M. Edith Durham

The Blaze in the Balkans:

Selected Writings, 1903-1941

Edited by Robert Elsie and Bejtullah Destani,

with an introduction by Elizabeth Gowing

ISBN 978-1-84885-710-0 I.B. Tauris in association with the Centre for Albanian Studies, London 2014 xv + 214 pp. Edith Durham is best known for her classic travel books about the Balkans. However, she was also a passionate, articulate and well-informed commentator on the twists and turns of Balkan politics and the machinations of the Great Powers. The pieces in this collection of her writings from the early half of the twentieth century remind us of the many connections between Britain and the Balkans over recent centuries – of Tennyson, Disraeli, Lord Fitzmaurice, Aubrey Herbert and Margaret Hasluck. With its wide geographical sweep, this book offers a fair picture of the Balkans in the early twentieth century: Montenegro, Macedonia, Kosovo, Albania, Serbia are all represented – their dangers and wonders, ugly brutality and startling beauty, history, customs, geography and politics. The anthology offers vivid pictures of Balkan locations which will be fascinating reading for anyone interested in modern Balkan history.

Table of Contents

Introduction by Elizabeth Gowing Selected Writings, 1903-1941 The Blaze in the Balkans (1903) My Golden Sisters — A Macedonian Picture (1904) Balkan Sketches — What Use to Make a Fuss? (1904) Balkan Sketches — Life is Cheap (1904) As Others See It — A Sketch in Old Servia (1905) East and West — A Study of Progress (1908) Albanian and Montenegrin Folklore (1912) The Soul of the War (1912) The Advance Guard of the War (1912) Miseria (1912) Hil (1913) Travels in Trueland — An Ecclesiastical Episode (1919) Ritual Nudity in Europe (1920) The Serbs As Seen in Their National Songs (1920) Because of the Berlin Congress — A True Tale, Dedicated to the Drawers of Frontiers (1920) King Nikola of Montenegro (1921) Albania: Oldest and Quaintest of Balkan Peoples (1922) A Bird Tradition in the West of the Balkan Peninsula (1923) Head-hunting in the Balkans (1923) The Balkans as a Danger Point (1924) Tribes of Northern Albania (1925) A Very Free Press (1931) The Making of a Saint (1933) Albania (1941) Bibliography Buy this Book on AMAZON