Anton Vodnik (28 May 1901 – 2 October 1965) was a

Slovenia Slovenia ( ; sl, Slovenija ), officially the Republic of Slovenia (Slovene: , abbr.: ''RS''), is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the west, Austria to the north, Hungary to the northeast, Croatia to the southeast, an ...

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral or writte ...

art historian Art history is the study of aesthetic objects and visual expression in historical and stylistic context. Traditionally, the discipline of art history emphasized painting, drawing, sculpture, architecture, ceramics and decorative arts; yet today ...

, and

critic A critic is a person who communicates an assessment and an opinion of various forms of creative works such as art, literature, music, cinema, theater, fashion, architecture, and food. Critics may also take as their subject social or governmen ...

. He was one of the most notable representatives of Slovene

Catholic The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

expressionism Expressionism is a modernist movement, initially in poetry and painting, originating in Northern Europe around the beginning of the 20th century. Its typical trait is to present the world solely from a subjective perspective, distorting it rad ...

in the

interwar period In the history of the 20th century, the interwar period lasted from 11 November 1918 to 1 September 1939 (20 years, 9 months, 21 days), the end of the World War I, First World War to the beginning of the World War II, Second World War. The in ...

. He was born in

Ljubljana Ljubljana (also known by other historical names) is the capital and largest city of Slovenia. It is the country's cultural, educational, economic, political and administrative center. During antiquity, a Roman city called Emona stood in the ar ...

, and studied art history at the

University of Vienna The University of Vienna (german: Universität Wien) is a public research university located in Vienna, Austria. It was founded by Duke Rudolph IV in 1365 and is the oldest university in the German-speaking world. With its long and rich histor ...

. He was member of the circle of young Slovene Catholic intellectuals gathered around the

Christian left The Christian left is a range of left-wing Christian political and social movements that largely embrace social justice principles and uphold a social doctrine or social gospel. Given the inherent diversity in international political thoug ...

journal '' Križ na gori''. In the late 1920s and early 1930s, he emerged as a renowned polemicist, especially directed against the influential

left liberal Social liberalism (german: Sozialliberalismus, es, socioliberalismo, nl, Sociaalliberalisme), also known as new liberalism in the United Kingdom, modern liberalism, or simply liberalism in the contemporary United States, left-liberalism ...

critic

Josip Vidmar Josip Vidmar (October 14, 1895 – April 11, 1992) was a notable Slovenian literary critic, essayist, and politician. From 1944 to 1946 he was speaker of the Slovenian People's Liberation Council (Slovenian Parliament). From 1952 to 1976 was pre ...

, with whom he nevertheless maintained a cordial relationship.Josip Vidmar, ''Obrazi'' (Ljubljana: Cankarjeva založba), 329-339. In the 1930s, he became one of the most notable contributors to the Catholic literary journal ''

Dom in svet ''Dom in svet'' ("Home and World") was a Catholic cultural and literary journal published in Slovenia. History and profile ''Dom in svet'' was published from 1888 to 1943. Its long-running rivalry with the national-liberal journal ''Ljubljanski ...

''. Vodnik published his first collection of poetry in 1920. His poetics was strongly influenced by late fin-de-siècle

symbolism Symbolism or symbolist may refer to: Arts * Symbolism (arts), a 19th-century movement rejecting Realism ** Symbolist movement in Romania, symbolist literature and visual arts in Romania during the late 19th and early 20th centuries ** Russian sy ...

, especially

Rilke René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke (4 December 1875 – 29 December 1926), shortened to Rainer Maria Rilke (), was an Austrian poet and novelist. He has been acclaimed as an idiosyncratic and expressive poet, and is widely recogni ...

and

Maurice Maeterlinck Maurice Polydore Marie Bernard Maeterlinck (29 August 1862 – 6 May 1949), also known as Count (or Comte) Maeterlinck from 1932, was a Belgian playwright, poet, and essayist who was Flemish but wrote in French. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in ...

. Vodnik was influential as a poet especially during the 1920s, while since the 1930s, his influence started to decline, due to the popularity of

social realism Social realism is the term used for work produced by painters, printmakers, photographers, writers and filmmakers that aims to draw attention to the real socio-political conditions of the working class as a means to critique the power structure ...

and the emergence of a new aesthetic sensibility among young Catholic authors that embraced

new objectivity The New Objectivity (in german: Neue Sachlichkeit) was a movement in German art that arose during the 1920s as a reaction against expressionism. The term was coined by Gustav Friedrich Hartlaub, the director of the ''Kunsthalle'' in Mannheim, who ...

on one hand, and a more mystical tradition on the other. During the

World War II in Yugoslavia World War II in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia began on 6 April 1941, when the country was swiftly conquered by Axis forces and partitioned between Germany, Italy, Hungary, Bulgaria and their client regimes. Shortly after Germany attacked the US ...

Vodnik participated in activities of Osvobodilna fronta. He died in Ljubljana. He was married to the teacher and editor Doroteja Vodnik (a.k.a. Pegam) ( sl). He was the brother of the literary critic France Vodnik.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Vodnik, Anton Slovenian male poets Slovenian Catholic poets Slovenian art historians Slovenian literary critics Slovenian Roman Catholics Writers from Ljubljana University of Vienna alumni 1901 births 1956 deaths 20th-century Slovenian poets 20th-century Slovenian historians Yugoslav historians