Kanun in Literature and Film
Albanian writer Ismail Kadare evokes the Kanun several times in his books and has it as its main theme in his novel Broken April. He also evoques the kanun in his novel Komisioni i festës (English: The Celebration Commission), where Kadare literally describes the Monastir massacre of 1830 as the struggle between two empires: the Albanian Kanun with its code of besa and the Ottoman Empire itself.
According to Kadare in his literary critique book Eskili, ky humbës i madh (English: Aeschylus, this big loser), where loser refers to the big number of tragedies that were lost from Aeschylus, there are evident similarities between the kanun and the vendetta laws in all the Mediterranean countries.
Barbara Nadel's Deep Waters refers to Kanun and Gjakmarrja.
Joshua Marston's 2011 film The Forgiveness of Blood, a drama set in modern-day Albania, deals with the Kanun. The film relates a blood feud between two families in Northern Albania, focusing primarily on how the feud affects the children of one family.
The Kanun is referred to in season 6 episode 9 of Law & Order Criminal Intent ("Blasters") as the explanation for the sudden retreat of a group of Albanian assassins.
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