We have forgotten the Bosnian War, but literature helps us remember

LITERATURE The Bosnian War (1992–1995), which claimed over 100,000 lives and displaced many more, is largely forgotten today. But powerful literature can evoke strong memories of the war, even among readers who have no personal recollection of it, new research shows.
Dark image of hands flipping through a book
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How do we remember a war? And how can literature about historical events forge connections between people across borders and generations?

These are two central questions in the new book Reading War, Making Memory – Remembering the Bosnian War Across Europe. In it, researchers examine how four literary works dealing with the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina have been received in Germany, Denmark, the United Kingdom, and Bosnia-Herzegovina. All the authors have roots in the former Yugoslavia.

“In addition to analyzing how ‘professional’ readers, such as critics and scholars, have interpreted the novels and their role in public debate about the war, we conducted focus group interviews with everyday readers in all four countries,” says Tea Sindbæk Andersen, associate professor of Balkan Studies and co-author of the book. She adds:

“This gave us incredibly interesting insights into how literature can generate memory and understanding of very complex issue, even among young people who, for obvious reasons, have no personal experience or memory of the war.”

Books that leave a mark

About the book

In Reading War, Making Memory – Remembering the Bosnian War Across Europe, researchers Tea Sindbæk Andersen, Jessica Ortner, and Fedja Wierød Borčak analyze how literary works about the Bosnian civil war are received in four countries: Germany, Denmark, the UK, and Bosnia.

The authors all have roots in the former Yugoslavia but now live abroad:

  • Saša Stanišić: How the Soldier Repairs the Gramophone
  • Nicol Ljubić: Stillness of the Sea
  • Aleksandar Hemon: A Coin
  • Alen Mešković: Ukulele Jam

During the focus group interviews, Tea Sindbæk Andersen and her co-authors Jessica Ortner and Fedja Wierød Borčak were repeatedly surprised by how strongly readers responded to the books.

“Older readers often had their own memories of the war reactivated by the harrowing depictions of events like the siege of Sarajevo. At the same time, these narratives challenged long-held assumptions and prejudices they’ve carried for 30 years. Younger readers, on the other hand, were almost angry that the war is no longer part of the public conversation, because they were so deeply affected by the stories they read,” says Tea Sindbæk Andersen.

According to the researcher, the powerful impact of these books stems from the demands they place on our imaginative capacity:

“In academic circles, we talk about the concept of ‘prosthetic memory,’ where literature about historical events becomes a kind of embodied, empathetic memory - a mental prosthesis - for readers who never personally experienced the events being described. We saw this mechanism clearly in our focus groups.”

In this way, a bridge is formed between the exiled authors’ personal experiences of war and new generations of readers across borders and cultural divides.

“Overall, our research shows that literature written by foreign authors is extremely important for understanding people in other parts of the world. We want to advocate for a broader literary curriculum in schools - one that includes books from countries we don’t typically engage with. This would give Danish children the opportunity to encounter different kinds of experiences than those offered by Danish authors and help them develop a deeper understanding of the world beyond Denmark,” concludes Tea Sindbæk Andersen.

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