European Origins of the Poetry of Kristijonas Donelaitis

The article analyzes the links of the poetry of Kristijonas Donelaitis with the origins of European literature,and primarily with the literature of Antiquity (Virgil and Hesiod). The systemic reference to the genreof “The Seasons” leads to an assumption that the classic of Lithuanian literature, born in East Prussia,educated in Königsberg University, and having spent all his lifetime in the heterogeneous environmentof Prussian Lithuania, wrote his masterpiece inspired by didactic idylls of Antiquity. Virgil was referredto and quoted by Donelaitis in his letter written in German, and Donelaitis could have read and analyzedHesiod‘s Erga in the years of his studies. The juxtaposition of “The Seasons” and “Works and Days”demonstrates the layers shared by the two poets: in addition to the relationships of the structure and thegenre, there are numerous links at the semantic level that intertextually thematize the categories of nature,time, work, and religion.KEY WORDS: the epoch of Enlightenment, intertextuality, the genre of idyll in Antiquity, a didacticcategory, the categories of nature and time. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.15181/ahuk.v26i0.49