ANDRIĆ AND KIERKEGAARD: THE IRONICAL FORMATION OF THE CHARACTER OF ALIJA ĐERZELEZ (WITH CONSTANT REFERENCE TO SOCRATES)

Аннотация

This paper analyzes Andrić's early short story The Journey of Alija Đerzelez (1920) from the perspective of the philosophical framework of the Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, who is often considered one of the significant influences that, to some extent, shaped the formation of his literary corpus. Given that this influence has primarily been recognized and demonstrated in Andrić's poetry collections (such as Ex Ponto, Nemiri), which the author himself emphasized as an indisputable fact, the aim here is to extend this connection with Kierkegaard to his prose debut, which effectively revealed and anticipated Andrić's immense creative potential. Specifically, the ironic transposition of the folkloric character Alija Đerzelez is based on Kierkegaard's seminal work On the Concept of Irony (with constant reference to Socrates), while also not overlooking Either/Or. Therefore, the focus is not on mechanically imposing Kierkegaard's philosophy onto Andrić's text, but rather, in the manner of proper comparative studies, to facilitate a broader understanding of the relationship between the two thinkers, connected by their very similar ways of expressing their own vision of the world and human existence within it, which ultimately resulted in a remarkable literary hero.