Symposium
& Festival: "The World Republic of Literature"
Lannan Symposium,
April 11-12, 2006
Gonda Theatre, Georgetown University
Semezdin Mehmedinovic
Semezdin Mehmedinovic was born in Tuzla, Bosnia in 1960 and is the author of four books, including Sarajevo Blues, composed of sto-ries and poems written during the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Published in 1992 in Ljubljana, the book was the first in the Biblioteka egzilabc series, which provided a forum for Bosnian writers and translators under siege or living in exile. In 1993 he co-wrote and co-directed Mizaldo, one of the first Bosnian films shot during the war. The film won the first prize at the Mediterranean Festival in Rome the following year. He, his wife, and their child left Bosnia and came to the U.S. as political refugees in 1996.
“Sarajevo Blues is at once a battle report and a philosophical investi-gation. In poems, micro-essays, and prose vignettes, Semezdin Meh-medinovic charts the collapse of a world with heart-breaking clarity and precision."—Paul Auster