Literature

Bulgarian literature is a lot like Bulgarian banitsa (the flaky cheese pastry): many layers, little butter, frequent tears and unfailing pleasure. From the medieval scribes to the International Booker Prize, here is a short tour – with no compulsory class tests. Poetry, prose and the novel, children's books, humour – and an anthology with the full texts of the classics that are now in the public domain.

1. Folk Songs and Medieval ScribesBefore the novels there were songs, and before the songs there were monks with quills.
2. Poetry: Botev and VazovThe two fathers of Bulgarian poetry, one with a pen, the other with a gun. Sometimes both with both.
3. Poetry: from Yavorov to DalchevModernism, symbolism and that famous Bulgarian melancholy.
4. Poetry: from Vaptsarov to TodayVerses from prison, from the sea and from late socialism.

1. The Novel: from Under the Yoke to TobaccoThe great prose of the 19th and first half of the 20th century.
2. Masters of the Short StoryBulgarian literature is strong over short distances – the short story is our sprint.
3. The Historical NovelWhen history is too dramatic to stay in the textbooks.
4. The Novel in the Second Half of the 20th CenturyCensorship, irony and a few masterpieces that made it through anyway.
5. Humour and SatireHow Bulgarian writers laugh at those in power, at their neighbours and, most of all, at themselves.
6. Children's LiteratureThe books from which Bulgarian children learn to read – and their parents learn to laugh.

1. Contemporary AuthorsWhich Bulgarian writers have been translated and read around the world over the last twenty years.
2. Recent AchievementsThe big year of 2023 and what happened after it.

1. Anthology: Hristo BotevFour poems every Bulgarian has learned by heart – at least the night before the exam.
2. Anthology: Ivan VazovThe patriarch of Bulgarian literature – on the language, the homeland and Shipka.
3. Anthology: Karavelov and Pencho SlaveykovA poem that became a song, and a long poem about the deaf Beethoven.
4. Anthology: Peyo YavorovTenderness, exile and love – from the most dramatic life in Bulgarian poetry.
5. Anthology: Debelyanov and SmirnenskiTwo poets who died young – one at the front, the other of tuberculosis.
6. Anthology: Nikola VaptsarovMachines, the sea and faith in tomorrow – from his only collection, “Motor Songs”.
7. Anthology: short proseA parable by Smirnenski that takes five minutes to read and a lifetime to forget.

1. Where to Read OnlineBulgarian classics are free – legally and in good quality. Here is where to find them.

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