Great Serbian Short Stories

“But the country could not accept the bridge and the bridge could not accept the country.”

This quotation, from the short story “The Bridge on the Žepa,” by the 1961 Nobel laureate Ivo Andrić, whose story, “Thirst,” is included in this collection, reflects the essence of the state of human relations in the Balkans. Here Andrić observes that while bridges are built to connect and not divide, human nature, as it is, can lead to discord and alienation. In fact, throughout its history Serbia was a point of convergence, and even more often, a place of confrontation.

The stories in this anthology depict figuratively the banks on either side of the bridge in Serbia and the Balkans. On the one side there is respectfulness and coalescence, and on the other, turbulence and division among people along social, economic, ethnic, and religious lines. One of the best ways to get acquainted with foreign literature is to select an anthology in order to sample individual writers to get a sense of a nation’s literary culture. To that end, the purpose of this anthology of short stories is to enlighten the reader about Serbia and the Serbian people. This volume represents the quintessential anthology of Serbian short stories in the English language selected in terms of the diversity of topics, styles, and literary trends, covering both the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The stories chosen for this anthology represent the best available selection presenting unique tales indigenous to Serbia.

The nineteenth-century stories deal with life in rural Serbia, characterized by realistic descriptions, simplicity, and appealing characters. In contrast, Serbia’s twentieth-century authors are recognized for their courage and daring in confronting totalitarian communist norms, and later for literary innovations illustrating the environment, people, and values of democratic Serbia. These Serb writers rank among the masters of modern literature.

The first short stories appearing in Serbia of literary value date from the middle of the nineteenth century. During that period, the Serbian literary milieu was impacted significantly by Western European and Russian cultures, due mostly to two developments: firstly, a number of Serbian students acquired higher education in Western European countries, and upon returning, exerted their influence on the Serbian literary scene, bringing with them new and progressive ideas. Through the influx of such foreign-educated Serb intellectuals, Serbia was able to establish at least a peripheral literary connection with Western Europe. Secondly, Russian literature of the nineteenth century with its two literary giants, Leo Tolstoy and Fedor Dostoyevsky, were accessible to Serbian intellectuals because of the similarity of the Serbian and Russian languages and the ability of Serbs to read some of the works in the original, as well as in translation.

~ B. M.

Authors represented in this anthology:

Stjepan Mitrov Ljubiša (1824-1878)

Milovan Glišić (1847-1908)

Lazar (Laza) Lazarević (1851-1890)

Simo Matavulj (1852-1908)

Janko Veselinović (1862-1905)

Radoje Domanović (1873-1908)

Svetozar Ćorović (1875-1919)

Borisav Stanković (1876-1927)

Petar Kočić (1877-1916)

Veljko Petrović (1884-1967)

Ivo Andrić (1892-1975)

Branko Ćopić (1915-1984)

Dobrica Ćosić (1921-2014)

Aleksandar Tišma (1924-2003)

Milorad Pavić (1929-2009)

Borislav Pekić (1930-1992)

Danilo Kiš (1935-1989)

Momo Kapor (1937-2010)

Milovan Vitezović (1944-)

Miroslav Josić-Višnjić (1946-2015)

Radoslav Bratić (1948-2016)

Vladislav Bajac (1954-)

Miomir Udovički (1954-)

Ivana Dimić (1957-)

Mihajlo Pantić (1957-)

Dejan Stojanović (1959-)

Jelena Lengold (1959-)

Goran Petrović (1961-)

Aleksandar Gatalica (1964-)