@Dostoevsky
You talking about The Golden Fleece above? I remember you mentioned it before?
Yep. The guy is simply incredible and although sometimes tough to read the reward you get is out of this world. Eventhough he's recognized as a writer and one of the best we had, I think he's very underrated and a hidden gem, because he's rated usually by the critics yet people don't read him much since he has plenty of books which are huge. I thought all 6 books were great and thought that was the peak but when seventh came I was literally shocked how he connected everything and in what way adding Greek mythology to it and just busting it all around. I also wondered if it's translated because I talked with some girl who studied literature and we basically agreed it's hell of a job to translate it because some parts are hard even for us, as he speaks in a "weird" languague. I wrote a couple of words about the whole thing, so I'll just google translate it if you're interested, and sorry for shitty translation but you'd probably get the point.
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I will commit a sin at the very beginning by mentioning Andrić and Selimović, even though we are talking about the great Borislav Pekić, and mentioning how the names of these two great men stand out from all sides today. I do not take away the importance of both writers who certainly deserved all the fame they received, and who will remain as greats not only in the literature of our region, but also in the world literary scene. I mention them because I sometimes have the impression that big names overshadow other big names, equally big ones, which not only deserve to be mentioned more often, but also to be read more often - which is a drastic difference in this case. Only ten years ago, Podgorica marked the house where Pekić lived at one period of his life, which speaks of a great deal of disrespect for culture and the importance of the work of an individual who spoke about the atmosphere not only of the former Yugoslavia, the Balkans, but the whole world. He even spoke about a world that never even existed, but in such convincing words that you are sure that it was so. It is not that Pekić is not recognized as a writer, but it seems to me that he is more recognized by critics and a narrow number of people, and that his name is often bypassed by the readership, unfortunately also by the narrow circle of literary classics. Does it take a bigger classic than the Golden Fleece to make it stand out as much as it deserves, or does it need to be much smaller in size to reach an audience?
To say that Pekić is my discovery would be insane, because anyone who is at all familiar with post-war literature cannot but be familiar with at least some of his works, whether it is about the Cannes achievement or created works from London. However, talking about his works, especially with someone, is a great rarity today, and the rarity, in my opinion, stems from the fear of the scope of the works behind Borislav. It is not known whether there are more pages or books he wrote, but it is known that the published works have the power to resonate from east to west, or at least from Turjak to Thrace. The fact that only eight people, including members of his family, appeared on the twentieth anniversary of the death of one of the greatest and best Serbian writers speaks of the disrespect and insufficient popularity of the writer. I can't help but think of the direct link between laziness in people and the focus on quantity versus quality, where a large number of people give up the very thought of reading works that are mostly five hundred pages and more. However, that number of pages in Pekić's works rewards many times because it provides not only a book, but an entire historical period to which you simply want to return and look for hidden pearls in characters that are unforgettable and eternal like vampires.
There will always be dilemmas of aesthetics and ethics about Pekić's works, looking for an answer to the question of where his area is, however, the works he created and which undoubtedly have a "surplus", have that surplus as something special and authentic, and as something that will not work as a surplus, but as his personal stamp of a fascinatingly revived atmosphere and novels that have the polyphonic overtone that Bakhtin discovered in Dostoevsky. No, Pekić was not just a writer. Today, everyone is a writer, and it is written everywhere and without any criteria and criticism, unfortunately, even such a title does not say much today because it is available to everyone. Earlier, however, it was different, and the title itself had a deeper meaning, a meaning that adorned his works with awards such as Nina, Andrić, Miloš Crnjanski, and Njegoš's award, which in this case decorated the cover of the Golden Fleece. Borislav Pekić was an erudite. A man of incredible amount of knowledge, amount of read and learned, but also a man of great amount of patience who carefully studied each period through encyclopedias that are larger than his books, would he not be able to shape them and make a work where you can find knowledge of history and architecture to make-up and politics, and even the myths themselves, which he will expose in his own unique and extremely intelligent and humorous way. Apart from writing, it seems that he would be a genius in everything, and that he could do anything, since the amount of knowledge of all professions is equal to people who have studied these areas all their lives. And I thank him for choosing literature because he left a mark that will forever remain imprinted.
"The Golden Fleece" is a journey through not only less than four thousand pages but also a journey through history, a journey through intertwined family dramas in Slovenia, a journey through the Njegovan family tree shown through generations, a journey through the company's balance, a journey from youth to old age, a journey from the real to the fantasy, the path from the mysterious parts to the knowledge of the same in the following books, the path from the spiritual to the material, the path from mythology to reality, the path from Colchis to Slovenia. The road from Pekić to the readers. The road to the Golden Run on the already famous Argos, and at the head of which is the unforgettable and legendary Noemis who will very often make you laugh to tears.
I would never say that Borislav Pekić is a perfect stylist. This certainly does not mean that he is bad, far from it, but I would point out a large number of writers before him when it comes to the way of beauty expressed. However, what Pekić offers in his works is much more far-reaching and it is perhaps an impossible task to stick to all that on so many pages. This entire impossible task has not been turned into the only possible one, but it has shown that the borders of literature, both Serbian and world, can be constantly moved. An innovative approach to a novel of this scope allows the reader to view the novel from multiple angles, and although I have read this entire work only once, I am convinced that returning to the work is rewarding many times over. There are often parts that miss when we read something for the first time, especially of this scope and with so many philosophical and other gems, questions of truth and meaning, and here these parts would be supplemented by re-reading and when you find new philosophical traits or a remarkable sense of humor. in Pekić's works, and which comes mostly only from geniuses, because it is never violent but subtle, leaving the reader to recognize himself and others in those once harsh words and remarks that you will often hear from Lupus, Gazda, Noemis and others.
The encyclopedic knowledge and artistic design in Pekić's works, it seems, reaches its very peak. In the countless topics that are primarily composed of the most important issues, whether they stem from a myth or from the bed in which the lawsuits are conducted by the Boss and Tomani, we see the explanation of the writer's interpretation of historical events in extremely entertaining and mysterious ways. In the moments when you think you have seen everything, you realize that you are wrong, and instead of entering Christmas Eve, IG Farben and Nazi Germany enter the possession of a magnificent villa in Slovenia.
As for the plot itself, it flows in two streams, where the first represents the situation in the same villa on Christmas Eve, while the second stream leads through the family line of Njegovan and different generations who chase their golden fleece in their own way. Personally, I was most delighted with the characters such as Lupus, Boss and Hadzija, where there is a whole treasure and the Golden Fleece that is imprinted in the hands of readers. Along with them, I would also mention Simeon Sigetski, who is trying to revive the long-dead sultan with make-up. A large dose of humor permeated through the Cincar family, several centuries old, allows the reader to get to know and connect with the characters / personalities, having the impression that over time you become part of that whole family and its dramas that seem endless. There are key parts in each book, both important for the development of the characters and important for the re-smiles you will have when Borislav Pekić introduces new characters like Juliana, a Hungarian horse tamer, who decided to ride them all in turn, all the way to other events where Hadžija will try to help the poor in an epochal way and through a great misunderstanding and misunderstanding by the wanderers and the homeless.
Describing books of this size seems ungrateful and extremely difficult to do, but if I had to describe these seven books in three words, it would be, just as Pekić emphasizes in the work: possession, offspring, past. These three things fork into a large number of topics where the company / family, the golden fleece, and then the offspring will always intertwine, which indicates the very beginning and the beginning of possessions and families, making it a closed circle and creating: the future. And if it were reduced to just one thing in the novel that binds the whole work, then it would be a constant longing for possession. In this part, there is also a review of Pekić's earlier characters, although it should certainly be noted that even without reading "The Pilgrimage of Arsenije Njegovan", you can dive into this work without any problems. However, those who have read will meet again with the man who gives the houses female names, and will see his new pranks in order to get to certain houses, making a depiction of a real merchant for whom, as a native, the Njegovan family is portrayed.
What I would recommend to the readers is to stand in line and buy a ticket for an unforgettable sailing on the Argo, which in this case would be through seven extraordinary books, and a work that left a huge mark in the Serbian literature of the 20th century. The entire crew of Argonauts chased their Golden Fleece. Borislav Pekić himself chased his Golden Fleece. And you, dear readers, you already have that treasure in front of you, and it is in bookstores under the same name.
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We're yet to translate his other work but I did hear it's planned to translate more
