Poetry
Свет у сунцокрету
Not translated into English
Dobrica Erić · 1959
Synopsis
Poems that fit within one district of Šumadija, that of Gruža: the song of the birds, the breathing of the fields, the warmth of the woods, the smells of the valleys, and the life of a family and a village told without grandiloquence. The language is simple and sonorous, the gaze that of someone who has never left what he describes, and who knows every animal and every season of it.
Context
The collection appeared in 1959 and opened a body of work that comprises twenty-three verse collections, more than forty books for children, several novels, five books of lyrical prose and five plays. All of this work keeps at its centre its author's native land and the life of his families. In 2019, for the sixtieth anniversary of this first book, a Belgrade publisher reissued his children's texts that had appeared in the journal Poletarac.
Who it is for
Short, regular pieces, in a simple language. Nothing in them requires prior knowledge, apart from a few names of plants and farm work.
Prizes and reception
The first book of one of Serbia's most widely read bodies of poetry, which sold a million copies and has been translated into several languages.