Milorad Pavic
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Milorad Pavić (Милорад Павић) is a noted Serbian poet, prose writer, translator, and literary historian.
Born on October 15, 1929 in Belgrade, Pavić has written four novels that have been translated into English: Dictionary of the Khazars: A Lexicon Novel, Landscape Painted With Tea, Inner Side Of The Wind, and Last Love In Constantinople, as well as many short stories not translated to English.
Though Pavić's novels can be enjoyed by reading them cover-to-cover, among his stated goals are a desire to write novels with unusual forms, and to make the reader a more active participent than is usual. To achieve these ends, he as used a number of unconventional techniques:
- Dictionary Of The Khazars takes the form of three cross-referenced encylopaedias of the Khazar people
- Landscape Painted With Tea mixes the forms of novel and crossword puzzle
- Inner Side Of The Wind — which tells the story of Hero and Leander — can be read back to front, each section telling one character's version of the story;
- Last Love In Constantinople has chapters numbered after tarot cards; the reader is invited to use a tarot deck to determine the order the chapters are read
Last Love In Constantinople and Dictionary Of The Khazars both have male and female versions, which differ in only a few brief, critical passages.
He has also written one play. There are more than 80 translations of his writing, into many languages.
External links
- Official site (http://www.khazars.com/)
- Pavić's library at Project Rastko (http://www.rastko.org.yu/knjizevnost/pavic/index_c.html) - His works in Serbian, Russian and Slovene; few articles on Pavić in English, French and German
- As a Writer, I Was Born Two Hundred Years Ago, by Thanassis Lallas (Interview) (http://www.centerforbookculture.org/interviews/interview_pavic.html)
- The Scriptorium: Milrad Pavic (http://www.themodernword.com/scriptorium/pavic.html)fr:Milorad Pavic