CELEBRATION by Damir Karakaš

Translated by Ellen Elias-Bursać

War stories are a dime a dozen, but few I’ve read nail the complex persona of a soldier on the losing side with such insight, compassion and clarity as Damir Karakaš’s Celebration. When we first meet Mijo, it is 1945 and he is hiding in a Croatian forest just outside his village. A member of the dreaded Ustaše, he desperately wants to return to his wife and kids, but doesn’t dare show his face lest he be captured by the Partisans combing the area. His fate, however, will remain a mystery. Karakaš has no interest in some revenge fantasy or cat-and-mouse adventure.

Rather, Celebration jumps around in time - 1935, 1941 and 1928 - as we come to understand what made Mijo into this vanquished soldier ruined by war. Sadly, it’s an all too familiar tale: deprivation, hopes raised and dashed, and the kind of cynical manipulation by despots-in-waiting that leads to violent nationalist fervour. Mijo is a tragic everyman, albeit one with blood on his hands. We are not asked to sympathise, nor forgive, but simply to reflect. In an increasingly dangerous and fractured world, Celebration makes for a sobering read.

Celebration by Damir Karakaš (Tr. Ellen Elias-Bursać)
Two Lines Press, 2024
116 pages