France Balantic
Encyclopedia
France Balantič was a Slovene
poet
. His works were banished from schools and libraries during the Titoist regime in Slovenia, but since the late 1980s, he has been re-considered as one of the foremost Slovene poets of the 20th century.
, in the Slovenia
n region of Upper Carniola
in what was then the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes. Before World War II
, he studied Slavic literature at the University of Ljubljana
.
As a student, Balantič professed left wing leanings, with a sympathy towards Christian Socialism
and trade unionism in general. As a devout Roman Catholic, he was however suspicious to the materialist world view present in most left wing ideologies of the time, especially in Communism
. By 1941, he turned away from political activism, convinced that the only salvation for humanity is to be found in the Gospel
.
In the first months after the Axis invasion of Yugoslavia
and the Italian occupation of Ljubljana
, he joined the illegal student organization of the Liberation Front of the Slovenian People
, but left it soon afterwards, disturbed by its pro-Communist leanings.
In June 1942, the Fascist
authorities of the Italian-occupied Province of Ljubljana
interned him in the Gonars concentration camp
, together with several other nationalist students, like Zorko Simčič and Marjan Tršar. He was released thanks to the intercession of the bishop Gregorij Rožman
in autumn of the same year. He returned to Ljubljana, and spent half a year in almost complete reclusion, mostly dedicating himself to writing. In March 1943, he joined the voluntary anti-communist militia sponsored by the Italians. After the Italian armistice in September 1943, he decided to enrol in the Slovenian Home Guard, an anti-communist militia sponsored by various Slovene conservative and anti-revolutionary political groups, which collaborated with the Nazi German occupying forces in the fight against the Yugoslav partisans. He was stationed as an officer at the Home Guard supply post in the village of Grahovo
near Cerknica
in 1943. The post was attacked, sieged and burnt down by the Partisan resistance
, and Balantič died in the attack.
, the decadentist poet Josip Murn, the expressionist Srečko Kosovel
and, especially the regigious symbolism of Alojz Gradnik
. Balantič was a master of classical poetic forms, especially sonnet
s. His major poem was 'The Wreath of Sonnets', written in 1940, and published posthumously by the literary critic Tine Debeljak in 1944.
The most typical trait of Balantič's poetry is his unique blend of personalist and eschatological visions, in which a messianic
sense of the tragic dissolution of civilization and the end of time is intertwined with premonitions of his own death and a strong erotic feeling. Most of his poems are a search towards a personal vision of Divinity, in connection with the tradition of Catholic mysticism
. He developed a complex metaphorical-hermetical style, verging on manierism. In many ways, Balantič continued the tradition of Slovene Christian expressionism, whose main exponents were Anton Vodnik
and Edvard Kocbek
, which he, following the example of the writer Ivan Pregelj
, connected with elements of Baroque aestheticism.
all his poetry was removed from public libraries
in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
, and his name was omitted in public education. When the literary historian Anton Slodnjak mentioned Balantič in his Review of Slovene Literature in the 1950s, he was fired from his post at the University of Ljubljana because of it. In 1966, a selection of Balantič's poems were printed under the title Muževna steblika, but after intervention by the Communist Party it was decided that the book should be withdrawn and the entire run was sent to be destroyed and recycled.
His poems were published among the Slovene diaspora
, especially in Argentina
, where the literary historians Tine Debeljak and France Papež edited and published most of his works. In the late 1980s, Balantič was rediscovered in Slovenia
, too, and he is now considered to be one of the foremost Slovene language poets of the 20th century, along with Edvard Kocbek
and Srečko Kosovel
.
Slovenian language
Slovene or Slovenian is a South Slavic language spoken by approximately 2.5 million speakers worldwide, the majority of whom live in Slovenia. It is the first language of about 1.85 million people and is one of the 23 official and working languages of the European Union...
poet
Poet
A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...
. His works were banished from schools and libraries during the Titoist regime in Slovenia, but since the late 1980s, he has been re-considered as one of the foremost Slovene poets of the 20th century.
Life
Balantič was born in a working class family in KamnikKamnik
Kamnik is the name of a municipality in Slovenia as well as the town that serves as its administrative, cultural, economic, and educational center. The municipality is in north central Slovenia. It encompasses a large part of the Kamnik Alps and the surrounding area...
, in the Slovenia
Slovenia
Slovenia , officially the Republic of Slovenia , is a country in Central and Southeastern Europe touching the Alps and bordering the Mediterranean. Slovenia borders Italy to the west, Croatia to the south and east, Hungary to the northeast, and Austria to the north, and also has a small portion of...
n region of Upper Carniola
Upper Carniola
Upper Carniola is a traditional region of Slovenia, the northern mountainous part of the larger Carniola region. The centre of the region is Kranj, while other urban centers include Jesenice, Tržič, Škofja Loka, Kamnik, and Domžale.- Historical background :...
in what was then the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes. Before World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, he studied Slavic literature at the University of Ljubljana
University of Ljubljana
The University of Ljubljana is the oldest and largest university in Slovenia. With 64,000 enrolled graduate and postgraduate students, it is among the largest universities in Europe.-Beginnings:...
.
As a student, Balantič professed left wing leanings, with a sympathy towards Christian Socialism
Christian socialism
Christian socialism generally refers to those on the Christian left whose politics are both Christian and socialist and who see these two philosophies as being interrelated. This category can include Liberation theology and the doctrine of the social gospel...
and trade unionism in general. As a devout Roman Catholic, he was however suspicious to the materialist world view present in most left wing ideologies of the time, especially in Communism
Communism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
. By 1941, he turned away from political activism, convinced that the only salvation for humanity is to be found in the Gospel
Gospel
A gospel is an account, often written, that describes the life of Jesus of Nazareth. In a more general sense the term "gospel" may refer to the good news message of the New Testament. It is primarily used in reference to the four canonical gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John...
.
In the first months after the Axis invasion of Yugoslavia
Invasion of Yugoslavia
The Invasion of Yugoslavia , also known as the April War , was the Axis Powers' attack on the Kingdom of Yugoslavia which began on 6 April 1941 during World War II...
and the Italian occupation of Ljubljana
Ljubljana
Ljubljana is the capital of Slovenia and its largest city. It is the centre of the City Municipality of Ljubljana. It is located in the centre of the country in the Ljubljana Basin, and is a mid-sized city of some 270,000 inhabitants...
, he joined the illegal student organization of the Liberation Front of the Slovenian People
Liberation Front of the Slovenian People
On 26 April 1941 in Ljubljana the Anti-Imperialist Front was established. It was to promote "an international massive movement" to "liberate the Slovenian nation" whose "hope and example was the Soviet Union"...
, but left it soon afterwards, disturbed by its pro-Communist leanings.
In June 1942, the Fascist
Italian Fascism
Italian Fascism also known as Fascism with a capital "F" refers to the original fascist ideology in Italy. This ideology is associated with the National Fascist Party which under Benito Mussolini ruled the Kingdom of Italy from 1922 until 1943, the Republican Fascist Party which ruled the Italian...
authorities of the Italian-occupied Province of Ljubljana
Province of Ljubljana
The Province of Ljubljana was a province of the Kingdom of Italy and of the Nazi German Adriatic Littoral during World War II. It was created on May 3, 1941 from territory occupied and annexed to Italy after the Axis invasion and dissolution of Yugoslavia, and it was abolished on May 9, 1945, when...
interned him in the Gonars concentration camp
Gonars concentration camp
On February 23, 1942 the Italian fascist regime established a concentration camp in Gonars, a town with approx. 4,600 inhabitants near Palmanova in the Province of Udine in northeastern Italy.Most of the prisoners were from present day Slovenia and Croatia...
, together with several other nationalist students, like Zorko Simčič and Marjan Tršar. He was released thanks to the intercession of the bishop Gregorij Rožman
Gregorij Rožman
Gregorij Rožman was a Slovenian Roman Catholic clergyman and theologian. Between 1930 and 1959, he served as bishop of the Diocese of Ljubljana. He is most famous for his controversial role during World War II...
in autumn of the same year. He returned to Ljubljana, and spent half a year in almost complete reclusion, mostly dedicating himself to writing. In March 1943, he joined the voluntary anti-communist militia sponsored by the Italians. After the Italian armistice in September 1943, he decided to enrol in the Slovenian Home Guard, an anti-communist militia sponsored by various Slovene conservative and anti-revolutionary political groups, which collaborated with the Nazi German occupying forces in the fight against the Yugoslav partisans. He was stationed as an officer at the Home Guard supply post in the village of Grahovo
Grahovo, Cerknica
Grahovo is a village on the eastern shores of Lake Cerknica in the Municipality of Cerknica in the Inner Carniola region of Slovenia.The Grahovo parish church, built southeast of the settlement, is dedicated to the Immaculate Conception and belongs to the Ljubljana Archdiocese. It was built in 1992...
near Cerknica
Cerknica
Cerknica is a town and municipality in the Kras region of southwestern Slovenia, with a population of 10,284 . It belongs to the traditional region of Inner Carniola....
in 1943. The post was attacked, sieged and burnt down by the Partisan resistance
Partisans (Yugoslavia)
The Yugoslav Partisans, or simply the Partisans were a Communist-led World War II anti-fascist resistance movement in Yugoslavia...
, and Balantič died in the attack.
Work
Balantič was an intimist and lyricist poet who wrote mystic and passionate poems. He was influenced by the work of the Slovene Romantic poet France PrešerenFrance Prešeren
France Prešeren was a Slovene Romantic poet. He is considered the Slovene national poet. Although he was not a particularly prolific author, he inspired virtually all Slovene literature thereafter....
, the decadentist poet Josip Murn, the expressionist Srečko Kosovel
Srecko Kosovel
Srečko Kosovel was a Slovene expressionist poet who evolved towards avant-garde forms. Since the 1960s, Kosovel has become a poetic icon, in the league of the most prestigious Slovene literates like France Prešeren and Ivan Cankar. Together with Edvard Kocbek, he is considered as the most...
and, especially the regigious symbolism of Alojz Gradnik
Alojz Gradnik
Alojz Gradnik was a Slovenian poet and translator.-Life:Gradnik was born in the village of Medana in the Goriška Brda region, in what was then the Austro-Hungarian Empire and is today in the Goriška province of Slovenia. His father was a Slovene from Trieste who came from a poor working family...
. Balantič was a master of classical poetic forms, especially sonnet
Sonnet
A sonnet is one of several forms of poetry that originate in Europe, mainly Provence and Italy. A sonnet commonly has 14 lines. The term "sonnet" derives from the Occitan word sonet and the Italian word sonetto, both meaning "little song" or "little sound"...
s. His major poem was 'The Wreath of Sonnets', written in 1940, and published posthumously by the literary critic Tine Debeljak in 1944.
The most typical trait of Balantič's poetry is his unique blend of personalist and eschatological visions, in which a messianic
Messiah
A messiah is a redeemer figure expected or foretold in one form or another by a religion. Slightly more widely, a messiah is any redeemer figure. Messianic beliefs or theories generally relate to eschatological improvement of the state of humanity or the world, in other words the World to...
sense of the tragic dissolution of civilization and the end of time is intertwined with premonitions of his own death and a strong erotic feeling. Most of his poems are a search towards a personal vision of Divinity, in connection with the tradition of Catholic mysticism
Mysticism
Mysticism is the knowledge of, and especially the personal experience of, states of consciousness, i.e. levels of being, beyond normal human perception, including experience and even communion with a supreme being.-Classical origins:...
. He developed a complex metaphorical-hermetical style, verging on manierism. In many ways, Balantič continued the tradition of Slovene Christian expressionism, whose main exponents were Anton Vodnik
Anton Vodnik
Anton Vodnik was a Slovenian poet, art historian, and critic. He was one of the most notable representatives of Slovene Catholic expressionism in the interwar period....
and Edvard Kocbek
Edvard Kocbek
Edvard Kocbek was a Slovenian poet, writer, essayist, translator, political activist, and resistance fighter. He is considered as one of the best authors who have written in Slovene, and one of the best Slovene poets after Prešeren...
, which he, following the example of the writer Ivan Pregelj
Ivan Pregelj
Ivan Pregelj was a Slovene writer, playwright, poet, and critic.- Life :Pregelj was born to a tailor's family in Most na Soči . His father died while Pregelj was still a child. He attended school with the help of the parish priest...
, connected with elements of Baroque aestheticism.
Legacy
After World War IIWorld War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
all his poetry was removed from public libraries
Library
In a traditional sense, a library is a large collection of books, and can refer to the place in which the collection is housed. Today, the term can refer to any collection, including digital sources, resources, and services...
in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was the Yugoslav state that existed from the abolition of the Yugoslav monarchy until it was dissolved in 1992 amid the Yugoslav Wars. It was a socialist state and a federation made up of six socialist republics: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia,...
, and his name was omitted in public education. When the literary historian Anton Slodnjak mentioned Balantič in his Review of Slovene Literature in the 1950s, he was fired from his post at the University of Ljubljana because of it. In 1966, a selection of Balantič's poems were printed under the title Muževna steblika, but after intervention by the Communist Party it was decided that the book should be withdrawn and the entire run was sent to be destroyed and recycled.
His poems were published among the Slovene diaspora
Diaspora
A diaspora is "the movement, migration, or scattering of people away from an established or ancestral homeland" or "people dispersed by whatever cause to more than one location", or "people settled far from their ancestral homelands".The word has come to refer to historical mass-dispersions of...
, especially in Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
, where the literary historians Tine Debeljak and France Papež edited and published most of his works. In the late 1980s, Balantič was rediscovered in Slovenia
Slovenia
Slovenia , officially the Republic of Slovenia , is a country in Central and Southeastern Europe touching the Alps and bordering the Mediterranean. Slovenia borders Italy to the west, Croatia to the south and east, Hungary to the northeast, and Austria to the north, and also has a small portion of...
, too, and he is now considered to be one of the foremost Slovene language poets of the 20th century, along with Edvard Kocbek
Edvard Kocbek
Edvard Kocbek was a Slovenian poet, writer, essayist, translator, political activist, and resistance fighter. He is considered as one of the best authors who have written in Slovene, and one of the best Slovene poets after Prešeren...
and Srečko Kosovel
Srecko Kosovel
Srečko Kosovel was a Slovene expressionist poet who evolved towards avant-garde forms. Since the 1960s, Kosovel has become a poetic icon, in the league of the most prestigious Slovene literates like France Prešeren and Ivan Cankar. Together with Edvard Kocbek, he is considered as the most...
.
Poetry collections
- V ognju groze plapolam ("I Flutter in the Fire of Horror". Ljubljana, 1944)
- Muževna steblika ("The Sappy Stem". Published posthumous in Buenos AiresBuenos AiresBuenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...
, 1966) - Zbrano delo, ("Collected Work". Buenos Aires, 1976)
- Zbrane pesmi, ("Collected Poems". Ljubljana, 1991)
- Tihi glas piščali, ("The Silent Voice of the Flute". Ljubljana, 1991)
See also
- Slovenian literatureSlovenian literatureSlovene literature, meaning the literature in the Slovene language, starts with Freising manuscripts around 1000. From first printed Slovene religious books in 1550 it is followed by these literary periods and notable authors:-Middle Ages:-Folk poetry:...