Prussian Lithuanian Literature
Literature in the Lithuanian language appeared earlier in the Duchy of Prussia than in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The first book in Lithuanian was published in Königsberg in 1547 by Martynas Mažvydas, an émigré from Grand Duchy of Lithuania, while the first Lithuanian book in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania was printed in 1596 by Mikalojus Daukša. Many other authors who wrote in Lithuanian were not Prussian Lithuanians, but local Prussian Germans: Michael Märlin, Jakob Quandt, Wilhelm Martinius, Gottfried Ostermeyer, Sigfried Ostermeyer, Daniel Klein, Andrew Krause, Philipp Ruhig, Matttheus Praetorius, Christian Mielcke, Adam Schimmelpfennig, for example. The first major Lithuanian poet, Kristijonas Donelaitis, was from East Prussia and reflected the Prussian Lithuanian lifestyle in his works. The first newspaper in the Lithuanian language, Nuſidawimai apie Ewangēliôs Praſiplatinima tarp Źydû ir Pagonû, was published by Prussian Lithuanians. Prior to World War I, the government and political parties financed the Prussian Lithuanian press.
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“As a man has no right to kill one of his children if it is diseased or insane, so a man who has made the gradual and conscious expression of his personality in literature the aim of his life, has no right to suppress himself any carefully considered work which seemed good enough when it was written. Suppression, if it is deserved, will come rapidly enough from the same causes that suppress the unworthy members of a man’s family.”
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