Vladimir Bartol
Bartol was born on February 24, 1903 in San Giovanni (Slovene: Sveti Ivan), a suburb of the Austro-Hungarian city of Trieste (now in Italy), as the third child of seven children of a middle class Slovene family. His father Gregor Bartol, was a post office clerk, and his mother Marica Bartol Nadlišek was a teacher, a renowned editor and feminist author. Vladimir's parents offered their children extensive education. His mother introduced him to painting, his father to biology. In his autobiographical short stories, Bartol described himself as an oversensitive and slightly odd child with a rich fantasy life. He was interested in many things: biology and philosophy, psychology, art, as well as theatre and literature. As a scientist, he collected and researched butterflies.
Vladimir Bartol began his elementary and secondary schooling in Trieste and concluded it in Ljubljana, where he enrolled at the University of Ljubljana to study biology and philosophy. In Ljubljana, he met the young Slovene philosopher Klement Jug who introduced him to the works of Friedrich Nietzsche. Bartol also gave special attention to the works of Sigmund Freud. He graduated in 1925 and continued his studies at Sorbonne in Paris (1926–1927), for which he obtained a scholarship. In 1928 he served the army in Petrovaradin (now in Serbia). From 1933 to 1934, he lived in Belgrade, where he edited the Slovenian Belgrade Weekly. Afterward, he returned to Ljubljana where he worked as a freelance writer until 1941. During World War II he actively participated in the resistance movement. After the war he moved to his hometown Trieste, where he spent an entire decade, from 1946 to 1956. Later he was elected to the Slovenian Academy of Sciences And Arts as an associate member, moved to Ljubljana and continued to work for the Academy until his death on September 12, 1967. He is buried in the Žale cemetery in Ljubljana.
“S láskou je to jako s pečínkou: čím starší jsou zuby, tím mladší musí být jehně.”
“Bugün Cengiz Han denildiği zaman aklımıza yok edilen şehirler ve yapılan katliamlar gelir. Milyonlarca öldürülen insanlar, yok edilen dünya mirasları ve yeryüzünden silinen zamanının en güzel şehirleri…Moğollar islam alemine bir çok zarar vermiştir. Hatta önüne Memlüklüler çıkmasaydı dünyada islam şehri bırakmayacaklardı. Fakat islam alemini Hasan Sabbah’ın kurmuş olduğu ölüm makinesinden kurtaran yine Moğollardır.Cengiz Han’ın başını çektği ilk dalga hiç kuşkusuz Doğu’nun başına çöken en yıkıcı afetti. Pekin, Buhara veya Semerkant gibi itibarlı şehirler yeryüzünden kazındı ve milyonlarca insan yok edildi.Alamut’u silip süpüren dalga ise ikinci dalgaydı.Bu önceki kadar kanlı olmasa da, daha yaygın bir istilaydı. Moğol ordularının bir kaç arayla Bağdat’ı Şam’ı Polonya’da Krakow kentini ve Çin’de Sezuan eyaletini yakıp yıkabildikleri düşünülürse, o çağda yaşayanların nasıl bir dehşete kapıldıkları kolayca anlaşılır.AlamutttYüz altmış altı yıl boyunca her türlü istilacıya kafa tutmuş Alamut kalesi de teslim olmayı tercih etti! Cengiz Han’ın torunu olan Hulagu Han bu askeri inşaat mucizesini bizzat gelip gözleriyle gördü; efsaneye göre, orada Hasan Sabbah’ın devrinden bu yana el sürülmeden duran ve hiç bozulmamış erzak depoları buldu.Hulagu Han askerlerine herşeyi yıkmalarını ve taş üstünde taş bırakmamalarını emretti. Yakılan yerlere Alamut’un kütüphanesi de dahildi. Bu kütüphanede binlerce hiç bir kopyası olmayan sayısız eser kül oldu.Böylece Hasan Sabbah’ın kurmuş olduğu ölüm imparatorluğu sona erdi.”
“Spoznal se, da je ljudstvo zanikrno in leno ter da se ne izplača, da se žrtvujes zanj. Zaman sem bil klical in vabil. Misliš, da je ogromni večini ljudij kaj do resnice? Kje neki! Svoj mir zahtevajo ter bajke za svojo lačno domišljijo. Ali pa kaj do pravičnosti? Na to se požvižgajo, da le ugodiš njihovim osebnim koristim. Nisem se hotel varati več. Če je človeštvo tako, tedaj izrabi njene slabosti, da dosežeš svoj visoki cilj, ki bi bil tudi njemu v korist, ki ga pa ne razume. Potrkal sem na neumnost in na lahkovernost ljudi. Na njihovo slo po užitkih, na njihove sebične želje. Vrata so se mi na stežaj odprla”
“That's for the best. Otherwise they might realize they're in prison. It can't be helped. You women are used to harems and prisons. A person can spend his whole life between four walls. If he doesn't think or feel that he's a prisoner, then he's not a prisoner. But then there are people for whom the whole planet is a prison, who see the infinite expanse of the universe, the millions of stars and galaxies that remain forever inaccessible to them. And that awareness makes them the greatest prisoners of time and space.”
“There's one other thing I'd like to remind you of, my dear. There've been many times when you've sworn to me that after all that life has dealt you, it was no longer possible for you to believe in anything. I replied that both life and my studies had led me to the same conclusion. I asked you, 'What is a person permitted, once he's realized that truth is unattainable and consequently doesn't exist for him?' Do you remember your answer?""I do, ibn Sabbah. I said something like this: 'If a person realized that everything people call happiness, love and joy was just a miscalculation based on a false premise, he'd feel a horrible emptiness inside. The only thing that could rouse him from his paralysis would be to gamble with his own face and the face of others. The person capable of that would be permitted anything.”
“سيلج الفدائيون معرفة سرية. سأعلمهم بأن القرآن كتاب مفعم بالألغاز، ويجب أن يفسر بواسطة مفتاح، وإذا ما أظهروا بأنهم جديرون من الاقتراب من المرتبة النهائية، فسوف نكشف لهم عن المبدأ المدهش الذي يحكم صرحنا كله: لا شيء حقيقي وكل شيء مباح”