Destiny With Notes

СУДБИНА И КОМЕНТАРИ
Serbia
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Radoslav Petković
Everything passes too quickly, and we made all our decisions long ago and too hastily, without realizing we were doing so, for that is simply how it has to be, since we were never given more time. But this is not determined by the qualities we usually boast of—reason, virtue—but rather by a mysterious intuition within us or a mysterious hand that guides us. Pavel Volkov came to terms with this realization; until then, he had believed that he was handling his life perfectly, just as a good writer might believe he is handling his story and the way he tells it.

The novel Destiny with Notes represent one of the key works of prose in modern Serbian literature from the late 20th century. Witty, insightful, and gripping, the narrative first takes us through the events of the turbulent 19th century with the help of Russian officer Pavel Volkov, while historian Pavle Vuković serves as our guide through the twists and turns of the 20th century, posing questions about revolution, political regimes, and, of course, love (questions that, in a curious way, echo those of Pavel Volkov’s century), meaningfully rounds out the insight into the cyclical nature of history and/or its non-fatalism.

Radoslav Petković (Belgrade, 1953–2024) was a novelist, short story writer, and essayist.

His novels include The Road to Dvigrad (1979), Notes from the Year of Strawberries (1983), Shadows on the Wall (1985),  Destiny with Notes (1993), and Perfect Memory of Death (2008). His short story collections are Report on the Plague (1989) and The Man Who Lived in Dreams (1998). His essayistic prose works include An Essay on the Cat (1995), Speaking of Michelangelo (2006), Byzantine Internet( 2007), The Use of Elves (2008), and The Event of the Year (2010).

Major awards include the Meša Selimović Award, the NIN Award for Best Novel of the Year, the Borisav Stanković Award, the Ivo Andrić Award, and the Vital Award for Book of the Year.

The works of Radoslav Petković have been translated into English, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Bulgarian, Slovenian, Slovak, and Macedonian.
He translated into Serbian the works of G. K. Chesterton, J. R. R. Tolkien, Daniel Defoe, and Robert Louis Stevenson.