The 2023 “Prozart” Award that “PRO-ZA Balkan” International Literature Festival awards for the 11th time to a distinguished author for his contribution to literature development in the Balkans, goes to Drago Jančar, a Slovenian writer with a sharp sense for modern narration and writing power in which he paints original pages in the Slovenian and Balkan prose. His prose work has profiled itself in the contemporary Balkan and European literature as a mighty potential in discovering new strategies and possibilities of the prose writing.

As a novelist, storyteller, playwright and essayist, Jančar is the central figure in the contemporary Slovenian literature.

His novels, essays and short stories have been translated into 33 languages and published in Europe, Asia and the USA. His plays, staged by a number of foreign theatres, are considered to be the most important events at home, in the Slovenian theatre season.

Jančar has received many Slovenian and international literary awards, including Prešern Award, the highest decoration in the field of artistic creation for 1993; four Kresnik awards for best Slovenian novel of the year for 1999, 2001, 2011 and 2018, as well as Kresnik award for best novel of the decade in 2020; the European Short Story Award in 1994; Herder award for 2002; Jean Améry award for 2007; the European Literary Award for 2011; Prix du Meilleur Livre Étrange for 2014; the Austrian National Award for European Literature in 2020, etc.

The perceptiveness in Jančar’s work is abundantly supported by his narrating charm – an example of a nuanced, focused prose, and it is very well adapted to painting the contemporary life, dilemmas and challenges.

“Prozart” Awarding Board
President
PhD Ermis Lafazanovski
Members
PhD Aleksandar Prokopiev
Dejan Trajkoski