War Trauma and the Experience of the Second Generation: A Roundtable Discussion

Session Submission Type: Roundtable

Abstract

Since the Baltic countries have regained independence, there has been an “explosion” of literature addressing the Baltic experience of WWII and its aftermath- oral histories, memoirs, and historical fiction. Psychoanalysis as a field, starting with Freud, has struggled to account for war and trauma. During this roundtable, psychoanalyst Ginta Remeikis will first briefly discuss this history as well as the components of a conversation in a psychoanalytic mode. She will then facilitate a conversation with and amongst writers, Daiva Markelis, Gint Aras, Birute Putrius, Inara Verzemnieks, and Julija Šukys, all of whom are the children and grandchildren of displaced persons. Topics likely to be explored include the role of literature in processing trauma; the decision to write, including choice of genre, considerations of privacy vs. exposure, exploring Baltic experience in a non-Baltic language; the experience of first writing and then publishing; common themes such as the elucidation of family history, the intertwining of personal and political histories, psychological sequelae; and particular problems encountered by the second generation.

Short Bio

Gint Aras’ (Karolis Gintaras Žukauskas) prose and translations have appeared in the St. Petersburg Review, Quarterly West, Hypertext, The Good Men Project, Curbside Splendor and other publications. His novel, The Fugue, was a finalist for the 2016 Chicago Writers Association Book of the Year award.

Birute Putrius’ fiction and poetry have appeared in numerous publications and anthologies. Two stories were optioned for short films by Columbia College in Chicago. Her novel Lost Birds was published in 2015. Her latest novel, The Last Book Smuggler, will be published in the fall of 2017.

Julija Šukys (PhD, U Toronto) is an Assistant Professor of English at the University of Missouri, Columbia, where she teaches the writing of creative nonfiction. She is the author of three books, including Siberian Exile: Blood, War, and a Granddaughter’s Reckoning and Epistolophilia: Writing the Life of Ona Šimaite. Epistolophilia won the 2013 Canadian Jewish Book Award for Holocaust Literature. ​

Inara Verzemnieks’ memoir Among the Living and the Dead was an Editor’s Choice in the New York Times Book Review.She has been nominated for the Pulitzer Prize for her journalistic work. Currently she is a professor of creative writing at the University of Iowa.

Sub Unit

• Literature and Language Studies

Chair

• Ginta Remeikis, Private practice of psychiatry and psychoanalysis; ClearView Communities

Participants

• Julija Sukys, University of Missouri

• Inara Verzemnieks, University of Iowa

• Gint Aras, Morton College

• Birute Putrius, Independent scholar

Session Organizer

• Daiva Markelis, Eastern Illinois University