Dora Pejačević

Countess Maria Theodora Paulina “Dora” Pejačević (; 10 September 1885 – 5 March 1923) was a Croatian composer, pianist and violinist and one of the first composers to introduce the orchestral song to Croatian music. Her Symphony in F-sharp minor is considered by scholars to be the first modern symphony in Croatian music. Pejačević is noted for her vocal compositions, piano miniatures, and string quartets, In her early career, Pejačević’s primary themes were highly representative of the Romantic period, but this would change after her experience working as a paramedic in the First World War after which her works reflected the philosophic movement of nihilism and discussed motifs of death, isolation, and futility of war. In one of her diaries, she commented on 470 books she had read in the period from 1902 to 1921, which covered fields of literature, philosophy, music, religion, history, and natural sciences. The couple soon moved to Munich and had their first child, which proved to be fatal for Pejacevic. Her life is the subject of the fictionalized Croatian biographical film Countess Dora (1993), directed by Zvonimir Berković and starring Alma Prica and Rade Šerbedžija. List of wor