Latvian Writer Research Articles

Divdabju lietojums latviešu un lietuviešu literāros tekstos

PARTICIPLES AS A STYLISTIC FEATURE IN LATVIAN AND LITHUANIAN LITERARY TEXTS Summary The present article is a contrastive analysis of the usage and frequency of Latvian and Lithuanian participles in modern prose. By comparing the inventory of participles in both languages we notice that the variety of participial formations in Lithuanian is greater than in Latvian. Syntactic models containing participles and the frequency of participles in a present-day text also differ. The syntac­tic synonymy allows the native speaker to choose between two or three alternatives (with or without participles) but the choice depends both on the structure of the Lithuanian/Latvian language and on the individual personality who prefers some special syntactic model. The numerical data for the frequency of occurrence of participial forms (based on novels and short stories of six contemporary Latvian writers and analysed by Aleksandra Eiche in her doctoral thesis) showed the same total num­ber of forms in all prose works but individual differences in the frequency of participles in -ošs, -dams and -ot. In order to compare the frequency of participles in Lithuanian and Latvian mo­dern prose, two Lithuanian novels ( Alkana žemė by V. Bubnys and Sakmė apie Juzą by J. Baltušis) and Kalpa zēna vasara by the Latvian author J. Akurāters were chosen for an analysis in detail. These original texts were compared with their translations into Latvian/Lithuanian. The comparison shows that the total number of participles used in the current text is somewhat greater in Latvian prose (depending on the frequent use of compound tenses) but that the difference lies in the relative frequency of special types: the usage of -is and -ts dominate in Latvian prose whereas Lithuanian authors use the present participles in -ąs more often than the Latvian writers choose the corresponding forms in -ošs.

The Need to Belong: Writers' Voices at the 2008 Gothenburg Book Fair

The Need to Belong: Writers' Voices at the 2008 Gothenburg Book Fair

Narrative Structures, Meanings, and Life Histories in the Historical Novel Kaugurieši

Abstract Narrative structures serve the double function of selecting episodes and charac-ters to be included in the narration, as well as offering a generative mechanism for their sequencing, both functions being simultaneous and mutually interac-tive. According to Eco (1984), narrative structures are multilayered, including an abstract level of ideology. Few studies have been done on specific narrative subgenres, such as the historical novel. This article examines a historical novel by Latvian writer Karlis Zariņš (1938, 1948, 1975, 1985), which depicts a failed peasant uprising at Kauguri, Latvia in 1802. Bakhtine's (1978) theoreti-cal notion of chronotope is invoked, distinguishing the external chronotope— the general historical and geographic situation—from the internal chronotope—the sequence of individual transformations. In Kaugurieši, the ex-ternal chronotope is depicted as a sociopolitical chess game, in which the Rus-sian king and the German knights play active roles, the queen is chance, and the pawns (Latvian peasants) are helpless victims. The plot centers on a tragi-cally failed attempt by the Latvians to change the historical givens by becom-ing an active, collective force. The internal chronotopes reveal the paths of individual lives, some of which follow the abstract model of heroic quest and sacrifice. (Psychohistory)

The use of folk and legendary motifs in Aspazija'sThe Serpent's Bride

In the fall of 1927, Latvia's famous poetess and dramatist, Aspazija (18651943), 1 and the wife of the foremost Latvian writer, Jānis Rainis (1865-1929), wrote a drama entitled The Serpent's Bride (ZaKa ligava). It was performed in the National Theater in Riga on 31 March 1928, but made no great impression. It was published serially in a popular magazine, Atpūta (No. 165-176), in 192728. The first publication in book form was in 1928 in Riga by Gulbis; a second printing followed in 1938. In 1968, the play was included in a small collection of Aspazijai plays (Aspazija, Lugas [Riga: liesma]). In the fall Gf 1979, after a 50-year hiatus, The Serpent's Bride was staged again, this time in Jelgava, and was very well received. A critic in Literatūra un Māksla states that the discovery of this play was like finding a rare gem.2 About the time that the rehearsals in Jelgava must have taken place, I (after obtaining the above mentioned collection in Riga) began a translation of the obscure drama. I did it really for no other reason than the pure pleasure of indulging in yet another exotic creation by Aspazija. As the translation took shape and gained its own life, I felt that I too had found something rare (not merely a gem, but a whole box of jewels): lovely lyrical verse, old wives' tales, proverbs, allusions to legends and mythologies, philosophy, psychology, religion; in short, the wide-ranging manifestations of Aspazija' s Sturm und Drang spirit. The Serpent's Bride may well be one of those rare literary and dramatic works that somehow has been misunderstood, misinterpreted, and miscast and then was lost in the confusion of the shifting and turbulent post-World War II rubble. But who knows? Once resurrected it might have a second life.

The influence of Jānis Rainis on writers in Soviet Latvia

Jānis Rainis (pseud.; Jānis Plieksāns, 1865-1929), the eminent Latvian writer, dramatist and poet as well as critic and translator, philosopher, lawyer, and statesman entered the Latvian literary scene as editor of the liberal newspaper Dienas Lapa , in which he promoted the New Current movement. As a result of the paper's as well as his own political leanings toward Marxism (which he later outgrew), Rainis was arrested and sent to exile in Siberia, from where he returned in 1903 and published his first collection of verse, Tālās noskaņas zilā vakarā (Distant Echoes in a Blue Evening), which was very well received for its artistic value. Rainis thus started his career as a writer.

Soviet attitudes toward pre-Soviet Latvian writers

Soviet attitudes toward pre-Soviet Latvian writers