Vitomil Zupan
| Vitomil Zupan | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
18 January 1914 Ljubljana, Duchy of Carniola, Austria-Hungary (now in Slovenia) |
| Died | 14 May 1987 (aged 73) Ljubljana, Slovenia, Yugoslavia |
| Occupation | Writer, Playwright, Poet, Screenwriter |
| Nationality | Slovenian |
| Notable works |
Menuet za kitaro, Komedija človeškega tkiva, Levitan, Igra s hudičevim repom |
Vitomil Zupan (18 January 1914 – 14 May 1987) was a post-World War II modernist Slovene writer and Gonars concentration camp survivor. Because of his detailed descriptions of sex and violence, he was dubbed the Slovene Hemingway and was compared to Henry Miller. He is best known for Menuet za kitaro (A Minuet for Guitar, 1975), describing the years he spent with the Slovene Partisans. In Titoist Yugoslavia he was sentenced to 18 years in a show trial, and upon his release in 1955 his works could only be published under his pseudonym Langus. He is considered one of the most important Slovene writers.
Zupan was born in Ljubljana, then part of Austria-Hungary. His mother was a teacher and his father, a soldier, was killed in the First World War. At age 18, Zupan played Russian roulette and shot a friend in the head, killing him. As a result, he was prohibited from graduating from secondary school in Yugoslavia. After leaving the country, he traveled for years—earning money as a sailor, ship's stoker, house painter in France, ski instructor, and professional boxer—across the Mediterranean, the Middle East, and North Africa, all before the outbreak of World War II. Upon returning home, he enrolled in the University of Ljubljana's Faculty of Engineering, which he did not graduate from, and read medical textbooks in an attempt to better understand his emotional condition.
After the Axis invasion of Yugoslavia in April 1941, as member of the Sokol athletic movement he joined the Liberation Front and participated in its underground activities in the annexed Province of Ljubljana until the authorities sent him to the Gonars concentration camp in 1942.
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