After the discovery of Slovakia, I knew that others had to find out about it as well
I’ll start with the current topic – the war in Ukraine. Slovenia has experienced it, albeit only briefly, relatively recently. Does it open up traumatic memories in you?
It will certainly provoke a war in the former Yugoslavia. There are also fears that such aggressive action is destabilizing the Balkans again. It’s not just about fear or reminiscences …
ConsiderationBut you know your vulnerability.
Both perspectives work in parallel: people are worried about what will happen and at the same time they have memories of what happened. I feel it for myself. I was six years old during the 10-day war in Slovenia. I remember how we had to hide in the basement. We watched the Balkan bloody 1990s in horror on television. We also experienced refugees. A family from Bosnia came to our grandmother’s village, they bombed their house. It was also my first and only positive contact with Muslim culture, I was fascinated by carpets and crocheted napkins all over the house. Well, the most pleasing thing we did to the swing.
To what extent is war reflected in Slovenian literature?
It depends on which. Two novels about the 1980s and subsequent independence were published recently in the 1990s. But the novel has not yet been written directly about the war, maybe it is more of a short story due to its short duration. However, on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of independence, the Public Agency for Books published a competition for literary works and film masterpieces on the right to Slovenian independence. But the Second World War is still a big topic. Drago Jančar writes a lot about her, his Northern Lights (1984, Slovak version 2001) play just before World War II in Maribor, but in the novel Tonight I saw her excellently treated the most painful blow of Slovenian society – the post-war murder. The purges were ordered by the then leadership of the Yugoslav party following the model of the Soviet revolution. But those mass graves have been deliberately hidden from the public for decades, though
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