Mats Traat (23 November 1936 – 27 June 2022) was an Estonian poet, poetry translator, and author.
Career
Traat was born in
Arula
Arula is a village in Otepää Parish, Valga County in southeastern 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 ...
,
Otepää Parish
Otepää Parish ( et, Otepää vald) is a rural municipality in Valga County, southern Estonia. It includes the town of Otepää.
Settlements
;Town
Otepää
;Small boroughs
Puka - Sangaste
;Villages
Ädu - Arula- Ilmjärve - Kääriku - ...
. He debuted in 1962 with a collection of poetry. He published over 20 anthologies of poetry. His poetry frequently dealt with social commentary and society's adoration for science. His lyrics praised nature and his native country. He also translated poetry from
Slavic languages
The Slavic languages, also known as the Slavonic languages, are Indo-European languages spoken primarily by the Slavic peoples and their descendants. They are thought to descend from a proto-language called Proto-Slavic, spoken during the Ear ...
(Polish, Macedonian, Czech).
Traat wrote about the indigenous Estonian
population
Population typically refers to the number of people in a single area, whether it be a city or town, region, country, continent, or the world. Governments typically quantify the size of the resident population within their jurisdiction using a ...
. His central topics were the changes and the developments of Estonian rural life in the course of centuries, with an emphasis on people's ethical choices. In ''Trees Were, Trees Were Tender Brothers'' (1979), a young protagonist wages a struggle to keep a farm running, something he never desired to do.http://elm.einst.ee/issue/24/views-freedom-mats-traat
''Pasqueflower, Antidote for Sadness'' (1982/uncensored version 1990) covered the fate of ancient
Livonians
The Livonians, or Livs ( Livonian: ''līvlizt''; Estonian: ''liivlased''; Latvian: ''līvi'', ''lībieši''), are a Balto-Finnic people indigenous to northern and northwestern Latvia. Livonians historically spoke Livonian, a Uralic language c ...
, conquered and formally aligning with the Christian invaders, while maintaining pagan convictions, and the problems of rural life during the
stagnation era
The "Era of Stagnation" (russian: Пери́од засто́я, Períod zastóya, or ) is a term coined by Mikhail Gorbachev in order to describe the negative way in which he viewed the economic, political, and social policies of the Soviet Un ...
Estonian SSR.
''Dance around the Steam Boiler'' (1971; originally a film script, that was finally accomplished in 1988) illustrated with five 'dances' with the portable engine the changes of rural life in half a century. In the movie, filmed during the
perestroika
''Perestroika'' (; russian: links=no, перестройка, p=pʲɪrʲɪˈstrojkə, a=ru-perestroika.ogg) was a political movement for reform within the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) during the late 1980s widely associated wit ...
era, a sixth 'dance' was added, showing the old age of the main characters on the background of the typical rural scenes of 1980s: industrial and technological developments combined with a reckless destruction of the environment.
Traat's short story, ''The Cross of Power,'' won the
Friedebert Tuglas
Friedebert Tuglas, born Friedebert Mihkelson or Michelson (2 March 1886 – 15 April 1971) was an Estonian writer and critic who introduced Impressionism and Symbolism to Estonian literature.Estonian Literature Information Center