Twenty Years of Balkan Tangle

by Edith M. Durham

Mary Durham was born in 1863. She was a British traveler, writer and artist. She is best known for her anthropologist accounts of Albania in the early 20th century. In Twenty Years of Balkan Tangle published in 1920 she tells the story of her time living in this region. When she was 37, her doctor recommended that she take a foreign vacation. She took a trip by sea down the coast of Dalmatia, traveling from Trieste to Kotor and then overland to Cetinie, the capital of Montenegro. She loved the area and returned there many times during the next 20 tears. This passage from Wikipedia shows the relevance of Durham's writings to the situation in this region today. "Durham came to identify closely with the Albanian cause and championed the unity and independence of the Albanian people. She earned a reputation as a difficult and eccentric person, and was strongly criticized by - and criticized in turn - advocates of a Yugoslav state, who supported the incorporation of Albanian-populated Kosovo into Slavic Serbia. She became increasingly anti-Serb, denouncing what she termed "Serb vermin" for having "not created a Jugoslavia but have carried out their original aim of making Great Serbia.... Far from being liberated the bulk of people live under a far harsher rule than before.".

Genres: Nonfiction

260 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1920

Reviews

[Jorge Caballero · Rating 4 out of 5]

A brief fast paced account on Balkan politics, so brisk and packed with intrigues and backstabbing it's difficult not to forget you're actually reading about historical events and not some Tom Clancy novel.

[T. · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very sad book, dealing with the treatment of Albania in the Balkan Wars and preceding WWI. A good read as background for a trip to the area.

[Pat · Rating 3 out of 5]

/and it definitely was a tangle! Ms. Durham covered a lot of Balkan history as well as some of her own experiences in the area, starting as a British tourist around 1900.