National and world poetry in action

  • 2002-05-29
  • Ausrine Bagdonaite
VILNIUS

For seven days this week, poets of all ages descended on the courtyards and parks of Vilnius and Kaunas armed with translators for the 38th annual poetry festival Poezijos Pavasaris (Poetry Spring), organized by the Lithuanian Writers Union.

Every year, dozens of local and international poets gather at the festival to trade verse. They come from as far afield as Ireland and France to celebrate their craft.

During Soviet times, the festival enjoyed widespread popularity. It was one of few forums where people could hear non-Soviet poetry.

Back then, the festival drew thousands, but these days there are only a few hundred devotees who fill the University of Vilnius' courtyards and the parks of Kaunas.

One of the issues raised and discussed at the festival was the place and popularity of poetry in today's society.

"The festival ceased being as popular as it was during Soviet times," said Eugenijus Alisanka, director of the festival. "But the public that still comes shows that people haven't lost the need for poetry."

This year, 14 foreign poets from 12 European countries participated at the event. Among them was Northern Irish-born Seamus Heaney, 63, who received the Nobel Prize for poetry in 1995.

Heaney, who has lived in Dublin since 1975, was recently published by the Lithuanian Writers Union publishing house. On May 21, he was on hand to assist in the unveiling of his book "The Digging Quill."

"I knew about Lithuania from the poetry and prose of Czeslaw Milosz," said Heaney, referring to the Lithuanian-born Nobel Prize for poetry winner.

Heaney went on to extol the virtues of Vilnius and Lithuania in general.

"There are two Lithuanias," said Heaney. "Vilnius is one Lithuania, and the countryside is another."

He said the Lithuanian countryside reminded him of his own native Northern Ireland during the 1950s, calling it "astonishingly beautiful."

Kazys Bradunas, 85, was awarded the Maironis Prize, the festival's top prize, for his two-volume book of poetry "Sutelktine." He presented his poetry to an audience in the Sarbievijus courtyard at the University of Vilnius on the festival's final day.

Bradunas, who fled to the United States in 1949, honed his craft while working as a gravedigger in a cemetery and a stone-crusher at a quarry.

He returned to Lithuania to live after the country regained its independence.

"I was surprised I got this prize," said Bradunas. "Over the last several years much younger poets have been receiving it."

Although the poetry festival no longer draws the crowds it once did, its organizers plan on putting it on as long as it attracts even a small crowd.

"Poetry is imperishable," said Alisanka. "Without it, language would lose its silvery flamboyance."