How the Postmodern Was Tempered: David Albahari as Editor of the Magazine Književna reč

Abstract

The article analyzes David Albahari's editorial activities in literary magazines and focuses on his work in the journal Književna reč (The Literary Word), which has been published in Belgrade since 1972 as an organ of the Književna omladina Srbije (Literary Youth of Serbia). David Albahari was a member of the editorial board from the winter of 1977 to the summer of 1984. This is a time when the dominance of so-called reality prose in Serbian literature is coming to an end and a new generation of authors appear whose literature would later be called postmodern. Albahari was involved in the process as both a writer and an editor. In the Književna reč, in addition to the prose of young local authors, he also published translations of contemporary international prose and also devoted himself to rock'n'roll culture. The article outlines the context in which he pursued this activity and tries to reconstruct the poetic and cultural ideological picture of the epoch.