History
Therefore, it is clear that the situation for Letopis improved to some extent two years later (1826), when the literary, scientific and cultural society Matica Srpska was founded in Pest, and since when the journal has been under the auspices of this extremely important national institution. Namely, Jovan Hadžić wrote his proclamation in the fourth volume editorial of the first section for the year 1826: "May it please our distinguished and most noble kin, Serbian Letopis is submitted hereby with zealous devotion by Matica Srpbska, which came to pass for your sake, for your glory, and which exists and breaths for you…” Thus, the foundation of Matica Srpska was announced, and Letopis would be published from then on until today as its journal. From that moment, the journal was published regularly, with brief interludes during major historical turmoils: 1835-1836 (during Bach's Absolutism when Matica Srpska was briefly abolished), 1848–1849 (during the revolution in Austria-Hungary), as well as during the First and Second World War.
Such incredible continuity of effort is all the more unusual because Serbian culture – due to severe hardships caused by turbulent historical events, as well as by great and frequent pressures from the imperial powers – had been exposed to equally turbulent, monumental and frequent developmental discontinuities. Nowadays, however, when imperial legacies of the great powers are being re-examined and ways of establishing post-colonial discourses are being explored, Matica Srpska Letopis represents a remarkable example of a dedicated, cultural, peacemaking effort aimed at integrating Serbian culture within European and world frameworks, within which all authentic values – including cultural values of the so-called small nations – should find their place. In other words, the permanence of Matica Srpska Letopis represents an authentic, cultural response of a numerically inferior nation ready to resist all the brutal mechanisms of the imperial and colonial powers, and which is also ready to resolutely seek complex paths to, in its own right, participate in the process of setting up the planetary, global culture of the entirely humanity.
An important fact remains that throughout its entire existence, Letopis has remained the crux Serbian journal that strives to bring together proven values of Serbian literature, science and culture. Matica Srpska Letopis achieved its mission with a varying, but undisputed success. In this sense, the editors' charge is to work on comprehending the integrity, complexity and paramount values of Serbian literature and culture. The editorial board strives for the journal to serve the role of a place where literary and cultural values are filtered, so that, at the same time, all prejudices and limitations of different poetic, generational and cultural affiliations of individual writers are overcome. The journal pays a great deal of attention to the literature of other nations (e. g. German, French, Russian, Polish, English, American, etc.), so entire volumes were devoted to foreign literature and their relations with Serbian culture (Hungarian, German, etc.).
Despite numerous criticisms endured during the two-century long tradition of publishing Matica Srpska Letopis, directed mainly at its conservative publishing norms and practices, for many generations of writers, literary historians, historians, critics and other champions of cultural workers, it has always been a privilege and honor – both for the already established writers and experts in their respective fields, as well as for young writers and researchers – to contribute to the oldest literary journal in Europe.
