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Poetry in translation. Translated from the Serbian (Znak i njegova deca).

The Sign and Its Children (Znak i njegova deca, 2000) is a collection of poetry by the Serbian-American poet Dejan Stojanović (1959). The book contains 43 poems in five sequences: "The Supreme Sign," "The Sign and Nothing," "Sign Face," "A Word and a Sign," and "The Sign and the Dream."

The search for more compact and essential relations between the poetic statement and the image (symbol) conditions new qualitative and creative accents in Dejan Stojanović's writing compared to his previous poetic work. Loyalty to subtle linguistic essences, "linguistics," and the hermeticity of meaning place Stojanović in a small and autochthonous circle of poets representing Serbian poetry's basic creative and artistic strength in the last few decades. The poet's esoteric curiosity questions the formative causes of the world—the Sign and the Lightray, the first destroyers and builders, the primary metaphors of existence, which multiply in the interrelationships of analogy and denial of the eternal truths of existence and duration against the transience of earthly days. Symbolic, transparent, metaphysical, and magical form concentric circles of meaning that achieve their unique elementarization about basic human aspirations; towards the heavenly and divine essence or the intoxicating depths of the abyss of absolute oblivion.

– 
Petar V. Arbutina

Dejan Stojanovic


Dejan Stojanović was born in Peć, Kosovo (the former Yugoslavia), in 1959. Although a lawyer by education, he has never practiced law and instead became a journalist, working as a foreign correspondent in the early nineties. He is a poet, essayist, philosopher, and businessman.

 

In 1986, as a young writer, he was recognized among 200 writers at the Bor (former Yugoslavia) Literary Festival. In addition to poetry and prose, he has worked as a journalist for the Serbian weekly magazine Pogledi (Views). His book of interviews from 1990 to 1992 in Europe and America, entitled Conversations, included interviews with several major American writers, including Nobel Laureate Saul Bellow, Charles Simic, and Steve Tesich. The book was awarded the Rastko Petrović Prize by the Serbian Heritage Foundation and the Association of Writers of Serbia for intellectual engagement.

 

He has published books of poems:

Circling (Krugovanje), Narodna knjiga – Alfa, Belgrade, three editions – 1993, 1998, and 2000.

The Sun Watches Itself (Sunce sebe gleda), NIP Književna reč, Belgrade, 1999.

The Sign and its Children (Znak i njegova deca), Prosveta, Belgrade, 2000.

The Creator (Tvoritelj), Narodna knjiga, Belgrade, 2000.

The Shape (Oblik), Gramatik, Podgorica, 2000.

The Dance of Time (Ples vremena), Konras, Belgrade, 2007.


Pentalogy: The World in Nowhereness (Svet u nigdini):

1. Ozar (Ozar), Udruženje književnika Srbije, Belgrade, 2017.

2. The World and God (Svet i Bog), Udruženje književnika Srbije, Belgrade, 2017.

3. The World in Nowhereness (Svet u nigdini), Udruženje književnika Srbije, 2017.

4. The World and Humans (Svet i ljudi), Udruženje književnika Srbije, Belgrade, 2017.

5. The Home of Light (Dom svetlosti). Udruženje književnika Srbije, Belgrade, 2017.


The Hidden Light (Skrivena svetlost), Čigoja, Belgrade, 2018.

Primordial Spark (Iskra iskona), Albatros plus, Belgrade, 2021.

Centuries and Steps (Vekovi i koraci), Albatros plus, Belgrade, 2023.

 

Essays:

Creator and Creating (Stvaralac i stvaranje), Albatros plus, Belgrade, 2021.

The New Man and the New World (Novočovek i novosvet), Rad, Belgrade, 2022.


Interviews:

Conversations (Razgovori), NIP Književna reč, Belgrade, 1999


Anthology: Selected Serbian Plays (Izabrane srpske drame), USA, 2016.


He lived in Chicago between 1990 and 2014 and is a Serbian and US citizen.