(1898 - 1966)
Dimitar Talev was born in the town of Prilep. At various times he studied in Prilep, Thessaloniki, Skopje, Stara Zagora and finished high school in Bitola (1920). He studied one semester in Medicine and another in Philosophy in Zagreb and Vienna respectively (1920–1921). He graduated from Sofia University in Bulgarian Language and Literature (1925). He was proofreader, editor and editor-in-chief of the newspaper Makedoniya. He is associated with the newspaper Zora; together with Yordan Badev he led the literary section of the newspaper between 1938 and 1944. After 9 September 1944 he was sent to the “labour correction village” of Bobovdol (until the end of August 1945); he was arrested again in October 1947 and assigned to work at the Pernik mine until February 1948. His family was forcefully displaced from Sofia to settle in Lukovit where in the next 10 years and in social isolation Talev created some of his most significant novels. He was rehabilitated at the end of the 1950s and the beginning of the 1960s and engaged in literary activities thereafter.
In the first half of the 1920s Talev published socially-oriented prose in newspapers and magazines. During this decade, as well as the next, he was associated with the Macedonian periodicals which were published in Bulgaria at the time and published short stories, travelogues, essays, legends, and many journalistic pieces of social critique. Among his most well-known books from this period are Zlatniyat klyuch [The Golden Key] (1935, short stories), Starata kashta [The Old House] (1938, short stories), Na zavoi [At the Turn] (1940, novel), Gotse Delchev (1942, biography), Grad Prilep. Borbi za rod i svoboda [The Town of Prilep. Struggles for Kinship and Freedom] (1943, local history), etc. The novels due to which he got known as the “last Bulgarian revivalist” and which became widely popular among readers in Bulgaria came out in the following two decades: Zhelezniyat svetilnik [The Iron Candlestick] (1952); Ilinden (1953), Kiprovets vustana [A Rebel from Chiprovtsi] (1954), Prespanskite kambani [The Bells of Prespa] (1954), the trilogy Samuil, tsar bulgarski [Samuil, King of Bulgarians] (1958-1960), Hilendarskiyat monah [The Monk of Hilendar] (1962), Glasovete vi chuvam [I Hear Your Voices] (1966).
Talev received the titles Zasluzhil deyatel na kulturata [Exemplary Cultural Activist] and Naroden deyatel na kulturata [People’s Cultural Activist]; he was Dimitrov Prize Laureate (1959), and also MP in the Fifth (31st) National Assembly.
The fate of Macedonia is a durable topic in the works of Dimitar Talev; the four-volume work comprising The Iron Candlestick, The Bells of Prespa, Ilinden, and I Hear Your Voices is representative of the so-called “big epic wave” in Bulgarian literature post 1944.
Dimitar Talev’s works have been translated into English by Nadya Kolin, Marguerite Alexieva, and Mihail Todorov, among others.
In the first half of the 1920s Talev published socially-oriented prose in newspapers and magazines. During this decade, as well as the next, he was associated with the Macedonian periodicals which were published in Bulgaria at the time and published short stories, travelogues, essays, legends, and many journalistic pieces of social critique. Among his most well-known books from this period are Zlatniyat klyuch [The Golden Key] (1935, short stories), Starata kashta [The Old House] (1938, short stories), Na zavoi [At the Turn] (1940, novel), Gotse Delchev (1942, biography), Grad Prilep. Borbi za rod i svoboda [The Town of Prilep. Struggles for Kinship and Freedom] (1943, local history), etc. The novels due to which he got known as the “last Bulgarian revivalist” and which became widely popular among readers in Bulgaria came out in the following two decades: Zhelezniyat svetilnik [The Iron Candlestick] (1952); Ilinden (1953), Kiprovets vustana [A Rebel from Chiprovtsi] (1954), Prespanskite kambani [The Bells of Prespa] (1954), the trilogy Samuil, tsar bulgarski [Samuil, King of Bulgarians] (1958-1960), Hilendarskiyat monah [The Monk of Hilendar] (1962), Glasovete vi chuvam [I Hear Your Voices] (1966).
Talev received the titles Zasluzhil deyatel na kulturata [Exemplary Cultural Activist] and Naroden deyatel na kulturata [People’s Cultural Activist]; he was Dimitrov Prize Laureate (1959), and also MP in the Fifth (31st) National Assembly.
The fate of Macedonia is a durable topic in the works of Dimitar Talev; the four-volume work comprising The Iron Candlestick, The Bells of Prespa, Ilinden, and I Hear Your Voices is representative of the so-called “big epic wave” in Bulgarian literature post 1944.
Dimitar Talev’s works have been translated into English by Nadya Kolin, Marguerite Alexieva, and Mihail Todorov, among others.
