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French Translation of Jurica Pavčić's Red Water Wins French Award for Best Crime Novel
The French translation of Jurica Pavčić's Crvena Voda (Red Water) snagged the 2021 Grand Prix de Litterature Policiere, France's esteemed award for the best international crime novel.
Crvena Voda was translated into the French by Olivier Lannuzel.
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Sandorf Publishing House Launches American Branch
Croatian publishing house Sandorf launched their American branch called Sandorf Passage earlier this year.
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The Best of New Eastern European Literature
Have an overabundance of free time, thanks to the pandemic and lockdowns? Yearning to travel but unable to do so safely? Discover the rhythm of life and thought in multiple Eastern European countries through exciting new literature translated into English. From war-torn Ukraine to tales from Gulag inmates to the search for identity by Eastern Europeans driven away from their home countries because of the economic or political situations but still drawn back to their cultural hearths, this list offers many new worlds to explore.
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Robert Perišić: No-Signal Area
American critics praise Robert Perišić’s No-Signal Area
After the international success of Our Man In Iraq by Robert Perišić, translated into a dozen languages across the globe, his novel No-Signal Area continues to spark interest of international publishers. The novel was published in the USA last month by the prominent publishing house Seven Stories Press and received glowing reviews, confirming Perišić as a contemporary author of international renown.
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Maša Kolanović 2020 Winner of European Union Prize for Literature
Maša Kolanović wins the prestigious European Union Prize for Literature as well as the Croatian Vladimir Nazor Prize for her collection of short stories, Poštovani kukci i druge jezive priče (2019) (Dear Insects and Other Spine-Tingling Tales).
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Bekim Sejranović Passes Away
Award-winning author and translator, Bekim Sejranović, passed away on May 21st, 2020 at the age of 48.
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Lit Link Festival 2019
Lit Link, the annual summer literature festival whose unofficial motto is literature without borders, is upon us again. Every year, authors from a different country or language group are invited to read their work alongside Croatian authors. While the author reads in his/her native language, a translation is projected onto a large screen onstage making all readings cross culturally accessible.
This year’s festival welcomes authors from German-speaking countries (Germany, Austria, Switzerland) and kicks off this Wednesday, June 26th in Zagreb at the cult café/cultural club and hangout for literary folks, booksa. The festival then moves to Pula on June 27th, Rijeka on June 28th and ends with a large event in Zagreb on June 29th in Zagreb’s alternative mecca, the club Močvara.
Guest authors who will present their work at the festival include Anke Stelling, Jonas Lüscher, Lauren Freudenthaler and Jovana Reisinger. Guest participants also include editors and publishers Kristine Listau and Jörg Sundermeier and literary editor Jessica Beer.
Croatian authors include (with more to be announced soon):
Pula- Željka Horvat Čeč, Neven Ušumovic, Viktorija Božina
Rijeka- Goran Ferčec, Damir Pilić
Zagreb- Asja Bakić, Nebojša Lujanović, Darko Šeparović, Zoran Lazić
All events are free and open to all literature lovers!
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Ivana Sajko Wins the International Literature Award
Croatian author, Ivana Sajko, was named this year's winner of Germany's International Literature Award, for her novel Liebesroman (Love Novel). The award recognizes the best translation of an international novel into German.
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Dubravka Ugrešić Wins Tportal Award for Her Novel Fox
Renowned Croatian author, Dubravka Ugrešić, has won this year's Tportal award for best novel of the year.
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Daša Drndić Dies
The award-winning, critically acclaimed Croatian novelist, Daša Drndić passed away this June in Rijeka at the age of 71. She boldly took on difficult subject matter in her novels from fascism to cancer. Her novel Sonnenschein (2007) won multiple awards in Croatia and the English translation (Trieste) was shortlisted for an international literary prize, as was her novel Belladonna (2012). Holding a Bachelor’s Degree in English Literature and Philology from the University of Belgrade, a Master’s Degree in Theater and Communications from Case Western University and a PhD from the University of Rijeka, her career was long and varied. She was a novelist, a playwright, an editor, a literary critic, a translator, she worked for twenty years as a writer, producer and editor for Radio Belgrade and wrote more than thirty radio plays and fifteen features. She taught Modern British Literature and Creative Writing at the University of Rijeka. Her writing has been published in numerous literary magazines and her books, thirteen in total, have been translated into multiple languages. Read a poignant tribute to her and her work in the Guardian.
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2018 Lit Link Literature Festival Begins, Welcoming American Authors This Year
The annual Lit Link festival brings together notable foreign authors and Croatian authors for a three-day event packed with bilingual literary readings across several Croatian cities. This year’s American guests include the author Nell Zink, the author and musician Elijah Wald, and two authors who Granta Magazine named among the Best Young American Novelists in 2017, Jesse Ball and Catherine Lacey, as well as a number of American editors and publishers. The festival opens Thursday (28.6) in Pula, moves to Rijeka on Friday (29.6) and concludes with a big closing event in Močvara Club in Zagreb on Saturday (30.6).
Festival Program
Pula: 28.6, Thursday, 20:30; “Dnevni boravak” in DC Rojc
Rijeka: 29.6, Friday, 19:00; Book caffe Dnevni boravak
Zagreb, 30.6, Saturday, 18:00; Močvara Club
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Daša Drndić's Belladonna Shortlisted for First EBRD Prize
The new prize, awarded by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, honors excellent English translations of books from countries where the bank operates- a vast stretch of land spanning from Central Europe to Central Asia. Dasa Drndic’s Belladonna, translated by Celia Hawkesworth, was shortlisted along with the Nobel Prize winner, Orhan Pamuk’s Red Woman. Tea Tulic’s novel, Hair Everywhere, which was translated by Coral Petkovich was longlisted for the prize. The 20,000 euro prize is split evenly between author and translator as the award intends to encourage more high quality English translations of authors from these regions. The winner will be announced in April, 2018.
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Damir Karakaš wins Fric Award
On Tuesday, December 19, 2017 the literary FriC Award Ceremony was held in the Foyer of the Croatian National Theatre in Zagreb. The award was granted to Damir Karakaš for his novel, Remembering Forest.
The Fric Award, which takes its name from Miroslav Krleža's nickname, was launched by the weekly magazine Express with the desire to position it as an award for literary works that in their widest sense reflect the modern world.
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Lit Link Festival 2017 in Pula, Rijeka and Zagreb
The 'Lit Link Festival' in Croatia (or 'Književna karika' - in Croatian) is a three-day literary tour whose participants are writers, editors and publishers. This year the motto of the Lit Link Festival is “Despite Brexit” and the guests are British writers, editors and publishers.
The festival consists of three evening readings in which both Croatian authors and British authors participate. The readings will take place in the coastal cities of Pula (29th June, Centar Rojc) and Rijeka (30th June, Astronomski centar), as well as the inland capital, Zagreb (1st July, Club Močvara/Mochvara).
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World Literature Today on Dubravka Ugrešić - the laureate of the 2016 Neudstadt Prize
Dubravka Ugrešić’s work takes center stage in the most recent issue of World Literature Today. She is the winner of the 2016 Neustadt Prize.
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Slobodan Šnajder the winner of T-portal 2016 literary award
The finalists were the novels “The Brass Times” by Slobodan Šnajder, “Alone by the Sea” by Zoran Ferić, “No Signal Area” by Robert Perišić, “Skin-coloured Cloud” by Nebojša Lujanović, and “Your Son Huckleberry Finn” by Bekim Sejranović.
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First Croatian newspaper for asylum-seekers, refugees launched
The monthly publication was launched with the aim of establishing closer mutual trust and offering information to people who were forced to leave their homes in search of protection and security, it was said at the launch.
Most of the newspapers' authors are asylum-seekers.
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Europe's best indie novels listed in support of UK remaining in EU
The independent publisher Dedalus Books is making its own small case for remaining in the EU, with its “Reading Europe” promotion, a selection of novels from EU countries intended to “let the reader know the literature, history and culture of each country better”. They are all from UK independent publishers, all translated into English, and of course, two of them are Croatian.
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French Translations of Eight Poetry Collections by Croatian Authors
Eight poetry books by Croatian poets and poetesses have been translated into French and published by the French publishing house L'Ollave within the edition "Domaine croate/ Poésie". The editor-in-chief Jean de Breyne launched this special edition in 2012 in order to introduce the readers with this very prolific and heterogeneous poetic production of whose existence the French public was previously almost completely unaware.
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11 Books To Read This Spring According to Paper Magazine
In the wise words of Kylie Jenner, 2016 is the year of "realizing things." If you want to speed up the revelation process, books are a good way to go. In the selection below, we've found a nice surprise: a ''dazzling, funny and deadly serious novel with which a glorious new European voice has arrived'' (The Guardian) - Adios, Cowboy, by Olja Savičević Ivančević.
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Star Wars Adds Shine to Croatian 'Pearl' Dubrovnik
The new Star Wars movie will be part-filmed in the Croatian resort of Dubrovnik in March, bringing the city additional prestige among film fans and marketing potential.
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Dubravka Ugrešić, winner of the Neustadt Prize
Dubravka Ugrešić announced as 2016 winner of prestigious Neustadt International Prize for Literature
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The Eastern Iowa Gazette reviewers selected Perisic's Our Man in Iraq as one of their favorites in 2013
Gazette book reviewers who have shared their insights about more than 100 books in 2013 were asked to name just five favorites from the long list of books they read this year.
One of them, Laura Farmer, include in her favorites “Our Man in Iraq” by Robert Perisic. She wrote that this was one of the most striking novels of the year. When Boris begins sending incoherent reports back to Croatia from Iraq, Toni, Boris’ cousin, rewrites them, blurring the line between truth and fiction and raising points about the role of the media, truth, and the chances we take in life to do what we think is best.
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Literary Link - LitLink at UNIRI Library
uniri.hr
At the University Library in Rijeka at the American Corner, the LitLink programme will be held on Friday, September 27th, from 4:00 PM to 4:45 PM in the Glagoljica exhibition hall, with american writers Elianna Kan and Ernesto Estrella as guests .
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Lit Link Festival 2013
26th-28th of September 2013
Pula 26.9. - Rijeka 27.9. - Zagreb 28.9. 2013.
The first edition of the festival hosts American writers, publishers and editors.
A number of Croatian authors present their work.
Lit Link Festival wants to induce the two-way exchange of fresh information.
Readings: Heidi Julavits, Damir Karakaš, Tao Lin, Zoran Ferić, Ernesto Estrella, Marinko Koščec, James Hopkin, Vlado Bulić, Buzz Poole, Sibila Petlevski, Renato Baretić, Tea Tulić, Bekim Sejranović, Drago Glamuzina, Nikola Petković, Vedrana Rudan, Slađana Bukovac, Gordan Nuhanović, Vladimir Stojsavljević, Drago Orlić, Neven Ušumović
Lectures and discussions: Richard Nash, John O’Brien, Elianna Kan, Buzz Poole, Gaston Bellemare...
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Croatia’s biggest leap since independence
Independent, 16 June 2013, by Keith Micallef
The 1st July is seen by many as a historic day in Croatia’s relatively brief existence as an independent state, marking the country’s accession to the EU. Twenty-two years have passed since the country declared its independence from Yugoslavia. Before that, Croatia’s only experience as an independent state was between 1941 and 1945, as a German puppet state under Nazi leadership. After a civil war that ended in 1995, EU membership was only a distant image on the horizon. Yet, after a prolonged negotiation period spanning more than six years, in 2011 Croatia finally received the green light to join the elite club, two years later.
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Trieste wins Independent Foreign Fiction Readers’ Prize
The winner of the 2013 Prize is 'The Detour' by Gerbrand Bakker, translated by David Colmer'. Themes of infidelity, exile and isolation won over the judges of this year’s Prize to give the author his second major prize win. His previous novel The Twin won the IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. Translator David Colmer will share the prize money with Bakker, in this unique award that recognises writer and translator equally.
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Our man in America
ROBERT PERIŠIĆ ON HIS FIRST AMERICAN BOOK TOUR TO PROMOTE HIS NOVEL, OUR MAN IN IRAQ.
Visit www.ourmaniniraq.com
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Perisic's book launch in New York
Facing the U.S. tour of Robert Perisic
The author will undertake a North American reading & cultural tour. Inaugural U.S. Event will take place in New York City on Tuesday, April 23 at 7:00pm - Hausing Works, Bookstore cafe
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Trieste Is Shortlisted
The shortlist for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize is announced, and Daša Drndić is on it!
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Daša Drndić long-listed for the 2013 Independent Foreign Fiction Prize
Drndić was shortlisted for her novel Trieste, a story about Jews of Gorizia in Northeast Italy during World War II.
The Independent Foreign Prize honours the best work of fiction by a living author, which has been translated into English from any other language and published in the United Kingdom.
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Perisic's novel selected as one of the Most Anticipated Books of 2013
A very popular American site on books and literary culture, The Millions, selected Robert Perisic's novel Our Man in Iraq as one of the Most Anticipated Books of 2013.
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New Meštrović's book published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing
After having published his book Dispersion of Meaning - The Fading Out of the Doctrinaire World? (2008), the same publisher CSP - Cambridge Scholars Publishing has just published a collection of nine inter-linked essays by Matko Meštrović under the title Towards a New Orientation. A Croatian version of the book, Prema novom usmjerenju, was published by Zagreb publisher Antibarbarus.
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Horvat and Štiks in Monthly Review Magazine
An article 'Post-Socialism, the European Union, and a New Left in the Balkans', published in Monthly Review is a theoretical paper written by Srećko Horvat and Igor Štiks who are also the editors of theoretical part of the Subversive Festival in Zagreb.
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Rebecca Duran's Take on Modern Day Life in Pazin (Istria)
Croatia is a small, charming country known today as a prime European tourist destination. However, it has a complicated often turbulent history and is seemingly always destined to be at the crossroads of empires, religions and worldviews, with its current identity and culture incorporating elements from its former Communist, Slavic, Austrian-Hungarian, Catholic, Mediterranean, and European traditions.
review
Review of Dubravka Ugrešić's Age of Skin
Dubravka Ugrešić is one of the most internationally recognizable writers from Croatia, but she has a contentious relationship with her home country, having gone into self-exile in the early 90s. Her recently translated collection of essays, The Age of Skin, touches on topics of of exile and displacement, among others. Read a review of Ugrešić’s latest work of non-fiction, expertly translated by Ellen Elias-Bursac, in the link below .
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Vlaho Bukovac Exhibition in Zagreb Will Run Through May
Vlaho Bukovac (1855-1922) is arguably Croatia's most renowned painter. Born in the south in Cavtat, he spent some of his most impressionable teenage years in New York with his uncle and his first career was as a sailor, but he soon gave that up due to injury. He went on to receive an education in the fine arts in Paris and began his artistic career there. He lived at various times in New York, San Francisco, Peru, Paris, Cavtat, Zagreb and Prague. His painting style could be classified as Impressionism which incorporated various techniques such as pointilism.
An exhibition dedicated to the works of Vlaho Bukovac will be running in Klovićevi dvori Gallery in Gornji Grad, Zagreb through May 22nd, 2022.
review
Review of Neva Lukić's Endless Endings
Read a review of Neva Lukić's collection of short stories, Endless Endings, recently translated into English, in World Literature Today.
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A Guide to Zagreb's Street Art
Zagreb has its fair share of graffiti, often startling passersby when it pops up on say a crumbling fortress wall in the historical center of the city. Along with some well-known street murals are the legendary street artists themselves. Check out the article below for a definitive guide to Zagreb's best street art.
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Beloved Croatian Children's Show Professor Balthazar Now Available in English on YouTube
The colorful, eclectic and much beloved Croatian children's cartoon Professor Balthazar was created by Zlatko Grgić and produced from the late 1960s through the 1970s. Now newer generations will be able to enjoy the Professor's magic, whether they speak Croatian or English.
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New Book on Croatian Football Legend Robert Prosinečki
Robert Prosinečki's long and fabled football career includes winning third place in the 1998 World Cup as part of the Croatian national team, stints in Real Madrid and FC Barcelona as well as managerial roles for the Croatian national team, Red Star Belgrade, the Azerbaijani national team and the Bosnian Hercegovinian national team.
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Sandorf Publishing House Launches American Branch
Croatian publishing house Sandorf launched their American branch called Sandorf Passage earlier this year.
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Jonathan Bousfield on the Seedy Side of the Seaside
From strange tales of mysterious murders to suspected criminals hiding out to scams, duels and gambling, Opatija, a favourite seaside escape for Central Europeans at the turn of the last century, routinely filled Austrian headlines and the public's imagination in the early 20th century.
review
Review of new English translation of Grigor Vitez's AntonTon
Hailed as the father of 20th century Croatian children's literature, Grigor Vitez (1911-1966) is well known and loved in his homeland. With a new English translation of one of his classic tales AntonTon (AntunTun in Croatian), children around the world can now experience the author's delightful depiction of the strong-minded and silly AntonTon. The Grigor Vitez Award is an annual prize given to the best Croatian children's book of the year.
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The Best of New Eastern European Literature
Have an overabundance of free time, thanks to the pandemic and lockdowns? Yearning to travel but unable to do so safely? Discover the rhythm of life and thought in multiple Eastern European countries through exciting new literature translated into English. From war-torn Ukraine to tales from Gulag inmates to the search for identity by Eastern Europeans driven away from their home countries because of the economic or political situations but still drawn back to their cultural hearths, this list offers many new worlds to explore.
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More Zagreb Street Art
Explore TimeOut's gallery of fascinating and at times thought-provoking art in the great open air gallery of the streets of Zagreb.
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Welcome to Zagreb's Hangover Museum
Partied too hard last night? Drop by Zagreb's Hangover Museum to feel more normal. People share their craziest hangover stories and visitors can even try on beer goggles to experience how the world looks like through drunken eyes.
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Jonathan Bousfield on the Future as Imagined in 1960s Socialist Yugoslavia
How will the futuristic world of 2060 look? How far will technology have advanced, and how will those advancements affect how we live our everyday lives? These are the questions the Zagreb-based magazine Globus asked in a series of articles in 1960, when conceptualizing what advancements society would make 40 years in the future, the then far-off year of 2000. The articles used fantastical predictions about the future to highlight the technological advancements already made by the then socialist Yugoslavia. Take a trip with guide, Jonathan Bousfield, back to the future as envisioned by journalists in 1960s Yugoslavia.
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Untranslatable Croatian Phrases
What’s the best way for an open-minded foreigner to get straight to the heart of another culture and get a feel for what makes people tick? Don’t just sample the local food and drink and see the major sights, perk up your ears and listen. There’s nothing that gives away the local flavor of a culture more than the common phrases people use, especially ones that have no direct translation.
Check out a quirky list of untranslatable Croatian phrases from Croatian cultural guide extraordinaire, Andrea Pisac, in the link below:
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Jonathon Bousfield on the Museum of Broken Relationships
Just got out of a serious relationship and don't know what to do with all those keepsakes and mementos of your former loved one? The very popular and probably most unique museum in Zagreb, the Museum of Broken Relationships, dedicated to preserving keepsakes alongside the diverse stories of relationships gone wrong, will gladly take them. Find out how the museum got started and take an in-depth look at some of its quirkiest pieces in the link below.
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Cool Things To Do in Zagreb
Zagreb is Croatia’s relaxed, charming and pedestrian-friendly capital. Check out Time Out’s definitive Zagreb guide for a diverse set of options of what to explore in the city from unusual museums to legendary flea markets and everything in between.
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Jonathan Bousfield on Diocletian's Legacy in Split
Diocletian’s Palace is the main attraction in Split, the heart and soul of the city. Because of the palace, Split’s city center can be described as a living museum and it draws in the thousands of tourists that visit the city annually. But how much do we really know about the palace’s namesake who built it, the last ruler of a receding empire? Jonathan Bousfield contends that history only gives us a partial answer.
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The Poetry of Zagreb
Cities have served as sources of inspiration, frustration, and discovery for millennia. The subject of sonnets, stories, plays, the power centers of entire cultures, hotbeds of innovation, and the cause of wars, cities are mainstays of the present and the future with millions more people flocking to them every year.
Let the poet, Zagreb native Tomica Bajsić, take you on a lyrical tour of the city. Walk the streets conjured by his graceful words and take in the gentle beauty of the Zagreb of his childhood memories and present day observation.
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You Haven't Experienced Zagreb if You Haven't Been to the Dolac Market
Dolac, the main city market, is a Zagreb institution. Selling all the fresh ingredients you need to whip up a fabulous dinner, from fruits and vegetables to fish, meat and homemade cheese and sausages, the sellers come from all over Croatia. Positioned right above the main square, the colorful market is a beacon of a simpler way of life and is just as bustling as it was a century ago.
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Croatian Phrases Translated into English
Do you find phrases and sayings give personality and flair to a language? Have you ever pondered how the culture and history of a place shape the common phrases? Check out some common sayings in Croatian with their literal translations and actual meanings below.
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Discover Croatia's Archaeological Secrets
Discover Croatia’s rich archaeological secrets, from the well known ancient Roman city of Salona near Split or the Neanderthal museum in Krapina to the often overlooked Andautonia Archaeological Park, just outside of Zagreb, which boasts the excavated ruins of a Roman town or the oldest continuously inhabited town in Europe, Vinkovci.
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Croatian Sites on UNESCO World Heritage Tentative List
A little know fact is that Croatia, together with Spain, have the most cultural and historical heritage under the protection of UNESCO, and Croatia has the highest number of UNESCO intangible goods of any European country.
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Croatian National Theatre in Zagreb
The National Theater in Zagreb, Croatia’s capital, is one of those things which always finds its way to every visitor’s busy schedule.
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Zagreb's Street Art
So you're visiting Zagreb and are curious about it's underground art scene? Check out this guide to Zagreb's street art and explore all the best graffiti artists' work for yourself on your next walk through the city.
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Zagreb Festivals and Cultural Events
Numerous festivals, shows and exhibitions are held annually in Zagreb. Search our what's on guide to arts & entertainment.
Authors' pages
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