Lazar Komarčić

Lazar Komarčić (Serbian Cyrillic: Лазар Комарчић; 9 January 1839 – 9 January 1909) was a Serbian pioneer science-fiction writer who today has a wide influence on the literary avant-garde and on surrealism. He was a novelist, playwright and best known for his profound influence on what was to become later the literary genres of science fiction and crime novels. He was the most widely read author during the second half of the nineteenth and the turn of the century, according to literary critic Jovan Skerlić. Science fiction and crime novel writing at the beginning of the 20th century was not considered a literary pursuit and as time passed he was forgotten until the 1970s when his works were revived. He was a contemporary of Jules Verne, Camille Flammarion, and H. G. Wells.