Dubravka Ugrešić will be in conversation with translator Ellen Elias-Bursać about _American Fictionary_ as part of the Transnational Literature Series. In the midst of the Yugoslav wars of the early 1990s, Dubravka Ugrešić — winner of the 2016 Neustadt International Prize for Literature — was invited to Middletown, Connecticut, as a guest lecturer. A world away from the brutal sieges of Sarajevo and the nationalist rhetoric of Miloševic, she instead has to cope with everyday life in America, where she’s assaulted by “strong personalities,” the cult of the body, endless amounts of jogging and exercise, bagels, and an obsession with public confession.
 Organized as a fictional dictionary, these early essays of Ugrešić's (revised and amended for this edition) are as pertinent to today’s America as when they were first published. It’s here, in these pieces filled with Ugrešić's unparalleled wit and devastating observations, that the comforting veil of Western consumerism is ripped apart as the mundane luxuries of the average citizen are contrasted with the life of a woman whose country is being destroyed.