Social criticism

In the early 1950s, he also wrote satirical stories, criticizing anomalies and personalities from the country's political life of the time, corrupted by the materialism of the "comrades", blossomed bureaucracy and sycophancy, which he despised, and for which he was considered a dissident and "heretic" who had to explain himself to the party ranks.^[13]

Using humor and satire, Ćopić targeted what he perceived to be social ills of the fledgling Yugoslav communist society. In 1950, he published Jeretička priča (transl. Heretic Story), mocking the new phenomena he observed around him such as state-owned company managers, Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) generals, government ministers, as well as their families and in-laws, misusing publicly funded resources including specific instances of government-provided luxurious cars being used by individuals form the above groups in order to be chauffeured to university lectures at faculties they recently enrolled in.^[10] In the story, state funds were also used by the high state dignitaries to travel to the expensive sea resorts, with the complete lack of willingness to throw away the benefits and privileges they obtained after the war. He was immediately attacked by his war compatriot Skender Kulenović in the next edition of the literary magazine Književne novine.^[19]

This was enough for the state security agency UDBA to open a file on him. Ćopić's harsh words against the political elite were conveyed to the secret police by one of his friends, who unbeknownst to Ćopić, was an UDBA agent with the code name Remington, after the typewriter. Ćopić's file was placed together with those of other authors, who at the time were being scrutinized by the state for similar reasons: Mira Alečković, Desanka Maksimović, Sava Nikolić, Dušan Kostić [sr], Vasa Popović [sr] and Zuko Džumhur.^[19] Ćopić then published another critical work, Ko s đavolom priče piše (transl. He Who Writes Stories with the Devil). He was reprimanded by the Yugoslav Communist Party (KPJ), while the country's leader Josip Broz Tito publicly criticized the writer in 1950: "He [Ćopić] presented our entire society, top to bottom, as a negative one, thus advocating its termination. Such satire we will not allow and we won't let this go without an answer. He deserves a public response and to say, once for all, that we will not allow enemy satire that works towards breaking our unity. It is up to him personally to own up to his mistakes and to follow the road of our other socialist writers".^[10][18]

At one of the meetings of the Women's Antifascist Front of Yugoslavia (AFŽ), Tito angrily said of Ćopić: "He lies! He is not telling the truth!". Ćopić's mother Stoja, who attended the meeting, said to Tito "My Branko never lies". After continuous attacks from Tito personally, Ćopić hanged on his door a page from newspapers where Tito stated that he will not arrest him.^[6]

Ćopić was later accused of being an adherent of Milovan Đilas. In the autumn of 1953, defending himself from the "new class" (as Đilas labeled the Communist nouveau riche), in a letter to Veljko Vlahović, Ćopić wrote: "A massive number of sycophants, slimes, and invertebrates who are milling around the party, occupying all positions and imposing themselves like horse flies. This is especially visible among public and cultural figures, among those who should be the conscience of the people and engineers of the souls". In the late 1954, Ćopić's statement at the University of Belgrade Civil Engineering Faculty's forum that things still didn't change since he published Heretic Story, was followed by the publishing of the obvious police-informant's pamphlet in the student's magazine Student which declared Ćopić an enemy of the socialism.^[19] The irony was that Đilas himself was one of the leaders of the public "show trial" against Ćopić few years before.^[20]

Because of the story Izbor druga Sokrata (transl. The Election of Comrade Socrates), published in the NIN magazine, and the novel Gluvi barut (transl. Silent Gunpowder) printed in 1957, he was denounced again. Defending himself in front of the party commission, he stated: "I showed some of our people who were a bit dehumanized under the harsh conditions of the [war] battles, living in belief that they do what's best for the revolution." Though he said he will "fight to stay in the party, cause its nice to be there", he was expelled from it. He opposed the writing of the foreign and right-wing press, which used his criticism of the new system in Silent Gunpowder.^[10] Especially affirmative analyses of anti-Communism and leftist errors in Silent Gunpowder were published in West Germany's press.^[21] In 1966, Živojin Pavlović wanted to film a movie Silent Gunpowder, but the production house, Avala Film, backed off, because of the "politically unacceptable ideas in the script which depicts leftist errors".^[22] The film, to a great success, was made only in 1990, by Bato Čengić.^[23][24]

His contemporary comedy Odumiranje medveda (transl. Bear's Dying Out) from 1958 caused him further problems with the political establishment. After only several rehearsals of the play, dramatized by Soja Jovanović, it was banned from the Belgrade Drama Theatre, as "ordered from the top". It was played later, but never in Belgrade.^[21] During all this time when he was criticized and ignored by the authorities, he was regularly visited by author Ivo Andrić.^[10] When he was already considered too critical, no one wanted to sit next to him in the famous "Writer's Club" in Belgrade. One day Andrić sat next to him, and advised him to switch to writing novels, as "no one reads them". Ćopić was stunned that Andrić even swore, as Andrić was regarded a personification of a diplomat and a gentleman. He accepted the suggestion, writing Silent Gunpowder, but only made things worse. After a period of party harassment, he was expelled from the party in 1960. After his expulsion from the party, the cultural centers began to massively cancel hosting of his literary lectures, citing "house painting" as the reason for cancellation. He once asked his [former] party comrades "how long is this painting going to last"?^[6]

He explained what he was writing in his defense when he was interrogated by the party apparatchiks: "Before you start writing, imagine that 50 years has passed already, that you and those who interrogate you today are not alive anymore, and someone starts to dig in their archives. Write in such a manner that you don't feel ashamed in front of that unknown man from the future."^[10]

Though he maintained for a while his jovial spirit, expulsion from the party was a major psychological blow. Apart from Tito, he was directly and publicly attacked and harassed by the party elite, including Moša Pijade and Milovan Đilas. He was much more hurt by the attacks from his colleague writers: Dušan Popović (journalist) [sr], Skender Kulenović, Oto Bihalji-Merin, Milorad Panić Surep [sr], Gustav Krklec. He suffered a lot, understanding this is a betrayal of the friends. In the years to come they avoided him, "as if he had a tuberculosis".^[6]

About his social criticism, Ćopić once said: "And I, tired of all that satire regarding petite bourgeoisie, religion, priests, sextons and khawajas, didn't want to close my eyes on social and political issues in new Yugoslavia either".^[6]

Death

On Monday, 26 March 1984, Ćopić called his longtime close friend Momčilo Srećković to come from Obrenovac to Belgrade. Srećković first met with Ćopić's wife, who told him that Branko had visited his doctor earlier that day and that he was depressed. Srećković found him around 16:00, sitting in Pioneers Park. They walked to Terazije, where they had cockta drink in the summer garden of the Hotel Moskva with Ćopić "opening his soul". He said that for several years he had problems writing, naming The Mallow Color Garden, The Adventures of Nikoletina Bursać and The Eighth Offensive as his favorites, and was sentimental about his childhood. According to Srećković, Ćopić was "talking a lot, more than I could memorize".^[4][6]

They continued to Zeleni Venac and the Bridge of Brotherhood and Unity across the Sava, today called Branko's Bridge. Ćopić recollected his arrival to Belgrade, when he slept under the bridge (at the time, it was King Alexander Bridge, which was demolished during the war), saying "this bridge is my destiny". While showing the bench under the bridge where he slept back in 1936, Ćopić's glasses fell down onto the pavement below. Srećković went down the stairs to retrieve it, but when he climbed back to the bridge, Ćopić had already crossed the river to the other, New Belgrade side. Srećković hurried to catch him, calling him, but when he got close, Ćopić threw himself across the metal fence, falling on the pavement on the Sava's left bank.^[6]

Police initially held Srećković as a witness, but also suspecting him of pushing Ćopić from the bridge. He was cleared after Ćopić's widow Bogdanka came to the police, bringing his suicide letter he left in the apartment. He ended the letter with "Goodbye you beautiful and scary life".^[6]

The bridge in general gained an infamous reputation as a suicide bridge, as some 40 people try to commit suicide by jumping from it every year.^[26] As the bridge is an extension of the Brankova Street, named after Branko Radičević, a Serbian romanticist poet, it was named after the street. However, an urban myth developed since then that the bridge was named after Ćopić's jump.^[27][28][29]

Ćopić repeated several times to his close friend and biographer Enes Čengić that he would kill himself, and the reason he gave was his inability to even remember or recognize the people or things around him, which he blamed on his advanced sclerosis, so that he could no longer write a letter.^[13]

Novels

• Prolom – The Break-out (1952)
• Gluvi barut – Silent Gunpowder (1957)
• Ne tuguj, bronzana stražo – Bronze Guards, Don't Mourn (1958)
• Osma ofanziva – The Eighth Offensive (1966)

Novels for children

• Orlovi rano lete – Eagles Fly Early (1957),
• Slavno vojevanje – Glorious Combat (1960) and
• Bitka u Zlatnoj dolini – The Battle of Golden Valley

– these three are known as „Pionirska trilogija“ – The Pioneer Trilogy,

• Magareće godine – "Donkey" Years (meaning: The Tough Teens);
• Balada o ribaru i mačku – Ballad of the Fisherman and the Cat
• Glava u klancu noge na vrancu – Head in the Col Legs on the Horse
• Ježeva kućica – Hedgehog's House (1949)
• Doživljaji mačka Toše – Adventures of Toscho the Cat
• Bašta sljezove boje – The Mallow Color Garden
• U carstvu medvjeda i leptirova – In the kingdom of bears and butterflies
• Priče ispod zmajevih krila – The stories under the dragon's wings

Films and television series made after Ćopić's writings

• "Živjeće ovaj narod" (1947)
• "Major Bauk" (1951)
• "Grob u žitu" (1951)
• "Nikoletina Bursać (1964)
• Eagles Fly Early (1966)
• "Četrdeset prva" (1971)
• "Hajdučka vremena" (1977)
• "Mala moja iz Bosanske Krupe" (1978)
• "Osma ofanziva", TV-series (1979)
• "Bježaćemo čak u Liku" (1979)
• "Odumiranje međeda" (1982)
• "Smiješne i druge priče" TV-series (1986)
• "Razgovori stari" (1986)
• Silent Gunpowder (1990)
• "Magareće godine" (1994)
• Ježeva kućica (2017)