In his works Ivan Goran Kovačić (1913—1943) used three Croatian idioms, i. e. the standard language and dialect expressions belonging to two phases. Bom at Lukovdol, Gorski kotar, »a whirling spot of all dialects«, Goran absorbed the richness of the language of his native soil. Since he had an ear for language nuances, showed interest in linguistic problems and poetic composition, his kajkavian poems in the collection Ognji i roie have the final »polishing« touches. There have been no detailed analyses of Goran’s language so far. Analyzing the basic features of sound, stress, morphology, word-formation, syntax and vocabulary the author points out the linguistic characteristics of the collection Ognji i rože. Its language has been compared with Goran’s early kajkavian lyrical poetry and attention paid to the differences between the Lukovdol speech and the language of the book analysed. In some of hi‘s essays the legendary author of Jama expressed the opinion which he strived to realize in his dialect poetry of the second phase, i. e. in Ognji i rože. The idea was that poetry should be written in the dialect as true to its origin as possible. In his endeavours to achieve the best possible poetic expression, however, Goran Kovačić does not fully obey his own poetic principles and therefore is not too eager to be fully devoted to his Lukovdol idiom.
