This subject theme has always been current and provocative. What constitutes a small language is easier to evaluate, but what constitutes great literature is much more difficult to establish. This applies to all national literatures, regardless whether the language in which they were written is "great" or "small". There is one significant condition: that it is real, artistically positive literature. For that reason, I have decided to remind you of Njegos and Montenegrin literature, assured that with this example a unique phenomenon in the relationship of language to literature may be grasped.
For a number of centuries Montenegro had been the only free (relatively free) state on the Balkan Peninsula. This small Mediterranean country inherits various ethnogenetic and spiritual traits, with a predominantly Slavic element. The geographical position of Montenegro, at which the influences and interests of east and west cross, has had significant effect on its history. Resisting foreign invaders -- Byzantium, the Ottoman Empire, the Venetian Republic, Napoleon's France, Austria and Austro-Hungary -- Montenegro and the Montenegrins became a symbol of successful resistance of small states and nations.
In spite of material poverty and being surrounded by enemies, significant literary monuments -- texts in Latin, Greek, Old Slavic, Italian and the uniquely rich and poetic Montenegrin language -- appeared in Montenegro. From the first love novel of South Slavic peoples (Vladimir and Kosara, 11th Century), through the renaissance and baroque poets from the Montenegrin coast (at that time under the occupation of Venice) to the greatest Montenegrin poet Petar Petrovic Njegos (1813-1851) and modern Montenegrin literature, there have been many linguistic, literary, historical, political and governmental changes in Montenegro, but the core has been preserved as a constant. The Montenegrin people have never abandoned their craving for freedom and spirituality. We are reminded that this year, 1994, the 500th anniversary of the first Montenegrin printing shop has been celebrated, the shop that operated in Cetinje only 38 years after Gutenberg's invention and two years after the discovery of America. That first Cyrillic press in the south of Europe and the first state printing press in the world (the others had been privately owned!) gave us the Oktoih (printed on 4 January 1494) as well as the other literary achievements from the period of Montenegro's Crnojevic dynasty. What happened in Montenegro at the end of the 15th Century characterized the spirituality of Montenegrins in the tumultuous centuries to come, full of continuous struggles and wars. Because of these troubles, the next printing shop did not begin working until the first half of the 19th century, in the period of Njegos, the poet, the monarch and head of the Montenegrin Autocephalous (Orthodox) Church. Njegos knew all the obstacles burdening "small" nations in cherishing their own culture; he said it indirectly in verse:
A lion may get out of a large bush without difficulty.
But Njegos, in his main works -- the philosophic long poem Ray of the Microcosm (1845) and the dramatic poem The Mountain Wreath (1847), managed to synthesize poetically people's experience and make Montenegrin literature European in the best way. Although poetry is difficult to translate because the most subtle pictures and nuances, even the entire meditative structure, remain locked in the semantics and poetics of the national language (a difficulty even for "great" languages), Njegos' works have been translated into dozens of major languages. Whether such an affirmation is due only to their aesthetic value, or also influenced by the Promethean destiny of Montenegro, is not the subject of this discussion. Nevertheless, it should be pointed out that Njegos' Montenegrin language is not some greater interlingual obstacle than is, for example, Shakespeare's English language.
To remind the reader, the language known in linguistics as Serbo-Croatian or Croatian-Serbian is spoken by four Yugoslav nations: the Serbs, the Croats, the Moslems and the Montenegrins. After the disintegration of Tito's Yugoslavia, local variants of that language acquired exclusively national names. Thus, instead of one, in cultural and sociolinguistic respects we have four languages: Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian and Montenegrin. The present Montenegrin authorities, greatly influenced by Serbian politics, call the language spoken by Montenegrins and other Montenegrin citizens (except the citizens of Albanian nationality) Serbian, which is an additional reason that the most significant part of the Montenegrin creative intelligentsia does not support such politics. To call Montenegrins' language Serbian implies that Montenegro is the only South Slavic nation that does not speak or write in its own language and denies the right of the Montenegrins to name their language by the national Montenegrin name, thus eliminating Montenegrin cultural and literary independence. This would make extraordinary material for a symposium on the endangerment of the cultures of the so-called "small nations".
Why is it necessary to remind readers of this situation, while on the expanses of ex-Yugoslavia the most brutal war in the 20th century goes on? The desire of Serbia and Croatia for hegemony, and the disintegration of Yugoslavia, set back its peoples an entire century. However, the attempts in that infernal context "to take down from the agenda" Montenegro and Montenegrin culture, even under conditions of "war for territories", did not succeed, so there remains a hope that in the process of the necessary democratization of the Balkans such attempts will be defeated for good. In this respect a serious contribution is made by actions in harmony with the Charter of the International P.E.N. (For that reason, the Montenegrin P.E.N. Center has supported the endeavors of the Serbian P.E.N. Center to follow the noble proposals of Mr. Predrag Palavestra, the basic objective of which is to protect as efficiently as possible the national cultures and languages of the so-called small nations, which means also a full protection of Montenegrin national culture.)
In Montenegrin tradition and literature, high moral norms are expressed in the definition of the motto HUMANITY AND HEROISM: heroism is when you defend yourself from somebody else, and humanity when you defend somebody else from yourself! The individuals who ignore these high moral demands, both then and now, were ostracized from humanity and culture. Misdeeds of such people, committed also in this war, thoroughly disturb our conscience. And it is not right, not even in the name of literature, to excuse the crime.
Thank you for your attention.
Sreten PEROVIC
Poet and literary critic
Montenegro
Presented at the 61st International P.E.N. Congress in Prague in 1994
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