Rajmund Kupareo

[2] Rajmund Kupareo was born on 16 November 1914 in Vrboska, the island of Hvar (present-day Republic of Croatia), a descendant of an old noble family.

[3][4] During World War II, Kupareo was the editor-in-chief of Gospina krunica (Our Lady's Rosary), a Catholic monthly magazine in Zagreb.

The arrival of communist troops in the spring of 1945 hindered his project to publish all the sermons and speeches delivered by Stepinac from 1934–44, in which the Archbishop had strongly condemned racism and intolerance, and emphasized the right of the Croatian people to have their own state.

He returned to Croatia to die but recovered to a certain degree and led a secluded and simple life in the Dominican priory in Zagreb.

He authored significant number of compositions of religious and secular character: manuscripts of polyphonic motets and even a few operettas, mainly to his own lyrics, are kept in Dominican priories’ archives in Croatia, Chile and Italy.

Among others, he put to music O Spem Miram (O wonderful hope), the famous prayer to St Dominic, while he was in Las Caldas de Besayu priory (Spain) in 1949.

[citation needed] His stories on World War II and the lives of Dominicans, priests, professors and emigrants in Latin and North America: Balada iz Magallanesa (The Ballad from Magallanes) are published in 1978; followed by stories on the same subject Čežnja za zavičajem (Longing for Home, 1989) and Patka priča (Tales by a Duck, 1994).