November 18, 2004
UW librarian translates classic Slovenian novel
It’s a novel about the founder of a sect of assassins driven by an extreme interpretation of Islam. His fanatical followers, who have a cult-like attachment to their leader, are trained to become “live daggers” in a holy war, and are promised an afterlife in paradise as a reward for their martyrdom.
The location of this tale? Eleventh century Persia. And the novel itself, a fictionalized account of a real historical personage (sometimes called the world’s first political terrorist), was written in 1938 by Slovenian author Vladimir Bartol. Now, thanks to the work of a UW librarian, the novel, titled Alamut, is available in English for the first time.
Michael Biggins, Slavic and East European librarian and affiliate professor of Slavic languages and literatures, spent the last 18 months translating the nearly-forgotten novel that in the past 20 years has been recognized as a classic in Slovene literature.
The novel’s publication will be the centerpiece of a weeklong series of events, “State of Art: The New Slovene Avant Garde,” held Nov. 18–24 at the Northwest Film Forum, 1515 12th Ave. The festival includes performances, panels, workshops, exhibits and more than 20 films.
Biggins will read from Alamut at 5 p.m. Nov. 20. More details about the week’s events are at www.nwfilmforum.org/slovenia and http://www.scalahousepress.com/news/event-index-calendar.html.
A thriving Slovenian community in the Northwest was established early in the 20th century, particularly in mining towns, and continues to this day. But the festival is intended to be of interest to the broader community.
Bartol’s work was written as Slovenia saw the rise of totalitarianism in three of its neighbors, Italy, Germany and Russia. “The novel,” Biggins says, “is sui generis, unlike anything else published in Slovenia up to that time. It is an exploration, in novel form, of the nature of totalitarianism, and the ways that political power can manipulate the public’s consciousness,” and, he said, “resonates with 20th and 21st century experience in many ways.”
The main character is portrayed as sympathetic, a well-read man with great humor and intelligence. “The novel doesn’t supply any ready answers or snap refutations of totalitarianism,” Biggins says. “In fact, the trappings of totalitarianism are portrayed as quite appealing.”
Even after examining the novel at the microscopic level of a translator, Biggins still finds it “delightful. It is well crafted, and being that close to it was a pleasure.”
The publisher is Seattle’s Scala House. The publisher’s representative walked into Biggins’ office one day looking for the Slavic Studies librarian, to see if Biggins knew a suitable translator. Biggins, who has many book-length translations to his credit as well as numerous poems and short stories, jumped at the opportunity. “I’d known about Alamut for at least 15 years. It had become a cult classic in Yugoslavia in the 1980s.”
Several other events in the Slovene arts festival also have origins in the 1980s and reflect themes in Bartol’s novel. The musical group Laibach plays with totalitarian themes in its music, as does a Slovenian art collective, trying to address both the seductions and repulsions of totalitarian regimes.
