Andrić shied away from cameras and journalists

I met Ivo Andrić in 1971 on the occasion of the exhibition "Art on the Soil of Yugoslavia from Prehistory to Today". The exhibition was first held in Paris (Grand Palais), and then for the Yugoslav public it was organized in the Skenderija building in Sarajevo.

ARRIVAL IN SARAJEVO FOR THE EXHIBITION

In the Organizing Committee of the exhibition, there were, in addition to several prominent figures from the field of fine arts and culture, Ljubo Jandrić, a colleague from the Faculty, then already a writer and in the position of Minister of Culture, and I, the cultural editor of TV Sarajevo, in the Committee in charge of media.

Through the media, we encouraged interest in the exhibition, among other things, with information about the visits of important figures from public life and culture. Ivo Andrić, despite several calls, did not come. However, one day, Jandrić, all happy, announced to the Organizing Committee - Ivo announced that he would come. We went to pick him up in a representative car of the Executive Council (Government) of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Along the way, I told Ljub Jandrić that this is the last chance to record Andrić's extensive, direct narration in front of the TV cameras for a television show, or just as raw material for the archive.

There was an opportunity for that because of Andrić's close relationship with Ljubo Jandrić, who was his connection to Bosnia for a long time. We agreed that it would be significant for Andrić to present his own views on life, on art, on literature in particular, similar to the texts in his books Signs on the Road, literary essays, etc. On the way to that goal, I had to overcome numerous difficulties, or at least unravel several enigmas:

Why, for example, Andrć did not agree to visual media, TV or film recording his direct and detailed narration, without pre-defined questions and written answers? Because we can only imagine what his direct speech in front of the TV camera would mean, where the face, intonation, gestures, often have as much importance as the words themselves? Filming with such a concept has never been done before.

Why, by the way, did he avoid the media and why didn't he like journalists? I was present when, on one occasion earlier, in the inner circle of the Dean's Office of the Faculty of Philosophy, before the start of the official conversation, he asked: "Are there any journalists among us?" " I wasn't a journalist then.

MEETING IN BELGRADE

In his home, he welcomed us very warmly. I could immediately notice his closeness to Jandric.

He spoke with a smile:

- Do you know what prompted me to go to the exhibition in Sarajevo? I met a neighbor the other day. A simple and warm-hearted woman. She asks me: "Ivo, were you in Sarajevo at the exhibition?" No, I tell her. "Is it possible, Ivo, that you didn't see it?" To better show her surprise and reproach, she leaned back and moved her body a little to the side... Well, maybe that also contributed to my calling you.

From that moment on, I discreetly wrote down his words, but also remembered them. Because, otherwise, never, not even from my childhood, have someone's words been etched in my memory so impressively as from the meeting with Andrić. In relaxed situations, he spoke slowly, fluently, as in his most beautiful written pages. Those who think that Andrić was "tough" when speaking orally are mistaken. He was like that only on official occasions, because he shied away from the presence of a wider circle of people or journalists. And the recording technique caused him a big psychological problem. atmosphere, the stories branched into a system of associations.

***

On that occasion, Andrić did not have an extensive program in Bosnia. He visited the exhibition and met with several people close to him. I also accepted his wish to visit the exhibition during a break, without the presence of the audience and journalists. I decided to make a report about it for television and send the information to news agencies.

He carefully visited the exhibition. He often watched from a distance, probably more in the desire to see the composition of parts of the exhibition, but also with full attention to individual exhibits. The camera was recording. At the end, another camera and microphone were waiting for him. He chose the option to sit down. He took out a pre-written text from his bag, probably written in Belgrade, and shared his impression. First of all, he spoke about the importance of that event for culture in general. After all, he had seen most of the collected gallery and museum works from the exhibition earlier in museums, galleries, and temples.

MEETING WITH FRIENDS AT THE EUROPA HOTEL

According to tradition, Andrić stayed in the hotel "Evropa". This hotel is located between old Sarajevo, Baščaršija and buildings from the Austro-Hungarian period. (It was destroyed in the last war, and after 2000 its reconstruction was completed). I also make a program according to the wishes of the guest.

- Who would you like to meet? - Jandrić addressed Andrić.

Instead of a direct answer, Andrić asks:

- How is Rizo Ramić, I heard he was in the hospital? - (Ramić is quiet, close to Andrić, a cultural researcher of Bosnian literary heritage). - Has Meša (Selimović) recovered after his heart problems? - Mladen Oljača is the president of the Association of Writers?

Jandrić answered all the questions more sparingly than I expected.

When we parted with the guest, I reminded Jandrić that he had not received an answer about who Andrić wanted to meet.

- We got an answer - Jandrić says with a smile - He answered those questions with whom he wants to meet. He did it indirectly, as was his wont.

Andrić and Ljuba Jandrić were bound by a long and sincere friendship. It started at the time when Jandrić was appointed Minister of Culture of BiH and continued until the end. During Andrić's guest appearances in Bosnia, during the breaks of his programs, the two had long conversations. Jandrić told me that at first he secretly wrote down Andrić's sayings, even by going to the toilet often. He explained to him that he had problems with the urinary tract. Andrić, of course, understood what it was about, so he once told him that he could comfortably have a notebook at hand and write down what interested him... Thus, like Ekerman with Goethe, Jandrić wrote a precious book With Ivo Andrić.

When I read it (Jandrić was no longer alive either), I wondered why he didn't record some interesting moments from Andrić's stay in Sarajevo, for example his dialogue with Meša Selimović over lunch at the Hotel "Evropa", where people attended whose health he had asked about the day before. Jandrić, it is evident, had already prepared the book for printing, and Andrić's stay at the exhibition was only briefly recorded.

CAN HE GET AWAY FROM HIMSELF?

Andrić, Selimović, Oljača, Ramić, Jandrić and I were at the table in the restaurant of the hotel "Evropa". After the aperitif, the waiter asks for the dish. Selimović answers:

- Something light, the doctor recommends.

- Veal loin with potatoes - routinely answers the waiter.

- It can.

- Me too - says Oljača - stomach.

Ramić, even though he was weak, ordered a slightly stronger dish.

- And you, Comrade Andrić? - the waiter pointedly addressed the chief guest.

- Oh, sorry Ivo! - Meša responded - We had fun with our problems, then forgot about you.

- It doesn't matter - answers Andrić. So the waiter:

- I will have a Bosnian pot.

The waiter completed the survey to the end. When he left, Oljača said, a little shy:

- Is pot too strong a dish for you? - It's not. I know that they prepare it well here. That's their specialty. I read in the book of a world traveler that, even when you find yourself in an environment you don't know, you won't make a mistake in choosing a dish if you order their specialty... I eat a little "pot" here out of habit.

After mutual exchange of information about health, family, new books, Meša told Andrić with emphatic satisfaction that he had finally managed to change his apartment from Sarajevo to Belgrade and that he would soon move there. (That was the time when some Sarajevo ideologues led a campaign against Selimović, supported by political writers and zealous politicians, due to disagreement with the messages of his works, above all the novel Dervish and Death, in whose characters, it was said, some important personalities were recognized from the political life of Bosnia and Herzegovina. They didn't like the chapter from Selimović's Memoirs about the death of his brother, a partisan, who was shot by his comrades for a trivial matter.) We all eagerly awaited Andrić's response to the information about Meša's imminent move to Belgrade. He made a small pause, which, it seems to me, he usually did when he wanted to create a psychological space for his speech, and said:

- You know, Meša, so many times my friends have offered me to go to some wonderful places from Belgrade, and I always answered them: thank you, it's bad enough for me here.

Instead of the satisfaction that a close person comes to his neighborhood, Andrić opted for a philosophical view of man's, often futile, search for better - and for himself.

There was a mess. So much so, as Andrić often did, that his thought rings out in peace. And then he moved on to a completely different topic, in order to free the interlocutors from the obligation to continue the story that had been started. Even today, I wonder - where did Andrić's distance from his close colleague Selimović come from? I don't know more than the assumption that perhaps it was a question of a certain gap towards Selimović's novel Dervish and Death, which at that very time caused enthusiasm among the general public and Yugoslav literary circles, with evaluations that that work ranks among the highest ranked in that genre, or even at the very top.

ANDRIĆ'S RESERVE TOWARDS TELEVISION

Andrić avoided being under the stage lights. He preferred to observe life from the auditorium. Hence, he reluctantly participated in the media, especially on television. He believed and sometimes said that the journalists had wronged him a lot with inaccurate information. In the conversation, when asked, among other things, why he never denied the inaccuracies that were sometimes published about him in the media, he answered: "Because I would do so if the inaccuracy about me were repeated two or more times."

And only television. I remember that at Television Sarajevo we planned to shoot a series based on Andrić's novel "Travnička hronika". Fearing whether he would agree, the editor and the director went to him. He agreed then in principle, although it did not come to fruition. And when the editor in that conversation timidly hedged that everything from the novel would not be able to fit into the series, but that some content would have to be shortened, Andrić said: "Cut as much as you want, just, please, don't add anything."

Knowing a lot about Andrić's attitude towards television and bearing in mind the fact that he never agreed to a wider, direct speech in front of TV cameras (what was recorded on TV were only short statements, mostly read texts), I worked out a strategy with Ljubo Jandrić how to let's take advantage of his stay in Sarajevo and convince him to agree to the filming. In the years when there was no more time to delay.

We waited for a suitable opportunity to agree on this. Jandrić announced the topic, and I explained the concept and plan in detail. When he understood what we were talking about, it was obvious from his facial expression that he was in favor of my idea. Why is he so hesitant? I offered him all the options: that after the recording, we would review the raw material and remove everything that was not to his liking. No. That we don't broadcast anything, but that the show be archived, or only the raw material and that it be broadcast when he determines in the contract, in twenty, thirty, fifty years. That doesn't work either.

- Why are you so persistent, Comrade Radović? You know that I have repeated several times that everything a writer has to say is in his work.

I cannot fathom the reasons why he refuses so persistently. I ask - does he need to be convinced of the importance of archival material for every sphere of human activity. It is known what the archive meant as a starting point for his literary creation. It doesn't respond. After a pause he says:

- Who knows if my life and work will be so important to a later generation. Time is an unpredictable judge. How many times has it happened, for example, that contemporaries overestimate an artist, and then he is covered by oblivion... Couldn't it also happen in this case that in fifty or a hundred years, some manuscripts that contemporaries did not consider valuable, come to light from the drawers? and let it be said - look at what valuable works they did not want to publish, and there some Andrić or Selimović, whatever they wrote was published more than once. This has happened in many cases. Not only with writers.

I defend myself with the fact that his work has stood the test of time for half a century. He smiles and stands his ground. But I'm not giving up yet. I ask, stating the archival value of what I am proposing, whether it would be significant for him to be able to observe the faces of Shakespeare, Njegosh, Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, Balzac... which in themselves as much as their words additionally tell about their life, about the time, about literature and its meaning. He does not reject this thinking, he smiles but does not answer.

I am thinking about the limit of my persistence and politeness towards a man for whom I feel no small awe. And I give up, eventually.

- Don't be so disappointed, Radović.

It was not difficult for him to notice my dissatisfaction and disagreement with his attitude.

- You didn't miss anything special - he added.

I am absolutely sure that intimately he could not have thought so. Why then?

I was thinking, great people sometimes (or often) have small (or big) vanities, so there could possibly be reasons for Andrić's refusal. Was there a fear that in improvisation he would tarnish the reputation of his written word and sentence carved in marble?

Perhaps, in his pursuit of perfection, he was not completely satisfied with the phonogenicity of his voice either... Or...

And in a relaxed atmosphere, in the presence of those he trusted, Andrić spoke perfectly vividly and fluently. But how to achieve this in conditions of insufficient trust in technology, in journalists and the media?!

Once he got rid of his worries about speaking for TV, he acted and spoke at ease.

He believed me, when I told him after everything that in further association he could be sure that I would not misuse anything as a journalist. His relaxed story flowed.

And then, due to circumstances, I followed him in my car on the way back to Belgrade, and, in addition to the previous ones, I noted down a few more details.

ON THE RETURN TO BELGRADE

About traffic:

The driver of the once-appreciated "shark" (luxury "Citroen"), delighted to be in the service of a great personality, drove inappropriately fast. It was noticeable that Andrić did not like it. From the back seat I could not signal the driver to slow down. I let Andrić do it. In the meantime he spoke very little. At the intersection of Tuzla - Županja, we came across a crashed passenger car on the side of the road. The driver, as if about something ordinary, said that there was a traffic accident there the other day in which two people died. Andrić took it as an occasion to indirectly rebuke our enthusiastic driver:

- We died in the traffic chaos. People are ignorant. They don't understand that getting behind the wheel is not the same as mounting a horse and pushing it across the field... The driver understood and slowed down. After a short break, Andrić continued:

- I recently read in the newspaper, a pharmacist from Kraljevo collided while overtaking and died with his wife and two children... Where was he in a hurry - Andrić said more to himself - when all the real reasons for his life were in his car?

Since the "agreement" about the speed with the driver, Andrić is more relaxed in his speech. Topics came through the system of associations.

About prejudice:

On the drive, we pass a house with loads of white laundry hanging out to dry. And a woman in white. This reminds him of the case of a classy Višegrad woman of Austrian origin, on whom everything shone with cleanliness, but the local women considered her dirty just because she washed fruits and vegetables in a basin, even though it was never used for dirty things.

About priorities:

Andrić, as we had the opportunity to see for ourselves, often indirectly expressed his position, including criticism. He started a story about some new criminal act. I said that, unfortunately, I did not get to read it.

He briefly finished the previous thought, and then told something from his experience. In Paris, namely, he was the guest of a distinguished lady at a reception held in honor of a new work by an important French writer. When she met Andrić, in addition to conventional words, she also mentioned the work that was the reason for the admission. On Andrić's remark that he hadn't had time to read it yet, she said with astonishment: "And what, Mr. Andrić, did you have before as a writer?" He knew that I understood the reproach, indirectly addressed to me.

When we arrived in Belgrade, he invited us for refreshments. The second half of the football match between Yugoslavia and Hungary was already underway. He took a chair and stood in a long room and without saying a word followed the broadcast to the end. During the transmission, the driver and I sat in the back in the company of an elderly woman, as far as I remember she was Andrić's mother-in-law, she outlived her daughter. She told us quietly, as if something was wrong with her Ivo. She says: "When it was something like this in America" ​​- she didn't know it was called boxing, but she pointed with her hands - "he would wind the alarm clock and get up at night to watch it". It is certain that these were the matches of the famous boxer Cassius Clay / Muhammad Ali.

On the same day, return to Sarajevo and notes along the way.

Many do not understand the full meaning of sports

Further down the road, Radio Belgrade news had a rich section on sports. They announced the match of the football team of Yugoslavia against Hungary. It was a key word for a sports story:

- Sport is on the rise here in Bosnia. Both Željezničar and Sarajevo, as well as Velež, are good teams. Basketball is of high quality, especially women's. Železničar has an excellent team. How Olga Djokovic plays!

Djokovic hardly believed me when I told her later that Andrić knew her both by her game and by name. He added that the development of sports in one environment is not accidental either. And that can be a sign of general progress, as is the case with Bosnia and Herzegovina. Upon entering Belgrade, during halftime of the soccer match, the announcer announced the awarding of the award to sports journalist Marko Marković.

- It's not the best example. Radivoje Marković commented very vividly. It was, among other things, characteristic when he commented on the crowd in front of the goal. So at one point he exclaimed: "Nothing!" He immediately explained to the listener that the ball did not go into the goal, and later explained how "nothing" came about... And Ljuba Vukadinović was an excellent reporter and commentator in Politics - he commented is Andrić. He took sports as a kind of dramatic game in which, in addition to the athletes, the audience in stadiums and sports halls participates more actively than in the theater, next to the TV screens and with the radios.

- Many do not understand the full meaning of sport. They don't see it as human competition and great skill in different skills, as art itself, which requires talent, great effort and sacrifice. Rather, it is often taken as something less valuable.

(The author is a TV producer and publicist)