Maironis : laiškai, atsiminimai

LTReikšminiai žodžiai: Maironis; Laiškai; Atsiminimai; Maironis; Letters; Memoirs.

ENThe book Maironis. Letters. Memories is a collection of letters written by Jonas Mačiulis-Maironis (1862-1932), a Lithuanian national poet, playwright, historian, educator and an important actor in the Catholic Church. The book also features recollections of the poet’s contemporaries. Maironis is one of the fundamental authors of the national revival that took place at the end of the 19th century; he created the poetic language still in use at the present day and remains the most important canonical poet. However, his literary heritage has still not been systemized, as this process was slow from the very beginning. [...] Maironis. Letters. Memories significantly complements and perfects its materials. The book contains letters written by and to Maironis, as well as the memories his contemporaries had of him. The letters include not only the letters by Maironis which had been discovered more recently, but also letters and postcards addressed to him. The letters are ordered chronologically, but letters addressed to or by the same person are grouped together. The second part of the book contains many new memoirs which had either originally been published abroad orafter 1990, as well as some which had been recently found in the form of manuscripts. Both the letters and the memoirs are, where possible, published from primary sources, therefore they are more reliable than in previous publications: the volume released in Soviet times has traces of the fears common at the time (such as missing stories about life at the seminary, the lack of capital letters in the names of religious holidays such as Christmas and Easter, and other irregularities). This book presents the unedited versions of the letters with all the grammatical, punctuation, syntax, vocabulary and other errors.The texts are written in the appropriate dialects, which is valuable when tracing the approximate periods of writing and as a mark of authenticity which is important to preserve. The memoirs were also edited as little as possible, with only the obvious proofreading errors removed. Considering how intensive the poet’s literary and cultural life was, his epistolary heritage is comparatively scarce. Having lived in many different places, travelled widely and holidayed in various resorts Maironis was constantly writing letters concerning his creative works, cultural and religious life and even personal matters. He also received many greetings himself. It is estimated that the wrote a few hundred letter and probably received even more, however, due to various circumstances - especially the fact that during the war a German hospital was set up in his home and used Maironis’ letters, manuscripts and books as fuel, and the overall fearful atmosphere of the Stalinist regime - the number of surviving letters is modest. [...] A general overview of the letters shows their fragmented and incidental nature. There are only a few instances, where letters create an epistolary dialogue, where we see both a letter and a relevant reply. The rest are separated by longer or shorter periods of time. Only a few names of addressors and addressees in the lists of sent and received letters match. However, even though the remains of Maironis’ correspondence are scarce, due to this individual’s multifaceted activities and unique importance to Lithuanian culture, we can still reconstruct some interesting empirical narratives which enhance our understanding about the writer’s social and creative worries, his various of interests, his values and the images of his working and resting moments. A large part of the book is dedicated to other individuals’ memoirs of Maironis.The story of the gathering of these memories is a difficult one. Though Maironis knew a wide variety of people, as would be expected for a man of his profession, activity, popularity and social character, there are few written reminiscences of him. Sadly, there was little effort put into collecting memoirs about Maironis immediately after his death. The eight years leading up to World War II could and should have been the most intense and fruitful for collecting these memories, as the people who had known Maironis were living Kaunas and Lithuania. Jonas Mačiulis was friendly with entire families: Jančiauskas, Stanelis, Matulaitis, Kaupas, Smetona, Nasvytis, Budrikas, and others. None of them recorded their memories of Maironis. To create a comprehensive portrait of Maironis and his surroundings, the most accurate strategy is to follow the key dates of his life. The poet’s biography can be split into three clearly-cut sections: the first 26 years, which Maironis spent in his parents’ home and in Kaunas (with the exception of one trip to Kiev in 1883-1884), the following 19 years spent at the Saint Petersburg Roman Catholic Theological Academy, and, finally, the last 23 years back in Lithuania, mostly in Kaunas. During the last period, Maironis was rector of the Kaunas seminary [...], therefore this period is the richest in memoirs about him. It is also split into three parts, leaving the "Memories of Contemporaries" of the book section presented in five chapters: "Maironis as remembered by family", "Maironis - a professor in Kaunas and Saint Petersburg", "Maironis - the rector of the Kaunas seminary", "On Maironis' life in Kaunas", “Maironis in the memory of cultural actors". The book ends with an index of names and locations. The index of names includes not only the names and surnames of the individuals mentioned in the book, but also the important dates and short biographical notes. [From the publication]