Testing the Prosopographical Method in Literary Studies: Lithuanian Writers' Association in The United States of America

Abstract

The article presents the research carried out within the framework of the project funded by the Lithuanian Research Council. The aim of this research was to analyse the composition of the Lithuanian Writers’ Association in 1950–1990, the most important areas of its activities, and the beginnings and specificities of writer professionalisation in the United States of America. The object of the research was the Lithuanian Writers’ Association and the beginning of its activities in the United States from 1950 to the restoration of independent Lithuania in 1990. The article focused on the people (writers and not only) who formed the Lithuanian Writers’ Association during the period in question and who, in difficult historical times, while being far from their homeland, took the initiative in Lithuanian cultural and literary life. So far the research has focused on the work, life and historical contexts of individual writers and members of the Lithuanian Writers’ Association. Therefore, taking the prosopographical method, which has already been tested by historians, as a starting point, an attempt has been made to apply it to a literary study: the Lithuanian Writers’ Association in the United States is seen as a single group and a single network of writers connected by certain ties.