Vladimir Bartol’s short prose, especially Al Araf (1935) conveys a message similar to that of his historical novel Alamut (1938). This is the key argument for the so-called nationalistic interpretation of the novel, according to which the Persian defenders of the fortress Alamut in the 11th century correspond to the members of the Slovene terrorist organisation TIGR that fought for the relief of the Slovenes of Primorje from the fascist Italian rule under which they unjustly fell after World War I; Bartol was a sympathiser with this national liberation movement. The comparison is based on a similar configuration of characters in both the novel and short stories, i.e. a conflict between an experienced teacher and a young hero who consequently finds out that he has been manipulated by his teacher. The teacher manages to persuade him that the manipulation had a higher goal, namely to educate him into a reliable national leader. The main character of the novel, the master Hasan ibn Sabbah, attributed negative and nihilistic features by most literary critics, compared to the heroes Klement Jug and Simon Krassowitz in the short stories, turns out to be a tragic personality who has sacrificed his personal happiness for the interests of his people, being ready to deploy any means to achieve them. The message of the novel is rather enigmatic and thus offers a variety of interpretations, while the idea of the short stories in Al Araf is explicit, which makes a decision for an allegorical interpretation of this Machiavellian novel much easier.
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