"The Bridge on the Drina" (1945) by Ivo Andri - Yugoslav Novelist and 1961 Nobel Prize Winner for Literature

[DonRocks]

This is one of the few novels it took me over an entire year to read, and one of the few that I can say made me a better person for having done so.

 

"The Bridge on the Drina"� is a rough-going, 300+ page book that spans almost 350 years, and therefore can't be threaded together by "traditional"� methods - the "rock,"� quite literally, that bonds this tale is the bridge itself, the Mehmed PaÅ¡a Sokolović Bridge (a UNESCO World Heritage site - there are 981 on Earth), spanning the Drina River, the Drina running northwardly through Bosnia and Herzegovina, connecting with the Rzav, and then flowing into the "Beautiful Blue"� Danube - the second longest river in Europe after the Volga.

 

But these geographical facts are pedagogical, as nearly the entire story takes place right in the town that houses the bridge, ViÅ¡egrad - a town that will feel like your second home when you're finished the book.

 

At times brutal (there is one chapter in particular that may upset you for the rest of your life), at times beautiful (the lovely Fatah hurling herself from the bridge, rather than facing forced marriage to a man she didn't love), this book is perhaps the definitive way to "get to know"� the cultural history of the Balkans - the point at which World War One officially started via the assassination of the Archduke Ferdinand, and ended up killing over 9 million people - while technically considered fiction, the novel is very much based on fact.

 

Why did I select such a difficult project to tackle? Because I'm an idiot, that's why. Because I knew relatively little about Balkan history, because Andrić won the Nobel Prize for Literature in the year I was born, and because this book is considered the singular reason he won: it's his magnum opus. Despite the rather superficial reason I chose it, I am a better person - a better human being - for having read this book. Jews, Christians, and Muslims living together for centuries in relative harmony - how appealing that was for me.

 

They are building a town-within-a-town - Andrićgrad - near the foot of the bridge, slated to be completed next year - and, they are talking about making the book into a movie. If they finish the town, and perhaps even if they don't, I want to go there, to pay my homage, and to look at this undoubtedly tiny bridge which served such an incredibly large part of the history of Bosnia and Herzegovina. 

 

I would be interested in discussing even the tiniest, seemingly most unimportant aspect of this - or any - book, with anyone who is interested (and I can say the same about any book, film, song, or whatever other medium I might have experienced) - I'm happiest going deep into the depths, and hearing new theories and possibilities about *why* someone might have done what they did. If you want superficial conversation, you won't find it here - I want content, substance, and depth to be our driving forces. Hint: I'm currently reading William Shakespeare's "Troilus and Cressida," Alice Munro's "Runaway,"� and will soon be starting Oscar Wilde's "The Important of Being Ernest."� Bring it, my friends! I want your best in this forum! I want to be challenged, dammit! And if it's a book, poem, essay, play - anything - that you're reading and wild about, post about it. I'll read it, and I'll discuss it with you. Just please don't make it that odious symbol of every middle aged woman in America trapped in a lonely marriage, "Fifty Shades of Gray"� which I've now had presented to me, in various forms, about ten times, as an apotheosis of cutting-edge literature. Please. Meet a friend for a drink, see a counselor, get divorced, do *anything* but *please* don't post here about it expecting serious discussion (*). If you want to post about Gilbert Gottfried's readings of it, that's fine. If you're one of "them,"� please, start reading heavy, and I mean *really* heavy. Coetzee's "Disgrace,"� Saramago's "The Cave,"� Pamuk's "My Name Is Red," or hell, Bryson's "A Walk In The Woods"� or Steinbeck's "Travels with Charley"� if you want to declench with some NPR-level laughs or escapism, respectively. I also don't mind listening to, and analyzing a 4-minute long pop song, or even a two-hour movie, or a one-hour art exhibit, but literature is different: I simply can't invest a month into a NY Times Bestseller which is going to be just awful and a complete waste of my time - my life is worth more than this. I've done it several times before, mainly when the books were gifts from friends (I read them out of respect for my friends), but I don't want to do it anymore. Oh, God it's a waste of life.

 

(*) I'm kidding. And I guarantee *hundreds* of our readers have read it, and probably liked it. Post away - I don't want this forum to be snobby. 

[porcupine]

Literature is tricky.  I'm loathe to recommend my favorites, because too often friends have hated my picks, and likewise when they've pushed a book on me I've raised an eyebrow. I'd love to find people who have similar tastes and are willing to dig into the nitty-gritty with me.  Maybe I'll give "The Bridge on the Drina" a try.

[DonRocks]

Literature is tricky.  I'm loathe to recommend my favorites, because too often friends have hated my picks, and likewise when they've pushed a book on me I've raised an eyebrow. I'd love to find people who have similar tastes and are willing to dig into the nitty-gritty with me.  Maybe I'll give "The Bridge on the Drina" a try.

It's really no trickier than anything else; it's just more *time-consuming* than anything else, so the investment is considerable.

I'm not recommending The Bridge On The Drina - it's a bear, it's not always interesting, and it's not a lot of fun. Important? Yes. Great? Yes, but not something I'm recommending when there's so much else out there. I wrote what I did just in case someone has already read it.