![]() ![]() To support the Guardian and Observer order your copy at. Bolla is a stark, powerful portrayal of the dehumanising effects of trauma, shame and fear.īolla by Pajtim Statovci, translated by David Hackston, is published by Faber (£14.99). By the end, Miloš is so broken that he envies the beast its one day of freedom every year. Hiding in its cave, Statovci suggests, the Bolla represents forbidden desire in the eyes of an unforgiving society. The Albanian word also means “alien” and “invisible”. Throughout, Statovci interweaves the story of the Bolla, a mythological beast born from the union between a snake and God’s daughter. He is also the author of My Cat Yugoslavia (Pantheon, 2017) and Crossing (Pantheon, 2019), which was a finalist for the National Book Award. He is currently a PhD candidate at the University of Helsinki. His fragmented diary entries, dated from January 2000 to April 2002, recall an abusive childhood and war’s “wreckage”, as well as his meeting with Arsim and their brief happiness together. Pajtim Statovci was born in Kosovo in 1990 and moved with his family to Finland when he was two years old. ![]() ![]() When he has sex with a male minor, he is charged with rape, imprisoned for 13 months and afterwards deported back to Pristina. Arsim finds it hard to adapt to his new life. Arsim and his family are forced into exile, while Miloš enlists as a soldier. ![]()
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