Issue 25 - May 2006

Romani Children’s Book Promotion within the Framework of the International Roma Day

Two reading performances to promote the book Molilese by the Serbian Roma author Miroslav Mihailovic supported by the Grants program of the Next Page VORBA project took place in Serbia on the 8th of April. This fabulous and wonderfully illustrated children’s book is now in the hands of Romani children in Serbia and Macedonia. The author’s and publisher’s vision to introduce the rich Romani tradition via written words and reading is fully achieved by this edition.

The reading events were intended as interartistic and intercultural performances: Molilese’s reading by Roma and non-Roma children and adults was accompanied by dancing, playing, reading aloud with music background and performing. The promotion events were organized at the Children Cultural Center - Belgrade, and at the Multimedia Center of Trstenik and brought together Roma children, representatives of the Roma community and friends of the Roma from different institutions such as UNESCO, the US Embassy, Ministry of Education and Sport, etc.

The two promotional events were supported by the Ministry of Culture as part of a long term strategy of the Multimedia Center – Trstenik to bring Romani children and their books together. The strategy was elaborated by the center as a result of the workshop Promotion of Reading for Romani Children and Young People organized by Next Page in the summer of 2005.

New books published:

Joze Vogrinc, Television Viewer, translation into Macedonian by Vesna Shopar (Alef, Skopje 2006), supported by East Translates East Project
This book by the eminent Slovenian scholar Joze Vogrinc analyses the sociological, psychological and philosophical aspects of television and its enlarging circle of consumers. The focus is placed on the influence of the TV-news and how it models and manipulates the viewers’ perception not only of public life, but also of their fragile and endangered private sphere. In the ‘revolution’ context of the new technologies boom, this publication is important also for interpreting the problem of media-power within two neighboring Southeastern languages and cultures.

Sasha Sokolov, School for Fools, translation from Russian into Czech by Jakob Shedivy (Prostor, Prague 2006) supported by East Translates East Project
This is Sokolov’s first novel, written in 1943, which turned out to be one of the masterpieces of Russian fiction from the Soviet period. Besides the stylistic complexity, the work is impressive with its digressive, dreamy, phantasm-like narration, focalized by an anonymous mental defective – a school pupil, suffering from personality split and a strange perception of time. Though bordering on the genre of the lyrical prose, Sokolov’s work also shows some elements of satire, especially when describing everyday life in the Russian countryside (far different from Turgenev’s vison), and the effects of the state-run economy. Vladimir Nabokov, who was asked to review the book, was amazed by the unusual style of this „charming, tragic and very interesting book“, and insisted on meeting the author in person. Since then, School for Fools has been translated into many languages all over the world. This is the first publication of this novel in Czech.