Dubravka Ugrešić published novels and short story collections. Her novellaSteffie Speck in the Jaws of Life (Croatian:Štefica Cvek u raljama života) was published in 1981. Filled with references to works of bothhigh literature (by authors such asGustave Flaubert andBohumil Hrabal) andtrivial genres (such asromance novels andchick lit), it represents a sophisticated and lighthearted postmodern play with the traditional concept of the novel.[7] It follows a young typist named Steffie Speck, whose name was taken from aDear Abby column, as she searches for love, both parodying and being compelled by thekitschy elements of romance. The novel was made into a successful 1984Yugoslav filmIn the Jaws of Life, directed byRajko Grlić.[8]
Regarding her writing, Ugrešić remarked:
... Great literary pieces are great because, among other things, they are in permanent polemics with their readers, some of whom are writers, and who are able to themselves express creatively their sense of this literary affair. Great literary pieces have that specific magical quality of provoking readers to rewrite them, to make a new literary project out of them. That could be theBorgesian idea that each book should have its counterpart, but also aModernist idea of literature which is in constant dialog with its literary, historical past.[9]
Her novelFording the Stream of Consciousness received theNIN Award in 1988, the highest literary honor in former Yugoslavia, whose winners includeDanilo Kiš andMilorad Pavić; Ugrešić was the first woman to be awarded the prize. The novel isBulgakov-like "thriller" about an international "family of writers" who gather at a conference inZagreb during Yugoslavian times.Museum of Unconditional Surrender is a novel about the melancholy of remembrance and forgetting. A female narrator, an exile, surrounded by scenery ofpost-WallBerlin and images of herwar-torn country Yugoslavia, constantly changes the time zones of her life, past and present.
Set inAmsterdam,Ministry of Pain portrays the lives of displaced people. In the novelBaba Yaga Laid An Egg, published in the Canongate Myth Series.[10] Ugrešić drew on theSlavic mythological figure ofBaba Yaga to tell a modern fairy tale. It concerns societalgender inequalities anddiscrimination.
Ugrešić’s “creative work resists reduction to simplified, isolated interpretative models”.[11]
Her collectionHave A Nice Day: From the Balkan War to the American Dream (Croatian:Američki fikcionar) consists of short dictionary-like essays on American everyday existence, seen through the lenses of a visitor whose country is falling apart.The Culture of Lies is a volume of essays on ordinary lives in a time of war,nationalism and collectiveparanoia. "Her writing attacks the savage stupidities of war, punctures the macho heroism that surrounds it, and plumbs the depths of the pain and pathos of exile" according to Richard Byrne of Common Review.[12]Thank You For Not Reading is a collection of essays on literary trivia: the publishing industry, literature, culture and the place of writing.
Ugrešić received several major awards for her essays, including Charles Veillon Prize, Heinrich Mann Prize, Jean Amery Prize.[13] In the United States,Karaoke Culture was shortlisted forNational Book Critic Circle Award.
Dubravka Ugrešić was also a literary scholar who published articles onRussian avant-garde literature, and a scholarly book on Russian contemporary fictionNova ruska proza (New Russian Fiction, 1980).[14] She edited anthologies, such asPljuska u ruci (A Slap in the Hand), co-edited nine volumes ofPojmovnik ruske avangarde (Glossary of Russian avant-garde), and translated writers such asBoris Pilnyak andDaniil Kharms (fromRussian intoCroatian). She was also the author of three books for children.
At the outbreak of thewar in 1991 in former Yugoslavia, Ugrešić took a firm anti-war and anti-nationalist stand. She wrote critically aboutnationalism, the stupidity and the criminality of war, and soon became a target of parts of the Croatian media, fellow writers and public figures. She had been accused of anti-patriotism and proclaimed a "traitor", a "public enemy" and a "witch". She left Croatia in 1993 after a long-lasting series of public attacks, and because she “could not adapt to the permanent terror of lies in public, political, cultural, and everyday life”.[15] She wrote about her experience of collective nationalist hysteria in her bookThe Culture of Lies, and described her "personal case" in the essayThe Question of Perspective (Karaoke Culture). She continued to write about the dark sides of modern societies, about the "homogenization" of people induced by media, politics,[16] religion, common beliefs and the marketplace (Europe in Sepia). Being "the citizen of a ruin"[17] she was interested in the complexity of a "condition called exile" (J. Brodsky). Her novels (Ministry of Pain,The Museum of Unconditional Surrender) explore exile traumas, but also the excitement of exile freedom. Her essayWriter in Exile (inThank You for Not Reading) is a small writer's guide to exile.[18] She described herself as "post-Yugoslav, transnational, or, even more precisely, postnational".[19]
Štefica Cvek u raljama života (1981).Steffie Speck in the Jaws of Life
Život je bajka (1983).Life Is a Fairy Tale
Forsiranje romana reke (1988).Fording the Stream of Consciousness, trans. Michael Henry Heim (Virago, 1991; Northwestern University Press, 1993)
Američki fikcionar (1993).American Fictionary, trans. Celia Hawkesworth and Ellen Elias-Bursác (Open Letter, 2018); revised translation ofHave a Nice Day: From the Balkan War to the American Dream. Trans. Celia Hawkesworth (Jonathan Cape, 1994; Viking, 1995)
Kultura laži (1996).The Culture of Lies, trans. Celia Hawkesworth (Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1998; Penn State University Press, 1998)
Muzej bezuvjetne predaje (1997).The Museum of Unconditional Surrender, trans. Celia Hawkesworth (Phoenix House, 1998; New Directions, 2002)
Zabranjeno čitanje (2002).Thank You for Not Reading, trans. Celia Hawkesworth and Damion Searls (Dalkey Archive, 2003)
Ministarstvo boli (2004).The Ministry of Pain, trans. Michael Henry Heim (SAQI, 2005; Ecco Press, 2006)
Nikog nema doma (2005).Nobody’s Home, trans. Ellen Elias-Bursác (Telegram/SAQI, 2007; Open Letter, 2008)
Baba Jaga je snijela jaje (2007).Baba Yaga Laid an Egg, trans. Ellen Elias-Bursác, Celia Hawkesworth and Mark Thompson (Canongate, 2009; Grove Press, 2010)
Karaoke kultura (2011).Karaoke Culture, trans. David Williams (Open Letter, 2011)
Europa u sepiji (2013).Europe in Sepia, trans. David Williams (Open Letter, 2014)
Lisica (2017).Fox, trans. Ellen Elias-Bursać and David Williams (Open Letter, 2018)
Doba kože (2019).The Age of Skin, trans. Ellen Elias-Bursać (Open Letter, 2020)
Brnjica za vještice (2021).A Muzzle for Witches, trans. Ellen Elias-Bursać (Open Letter, 2024)
In the Jaws of Life, trans. Celia Hawkesworth and Michael Henry Heim (Virago, 1992). Collects the novellaSteffie Speck in the Jaws of Life, the short story collectionLife Is a Fairy Tale (1983), as well as "A Love Story" (from the 1978 short story collectionPoza za prozu) and "The Kharms Case" (1987).[24]
Republished asIn the Jaws of Life and Other Stories (Northwestern University Press, 1993)
Republished again asLend Me Your Character (Dalkey Archive, 2005), translation revised by Damion Searls with "A Love Story" excluded.
2005 edition republished by Open Letter Books in 2023 with additional pieces "How to Ruin Your Own Heroine" and "Button, Button Who's Got the Button?", translated by Ellen Elias-Bursác.
