page_title: The Bridge on the Drina
section_title: Reception and legacy
hierarchical_section_title: The Bridge on the Drina / Reception and legacy
caption_attribution_description: English: Ivo Andrić signing books at the Book Fair
context_page_description: The Bridge on the Drina is a historical novel by the Yugoslav writer Ivo Andrić. It revolves around the Mehmed Paša Sokolović Bridge in Višegrad, which spans the Drina River and stands as a silent witness to history from its construction by the Ottomans in the mid-16th century until its partial destruction during World War I. The story spans about four centuries and covers the Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian occupations of the region, with a particular emphasis on the lives, destinies and relations of the local inhabitants, especially Serbs and Bosnian Muslims.
  Andrić had been Yugoslavia's ambassador to Germany from 1939 to 1941, during the early years of World War II, and was arrested by the Germans in April 1941, following the Nazi German-led Axis invasion of Yugoslavia. In June 1941, he was allowed to return to German-occupied Belgrade but was confined to a friend's apartment in conditions that some biographers liken to house arrest. The novel was one of three that Andrić wrote over the next several years. All three were published in short succession in 1945, following Belgrade's liberation from the Germans.
context_section_description: The three novels Andrić published in 1945 were an immediate success. The Bridge on the Drina was instantly recognized as a classic by the Yugoslav literary establishment. The novel played an important role in shaping Andrić's Tito-era reputation as the very embodiment of Yugoslav literature, a "living equivalent to Njegoš". From its publication in 1945 until the dissolution of Yugoslavia in 1991–92, the novel was required reading in Yugoslav secondary schools.
  The novel's literary and historical significance was instrumental in persuading the Swedish Academy to award Andrić the Nobel Prize. In his introduction to Andrić's acceptance speech, Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences member Göran Liljestrand took note of the symbolic significance of the bridge and described Andrić as a unifying force. "Just as the bridge on the Drina brought East and West together," Liljestrand said, "so your work has acted as a link, combining the culture of your country with other parts of the planet." Following Andrić's death in 1975, Slovene novelist Ivan Potrč wrote an obituary praising the Nobel Laureate. "Andrić did not merely write The Bridge on the Drina," Potrč remarked. "He built, is building and will continue to build bridges between our peoples and nationalities."
  In subsequent decades, large sections of the Croatian and Bosnian Muslim (Bosniak) literary establishments distanced themselves from Andrić's body of work due to his strong ties with Serbian culture. In 1992, at the outset of the Bosnian War, a Bosnian Muslim destroyed a bust of Andrić in Višegrad using a sledgehammer. Later that year, more than 200 Bosniak civilians were killed on the bridge by Bosnian Serb militias and their bodies tossed into the Drina. By 1993, owing to the war and consequent ethnic cleansing, the multi-ethnic Bosnia described in the novel had largely been consigned to history. Andrić and his works, particularly The Bridge on the Drina, remain a source of controversy among Bosniaks due to their alleged anti-Muslim undertones. The Turkish writer Elif Shafak has stated that the novel radically changed her perception of Ottoman history. "Suddenly, I had to rethink what I thought I knew," Shafak wrote for the New Statesman. "I had to unlearn. What Andrić’s novel did for me at that young age was to shake years of nationalistic education, and whisper into my ears: "Have you ever considered the story from the point of view of the Other?""
  Patterson describes The Bridge on the Drina as a seminal work whose themes and motifs—forced labour, invasion, annexation and displacement—would appear frequently in subsequent 20th-century fiction. The town of Višegrad and its historic sites were popularized throughout Yugoslavia as a result of the novel, to which the Mehmed Paša Sokolović Bridge owes its renown. The Bridge on the Drina was widely read by Western scholars, reporters and policy makers amidst the Yugoslav Wars of the 1990s, and sometimes cited as one of the two most important texts ever written about the Balkans, the other being Rebecca West's 1941 travel book Black Lamb and Grey Falcon. The bridge was recognized as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 2007. In 2011, the Serbian filmmaker Emir Kusturica began construction of a mock-town called Andrićgrad in the vicinity of the bridge. Andrićgrad was officially opened on 28 June 2014, the 100th anniversary of Franz Ferdinand's assassination. Kusturica intends to use it as a set for a future cinematic adaption of the novel. In 2019, Pope Francis quoted a passage from the novel at a press conference in Rabat, Morocco while arguing for amity and concord between nations.
caption: Andrić signing books at the Belgrade Book Fair
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