Milan Rakić

photo of Jovan Dučić (left) and Milan Rakić (right)

Milan Rakić (18 September 1876 – 30 June 1938)^[1] (Милан Ракић) was a Serbian poet. He focused on dodecasyllable and hendecasyllable verse, which allowed him to achieve beautiful rhythm and rhyme in his poems. He was quite a perfectionist and therefore only published two collections of poems (1903, 1912). He wrote largely about death and non-existence, keeping the tone sceptical and ironic. Two of his most well-known poems are An Honest Song (Iskrena pesma), A Desperate Song (Očajna pesma), Jefimija, Simonida and At Gazi-Mestan (Na Gazi-Mestanu). He was a member of the Serbian Royal Academy (1934).

Biography

The poet was born in 1876 in Belgrade. He finished elementary school (grade school) and high school (gymnasium) in Belgrade. In Paris, France he finished law school. It was in Paris that he, like Dučić, came under the influence of French Symbolist poets. They both had learned to admire French culture and had dreamed of a better world after the war. After returning to Belgrade from Paris he became a diplomat (like Jovan Dučić) for the Serbian (and later Yugoslav) government and remained in that job until nearly his death, representing the country abroad. He died prematurely in 1938 in Zagreb, Yugoslavia (now Croatia) right after surgery.

His father, Dimitrije Mita Rakić, educated abroad, was Serbia's Minister of Finance (1888); his mother Ana was the daughter of Serbian writer Milan Đ. Milićević; his sister Ljubica was married to Milan Grol; and his wife Milica was the daughter of Ljubomir Kovačević, a distinguished Serbian historian and politician.

Publications

• Collection of Poems, 1903
• Collection of Poems, 1912

References

• Translated and adapted from Serbian Wikipedia: Милан Ракић

Sources

• Jovan Skerlić, Istorija Nove Srpske Književnosti (Belgrade, 1914 and 1921), pp. 458–60.

External links

• Article on Serbian Poetry
• Translated works by Milan Rakić