Novel
Time of Parting
Време разделно
Anton Donchev · 1964
Synopsis
Summer 1668, in the Rhodopes, during the War of Candia. A troop of horsemen led by Karaibrahim, a janissary born in the country, comes to convert the valley of Elindenya to Islam. Two chroniclers recount the same days: the priest Aligorko, on the villagers' side, and the man known as the Venetian, a French nobleman captured at Candia and converted, held captive by the troop's leader. The shepherd Manol is at the centre of the resistance, and the villagers have ten days to choose.
Context
The book appeared in 1964 and rests on a two-voice device: a Bulgarian priest keeps the chronicle from the village side, and a Frenchman taken prisoner at the siege of Candia, forcibly converted to save his life, tells what he sees from the side of the troops. Ludmil Staikov brought it to the screen in 1988, and that film appears in the same catalogue. The French version by Ivan Evstatiev Obbov appeared from Actes Sud in 1995, under a title that foregrounds the shepherd and his companions, and it was reissued in paperback in 2002.
Who it is for
A broad narrative, carried by two narrators who alternate; it has existed in French since 1995, and in paperback since 2002.
Prizes and reception
Often reissued and translated into many languages, it remains debated because of the old chronicle on which it draws, held to be a mystification.
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