Semantization of Space and Identity Quest in Post-Yugoslav Literature

This article examines the role of symbolic and material space in four post-Yugoslav novels—David Albahari’s Bait (1996), Dubravka Ugrešić’s The Museum of Unconditional Surrender (1996), Faruk Šehić’s Quiet Flows the Una (2011), and Tanja Stupar Trifunović’s Clocks in my Mother’s Room (2014). Building on Mikhail Bakhtin’s concept of the chronotope and Pierre Nora’s theory of lieux de mémoire , the study introduces the notion of the chronotope of memory as a tool to understand how space enables the narration, preservation, and negotiation of identity in the wake of displacement, war, and national disintegration. The analysis categorizes spatial functions into inductive, memorial, and geographic chronotopes to show how these narratives articulate personal trauma through culturally resonant spaces. In doing so, it contributes to the study of post-Yugoslav autofiction and memory by demonstrating how spatial imagination shapes both narrative progression and the identity work of character-narrators in fragmented political geographies.