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Kočić (Кочић) Petar
(1877—1916)

Petar Kočić was a Bosnian Serb poet and writer. Like Borisav Stanković who was self-made and successful poet of Slavic South, like Ivo Ćipiko who was poet of seaside - Kočić was poet of Bosnian mountains and fresh life of his area.

He was born in Stričići, a village near Banja Luka. He attended primary school in Gomjenica Monastery, during which time his mother died and his father became a priest. He started his gimnasium (high-school) education in Sarajevo, but because of his pronounced nationalism, he was expelled from 3th grade and had to finish his secondary education in Belgrade. He studied Slavic Studies under the mentorship of famous Professor Jažić in Vienna, joining a circle of Bosnian students and writers interested in South Slavic literature and national liberation. In 1904 he came back to Serbia, and for a short while earned his living as a teacher in Skopje. Two years later, already a well-known writer and publicist, he returned to Sarajevo, this time as a clerk of publishing company "Prosveta", but after a while he was fired for taking a part in a worker's strike, and banished to Banja Luka.

There he founded a magazine Otadžbina ("Fatherland"), and formed a political group, which advocated a fight against the Austro-Hungarian occupation, and especially a fierce struggle against the remains of feudal slavery. As a national and social revolutionary Kočić was favoured among peasants and progressive youth, and as such he was elected as a member of Bosanski sabor (Bosnian parliament) in Sarajevo. Austria recognized Petar Kočić as a serious enemy, continuously persecuting and repeatedly arresting him between 1907 and 1909 for his activities. On the eve of World War I and the subsequent South Slavic unification, he started to show signs of a nervous breakdown, and was taken to Belgrade for treatment. He died in a Belgrade mental hospital, not having lived to see the liberation and unification of South Slavs. The night before he died, he wrote: "U ropstvu se rodih,u ropstvu živjeh,u ropstvu vajme i umrijeh." ("In slavery I was born, in slavery I lived, and in slavery I died.) In Bosnia, he was one of the most prominent promoters of national pride, and a highly regarded preacher of social justice.

Kočić wrote three collections of tales named From Mountain, and Under The Mountain (С планине и испод планине), Howls From Zmijanje (Јауци са Змијања), and two political-social satires: Badger on Tribunal (Јазавац пред судом) and Trials (Суданија), first in a form of play, and second in a form of dialogue.

Bosnia & Herzegovina (Serb administration), 1997, Petar Kočić

Yugoslavia, 1977, Petar Kocic