World War One drew a line under the preceding period of Art Nouveau in the Croatian literature, with its typical distancing from the everyday-life problems and cult of refi ned, subtle form. At the height of the war, the new literary epoch of Expressionism came to take the Art Nouveau’s place. It saw its mission in the awakening of society from selftranquillity and indifference. The motive of World War One in the Croatian literature of the twentieth century found its most brilliant exponent in Miroslav Krleža.