Lithuania awakening
By: Alfred Erich Senn.
Series: Society and culture in East-Central Europe; Societies and culture in East-Central Europe.
Publisher: University of California Press
Published: 1990
Place of publication: Berkeley
Language: eng
Number of pages: 294
Subjects: Nationalism -- Lithuania -- History -- 20th century; Lithuania -- History -- 1918-1945; Lithuania -- History -- 1945-1991
Description: Mikhail Gorbachev's policy of perestroika released new forces throughout Soviet society. In Lithuania this process resulted in a psychological-cultural revolution. Deep-rooted feelings, long suppressed, exploded, demonstrations and mass meetings ensued, and the face of the society changed. Although at the beginning of 1988 Lithuania appeared to be one of the relatively conservative republics in the Soviet Union, by the end of the year it stood among the leaders in pushing change. By 1990, Lithuania was even forcing Moscow to respond to its initiatives for independence and economic reform. Is Lithuania the prototype of a nation emerging from the collectivity of the Soviet Union? Alfred Erich Senn, who was present during most of this piece of history in the making, believes that it may be. He documents the dramatic events and changes in Lithuania during 1988 with the perspective of a historian and the immediacy of a participant. The reader will easily grasp the whole spectrum of political activity in Lithuania, and the range from right to left among Lithuanian activists. And, because the Lithuanians have emerged among the leaders of change in the Soviet Union, Senn's account provides a key to later developments, in terms of both political movements and political personalities.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. [261]-282) and index.
A digital reproduction is available from E-Editions, a collaboration of the University of California Press and the California Digital Library's eScholarship program.