THE PERCEPTION OF BALKANS IN THE WORKS OF MARY EDITH DURHAM

This paper tries to establish the image of the Balkans in the works of the famous travel writer Mary Edith Durham. Placing her work within the context of orientalism and balkanism the image of the Balkan Other is problematized. Edith Durham’s’ travels through the Balkans in the early 20^th century shaped her first images of the peninsula. Special concern is given to the first change in the attitude of this travel writer towards the imagined geography of the Balkans that is the change of her position from an observer to a protector of the pet nation – the Albanians. The second change occurs long after the author returns to Britain and in a moment when she tries to position herself as an objective researcher of the “Balkan tangle” and within the context of the first wave of revisionism of the image of the Great War. In that sense, Serbia and Serbs take the role of lead culprits. With this Edith Durham completes the usual circle of balkanism, so common in the Anglo-American world of her time. However, her ethnographic observations, although coming from an amateur are important for later researchers as pioneering work in that field. Her point of view and observations indeed come as a result of her expectations, prejudice and affinity more than objective research that is why critical source-analysis is important because it often shows hidden orientation, tendencies and aspirations of the author as well as the research objective.