Lithuanian Press Ban - Aftermath

Aftermath

After the ban was lifted, printing presses and their supporting social and cultural infrastructure needed to be established. The first issue of a Lithuanian newspaper after the ban, Vilniaus žinios, appeared on December 23, 1904; the Great Seimas of Vilnius, which took place in November 1905, was now able to issue its announcements and publications in Lithuanian.

The publishing houses of Martynas Kukta, Saliamonas Banaitis, and the Society of St. Casimir in Kaunas were responsible for many of the publications issued between the end of the ban in 1904 and the restoration of Lithuanian independence in 1918. The businessman Petras Vileišis installed a printing press at his palace, commissioned in 1904. During this period 4,734 Lithuanian-language titles in the Latin alphabet were published in Lithuania and abroad. After Lithuanian independence was established, the rate of publication increased steadily; 16,721 book titles were printed from 1918 to 1939. Between 1925 and 1939 about 800 to 900 book titles were printed annually.

A standard Lithuanian othography and grammar were established during the ban, despite the fact that the co-ordination of this process, involving competing dialects, was forced to take place in several countries. The ban is widely felt to have stimulated the Lithuanian national movement, rather than discouraging it. In 2004, the 100th anniversary of the ban's end was noted in UNESCO's events calendar, and the Lithuanian Seimas declared the "Year of the Lithuanian Language and Book."