Famous Croats

MIRKO BOGOVIĆ (1816 – 1893)

A poet and an influential person Mirko Bogović was born in Varaždin and died in Zagreb. He was a son of impoverished Croatian nobleman and Hungarian mother who at an early age lost both parents. He made his way through life mainly alone. He attended schools in Križevci, Varaždin, Szombátely and Zagreb. In 1933, with unfinished study of philosophy, he became an army cadet. He resigned in 1840 and privately passed his exams at law academy. During his whole life he was very busy combining two activities – of a writer and a political one. At the beginning an exponent of Illyrian anti-Hungarian ideas, he took part in famous demonstrations in 1845 at St. Marcus Square (and was also injured as one of the „July victims“). However, after 1850 he was an opponent to Austrian autocratic aspirations, a supporter of Croatian-Hungarian cooperation and a representative of the Unionist Party, who continuously engaged against Germanic cultural and political aspirations. As editor of the literary magazine Neven, issued by Matica hrvatska, he published a politically unwelcome poem by Ivan Filipović Domorodna utjeha (Homeland Consolation) and was condemned to two years of prison. Generally as a very dynamic person, he was a typical romanticist of Croatian literature.

In the period of Austrian absolutism, between 1850 and 1860 Bogović was a central literary personality. From his “Illyrian” beginnings to the end of his life he published about ten very popular collections of poems (Ljubice, Smilje i kovilje, Domorodni glasi, Vinjage I – IV, Strelice), a number of stories, many political and culturological articles and - for Croatian literature most important - decasyllabic plays Frankopan, Stjepan- posljednji kralj bosanski and Matija Gubec. At that time they stayed long time on Croatian theatre repertoire.

Today, one of the most frequented pedestrian streets in the most central part of Zagreb bears his name.

Academician Ante Stamać

MIA ČORAK SLAVENSKA (1916 – 2002)

About Mia Čorak Slavenska the absolutely competent Dr. Slavko Batušić wrote in 1942 in the fourth volume of Hrvatska enciklopedija (Croatian Encyclopaedia) the following: “She is the greatest and most talented dancer artist Croats have ever had.” This valorisation has resisted time and has remained valid for more than seven decades, so that to the “greatest and most talented“, also “one of the most famous Croatian women in the world in the 20th century” can be added.

Mia Čorak was born in Brod on Sava on 20 February 1916. Her father Milan was a pharmacist, and mother Hedviga originates from the Palma family of talented musicians. The family moved to Zagreb when Mia was one year old and there her mother - as soon as Mia was able to walk properly - exposes her to musical and dance pedagogy of strict discipline and high criteria. At the age of three, she performed for the first time in Croatian National Theatre in the role of Trouble in Madame Butterfly. As child she learns ballet dance with Jozefina Weiss, and later her teachers are Margareta and Maksimilijan Froman, with whom she performed together at the stage of Croatian National Theatre. When she turns six, she performs in the ballet La Sylphide. At the age of seven she learns to play piano as the main subject at the Music School of the Music Academy. When she is eight, she dances Small Heart (Malo srce) in the ballet Licitarsko srce (Gingerbread Heart) by Baranović and with nine a main role in the ballet Figurine at Croatian National Theatre. At the age of twelve she leaves for Vienna where she receives lessons from the opera ballet master Leo Dubois and from Greta Kraus Arnicki, who teaches her modern dance. In that same year she specialises dance in Paris with famous ballet dancers Matilde Kschesinski, Olga Preobraženska and Ljubov Jegorova.

After returning to Zagreb the twelve year old ballet dancer performs in a Ballet Evening by Mia Čorak at Croatian Music Institute and wows the public and the critics. Soon after that, she achieves a great success in the role of princess in Žar-ptica (The Firebird) by Igor Stravinski. With thirteen, she is a solo dancer of the Croatian National Theatre ballet and a prima ballerina at the age of eighteen. At Olympic Games in Berlin in 1936 she wins the dance competition. One year later she triumphs in Paris in the overcrowded Salle Pleyel. The French give her the Order of the Legion of Honour and proclaim her the ambassador of good will. That same year she acts in the famous movie The Swan's Death shot in Paris. She became first a guest ballerina and later a prima ballerina of the most famous ballet troop of the time Ballet Russe de Monte-Carlo, which marks the beginning of her world success. She dances in France, England, North America and Canada, South America...

At the end of the Second World War she founds the Slavenska, Tihmar & Company and performs in tens of towns through USA. After marriage (1946) and the birth of her daughter Marija (1947) she performs with the group Slavenska Ballet Variante in the USA, Canada and Central America. Slavenska Franklin Ballet was formed in 1952 and with them she creates and produces a well-known ballet A Streetcar Named Desire, based on the play by Tennessee Williams. She again gives a guest performance In USA, but also in Cuba and in Japan. After that tour she is the prima ballerina at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. In 1956 she is the art director and guest ballet performer of the Louiswille Ballet. During five years she performed in special American TV shows. She is the art director of the Forth Worth Ballet from 1958. She stopped dancing in1962 and started working as ballet pedagogue at the University of California in Los Angeles.

Mia Čorak Slavenska died on 5 October 2002 in Los Angeles and on 18 April 2005 the urn with her remains was transferred to the Mirogoj Cemetery in Zagreb.

Stribor Schwendemann

SIDONIJA ERDÖDY RUBIDO (1819 – 1884)

Sidonija Erdödy, married Rubido, is the most famous woman of the Illyrian Movement. Daughter of Karl Dragutin Erdödy and a French noblewoman Henriette de Harbuval et Chamaré, she spent her earliest childhood in the mansion of the Counts Erdödy at Razvor near Kumrovec. There, in the heart of Hrvatsko zagorje, she acquired a solid education from private teachers and received her first lessons in singing. At the incentive of Ljudevit Gaj, the fourteen year old Sidonija performed for the first time in public in Zagreb in March 1833. At the end of the concert she sang the patriotic song by Gaj Croatia Has Not Yet Fallen, composed by Ferdo Livadić. The enthusiastic public strongly applauded to the young artist, the press was full of praise and Sidonija became immediately the star of the Illyrian Movement. She joined the political life, stood next to Gaj, Demeter, Kukuljević and other Illyrians while the palace of the Hungarian noble family Erdödy in Zagreb Upper Town became an important meeting point of the opponents of pro-Hungarian policy.

She regularly held concerts (always humanitarian) at which - along with German and Italian standard Opera repertoire, she constantly promoted also Croatian music. After only one month of lessons received from the famous music educator Caroline Unger, Sidonija was offered to accept the position of a solo singer in the Opera of Vienna. Sidonija refused that attractive offer; her heart drew her back to her homeland. She married in 1843 the nobleman of Spanish origin Antonio Rubido, and after a short period during which she did not perform because she became mother, she joined Albert Štriga in the promotion of the first opera in Croatian language Love and Malice (Ljubav i zloba), written at that time by Vatroslav Lisinski. At concert performances Sidonija sang some of the arias from that opera. At the premiere of Love and Malice on 28 March 1846 and in performances that followed it (on 29 and 30 March and 2, 4, 19 and 24 April) she sang the main female role, Ljubica. According to newspaper reviews, she significantly contributed to the great success of the opera. She continued to perform almost for a year and also to further support the Illyrian Movement as sponsor and almost fell into debts herself. Modest and a patriot, the countess of “lively” and “dulcet” voice, Sidonija Erdödy Rubido was a primadonna of the Illyrian Movement.

Ennio Stipčević

SLAVKO KOLAR (1891 – 1963)

Slavko Kolar is by the serenity and unique humorous and satirical tone of his story-telling an exceptional appearance in Croatian literature. As heir of the tradition of Croatian humoristic and satirical writing of the 19th century, he already in his collection of Nasmijane pripovijesti (Smiling Stories, 1917) showed his narrative talent and without following any major models shaped the genuine work in his classically direct style. He wrote stories, spoofs, plays, feuilleton, criticisms and scripts.

He was born on 1 December 1891 in Palešnik. He finished secondary school Gymnasium) in 1911 in Zagreb, and the School of Economy in 1913 in Križevci. He worked as an agronomist and a principal at state property farms and as teacher at schools (Božjakovina, Petrinja, Hruševac Gornji, Karlovac, and Požega). He died on 15 September 1963 in Zagreb.

In the most mature pages of his work (Ili jesmo ili nismo, 1933.; Mi smo za pravicu, 1936) Slavko Kolar is a virtuous painter and a documentarist of Croatian small town and village environment, which he describes - knowing it as an agronomist - in a genuinely humoristic way. His humour is not an entertaining or self-purposed, but he draws the attention of people to the pretence, immorality, political chameleonic and compromising behaviour, social poverty and the backwardness of Croatian peasant. Convincingly and without pathetic or moralising he portraits the characters in a patriarchal environment and sympathetically depicts them as victims of social earthquakes and traditional prejudices. With his fine humour he provokes sorrow and tears through laughter when he seeks to soothe the tragic of life with humorous content and illogical behaviour (Svoga tijela gospodar, 1942; movie, 1957) or subtle compassion (Breza, 1929; movie, 1967). He is the author of the collections Perom i drljačom, Natrag u naftalin, Glavno da je kapa na glavi, of the comedy Narod je strpljiv, of the play Sedmorica u podrumu and of books for children Na leđima delfina and Jurnjava na motoru. Focused on analysing human identity and the possibility of human self-realisation, Slavko Kolar positioned himself with his specific style, high artistic value and humanism pervaded by humour among the most successful Croatian writers of the 20th century.

Nevenka Videk