Each Day Catches Fire

Each Day Catches Fire PDF Author: Imants Ziedonis
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781937693763
Category : Latvian poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Poetry. Translated from the Latvian by Bitite Vinklers. EACH DAY CATCHES FIRE presents work from the rich period of the 1970s and 1980s, particularly the prose poems Ziedonis called "epiphanies"; he characterized them as "little impulses, sparks, in the light of which some moments in our life appear in unusually sharp relief" that he was prompted to write by the "positive life rhythm in Latvian folk songs." Like the observant wayfarer he was, with whimsical, surprising imagery he guides us through the Latvian countryside and rural life he knew so intimately, depicts an animistic nature, comments on human relationships, and stresses the power of song and of words themselves.

Each Day Catches Fire

Each Day Catches Fire PDF Author: Imants Ziedonis
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781937693763
Category : Latvian poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Poetry. Translated from the Latvian by Bitite Vinklers. EACH DAY CATCHES FIRE presents work from the rich period of the 1970s and 1980s, particularly the prose poems Ziedonis called "epiphanies"; he characterized them as "little impulses, sparks, in the light of which some moments in our life appear in unusually sharp relief" that he was prompted to write by the "positive life rhythm in Latvian folk songs." Like the observant wayfarer he was, with whimsical, surprising imagery he guides us through the Latvian countryside and rural life he knew so intimately, depicts an animistic nature, comments on human relationships, and stresses the power of song and of words themselves.

American Latvians

American Latvians PDF Author: Ieva Zake
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1351532561
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 204

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Book Description
This book analyzes the political experience of a small and unique American ethnic group-American Latvians. This community was constituted by post-World War II political refugees, who fled Communism and arrived in the United States seeking safety and protection. For decades, they insisted on preserving their ethnic identity and therefore did not call themselves Latvian Americans. Instead, they formed a distinctive double identity, that is, they blended into the American society economically and socially, but refused to become assimilated culturally and politically. The book offers a detailed look into the life of this community of political refugees, which also provides a novel perspective on the Cold War as experienced by certain ethnic groups. From a theoretical point of view, the book makes two major contributions. First, it reasserts the need to understand the generalized category of "white Americans" or "white ethnics" with more nuance and attention to differences, and, second, it strengthens the so-called realist claim that refugees are not like other immigrants. In order to achieve these goals, the book provides compelling descriptions and interpretations of the most politically relevant moments in the experience of American Latvians in the period between the 1950s and the 1990s. Concretely, the book deals with topics as the American Latvians' anti-communist activism, the impact of the hunt for Nazis on Latvian emigres, the Soviet Union's anti-emigre propaganda campaigns and the exiled Latvians' involvement in the politics of national liberation in Latvia. The author strives to reveal the complexity of the refugee experience in the United States during the Cold War and its aftermath. Since such aspects of the life of ethnic groups in the United States have not been sufficiently studied, this book makes a substantial contribution to a fuller understanding of American immigration history and sociology of ethnic groups. It is well written, expertly organized, and will be of interest to a large readership at many levels of academia.

Among the Living and the Dead

Among the Living and the Dead PDF Author: Inara Verzemnieks
Publisher: Pushkin Press
ISBN: 1782274308
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 263

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Book Description
A powerfully told memoir of family, separation, and the things left unsaid, in the wake of the Second World War Raised by her grandparents in the USA, Inara Verzemnieks grew up among expatriates, scattering smuggled Latvian sand over the coffins of the dead, singing folk songs about a land she had never visited. Her grandmother Livija's stories recalled the remote village in Latvia left behind, where she and her sister, Ausma, were separated during the Second World War. They would not see each other again for more than fifty years. Coming to know Ausma and the trauma of her exile to Siberia under Stalin, Inara pieces together her grandmother's survival through the years as a refugee, and her grandfather's own troubling history as a conscript in the Nazi forces. As she interweaves two parts of the family story in spellbinding, lyrical prose, she offers us a profound and cathartic account of loss and survival, resilience and love. Inara Verzemnieks teaches creative non-fiction at the University of Iowa. She has won a Pushcart Prize and a Rona Jaffe Writer's Award, and has been a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in feature writing. She lives in Iowa City, Iowa.

The Latvian Saga

The Latvian Saga PDF Author: Uldis G̦ērmanis
Publisher:
ISBN: 9789984342917
Category : Latvia
Languages : en
Pages : 358

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Book Description


God in a Cup

God in a Cup PDF Author: Michaele Weissman
Publisher: HMH
ISBN: 0544186613
Category : Cooking
Languages : en
Pages : 218

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Book Description
Follow the ultimate coffee geeks on their worldwide hunt for the best beans. Can a cup of coffee reveal the face of God? Can it become the holy grail of modern-day knights errant who brave hardship and peril in a relentless quest for perfection? Can it change the world? These questions are not rhetorical. When highly prized coffee beans sell at auction for $50, $100, or $150 a pound wholesale (and potentially twice that at retail), anything can happen. In God in a Cup, journalist and late-blooming adventurer Michaele Weissman treks into an exotic and paradoxical realm of specialty coffee where the successful traveler must be part passionate coffee connoisseur, part ambitious entrepreneur, part activist, and part Indiana Jones. Her guides on the journey are the nation’s most heralded coffee business hotshots: Counter Culture’s Peter Giuliano, Intelligentsia’s Geoff Watts, and Stumptown’s Duane Sorenson. With their obsessive standards and fiercely competitive baristas, these roasters are creating a new culture of coffee connoisseurship in America—a culture in which $10 lattes are both a purist’s pleasure and a way to improve the lives of third-world farmers. If you love a good cup of coffee—or a great adventure story—you’ll love this unprecedented up-close look at the people and passions behind today’s best beans. “Weissman illustrates how the origin, flavor compounds and socioeconomic impact of a cup of coffee are relevant now more than ever. . . . Tagging along behind the main characters in today’s specialty coffee scene, [she] travels from the exotic to the expected to artfully deconstruct the connoisseur’s cup of coffee.” —Publishers Weekly

Hard Labour: The Forgotten Voices of Latvian Migrant 'Volunteer' Workers

Hard Labour: The Forgotten Voices of Latvian Migrant 'Volunteer' Workers PDF Author: Linda McDowell
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134057148
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 237

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Book Description
Although the Second World War ended sixty years ago, there are still untold stories waiting to be heard: stories not only of diplomats and soldiers but also of refugees, camp inmates and ordinary people living in occupied territories, stories of women's and children's lives as well as those of men. In Hard Labour the forgotten voices of a group of young women who left Latvia in 1944 are captured, telling the story of their flight from the advancing Soviet Army, their difficult journeys across central Europe, their lives as displaced people in Allied camps in Germany and finally their refuge in Britain. Hard work is at the centre of these stories, as the women became 'volunteer' workers, first for the Nazi war effort and then as labourers in the British post-war reconstruction plan. In what has been described as a 'venemous postscript' to the War, the fit and able amongst the vast homeless and often stateless population that fetched up in camps run by the Allies in war-devastated Germany were recruited by western states as labourers. Great Britain was the first nation to recruit displaced persons, offering jobs in hospitals and private homes as domestic workers and in the textile industry to young single women (and later men) from Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, and other once independent states. Many of these women spent the rest of their lives in Britain, longing to return to their homelands but independence came too late for many of them. At the centre of Hard Labour are the lives of twenty-five now elderly Latvia women who came to Britain between 1946 and 1949. Their memories are placed in the context of recent work in feminist history, illuminating debates about displacement and loss as well as the transformation of women's lives in post-war Britain.

Suddenly, a Criminal: Sixteen Years in Siberia

Suddenly, a Criminal: Sixteen Years in Siberia PDF Author: Melanija Vanaga
Publisher: FriesenPress
ISBN: 1460264037
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 582

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Book Description
"Those among us who survived," says Melanija, "did so because we were unbelievably full of the determination and will to live, and faith in our ultimate liberation, as well as because all the disasters arose unexpectedly." From her own and some of her fellow victims' notes and diaries written while the experiences were raw, she portrays an authentic panorama of what ethnic cleansing looked like on the ground during her involuntary Siberian exile (1941-1956). First on an animal collecting station near Tyukhtet when her son Alnis is only nine, and later in the village itself, she and the other women endure homelessness, borderline starvation, extreme cold, humiliation, insult, ill treatment and brutality, and all the while without any knowledge about their husbands' fate, the men having been separated from the women and children already at the first train station where their ordeal began. Add to that, black mud into which one sinks up to the knees, and in Melanija's case, a death's door operation. Miraculously, some survived, and a few, like Alnis, even ultimately regained a respected position in society. Indomitable, iron lady Melanija recorded uncounted biographies of those who did not—members of her extended family, neighbours, friends and acquaintances. She filled one hundred and ten large albums in her calligraphic handwriting, supplemented by photographs, and hand drawn maps and pictures. In Latvia, this documentary became an instant modern classic. In September 2014 it was published in Russian.

The Story of Latvia

The Story of Latvia PDF Author: Arveds Švābe
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Latvia
Languages : en
Pages : 78

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Book Description


The Testimony of Lives

The Testimony of Lives PDF Author: Vieda Skultans
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134714874
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 244

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Book Description
Vieda Skultans left Latvia as a refugee at the age of six months. In 1990, she returned for the first time. This text is both a personal account of a homecoming and an anthropology of a people trying to come to terms with its past and to face an uncertain future. Based on more than 100 interviews carried out in the wake of Latvian independence, it gives voice to stories of dispossession and exile and of ambiguous returns. At the same time it unpicks the process of memory itself, showing how personal memory is shaped by the traditional narratives of national history and culture.

The Emigrant Communities of Latvia

The Emigrant Communities of Latvia PDF Author: Rita Kaša
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3030120929
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 300

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Book Description
This open access volume examines experiences of contemporary Latvian migrants, thereby focusing on reasons for emigration, processes of integration in their host countries, and – in the case of return migration - re-integration in their home country. In the context of European migration, the book describes the case of Latvia, which is interesting due to the multiple waves of excessive emigration, continuously high migration potential among European Union member states, and diverse migrant characteristics. It provides a fascinating insight into the social and psychological aspects linked to migration in a comparative context. The data in this volume is rich in providing individual level perspectives of contemporary Latvian migrants by addressing issues such as emigrants’ economic, social and cultural inclusion in the host country, ties with the home country and culture, interaction with public authorities both in the host and home country, political views, and perspectives on the permanent settlement in migration or return. Through topics such as assimilation of children, relationships between emigrants representing different emigration waves, the complex identities and attachments of minority emigrants, and the role of culture and media in identity formation and presentation, this book addresses topics that any contemporary emigrant community is faced with.