Algimantas Bučys


Algimantas Anicetas Bučys is a poet, prose writer, translator, literary theorist, historian and critic of Lithuanian literature, doctor of Humanities.

Early life

Bučys was born in Kaunas. His grandfather Petras Bučys was a native of the small boyars in Samogitia, but was not engaged in farming, becoming a builder of water and windmills. His father, Anicetas Bučys, already in school began to write poetry, publishing in the press in pre-war Lithuania, but at the end of World War II he found himself in exile in Britain. In London he published in Lithuanian plays and a book of poetry, actively participated in the activities of the Lithuanian emigration in London and Bradford; for services to cultural activities elected to the British Union of Lithuanian honorary member, returned to Lithuania before his death. His mother, Sofija Serbentaitė was maternally from a branch of an ancient family estate Raunets.
In 1957, after graduating from high school, Bučys enrolled at the University of Vilnius, where he studied Lithuanian language and literature. After graduation he was appointed teacher of Lithuanian language in the eight-year school of Bartkuškis, also taught drawing and mathematics from 1962. At the same time he wrote and published in the national press poems and critical articles on literature, in 1962 published his first book of poems.

Scientific specialization

In 1964, Bučys received an invitation from the Institute of Lithuanian language and literature to finish postgraduate studies at the Institute of World literature in Moscow. In 1968 he defended his thesis "The Problem of the novel in contemporary Lithuanian literature" for the degree of candidate of philological Sciences.
At that time the Institute had been particularly intense research in the Department of theory of literature. There was created a new academic three-volume "Theory of Literature. The main problems in historical interpretation". In this works literary genres and the laws of development of separate national literatures of Europe were considered in their original versions historical development. Already published the first volume and second and was being prepared for publication the third volume. The authors of the new "Theory of literature" - young and enthusiastic scientists S. Bocharov, V. Kozhinov, P. Palievsky, G. Gachev - at the time yet had no global fame, but the weekly discussions of new texts in the Department of theory with the participation of two or three graduate students became truly Socratic feasts of intellectual thought.
Theoretical concepts in historical perspective were associated with the revival of the ideas of Mikhail Bakhtin. That's when his manuscripts were delivered to Moscow by Kozhinov and Bocharov, when they visited in Saransk not yet rehabilitated the scientist in his exile for participation "in a conspiracy against the Soviet government". So were brought, in old suitcases, to Moscow works of Bakhtin, among them the two famous books on Rabelais and Dostoevsky. M. Bakhtin made «a true revolution" in the poetics of prose, legalized independent existence of polyphonic voices in the novel. In the book "The Novel and Modernity” Bučys tried to apply the ideas of Bakhtin as far as possible on the material of the Lithuanian novels of the Soviet period.

Literary activity

In addition to works of literary criticism he has published two novels and four books of poetry. May be it was some relief from his mental cramps, because in the years of occupation «Bucys was best known as a well-informed and intelligent literary critic doing his best to operate within the confines of Soviet ideology. At times, he turns to the more open-ended and multilevel medium of poetry. These are his "anti-moments”, as he says in the title of the present book. In his poetry „complex transmutations of object into spirit and spirit into object, the basic poetic principle remains the same: to fill reality physically with metaphors of thought and feeling for the purpose of giving real body and substance to the visions born in one's mind.
His poems have been translated into Polish, Russian, Serbian languages. In turn, he had translated into Lithuanian language poetry of Polish poets K. I. Gałczyński, Julian Przyboś, Tadeusz Śliwiak, B. Drozdowski, stories by Serbian writer Grozdana Olujič, plays of Croatian writer Miroslav Krleža, Polish poet, writer, author of theatre and television screenplays Agnieszka Osiecka.
Creative work at home from time to time was interrupted by work in various literary magazines of the Union of Lithuania writers.

International literary contacts

Interest in the problems of national literatures amplified many literary acquaintances and connections, particularly with writers of the Caucasus and the Baltic States, as well as participation in literary conferences abroad. Trips and performances in Poland, Yugoslavia, Romania, East Germany, in the USA, Italy, West Germany was reflected in numerous literary articles. In 1962 – 2014 published not only in Lithuanian, but in Russian, English, German, Spanish Polish, Estonian, Latvian, Armenian, Bulgarian, Georgian French Japanese languages.
Most of the articles contain a presentation of Lithuanian literature to foreign readers. One of the first Bučys began to write about the Lithuanian literature created in exile and banned in the Soviet Union; he prepared two volumes of the works of playwright, novelist Аntanas Škėma, wrote the Foreword to his novel "Isaak", first published in English. After the restoration of independence of Lithuania, Bučys wrote the first essay on the history of Lithuanian literature, where emigration literature is presented as an organic part of a single national literature.

Comparative literature

After twenty years of silence, Bučys issued three literary studies that emerged new methodological and cultural concepts.
Many years of close acquaintance with the writers of different nations and the works of various national literatures inevitably led to the need to find and develop new methods of studying the peculiarities of each national literature. Traditional comparative methodology, unfortunately, most often identified "similarity and resemblance" literary phenomena in different national literatures. It did not help to identify the individual identity of national literature, did not disclose its historical uniqueness. Structural comparison of very different historical experience of national literatures leads to the conclusion that the traditional "literary connections" represents only the outer side of the "invisible" internal typological interactions. A study similar ideological influence on national literature in the countries of the Soviet Union, the countries of post-war socialist camp in Europe has demonstrated the crisis of traditional comparative analysis by analogy. In these cases nothing is revealed except the statement that the monotony, the detection of the same trendy genre and stylistic standards in all of the compared national literatures. In the discussion Arthur Miller openly stated that the official ideology smoothes the creative individuality of Soviet writers, "it becomes difficult to distinguish you. It is impossible to determine your personality".

Cultural paradigms

A new concept Bučys gradually developed in the articles on various national literatures, trying to prove that the traditional search of analogies in world literature often leaves out a proper evaluation of the most outstanding and original works of one or another national literature. That is, in his opinion, an unfortunate fate that is not deserved, for example, Lithuanian poet of the late 18th century Kristijonas Donelaitis or Croatian writer of the twentieth century Miroslav Krleža. At the same time Bučys began to form the concept of comparative literature in contrast, not only by analogy. The theoretical basis and possibilities of comparative literature to contrast he presented in different aspects in a special theoretical papers, the article "National identity and the global context", translated into several languages.
In 2009, there is a book "The ancient Lithuanian literature in the time of king Mindaugas", in which analysis of cultural conflicts in the collision of Lithuania in the 13th century is based on the prior experience of the analysis of the constant interactions of the "center" and "periphery". The Paganism and Christianity in the book are perceived and studied as completely independent historical and cultural paradigms, as two civilizations, two systems of thinking and values, each of which is self-sufficient and fulfilled human being. The subtitle of the book "Polyparadigmatic research of the cultural conflicts in the Middle Ages" specifies the subject and method of research. According to the author, any attempt to analyze these conflicts within the framework of one individual culture or a certain religious paradigm would be fruitless. In each case the research will result in a dead end. If we choose a Catholic paradigm this will only allow us to deny or belittle the importance of a different paradigm, for example, Orthodoxy or Paganism, embodying polytheism. Thus the traditional method of comparatives is given a new direction of polyparadigmatic research, whereby cultural occurrences are compared not only by analogy, but also by contrast, without giving preference to any of the phenomena being compared. In the history of culture of Lithuania, unfortunately, is still dominated by traditional monoparadigmatic method of research with catholic hierarchization, continuing the line of the Polish historiography of the 19th - 20th centuries.
In 2012, Bučys published "History and Anthology of Ancient Lithuanian Literature" with 13 texts in old Slavonic and Church Slavonic languages, most of them were sacred and were never presented in the context of Lithuanian culture. Among them – medieval “Vita of Vaishvilkas”, the son of king Mindaugas, who founded in the middle of the 13th century one of the oldest monasteries of the Greek rite on the bank of the Nemunas river, and other sacred texts, devoted to forgotten or completely unknown in modern Lithuania the Orthodox saints St. Charitina of Lithuania and St. Timothy Daumant.

Scholarly reception

According to Lithuanian literary critic and philosopher of culture V. Daujotytė, ""here comes a very important idea in the book of A. Bučys: conflicts have arisen and arise from the fact that the world from the middle ages, and earlier, could not and cannot agree, cannot find a common language due to various approaches and a fierce desire for a single truth. The position of the author, tested and discussed, it seems reasonable: " "the true sacral base by its nature is not compatible with any mono-paradigm“; sacred nature lies deeper than reaches the dogma of “monopartism” in religion and in the humanities. But the strong position of the "powers that be" suppress other positions, other paradigms“. According to the author, „the chronicle of the medieval ages is not one text shows a belief that all that is outside of the Christian faith, this is the world of heretics“. In the book positively says about the work of Vladimir Pashuto "Formation of the Lithuanian State" ; for this study, research-informed, lets see how much untruth has been written about the beginning of the statehood of Lithuania. The author reminds about the work of Edward W.Said's "Orientalism" ; according to A. Bučys, „we can expect a study, which, in the tradition of W.Said's, consistently and deeply will reveal a long history of creating a negative image of Paganism in the Baltic countries and ancient Lithuania". „Wherever the right is considered a single paradigm, there to its limits is narrowed world“.
The principal of Bučys: the human world is polyparadigmatic; it is what it is today, so it was in the Middle Ages. Comparative studies, as a humanistic strategy, are obliged to study the similarities and differences that stem from the same foundation“.

Honors and awards

1972 - Award of the Union of Soviet Writers for the best article of the year about the native literature in the foreign press. The prize was awarded in Moscow at the Congress of the International Association of Literary Critics.
1975 - State Prize of the Lithuanian SSR for the scientific work "The Novel and Modernity”.
1982 - Petras Libertas Literary Award for the novel „An enemy to your enemies“.
1990 - Awarded the honorary title "Honored artist of the Lithuanian SSR“
2000 - Award of The Open Society Fund – Lithuania and The Lithuanian Writers Union for the best article of the year in the cultural press.
2010 - The Lithuanian Government culture and art prize for books "Barbarians vice versa Classics", “The ancient Lithuanian literature in the era of king Mindaugas" and other recent works.