The Sandzak of Novi Pazar is chiefly remembered as one of the smaller pieces in the game played by the Great Powers before World War I, an obscure place which doomed those who got too closely involved with it.[1]

---

[1] See, for instance, “The Lost Sanjak”, a short story by Saki (H.H. Munro) published in 1910, whose protagonist’s failure to remember the location of Novibazar (Novi Pazar) proves fatal; and Thomas Pynchon’s novel, Gravity’s Rainbow, in which a minor character, Lord Blatherard Osmo, “occupied the Novi Pazar desk at the Foreign Office … for on this obscure sanjak had once hinged the entire fate of Europe”, and similarly comes to a very sticky end.

Novopazarski Sandžak se uglavnom pamti kao jedan od manjih figura u diplomatskim igrama koju su velike sile vodile pre Prvog svetskog rata – izolovano mesto koje je osuđivalo na propast sve one koji bi mu se previše približili.[1]

---

[1] Vidi, na primer, “Izgubljeni Sandžak”, kratku priču autora Sakija (H. H. Munro) objavljenu 1910. godine čiji protagonista ne uspeva da se seti lokacije Novibazara (Novog Pazara) što se ispostavlja kao pogubno po njega; i roman Tomasa Pinčona, Gravity’s Rainbow, u kojem jedan sporedni lik, Lord Bladerard Osmo, koji je “radio u odeljenju za Novi Pazar u Ministarstvu spoljnih poslova… jer je od ovog nepoznatog sandžaka nekada zavisila sudbina čitave Evrope”, na sličan način doživljava veoma neugodan kraj.

I’m sorry to lose “sticky” as part of the footnote – “neugodan” doesn’t quite have the same meaning, and I wrote it as a coy reference to the fact that Lord Osmo is found drowned in a bath of tapioca – but I guess it can’t be helped.