Croatian Love Quotes

Tell us more, Darcy, about how European you are. Tell us about the way the Croatian sun roasts your shoulders, tell us about your love of canned fish and the girl you’d kiss for practice at your German primary school.

I am living with these pigs, with these horses and with these cows. Every day I have to look at their blank eyes, their stupid bellies. They call themselves by the names of various nationalities. As if that would make any difference! Germans, French, Italians, Croatians, Russians, Poles, and other animals. Thank you for the pleasure! I love animals, but only real animals. I love animals who do not pretend to be humans. You should look, sometimes, into the eyes of real cows. They are serene, quiet, round. They are good, so good. Like medicine. I like being with cows. I have spent much of my life with them. They do not know greed, they do not play politics. I love them. Protect me from human beings! Let me live with cows! I'll live as a shepherd, if that's the only way. You are driving me out of my mind, you, the Thinking Animals!

Miroslav Volf puts a finer, harder point on this: we are substantially defined not only by those we love but by who our enemies are. Our own identities are shaped by our interactions with them. As a Croatian Protestant, he was defined by the identity and convictions of Serbian Christians. We are all, whether we wish it or not, in profound relationship with our enemies, especially when that relationship is a combative one. When we respond in kind to hatred and aggression, we risk becoming like our foes. And so the biblical virtue of “love” of enemies is not romantic but practical, a love of action and intention, not of feeling. This religious wisdom would subvert the either/or choices often presented for debate in our age, where rhetoric about enemies local and global abounds. This faith requires both realism and compassion. We might need to fight our enemies or keep them at a safe remove; but we cannot let hatred, anger, and fear toward them determine our character and our actions. This cleansing of focus is the true purpose of forgiveness. I

French is the perfect language for love,” Monique said. “Je t’aime.” She stared straight at Tomas. That was subtle. He thought about telling her to fuck off in Croatian but decided not to risk it in case she assumed it was a compliment.

I’m convinced that the best things in life are: Red wine, honey, Croatian olive oil, being self-employed, love, old books, the Bialetti Moka pot, sunsets, and living in a neighborhood that wasn’t planned by modernist architects. Anything else is strictly unnecessary.

Yandex translation from Croatian to English: Nomadom was the time when the ratio of beauty began to think about how about love than between two parts, in which opposites attract only magical powers, and the same ratio is equal to the lords and architecture and nature.

You remember, from that time, nightmares, night sweats, waking up, calling out. You remember dreaming about your mother, the urge to show her a painted stone, city lights, a burn on your forearm from hot glue. When you woke, the longing for her was something physical. You lost her when you were twelve. Every day, you wore the gold bangles she had hidden on her upper arms when she came to Ellis Island from Baghdad. Your father was a geography professor but always getting lost. They met at a country club when your mother had just arrived. She cleaned the club kitchen at night. Ten months after she died, your father remarried a Croatian woman with parrot-colored hair and you went to boarding school. He couldn’t be alone and you couldn’t be alone with him. From then on, you took care of yourself.

Dražen Kalenić is a Croatian author whose literary work is grounded in philosophical reflection and moral inquiry. Originally trained in technical sciences, he later turned to art, first through photography and design, then fully dedicating himself to literature. His breakthrough novel Underneath the Baldachin (1995), now reissued in a two-part edition, explores themes of spiritual decline, power, sacrifice, and beauty through allegorical storytelling and layered narration. Kalenić’s writing is inspired by Western philosophical tradition and classic literature, particularly authors like Robert Musil. His characters confront the tension between good and evil, faith and betrayal, and the search for moral clarity in a complex world. He lives and works in Zagreb. Editorial Reviews • Academician Ranko Marinković: “You wrote a miracle!" • Prof. Slavko Harni, National Library of Croatia: “An original literary voice... Kalenić joins the philosophical investigation of man as a seeker of beauty. His writing rebels against stylistic comfort and explores the moral complexity of human life.” • Drago Z. Spectar: “Kalenić offers a layered allegorical novel, exposing the spiritual and moral challenges of our age. The book is read in one breath, and reminds us we are all under the baldachin.” • J.S. Wagner: “A literary achievement that should be read worldwide. Underneath the Baldachin is a phoenix-like masterpiece, rising from personal and collective trauma to affirm the essential truth of love and faith.” • Academician Ante Lib Matić: “Read the first and last sentence… If they stay with you – as they did with me – you’ll know this story matters.