intervju / Interview
Sjajno je što Er Srbija leti iz Niša Znam da za tebe od Niša nema lepšeg mesta, ali od- letiš li ponekad negde Er Srbijom? – Lepo je što je Er Srbija uvela liniju Niš–Beograd. Ina- če, ta linija je postojala i pre Drugog svetskog rata. A tu su i druge destinacije, tako da je stvarno lepa stvar ka- da iz rodnog grada možeš da odletiš u Atinu, Keln ili Istanbul... Doskora je to bila privilegija prestoničana. Moja sledeća destinacija je Ljubljana, gde planiram pro- mocije i razgovore sa izdavačima. Dosta putujem i jed- no od putovanja koje je ostavilo veliki utisak na mene je bilo ono na Maltu, to nije samo putovanje kroz prostor nego i kroz vreme, kao da ste negde u srednjem veku.
the surface a little. He was found dead in a kneel- ing position, hanging from someone else’s belt on a branch as thick as a child’s arm. People who claimed in the 1960s that he’d committed suicide changed their minds suddenly following the collapse of the Socialist Federal Yugoslavia, the police and Secu- rity Service files on him disappeared, most likely destroyed, along with all other documentation... So many decades after the fact, it’s no longer so much a matter of whether it was suicide, because it’s long been clear that it wasn’t, but rather that the established canon should be changed. And it’s also changing, with suicide having been removed from Branko’s biographies and replaced with “died under unexplained circumstances” instead. In the latest documentary about him, which was released last year, it is stated clearly that he was murdered, while the recently published monograph of the So- ciety of Writers of Niš, which contains the biogra- phies of all members from the 1950s to the pres- ent day, it is also stated clearly in the entry linked to Miljković – “murdered in Zagreb in 1961”, and that’s the first official document to treat the mat- ter in this way. The truth is slowly coming to light.” Do you have a favourite among Branko’s poems and does your book address the unhappy love story behind Uzalud je bu- dim [In Vain I Wake Her]? “It’s tough to pick a favourite among Branko’s poems, but for this specific instance I’ll choose Re- membrance of the Deceased, a verse of which I bor- rowed for the title of the novel. When it comes to the creation of the poem In Vain I Wake Her, that is mentioned and explained in the novel. Branko dedicated the poem to his tragically departed neigh- bour Ruža Đorđević, who was killed in the Allied bombing of Niš towards the end of World War II.” It's wonderful that Air Serbia is flying from Niš I know that there’s no prettier place for you than Niš, but do you sometimes fy away with Air Serbia? “It’s nice that Air Serbia has introduced a Niš-Belgrade route. Interestingly, that route also existed before World War II. And there are also other destinations, so it’s a really nice thing when you can fly from your hometown to Athens, Cologne or Istanbul... Until recently, that was an exclusive privilege of the capital city. My next trip is to Ljubljana, where I plan promo- tions and discussions with publishers. I do plenty of travelling and one of the trips that left a big impression on me was to Malta, which isn’t only a trip through space, but also through time, as if you are going somewhere in the Middle Ages.”
ing the mystery of life and the world. So, he wasn’t one of the many “haunted” bleak poets, as he is of- ten declared, nor was he a propagandist poet or a state amplifier, but rather a misunderstood geni- us who was at war with the world around him. And with himself. He was burned in that battle, but on- ly after he had, like Prometheus, brought fire to the people. His life and works should be celebrated, as opposed to forever mourning his untimely demise.” Will we be able to believe in this wri- ter after reading Zvezda nad prazninom [Star Above the Void]? You base your story on facts, but it then breaks out in- to fiction... “Ursula Le Guin once said: fiction is truth in- side a lie. In literature, and in art generally, it is the substance that’s important, not the packaging. You read Dostoevsky’s The Idiot, for example, and you know that the characters are made up, that the de- picted events never occurred in the way they’re de- scribed in the book, but wait a minute... Haven’t we all at least once in our lifetime encountered a Prince Myshkin? Haven't we all at least once won- dered what separates good from evil, and wheth- er absolute justice and fairness are merely illuso- ry? The world of the novel is fictitious, false, but its substance is true and that counts, because it ad- dresses major themes like life, love, death, good and evil... My stories often combine real people with fic- tional situations, but that’s also the case with Tol- stoy, Dobrica Ćosić or Hilary Mantel; that’s noth- ing new in literature.” Is it even possible to recount a truthful version of Branko’s death? Are you cer- tain he was murdered? “That arrangement with his suicide was so clum- sily staged that it falls apart as soon as you scratch
40 | Književnost » Literature
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