Images and scenes from rustic life appeared in Macedonian-language poems such as Peasant woman and Rebec-player at the fair by Rajko Žinzifov (1839–1877). The plot of the melodrama The Macedonian bloody wedding (1900) by Vojdan Černodrinski was inspired by rustic life as well. The figure of the peasant was invested with the values of patriarchal authenticity and national purity, considered to be under threat from Greek cultural domination, Turkish oppression or the morally destructive influence of European fashions.

Rustic themes became more frequent in interwar Macedonian literature, usually, again, in drama by playwrights such as Vasil Iljoski (1902–1995), Risto Krle (1900–1975) and Anton Panov (1906–1968).