Vitomil Zupan | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | (1914-01-18)18 January 1914 Ljubljana,Duchy of Carniola,Austria-Hungary (now inSlovenia) |
| Died | 14 May 1987(1987-05-14) (aged 73) Ljubljana,Slovenia,Yugoslavia |
| Occupation | Writer, playwright, poet, screenwriter |
| Nationality | Slovenian |
| Notable works | Menuet za kitaro, Komedija človeškega tkiva, Levitan, Igra s hudičevim repom |
| Children | Dim Zupan |
Vitomil Zupan (18 January 1914 – 14 May 1987) was a post-World War II modernistSlovene writer[Note 1] andGonars concentration camp survivor. Because of his detailed descriptions of sex and violence, he was dubbed the SloveneHemingway[3] and was compared toHenry Miller. He is best known forMenuet za kitaro (A Minuet for Guitar, 1975), describing the years he spent with theSlovene Partisans. InTitoist Yugoslavia he was sentenced to 18 years in ashow trial, and upon his release in 1955 his works could only be published under his pseudonymLangus. He is considered one of the most importantSlovene writers.
Zupan was born inLjubljana, then part ofAustria-Hungary.[4] His mother was a teacher and his father, a soldier, was killed in theFirst World War. At age 18, Zupan playedRussian roulette and shot a friend in the head, killing him.[3] As a result, he was prohibited from graduating from secondary school in Yugoslavia. After leaving the country, he traveled for years—earning money as a sailor, ship's stoker, house painter in France, ski instructor, and professional boxer—across the Mediterranean, the Middle East, and North Africa, all before the outbreak of World War II. Upon returning home, he enrolled in theUniversity of Ljubljana's Faculty of Engineering, which he did not graduate from, and read medical textbooks in an attempt to better understand his emotionalcondition.[3]
After theAxisinvasion of Yugoslavia in April 1941, as a member of theSokol athletic movement he joined theLiberation Front and participated in its underground activities in the annexedProvince of Ljubljana until the authorities sent him to theGonars concentration camp in 1942.
After the capitulation of Italy, in 1943 he joined theSlovene Partisans, first in combat units and soon after in the cultural unit, where he was assigned to write resistance propaganda theater plays.[4] After World War II, until 1947, when he fully dedicated himself to writing, he served atRadio Ljubljana as the cultural program's chief editor. For his novelRojstvo v nevihti (Birth in a Storm) he was awarded his firstPrešeren Award the same year. He married Nikolaja Dolenc and they had two sons,Dim Zupan and Martel Zupan;[3] however, after theTito–Stalin split in 1948, he was accused of anti-government conspiracy, spying, antipatriotic activity, immoral acts, murder, and attempted rape, and was sentenced in ashow trial to almost twenty years in prison. He was released in 1955 and his two sons lived without their father, similar to his own childhood. He graduated from theUniversity of Ljubljana in 1958.[4]
He published his works for several years only under a pseudonym and was again able to publish under his name again from the 1960s onward. His best-known novel,Menuet za kitaro (Minuet for Guitar), was adapted by the Serbian directorŽivojin Pavlović for his 1980 filmSee You in the Next War (Slovene:Nasvidenje v naslednji vojni,Serbian:Doviđenja u sledećem ratu) and Zupan received his secondPrešeren Award—this time for lifetime achievement.
Zupan died in Ljubljana in 1987 and is buried in theŽale cemetery.
Vitomil Zupan is best known for his semi-autobiographical novels centered on the quest of an individual for his identity in the modern world. He gave an idiosyncratic description of the years he spent with theSlovene Partisans in his 1975 novelMenuet za kitaro (Minuet for Guitar), described the ruthless environments in repressive institutions, such as thearmy and the prison in the 1982 novelLevitan, and described the period before and during World War II in the third part of his trilogy,Komedija človeškega tkiva (A Comedy of Human Tissue).
In the 1978 novelIgra s hudičevim repom (A Game with the Devil's Tail), he wrote about a middle-aged man who becomes involved in a sexual affair with his housekeeper, filled with depictions of sexuality and the banality of everyday life, because of which he was accused of pornography. However, his novels were also filled with philosophical and cultural references, and he wrote poetry, most of which remained unpublished during his lifetime. A collection of Zupan's poetry from his prison years was first published in 2006 and revived interest in Zupan's literary legacy.
He also wrote the children's bookPotovanje v tisočera mesta (Travelling to a Thousand Cities; NIP "Kosmos", 1956).
The Yugoslav critics were part of officialTitoist nomenclature, and rejected hisbohemian style and freethinking attitude and accused his writings of beingdecadent,cynical, and a glorification of evil,amorality, andnihilism.
Alternative Slovene writers and literary thinkers, such asDušan Pirjevec Ahac andTaras Kermauner, were influenced by Zupan's work and they challenged the Titoist cultural policies. The echos of Zupan's vitalism and anticonformism can be seen in the works of the writer and essayistMarjan Rožanc, who reflected on Zupan in his 1983 novel-like essayRoman o knjigah (A Novel about Books). He also influenced the poet Borut Kardelj.
