Albanian Life Journals

Dave Smith was a frequent contributor to the Albanian Life: Journal of the Albanian Society, and in 1986 he was elected committee-member  of the Albanian Society in Britain. The Society’s president at the time was musicologist A.L. Lloyd, while its secretary was a militant activist Bill Bland. The work of these two figures provided much of the context to Smith’s future work. Bland visited Albania many times during his activities in Albanian Society. He was the founder and editor of the Albanian Life.

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Through the pages of Albanian Life, Society members tirelessly opposed the official, globally-dominant views of Albania—challenging the often repeated mantras about lack of human rights, lack of democracy, and hysteria on the ban of religion. They wrote about folk music, theatre, cultural institutions with interpretations seldom heard in the public sphere. This engagement also included translation of poetries, stories, texts on art, and reproduction of paintings produced in Albania. Not always were the Society’s views on the official Labour Party shared: Albanian Life journal helped develop the practice of writing that was not only giving a new perspective on the socialist Albania, but also demolished many  historical myths involving Britain's past.