Roger Portal (1906–1994)

A study of Slavic development and migration from the 8th century. Mostly emphasizes other Slavs but has a nice section called “Birth of a Nation: the Slovenes,” in which he talks about the development of literature as the basis for their nationalism. That and the crush of Teutonic culture and Croatian “Illyrianism” and general “Pan-Slav” ambitions(unspecified as to whom.) He lists all the early authors, and adds, “Although legislation[by the Austrians] fostered the teaching of German at the expense of Slovenian, the population as a whole benefited from the high quality of the educational system; of all the South Slav peoples the Slovenes had the lowest illiteracy rate (3 per cent of the under-twenties in 1910. and less than one percent in 1990… (mehr)