Slavko Kolar

Born Dec. 1, 1891, in the village of Palesnik; died Sept. 15, 1963, in Zagreb. Croatian writer. Son of a teacher.

Kolar received an agricultural education and became a functionary. In 1944 he joined the liberation struggle of the peoples of Yugoslavia against the Fascist invaders. His first collection of stories, Smiling Stories, was published in 1917.

Kolar joined the democratic circles of Croatian writers. His talent is most vividly revealed in his short stories of peasant life and in his political satire, which ridicules the unprincipled position of the philistine, as well as scoffing at his passivity and indifference (Where Are You Going, Europe?, 1938; and Migudac, or a Defense and Praise of Cowardice, 1956). Kolar’s peasant stories are distinguished by severe restraint of narration, which conveys the tragic ordinariness of the life depicted: We Are or We Aren’t, 1933; We Are for Justice, 1936; With a Pen and a Harrow, 1938; and Selected Short Stories, 1958.