Page 4 - Vladimir Bartol catalogue, 2019

4Vladimir Bartol (1903–1967)writer, playwright, essayist, and critic. Born in Trieste, Vladimir Bartol was one of Slovenia’s leading intellects and an author of plays, short stories and theater reviews. During the 1920s, he studied at the universities of Paris and Ljubljana, concentrating on philosophy, world religions, psychology(he was among the rst to introduce Freud’s teachings inthe former Yugoslavia) and biology. During World War II,he participated in the resistance movement against the Nazi occupation of former Yugoslavia.Alamut, the second of his two novels, represents the culminating point of his ideas and experiences of totalitarianism during the years before and after World War II. Vladimir Bartol did not live to experience the tremendous success of his novel Alamut, even though he had suspected and predicted it. Over the years, Alamut has been published more than 70 times. e success dreamt of by the author is thus becoming a reality. It is striking that in his diary, Bartol predicted his rst international success with astonishing precision: “I will be understood by the public in 50 years” ... 1938 – and the rst success of Alamut in France in 1988.“I had a feeling I was writing for a public who was going to live 50 years later...”“I nished Alamut at 5.45 a.m. Pleased. ese nal daysI kept trembling for someone not to steal it from me,for a re not to start, or for something else not to happen. Towards the end I fancied that someone could even have killedme or I could have met with an accident, Alamut was chie y completed. Yet it was not until I put down the last letter that I felt really at ease. Let someone kill me - in Alamut, I am going to be immortal.”– Vladimir Bartol, Diary, Sunday, 24 July 1938