Lit in Translation

Svetislav Basara

Born 1953 · Serbia

In English
1 of 7

Books on prize lists

  • No English yet

    NIN 2020 · Winner

    Kontraendorfin

    Title translated by AI:“Counter-Endorphin”

    Svetislav Basara · 67 when first published

    Novel · 292 pages · Satire, Historical

    AI-generated summary:The painter Stojković, an invented character and Ivo Andrić's secret friend, narrates a grotesque history in which Serbia's national greats appear among levitations, repeated resurrections and impossible liaisons.

  • No English yet

    NIN 2015 · Shortlist

    Anđeo atentata

    Title translated by AI:“The Angel of the Assassination”

    Svetislav Basara · 62 when first published

    Novel · 270 pages · Satire, Historical

    AI-generated summary:From beyond the grave, Archduke Franz Ferdinand dictates to his posthumous secretary his own account of the Sarajevo assassination, its causes and its consequences.

  • No English yet

    NIN 2011 · Shortlist

    Mein Kampf

    Svetislav Basara · 58 when first published

    Novel · 180 pages · Satire, Politics

    AI-generated summary:In a hospital room shared by several bedridden patients, a district informer, a writer and Aprcović, a philosopher of dark fate, trade memories that add up to a sardonic history of a nation inventing its own past and future.

  • No English yet

    NIN 2008 · Shortlist

    Dnevnik Marte Koen

    Title translated by AI:“The Diary of Marta Koen”

    Svetislav Basara · 55 when first published

    Novel · 281 pages · Satire, Politics

    AI-generated summary:In late-1980s Belgrade a certain Marta Koen dies, and the top of the party and state leadership turns up at her funeral; a reporter for the daily Borba tries to find out who she really was.

  • In English

    NIN 2006 · Winner

    The Rise and Fall of Parkinson's Disease

    Uspon i pad Parkinsonove bolesti

    Svetislav Basara · 53 when first published

    Novel · 200 pages · Satire, Historical

    AI-generated summary:Demyan Lavrentyevich Parkinson, inventor of a terrible disease, dies of exhaustion in a Kolyma camp in 1947 under a false name, having spent his life trying to change the world from the perspective of his strange illness.

  • No English yet

    NIN 2004 · Shortlist

    Srce zemlje

    Title translated by AI:“The Heart of the Earth”

    Svetislav Basara · 51 when first published

    Novel · 268 pages · Satire, Historical

    AI-generated summary:Friedrich Nietzsche, who never set foot on Cyprus, spends invented 'Cypriot days' there trying to build a hot-air balloon, while Freud advises Atatürk, Wagner builds his theatre at Bayreuth and Stalin and Lou Salomé fall under the philosopher's spell.