SOURCE: "Bosnia Demythologized: Character and Motivation in Ivo Andrić's Stories Mara milosnica and O starim i mladim Pamukovićima," in Die Welt der Sloven, Vol. 25, No. 1,1980, pp. 98-108.

In the following essay, Johnson examines Andrić's changing portrayal of Bosnia by comparing his early story "Mara the Concubine" to his later story, "About the Old and Young Pamukovićes."

Ivo Andrić was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1961 for the "epic force" with which he presented the history of his land. The stories and novels about Bosnia occupy a position of central importance in his fiction and reflect most clearly its development in both thematic and formal terms. Major changes have been noted in his writing, particularly after World War II. One can, in fact, identify a thematic shift away from bizarre, violent passions and the curse of heredity, from the legendary Bosnia, to the historical...