"Folded to fit into a pocket...": delivering a sermon without pulpit and cassock
ENIn contemporary editions of sermons it is not easy to trace the authentic shape of these texts. Diplomatic publishing of sermon manuscripts reveals the priests’ “homework” rather than their activity in the pulpit. These editions reduce sermons to spiritual and theological writings that were read privately, thus removing their social uniqueness. This article addresses this problems with reference to a collection of manuscript notes of sermons and religion lectures by the well-known Lithuanian poet and preacher Silvestras Gimžauskas from the second half of the nineteenth century and suggests alterantives to preserve or mimic the sermons’ inherent orality. Keywords: Documentary editing, Diplomatic edition, Manuscripts, Orality, Lithuanian history.
