Travnička hronika
Travnička hronika. Konsulska vremena (in the Cyrillic alphabet: Травничка хроника) is a novel by the Yugoslav writer and Nobel Prize winner Ivo Andrić (1892-1975), which was written in 1942 and first published in 1945. The title literally means: The Chronicle of Travnik. The times of the consuls. The German translation appeared under other titles, mostly viziers and consuls , occasionally also an audience with the vizier .
content
The novel covers seven years (1807-1814) in the Bosnian city of Travnik , which at the time was the seat of an Ottoman vizier . In the course of the Napoleonic wars , a French consul was sent to the remote city, which was still completely untouched by strangers, whereupon the rival great power Austria immediately installed a consul there as well. Without really telling a continuous story, different people are depicted in the novel against the background of historical events, but especially the circumstances of Bosnia at that time are portrayed.
As the real main character of the novel, we get to know the French consul Daville, who is met with the hatred of the local population as soon as he enters the city. He dutifully tries to fill his post as best he can, alone in a hostile and backward environment. All that remains for him is poetry , in which he practices more badly than right, his quiet and hardworking wife and the children who give him consolation. His translator, the doctor D'Avenat, is a necessary collaborator for him, who knows how to find out the latest news from the city, but from a human point of view he remains a stranger to the consul, as does the vice-consul Des Fossés, a young man thirsty for knowledge, who stayed in Travnik for some time Man who strives to record all aspects of Bosnian life and who confidently and cleverly shows no fear of contact with the locals. The Austrian consul von Mitterer has a fate similar to that of Daville. Although he is familiar with the country and speaks the language, as well as a dutiful civil servant, his wife also makes life difficult for him and is constantly on his ears to request his transfer from this wilderness. He, too, is to a certain extent alone and isolated here.
On the Turkish side, the enlightened Georgian Mehmed Pasha is a vizier in Travnik. Daville manages to establish better relationships with him than von Mitterer, yes, the conversations with him are humanly valuable to Daville. But the constant intrigues in the capital Istanbul mean that the vizier is relieved and replaced by Ibrahim Pascha , a confidante of the former Sultan Selim III. who was exiled to Bosnia, as it were. Ibrahim Pascha is a pessimistic character who always talks about the ex-sultan whom he idolized. Daville knows how to adjust to the new vizier better than his Austrian colleague.
After years, Mitterer will finally be replaced by Mr. von Paulich. This is single and noticeably superior to the French in terms of efficiency and knowledge. The relationship between the French and Austrian consuls is very ambivalent. On the one hand, they are actually opponents who have to try to enforce the interests of their country in the Balkans, to intrigue against the other great power and to spy on everything that could be of interest to their homeland. Both do this with more or less great success, but dutifully. On the other hand, as Europeans, they are connected to one another and get on culturally and socially as well as their role allows. Both face a completely different, strange and barbaric environment. When a child of Daville dies, the solidarity and human understanding of Europeans becomes particularly evident.
When Ibrahim Pascha is also relieved of his post, which he accepts with stoic composure, as if he had already expected it for a long time, the merciless and cruel Ali Pasha takes office. He rules through sheer terror, spreads fear and terror among the Bosnian population and has numerous people murdered and robbed. The position as consuls forces both Europeans to establish correct relationships with this vizier, which is very difficult for them on a human level. During their years both had to experience several times what barbarous atrocities are possible in this country. They were direct witnesses to popular uprisings, murders and looting.
When Napoleon's luck finally began to turn and his defeat was evident, Daville sought his recall and the closure of the consulate, since there were now no French interests to be represented in the Balkans. This is granted and the Austrian consul von Paulich now also applies for his consulate to be closed. With the withdrawal of the French there is no longer any reason for Austria to maintain a base here either. An uprising against the vizier is being prepared among the Bosnians. When they came, the consuls have now disappeared again, but nothing has changed in Travnik. The country stubbornly persists in its backwardness and ignorance of everything foreign.
In addition to these political events, numerous episodes are described that highlight various aspects of life in Bosnia, but also a number of secondary characters who together paint a colorful picture of this country. We get to know the minorities of the Catholic and Orthodox Bosnians, as well as the Sephardic Jews who have placed their hopes in the French. Austria succeeds in establishing better relations with the Catholics than the French, while the Orthodox hope that perhaps Russia would also send its own consul to Travnik. People passing through and small love affairs add a bit of confusion to the otherwise so persistent life in Bosnia.
meaning
After Ivo Andrić was recalled as Yugoslavia's ambassador to the German Reich , he withdrew to work in his homeland on several novels that revolve around the history of Bosnia and address the question of the special nature of this country, inhabited by many peoples. In addition to the books Die Brücke über die Drina and Das Fräulein , viziers and consuls ( number 1 on the Spiegel bestseller list from December 13th to 19th, 1961 ), all three of which appeared after the war in 1945.
With its publication, Andrić began a new creative phase, which can be described as the high point of his work. At the same time, they also represent a peak within the Serbian fiction. The novel is characterized by a particularly clear and pure language that uses the Ekavian (Serbian) dialect, while Bosnian people are characterized by the Ijekavian dialect within the novel . Andrić also uses numerous Turkish loan words to represent the special Bosnian local flavor.
Andrić describes Bosnia mainly through the eyes of Europeans who are forced to live here for some time. As a result, he succeeds in alienating his homeland, while the clash of different worlds is a main motif of the novel. It is no coincidence that Andrić, who was a diplomat by profession , described the diplomatic work of his main characters, although their appearance in Travnik was not of particularly great historical importance. With great empathy and extensive historical research, he succeeded in writing a historically very reliable report on a country largely unknown in Europe. In addition to handwritten notes from the French and Austrian consuls, Andrić also used the travelogue of the French vice consul JB Chaumette Des Fossés Voyage en Bosnie dans les années 1807-1808 (Paris 1822).
literature
- M. Šamić: Istorijski izvori "Travničke hronike" IA i njihova umjetnička transpozicija . Sarajevo 1962
- Reinhard Lauer : Travnička hronika ; in: Kindler's new literary dictionary, vol. 1. Munich 1988
- Michael Müller: The Bosnian people's perception of themselves and others in the historical prose by Ivo Andrić and Isak Samokovlija . Peter Lang Verlag, Frankfurt am Main a. a., 2006
expenditure
- Sabrana dela vol. 2 . Belgrade 1945
- Travnička hronika . Svjetlost, Sarajevo 1951
- Travnička hronika . Belgrade, Prosveta 1964
- Travnička hronika . Belgrade, Nolit 1981
- Travnička hronika . Belgrade, Dereta 2004
- Travnička hronika . Sarajevo, Civitas 2004
- Travnička hronika . Zrenjanin, Sezam books 2005
- Travnička hronika . Belgrade, Logos-Art 2005
Translations
German
- Viziers and consuls. Translated by Hans Thurn. Hanser, Munich 1961
- Audience with the vizier. Translated by Hans Thurn. Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 1961
- Viziers and consuls. Translated by Hans Thurn. Gutenberg Book Guild, Frankfurt am Main 1963
- Viziers and consuls. Translated by Hans Thurn. Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, Munich 1964
- Audience with the vizier. Translated by Hans Thurn. The Book Community, Vienna 1967
- Viziers and consuls. Translated by Hans Thurn. German Book Association, Stuttgart 1968
- Viziers and consuls. Translated by Hans Thurn. Coron-Verlag, Zurich 1968
- Viziers and consuls. Translated by Hans Thurn. Goldmann Taschenbuch, Munich 1974
- Viziers and consuls. Translated by Hans Thurn. Zsolnay, Vienna 1996
English
- The Days of the Consuls. Forrest Books, London 1992
French
- La chronique de Travnik. L'Age d'Homme, Lausanne 1994
Macedonian
- Travnička hronika. Misla, Skopje 1977
Russian
- Травницкая Хроника, translated by M. Volkonsky, Moscow, 1958