Petropol Art Award statuettes: Saint Xenia of Saint Petersburg and Fyodor Dostoevsky. Sculptor: Sergei Alipov.

Research into the international reception of Milorad Pavić has brought to light evidence that the Serbian writer received the Petropol Art Award (Художественная премия «Петрополь») in Saint Petersburg on 18 September 2003.

The distinction had not previously been recorded in the archives of the Milorad Pavić Legacy or in the list of his awards published on khazars.com. It is documented in contemporary Russian newspaper reports from September and October 2003, as well as in a subsequently published list of award recipients.

On 20 September 2003, Nevskoye Vremya listed Pavić among the laureates, citing his "metaphorical understanding of the world."

On 1 October 2003, Chas Pik reported that Pavić had not attended the ceremony but that a telegram of thanks attributed to him had been read aloud. Among the other recipients was theatre director Aleksei Slyusarchuk, who had staged a work by Pavić at Saint Petersburg's Osobnyak Theatre.

Radio Svoboda also reported the award on 19 September 2003, including comments from one of its founders, Nikolai Yakimchuk, about the importance of international cultural connections.

The Petropol Art Award was established in Saint Petersburg in 1999 to recognize achievements in culture and the arts.

The award is now being added retrospectively to the documentation of Milorad Pavić's international distinctions. The original certificate, statuette and message of thanks have not yet been located in the Legacy's records.

Russian press sources from 2003:

• Aleksandr Ures, "Лауреаты 'Петрополя' получили свои награды," Nevskoye Vremya, 20 September 2003

• "'Петрополь' отмечает тех, кого любит," Chas Pik, 1 October 2003

• Tatyana Voltskaya, "В Петербурге вручены художественные премии 'Петрополь'," Radio Svoboda, 19 September 2003

• "Псковскому драмтеатру им. А. С. Пушкина вручена премия 'Петрополь'," Pskovskaya Lenta Novostey, 22 September 2003

• "Ежегодная Художественная премия 'Петрополь'" — historical list of laureates, Saint Petersburg branch of the Russian Creative Union of Cultural Workers

The period of ascent in the life of Milorad Pavić, Serbia's most widely translated writer, unfolded, as such things often do, far from the public eye. The four-member Pavić family lived modestly in an apartment in Belgrade's Zvezdara district. Their circumstances were such that, for a time, Milorad Pavić had to commute to Novi Sad in order to support his family.

It was precisely during those years that he created his major scholarly and literary works: The History of Serbian Literature of the Baroque Period and Dictionary of the Khazars.

This book recounts episodes from the renowned writer's private life during his most productive period. It was written by the only surviving member of the family that lived at 9 Vojvode Brane Street — his son, the painter Ivan Pavić. Although Milorad Pavić stated in numerous interviews that he had not been an ideal father and had not devoted enough time to his children, this book reveals a very different picture.

The romantic, Baroque family atmosphere — in which, despite the cramped surroundings, there was always room for two Russian wolfhounds — inspired both the great writer and the painter Ivan Pavić as they laid the foundations of their creative ideas.

During those years, father and son also inspired and influenced one another, as the novel Landscape Painted with Tea most clearly demonstrates.

For the past 17 years, in accordance with Milorad Pavić's testamentary wishes, his legacy has been cared for by his wife, Jasmina Mihajlović, and his son, Ivan Pavić.

A lecture on Milorad Pavić and Julian Barnes at the International NAUKA 0+ Festival in Moscow

A lecture on Milorad Pavić and Julian Barnes at the International NAUKA 0+ Festival in Moscow

On 9 October 2026, Moscow State Linguistic University hosted the lecture "A Signal from the Text: How the Reader Deciphers Personality in the Postmodern Novel", devoted to the works of Milorad Pavić and Julian Barnes.

The lecture formed part of the programme of the Centre for Extraterrestrial Communication, Moscow State Linguistic University's thematic platform at the International NAUKA 0+ Festival.

Milica Nikolić, Junior Research Fellow at MSLU's Laboratory of Comparative Literature and Cultural Diplomacy, discussed the ways in which Pavić and Barnes use parody, grotesque, archetypes, quotations and nonlinear narration to shape their characters and transform the reader into an active participant and co-author of the literary work.

Pavić's prose thus entered an unusual yet remarkably congenial scientific context: a programme devoted to language, consciousness, the interpretation of the unknown and the possibilities of communication with different worlds.

Official lecture page

I should have written about this book earlier. The news, however, comes only now, with a delay caused not by literature but by history: war severed connections and separated the family that had spent years working on this unusual edition.

This is the second Iranian edition of Milorad Pavić’s “Dictionary of the Khazars” — and, most importantly, an uncensored edition.

“Dictionary of the Khazars” had already been published in Iran. The new edition, published by the Tehran publishing house Noghreh, has an entirely different history.

It all began in 2021, when literary translator Youltan Sadykova contacted me from Tehran. This was the beginning of a long and unusually warm correspondence with her and the Aslani-Fazaeli family, who are behind the Noghreh publishing house.

Books in Iran are subject to very strict censorship, but the publishers succeeded in obtaining permission from the relevant religious authorities to publish “Dictionary of the Khazars” uncensored. For this reason alone, this edition occupies a special place among the many translations of Pavić’s novel.

I also wrote a special text about Milorad Pavić and “Dictionary of the Khazars” for this edition. Youltan translated it into Persian, and the publishers included it in the book as a letter from me — a kind of manuscript, printed on a separate sheet designed like an unfurling papyrus scroll.

And then the war came.

Youltan and her husband Amin, together with his parents, the founders of the Noghreh publishing house, had been planning to move to France. Amin’s parents received their visas, while Youltan and Amin were still waiting for a response from the embassy when the war began. Youltan, who had taken part in protests in Iran and, as a Russian citizen, also feared for her own safety, temporarily returned to Russia to stay with her family. Amin and his parents remained in Iran.

And so the family that created this edition of “Dictionary of the Khazars” found itself separated.

That is why I am only now publishing the news about the book.

The video accompanying this news was filmed by Amin shortly after the book was published. His is the voice we hear; the hands opening the book and unfurling my text belong to Youltan.

At that time, the two of them were still together.

The book remained.