|
© – |
Svetlozar Zhekov died suddenly on April 20, said Prof. Kiril Topalov. Closest friend, talented and penetrating literary critic, great translator, publisher of “Pero” (the first Bulgarian private publishing house, since the dawn of democracy), longtime head of the “Poetry” edition of the National Radio, editor of the “Bulgarian Writer” publishing house and Flame magazine, director of the National Book Center at the Ministry of Culture, a beloved teacher of Bulgarian literature, a true intellectual.
With his polemical pen he has always defended the high aesthetic criteria in the evaluation of Bulgarian literature as an important factor in the construction and development of Bulgarian spirituality.
He was born in Plovdiv on January 30, 1951. He graduated in Bulgarian and Russian philology at Sofia State University. He works as an editor and head of the “Poetry” editorial office in the “Culture” General Directorate of the Bulgarian National Radio, in the “Flame” magazine, “Bulgarian Writer” publishing house, as an assistant in new Bulgarian literature at Sofia University and as director of the National Book Center at the Ministry of culture.
He is a member of the Union of Bulgarian Journalists, the Union of Translators in Bulgaria (Chairman of the Poetry Section (1984-1986), a member of the Management Board (1989-1991), a founding member of the Association of Bulgarian Publishers). In the same year he was nominated as a representative of Bulgaria in the COST A32 project “Open scholarly communities on the WEB”, in which he was elected a member of the Board.
He took an active part in the democratization of the country after 1989. His polemical articles “The Conscious in Our Country Consider Us Crazy”, “And the World in Darkness” and “At the Crossroads”, published at the very beginning of the changes, provoked public debate on the need for democratization of culture. .
Together with Stefan Savov and Alexander Shurbanov he founded one of the first clubs for democracy in Bulgaria – the Club for Democracy at the UPB (December 1989). Together with the journalist Yuri Lazarov, he led the UDF Media Council in the UDF election campaign (1997). He has not been a member of a political party.
The service and worship will take place on Monday, April 25, at 1 pm in the church of the Central Sofia Cemetery “Assumption”.
A tribute to his work and memory!
–
