KRISTIAN NOVAK

Kristian Novak was born in Baden-Baden in 1979. He spent his childhood in Sveti Martin na Muri. He attended secondary school in Čakovec, graduated in Croatian and German studies, and earned his PhD at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in Zagreb. He worked for six years as a teaching assistant in the Department of German Studies at the same faculty, and in 2012 moved to the Department of Croatian Studies at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in Rijeka, where he currently teaches as an assistant professor. His research focuses on historical sociolinguistics, discourse analysis, and linguistic biography.

From 1998 to 2009, he was a member of the Croatian national karate team. He won numerous medals at European and World Championships.

He has published the novels The Hanged (Obješeni, 2005), Black Mother Earth (Črna mati zemla, 2013), and Gypsy, but the Most Beautiful (Ciganin, ali najljepši, 2016). He received the t-portal Award for Novel of the Year in 2014 and 2017. Black Mother Earth was soon published in several foreign editions, while its theatrical adaptation at Zagreb’s ZeKaeM theatre was named one of the productions of the season. According to a selection by Večernji list, the novel was included among the ten best Croatian novels of the past fifty years. A film adaptation is currently in development.