Biljana Srbljanović (, ; born 15 October 1970) is a Serbian playwright and university professor.
She has written eleven theater plays and screenplay for Otvorena vrata television series that aired on Radio Television of Serbia during the mid-1990s. Her plays have been staged in some 50 countries. Srbljanović is also a part-time lecturer at the University of Arts' Faculty of Dramatic Arts (FDU) in Belgrade. On 1 December 1999, she became the first non-German writer to receive the . She is the recipient of various theatre awards in Serbia, including the , , , Joakim Vujić Statuette, and . Furthermore, she received the 2003 , an annual accolade given out by the Serbian Civic Alliance (GSS) political party to women for "contributions in promotion of human rights, democracy, and tolerance in political communication".
In 2007, she was awarded the IX Europe Prize Theatrical Realities, in Thessaloniki.
Early life Srbljanović was born on 15 October 1970 in Stockholm whereto her father Danilo Srbljanović had arrived a few years earlier during the late 1960s as a gastarbeiter from SFR Yugoslavia in search of better employment opportunities.Interview in Yugoslav teen magazine Super Tin (June 1997) on the website Yugopapir, retrieved on 2018-08-18.Article commemorating the assassination of Yugoslav ambassador in Sweden in Kurir, retrieved on 2018-08-18.Text of the speech (emigrant; p. 14) on the website issuu, retrieved on 2018-08-18. He would soon be joined by his girlfriend Miroslava Simić who came over from Yugoslavia. The couple wed in the Yugoslav embassy in Stockholm—a civil ceremony presided over by ambassador Vladimir Rolović—and had their daughter Biljana. In April 1971, months after her parents' wedding, the embassy was attacked by a group of Croatian Ustashe-affiliated terrorists led by Miro Barešić who assassinated ambassador Rolović.Biljana Srbljanovic: Dok je ambasador Rolović umirao u mukama Barešić je poljubio Brajkovića i radosno vikao u slavu ustaških ideala, 5 August 2016
Writing career Srbljanović obtained her dramaturgy degree in 1995 at the Faculty of Dramatic Arts in Belgrade. The first play she wrote, Beogradska trilogija (The Belgrade Trilogy), was premiered in 1997 in Belgrade, Serbia at the Yugoslav Drama Theater. After its huge success, the play was staged in many other countries, including Armenia, Italy, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, England, and the Scandinavian countries.
In April 1998 her second play, Porodične priče (Family Stories), was written in Belgrade and staged at Atelje 212. It won the Best New Play Award at the theatre festival in Novi Sad, Serbia and was later staged in Germany, Poland, Romania, Slovenia, the United States, Switzerland, the Netherlands, France and elsewhere.
In December 1999, Srbljanović completed The Fall, which premiered in July 2000 at the City Theater Festival in Budva, Montenegro. Due to lack of public interest, the play was quickly erased from the program of Belgrade's theaters.
The young artist can also be seen in the Serbian movie Land of Truth, Love and Freedom (Zemlja istine ljubavi i slobode) as an actress in a leading role.Full movie (with English subtitles) on YouTube, retrieved on 2018-08-22.
The premiere of Supermarket, her fourth play, took place in May 2001 at the Festival of Vienna, Austria. It is still staged in many European countries.
In late 2003, Srbljanović completed her fifth play, America, Part Two. This became Serbia's most popular play in 2003 and 2004.
Srbljanović's next play, Skakavci (Locusts), won the New Theatrical Realities Award, one of Europe's most prominent theatre awards. In the 2005–06 season, German theater magazine Theater Heute proclaimed Srbljanović the best foreign playwright of the season.B92 – News – Society – Serbian playwright wins prestigious award
Her latest play This Grave Is Too Small For Me has attracted international press attention as well as acclaim from various audiences in Europe.
Europe Theatre Prize In 2007, she received the IX Europe Prize Theatrical Realities, in Thessaloniki, with the following motivation:For her and for the people of her country which has suffered so much, it is undoubtedly the epithet “European prize” that imports more as a confirmation of the fact that the Serbs are present and will be always present on this continent. Living in Serbia and in Europe at the same time, Biljana Srbljanović is not kind at all towards her compatriots: in the “Belgrad Trilogy”, she revealed their dissimulated, two-faced morality; then, with anger, she draws a caricature of them in the “Family Stories”. This author belongs to the current of the new European drama - courageous, open, brutal and it is not only in her own place that she’s offensive: in “The Supermarket”, she left for the superficial Occident, than she had the courage to attack and criticise “L’Amerika”- it is in this part, that came to maturity her ability to realise character’s deep, psychological characterization. “The Fall” analyzes people living in countries with totalitarian regimes, and in “The Locusts”, she goes back in her own country in the aim to draw a historical picture of four generations which worked out the corroded country’s actual face. Biljana Srbljanović is not the only one politically committed playwright who criticizes with ferocity her own country’s regime and the people supporting this regime: last year, Harold Pinter’s name has proved us that she‘s not alone in her case. At all monochromic, Biljana Srbljanović’s Balkans, have an outstanding environment; - rough, frank, quarrelsome and mystical. More than any of her predecessors, this playwright brought Balkans closer to the Europe and made us think about how much Balkan spirit is present in our souls as well. Her voice strongly echoed over the whole continent.
Political career Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) In April 2007, Srbljanović officially joined the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), with an additional role as a member of the party's newly established political council.B92 - Vesti - Lečić napustio predsedništvo LDP-a - Internet, Radio i TV stanica; najnovije vesti iz Srbije Alongside Srbljanović, other individuals appointed to the LDP political council were: Vesna Pešić (council president), Biljana Kovačević-Vučo, Bojan Đurić, Branko Dimitrijević, , Filip David, Ivan Andrić, Ivan Torov, Jadranka Jelinčić, Jasna Šakota, Latinka Perović, , Miša Šahović, Nenad Prokić, , , Petar Luković, Rajko Danilović, Saška Stanojlović, Sonja Biserko, Srbijanka Turajlić, Veljko Đurović, Vera Marković, Vladimir Gligorov, Vladimir Todorić, Zoran Ostojić, and Zoran Purešević.
In late March 2008, Srbljanović was announced as LDP's candidate for mayor of Belgrade at the upcoming May 2008 local elections.LDP: Biljana Srbljanović za Beograd u Evropi, March 2008
Six months after the party's poor electoral showing in various Belgrade municipalities, she publicly complained on her personal blog of being marginalized by the LDP, specifically that "everyone within the party, except for Vesna Pešić and Žarko Korać, distanced themselves [from Srbljanović]" and that she has since learned that "everyone [in the party] has a price, whether it's commercial real estate in municipalities where LDP is part of the ruling coalition or salaried positions at the state-owned enterprises or an opportunity for future [financial and political] deals".Biljana Srbljanović: Skrajnuta sam u LDP, November 2008 Though quickly deleted, the blog post caused a lot of reaction from her party colleagues.Biljana Srbljanović: LDP me izbrisao, November 2008 Days later, reportedly following a talk with the party president Čedomir Jovanović who had in the meantime publicly expressed his support for the playwright's future in the party,LDP: Biljani Srbljanović sva vrata otvorena, November 2008 Srbljanović came out with a statement that interpersonal relations within the party are good while relaying a personal opinion that LDP is "the best political party in Serbia".Biljana Srbljanović: Nema sukoba u LDP svi se volimo, November 2008
She has quietly left the party at some point over the years since.
Other activities Ana Brnabić's Council for Creative Industries In March 2018, Srbljanović's appointment to the newly established Government of Serbia Council for Creative Industries was announced. Formed and launched by Serbia's Prime Minister Ana Brnabić, the council is envisioned as a "gathering of individuals and organizations possessing a wealth of experience in creative industries who will help the Prime Minister fully understand the needs of that sector and make informed decisions for its future development".Lazar Džamić i Biljana Srbljanović članovi Saveta za kreativne industrije koji je osnovala premijerka Brnabić, Blic, 23 March 2018 In addition to Srbljanović, other council members include marketing expert Lazar Džamić, Tijana Palkovljević Bugarski, Vuk Veličković, art historian Aleksandra Lazar, Youth Initiative for Human Rights NGO founder Andrej Nosov, Igor Todorović, Milan Marković, Jasna Dimitrijević, visual artist Slavimir Stojanović as well as representatives of Exit Foundation, Mokrin House, Serbia Film Commission, , and Nova iskra.
Immediately after the announcement of her appointment to the governmental agency, Srbljanović faced criticism of selling out to the government from various individuals including political activist .
Six month after the council was formed, in an October 2018 Nedeljnik interview, Serbia PM Brnabić praised Srbljanović as "an intellectual she especially admires, someone who criticizes the government but is also willing to help" while adding that Serbia would be a better place if it had more brave people like her".Brnabićeva o "udaru" na Sergeja Trifunovića, B92, 11 October 2018Ana Brnabić o tome zašto je Sergej Trifunović na udaru, a zašto Srbiji treba više Biljana Srbljanović, Blic, 11 October 2018
Heartefact fund Srbljanović is the program director of the Heartefact fund, a Belgrade-based non-governmental organization active since 2009 in the Western Balkans politically defined region, that among its mission lists "rethinking of contemporary artistic, social and political issues and phenomena at national [Serbia], regional [Western Balkans] and European levels" and "advocating new models of production, regional [Western Balkans] cooperation and alternative forms of education" through "developing policies that support Erinnerungskultur (culture of remembrance), democratic values, human rights, freedom of speech and public sphere accountability".Heartefact, About Us
Hertefact's organizational structure also includes Andrej Nosov, Živana Janković, Mirjana Milivojević, Aleksandra Lozanović, and Vana Filipovski while its governing board consists of FDU vice-dean Ana Martinoli, PR manager and piano professor Jelena Milašinović, political scientist, advisor, and NGO administrator , public advocate and lobbyist Goran Miletić, and actor Branko Cvejić. The organization is financed by the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), Open Society Foundations' Serbian branch, U.S. embassy in Serbia, European Union's Creative Europe programme, Serbian government's Ministry of Culture and Information, Swiss embassy in Serbia, Kingdom of the Netherlands, Heinrich Böll Foundation, etc.
Views and opinions Srbljanović has for decades been an outspoken figure in the Serbian public sphere.
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, during her university days, Srbljanović was a close friend of Isidora Bjelica and wrote for the right-wing Pogledi magazine.