Aleksa \u0160anti\u0107 left us a remarkable body of poetry, but what has perhaps been most missed in these lands over the past 30 years is his \u201cneighborly patriotism\u201d\u2014the way he viewed anyone who shared the same land and air with him as a brother, regardless of whether they were Muslim, Croat, or Jew.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It has been 99 years since the great Serbian poet and intellectual Aleksa \u0160anti\u0107 passed away, yet his spirit endures through his timeless poetry. Even in modern times, his verses have found life in folk and pop arrangements, turned into hits performed by popular artists, from Himzo Polovina to Jadranka Stojakovi\u0107, from Emina<\/em> to \u0160to te nema<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What perhaps has been most absent in the region over the past two decades is \u0160anti\u0107\u2019s brand of patriotism, one that transcended narrow national boundaries. On one hand, he was a nationalist in the purest sense of the term, yet as a man from a multinational environment, he showed deep respect and affection toward non-Serb communities in Herzegovina and his native Mostar. \u0160anti\u0107 considered all peoples living in these lands as brothers\u2014Croats, Bosniaks, Jews\u2014and sought their liberation and unity, expressing this ideology in works like Ostajte ovde<\/em>, a prayer-like appeal to his people bearing the weight of global geostrategic shifts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n His significance as both a poet and a public advocate is evident, and the absence of such figures has been decisive in the bloody conflicts of recent decades, during which the peoples \u0160anti\u0107 once called \u201cbrothers\u201d suffered immensely\u2014a conflict now continuing through other means, via hatred and distrust.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Early Years with Du\u010di\u0107 and \u0106orovi\u0107<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u0160anti\u0107 belonged to the literary circle surrounding the Mostar newspaper Zora<\/em>, founded with Jovan Du\u010di\u0107 and Svetozar \u0106orovi\u0107. Contemporary literary scholars argue that his poetry is best understood alongside his biography, filled with great highs and lows, struggles, and constant personal sacrifice for causes he believed in almost blindly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A native of Mostar, \u0160anti\u0107 was deeply connected to his city, rarely leaving it and always returning. His legacy includes anthological poems such as Ostajte ovdje<\/em> (1896), Emina<\/em> (1903), Ve\u010de na \u0161kolju<\/em> (1904), Hasanaginica<\/em>, Ne vjeruj<\/em> (1905), Pretprazni\u010dko ve\u010de<\/em> (1910), \u0160to te nema?<\/em> (1897), O klasje moje<\/em> (1910), Moja otad\u017ebina<\/em> (1908), and Mi znamo sudbu<\/em> (1907).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Growing up in a merchant family, his household lacked understanding of his literary talent. He completed commercial schooling in Trieste and Ljubljana, returning to Mostar in 1883, where he found \u201can unusual stagnation,\u201d a consequence of the recently suppressed Herzegovinian uprising against Austria. Svetozar \u0106orovi\u0107 wrote that \u0160anti\u0107 was initially \u201cquite withdrawn,\u201d managing accounts in his father\u2019s shop and reading whatever newspapers and books he could access in Mostar. A few years later, he began his literary and social work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Croatian writer Miljenko Jergovi\u0107 describes \u0160anti\u0107 as a unique figure in regional literature:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAleksa \u0160anti\u0107 is, in a sense, almost hidden, forgotten from today\u2019s perspective, and sidelined. On one hand, he was a prominent Serbian poet of his generation, living, so to speak, in a distant province if viewed from Belgrade. At the same time, he was a Herzegovinian poet, important for the nature of his political and social engagement. That kind of engagement was unusual for the time, and especially unusual for today\u2019s standards.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Political Struggle Against the Yellow-Black Monarchy<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n In 1887, \u0160anti\u0107 became a contributor to the magazines Golub<\/em>, Bosanske vile<\/em>, Nova Zeta<\/em>, Javor<\/em>, and Otad\u017ebine<\/em>. In 1888, he founded and became president of the Serbian Singing Society Gusle<\/em>, promoting song and national consciousness. He was later elected first vice-president of the Mostar branch of Prosvjeta<\/em>. In 1896, when Zora<\/em> was launched, he was one of its first editors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He briefly went to Geneva in 1902 but could barely last three weeks; in his naive poem Ja ne mogu ovde<\/em> (I Cannot Stay Here<\/em>), he sincerely lamented his inability to endure foreign lands. In 1907, Mostar elected him as one of four representatives to the first assembly of the People\u2019s Organization.<\/p>\n\n\n\n During the annexation crisis, he fled to Italy with Svetozar \u0106orovi\u0107 and Nikola Ka\u0161ikovi\u0107, offering his support to the Serbian government\u2014a stance he would repeat in 1912 at the start of the Balkan Wars. During World War I, Austro-Hungarian authorities arrested him as a prominent Serbian nationalist. Later, he served as a member of the Bosnian Parliament.<\/p>\n\n\n\n THE CAUSE OF THE TERRIBLE ACCIDENT REVEALED: PAOK fans died due to an error in the vehicle\u2019s electronic system! 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