GRĮŽIMO SAVIN GENIJAI: SH. ANDERSONAS IR J. SKABLAUSKAITĖ
Geniuses of the Authentic Self: Sh. Anderson and J. Skablauskaitė

Summary/Abstract: The main aim of the article is to compare fictional worlds of two authors of two different cultures and periods – American writer Sherwood Anderson (1876–1941) and Lithuanian author Jolita Skablauskaitė (1950), to ponder upon the possibilities of literary grotesque and the validity of the term genius loci nowadays. Reality of everyday life in J. Skablauskaitė’s texts is more distorted, but this grotesque deformation is not so embarrassing or depressing as perverted being of Sh. Anderson’s characters. Specific atmosphere in the texts of American writer is stipulated by the relations between odd characters and their unusual moods, though from the first sight it could resemble quite usual everyday life. Nevertheless American grotesque encodes impossibility to change something or to change oneself. J. Skablauskaitė’s grotesque is a bit different – marked by specific potential and a kind of more “visual“. These texts written in different cultures and on different time are alike by encoded particular contrasts between authentic feelings and enforced obligations. American and Lithuanian authors used their own notions of grotesque, but the messages they have sent are the same – a human-being is limited and limitless at the same time. So may be, we could say, that the term genius loci could be understood in a broader sense – as a creative guiding spirit, in charge of the territory, encompassing the whole world.

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