The Lastovka Award will be presented to the author of the winning entry in the 35th short story competition organised by the Ars programme of Radio Slovenia.

This year, 274 stories were submitted to the competition. The winning story, selected by a three-member expert jury, will be read aloud at the award ceremony. In the days leading up to the event, shortlisted stories and their authors will be presented on the radio programme Literarni nokturno.

The competition was launched in 1992 by Andrej Arko and his colleagues. Initially, it featured separate categories for shorter and longer texts, before later focusing on a single category encompassing, on the one hand, the more narrative genre of flash fiction or microfiction, established in American literature, and, on the other, the more reflective and lyrical vignette familiar from Slovenian literary history.

This year’s award ceremony will be broadcast live on Radio Slovenia’s Ars Programme. The event will be directed by Klemen Markovčič, with Matej Juh as screenwriter.

Immigrant authors will address the importance of immigrant literature, the conditions for creativity in Slovenia and their participation in Slovenia's main literary events and festivals.  

Svetlana Slapšak was born in 1948 in Belgrade and has a PhD in Classics. A critic, scholar and anthropologist, Slapšak has authored numerous works in the fields of anthropology, linguistics, classical studies, gender studies, Balkan studies and comparative studies. 

Lidija Dimkovska (1971, Skopje) has lived in Ljubljana since 2001. She has published seven collections of poetry, four novels, an American diary and a collection of short stories translated into seventeen foreign languages, and edited four anthologies. She is a recipient of numerous awards, most recently the Macedonian Novel of the Year and the regional Štefica Cvek Prize for her novel EMŠO.

Miomira Šegina was born in Srebrenica, grew up in Tuzla, and has lived and worked in Slovenia since 1980. She writes short stories, journalistic articles, reflections and travelogues. She has written three plays, a collection of short stories (Skozi rdečo, 2009), as well as bilingual books Dve drami – dva jezika (2012) and Skrivnost Blejskega jezera (2022).

Hosted by: Selma Skenderović
 

Launched in 1996, the Prišleki series published by LUD Literatura celebrates its 30th anniversary in 2026. To date, 140 titles have appeared in the series. Previous editors include Urban Vovk, Goran Dekleva, Petra Koršič, and Andrej Hočevar, while Veronika Šoster – moderator of the event – has held the role since 2021.

The Prišleki series publishes new Slovenian novels, short story and poetry collections, often introducing entirely new literary voices to the Slovenian publishing landscape. Alongside award-winning titles, the series has also produced numerous longlisted and shortlisted works, including Veronika Dintinjana’s poetry collection V suhem doku (Jenko Award), the Novo Mesto Short Award-winning collections Obvoz by Franci Novak and Leteči ljudje by Ajda Bračič, as well as recipients of the Kritiško Sito Award, presented by the Association of Slovenian Literary Critics to emerging authors Jernej Županič, Muanis Sinanović, Ajda Bračič, and Ana Pepelnik. In recent years, novels from the series have regularly been shortlisted for the Kresnik Award, while the collection has twice received the Brumen Award for outstanding Slovenian design for its iconic covers by Zoran Pungerčar.

To mark this milestone anniversary, authors published in the Prišleki series will gather in Alma Karlin Hall to reflect on past achievements and read excerpts from their works – from Andrej Blatnik’s novel Tao ljubezni (1996) to Nika Nikolič’s novel Zataknjeni v vezju (2026).
 

The Vegetarian, originally published in 2007, is a novel by the South Korean author Han Kang, recipient of both the International Booker Prize and the Nobel Prize in Literature. The Slovenian edition was translated by Urša Zabukovec, who worked from the Spanish edition while consulting other translations.

The novel centres on a seemingly simple decision with far-reaching consequences. It follows a woman whose decision to stop eating meat unwittingly exposes tensions and misunderstandings within her family. The narrative unfolds through the perspectives of three narrators, each revealing the consequences of the protagonist's rejection of her expected role. As the story progresses, a portrait emerges of a family unable to come to terms with otherness, and of an individual struggling to survive her inner turmoil.

Maša Jelušič and Andrej Blatnik will discuss Han Kang's novel with David Zupančič, physician, writer and one of Slovenia's leading science communicators. An infectious disease specialist at the University Medical Centre Ljubljana, he is the author of the bestselling books Življenje v sivi coni ("Life in the Grey Zone"), Znanost mirnega življenja ("The Science of a Peaceful Life") and V mejah normale ("Within the Limits of Normalcy"), as well as the podcast Umetnost lenarjenja ("The Art of Idling").

Widely recognised for his ability to explain complex subjects with clarity and insight, Zupančič is an ideal discussion partner for a novel that explores psychological and social tensions while also touching on questions surrounding vegetarianism.

South Korean writer Han Kang is known for her uncompromising exploration of pain, violence and historical trauma. Her works, including The Vegetarian, Human Acts and We Do Not Part, combine poetic language with unflinching honesty.
In South Korea, she is widely regarded as a symbol of artistic integrity, recognised for her refusal to yield to political pressure and her commitment to artistic independence. Her Nobel Prize has also been celebrated as a landmark achievement for Korean literature as a whole, a literary tradition that has long grappled with historical trauma and social upheaval.