Ivana Knežević
Ivana Knežević (née Lazić), born on 31 July 1965, is a physician, scientist, and poet whose life is shaped by a deep love of nature, philosophy, travel, art, languages, and cultures. A tireless explorer of the human spirit, she writes poetry in Serbian, English, and French, offering readers a healing balm in verse for the burdens carried by the human heart. She recites poems to plants, converses with animals, and finds in a single drop of morning dew the beginning of a poem.
She has written poetry and prose since her youth and, as she likes to say, has been “breathing in verse” for as long as she can remember. Love, faith, and hope lie at the heart of her work, which ranges from reflective and spiritual poetry to patriotic, lyrical, and children’s verse. The Serbian Cyrillic alphabet is her literary homeland – a place where words take root, imagination flourishes, and poetry is free to soar like a bird. In that world, she delights in weaving stories with the wonder of a child, painting the sky with imagination while gently persuading thought to speak in rhyme. For her, imagination is the country in which she has lived the longest and where she continues to create with joy.
Ivana Knežević lives in Switzerland with her husband, Borislav Knežević. Married for more than thirty years, they have a loving family, and they happily play the role of children, parents, grandparents, and make every effort to spend as much time as possible in their homeland, Serbia.
Summary of the published books
Ivana’s collections of poetry in the Serbian language include Pletenice od snova (Braids of Dreams, 2019, Bistrica), Tajna peščanog sata (The Secret of the Hourglass, 2020, Tiski cvet), Plavet u očima (Blueness in the Eyes, 2021, Tiski cvet), Osvit duše (The Dawn of the Soul, 2022, Tiski cvet), Blagoslov ljubavi (Blessing of Love, 2024, Slovensko slovo), and Poljubac leptira: Blagodarnica za unuče (Butterfly’s Kiss: A Poetic Thanksgiving for a Grandchild, 2024, Prometej). The collection Osvit duše was translated into French and published under the title L’aube de l’âme (2023, Tiski cvet). Her poetry has been warmly received by readers and literary critics alike and has been featured in numerous reviews. The Dawn of Soul represents her first collection presented to readers in the English language. Many of her books have been distributed as gifts to poetry enthusiasts, while proceeds from others have been directed toward supporting the treatment of individuals without access to adequate medical care.
Dr. Knežević is a member of several distinguished professional and cultural organizations, including the Serbian Medical Society; the International Alliance for Biological Standardization (IABS); the Royal Society of Medicine (RSM); Matica Srpska; the Academy of Medical Sciences of the Serbian Medical Society; the Association of Writers of Serbia; the Geneva Writers Group; the literary society Slovensko Slovo; the United Nations Society of Writers; the Association of Physician Writers “Vidar”; the Association of Serbian Writers in Switzerland; and the literary circle “Golden Pen” in Switzerland.