‘My youth Yugoslavia’

All four were born in Yugoslavia and experienced the gruesome civil war which tore their fatherland apart a quarter of a century ago. Today, all four have a different nationality and Yugoslavia is a distant memory. But is that also true in their books? Or do they draw inspiration from the country that is sometimes described as the Utopia of post-war socialism?

On the eve of the Balkan Trafik festival author and Balkan-connoisseur Peter Vermeersch speaks with the Serbian Jelena Lengold, the Bosnian Faruk Šehić, the Slovenian Suzana Tratnik and the Croatian Lada Žigo about the “Yugoslavian” in their work. 

How does Croatia, since 5 years part of the European Union, see Brussels? And how does Serbia and Bosnia, European countries outside of the European Union look at it? Do they want to follow in the footsteps of their former compatriots from Slovenia and Croatia and also be a part of this Union, or have they got another Europe in mind?