DIVAN

DIVAN · Genres

Short story

36 published works. Explore books by literary genre and discover new works.

  • The School Icon

    The School Icon — Laza Lazarević. “Our village had a church, and the church had a priest.” From this deceptively simple beginning, Lazarević builds a world in which authority, affection and daily work seem inseparable. The priest belongs to everyone, and everyone belongs, in some measure, to him. When a daughter comes unexpectedly into his life, the village helps to raise her. Her future becomes its shared hope.

    Laza LazarevićShort storyeBook

  • The Singer’s Easter

    A singer can turn private sorrow into public pleasure, but what happens when the sorrow becomes too great to sing? In Pevačev Uskrs (The Singer’s Easter), Radoje Domanović follows Pera through the preparations for a holiday that other households can afford to celebrate. Lambs, new clothes, cakes and painted eggs are ordinary comforts to the people around him.

    Radoje DomanovićShort storyeBook · Audiobook

  • The Slava

    The Slava — Radoje Domanović. A rider returning to his village meets a child watching three sheep in the rain. Their conversation turns from work and taxes to the next day's family celebration. The boy expects his mother's preparations to be understood at once; the adult narrator hears in them the effort required to keep a poor household within the circle of ordinary social life.

    Radoje DomanovićShort storyeBook · Audiobook

  • The Vow

    The Vow — Simo Matavulj. In The Vow, a word spoken within a family becomes an obligation reaching into love, religion and public life. Dubrovnik is more than a backdrop: aristocratic pride, memories of former independence, newspaper accusations and municipal elections enter the drawing room itself. Ivo tries to reconcile political conviction, his love for Milica and tenderness towards his ailing mother. What one person calls duty becomes another’s intolerable sacrifice.

    Simo MatavuljDramaeBook · Audiobook

  • The Wind

    The Wind — Laza Lazarević. Janko lives comfortably with his mother and thinks of marriage as something that time and chance will arrange. A visit to the hospital where his friend Joca works brings him face to face with suffering he cannot readily explain away. Recognition, gratitude and desire begin to unsettle the language in which he understands his own life.

    Laza LazarevićShort storyeBook · Audiobook

  • Theatre in a Small Town

    Theatre in a Small Town — Radoje Domanović. A small town notices everything: a missing rooster, a badly played card, a neighbour's talent for preparing radishes. Its narrator treats this vigilant attention as proof that provincial life nurtures talent. What follows tests that claim by bringing a theatre into the town's ordinary routines.

    Radoje DomanovićShort storyeBook · Audiobook

  • Through the Blizzard

    Through the Blizzard — Petar Kočić. Relja and his nephew Vujo return from market with their cow unsold. Behind this small failure lies the loss of a household once full of people, livestock and standing in the world. As the road climbs towards the mountain, the story opens into a long recollection of prosperity and its collapse. Returning to the winter night means returning to the little life Relja still has left.

    Petar KočićShort storyeBook · Audiobook

  • Werther

    Werther — Laza Lazarević. A spa is a place to recover one’s health, and an excellent place to lose one’s perspective. Lazarević begins by comparing a fashionable visit to the baths with a war: both demand preparation, waste money and end in negotiations at home. Among the officers, officials, card players and self-appointed experts stands Janko, a thirty-year-old man whose feelings still expect the world to behave like a novel.

    Laza LazarevićShort storyeBook
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