The publication contains a collection of literary sketches on love by the Serbian Slavist Dejan Ajdačić, a theoretician and literary critic, folklorist and ethnolinguist, researcher in contrastive Slavic culture, translator and editor, who combines the knowledge of three Slavic cultural traditions: southern, eastern and western. In the texts included here, the author presents interpretations of works that originated during the Renaissance, Romanticism, realism, surrealism – up to the latest output of Croatian, Serbian, Bulgarian, Czech, Polish, Ukrainian and Russian literatures."One very important and valuable aspect of the book is its alethic dimension, reminding the postmodern reader, living in times long past the era of great narratives, of a cultural reflection on the mystery of erotic love, in which philosophy and literature, theology and folklore – interpenetrate … Just like love is a mystery in itself, so the forms of its literary imagery are certainly – in this particular case – an attempt to go through the maze of forms and show what is most important in love. Even if they are not necessarily interested in Slavic literatures, the Polish readers will undoubtedly enjoy this collection as a research project offering some captivating anthropological, comparative and philological perspectives."From the introduction by dr hab. Bogdan Trocha professor of the University of Zielona Góra |