Mazuranic, Ivan

Mažuranić, Ivan 

Born Aug. 18, 1814, in.Novi Vinodoljski, in the Croatian Primorje; died Aug. 4, 1890, in Zagreb. Croatian poet and political figure. The son of a minor landowner.

From 1835 to 1838, Mažuranić studied philosophy and jurisprudence in Szombathely (Hungary) and Zagreb. He joined the Illyrianists’ radical circle, whose ideas inspired his patriotic poems of the 1830’s (Illyria in the Ages, For the Ancestors of the Slavs) and his pamphlet Croats to Magyars (1848). During his service as ban (governor) of Croatia (1873-80), Mažuranić supported Austrian rule and, in addition, furthered the development of Croatian national culture. The influence of epic folk songs and Dalmatian poetry was evident in Mažuranić’s verses. He was greatly influenced by Byron and Pushkin. His most significant poem is his lyric epic about the struggle of the Montenegrins against their Turkish oppressors, The Death of Small-age Čengiji-ća (1846; Russian translation, 1871), which embodies a call for Slavic unity.

WORKS

Djela. Zagreb, 1958.
In Russian translation:
“Smert’ Izmaila-agi Chengiicha.” In Poety lugoslavii XIX-XX vv. Moscow, 1963.

REFERENCES

Kulakovskii, P. A. Illirizm. Warsaw, 1894.
Istoriia lugoslavii, vol. 1. Moscow, 1963. Pages 537-40.
Barac, A. Hrvatska književnost odpreporoda do stvaranja Jugoslavije, vol. 1. Zagreb, 1954.