As a novelist, short-story writer, playwright, and essayist, Drago Jancar is a central figure in contemporary Slovenian literature. In the past twenty years his writing has revealed an artistic power of formulating and expressing ideas that reach far beyond the spiritual and cultural sphere of his native Slovenia, thereby making his work accessible to a large and varied audience.

Jancar was born on 13 April 1948 in Maribor, Slovenija, to Anton Jancar, a technical supervisor in an automobile factory, and Rozalija Trantura. In 1970 Jancar earned a degree from the law college in Maribor. As a student he was editor in chief, executive, and cultural editor of the student magazine Katedra. In 1970 he married Olga éeric, director of the theater festival Borsikovo srecanje in Maribor; the couple has one daughter. From 1971 to 1974 Jancar worked as a journalist for the Maribor daily Vecer; in 1975 he was sentenced to one year in...