Original scientific paper
Dubrovnik in the Novel of the English Writer Ann Bridge (1935)
Žarko Muljačić
Abstract
The author analyses the novel »Illyrian Spring« which Ann Bridge published in London in 1935. Her knowledge of Dalmatia (Split, Trogir, Klis, Dubrovnik and the surroundings) is based, according to the writer, on a real voyage made probably in the early thirties of this century.
The story itself is very weak: a married woman and a twenty year younger student, both aristocrats, uncomprehended by their own families, happen to meet in Venice, from where they start their trip down the Dalmatian coast in order to get to know its sights and to paint its scenery and monuments. The story finishes with a happy end. Lady Kilmichael proves herself to be a personality and a painter. So there are no obstacles for her return to her own country and for her further happy life. Thus today's reader will not be so much interested in the very story, as in the writer's observations on our country and people.
Beside stereotypic remarks usually found in similar texts, this novel abounds in original comments on architecture (wickerwork ornaments) and the Dalmatian flora (both of these being her hobbies). Her impressions of some personalities are very interesting. For example: Don Frane Bulić, named here Abbé B. is given as »a courteous little old gentleman with whitie hair and rather unclerical black suit«.
Thanks to favourable circumstances (great interest for our country shown by tourists and intensified by all the world press reports on the private voyage of Prince of Wales and his great love) the novel was published in English again (Leipzig, 1936) and was soon translated into different languages (Stockholm, 1939; Paris, 1948; Utrecht, 1956). Although of a very low literary value, the novel attracted numerous readers who were looking for entertainment as well as for information on Yugoslavia.
Keywords
Hrčak ID:
243252
URI
Publication date:
30.6.1982.
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