Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson (December 8, 1832, Kvikne - April 26, 1910, Paris) - Norwegian author, poet, dramatist and editor, 1903 Nobel Laureate in literature, fighter for the rights of oppressed nations. Representative of the Scandinavian realism in its culminating period, he wrote short stories from the rural background, later on novels and burgeois problem dramas. "Flags above the City and Harbour" (1884), "Poems and Songs" (1870), "Beyond Our Power" (1883), "A Gauntlet" (1884), "Mary Queen of Scots" (1906) are some of his significant works. Several of his works have also been published in Slovak ("Peasant Tales", 1971). As editor, he fought for the rights of oppressed nations, for equality of the Slavic nations in Austro-Hungary. He came out in defence especially of the Slovaks and both in his letters and as editor he stood up for them. Defending them he unleashed a fierce polemics against Count A. Apponyi, the originator of the anti-Slovak language act (Apponyi Act), who was Hungarian minister at the international peace congress in Munich, 1907. B.Bjørnson raised the world public opinion informing about the bloodshed in Černová near Ružomberok. With his articles on the electoral system and freedom of meetings in Hungary he drew attention to the existing Slovak cause.