Fan Noli: the bishop, translator and prime minister from Boston

Fan Stilian Noli was born on 6 January 1882 in Qytezë (in Turkish İbriktepe), in eastern Thrace, into an Orthodox Albanian family long settled there. In 1906 he emigrated to the United States and settled in Boston, home to a growing Albanian community.

The church and the language

In 1908 he was ordained a priest. At that time Orthodox services for Albanians were held mainly in Greek. Noli began celebrating the liturgy in Albanian and translated the liturgical texts. He was one of the founders of the Albanian Autocephalous Orthodox Church and in 1922 was consecrated bishop of Korçë. For him, a church that spoke Albanian was part of national liberation.

The diplomat

Noli led the diaspora organisation Vatra and worked for the international recognition of Albania. With the support of the American president Woodrow Wilson, in 1920 he helped Albania gain admission to the League of Nations. In 1912 he had graduated from Harvard University, and he later also received a doctorate in history from Boston University in 1945, with a study of Skanderbeg.

Noli understood that a small people needs voices that speak both its own language and the language of the world.

The government of 1924

After the June Revolution of 1924, Noli became prime minister and regent from 16 June. His government promised great reforms but had little time and little international support. In December 1924 it was overthrown by the forces of Ahmet Zogu. Noli went into exile in Italy and then settled permanently in the United States in the 1930s, where he left active politics.

The translator

Perhaps Noli's most lasting legacy is his translations. He brought into Albanian works by William Shakespeare, such as Othello, Hamlet, Macbeth and Julius Caesar, the quatrains of Omar Khayyám and works by Vicente Blasco Ibáñez. His translations are known for their rich, lively language, which showed Albanian to be capable of the greatest literature in the world. He also wrote about Skanderbeg and Beethoven, and composed music, including a symphony entitled Scanderbeg.

The end

Fan Noli died on 13 March 1965 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and was buried in Forest Hills Cemetery in Boston. The University of Korçë bears his name.

How to read him today

Start with one of his Shakespeare translations, for example Othello, and read a few scenes aloud. Notice how he uses everyday words and popular expressions to bring into Albanian a text written four centuries earlier in English.