– Does creating poetry require a special mood, an unexpected event, deep concentration, or can it just be like an unexpected gust of wind?
– A poem, of course, can be born spontaneously. But what is important to me is the approach to the text and, above all, to the execution of the text. Therefore, the pursuit of that “final” textual version, the embodiment of the form, takes considerable time. It’s work. In addition, one should not forget the writer’s cultural environment, context, cultural aspirations: how you understand art, culture and so on, – finally, the limits of creative possibilities – the vocation. Because man is a living creature, therefore, he is limited – not everything gives up easily. It also depends on his state of consciousness, world view and feeling. For example, I have always been interested in intellectual poetry, especially in my youth.
– Your poetry – with reflections.
– I chose this path. Or maybe “someone” indicated that path a priori, marked it… After all, you can as much as you can… I have always liked unexpected metaphors, observing the world from a distance, capturing those lived moments, precisely moments. The desire to break away from domestic “coercion” as much as possible (or is it possible?) and, frozen in that state, “between” (between physics and metaphysics), “turn” the world of things, feelings into the world of words – poetry. The power of poetry is metaphor.
Thus, poetry is a unique way of knowing the world and experiencing reality, which has its own internal logic and energy of vitality (in the sense of the soul). And my teachers helped me a lot on that journey – because time is relative in creative things – Robert Musil, James Joyce, Thomas Stearns Eliot, Ezra Pound. Even at the beginning of the 20th century, when literature became more beautiful and sentimental, they began to ironize that overly refined sentimentality, literary domesticity, unhealthy excitability and kitsch. They are all supporters of intellectual literature, but at the same time they are confessors of feeling and deep feeling. It was not for nothing that R. Musilis said that feeling and sensory facts should not be mixed, that is, sentimental stimuli. Among other things, those sentimental stimuli are again so abundant in the arts, especially in the theater
Of course, these are the great authors-teachers who, with the help of the text, changed the very paradigm of European thinking, mentality in the civilized sense. Let’s look at E. Pound, for example, and his Cantos: he not only tries to “reorganize” the texture and understanding of poetry as a way of expression, but through texts to “organize” the world itself; he speaks to us, the people, as having cultural and civilizational power, that is, he teaches us what we must do, how to think, how to evaluate… His work is not confined to narrow frames, he tries to overcome linguistic, cultural, national, etc. barriers and connect eras, histories, cultures, traditions, languages into one whole. It is a universalist approach to culture as, I would call it, a “pure” phenomenon through the fabric of the text. Of course, it is impossible to repeat this for another author, but why not learn, after all, we all learn from something. It was a challenge for me, I thought about literary ideological disputes, like-minded intellectual poetry.
– Did you manage to gather like-minded people?
– You know, Lithuania is a small country, a small market, which is shrinking anyway due to demographic “losses”, so there are probably very few like-minded people. In addition, such an activity – casting something – needs to be engaged in, to put in a lot of effort. And you have to earn your living. I am a historian by profession and I work at the National MK Čiurlionis School of Arts as a history and history of philosophy teacher, which requires great responsibility and a lot of work.
And yet, I would like to mention my second book of poetry, which was published in 2007 by the publishing house “Vaga”. This is a collection of poems “The Book of Dreams, or Late Irony”. In it, with intellectual means, which are really very poetic, I tried to look ironically at some established cultural, intellectual, sensory (supposedly sensory), textual templates, the political ideological atmosphere at that time, etc. By choosing certain philosophical, theological, historical, literary material, I wanted to portray my the lived environment-the world as a universal whole. And this was helped by the metaphor of dreams. After all, more or less, a dream is a universal “reality”.
– How much of your life is devoted to history, its teaching, and how much to poetry? Maybe poetry is a stream that flows alongside the main river, history and its teaching, or both of similar size?
– As a human being (existence), you are whole. Therefore, it is difficult to single out one of those sands. Poetry, history, teaching are like means, functional instruments, communicating with people and things, being in this world. It is also an inner aspiration to learn to be a human being, as Sioren Kierkegaard would say, a human spirit throughout his life. All these things help me as a person to see the limits of my personal capabilities, the smallness, and at the same time to strive for the human meaning of being – after all, a person is the image of God. Ungrounded humanism cannot absolutize the “truths” of history or philosophy, nor art, nor the activities and values of various practices. You know, the older I get, the more I think about it.
– And does poetry help such thinking?
– Yes. Because, as I said, it helps to observe the world from a distance, it helps to occasionally get out of the mire of everyday life.
– The world is now very restless, threatening. What place does poetry occupy in it and, in general, is there room for it?
– Apparently, everything is already written. Thinking about life, intending to know and experience the Living God more deeply – I am a believer – I want to empty myself of attachment to His creations… That’s why I wonder if it’s worth writing.
– Probably many people could similarly say that all the pictures have already been painted, all the songs have already been created and sung.
– I adapt all this to myself very individually. And to be completely honest – not everything is so simple… Every time I said that this book is the last one. Finally, reflecting on my modest creation, I decided to make a selection. I wanted to select the written texts very carefully. I worked for three years, and thus the collection of poetry “Saulėblrža” was recently published. I rewrote many texts, changed the layout structure of the texts, added completely new poetry, paid great attention to language – clean language. So, this is almost a new book of my creation.
– What are the main themes in this collection of poetry?
– Themes of nature, man, history, and religion emerged completely unconsciously and spontaneously. Probably nothing unexpected – I have always been interested in those topics of life and am still interested.
– Why is poetry important to you, what does it provide?
– First of all, to know yourself and the world. To observe and get to know as if from the side… Poetry is a part of culture, which has a specific language and addresses the human heart, mind, and imagination. It is a peculiar way of speaking and a peculiar way of seeing the world. This is the space of metaphors
– What is the feeling when your poetry is published and read by other people who do not even know you?
– The feeling of respect for another reader, especially a stranger, that when he turns the page of the book, he forces himself to take a look “with his mind and feelings” at the world I live in.
– I found a poem in the collection “Saulėlžiža” that if you want peace, prepare for war. Is it about the realities of the present?
– No. The cycle of poems was written in 2003. The current version of the cycle has been slightly modified, although the spirit of this cycle – the futility and hypocrisy of war as a phenomenon – has remained the same.
– It seems like now.
– This is a contemporary poetic intuition and, I would say, an unconscious reaction to, first of all, the senseless invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq by the United States.
– And when I read it now, it seems like a response to Russia’s aggression in Ukraine.
– The logic of war is probably universal. I mentioned: painful futility and insidious hypocrisy. Let’s read Thucydides… Or the Epistle of James. Why do wars happen? On a whim. You want it, you don’t have it, you envy it and you can’t get it. Then you kill each other. And most often to satisfy your selfish desires. I would add, after all, wars are usually caused by great powers, in order to redistribute the world, to redistribute spheres of influence. And the little ones? You have to suffer… It’s a pity, but I think most people in Lithuania don’t understand this, and the worst thing is, they live in the “spirit” of war… are they afraid of peace?… I’ll let myself be quoted: “rejoice over war, because peace that comes unexpectedly is bitter”. Such is not our state
– Can knowledge of history harden people?
– I will say this: there is history and there is “history”. A pure archival fact or event is not yet history. History is written by living people who have a certain worldview, perception of events, values. In other words, the paradox of history is its interpretive field. It is being reconstructed, so there are dangers of subjectivity in it and in its writing. Therefore, it often becomes a tool of ideology and propaganda. Also, when it comes to history, there are several factors to consider. Unlike the people of that time and those who wrote one or other texts and directly evaluated those past events, we know the “future that happened” and often judge them as judges for their “wrong actions”. But, knowing the historical consequences, do we delve into the specific circumstances and context of that era? And is it possible to fully understand them? People tend to mythologize past events, that is, real historical events are replaced by a “myth” about them, so the historian must find out when and why the real story of the event was replaced by “such a myth” about the former event. For example, look at the heated debate about the post-March 1990s. the status of the head of state; and how “strongly” the myth prevailed
– Ten of you have been working as a teacher at the National MK Čiurlionis School of Arts for more than 30 years. What is today’s youth like?
– I have been a teacher for 34 years. Young people always seek their own innovations, and it is the duty of the teacher to encourage them to establish a civilized connection with the previous generations, what we call the process of inculturation. In addition, while going through social fractures, “cracks” of consciousness, to help people survive – which is a black job with oneself – people. Not to pursue the interests of a narrow group, but to foster a humanistic ideal. Love for a person as an individual, a person, a specific soul. Of course, I often don’t understand those current youth cultural codes, but that’s natural. It’s funny if I try to fit in flatteringly, that is, become “friends” with 17-year-olds, 18-year-olds. Friendship is the attachment of kindred souls to each other, which is already terribly delicate.
On the other hand, has man as a conscious being, consciousness, fundamentally changed over several thousand years.
I like one of the sayings of Edward Wilson, an American biologist and developer of the science of sociobiology, that the modern problem of humanity is that its emotions have remained the same as those of the people of the Paleolithic era, its institutions are medieval, and only technology is god-like, that is, miraculously advanced. But isn’t it dangerous when the “tools” created by our hands and mind overtake the maturity of consciousness, that is, the inner responsibility and commitment of how to deal with them. And if it takes us and darkens the blindness of our own paika soul (sinful nature). After all, as we can see, it is easy to provoke emotional waves caused by a feeling of mistrust, suspicion, even hatred in society.
– You are turning 60 years old. What wisdom have you managed to accumulate, what things do you consider most important in life?
– For example, that by giving people injections of pleasure and entertainment for utilitarian gain, one can unthinkingly destroy culture. That the spirit, as the beginning and essence of human being, life-immortality, must be distinguished from culture as a phenomenon, especially from cultural phenomena. Therefore, even such an expression as “spiritual culture” is only a working metaphorical anthropology of human life, lacking metaphysical “smell and taste”… And most importantly, there is nothing new under the sun: through love for God, love for one’s neighbor. And spiritual peace.
– Maybe achieving spiritual peace is also wisdom?
– Probably.
The anniversary evening of the poet Albinos Galinis and the presentation of the collection of poetry “Saulėblrža” – 2024. April 25 6 p.m. In the writers’ club / K. Sirvydo str. 6, Vilnius. Poets Albinas Galinis, Marius Burokas, book publisher, poet Juozas Žitkauskas, literary critic Eimantas Garšauskas, artist Ugnė Žilytė, pianist, composer Tomas Kutavičius will participate.
Tags: Albinus Galinis celebrating #60th birthday poetry break everyday life
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