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Death and the Dervish

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Wikipedia article




'Death and the Dervish' (Serbo-Croatian: 'Dervi i smrt' / ) is a novel by Mea Selimovi, published in 1966. The novel was made into a 1974 feature-length film of the same name.

Plot



Sheikh Nuruddin is a respected dervish in an Islamic monastery in eighteenth century Bosnia. He learns his brother Harun has been arrested by the Ottoman authorities but he struggles to determine exactly what happened and what he should do. He narrates the story as a kind of elaborate suicide note from a need stronger than benefit or reason and regularly misquotes (or misunderstands) the Quran, the sacred scriptures of his faith. Slowly the Sheikh starts to probe and question society, power and life in general. Speaking the truth leads to his being physically assaulted in the streets and even arrested briefly. Ultimately he fights and challenges the injustice of the world by employing deceit which succeeds at the expense of innocent life. Nuruddin replaces the old Kad but is in turn corrupted by the need to uphold the original deceit.

Principal characters

* Sheikh Ahmed Nuruddinthe protagonist who is a religious everyman. His name Ahmed means friend in Arabic, whilst Nuruddin means light of the Religion.

* HasanNuruddins principal friend outside the tekke.

* Mullah Yusufthe young student Nuruddin has brought into the tekke as an orphan, who spies on him for outside interests.

Subject Matter

The principal theme of Death and the Dervish is malodunost, a Bosnian word meaning diminished or reduced soul (translates as faint-heartedness, cowardice or indifference). The most popular interpretation of this popular novel is that Selimovi employed a fictional Ottoman setting to obscure a real critique of life in Communist Yugoslavia. Another important component is the fact that the story reflects a real-life incident in the authors own life, when his brother, an ardent Communist functionary, was imprisoned and executed by Communist authorities after the war as an example to others for a very minor offense.

References



Category:Bosnia and Herzegovina culture

Category:Bosnia and Herzegovina literature

Category:Novels set in Yugoslavia

Category:Historical novels

Category:Dervish

Category:1966 novels

Category:Novels set in the Ottoman Empire

Category:Novels adapted into films


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