Ismail Kadare Dies Aged 88

Hello Gentle Reader,

Ismail Kadare was a singular writer. A towering figure of European literature, Kadare’s reputation was built and fortified on a literary body of work which was as immense as Balzac’s and of unimpeachable quality; uncompromising in its allegory and critique of political injustices and dictatorships; while exploring the existentially horrors such dictatorships force upon its citizens, and their reality warping and corroding effects. Ismail Kadare was a unextinguishable beacon of light, whose pen became a necessary form of resistance against the Soviet endorsed communist regime of Enver Hoxha (before Hoxha broke ties with the communist superpower, while retaining its Stalinist principles), and the infectious paranoia such a society breeds. Ismail Kadare—be it willing or unwillingly—became the palpable hope of Albania, who withered under repressive policies of communism. To quote Ismail Kadare:

“Literature has often produced magnificent works in dark ages as if it was seeking to remedy the misfortune inflicted on people.”

Allegory and irony were Kadare’s greatest literary weapons. The ability to craft a compelling metaphor, provided Kadare enough ability to criticize Hoxha, while seemingly able to avoid punitive political recourse. Where other writers were arrested (and some executed), Kadare avoided the fate, though he was exiled to a remote village for a year. How, Kadare avoided political persecution, had often been a subject of debate and attack on the writer. It turned out, however, that Enver Hoxha considered himself a literary man, and while there have been reports that the former dictator did in fact order Kadare’s arrest and execution, he always spared him in the end, perhaps out of begrudged respect or literary appreciation. I suspect, it was more international renown in addition to literary merit that saved Kadare from imprisonment and execution. If Kadare’s reputation was not as stellar and his literary talents but a fraction, Hoxha would have done away with him. By the end of the 80’s though, Kadare fled Albania for France, and his international stature was now set in stone. For the past thirty to forty years, Ismail Kadare was rumored to be a future Nobel Laureate in Literature and a perennial contender, in addition to Milan Kundera, Chinua Achebe, and Philip Roth. In 2005, Kadare won the inaugural Man Booker International Prize, for a lifetime assessment of his literary work. Further international accolades include: the Princess of Asturias award in 2009, the Jerusalem prize in 2015 and the Neustadt international prize for literature in 2020. The elusiveness of the Nobel Prize in Literature, will be marked down as another missed opportunity for the Swedish Academy.

Today, Ismail Kadare died and Europe has lost not only of its towering figures, an institution of literary resistance and political discourse, but also a writer who is perhaps one of the few writers, who remained unabashedly a national writer. The kind of writer who captured and celebrated a geographical place. In his work, Ismail Kadare, celebrated Albania as an ancient and shackled nation, overlooked or ignored by the its European neighbours. In doing so, Ismail Kadare elevated the south-eastern Balkan nation to new literary heights, as Kadare promoted and encouraged many young Albanian writers, championing their work abroad.

Rest in Peace Ismail Kadare, you were truly one of the greatest writers of the past 20^th Century and early 21^st Century.

Thank you for Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
 

M. Mary