Slovenia has some beautiful alpine mountains and Slavoj Zizek. It’s a small country. 57% of the people there self-identify as Catholic, but, interestingly enough, 23% choose not to specify any particular religion, and 10% proudly identify as either atheist or “no religion at all.” The current president is Danilo Turk.
When WWI ended, so did the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Borders, famously, were redrawn. Some got what they hoped for. Others didn’t. The Croats, Serbs, and Slovenes, eventually, figured they would create the country of Yugoslavia, which they did in 1929.
Originally Slovenia was a republic of Yugoslavia. In 1991, the Slovenes won their independence from the Serbs. They did so violently, and the memory of the brief (10 days) war has not faded.
Today, the tone of Slovenia’s culture is characterized by a robust democracy that boasts a deeply engaged, well-informed electorate.
Slovenia has been a member state of both the European Union and NATO since late 2004.
France Prešeren and 18th and 19th century Slovenian literature—the patrimony of our anthologized poets
Still widely read and deeply influential to many contemporary Slovene poets are Josip Murn Aleksandrov (b.1879), Oton Župančič (b. 1878) and Alojz Gradnik (b. 1882).
France Prešeren, though, seems to be regarded as the greatest Slovene poet, or at least the most written about. Here’s a lecture by a literary historian who works at Zizek’s university in the Slovene capital. At the bottom there are links to poems by Preseren, who appears to be interesting indeed. Here’s a characteristic stanza
Live, oh live all nations,
Who long and work for that bright day,
When o'er earth's habitations
No war, no strife shall hold its sway;
Who long to see
That all men free,
No more shall foes, but neighbours be.
Modernism, or “Moderna”
Apparently what we call Modernism, the Slovenian critics call “Moderna,” and “the damned poets movement,” which seems to not be pajorative at all. Dragotin Kette (b. 1876) is a name that pops up quite a bit.
Here one of our anthologized poets, Boris Novak, comments on the difficulties of translating Kette’s work. The essay also serves as a useful education in Slovene poetry.
Posts
