Josip Vandot

Josip Vandot (15 January 1884 – 11 July 1944) was a Slovene writer and poet who wrote mainly for young readers.

Josip Vandot
Born(1884-01-15)15 January 1884
Kranjska Gora, Carniola, Austria-Hungary
Died11 July 1944(1944-07-11) (aged 60)
Trnjanski Kuti, Independent State of Croatia
OccupationWriter, poet
NationalitySlovene

Biography
Josip Vandot Street, Kranjska Gora

Vandot was born in Kranjska Gora in Upper Carniola, then part of Austria-Hungary, now in Slovenia. Under the interwar Kingdom of Yugoslavia, he was employed as a railway official in Maribor. In 1941, after the area was annexed by Germany, Vandot was deported to Croatia. He was killed in the Allied bombing of Slavonski Brod in 1944.[1] A street is now named for him in Kranjska Gora.

Work

Vandot is best known for the creation of the character Kekec, a brave and clever shepherd boy from the highlands of his home region, the Karawanks and Julian Alps. He wrote three books with Kekec as the main character:

  • Kekec na hudi poti (Kekec on the Hard Path, 1918)
  • Kekec na volčji sledi (Kekec on the Wolf Trail, 1922)
  • Kekec nad samotnim breznom (Kekec Above the Lonely Abyss, 1924)

The Kekec books were adapted into three films about the character, although only the first was a direct adaptation of the first book:

  • Kekec (1951)[2]
  • Srečno, Kekec (1963)[3] (Good Luck, Kekec) – the first Slovene colour film
  • Kekčeve ukane (1968)[4] (Kekec's Wiles)

References
  1. Helga Glušič, Sto Slovenskih Pripovednikov (Ljubljana: Prešernova družba, 1996) ISBN 961-6186-21-3
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.