Škėma ir žvilgsniečiai

ENThe article presents an essayistic consideration of the phenomenon of Antanas Škėma and the rebellious young writers (J. Mekas and others), who published the magazine “Žvilgsniai” in 1946-1948. The emphasis is put on the critical avant-garde role of these authors in contradicting the mental stereotypes of the exodus and the whole of the Lithuanian literature. There is an admiration at their actively expressed alternative attitude to the anaemia of thought, their efforts to escape the isolation and the iconised past, deepen the reception of modernism, psychoanalysis and Western experience in Lithuanian literature. Therefore the main emphasis is placed on the less explored literary criticism of Škėma, which, just as the publications of the “Žvilgsniai” team, was directed against die banalities of creativity and thought, “the patented surrogates of truth” disguised under the name of tradition.