Pernicious City: Mythologization of Kaunas in the Lithuanian Literature of the Interwar Period

Abstract

The article analyzes the mythologization of Kaunas, the temporary capital of Lithuania, in the Lithuanian literature of the interwar period. The methodological approach of the research is based on the research methods of urban mythopoetics by Vladimir Toporov and that of topological semiotics by Algirdas Julien Greimas. Due to objective historical and social circumstances, the formation of the Lithuanian urban literature started only at the beginning of the 20th century. The intensive period in the urbanization of the Lithuanian literature was that of the interwar period when literary reflections on Kaunas started gaining certain dominant symbolic images of the city, repeating plots and characters typical of Kaunas. The literary myth of the temporary capital as a pernicious city which becomes a moral trial for an individual is revealed in the article through the analysis of Part III of the novel Altorių šešėly [In the shadows of altars] by Vincas Mykolaitis-Putinas, the most prominent Lithuanian novelist of the interwar period.