Books From Lithuania Available in the U.S.

I just finished editing a much needed directory, The Lithuanian Publishers Directory, on Lithuanian Publishers and publishing activities in Lithuania. It took me a year and two trips to Vilnius to gather the information for the directory. My study objective was to collect concise data on who the publishers in Lithuania are, what type of material they publish, and how to identify and obtain these publications. It is not a books-in-print type publication but a road map to who the publishers are, how they can be contacted and how to order from them. I had some collaborators for this project in Lithuania to help me with data gathering; they were from the Lithuanian Librarians Association, the Vilnius University Library and the Vilnius University — Book Science Department. The sponsor of this study is IREX in conjunction with ASSIST International, Inc.

While in Vilnius I attended all the book fairs, visited bookstores, book distributors, vendors, and, of course, publishers. I was pleasantly surprised and amazed at the great number of beautifully printed publications available.

During the next six months we gathered over 300 data survey forms from publishers; 50% of all the publishers contacted. I want to note that this is a very high percentage of response on any survey questionnaire done by mail; which, indicated that there was definitively great interest by the publishers to expand their markets to the United States.

We had plenty of data to analyze and use for the compilation of the Directory. The Lithuanian Publishers Directory is at the publisher in the USA and should be published some time around February 1999. It should be a useful resource for libraries and other institutions to point them to information they wish to acquire from Lithuania.

The reason I was doing the project was because I knew, from previous visits and contacts, that there was an immensity of publishing activities in Lithuania since the early 1990. The publications were very well done, very informative, and full of previously unpublished information about Lithuania. Yet, people in the USA were not aware of this and were at a loss in acquiring such information from Lithuania.

The publishing boom after 1990 was phenomenal and a direct response to Soviet censorship. Hundreds of independent newspapers, magazines, books on every imaginary subject, memoirs, and previously unpublished literature needed to be published. In addition, textbooks had to be rewritten. This publishing activity produced chaos of unparalleled proportions for the libraries, the reader, and especially to foreign scholars and libraries looking for material from the newly independent countries for their collections.

The study was a necessary first step toward some form of organization and cognition of what is and has been happening in the past 10 years in Lithuania in publishing. The reason I am writing about this experience is that after analyzing the information collected, it became evident that there is a need for an organization to distribute this published information in Lithuania to the outside world, specifically to the USA and Canada. Information about Lithuania should be made available by Lithuanians themselves to others; who more often than not have little information about Lithuanian people, its long history, culture, science, industry, government, and most of all its beautiful language and its creative genius.

From the data received, it became evident that there was a lack of expertise by publishers of how to market their publications outside of Lithuania. However, within the last year, I have noticed an increase in publishers’ catalogs, some in English, as well as publishers participation in European book fairs. Most publishers indicated that they would like to have a marketing source for their publications in the US. It so happens I found someone in America who actually listened and started a business specifically for the distribution of publications from Lithuania (in Lithuanian and some in English).

The new company is The Baltic Bookshelf, whose director is Loreta McPartland. Loreta speaks Lithuanian and also has a degree in marketing, which is a fine combination for this job. The address of her book distribution company is:

The Baltic Bookshelf
Loreta McPartland
2107 Sandy Court
Crofton, MD 21114-2132
Fax: (410) 721-3411
e-mail: balticbook@aol.com

Anyone interested in material published in Lithuania can contact her and she will search her database to offer lists of books on a particular topic. In the future, she plans to expand to the Internet and have a Baltic Bookshelf home page. She is also compiling a catalog, which when ready will be mailed to readers on request.

The Baltic Bookshelf staff has already made contact with publishers in Lithuania, and has received an overwhelming response with lists of books they can provide to be sold in the USA.

The first publishers to supply books in English published in Lithuania, were TVERME, the publisher of the Skomantas series (English translation). These stories of Lithuanian pagan past weave the material of history into fascinating tales of adventure and romance, and provide exciting reading for young and old. The characters are very well developed and continue from story to story presenting a very good view of their ancient beliefs and customs of pagan traditions based on authentic ethnographic material. The books are published in paperback format. The three books available now are The Captive, The Fen Wolf, and the Blood Wedding.

The other publisher of interest is KRASTOTVARKA, who publishes all kinds of information about Lithuania, including visitor guides in both English and Lithuanian. Another publisher of great interest to computer buffs is publisher SMALTIJA, who publishes computer information, but of special interest is the directory called Geltonieji Interneto Puslapiai (Yellow Pages to the Internet Homepages) which lists over 90% of all the www home pages in Lithuania.

Contact The Baltic Bookshelf for additional information and to order books published in Lithuania. I hope this information will be useful to the person seeking reading material from Lithuania and about Lithuania.