Ivana Brlic-MazuranicIvana Brlic Mazuranic was born in Ogulin on April 18, 1874, in very well known Mazuranic family, grandchild of Ivan, poet, politician and Croatian ban, and daughter of Vladimir lawyer and legal historian. Through her marriage to Vatroslav Brlic, lawyer and politician in Slovenski Brod, she bacame part of yet another family very well known in Croatian society; it provided Ignjat Alojzije, writer and linguist, and Andrija Tokvart Brlic, politician and journalist, important names of a line that was as well known in Croatian cultural and social life as the Mazuranic family. Surrounded by capacious libraries in the both houses, by an atmosphere of work and patriotism, she attained a very considerable learning in her own home, learned languages and lived a rich and intense inner life. She devoted all her work to her family, to education and to her literary creations.
Highly valued by both national and foreign critics, she obtained the title of "Croatian Hans Cristian Andresen" for the collection of Tales of Long Ago. Her place as the best writer in Croatian children's literature is assurred. She had the ability to identify with the psyche of the child, to understand the purity and naivety of the world of children. Her works has been translated into many languages and she was nominated for the Nobel prize for literature. In the 1937 she became the first woman ever to be elected to the Croatian Academy of Scinces and Arts. She died in Zagreb on September 21, 1938.
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