Esad MEKULI
BIOGRAPHY
The writer widely considered to be the father of modern Albanian
poetry in Yugoslavia, Esad Mekuli (1916-1993), was not born in
Kosova itself but in the mountain village of Plava on the Montenegrin-Albanian
border where national traditions are still revered. Mekuli went
to school in Peja on the Kosova side of the wild Rugova canyon
and studied veterinary medicine at the University of Belgrade.
There he came into contact with Marxist teachings and subsequently
took part in the partisan movement of World War II. In 1949,
he founded the literary periodical Jeta e re (New life),
whose editor-in-chief he remained until 1971. Mekuli was a committed
poet of social awareness whose outrage at injustice, violence,
genocide and suffering mirrors that of the pre-revolutionary
verse of the messianic Migjeni of Shkodra. His first collection,
Për ty, Prishtina 1955 (For you), was dedicated to
the people of Kosova. His final collection, Drita që
nuk shuhet, Prishtina 1989 (The light that does not go out),
appeared over thirty years later. Mekuli also published translations
of much Yugoslav literature, including the works of the Montenegrin
poet-prince Petar Njegosh (1813-1851), as well as Serbian translations
of many volumes of Albanian literature. |
Albanian Literature in Translation
Classical
Authors (19th - early 20th centuries)
