The announcement stated that when the jury was making a list of 30 novels in which it did not include Ugričić's work, it did not know about his letter about withdrawing the book. Stating that the list of all novels and the writer's letter about the novel's withdrawal will be published in the next issue of NIN, the newspaper's editors cited part of Ugričić's explanation, reports Beta. "The writer explains that the award is functionally embedded in the socio-symbolic order that he deals with in the novel that he withdrew from the competition, an order that he says is traditionalist and states: The governing standard is: the more Serbian the better, and it should be exactly the other way around: what the better - the more Serbian," states NIN. Explaining in detail how he sees that order, Ugričić states that he does not agree to participate in it. 124 novels entered this year's competition, and the novel of the year is decided by a jury consisting of Vasa Pavković (president), Ljiljana Šop, Mileta Aćimović Ivkov, Aleksandar Ilić and Mladen Šukalo.
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