Historical investigations of cultural and religious life in Soviet Lithuania: problems with the sources

The article deals with the sources that could be used to reconstruct adequately the atmosphere of cultural and religious life in Soviet Lithuania. The group of documents reflecting activities of state bodies is the most abundant but it doesn‘t reveal deeper processes which were going on in those spheres. These documents mostly fix decisions already taken while leaving their motivation in the dark. The second deficiency of documents of this type is their ideologically codified language which it is difficult to interpret adequately. Moreover, many condidential documents were destroyed by the retreating Soviet authorities, and due to this there are quite extensive “white gaps” in the field. The majority of memoirs about cultural and religious life during the Soviet rule are also of a little use because of their strong political motivation. Meanwhile, existing diaries as well as letters reflecting the atmosphere of cultural and religious life in Soviet Lithuania are very few. Qualified interviews with former participants in the cultural discourse could constitute a way out of this situation as well as an introduction of new theoretical tools