Controversy and formalization
Before 1945 saw the standardization and officialization of the Macedonian language, previous centuries saw debates that continue to this day. For example, what language were poets born in the towns that are now part of contemporary North Macedonia writing in? Some say Bulgarian, while others claim Macedonian. These differences, which have as much to do with linguistics as with nationalism, cannot be resolved here. All we can do is mention three authors whose work fueled this controversy: the priest Joachim Kartchovski (c. 1750-1820), whose texts written in the popular language carried his faith, Kiril Peïtchinovitch (c. 1770-1845), who used the dialect of his native region, Polog, for his books, which were also religious, and Partenija Zografski (1818-1876), who became a folklorist and philologist. Oral tradition then irrigated the work of Dimitar Miladinov (1810-1862) and his brother Konstantin (1830-1862): they collected over six hundred folk songs, published in a collection in 1861 in Zagreb. Although they claimed to be Bulgarians - and their approach got them into trouble with the Ottoman government, which was concerned about their Panslav bias - the fact remains that they were originally from Struga, now in Northern Macedonia. At first glance, the profile of Krste Petkov Misirkov (1874-1926) doesn't seem to raise such questions of identity, since he worked from the beginning of the 20th century to establish a standardized Macedonian language. Nevertheless, his political about-turns still motivate his opponents, even though some have unhesitatingly proclaimed him the father of modern literary Macedonian. Consensus finally seems to have been reached with Kotcho Ratsin, born Kosta Apostoi Solev in 1908, who inherited the title of father of Macedonian literature. His work is clearly delineated: he first wrote in Serbo-Croatian and Bulgarian, then added Macedonian to this panel in 1936. It was in the latter language that, three years later, Aubes blanches was composed, earning him great renown throughout Yugoslavia, and especially in Pirin Macedonia, a region that may be in Bulgaria, but where the same language is spoken as in North Macedonia. However, if we are to believe Venko Markovski, who published Narodni Bigori in 1938 but later used Bulgarian, the dissension was not over: until the eve of his death in 1988, he dithered over his roots. Even more tragic was the fate of Kolé Nedelkovski, a member of the Macedonian Literary Circle founded in Sofia in 1938, who had to flee because of his revolutionary poems written in the Skopje dialect and lost his life, aged 28, during this precipitous exile.
In the aftermath of the Second World War, with the proclamation of the Socialist Republic of Macedonia, the official recognition of Macedonian as a literary language sounded like an opportunity to settle differences, and coincided with the birth of a Macedonian literature that dreamed of defining itself as such, as evidenced by the creation - as early as 1947! - of the country's first Writers' Association. Of course, this was not without its problems, and the "linguistic neutrality" of Blaze Koneski, who standardized the Macedonian language, was itself called into question. Nevertheless, he is still considered the leader of the first generation of authors, and has received numerous awards for his numerous collections of poetry. Poetry was the preferred genre of pioneers such as Vlado Maleski (1919-1984), best known for having written the lyrics of the national anthem Denes nad Makedonija, Aco Sopov, who was discovered in French by Actes Sud(Anthologie personnelle : 1950-1980), or Gane Todorovski, illustrious academician at the MANU (Macedonian Academy of Sciences and Arts) and president of the no less prestigious Soirées de poésie de Struga, a festival with an international reputation. Their contemporary, Slavko Janesvski, born in 1920 in Skopje, distinguished himself in all the literary arts, but is best known for having written the first novel in standard Macedonian, The Village Behind the Seven Ash Trees, published in 1952, the first in a long line of works.
Modern and contemporary
The embodiment of the second generation of Macedonian writers is undoubtedly Mateja Matevski, although he was born in Istanbul in 1929 into an Albanian family. After studying and teaching in Skopje, he went on to become a journalist and editor-in-chief of the magazine Mlada literatura. In the second half of the twentieth century, literature took a turn for the better, becoming "professionalized" in a way, the object of young graduates who brought a new complexity to it, sometimes leaning towards surrealism. Matevski's substantial body of work - some thirty books, of which only Naissance de la tragédie has been translated into French - places him at the pinnacle of this new upswing, but we could place alongside him Vlada Urosević(Ma Ccusine Émilie published by L'Âge d'homme, Une autre ville published by Temps des Cerises éditions), Petre M. Andreevski, renowned for his historical novel Pirej and his poetic collection Denicija, Zivko Čingo, whose novel La Grande Eau has been reissued by Nouvel Attila and whose short stories have been collected under the title Paskvelija by Non Lieu... Nevertheless, the author who has had the greatest impact on our language is Luan Starova (1941-2022), who was an ambassador (notably in Paris) and had the particularity of writing in both Macedonian and Albanian. Fayard still offers his novels as print-on-demand editions(Le Temps des chèvres, Les Livres de mon père, Le Musée de l'athéisme), while his poetry is well preserved by Écrits des Forges(Poèmes de Carthage) and Editions des Syrtes(Le Chemin des anguilles).
While poetic art - theorized by Katica Kulavkova in her university theses - retains its primacy, the theater takes center stage thanks to numerous playwrights such as Kole Časule (1921-2009), Tome Arsovski (1928-2007) or, closer to home, Goran Stefanovski(Éloge du contraire, Le Démon de Debarmaalo..) and Jordan Plevnes(Erigon, La Peau des autres...), both born in the 1950s, then Venko Andonovski(Cunégonde en Carlaland), their younger brother. Thanks to the formidable work of publishers such as L'Espace d'un instant, the theatrical stage has become the privileged place where Macedonian literature can offer itself to the world. A new generation, born in the 1970s, is beginning to make a name for itself beyond the country's borders, with works by Lidija Dimkovska(Comment c'est, published by Al Manar), Nikola Madzirov, Goce Smilevski(La Liste de Freud, 10-18), Slavo Koviloski, Rumena Buzarovska(Mon cher mari, Gallimard), Petar Andonovski(La Peur des barbares, Glassroots) and Nenad Joldeski, both winners of the European Prize for Literature, and the youngest, Stefan Markovski.
