Dutch non-fiction in Serbia

Since the turn of the millennium, the number of translated non-fiction books from Dutch into Serbian is constantly on the rise. This appears to be the trend not only in Serbia, looking at the overview of translation grants awarded by the Dutch Foundation for Literature. The data retrieved from their annual reports shows an increase in the number of grants for non-fiction titles from 42 in 2003 to 117 in 2014. This is in stark contrast to the 1990s, when the number of awarded grants ranged from 24 to 30 (Budimir 2020). Therefore, we can conclude that Dutch non-fiction in translation has been gaining popularity in recent decades. 

In this article, we will give a brief overview of translated non-fiction in Serbia, and we will try to highlight some trends that are unique to the distribution of the translations of this genre.

The first recorded translation of a non-fiction work from Dutch dates back to the year 1900. The third edition of the book Elementi psiholigije– očigledno i na vaspitanje primenio H. de Raaf was released by the Kingdom of Serbia's State Press (Državna štamparija Kraljevine Srbije). It was most likely a translation of the German issue, Die Elemente der Psychologie: Anschaulich entwickelt und die Pädagogik angewandt. It is not surprising that the first translation from Dutch is the pedagogy book, since one of the functions of translations is to fill in the gaps in the target language's literary system. Not long before the publishing of this translation, the Congress of Berlin recognized the independence of the Principality of Serbia in 1878. Because the majority of its citizens were illiterate, the newly formed state had to take measures to educate them. The Law on Primary Education was passed in 1882, followed by the Law on Secondary Schools in 1892. As a result, there was an era of educational changes during which the government sought new pedagogical ideas. 

During the Kingdom of Serbia period, only one more translation of a non-fiction book from Dutch was published in Serbia, in 1903. It was a translation of Christiaan Rudolph de Wet’s book De strijd tusschen Boer en Brit. More translated non-fiction works did not appear until the Yugoslav period.

During the Yugoslav era, the translations were sporadic and most of them were published in Croatia. Between 1918 and 1990, there were ca. 21 non-fiction works produced in the Serbo-Croatian language, 7 in Serbia and 14 in Croatia. It's worth noting that during this time period, Theodore van de Velde's groundbreaking work about women's sexuality in marriage, Ideal Marriage (Het volkomen huwelijk), was translated three times. The first translation came about in 1934 in Zagreb. K. Raziljev translated the book from German. The second publication was brought out in 1943, during World War II, and edited by A. D. Batrinski. In 1939, Batrinski also translated Van de Velde's Love in a Woman's Body: How to Wilfully Influence Female Fertility (Ljubav u tijelu žene: kako da po volji utičemo na plodnost žene). Further research needs to be conducted on the source text of this translation, which is unknown. Finally, Nedo Zec completed the third translation, which was published by Veselin Masleša in Sarajevo, in 1966. 

When we consider the book's social setting, it's no wonder that it's been translated so many times. As a result of their participation in the National Liberation Movement during World War II, women in Yugoslavia were beginning to emancipate and engage in the Republic's social, political, and economic life. They were gaining more rights that were guaranteed and protected by the law as well. For instance, the Law on Marriage from 1946 introduced the equal status of men and women in marriage. Women in Yugoslavia were allowed the right to abortion in 1951, and the constitution of 1974 guaranteed a woman's right to reproductive freedom and choice. This may explain the publishers' interest in female concerns. Apart from Van de Velde's works, a publishing house from Belgrade, Vuk Karadžić, brought out in 1975 the translation of the handbook Women between 40 and 60 (Vrouwen tussen 40 en 60) by P. A. Van Keep and L. Jaszmann. This publication is also for women and it covers the issues they face during menopause.

Since 2000, there has been a noticeable upsurge in the number of translated non-fiction books published in Serbia, with ca. 20 publications per decade. As for the category of non-fiction books, they are found in 6 out of the 10 main classes of the Universal Decimal Classification (UDC). Most of the books are found in the class of Philosophy and Psychology (12), followed by Social Sciences (10) and Applied Sciences (7) (Budimir, 2020). As we can see, those books cover a wide range of topics. There is, of course, increased interest in the titles dealing with the history of the target country, such as Arius van Tienhoven’s works about his experiences while serving as a wartime surgent in Serbia during the Balkan Wars and World War I. His work The Horror of War in Serbia (De gruwelen van den oorlog in Servië) was translated by Jelica Novaković-Lopušina in 2005, and his diaries were first translated from French in 2015 (Avec les Serbes en Serbie et en Albanie 1914-1916) and then straight from Dutch a year later.