Knygos kultūra ir vienuolynai XVIII a. pabaigos - XIX a. pirmosios pusės Lietuvoje

LTLDK vienuolynų bibliotekos XIX a. pirmajame ketvirtyje sukaupė apie pusę milijono tomų knygų. Šis įspūdingas skaičius, rodantis neįtikėtiną vienuolynų veržlumą kontrreformacijos sąlygomis ir palankias aplinkybes įvairiapusei jų veiklai Abiejų Tautų Respublikoje (toliau - Respublikoje), kelia daugybę klausimų. Kokią dalį vienuolynų knygų rinkiniuose sudarė vietos spaustuvių produkcija ir įsivežtiniai spaudiniai? Iš kokių šaltinių šios bibliotekos buvo sudarytos, ar priklausė, o jei taip, tai kaip, krašto socialinės komunikacijos sistemai? Ar knygos skaitytos? Jei taip, tai kokios, kaip ir kodėl? Pagaliau vienuolynų knygų rinkiniai tyrinėtini kaip LDK dvasininkijos ir kitų luomų mentaliteto atspindys, tautos atmintis, vienos ar kitos epochos kultūros tekstas. [Iš straipsnio, p. 130]

ENThe culture of book of the culturological history has evolved from the school of "Annals", and today in a lot of countries, particularly in France and the USA, it occupies a proper place in the system of the humanities and social sciences. It helps to conduct complex comparative researches into anthropology, mentalities, ideas, the history of literature and sociology. The objective of Lithuanian book research - to employ new into the history of book and culture, to mastering Lithuanian studies, multilingual literature of all kinds and genres, which is spread in a wider historical region than ethnographic Lithuania. In this context, the research into the culture of book in separate social strata and structures, for example, in monasteries, become important from the viewpoint of social communication. The development of book and its culture in Lithuanian monasteries during Enlightenment and Romanticism epochs were conditioned not only by the social state of monasteries and the state policy but also by the negative opinion formed among the society. It was expressed in the press by the fellow citizens Joachim Lelewel, Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz, Ignacy Krasicki, who wanted to restrict the influence of monks on public life and scientific-educational activities. The criticism levelled at the monastery libraries had also a narrow pragmatic aim - to expropriate collections of books and to hand them over to science and educational institutions or to include them into private collections. The romanticists Eustachy Tyszkiewicz, Ignacy Kraczewski, despite their awareness of the rich heritage of monastery culture and their historical mission, were able only to slow down the destruction of monasteries and partly save the libraries from their total removal to the heart of Russia. Social communication in the sphere of propaganda was essentially carried out not in favour of monasteries.In this process, the monks held a passive position, hoping to adjust themselves to new public and political circumstances an to survive. The powerful potential - printing houses, libraries, multilingual monastic intellectuals created in the period of Counter-reformation - enabled monasteries in their inter- competative fight in the last quarter of the 18th century to hold a dominant elite position in the system of social means of communication. 80% of publication of books belonged to monastic communities, and an extensive system of schools and libraries was created. In the social and cultural educational activities of monks, a great role was played by Lithuanian monastic province, which performed not only administrative but also protective functions. Lithuanian provinces maintained direct contacts with West European centres and book-printing centres, which helped them to complete collections of books for libraries: in the Bernardine monastic community nearly 30% and respectively in that of the Dominicans - up to 80% of the printed matter in the collections of books was made up of the production of European Catholic printing houses. The most active in the sphere of Catholic enlightenment were Basilian, Bernardine, Domini- cian. Missionary and Piarist monastic communities. In the last years of independence of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the latter's Museum of Physics attached to Collegium Wilnensis organized the transportation of books from Vienna, Venice, Konigsberg and Riga to Lithuania. The crisis of monasteries and their culture was provoked not only by common European processes of secularization but rather by the liquidation policy of Tsarism, the restrictions imposed on communication with monastic administration and cultural centres in West Europe and the "washing" of a material basis.The planned anti-Catholic policy pursued by Tsars in Lithuania in the early 19th century is witnessed by the concentration of cultural centres (schools, publishing houses, libraries) in the area the North East of Vilnius, which was followed by the transfer of the main institutions to Petersburg after the 1831 uprisal. In the 18th century, the culture of reading, which made an inseparable part of the culture of book in monastic communities, starting with the medieval lectio librorum, underwent modenization both in a technical and psychological respect and acquired some new features. Intensive reading was substituted for extensive reading, and European "revolution of reading" did not fail to reach monastic communities and the whole Lithuanian society. In spite of the Church and later the tsarist censorship, the monks used to read popular West European literature, which was spreading through certain channels (for example, through secular schools under monasteries) among broader strata of society. Further researches will throw light on the character of book collections, their contribution to the Lithuanian cultural text and the reflection of the mentality of monks and broader social strata. [From the publication p. 349-351]