page_title: Vidosav Stevanović
section_title: Persecution and exile
hierarchical_section_title: Vidosav Stevanović / Persecution and exile
caption_attribution_description: English: Photo of Vidosav Stevanović.
context_page_description: Vidosav Stevanović is a Serbian novelist, story writer, poet, playwright, and publicist. he has written over thirty literary works, a political biography of Slobodan Milošević, numerous essays and various other pieces of writing. Stevanović used to write for European newspapers such as Le Monde, Liberation, El País and Expressen.
context_section_description: At the beginning of 1989, Stevanović accepted the position of an advisor in the Sarajevo publishing house Svjetlost, which published the second edition of his collected works. The two years he spent in the multiethnic city of Sarajevo were relatively peaceful. With a few like-minded people, Stevanović established the literary association Independent Yugoslav Writers. One of the constitutive documents proposed the foundation of the professional trade union Svjetlost, which still exists, while the other required that the political parties at the time reveal to the public the archives of the secret services; this initiative was supported only by reformists from Serbia. These archives remained undisclosed even at the beginning of the 21st century. Stevanović founded the Liberal Forum in Belgrade, together with a couple of independent intellectuals. It aimed to act as an intermediary between various political options, but with no success. At the first free elections held towards the end of the 1990s, he participated in the campaigns of the presidential candidate Ivan Djuric. Except the primary liberal and pro-western orientation, we had in our political platform three important aims for Serbia: peace with itself, peace with its neighbors, peace with the world. Still, we couldn’t do much in the middle of the hellish media blitz of Milosevic and the other frenzied nationalists who were everywhere preparing for the war and rapine. (Vidosav Stevanović: Notes). In December of the same year he resigned from his position as advisor in Svjetlost and withdrew to his home village near Kragujevac.
  In the first year of democracy, Stevanović, like other people holding the same attitudes as his, could not find publishers for his works. It happened in the same year that I lost my job and couldn’t have my works published, so I was unable to support my family. Nobody noticed this in the city which was caught up in war fever and nationalistic fanaticism. We had to leave. After a physical assault in the street, he fled to Greece with his wife and sons, and going through the experiences described in his writing, started the trilogy The Snow and the Dogs. His first book, The Snow in Athens, was published in Greek, and later on, in Serbian.
  With help from PEN and his French friends he managed to get to France to promote his book and, following an invitation from the publisher, decided to stay in France. Stevanović gave a number of interviews, appeared in many TV programs, participated in public debates and visited French towns; in all places severely criticizing the regime of Slobodan Milosevic. He joined Ivan Djuric, also an asylum seeker, and his Movement of Democratic Forces. They tried to convince the European public and politicians of how necessary it was to stop the war in the former Yugoslavia. They also tried to help Sarajevo, the city being bombed at the time. After the Dayton Agreement, the two of them criticized the delayed halt of war, the division of Bosnia and the nationalism of the politicians leading the three constitutive nations.
  Towards the end of 1995, Stevanović stayed in his house near Kragujevac. Appalled by the political atmosphere, he left again, this time heading first to Prague to write the screenplay for The Balkan Island, and then to Paris. He publicly opposed the positions held by western governments claiming that Milosevic was a guarantee of stability in the Balkans. Over a span of just two years he lost two of his close friends: Dragisa Pavlovic died in Belgrade, and Ivan Djuric in Paris. For the sake of his sons he returned to Serbia during the big demonstrations of 1996–97, joining the opposition in Kragujevac which soon won the favor of the city radio-television, the first free one in Serbia. Six months later, Stevanović resigned from the position of director and left for Paris. In his diary from that period Thieves of Their Own Freedom, published in French, there is a sentence saying: "The opposition is the final line of defense against the regime of Slobodan Milosevic." His wife and younger son joined him, and 
caption: Vidosav Stevanović
exif: {}