Vladimir Arsenijević

Vladimir Arsenijević (born 1965) is a Serbian novelist, columnist, translator, editor, musician, and publisher. He lives and works in Belgrade.

Arsenijević was born in Pula, SR Croatia, SFR Yugoslavia, and moved to Belgrade at a young age. In his early youth, Arsenijević (nicknamed Vlajsa) played with a punk band called "Urbana Gerila" as well as its post-punk offshoot "Berliner Strasse". After graduating high school and completing the mandatory military service in 1985, Arsenijević moved to London at the age of 20. He returned to Belgrade four years later in 1989.

Arsenijević won the 1994 NIN Prize in January 1995 for his first novel In the Hold (U potpalublju), thus at the age of 29 becoming the youngest ever recipient of the prestigious prize. This was the first time NIN Prize went to an author's debut novel. The anti-war novel, which takes place during the Battle of Vukovar in autumn 1991, was one of the first works published in Serbia to discuss the violent disintegration of Yugoslavia, although from the perspective of those who lived in Belgrade at the time. The slim 128-page novel got some attention internationally such as affirmative write-up by Laura Silber in the Los Angeles Times and was soon translated into 20 languages, placing Arsenijević almost instantly among the most translated Serbian writers. Translated into English by Celia Hawkesworth, the novel received positive reviews by Ken Kalfus and Richard Eder in the New York Times and Los Angeles Times, respectively, upon its 1996 release in the United States by the Alfred A. Knopf publishing house. It was also staged as a play in the Yugoslav Drama Theatre by theater director Nikita Milivojević.

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