David Albahari Давид Албахари | |
|---|---|
 Albahari in 2011 | |
| Born | (1948-03-15)15 March 1948 |
| Died | 30 July 2023(2023-07-30) (aged 75) Belgrade, Serbia |
| Occupation | Writer, novelist |
| Nationality | Serbian, Canadian |
| Alma mater | University of Belgrade Faculty of Philology |
| Children | Natan Albahari Rebeka Albahari |
David Albahari (Serbian Cyrillic:Давид Албахари,pronounced[dǎv̞idalbaxǎːriː]; 15 March 1948 – 30 July 2023) was a Serbian novelist.
Albahari wrote mainly novels and short stories in theSerbian language. He was also an established translator from English intoSerbian. He was a member of theSerbian Academy of Sciences and Arts[1] and aUniversity of Belgrade graduate. Albahari was awarded the prestigiousNIN Award for the best novel of 1996 forMamac (Bait). He was among the award's finalists on seven other occasions.
David Albahari was born on 15 March 1948 inPeć,[1] in the formerYugoslav region ofKosovo to aSephardic Jewish father and a mother of Serbian origin[2] (who had previously been married to an Ashkenazi Jewish man killed in the Holocaust, as were their children and as was the first family of his father, which Albahari himself defined as "Four children had to die so that I, and my sister, would be born."[3]).
Albahari published the first collection of short storiesPorodično vreme ("Family Time") in 1973. He became better known to wider audience in 1982 with a volumeOpis smrti ("A Description of Death") for which he got theAndrić Prize. In 1991 he became the chair of the Federation of Jewish Communes of Yugoslavia, and worked on evacuation of the Jewish population frombesieged Sarajevo. In 1994, he moved with his family toCalgary in theCanadian province ofAlberta, where he lived until 2012 when he returned to live in Belgrade. He continued to write and publish in theSerbian language.
In the late 1980s, Albahari initiated the first formal petition tolegalize marijuana in Yugoslavia.
Albahari died after a long illness in Belgrade on 30 July 2023, at the age of 75.[4]
In 2012 he was awarded theVilenica Prize. He also received the following awards: theAndrić Prize (1982), Stanislav Vinaver Award (1993),NIN Prize (1996),National Library of Serbia Award for bestseller (1996), International Balkanika Award (1996), Bridge Berlin Award (1998), City of Belgrade Award (2005) andIsidora Sekulić Award (2014).[1]
On 29 July 2016, Albahari won the first award at the "Druga prikazna" ("Another Story") literary festival inSkopje,Macedonia.[5]
Albahari was a contributor toGeist magazine.
His books have been translated into several languages and several of them are available in English.
