Historical Positionalities in Ivo Andrić’s The Bridge on the Drina

The author

When we write about any work by Ivo Andrić, we must do so with a lengthy preamble at the start. Andrić was as much of a politician as an author. To this day, his writings and political views live in the central Balkans. Loved by many in Yugoslavia’s center, especially by those with a more bratstvo i jedinstvo (brotherhood and unity) mindset, Andrić was celebrated as the embodiment of a true liberal arts academic. Hated, arguably, by some more outside of the center, such as the Croats, Bosnians, and Albanians, he was seen as the instrument of Belgrade hegemony. A sort of in–house orientalist, heavily contributing to colonization discourses.

In 1911, Andrić became the first president of the Serbo–Croat Progressive Movement, a member of which was none other than his friend Gavrilo Princip, who would kill the Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo three years after Andrić took office.[1] With the creation of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes in 1918, Andrić entered government service and embarked on a diplomatic career. By the 1920s, he had become part of the diplomatic establishment of the kingdom, where his writings on political and cultural questions fed his nationalist leanings and his belief in centralization.

Towards the end of his diplomatic career, Ivo Andrić was appointed Yugoslavia’s ambassador to Nazi Germany[2]a post he held until the German invasion of Yugoslavia in April 1941. As ambassador, Andrić attended official functions with the Nazi leadership and reported back to Belgrade on the shifting balance of power in Europe. After Germany invaded and occupied Yugoslavia in April 1941[3], Andrić returned to Belgrade, where he largely withdrew from public life during the war. This ambassadorship is often noted by his critics, since it placed him in close contact with the Nazi regime, even though there is no evidence he personally collaborated with it.[4]

The bridge

Now why did Andrić choose a bridge as the main character of his book? The original title of the book Na Drini ćuprija, is a wordplay that substitutes the Serbian name for the bridge most, with a Turkified one deriving from köprü. But what is special about an Ottoman bridge in Višegrad?

The bridge is a trope representing connection, achieved via an enormous undertaking of human power and ingenuity. Uniting two parts of a town, a country, and also the people. Doing so by overcoming mighty natural obstacles such as rivers or gorges. It is the essential symbol of human supremacy over nature. As such, it is the main point of the book. It represents the leap forward from the medieval ferry that connected the two banks of the Drina. The advancement from the Middle Ages to the new modern Bosnia. Built by the good grace and orders of Mehmet Sokollu, the local kid who was taken to Constantinople to become a soldier slave, part of the elite and influential Janissary corps, the personal standing army of the Sultan, and who rose to the rank of the Grand Vizier, being de facto the most powerful man in the most powerful empire.

Although Andrić, in this book, tries to convince the reader that the bridge was more of a gift that Mehmet made to his former home country, history is different. Bridges in the Ottoman Empire were indeed built by endowments of powerful beys as part of vakifs (foundations – in the contemporary sense), however, they served a military and, more importantly, commercial purpose in the first place. Built in 1577, the bridge in Višegrad was part of a series of infrastructure built during the 16th and 17th centuries in the Balkans, particularly in Bosnia. The reason for the building of the bridges during Mehmet Sokollu’s time in Višegrad, Mostar (1566), Trebinja (1574), and others, was the maritime Ottoman–Venetian wars of the 16th century, especially the war of 1571–77, when, in the Battle of Lepanto, the whole of the Ottoman military fleet was defeated by the Holy League, effectively rendering them unable to protect their trade interests in the eastern and larger Mediterranean.

The Ottomans were put in a position to urgently strengthen their land trade routes towards Ragusa (Dubrovnik), their only vassal on the Adriatic, having a special status of a quasi–free cityThis prompted the clearing of roads, construction of bridges and caravanserais, so that Ragusan and Ottoman subjects could pass freely via the long Balkan hinterlands, from the Adriatic to the capital and back. Through Ragusa flowed Balkan raw materials, silver, copper, lead, timber, hides, and wool, transported by caravans across Bosnia and Serbia. In return, Western goods such as textiles, glass, weapons, paper, and colonial commodities reached Constantinople. Hence, such strategic investment in bridges like the one in Višegrad was not merely architectural splendor or local pride – it was part of a deliberate Ottoman policy to integrate their Balkan territories economically and militarily.

Andrićs problematic stances

Andrić supported the creation of a strong, centralized kingdom in which Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes would coexist under a unified national identity. This was quite unlike the federalists in Yugoslavia, who advocated for significant autonomy of the different nations within the state.[5] In the 1930s, Andrić’s political views included a skepticism toward certain minority populations. For instance, in January 1939, Ivo Andrić, then Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, prepared a confidential document titled “Aide–Mémoire on the Albanian Question”[6] for internal use within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. This memorandum, often referred to as the “Albanian Draft,” was created at the request of Prime Minister Milan Stojadinović during a period of heightened diplomatic engagement with Italy. The document outlined Yugoslavia’s strategic interests regarding Albania, particularly in light of Italy’s increasing influence in the Balkans. The memorandum proposed the partition of Albania between Yugoslavia and Italy, with Yugoslavia annexing the northern regions, including the port of Durrës. The document suggested the relocation of the Albanian population to Turkey. Andrić emphasized the economic and military advantages of controlling northern Albania, including access to the Adriatic coast, fertile lands, and key transport routes. In the draft, he talked about the importance of weakening Albania as a political entity to prevent the emergence of a unified Albanian nationalist movement, which could influence the Albanian population in Kosovo and northern Macedonia. The memorandum explicitly notes that Yugoslavia could gain both material resources and political leverage by reshaping the demographics of the region. The draft discusses potential methods for implementing these demographic changes, including incentives for relocation, encouragement of voluntary emigration, and coordination with Turkey for resettlement programs. Andrić also evaluated the potential resistance from local populations and the risks of international criticism, suggesting that diplomatic work and propaganda campaigns would be necessary to mitigate backlash. Although this proposal reflects a colonizing trend in Yugoslav policy at the time, and it was never enacted, it left a big stain on Andrić, making him one of the prime hegemonists in the eyes of millions of Yugoslav Albanians.

Andrić’s dual identity, as both a novelist and a statesman, defined his career and determined the political controversies that would surround his legacy. While celebrated internationally for his Nobel Prize–worthy novel The Bridge on the Drina, some critics argue that his depictions of Ottoman rule and Muslim communities reinforced stereotypes that later fed into nationalist narratives in the region. For some, he is an author whose writing transcends ideology and nationalism, while for others, he represents an intellectual committed to oppressive systems.

Conclusion

The Bridge on the Drina is one of the most important books of the 20^th century Balkans. It was written at a time of enormous change. No other book has left a legacy as great in Yugoslavia from its beginning after WWII until its demise in 1990s. All the centralists have used it, often to justify Belgrade hegemony, itself having a mostly Serbian character. The author, Ivo Andrić, has taken great care to write each character and event in the book as historically accurate as possible, while he himself can be regarded, at worst, as an agent of colonization and, at best, as an instrument of centralization.

            We should read the book having in mind that Andrić was a trained historian. The characters and events could have just as easily been taken out of any scholarly book dealing with Ottoman history. This fact has made the book so important and enduring, and sometimes controversial, as historians still argue over who was what in the Balkans. We can always speculate about the meaning of it, or of the message that Andrić wanted to convey, but I argue that it is the ultimate fictional book written by a historian.

Andrić chooses to give us an account of what the bridge meant for the Višegrad locals. The bridge becomes a silent witness to centuries of life, love, conflict, and everyday existence. And in doing so, it embodies the enduring thread of history in the region. At the same time, the bridge acts as a neutral space, serving all people, regardless of religion, status, or background, becoming a unifying presence in a town often divided by social and political tensions, striving to survive the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity. However, it is neither inaccurate to state, nor does it diminish the book’s significance, that in reality it was mercantile interests that brought the bridge into existence.

The critical reader should take into account that Andrić wrote The Bridge on the Drina from the position of a very politically exposed person. It is a shame that he could not escape the colonial currents of his time. He was not merely a champion of a strong state; his ideas about Albanians prove this. The “Albanian Draft” is nothing short of chauvinism and might have indirectly served as part of the justification for the expulsion of Albanians from Kosovo to Turkey in the 50s. Therefore, the reader must be careful not to project the great literary achievement of The Bridge on the Drina onto all of the author’s works.

Though I cannot answer the age-old question of whether we can separate the artist from the art here, on Andrić’s birthday we should think about the complex positionalities of every author, the ramifications of their work, and learn lessons wherever they are without sacrificing the fulfillment we receive from reading a masterpiece.

Literaturverzeichnis

 

[1] Vucinich, Wayne S. 1995. “Ivo Andrić and His Times”. In Ivo Andrić Revisited: The Bridge Still Stands, edited by Wayne Vucinich. Oakland: University of California Press.

[2] Perišić, Žaneta Đukić, Biljana Đorđević Mironja, and Mihajlo Pantić. “The Biography of Ivo Andrić.” https://www.ivoandric.org.rs/english/biography (accessed 26 September 2026).

[3] Krizman, Bogdan. 1977. “Završni pregovori o pristupu Jugoslavije Trojnom paktu 1941. god.” Historijski zbornik 29–30 (1976–77): 517-27.

[4] “The Biography of Ivo Andrić.”

[5] Vucinich, Wayne S. 1995. Ivo Andrić Revisited: The Bridge Still Stands. Oakland: University of California Press.

[6] Andric, Ivo. “Draft on Albania.” 1939. Robert Elsie. Texts and Documents of Albanian History. http://www.albanianhistory.net/1939_Andric/index.html (accessed 26 September 2026).