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However, it is worth reading for all Kaunas residents, especially the young and stereotypically convinced of Kaunas’ Lithuanian identity. “The interwar Kawar was multicultural, almost a third of the townspeople were Jews, and those who considered themselves Lithuanians spoke Polish,” recalls I. Pukelyt who, who is dedicated to historical events and scrupulously investigated the cultural context. , is one of the strengths of this novel.
– After reading the book, I cannot refrain from the first question: how much historical truth does it contain and how much ingenuity? Kipras Petrauskas, Borisas Dauguvietis, and many other interwar artists became the characters in his book, not to mention one of the most important characters in the novel: Rachel Berger.
– I started thinking about the novel when I finished the monograph “Jewish Theater in the interwar Lithuania”. While researching the phenomenon of Jewish theater, its importance to Kaunas’ theater life at the time, I came across many inspiring stories and facts that I knew nothing about. On the one hand, they wanted to use them, on the other hand, many things were left unwritten in the monograph. While writing the monograph, I felt like a detective when it was necessary to gather the personalities working in the Jewish theater from fragments and details.
Intellectuals in the temporary capital attempted to unite the nations living in Kaunas. Kipras Petrauskas maintained close contacts with the Jewish theater and rescued the daughter of the violinist Daniel Pomeranco during the Nazi occupation.
When I was a child, I had joy and a gift: many uncles and aunts. We communicate with each other in Lithuanian and Polish.
When we read about Boris Dauguvietis in interwar literature, we see him as a symbol: a flamboyant personality who walked down the Laisv alley with an earring on his ear, a director of the State Theater who baked pancake performances. I managed to find the Dauguvietis’ own texts on the Jewish theater, which I was very interested and supported. When it turns out that this personality is very important to the Jewish theater, you start to hypothesize: why did Dauguvietis, after joining the German army, escape to his homeland near Biržai? Perhaps because he worked with Jews?
These are things we know little about. The scenes associated with famous people from the interwar period in the novel are invented, but they are completely possible in that historical and cultural context.
Rachel Berger made a big impression on me. It seemed wrong that very little knowledge of this brilliant personality remained. I learned more about her from memories of John Turkov found in New York. Rachel is a wandering Jewish actress who loves to stay in Kaunas, a city that is becoming increasingly nocturnal during the interwar period. He wanted to reveal the cosmopolitanism of that woman and, through him, also the cosmopolitanism of Kaunas. Rachel Berger became the director of the Kaunas Jewish Theater, married here and gave birth to a daughter. Her story was interrupted by the Dachau concentration camp. In the novel, Rachel also has a daughter, although when I wrote I did not know this fact. So Rachel, like the other art people mentioned in the novel, really existed, but here she is more fantasy than real, and the situations described are fictional.
– The second important plot is Polish, it is Zofija, who speaks excellent Lithuanian and works in a bookstore. Does she also have a prototype?
– The character of Rachel came from my love for the theater, and next to her I wanted a resident closer to us, closer to us, residents of Kaunas. This is how the character of Zofija was born, a Pole living in Lithuania, which was not difficult to create: all he had to do was take it from memory. When I was a child, I had joy and a gift: many uncles and aunts. We communicate with each other in Lithuanian and Polish. My grandmother didn’t speak Lithuanian, she just understood what the others were talking about. Her older sister did not understand Lithuanian, and the younger sister spoke and wrote Lithuanian. Everyone in the grandfather’s family spoke Lithuanian, but they also spoke Polish. There was a lot of Polish in my childhood.
For me, representative of the Soviet generation, I always had questions about how here with Kaunas Lithuania, if so many people lived in the city that spoke Polish, even though they considered them Lithuanian.
For me, representative of the Soviet generation, I always had questions about how here with Kaunas Lithuania, if so many people lived in the city that spoke Polish, even though they considered them Lithuanian. In my novel, Zofija is the youngest in the family, she is emancipated, she also speaks Lithuanian and is an intelligent language. He wanted to develop that line and imagine what people identified with themselves, what they considered themselves.
– In the preamble to the novel, you chose Vincas Mykolaitis-Putin’s quote from the “Literary Etudes” of 1937: “From within, our nation remains self-righteous, resistant to foreign influences. Even today, Lithuania is the most vulnerable of all European nations to nationalization. ”Isn’t that too strict, considering the characters in the novel you lovingly create?
– First of all, it should be said that the novel should have been called “Soft Stones”, as in the Vydūnas quote quoted by Putin. However, we agreed with the editors of the publisher “Tyto Alba” that this name is too difficult, it should be simpler, warmer. The title changed, but the preamble remained.
Putin’s text disappointed me as a citizen: he was angry that he allowed himself to call his fellow citizens with a soft nose. It sounded almost nationalistic to me and … very masculine. A woman would never say that. I wanted to look critically from today’s perspective and ask if the writers we have adored for almost a century are really fair. After all, those soft bones were strong women and part of the Lithuanian state.
– Although you get away from the real facts, aren’t they really in the novel? And what about the case of Rachel attacked by obsessive fans?
– This authentic text is a quote from a Sunday newspaper of the time. It’s a fact of life: The press really loved Rachel Berger, described how she was persecuted by fans, and even threatened her. Both in reality and in the novel, this sparked public interest in the Jewish theater: it could not accommodate everyone who wanted to see the sacrifice.
– Were you guided by the plot, or did you stick to it when making the plan?
– I wrote a plan before writing. The clearest thing for me was the beginning of the novel. I really wanted to write about Šančiai in winter, his feelings. Initially, I wanted to develop the plot according to the seasons. Winter and spring are for an optimistic and euphoric state, when everything seems to be at the forefront, life is beautiful, problems are naive, homey. 1932, the threat of war is still a long way off. Seven years pass. Summer and autumn unfold in a completely different context: war.
Kaunas is my hometown, I grew up in Žaliakalnis, when I returned from abroad I settled there, I live a full life here.
The plot was not modified, but the individual scenes were modified. For example, a scene in Kulautuva, a very Jewish tourist center of the time. It was at this time that my book “The Jews in the Pakaunė” by Inga Stepukonienė was published, which revealed many facts about the lives of Litvak soldiers. They wanted to show how rich the life of the riverside resort was at the time: a busy marina, concerts, a restaurant, even a cinema – it was all in Kulautuva.
– You freed me from the question of why the first half of the novel seems a bit naive, too sentimental. This was necessary in contrast to the heartbreaking second part of the novel.
– Yes actually. At the beginning of the novel, I wanted to photograph the world that was about to disappear, capture images and details, so that they could be sniffed and touched. As a result, maybe there is a bit of sentimentality, elevation. The first part of the book was good to write, the second difficult. It is not easy to immerse the characters in difficulties, ruin their lives …
– The book came out just after quarantine. Lolita Varanavičienė, director of the publisher Tyto Alba, called the book presentation in Vilnius, at the Martynas Mažvydas National Library, an almost historic moment: it was the first live meeting with readers. What impressions did you hear?
– First of all, I would like to thank the editor: the cooperation during the quarantine was very fluid, the novel was practically ready to print. Good reviews that this is a deep and sensitive human book. The older generation, like my mother, is grateful for the memories, and the younger generation for the opportunity to get to know that period better. The novel wanted to take events off the pedestal, to show that they simply had to be lived humanely, to endure. My daughter Adele, who was the first reader of the book, admired the characters in the book and felt great sorrow for them.
– Soon, on July 2, he will introduce the book to Kaunas residents as well, but now we are going to get away from the novel for a short time. If you’ve already talked about your daughter, introduce her.
– In addition to being a great reader, Adele is also a great painter. She has just defended her master’s thesis, we have a man at home who cares about talking about modernity in a visual way. Also, she is still studying art criticism and healing. I don’t know what he will do next, but so far he does what he likes best. I am fascinated by trying to do this without lying to myself.
– What will the summer be like?
– Like most, calm, sedentary, we will spend most of the time in Lithuania. My husband was unable to reach his home in France in any way during quarantine, so the only foreign trajectory this summer will be in August, when we drive to see that house.
– You can show your diplomas at the Sorbonne in Paris, the University of Leipzig, and have lived in France and Germany for a long time. Are there still many countries in you?
– Less and less (laughs). After seven years of living abroad, it has become quite clear to me that living alone is necessary here, in my homeland, in my midst. My husband and I have been living in Lithuania for eleven years. Kaunas is my hometown, I grew up in Žaliakalnis, when I returned from abroad I settled there, I live a full life here. Here is my family, my friends, I can leave here at any time to see the world, but the most fun is that I can come back here. Since Mark’s house is in France, near Paris, we travel there constantly. That atmosphere is also attractive, I’m glad to have a French family too. But life there is not the same as life in Kaunas.
Our identity is not only Lithuanian, we must forget that myth of the pure race. Ladies from Laisvės Alley is an attempt to understand one’s identity.
– But your lavender in Žaliakalnis, whose photo you shared on Instagram …
– Oh, in the photo only a quarter of that beauty that is under the windows of our house. Lavender loves the sun and the sand. We live in Žaliakalnis, the patio on the sunny south side is an ideal place for lavender.
– You may not even mention all your previous activities (which we would not find, both political and administrative work), but I will highlight the writing: scientific and fictional. Which is closer?
– Scientific work is my daily routine: delving into sources, researching, comparing results, drawing conclusions, writing articles: this rhythm is natural for me. Meanwhile, writing fiction is an exceptional moment, because you allow yourself to be more creative, wander where science does not allow, swell up, like in women’s plays about brandy and conversations with him. I enjoy writing fiction, it is a celebration for me. Even during that long break between The French Novel and The Ladies of Freedom Alley, I quenched my hunger for this writing. I wrote plays and founded the Theater Club, where we performed comedies for women. Together with Bella Shirin, known to Kaunas residents, we have created a performance related to Jewish history in Kaunas “Shalom, Bellissima!”.
– Wishing you a meaningful meeting with readers at the book launch next week, I will ask you who is talking all the time: Aren’t you afraid of taking Kaunas the myth of Lithuania from our city?
– Our identity is not only Lithuanian, we have to forget that myth of the pure race. Ladies from Laisvės Alley is an attempt to understand one’s identity. Of course, there will be those who will say that this is not true, it was not … Both the residents of Polish-speaking Kaunas and Yiddish were, this is a very important past for our current culture. For many years we have been creating a story, as if Kaunas were a very Lithuanian city, that story was very suitable for our post-Soviet historical memory. But the pains, the spiritual traumas remained … Until we solve the problems of our history, we will not live with them, we will have difficulties moving forward.
A book for Kaunas residents.
… Golden times of Kaunas. Theater, love, jazz. Rachel’s impressive career plans and Zofia’s vision of family happiness. However, none of them have any idea how short their happiness will be, how soon everything will be replaced by the shadow of war that has fallen on temporary capital and what fateful life decisions they will have to make.
“The myth that Kaunas is a very Lithuanian city. For more than half a century, we have been trying to remove certain layers from our history. I wrote this novel because I wanted us to better understand our identity “, intrigues the author of the book” Ladies from Freedom Alley “Ina Pukelytė and invites her to the presentation of her book on Thursday, July 2 at 6 pm KEKS 2022 office (Laisvės al 36).
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