Višnjić, Milisav Savić, Radoslav Petković, Vladimir Arsenijević, Svetlana Velmar-Janković, Danilo Nikolić, David Albahari, Milovan Danojlović, Goran Petrović, Vladan Matijević, Vladimir Tasić, Svetislav Basara, and others. This year’s winner was Dragan Velikić, for his novel Ruski prozor [Russian Window.] The books by the abovementioned authors have been translated into many European and world languages, and a few of them have found real international success. The prestige of this award, the continued interest of the public and media in it, as well as the constant reevaluations of the novels which have received the award, have resulted in—following an old idea of mine—a publication called “Off-NIN,” which has assembled the most important novels that, for various reasons, throughout the years, have not been honored by the NIN Award.
What the NIN Award is for the Serbian contemporary novel, the Andrić Award is for the Serbian short story. The list of past recipients of the Andrić Award, with a few additions or corrections, could easily become the table of contents for a nice anthology of contemporary Serbian short stories. The latest winner is Goran Petrović and his collection Differences. It is interesting to note that a large number of writers who received the NIN Award have also been honored with the Andrić Award, which shows that Serbian prose writers are as dedicated to novel writing as they are to story writing, while those who are dedicated exclusively to one form or another are rare: the novel brings public recognition and a wider readership, while the short story is considered a genre that brings recognition within more exclusive literary circles.
Towards the end of the last and beginning of the current century, Serbian literature has gone through a phase of deep internal and external transformation, and, as a result, has gained a few new important characteristics. Following the changes in Serbia’s social model, from socialism to a regressive phase of post-socialist collapse that nobody, because of the uniqueness of the phenomena, has found a true name for yet, to democracy and thence to liberal capitalism, literature has lost its previous social function (ideologically affirmative or corrosive). A complete liberalization of public speech has reduced the real importance of fiction writing, which, in the past, used metaphors to essay the boundaries of human liberty under the old regime. Many writers who gained recognition during those days have now left the scene, and new generations have taken their place, offered no social contract of any kind. Each writer is left to his own devices on the free market of art forms and ideas. There is no dominant poetics anymore (but also no literary agents). The new social circumstances, in which the interest in art and culture ranks low, have spontaneously and indifferently legalized all kinds of writing. Write whatever and however you like! In present-day Serbia, you can be a Thomas Mann, but nobody cares—be whatever you can or want to be. The establishment of an art market, in which the new state administration is intervening, with good intentions but not always skillfully or with happy results, has separated fiction writing from everything else, and so contemporary Serbian poetry, for instance, or the essay, which produce equally brilliant results, are frequently pushed to the background. While the short story and novella are surviving within ever-smaller circles, playwriting, thanks to numerous successful stagings, has experienced a new expansion (in addition to Ljubomir Simović, Dušan Kovačević, and Vida Ognjenović, who have received numerous awards and been widely recognized, this newfound vigor was introduced to Serbian theater by Nebojša Romcević, Biljana Srbljanović, Milena Marković, Uglješa Šajtinac, and Maja Pelević).
As of twenty years ago, women fiction writers (and poets and playwrights) in Serbia have been very active in the area of romance- and adventure-novel writing, as well as producing quality literary work. These include Svetlana Velmar-Janković, Vida Ognjenović, Milica Mićić Dimovska, Mirjana Pavlović, Ljubica Arsić, Gordana Ćirjanić, Ivana Dimić, Mirjana Mitrović, Mirjana Novaković, and Jelena Lengold . . .
This is not the least bit surprising, given that eight out of ten readers of Serbian contemporary literature are women: after a millennium-long domination of the male perspective, the time has come for stories told by women.
The pressures of reality have expanded the themes that our writers are dealing with in literature. The traumatic experiences of the past, which have left scars on everybody in this part of Europe, are relived and reexamined through literature, and these have determined the structure, genre, and content of our writers’ work. And although Serbian literature has nurtured, for over two centuries—and with strong reasons—the myth of nationalist responsibility, oftentimes resulting in dark, tragic, occasionally pretentious, certainly serious literary expression, it is nonetheless true that playfulness, humor, and experimentation with language have never been entirely absent from Serbian writing—a trend that flourishes nowadays, when writing, for the most part, is free from any outside political imperatives.
The writer is no longer an arbiter of morality or taste, nor a political messiah, nor a spokesperson for the whole nation, but simply somebody who invites us to follow our own needs and wishes. The playful game of mystification and demystification is one of the nicer characteristics of contemporary Serbian prose—something I am particularly reminded of while reading books by Jovica Aćin, Radovan Beli Marković, Vladislav Bajac, Laslo Bašković, Mileta Prodanović, Milovan Marcetić, Miodrag Raičević, Djordje Pisarev, Franje Petrinović, Vladimir Pištalo, Slobodan Tišma, Vasa Pavković, Nemanja Mitrović . . . as well as the books written by those writers who gained popularity during the past decade, such as Srdjan Valjarević, Zvonko Karanović, Igor Marojević, Vule Žurić, Marko Vidojković . . . Each year brings a few new books that inevitably need to be read.
There is nothing very final or even general about my conclusion: contemporary Serbian literature, especially its prose, is following its own life cycle: sometimes it swims along with the current and sometimes against it, sometimes it floats on the surface, sometimes it calls for help, sometimes it plays the seducer, sometimes it inspires and speaks wisely, and sometimes it finds itself in shallow waters. I would be happy if you would take one of the above-mentioned novels and surrender yourself to an experience that only reading can bring. See for yourself, compare what you read with your own insights, experiences, and attitudes. I am sure it will be worth the time invested.
Translation by Ana Lucic
Note: Shortly after we received this “Letter from Serbia,” the Serbian media announced which contemporary novels published after 1989 have been chosen to be translated into eleven Slavic languages as well as into English by 2015, as part of the Forum of Slavic Cultures initiative “100 Slavic Novels.” The English-language translation of the following works of fiction are expected by 2015:
1) Pijavice [Leeches] by David Albahari
2) Na Gralovom tragu [On The Grail Trail] by Svetislav Basara
3) Komo [Komo] by Srdjan Valjarević
4) Ruski prozor [Russian Window] by Dragan Velikić
5) Lagum [Dungeon] by Svetlana Velmar-Janković
6) Kuća mrtvih mirisa [A House of Dead Smells] by Vida Ognjenović
7) Sudbina i komentari [Faith and Commentaries] by Radoslav Petković
8) Sitničarnica “Kod srećne ruke” [At Lucky Hand] by Goran Petrović
9) Oproštajni dar [A Farewell Gift] by Vladimir Tasić
10) Madonin nakit [Madonna’s Jewelry] by Laslo Blašković
We look forward to reading these novels in English translation, and to following the development of this exciting initiative.
