Faik Bey Konica (later named Faïk Dominik Konitza, 15 March 1875 – 15 December 1942) was an important figure in Albanian language and culture in the early decades of the twentieth century.

[2] Konica was born on 15 March 1875 as a son of Shahin and Lalia Zenelbej in the town of Koniçe (modern Konitsa),[3] Janina Vilayet, Ottoman Empire, now in northern Greece, not far from the present Albanian border.

After elementary schooling in Turkish in his native town, he studied at the Xavierian Jesuit College in Shkodër which offered him some instruction in Albania and also an initial contact with central European culture and Western ideas.

As a result of his highly varied educational background, he was able to speak and write Albanian, Greek, Italian, French, German, English and Turkish fluently.

He contributed bitingly sarcastic articles on what he saw as the cultural backwardness and naivety of his compatriots, stressed the need for economic development and national unity among Muslim and Christian Albanians and opposed armed struggle.

In the words of the famous French poet Guillaume Apollinaire, "Konica turned a rough idiom of sailors inns into a beautiful, rich and supple language".

Konica also published the works of Albanian writers of the time like Aleksandër Stavre Drenova, Andon Zako Çajupi, Filip Shiroka, Gjergj Fishta, Kostandin Kristoforidhi, Thimi Mitko and so on.

[11][12] Writing in his periodical Albania during 1906 Konica viewed independence as being some "twenty years" away and stressed that focus be devoted toward placing the Albanian nation "on the road to civilization" that would lead to "liberation".

[13] A committee founded by Dervish Hima in Paris that sought to make Albert Ghica the prince of Albania established close ties with Konica, who at the time was pro-Austrian.

The lunches were so long that I could not visit a single museum in London, as we would always arrive when the doors closed, and the attention and care with which Konica edited his articles meant that the journal always came out very late.

On 17 November 1912, Vatra held a mass gathering in Boston and Konica was the main speaker rallying the Albanian diaspora in the US to oppose any partition of Albania, due to the Balkan Wars.