Maketa fails - Jura Žagariņa mājas lapas

LETTERS AND CULTURE. Baiba Bičole cultivated
her distinctive voice in the so-called
“Hell’s Kitchen” school of Latvian poetry −
as much in tune with the naturalistic heritage
of the Old Country as with the avantgarde
of the New World. Here she brings us
four new poems, characteristically brimming
with visionary imagery, yet tightly bound to
physical reality. She recounts, in one of her
poems, momentarily losing track of a friend
on a tour of the MoMA, then spotting his
grey-clad figure in Henri Matisse’s painting
Dance, happily laughing, blue eyes flashing,
whirling and floating in the ring of naked
pink women against an azure sky... In
December 2008 poet Knuts Skujenieks received
an award from the Baltic Assembly for
the publication of his eight-volume collected
works Raksti. Skujenieks’ article deals with
his arrest for anti-Soviet activities in 1962
and seven subsequent years in the Siberian
Gulag and concludes, sadly, that his lifelong
fight for the integrity of the written word has
been fought against windmills: Opportunism
and conformity are rife today even without
totalitarianism. London-born playwright,
novelist, poet, translator and scholar,
Juris Rozītis, has lived in Australia and
currently resides in Sweden. In “Dish Rag”,
a short fragment of a larger work in progress,
he tells of a Latvian boy in Tasmania
wanting to purchase a dish towel as a gift
for his mother and failing to come up with
quite the right word for it. In a 2003
essay Inta Ezergaile (1932-2005) spotlights
three important Latvian women poets in exile,
Velta Toma, Astrīde Ivaska and Rita Gāle.
Poet Ingmāra Balode eloquently passes
judgment on poet Eduards Aivars’ latest effort,
Sarah’s Love: Aivars tries to depict the
bare essentials, but so bare, that its genre is
erotica. Juris Šlesers takes a long hard
look at the third volume of Jānis Krēsliņš’, Sr.,
collected works, and finds much to admire,
but takes exception to his apparent overuse
of the epithet “marxofascist” − especially
when applied to Jaunā Gaita (in the ‘70’s...)
Ildze Kronta comments on a memoir,
Barjērskrējiens (Hurdle Run) by Jānis Škapars,
editor of Literatūra un Māksla (Literature and
Art) 1969-1985: Without compromise there
would not have been such a newspaper, but
compromise, undeniably, sacrificed something...
The latest installment of Eva
Eglāja-Kristsone’s study of cultural contacts
between occupied Latvia and the Latvian exile
community focuses on the period 1968-
1971 and, in particular, on Olaf Stumbrs’ and
Valentīns Pelēcis’ trips to Latvia.
MEMOIR. Actor-playwright Uldis Siliņš has
a special talent for provoking smiles in the
grimmest of situations. In a chapter from his
autobiography he relates some experiences
as a teenage war refugee in Germany.
VISUAL ART. Featured are color reproductions
of a monotype by Gerda Roze, an
acrylic by Ināra Matīsa and photography by
Līga Balode-Svikss. Roze and Matīsa are nonrepresentational
abstractionists who have
delighted our readers in previous issues, but
Balode-Svikss, an accomplished young artist
who has exhibited widely in the US and
Latvia, is a newcomer to these pages.
CURRENT EVENTS AND OPINION. The passing
of John Updike, many of whose novels
have been translated into the Latvian language,
is marked by Jānis Krēsliņš, Sr. with
a translation of his poem “Requiem”.
Juris Šlesers points to evidence of a looming
demographic crisis for Latvia and proposes
coming to grips with it by importing, accepting,
integrating, adopting and marrying
foreigners. In Letters from Readers,
one Pelikāns comments on the January 13
near-riot in Riga and draws parallels with the
historic real riot on the same date in 1905.
The Jānis Bieriņš award this year goes
to Baiba Bredovska, a teacher in Hamilton
Latvian School in Canada. Archy the
Cockroach drops his mask of civility, declares
war on humanity, and abandons all diacritical
marks in the Kiberkambaris column.
MARGINALIA. Culture news briefs from all
over the world. JG welcomes two new contributors:
Vita Gaiķe in the Recent Books section
and Māris Brancis in the Visual Arts section.
BOOK REVIEWS. The third collection of poetry
by Kārlis Vērdiņš (Lalita Muižniece); the
seventh volume of the collected works of
Dzintars Sodums, a novel by Jānis Rokpelnis,
In Love With Jerzy Kosinski by Agate Nesaule,
and a history of Latvian theater in the US and
Canada by Viktors Hausmanis (Juris Silenieks);
a biography of the great chorusmasters Gido
and Imants Kokars by Laima Muktupāvela
(Biruta Sūrmane); The Case for Latvia by
Jukka Rislaki (Gundars Ķeniņš-Kings and Aija
Veldre Beldava); the fall 2008 issue of the
Journal of Baltic Studies (Gundars Ķeniņš-
Kings); a play by the Rumanian playwright
Saviana Stănescu (Jānis Krēsliņš, jun.); a novel
by Inga Žolude (Aina Siksna); and October
2008 to March 2009 issues of the literary
monthly Karogs (Juris Zommers). J.Ž.