Must-Read Lit from Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia and Serbia

Courtney Angela Brkic shares her must read fiction, nonfiction, and poetry from Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia and Serbia.

by Courtney Angela Brkic

Must-Read Lit from Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia and Serbia

Trieste by Dasa Drndic (2007/2014)

A history of the 20th century’s darkest corners, the novel charts a mother’s search for her vanished child and a stolen son’s reckoning with the past. Drndic once observed that “there are no small fascisms”, and she is unsparing in her treatment of her material and her characters. 

The Collected Poems of A.B. Simic (1920-1925)

Simic was an Expressionist poet who died at 27. His incandescent work – about love, place, poverty and death – influenced generations of writers and resonates today. Only a handful of his poems have been translated into English. 

(http://poetrymagazines.org.uk/magazine/recordec72-2.html?id=12954)

Portraits of Sarajevo by Zlatko Dizdarevic (1995) 

These short (short) fictions of life in Sarajevo during the 1992-1996 siege are windows into the lives of extraordinary ordinary people. Dizdarevic was one of the editors of Oslobodjenje, Sarajevo’s heroic daily newspaper which continued to print editions throughout the war.

Death and the Dervish by Mesa Selimovic (1966)

Set in Ottoman Bosnia, this allegorical novel is a dizzying portrayal of a twisted psyche. Strikingly tender in parts, it is a timeless depiction of the delusional thinking that flourishes under oppressive systems. 

The Silk, the Shears, and Marina by Irena Vrkljan (1984/1999)

Published together, this memoir-plus-meditation about the life of Marina Tsvetaeva is an unflinching exploration of women’s lives and their relationship to art. 

A Tomb for Boris Davidovich by Danilo Kis (1976/1978)

These precise and brutal stories portray the hypocrisy endemic to any tyrannical ideological system. Shattering in their lyric details, the stories are as relevant to our current moment as to the historical events they portray.