Svetlana Makarovič draws extensively on folklore, especially on balladic poetry. She developed this resource in a distinctly individual fashion by faithfully maintaining the rhythm and lexis of the traditional ballad; her heartbreaking ballads speak of the dehumanized nature of the modern world.
Through her poetry, Svetlana Makarovič brings to life many beings from Slovenian mythology that had been more or less consigned to the attic of collective oblivion: desetnica (the tenth daughter), kresnik (the summer solstice bonfire spirit), the spring-announcing deity of Zeleni Jurij ('Green George’), Pehtra (the witch or sorceress), sojenice (the Fates), škopnik (the night spirit), and so on.
The pan-European dimension of her work is valid not only at the formal level but also with respect to the artistic worth of her poetry: as the structures of Makarovič’s ballads connect Slovenian heritage with the traditions of other European nations, so, too, does her artistic vision grow from a Slovenian vision of the world, transcending it into a universal account of human destiny. Svetlana Makarovič is a great European, as well as a Slovenian, poet (www.litteraeslovenicae.si).
