The ceremonial session marking the 150th anniversary of the birth of the poet, diplomat, and Academician Milan Rakić (1876-1938) was held on 13 October, in the SASA Grand Hall.

He was one of the foremost Serbian poets of the first half of the 20th century, whose work and personality occupy an important place in Serbian culture and history. In 1894, he enrolled in the Faculty of Philosophy of the Belgrade Higher School.  The following year, he transferred to the Faculty of Law. After receiving a scholarship, he continued his studies in Paris in 1898. In 1901, he obtained a law degree. Although he had translated from French as early as his grammar-school years, his time in Paris and his exposure to French modernist poetry had a profound influence on his poetic development.

He returned to Belgrade in late January of 1902, and was appointed a clerk at the Export Bank. In the same year, he began publishing his first poems in the Serbian Literary Herald, while his first collection, ’Poems’, was published in 1903. The second collection, ’New Poems’, was published in 1912, followed by a selection of his poetry in 1924 and 1936.

He spent almost three decades in Serbian and Yugoslav diplomacy, serving in various positions in the diplomatic and consular service, from clerk and consul to Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary. As a diplomat of the Kingdom of Serbia, he served in Pristina, Skopje, Thessaloniki, and again in Pristina (1905−1911), in Bucharest and Iași (1915−1917), in Stockholm and London (1918). As an envoy of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, later the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, he served in Copenhagen and Oslo (1918−1921), in Sofia (1921−1927) and in Rome (1927−1933).

During his years of service at the Serbian Consulate in Pristina, from 1905 to 1911, Rakić wrote his famous cycle ‘In Kosovo’, which has a special place in his opus and had a profound influence on the development of Serbian patriotic poetry.

He volunteered in the First Balkan War, for which he received the Golden Medal of Courage.

In 1922, he became a corresponding member of the Serbian Royal Academy, and he became its full member in 1934.

His poetry encompasses themes of love, transience, inner turmoil, and historical and national memory.

Academician Jovan Delić, SASA Corresponding Member Gorana Raičević and Professor Predrag Petrović  addressed the audience at the ceremonial session.