Judita Vaičiūnaitė

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Judita Vaičiūnaitė
BornJuly 12, 1937
Kaunas, Lithuania
DiedFebruary 11, 2001(2001-02-11) (aged 63)
Vilnius, Lithuania
OccupationPoet
Alma materVilnius University
SubjectMythology, Vilnius, the lives of women
SpouseHermanis Marģers Majevskis

Judita Vaičiūnaitė (July 12, 1937 – February 11, 2001) was a Lithuanian writer. Best known for her poetic exploration of urban settings and mythological women, she is one of Lithuania's most famous 20th-century poets.[1][2][3]

Early life and education[edit]

Judita Vaičiūnaitė was born in 1937 in Kaunas, Lithuania.[4][5] Her father was a professor of psychiatry, and her mother was a nurse. She was particularly close with her sister Dalia.[4]

After World War II, she moved to Vilnius with her family.[3] There, she studied at Vilnius University, graduating in 1959.[6] Vaičiūnaitė would live in Vilnius for the rest of her life, making the city a central subject of her work.[1][4]

She was married to the famous Latvian poet and translator Hermanis Margeris Majevskis [lt].[7]

Career[edit]

Vaičiūnaitė's first poetry collection, Pavasario akvarelės ("Spring Watercolors"), was published in 1960.[2] She went on to publish new collections frequently, producing more than 20 books of poetry.[2][6] She also wrote fairy tales and poems for children.[2][4]

Vaičiūnaitė worked as an editor for several literary journals in Lithuania.[6] She also completed translations of other poets into Lithuanian, notably the work of Anna Akhmatova.[8][9] In 1978, she was named the laureate of the Lithuanian Poetry Spring [lt] festival.[4]

In 1996, she was awarded the Baltic Assembly Prize for Literature, the Arts and Science for her collection Žemynos vainikai ("Wreaths of Zemyna").[4] That year, she published the memoir Vaikystės veidrody, a series of essays about her own life.[4][10] She was issued the Order of the Lithuanian Grand Duke Gediminas in 1997, and the Lithuanian Writers' Union Prize in 2000.[6]

Writing[edit]

Vaičiūnaitė's poetry dealt with a wide range of subjects and themes, including Lithuanian and Greek mythology, modern jazz, history, and contemporary city life.[1][3][11] Her urban-centered poetry, frequently set in Vilnius' Old Town, is perhaps her best known.[1][2] It came at a time when most other Lithuanian poets were from the countryside and focused on the natural world in their work.[12][13] She also incorporated the city's multicultural history into her poems.[3][14]

She frequently employed dramatic monologue in her work, often from the point of view of female historical and mythological figures.[1][14] Her poetry was influenced by the neo-romantic work of Salomėja Nėris, the first prominent Lithuanian woman poet.[15] Alongside Marcelijus Martinaitis, Sigitas Geda, and others, she was part of a generation that quietly revolutionized Lithuanian poetry as dissatisfaction grew with Soviet rule, but the neo-romantic strains persisted.[3][4][14][10]

Vaičiūnaitė was a highly independent single mother, but she was also convinced of the importance of romantic love. She wrote with a feminist realism, narrating the lives of single women in the city.[4][3][12]

Death and legacy[edit]

Judita Vaičiūnaitė died in Vilnius in 2001.[4][5][16] A 2010 posthumous collection of selections from her work, Kristalas: Poezijos Rinktinė, was published by the Lithuanian Writers' Union.[6][14] In 2018, a collection of her work in English translation was published as Vagabond Sun: Selected Poems.[3]

A monument to her stands near the Church of St. Catherine in Vilnius.[4]

Selected works[edit]

Poetry[edit]

  • Pavasario akvarelės (1960)
  • Kaip žalias vynas (1962)
  • Per saulėtą gaublį (1964)
  • Vėtrungės (1966)
  • Po šiaurės herbais (1968)
  • Žiemos lietus (1987)
  • Žemynos vainikai (1995)
  • Seno paveikslo šviesa (1998)
  • Debesų arka (2000)
  • Kristalas: Poezijos Rinktinė (posthumous, 2010)

Plays[edit]

  • Pavasario fleita (collection, 1980)

Memoir[edit]

  • Vaikystės veidrody (1996)

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b c d e "Judita Vaiciunaite". All Poetry. Retrieved 2021-03-15.
  2. ^ a b c d e "Judita Vaičiūnaitė". Vilnius Review. 2017-06-19. Retrieved 2021-03-15.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g Tsai, Jennifer Lee (2019-03-02). "On 'Vagabond Sun: Selected Poems' by Judita Vaičiūnaitė, translated by Rimas Uzgiris (Shearsman, 2018)". Ambit. Archived from the original on 2019-10-30. Retrieved 2021-03-15.
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Bernotienė, Gintarė. "Vaičiūnaitė". Šaltiniai (in Lithuanian). Retrieved 2021-03-15.
  5. ^ a b North, Michael (2016). The Baltic : a history. Kenneth Kronenberg. Cambridge. ISBN 978-0-674-42604-7. OCLC 1124433712.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  6. ^ a b c d e "from Crystal by Judita Vaičiūnaitė". Asymptote. Retrieved 2021-03-15.
  7. ^ "Bilingvālā izdevumā izdota Hermaņa Marģera Majevska dzejas izlase "Pretstraumes čuksti"". Latvijas Sabiedriskie Mediji (in Latvian). Retrieved 2024-04-08.
  8. ^ Urban semiotics : the city as a cultural-historical phenomenon. I. A. Pilʹshchikov. Tallinn. 2015. ISBN 978-9985-58-807-9. OCLC 951558037.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) CS1 maint: others (link)
  9. ^ Venclova, Tomas; Hinsey, Ellen (2014). "Meetings with Anna Akhmatova". New England Review. 34 (3/4): 170–182, 383, 390. doi:10.1353/ner.2014.0039. S2CID 176956687.
  10. ^ a b Transitions of Lithuanian postmodernism : Lithuanian literature in the post-Soviet period. Mindaugas Kvietkauskas. New York: Rodopi. 2011. ISBN 978-94-012-0728-7. OCLC 785782275.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
  11. ^ Silbajoris, Rimvydas (1980). "Lithuanian literature". The Columbia Dictionary of Modern European Literature (2nd ed.). New York: Columbia University Press.
  12. ^ a b Uzgiris, Rimas (2016-04-18). ""Unexpected Vistas": Rimas Uzgiris Translates Judita Vaičiūnaitė". AGNI Magazine. Retrieved 2021-03-15.
  13. ^ Silbajoris, Rimvydas (Winter 2002). "Debesu arka". World Literature Today. 76 (1): 170. doi:10.2307/40157122. JSTOR 40157122.
  14. ^ a b c d Uzgiris, Rimas (2017-06-19). "To Gaze Through Clouds of Dust". Vilnius Review. Retrieved 2021-03-15.
  15. ^ Uzgiris, Rimas (2016-03-15). "Translating Two Neo-Romantic Poems by Judita Vaičiūnaitė". World Literature Today. Retrieved 2021-03-15.
  16. ^ Lithuania : in her own words : an anthology of contemporary Lithuanian writing. Laima Sruoginis. Vilnius: Tyto alba. 1997. ISBN 9986-16-054-5. OCLC 40545537.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Judita_Vaičiūnaitė&oldid=1217905618"