Dobri Voynikov

He graduated from the Galatasaray High School in Istanbul in 1858 and became a teacher in Shumen, where he remained until 1864.

In 1864, he was forced to emigrate to the autonomous Romanian Principalities, settling first in Brăila and then moving to Giurgiu in 1873.

As an émigré in Romania Voynikov came to be involved in theatre: he founded a Bulgarian amateur theatrical company in Brăila in 1865 and headed it until 1870.

Voynikov authored several plays, both dramas and comedies: Princess Rayna (1866), Baptism of the Preslav Court (1868), Velislava, Bulgarian Princess (1870), The Enthronement of Krum the Fearsome (1871), the famous The Misunderstood Civilization (1873), The Chorbadzhia (1881), A Physician in Spite of Himself (1884) and the unpublished Dimanka or True First Love.

His plays constitute the main repertoire of Bulgarian National Revival theatre and set some trends that were continued by the next generations of playwrights, such as Vasil Drumev and Ivan Vazov.