Ismail Kadare

Ismail Kadare was born on the 28^th January 1939. He is the best-selling writer from Albania. He is a prominent novelist, though he was first known for his poetry collections. He has been a leading literary figure in the country since the 1960s. In the 1960s, he was concentrating on short stories until the he published his first novel in the country, General of the Dead Army. In the year 1966, he was made a lifetime member of the Academy of Moral and Political Science of France. In the year 1992, he was given the award of the Prix Mondial Cino Del Duca; he was the winner of the Man Booker International Prize in the year 2005 and in the year 2009 he gained the Prince of Austria award of arts. He has been sharing his time for his country and France since the year 1990. He has been named as a possible receiver for the Nobel Prize in Literature for so many times. He started writing at a very tender age; in the mid-1950s. His works are being published in over 30 languages.

source of picture: www.worldliteraturetoday.org

Biography

Kadare was born in Gjirokaster, Kingdom of Albania in a non-religious family on the 28^th January 1936. Halit, his father was a civil servant in the country. He completed his primary and secondary school in Gjirokastera and he went on to study language and literature at the faculty of History and Philology of the University of Tirana. He got his teacher’s diploma in the year 1956. He also went on to study at the Maxim Gorky Literature Institute, which is in Moscow.

Kadare worked as a member of the parliament of the country at the time of the communist regime from the year 1970 to the year 1982 and was allowed to tour and publish his work outside the country.

After he had offended the authorities of the country with the use of a politically satirical poem in the year 1975, he was not allowed to publish his work for the next three years in the country. In the year 1982, he was accused by the president of the league of Albanian writers and artist of intentionally evading the politics of the country by shrouding much of his fiction in the history and in folklore. He claimed political asylum in France in the year 1990 and issued a statement of favour of democratization. Then, he opined that "dictatorship and authentic literature are incompatible. The writer is the natural enemy of dictatorship".

Critical opinion is not the same as to the fact of whether Kadare should be seen to have been a nonconformist or an orthodox at the time of the communist era in the country. For his part, Kadare opined that he never have claimed to be a Solzhenitsyn or a dissient of the country Albania, stating that dissidence is a position that nobody can occupy for even a few days without the face of firing squad, he on the other hand opined that his books consist of a very obvious pattern of resistance; The Great Winter, which he wrote in the year 1977, stating that the book was the prize he had to pay for his own freedom.

Kadare is married to Helena Kadare and they have two daughters.

Recognition

Kadare’s works have been published in close to 40 countries and are translated in more than 30 languages. In the English language, his work are often appeared as minor translation from their French editions, usually extracted by student David Bellos. In the year 1996, he was made a lifetime member of the Academy of Morakl and Political science of France, as he substituted the philosopher called Karl Popper. In the year 1992, he was given the award of the Prix Mondial Cino Del Duca; he was the winner of the Man Booker International Prize in the year 2005 and in the year 2009 he gained the Prince of Austria award of arts. In that same year, he was given the Honorary Degree of Science in Social and Institutional Communication by the University of Palermo, which is in Sicily.

He was compared to Gogol, Kafta and Orwell by the London Newspaper, The Independent.

Works published in English language

The original works he did on the Albanian language have been published by Onufri Publishing House since the year 1996 as a single works or a whole sets. These are the novels that have been translated into English language.

Ø  The General of the Dead Army (1963), (Albanian: Gjenerali i ushtrisë së vdekur)

Ø  The Monster (1965) (Albanian: Përbindëshi); shortly published in 1965 in the literary Nëntori magazine, the novel was soon censored and never appeared on the libraries. It was republished only 30 years later.

Ø  The Wedding (1968), (Albanian: Dasma)

Ø  The Castle or The Siege (1970), (Albanian: Kështjella)

Ø  Chronicle in Stone (1971), (Albanian: Kronikë në gur)

Ø  The Great Winter (1977) (Albanian: Dimri i madh)

Ø  Broken April (1978), (Albanian: Prilli i thyer)

Ø  The Three-Arched Bridge (1978), (Albanian: Ura me tri harqe)

Ø  On the Lay of the Knights (1979)

Ø  Doruntine (1980), (Albanian: Besa e Kostandinit)

Ø  The Autobiography of the People in Verses (1980), (Albanian: Autobiografia e popullit në vargje)

Ø  The Palace of Dreams (1981), (Albanian: Nëpunësi i pallatit të ëndrrave)

Ø  The Concert (1988), (Albanian: Koncert në fund të dimrit)

Ø  The File on H (1990) (Albanian: Dosja H: roman)

Ø  Albanian Spring (1991) (Albanian: Nga një dhjetor në tjetrin)

Ø  The Pyramid, or La Pyramide (1992), (Albanian: Piramida)

Ø  Three Elegies for Kosovo (1998), (Albanian: Tri këngë zie për Kosovën)

Ø  Spring Flowers, Spring Frost (2000), (Albanian: Lulet e ftohta të marsit)

Ø  The Successor (2003), (Albanian: Pasardhësi)

Ø  Agamemnon's Daughter (2003), (Albanian: Vajza e Agamemnonit)

Ø  The Fall of the Stone City (2008), (Albanian: Darka e Gabuar)

Ø  The Accident (2010), (Albanian: Aksidenti)

Ø  Mosmarrëveshja: Mbi raportet e Shqipërisë me vetveten. (2010)

Ø  The Ghost Rider (2011); an updated translation of Doruntine. It has been revised to include previously omitted text.

Works Published in French language

The complete works he did were published by Fayard in Albanian and in French language between the years 1993 and 2004, only the poetry and the short stories were removed from the list.

Ø  Le Général de l'armée morte (1963), adapted for the cinema in 1983 with Marcello Mastroianni

Ø  La Peau de tambour (1967, under the Albanian title La noce)

Ø  Chronique de la ville de pierre (1970)

Ø  Les Tambours de la pluie (1970, under the Albanian title La citadelle)

Ø  L'Hiver de la grande solitude (1973, also published as Le Grand Hiver), deals with the break with the Soviet Union in 1960

Ø  Novembre d'une capitale (1975)

Ø  Le Palais des rêves (1981)

Ø  Le Crépuscule des dieux de la steppe (1978)

Ø  La Commission des fêtes (1978)

Ø  Le Pont aux trois arches (1978)

Ø  La Niche de la honte (1978)

Ø  Avril brisé (1980)

Ø  Qui a ramené Doruntine? (1980)

Ø  Clair de lune (1985)

Ø  L'Année noire (1985)

Ø  Le cortège de la noce s'est figé dans la glace (1985), set against the background of the repression of the 1981 demonstrations in Kosovo

Ø  Eschyle ou le grand perdant (1985, essay)

Ø  Concert en fin de saison (1988, also published as the Le concert), edited in 1978–1981 but censored for seven years, deals with Sino-Albanian relations in the 1970s

Ø  Le Dossier H. (1989)

Ø  Le Monstre (1990), a short version had already appeared in 1965 but was soon censored

Ø  Le Firman aveugle (1991), edited in 1984

Ø  Invitation à l'atelier de l'écrivain (1991, essay)

Ø  La Pyramide (1992)

Ø  La Grande Muraille (1993)

Ø  L'Ombre (1994), edited in 1984–86, appeared in French before being published in Albanian

Ø  L'Aigle (1995)

Ø  Spiritus (1996)

Ø  Le Printemps Albanais (1997)

Ø  Trois temps (1997)

Ø  L'albanie, Visage des Balkans (1998)

Ø  Trois chants funèbres pour le Kosovo (1998)

Ø  La Ville sans enseignes (1998), written much earlier and edited in Moscow in 1959

Ø  Mauvaise saison sur l'Olympe (1998, drama)

Ø  L'Envol du migrateur (1999), edited in 1986

Ø  Froides fleurs d'avril (2000)

Ø  Il a fallu ce deuil pour se retrouver (2000), diary of the war of Kosovo

Ø  Le Chevalier au faucon (2001)

Ø  Histoire de l'Union des Écrivains albanais telle que reflétée dans le miroir d'une femme (2001)

Ø  La Fille d'Agamemnon (2003), edited in 1985

Ø  Le Successeur (2003)

Ø  Vie, jeu et mort de Lul Mazrek (2003)

Ø  Dante l'incontournable (2006)

Ø  Hamlet, le prince impossible (2007)

Ø  L'Accident (2008)

Ø  Le Dîner de trop (2009)

Bibliography

Ø  Akademia e Shkencave e Shqipërisë (2008) (in Albanian), Fjalor Enciklopedik Shqiptar 2 (Albanian encyclopedia), Tirana, ISBN 978-99956-10-28-9

Ø  Robert Elsie, Historical Dictionary of Albania, New Edition, 2004, ISBN 0-8108-4872-4

Ø  Shefki Hysa, "The Diplomacy of self-denial" (Diplomacia e vetëmohimit), publicistic, Tirana, 2008, ISBN 978-99956-650-3-6

Ø  Morgan, Peter (2011) "Ismail Kadare's Inner Emigration", in Sara Jones & Meesha Nehru (Eds.), Writing under Socialism, (pp. 131-142). Nottingham, UK: Critical, Cultural and Communications (CCC) Press.

Ø  Morgan, Peter (2011) "Greek Civilisation as a Theme of Dissidence in the Work of Ismail Kadare", Modern Greek Studies (Australia and New Zealand), 15, 16-32.

Ø  Morgan, Peter (2010) Ismail Kadare: The Writer and the Dictatorship 1957-1990, Oxford: Legenda, 2010, Albanian translation 2011, paperback re-issue 2013.

Ø  Morgan, Peter (2010) Kadare post Communism: Albania, the Balkans and Europe in the Work of Ismail Kadare, 1990-2008, Australian Research Council (ARC)/Discovery Projects (DP).

Ø  Morgan, Peter (2005) "Ismail Kadare: Creativity under Communism", The Australian Newspaper.

Ø  Paulin Rranzi, "Personalities – Missionaries of Peace" publicistic, (2011), Tirana, ISBN 978-99956-43-60-7