It’s getting dark. And in the west somebody’s foot has tipped over a wine jug, pouring it all over the horizon. The new moon looks like the horns of the helmet in which Moses appears in movies. Pines smell of lemons and incense mingled. A soldier, tall and brittle like a rye stalk, is doing sentry duty. Brittle with love […]
A man who has never known suffering cannot be self-reliant, nor can he recognize his own value. —Joseph de Maistre We who passed through the siege of Sarajevo shall, of course, gain nothing. An experience that will serve no purpose: as if you lost your arms and won a violin, as Rasko would say. You can’t even tell others about […]
Tošo Dabac Archive
Dr. Midhat Ridjanović, professor emeritus of English and linguistics at the University of Sarajevo, recently published a major work on the Bosnian language – BOSNIAN FOR FOREIGNERS : With a Comprehenisve Grammar. It is a product of many years of research and writing, in which Professor Ridjanovć brought to bear his life-long involvement in language teaching and linguistics on a […]
Here lies Hlapic Tihmilich And this stone I carved with my own hands while still alive, so even when dead, I can still have a dream from my life for ages. And bless the one who will pass by, and curse the one who will overturn it. June 1417 A. D. Here lies Ahmat Stuk on his noble heritage. Let […]
At the far end of death the hues shall be better Translated by Keith Doubt and Wayles Browne © 2012 Keith Doubt and Wayles Browne
It was December 1992, the last day before winter break. I entered the school where I had been a teacher and principal for 15 years with nothing on my mind but the coming day, my students, and the lesson I would teach. Murisa, custodian and my dear friend, changed my mood in an instant. Her look of worry and fear […]
The break-up of Yugoslavia has generated an enormous literature – much of it poor, some of it acceptable and some of it excellent. There are several decent introductory accounts of the break-up that competently summarise familiar information. There are some very good studies of Slobodan Milosevic and his regime that do justice to the break-up as well. There are some […]
Angelina Jolie’s directorial debut, In the Land of Blood and Honey, is difficult to watch. Difficult to watch in the sense that, here in the UK, it hasn’t been released, and there doesn’t appear to be any information about when or where it will be – certainly not on the movie’s official website, nor in any of the reviews that […]
FIRST Wrought within the body sewn into the hide You’re dreaming of the sky once more spreading wide Within the brain enclosed in the heart detained Ever dreaming sunlight but by darkness stained Prisoner of flesh imprinted into bone Can you bridge the distance To the heavens’ throne? SECOND Caged by the ribs in silver’s grip you rest No better […]
Bosnia and Herzegovina is a meeting place of cultures, civilisations, and peoples whose existence is derived from their religions and largely shaped by them. For this reason, Bosnia and Herzegovina is a meeting place of religions. Relations between religions are reflected in all aspects of social life in Bosnia and Herzegovina. If Hans Kung’s maxim that there is no peace […]
Foreword Bosnia is the name for a thousand year-long tradition of striving for a plural social order within a shared political framework. Its grounds have always been sought in the sacred traditions Bosnia’s peoples have adhered to over the past several hundred years. Bosnia’s name is also linked to the negation of this, through violence and hatred of the other, […]
Belgrade, July 11, 2012. This year marks the 17th anniversary of the Srebrenica genocide. As years go by, new evidence of this horrible crime accumulate. Many sentences either for or closely related to the Srebrenica have been passed in ICTY. On the grounds of these sentences the International Court of Justice decided that genocide had been committed in Srebrenica. An […]
A decree arrived from Istanbul, An order from Travnik, Right to the city of Sarajevo, Delivered into the hands of Dizdar-aga: To capture the two Morić brothers, The two Morić brothers, the two young men, Ibro Morić and Pašo Morić; To capture them, to bind them, To bind them, and to condemn them to death. And furthermore the sultan was […]
Petar Petrović Njegoš once told a group of English officers about a visit paid him by two English travelers in 1843. One of these was a woman. They had come to Cetinje after a hard climb through enemy ranks to see the Montenegrin ruler and poet. Asked by Njegoš what made her undertake such an arduous and perilous journey, the […]
Consider Karl of Ernstthal A. k.a. Kara Ben Nemsi Who’d never been To Ottoman Turkey And only posthumously Bore the Wild West Clear to South Dakota Where a Shatterhand Would as soon kick aside As make a sidekick Of a Lakota (Sioux) Or of a Winnetou And the day is not saved To be savoured By a Hitler Who eats […]
It is not easy to speak about Srebrenica and the war in Bosnia here in front of you, because it brought you all here to this friendly country where you have found a new home. You have left your homes behind you as well as your memories of a past life, of your nearest and dearest. You have brought your […]
Kym Vercoe, an actress with the version 1.0 theatre company in Sydney, visited Višegrad in the summer of 2008. Upon a recommendation provided in a tourist guidebook, she stayed at Vilina Vlas Spa, not knowing that it used to be a notorious rape camp during the Bosnian conflict of the 1990s. When she learnt this fact upon her return to […]
What did Angelina Jolie do? She spoke up about the horrific drama of women who were raped, of what is the most painful wound for a human being: that another can desecrate and destroy you. The damaged sanctity of the human being, a Bosniak woman who was raped, disturbs the horizon of modern society, no matter that the United Nations, […]
Contradictory commentaries on Angelina Jolie’s movie In the Land of Blood and Honey stimulated me to watch the movie. It was already clear that Bosnian Muslims liked the movie and that the Great-Serbian nationalists loathed it, but I was particularly intrigued by the affectations of the small-Herzegovinians, who detested the movie in imitation of the Great-Serbs. I was impressed by […]