Nada Gašić

Nada Gašić was born in 1950 in Maribor. She graduated in Yugoslav studies and sociology from the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in Zagreb. She worked as a lecturer at universities in Leningrad/St. Petersburg and Prague, where she defended her PhD dissertation on Czech-Croatian cultural ties from the beginning of the modern era. Collaborated on the making of the first Anić Dictionary of Croatian Language. Using the construct of the Zagreb slang, she translated Hašek’s The Good Soldier Schweik and Moša’s play of the same title. At the age of fifty-seven, she published her first ‘summer’ novel, Mirna ulica, drvored, with which she announced a tetralogy about Zagreb through the seasons. The book received the Slavić Award for the best debut novel. The second, ‘autumn’ novel, Voda, paučina, published in 2010, was awarded the City of Zagreb Award and the Vladimir Nazor Award. The novel is included among the 100 best novels of Slavic literature. She published Devet života gospođe Adele, a novel created during the twelve weeks of the ‘Zagreb Spring’ during the pandemic and post-earthquake trials and tribulations in the city. It was followed by the collection of stories Posljednje što su vidjele. The ‘winter’ novel Četiri plamena, led, published in 2024, closed the tetralogy dedicated to Zagreb. Her works have been translated into English, Italian, Slovenian, Ukrainian and Macedonian.