National character and mood of lithuanian ballads

Abstract

The Lithuanian “baladeacutes” should be held to be narrative lyrics. Because of a strong lyrical trend in Lithuanian folk poetry, very often they seem to be cases between folksongs and folkballads. An attempt to explain the untragic nature of part of Lithuanian ballad-sujets is done in the article. The cause could be not only the lyrical mood of folk singers or the lack of epic as well as dramatic traditions in Lithuanian singing folklore, but on the great part the answer may be found in the medium those foreign sujets got in. In the oldest strata of Lithuanian ballads the role of mythology is of great importance, the archaic conception of death and love. It is the avoidance of rude cruelty in Lithuanian ballads that causes the absence of certain parts; the structure of sujet becomes obscure, and the inner logic of sujet is ruled out. Dramatical manner of performance is present only sometimes, but not always in Lithuanian ballads. The expression of the individual; traditional occasions to perform ballads; some poetical artificies of Lithuanian ballads; suppositional meaning of some ballads motifs; the classification of Lithuanian ballads as well as their origin is also reviewed shortly in the article.