Slavko Grum

Slavko (Ignacij) Grum (1901–1949) was a Slovenian physician, playwright and prose writer.

Life Grum was born as the third, second-to-last child of Franc Grum, a foreman at the leather factory in Šmartno pri Litiji, and Marija Grum, née Dolšek. Due to his father's job, the family moved to Novo Mesto in 1906, This had a significant impact on his artistic work, which was closely linked to his professional interests. In 1920, he faced an existential crisis, suffered from psychosomatic disorders, and became addicted to cocaine. Once the crisis had passed, he wrote prolifically. During rehearsals for the production of Cankar's Lepa Vida, he became close to the actress playing the title role, Joža Debelak, the daughter of a head teacher from Šmartno and an electrical engineering student. She was his most important literary and personal confidante. In 1926, he graduated and returned home. In Ljubljana, he was drafted into the army, but was discharged after two months due to a heart condition. At the end of 1926, he began his mandatory internship at hospitals in Ljubljana and, at his own request, remained at the hospital as an assistant physician. As a doctor, he worked at a women's hospital and a psychiatric clinic, where he gathered material for writing his most important works and plays. After 1929, his literary output began to dwindle; he published only reprints and variations. In 1946, he attempted suicide by taking Veronal. Three years later, he died of liver cancer in an isolation ward in Zagorje. From 1921 to 1924, he wrote the plays Pierrot and Pierrette (Pierrot in Pierrette), The Merciless Saviour (Neusmiljeni odrešenik), and Tired Curtains (Trudni zastori). In 1921, he became acquainted with Freud, who had a profound influence on his later works. In 1922, he was captivated by Alexander Moissi's melancholic, decadent and morbid performance in a production of Ibsen's Ghosts. During the summer of 1922, he staged an amateur production of Funtek's The Race (Tekma), followed the next year by Cankar's Beautiful Vida (Lepa Vida) and Strindberg's Miss Julie. His period of mature writing spanned from 1925 to 1929. In 1928, he gave a lecture on the sexual education of youth at the Matica cinema, where he explained Freud's theory and later published the lecture. That same year, he published his best-known work, the drama An Event in the Town of Goga (Dogodek v mestu Gogi), for which he received second prize in the field of drama in Belgrade. It was staged three years later at the National Theatre in Maribor and subsequently at the National Theatre in Ljubljana. An Event in the Town of Goga, and with it Slavko Grum, is considered a Slovenian classic. That was followed by essays, including the psychoanalytic text Suicide (Samomor). He conceived a collection of short stories titled The Prodigal Son (Izgubljeni sin). By the end of his life, he had further written only the narrative works Escape to the Beyond (Beg v onstran) and Escape from Life (Beg iz življenja), the novella The Boy and the Madman (Deček in blaznik), and the popular science essay The Truth About Alcohol (Resnica o alkoholu). His bequest, comprising Grum's most important literary works, was donated by Olga Hlede and is kept at the Miran Jarc Library in Novo Mesto.

Namings A street in Novo Mesto and the Slavko Grum Elementary School in Zagorje ob Savi are named after Slavko Grum. In Litija, the former district headquarters has been renovated to house the Dr. Slavko Grum Central Library. On the 120th anniversary of his birth (2021), a bust of him was unveiled in his hometown of Šmartno pri Litiji.

The Grum Award for the best Slovenian play is named after him. At the main municipal celebration during the cultural festival in Zagorje, the Slavko Grum plaque is also awarded to cultural workers for their many years of successful work in the field of culture.