JOSIP KOCEV
Macedonia
Josip Kocev is born on May 25, 1985 in Skopje. He completed legal studies at the University "St. Cyril and Methodius" - Skopje. He is the author of three books of poetry: "I, Quentin Scribbler" (2015), "Written Silence" (2016) and "Now Is the Longest Never" (2018). He won the "Enhalon" award at the Struga poetry evenings for the song "Etna" from the debut collection "I, Quentin Scribler". His second poetic achievement, "Written Silence", was shortlisted for the 2017 "Brothers Miladinovci" award. He is represented in several Macedonian and foreign poetry anthologies.
"Now is the Longest Never" could be read as a love poem, a poetic score in three movements ("Now", "Never" and "The Longest Never"). When we read the poems of Josip Kocev, we look forward to the poetic "now and here", easily captured in each poetic image. On almost every new page, we are greeted by a beautiful trap: we want to re-read the poem we have already read, but at the same time we want to turn a new page to see the next one, and we get the impression that the poems flow into each other and as if together they create a larger poetic synthesis. Therefore, this book is not just a collection of poems (a kind of collection and selection of poems and verses), but a rounded poetic unit of fifty poems.
Vladimir Martinovski