Artur Alliksaar (15 April 1923, in

Tartu Tartu is the second largest city in Estonia after the Northern European country's political and financial capital, Tallinn. Tartu has a population of 91,407 (as of 2021). It is southeast of Tallinn and 245 kilometres (152 miles) northeast of ...

– 12 August 1966, in Tartu) was an

Estonia Estonia, formally the Republic of Estonia, is a country by the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, a ...

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral or writte ...

Biography

Alliksaar (formerly Alnek) attended elementary school in Tartu in 1931. In 1937, he enrolled in the prestigious secondary school: the

Hugo Treffner Gymnasium Hugo Treffner Gymnasium ( et, Hugo Treffneri Gümnaasium; abbreviated as HTG) is a secondary school in Tartu, Estonia with special emphasis on science education. Founded by Hugo Treffner, it was the only large secondary school in 19th-century Est ...

. Afterwards, he worked for the railway, like his father, for a short period of time in 1942. That same year, he started to study law at the

University of Tartu The University of Tartu (UT; et, Tartu Ülikool; la, Universitas Tartuensis) is a university in the city of Tartu in Estonia. It is the national university of Estonia. It is the only classical university in the country, and also its biggest ...

. In 1943–1944, he served as a conscript in the

Estonian Legion The Estonian Legion ( et, Eesti Leegion, german: Estnische Legion) was a military unit within the Combat Support Forces of the Waffen-SS during World War II, mainly consisting of Estonians, Estonian soldiers. Creation The formation was annou ...

Waffen-SS The (, "Armed SS") was the combat branch of the Nazi Party's ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) organisation. Its formations included men from Nazi Germany, along with Waffen-SS foreign volunteers and conscripts, volunteers and conscripts from both occup ...

.Artur Alliksaar: rohkem kui legend
/ref> In 1944, he saw combat on the Eastern Front against the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army (Russian: Рабо́че-крестья́нская Кра́сная армия),) often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and, after ...

. After the Soviet occupation, he joined the underground as a

Forest Brother The Guerrilla war in the Baltic states was an armed struggle which was waged by the Latvian, Lithuanian, and Estonian partisans, called the Forest Brothers (also: the "Brothers of the Wood" and the "Forest Friars"; et, metsavennad, lv, me� ...

. Eventually, he returned to Tartu and again worked for the railway. In 1949, the Soviet authorities arrested him for abusing his position. The charges were dubious. Alliksaar believes they were politically motivated. In 1954, he was also charged with betraying the homeland. Upon his release, in 1957, Alliksaar was not allowed to return to Estonia and lived in the

Vologda Vologda ( rus, Вологда, p=ˈvoləɡdə) is a types of inhabited localities in Russia, city and the administrative center of Vologda Oblast, Russia, located on the river Vologda (river), Vologda within the watershed of the Northern Dvina. ...

oblast. In 1958, he secretly returned to Tartu and worked in a brewery, in construction and for the railway. He also dedicated himself to creative writing. Artur Alliksaar suffered much injustice under Soviet authority. In addition to imprisonment, his house was burned down and he was forced to live in a shed with a dirt floor while his wife and son suffered with

pneumonia Pneumonia is an inflammatory condition of the lung primarily affecting the small air sacs known as alveoli. Symptoms typically include some combination of productive or dry cough, chest pain, fever, and difficulty breathing. The severity ...

. Alliksaar died of colon cancer in 1966.

Creative life

In his poetry, Alliksaar celebrates individual freedom. His poems are innovative and critical of his era. Mainly, he wrote in

free verse Free verse is an open form of poetry, which in its modern form arose through the French ''vers libre'' form. It does not use consistent meter patterns, rhyme, or any musical pattern. It thus tends to follow the rhythm of natural speech. Definit ...

. His language is innovative and full of wordplay. Alliksaar is idolised by many. His creation is passionate, reckless and bohemian in nature. Few of Alliksaar's poems were published during his lifetime; yet, he was well known. He wrote one play, ''Nimetu Saar'' (''Nameless Island''), which he lived to see in print. The complete collection of his poems, ''Päikesepillaja'' (''Lavishing Sunshine''), was published in 1997, and became a

bestseller A bestseller is a book or other media noted for its top selling status, with bestseller lists published by newspapers, magazines, and book store chains. Some lists are broken down into classifications and specialties (novel, nonfiction book, cookb ...

. He also translated poetry.

Sources

* * * *

References

External links

Artur Alliksaar at Estonian Writers' Online Dictionary
Estonian male poets 1923 births 1966 deaths Writers from Tartu Hugo Treffner Gymnasium alumni 20th-century Estonian poets 20th-century male writers Soviet military personnel of World War II Deaths from colorectal cancer Deaths from cancer in Estonia {{estonia-poet-stub