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About the publishing house

Aristej Publishing House was founded in 1993 by Emica Antončič, specialist in Slovene language and comparative literature, after she left her job as a dialect coach at the Slovenian National Theatre Drama Maribor. The first published books were her own work, the picture books in the Ada collection, which also marked the beginning of the publisher’s children’s fiction programme. This continues today in the Iva collection and with other books and picture books.

A year later Aristej accepted into its programme the journal Dialogi, one of Slovenia’s oldest journals of culture, ensuring its continued existence and revamping it editorially.

The book Theatre Concepts for Young Readers by Blaž Lukan (1996) gave rise to the now legendary popular science collection Concepts (Pojmovniki), in which new books are still being published. The publishing house built on the field of popular science for young people in 2020 with a new collection, What Was It Like Before There Were (Kako je bilo, ko še ni bilo).

The books from Breda Varl's My Puppets collection were the first Slovenian handbooks for puppet technologies and the production of theatre puppets, which brought much-needed help to preschool teachers, educators, and amateur puppeteers. The collection was later published in translation in Croatia as well, and from it grew the collection Puppet Stage (Lutkovni oder), which publishes plays for children.

In 1998, Aristej began publishing academic works in the humanities and social sciences in the Dialogi book collection. A number of original works have been published to date, as well as translations of fundamental works that were not available in Slovene before. The Dialogi collection primarily covers anthropology, sociology, philosophy, social psychology, cognitive science, linguistics, film studies, women's studies, and literary history.

In 2018, we published the first Slovenian handbook for creating kamishibai, The Art of Kamishibai by Jelena Sitar, and then the first Slovenian printed kamishibai Janček the Hedgehog (Ježek Janček, 2021), which is already being followed by new ones. Kamishibai is a traditional Japanese art of telling stories with pictures in a small wooden stage (butai), which is becoming popular all over the world as a form of resistance against the widespread digitization of society.

The publishing house has built up a good reputation through its selective and high quality programme based on fresh and original ideas. Many of Aristej’s books have opened up new fields and topics which prior to that time had not received attention in Slovenia.

In addition to original publishing ideas, the publishing house is characterized by editorial thinking outside the box and concern for the Slovene language, especially for the development of Slovene terminology in the humanities and social sciences.

About Dialogi

Published in Maribor since 1965, Dialogi is one of Slovenia’s oldest cultural journals. It was created through the efforts of many generations of Maribor’s intellectuals and literati; for the most part it has been predominantly a literary journal with a local emphasis, but during certain periods it has also covered wider cultural topics.

From 1994 on, when Založba Aristej (Aristej Publishing House) became its publisher and Emica Antončič its editor-in-chief, it began to develop as a general cultural journal with the subtitle Journal of Culture and Society aimed at a national and international readership. The editorial board publishes and encourages critical thought from various fields in the arts, humanities, and social sciences, with a particular focus on civil society, independent culture, and socially engaged intellectuals.

The discerning reader can find in Dialogi in-depth interviews with Slovenian and foreign cultural figures and reviews of domestic and international arts events, including those frequently overlooked by the mass media. A particular feature of the magazine, evoking the most responses, is the thematic sets of articles devoted to a specific topic of current interest. In keeping with the tradition of Slovenian cultural journals, Dialogi also publishes original and translated works of fiction.

In April of 1999 Dialogi became the first magazine from Slovenia to partner with Eurozine, an international network which has joined together leading European cultural journals since 1989, facilitating a rich and free European dialogue and public space. Selected articles from Dialogi in English translation or the original can be found on the Eurozine website.

Publication of Dialogi is made possible through the financial support of the Slovenian Book Agency and the Municipality of Maribor.

Editorial board, contact

Contact us

Address:
Dialogi, Založba Aristej, p.p. 115, 2116 Maribor

T) +386 2 250 21 93, +386 2 250 21 94
F) +386 2 252 18 97
E) info@aristej.si