As part of the programme of the Centre of the Forum of Slavic Cultures in Belgrade, a literary evening dedicated to the Bulgarian writer Zdravka Evtimova and her novel “Thursday” took place at the National Library of Serbia. The work, translated into Serbian by Elizabeta Georgiev, was published in the 100 Slavic Novels collection.
Gojko Božović, Director and Editor of the publishing house Arhipelag, and Vesna Trijić, Head of the Centre of Slavic Cultures in Belgrade, spoke about the novel Thursday by Bulgarian writer Zdravka Evtimova in front of the audience in the atrium of the National Library of Serbia, as well as for those who followed the live stream on Facebook.
Božović and Trijić agreed that the 100 Slavic Novels collection, with its central idea and programme objectives, is a rare opportunity to bring together and get to know the Slavic literatures better. As one of the most important results, Gojko Božović highlighted the affirmation of a new generation of translators from Slavic languages in all the countries involved in the project.
In discussing the artistic merits of the novel, the speakers focused on the concision of the author’s expression, the narrative skill of her depiction of characters and situations, and the evocative thematisation of transition as a social and economic problem. One of the conclusions was that the artistic depiction of the period after the fall of the Berlin Wall in different Slavic literatures reveals deep analogies between seemingly quite different national experiences. Therefore, according to Gojko Božović, the Serbian readers can identify with the heroines of the novel Thursday and find in their fates some of their own moral and existential dilemmas.
