page_title: Gabrielius Landsbergis-Žemkalnis
section_title: Theater activist
hierarchical_section_title: Gabrielius Landsbergis-Žemkalnis / Biography / Theater activist
caption_attribution_description: English: Stamps of Lithuania, 2006
context_page_description: Gabrielius Landsbergis-Žemkalnis was a Lithuanian playwright and activists of the early Lithuanian amateur theater.
  Born to an old noble family, Landsbergis attended Šiauliai Gymnasium where his friend Petras Vileišis encouraged him to speak Lithuanian and support the Lithuanian National Revival. After finishing a telegraph school in Riga in 1871, he worked at the telegraph offices in Moscow and Crimea. He returned to Lithuania in 1884 and joined the Lithuanian cultural life. He contributed articles to the illegal Lithuanian periodicals Varpas and Ūkininkas and his house was a gathering place of many Lithuanian intellectuals. Due to these activities, he was forced to leave Lithuania in 1894 but continued to maintain contacts with Lithuanian activists. He was arrested and imprisoned for ten weeks in 1900 and sentenced to two years of exile in Smolensk in 1902. He returned in 1904 and became administrator of Vilniaus žinios, the first legal Lithuanian daily established by Petras Vileišis. At the same time, Landsbergis devoted his energy to the Lithuanian amateur theater. He was a director, actor, playwright, critic of many of the early performances.
context_section_description: In 1894, due to suspicions about his involvement in the Lithuanian book smuggling activities, Landsbergis was forced to leave Lithuania. He lived in Moscow and worked as an inspector of the 1st City Hospital. He continued to maintain contacts with various Lithuanian activists, including with Jonas Basanavičius and Juozas Tumas-Vaižgantas. He visited Lithuania in summer 1900 when Lithuanian activists wanted to host further Lithuanian theater performances after the successful staging of America in the Bathhouse in 1899. Tsarist police launched an investigation into activists connected with Liudas Vaineikis and Landsbergis was arrested on 6 October 1900 and sent to a prison in Liepāja for ten weeks. According to his son's memoirs, he was released because his family managed to bribe Russian policemen, but he lost his job in Moscow. On 27 February 1902, Tsar Nicholas II of Russia signed order sentencing 24 Lithuanians to various terms of exile. Landsbergis was sentenced to two years of exile in Smolensk.
  Landbsbergis returned to Lithuania in March 1904 and settled in Vilnius. The Lithuanian press ban was lifted that spring and Landsbergis worked helping Petras Vileišis organize a Lithuanian printing press, bookstore, and periodical Vilniaus žinios. He was administrator of the daily until 1908. During the Russian Revolution of 1905, together with others, Landsbergis organized the Great Seimas of Vilnius which resolved to seek autonomy for Lithuania in the Russian Empire. He was also active in Lithuanian cultural life in Vilnius. He was one of the founders of the Lithuanian Mutual Relief Society of Vilnius and the Lithuanian Scientific Society. He was also elected chairman of the Union of Lithuanian Teachers (the founding meeting took place in his apartment in October 1905) and later raised funds to pay for Lithuanian language lessons at city schools. 
  However, he was most active in the Lithuanian amateur theater. He performed various roles – director, actor, playwright, critic. He founded and chaired Kanklės of Vilnius Society which was active in 1905–1908 and organized various theater performances, concerts, cultural evenings. The largest production was the first Lithuanian opera Birutė which was adapted by composer Mikas Petrauskas from a drama written by Landsbergis. Landsbergis was also involved with the Daina Society. In 1908–1909, he lived in Kaunas and was active in the Daina Society. He then moved to Šiauliai where he worked as an inspector of an insurance company and staged about 50 plays with Varpas Society. Among the plays staged by Landsbergis were Pilėnų kunigaikštis by Marcelinas Šikšnys (1906), Mindaugas by Juliusz Słowacki (1908), Du keliu by Herman Heijermans (1913). In April 1915, Landsbergis evacuated from Šiauliai and returned to Vilnius where he organized cultural evenings on behalf of the Lithuanian Society for the Relief of War Sufferers. His last play was staged on 26 June 1916. However, Landsbergis was of poor health and he died on 28 August 1916 in Vilnius and was buried in Rasos Cemetery.
caption: 2006 postal stamp for the 100th anniversary of opera Birutė
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