Ognjen Spahić
WINNER
WINNER
Biography
Ognjen Spahić was born in 1977 in Podgorica, Montenegro. Prior to Puna glava radosti, Spahić published two earlier collections of short stories: Sve to (All That) in 2001, and Zimska potraga (Winter Search) in 2007. His novel Hansenova djeca (Hansen’s Children), published in 2004, won him the Meša Selimović prize for 2005, awarded to the best new novel from Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro, and Bosnia and Herzegovina. To date, Hansenova djeca has been published in French, Italian, Slovenian, Romanian, Hungarian, Macedonian and English. His short story ‘Rejmond je mrtav. Karver je umro, rekoh‘ (‘Raymond is No Longer with Us – Carver is Dead’) was included in the anthology Best European Fiction 2011, published by Dalkey Archive Press in the USA. In 2007, he was a resident writer at the University of Iowa’s International Writing Program. In 2011, he was the recipient of Romania’s Ovid Festival Prize awarded to a prominent young talent. Puna glava radosti is Spahić’s most recent work, his fourth book of fiction to date.
Nominated book : Puna glava radosti (Head Full of Joy)
Summary
Puna glava radosti (Head Full of Joy) by Ognjen Spahić, published this year by the Podgorica-based publisher Nova knjiga, presents a corpus of 16 unusual tales featuring episodes from the life of each story’s hero. Each story is told by an omniscient narrator or the hero himself, and they paint a picture showing the collision of the outer and inner world of modern man, providing a distinct interpretation of the universal values of life. This peculiarity of style contains a range of genres, a diversity of themes and abundant associativity, which gives much pleasure to the modern reader, making them feel like they are privileged participants in the book’s events.
Related publications
EUPL Anthology 2014
Various authors