Albanian writer Ismail Kadare, who died on 1 July 2024 at the age of 88, never saw a world free from empires set on expansion, conquest, dictatorship, and the theft of dreams, privacy, and histories. From the onset of his literary career in the 1950s, his writings confronted the imperial structures that emerged after World War II and evolved ever since. He was a son of the dictatorial era and one of its most high-profile victims.
Kadare’s published portfolio of more than 80 books translated into 45 languages meticulously examines the conditions of fragmentation that beset the world. Imbued with an Albanian sensibility, his work narrates the struggle of the marginalised to gain recognition in the relentless battle for identity and acknowledgement.
Dictatorship and awards
A renowned author whose works were translated into many languages worldwide, Kadare’s prominence stemmed from his ability to coexist with the dictatorial regime of Enver Hoxha, who ruled Albania from 1944-85. The greatest irony lay in his ability to compel a dictatorial regime to promote literature that profoundly condemned and opposed its very essence. Yet he was no isolated case: coexistence with a dictator extended to many dedicated and significant writers.
Year after year, Kadare was nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature. He never won, but he did receive the British Booker Prize in 2005 and the Jerusalem Prize in 2015, awarded biennially by the Israeli government to a literary or intellectual figure under the title Jerusalem Prize for the Freedom of the Individual in Society. After receiving the award, he sparked controversy and anger by saying that “Israel and Albania are struggling to survive in a foul environment”.
In 1990, to escape the communist regime and its Sigurimi secret police, Kadare fled to Paris, where he continued his literary pursuits. The Sigurimi mission was, in part, to suppress opposition to the existing political framework. He benefited from the appeasement of the communist regime, arriving in France with an aura, bolstered by numerous translations. He portrayed himself as a dissident and freedom fighter, but his ultimate goal was the Nobel Prize.
However, Albania's obscure position in southern Europe and its history of appeasing communist regimes may have proven to be obstacles. Kadare's personal quest for international literary recognition mirrors a broader Albanian desire for the country to be acknowledged as a genuine part of Europe.
Framed by its Ottoman history, Albania's identity has long been subject to debate. In numerous interviews after leaving Albania, Kadare emphasised Albania's European affiliation. Europe could encompass Albanian components with their Ottoman Islamic and Orthodox Christian cultural backgrounds.
Oblique existence
Kadare's works often drew on parable, myth, and folklore, saying things through insinuation or with double meanings, all serving as literary fire exits should the censors and secret police come knocking, which they often did.
His writing often treated the world as hostile and obscure. In The Fall of the Stone City, he describes "a tilted city, perhaps the most tilted in the world, defying all laws of architecture and city planning". In this world, he writes, "the top of one house touched the foundations of another, making it the only place where one could stoop down the side of a street and find themselves on a rooftop".
