ZIMSKO PUTOVANJE ILI PRAVDA ZA SRBIJU Petera Handkea je spoj eseja o događajima koji su stvorili radoznalost kod njega prema srpskoj odnosno pro-jugoslovenskoj strani rata i putopis o njegovim prvim dužim posetama Srbiji. Oba segmenta su zanimljiva s tim što je ovaj prvi o prepoznavanju nepravde nama nekako dobro poznat jer su slična razmišljanja imali i mnogi ljudi odavde. S druge strane, putopisni deo je zanimljiviji pre svega zbog predela i krajeva za koje se opredelio Handke da ih poseti i opiše i načina na koji ih je doživeo, kao i zbog zanimljivo opisanih susreta sa našim čuvenim piscima Bulatovićem, Pavićem i Velikićem. Ova knjiga nije bez trajne vrednosti ali svakako da je u međuvremenu Handkeovo poznavanje Srbije preraslo ono što piše u njoj, a i naš odnos prema njemu je sazreo pa je pre vidim kao jednu "vremensku kapsulu".

"An einer Stelle der Brücke war jahrelang ein Brett locker"

Ich würde fast die These wagen, dass, wer sich über diesen Text echauffiert, ihn schlicht nicht gelesen hat.

Strange that such a short (80 pages), curious little book should cause so much commotion in Europe of the 1990s for making what seems now fairly anodyne observations.

Viz., that it is impossible to be sure about the truth of media coverage on current events, that a good-vs-evil media narrative adopted universally and instantaneously at the outset of an event and maintained even by photo selection is suspect, and that a culture may be wholesome and admirable in some ways even while they commit atrocities.

Handke was one of the 2019 Pulitzer winners, so I suppose the outrage over this little volume has blown over, at least in the elite circles of cultured opinion-making.

More than anything this book reminds me of Lukac's Budapest 1900: a literary portrait of a people of a particular geography and a particular time, at the cusp of a fundamentally irreversible transition.

Maybe the Pulitzer will incentivize another edition. I had to get this from a Baptist seminary through interlibrary loan, as the only copies online are listed for about $1,000. (Is anyone buying?)

Für mich ist die ganze aufregung an dem Buch eher schwer nachzuvollziehen.
Weder sehe ich das Buch als serbisch natuonalistisch - noch werden Kriegsverbrechen geleugnet.
Vielmehr ist es für mich ein subjektives schwelgen in alten Erinnerungen mit einer guten Portion Medienkritik.
Ob die Kritik in diesem Fall angebracht ist - darüber lässt sich streiten. Jedoch zeigt das Buch ganz gut, dass nicht jeder Serbe in die Schublade des Aggressors gesteckt werden kann.

Volim ljude koji pišu kao da sede sa čitaocem uz kaficu i prepričavaju mu neki deo svog života. U takvim knjigama uživam najviše, najbrže ih čitam i uvek visoko ocenim. Izuzetno kratka knjiga, od samo 3 poglavlja i predgovora koji je pisao Kusturica. Međutim, u tih stotinak strana stane jedna priča o razumevanju srpskog mentaliteta i ljubavi prema našem kilturnom nasleđu. Definitivno me je privuklo da čitam još njegovih dela.

Με δυσκολία μπορεί να διακρίνει κανείς αν πρόκειται για ημερολόγιο ενός οδοιπορικού ή έχουμε άλλη μια νουβέλα δρόμου από το αγαπημένο ύφος του συγγραφέα. Ίσως εδώ έχουμε και τα δύο, μα περισσότερο μια μαρτυρία για το τέλος της Γιουγκοσλαβίας και την ανάδυση των νέων εθνικισμών των Βαλκανίων. Μια ιστορικά σημαντική, πλέον, καταγραφή.

q movida

controlled opposition

Beautifully worded and very daring: in this world, one man sees and believes want he wants to see and believe - motivated perception. I command Handke for his works and in my opinion, he has rightfully earned the Nobel Prize in Literature. It is time we stop believing everything the Western media has perpetrated on us! We should think for ourselves and consider the side of all parties involved: All the media does is talk about Srebrenica, but how about Kravica? or the massacre of Serbians by the Croats (NDH)? Everybody had to suffer.
Justice for all!

This book is all about whining over Serbia. Very often completely unreasonable and with no argument behind, like “Serbia is not land of paranoiacs but huge, orphaned child”. Okay, the author has the right for his personal feelings, whatever I thought of it. However, the problem I see is that the book is based on lies and non-reason. Like, Muslims are descendants of Serbs, war in Croatia started by Croatian police entering villages around Vukovar, the whole journalist world is lying and wants to make Serbs villains...And at the end, let’s finish with a letter of a poor man who killed himself because “the extermination of Serbian people” in the war.
Wtf?
All controversy of this book is in first chapter and in epilogue. The journey itself is just pathetic, boring nothing.

Finally read the Handke book that continues to cause so much ruckus decadess later, making him the most hated Nobel laureate of his generation.

I would say it's a fairly trivial little travelogue. Handke's intuitions on the hypocrisy of western media on Serbia may be correct, but he doesn't really develop these intuitions with research or sustained critique. So it's not a great book but neither is it Mein Kampf part 2, as some would have you believe. In the past few years we've seen the liberal media class grow increasingly emboldened, to the point where they now simply feel entitled to dictate the way of the world and the behavior of its billions of inhabitants. Handke ran afoul of this class (to which he should naturally belong), and even if he could have done it more gracefully, I'd still give him credit for his audacity.

how can you ask us to revue this book if you that control our LIFE do not let us buy the