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Ivo Andrić
Born	October 9, 1892 Dolac (village near Travnik), Bosnia and Herzegovina, Austro-Hungarian Empire
Died	March 13, 1975 (aged 82) Belgrade, SR Serbia, SFR Yugoslavia
Occupation	Novelist, short story writer
Nationality	Yugoslav
Notableaward(s)	Nobel Prize in Literature (1961)

Ivo Andrić (Serbian Cyrillic: Иво Андрић) (October 9, 1892 – March 13, 1975) was a Yugoslav novelist^[1][2], short story writer, and the 1961 winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature^[3]. His writings dealt mainly with life in his native Bosnia under the Ottoman Empire. His native house inTravnik has been transformed into a Museum and is open for visiting.

Contents  [hide] 1 Biography 2 Works 3 Classification 4 References 5 External links

[edit]Biography

Andrić was born on October 9, 1892, to a Catholic family of Bosnian Croats in Travnik, mahala Zenjak number 9, Bosnia and Herzegovina, then part of the Ottoman Empire, under control of Austria-Hungary. Originally named Ivan, he became known by the diminutive Ivo. When Andrić was two years old, his father Antun died. Because his mother Katarina was too poor to support him, he was raised by his mother's family in the eastern Bosnian town of Višegrad on the river Drina. There he saw the Ottoman Bridge, later made famous in his novel The Bridge on the Drina (Na Drini ćuprija).^[4]

Andrić attended the Jesuit gymnasium in Travnik, followed by Sarajevo's gymnasium and later the universities in Zagreb (1912 and 1918),Vienna (1913), Kraków (1914), and Graz (PhD, 1924).^[5] Because of his political activities, Andrić was imprisoned by the Austrian government during World War I (first in Maribor and later in the Doboj detention camp) alongside other pro-Yugoslav civilians.

Under the newly-formed Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes (later the Kingdom of Yugoslavia) Andrić became a civil servant, first in the Ministry of Faiths and then the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, where he pursued a successful diplomatic career as Deputy Foreign Minister and later Ambassador to Germany. He was also a delegate of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia at the 19th, 21st, 23rd and 24th sessions of the League of Nations.^[6] Andrić greatly opposed the movement of Stjepan Radić, the president of the Croatian Peasant Party. His ambassadorship ended in 1941 after the German invasion of Yugoslavia. During World War II, Andrić lived quietly in Belgrade, completing the three of his most famous novels which were published in 1945, including The Bridge on the Drina.

After the war, Andrić held a number of ceremonial posts in the new Communist government of Yugoslavia, including that of the member of the presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina. In 1961, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature "for the epic force with which he has traced themes and depicted human destinies drawn from the history of his country". He donated all of the prize money towards the improvement of libraries in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Following the death of his wife in 1968, he began reducing his public activities. In 1969 he was elected an honorary member of the Academy of Sciences and Arts of Bosnia and Herzegovina.^[7] As time went by, he became increasingly ill and eventually died on March 13, 1975, in Belgrade, SR Serbia, SFR Yugoslavia.

[edit]Works

The material for his works was mainly drawn from the history, folklore, and culture of his native Bosnia.

• The Bridge on the Drina
• Bosnian Chronicle[1] (a.k.a. Chronicles of Travnik)
• The Woman from Sarajevo[2]

Those were all released in 1945 and written during World War II while Andrić was living quietly in Belgrade. They are often referred to as the "Bosnian trilogy" because they were released at the same time and had been written near together in time. However, they are connected only thematically -— they are indeed three completely different works.

Some of his other popular works include:

• Ex Ponto[3] (1918)
• Unrest[4] (Nemiri, 1920)
• The Journey of Alija Đerzelez[5] (Put Alije Đerzeleza, 1920)
• The Vizier's Elephant[6] (Priča o vezirovom slonu, 1948; trans. 1962)
• The Damned Yard[7] (Prokleta avlija, 1954)
• Omer-Pasha Latas[8] (Omerpaša Latas, released posthumously in 1977)

His manuscripts and literary legacy is in custody of the Foundation he founded (Fondacija Ive Andrica) and Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts,^[8]

Some claim that the works of Ivo Andric particularly his thesis "The Development of Spiritual Life in Bosnia under the Influence of Turkish Rule" have resurfaced as a source of anti-Muslim prejudice in Serbian cultural discourse.^[9]