Ignas Jurkūnas (2 April 1889 – 15 January 1959), best known by his pen name Ignas Šeinius, was a Lithuanian-Swedish writer, publicist, and diplomat. Šeinius worked as a diplomat for the
interwar Lithuania
In the history of the 20th century, the interwar period, also known as the interbellum (), lasted from 11 November 1918 to 1 September 1939 (20 years, 9 months, 21 days) – from the end of World War I (WWI) to the beginning of World War II ( ...
in the
Nordic states
The Nordic countries (also known as the Nordics or ''Norden''; ) are a geographical and cultural region in Northern Europe, as well as the Arctic Ocean, Arctic and Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic oceans. It includes the sovereign states of Denm ...
, to which he immigrated after the
Soviet occupation of Lithuania
The occupation of the Baltic states was a period of annexation of
Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania by the Soviet Union from 1940 until its dissolution in 1991. For a period of several years during World War II, Nazi Germany occupied the Baltic st ...
. He is best known for his novel ''Kuprelis'' (The Hunchback), which, along with Šeinius' other novels, was at the forefront of
impressionism
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by visible brush strokes, open Composition (visual arts), composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...
in the
Lithuanian literature
Lithuanian literature () concerns the art of written works created by Lithuanians throughout their history.
History Latin language
A wealth of Lithuanian literature was written in Latin, the main scholarly language in the Middle Ages. The edi ...
.
Biography
Early years
Ignas Jurkūnas was born on 2 April 1889 to a family of Lithuanian peasants in the village of , from which he would eventually create his pen name. He attended schools in both
Gelvoniai and
Musninkai
Musninkai is a town in Širvintos district municipality, Vilnius County, east Lithuania. According to the Lithuanian census of 2011, the town has a population of 415 people. The town has a Catholic church.
Its alternate names include Muśniki (Pol ...
. In 1908, he finished teachers' courses in
Kaunas
Kaunas (; ) is the second-largest city in Lithuania after Vilnius, the fourth largest List of cities in the Baltic states by population, city in the Baltic States and an important centre of Lithuanian economic, academic, and cultural life. Kaun ...
and
Vilnius
Vilnius ( , ) is the capital of and List of cities in Lithuania#Cities, largest city in Lithuania and the List of cities in the Baltic states by population, most-populous city in the Baltic states. The city's estimated January 2025 population w ...
, and in the same year he passed an exam in
St. Petersburg
Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea. The city had a population of 5,601, ...
which officially allowed him to become a teacher. From then on he would be involved in the press, usually creating and publishing short poems.
Studies in Moscow
In 1912, he moved to Moscow where he studied art and philosophy at the until 1915. During this time, he met with some notable Lithuanian writers, such as
Juozas Tumas-Vaižgantas
Juozas Tumas also known by the pen name Vaižgantas (20 September 1869 – 29 April 1933) was a Lithuanian Roman Catholic priest and an activist during the Lithuanian National Revival. He was a prolific writer, editor of nine periodicals, universi ...
and
Jurgis Baltrušaitis
Jurgis Baltrušaitis (2 May 1873 – 3 January 1944) was a Lithuanian Symbolist poet and translator who wrote in Lithuanian and Russian, and was an exponent of iconology. He was the father of art historian and critic Jurgis Baltrušaitis Jr.
...
, among others, who encouraged the young Šeinius to write. In 1913, he published his best-known novel, ''Kuprelis''. The novel was not very popular in Lithuania and was heavily re-edited and re-published by Šeinius in 1932. He also translated
Nietzsche
Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (15 October 1844 – 25 August 1900) was a German philosopher. He began his career as a classical philologist, turning to philosophy early in his academic career. In 1869, aged 24, Nietzsche became the youngest pro ...
's ''
Thus Spoke Zarathustra
''Thus Spoke Zarathustra: A Book for All and None'' (), also translated as ''Thus Spake Zarathustra'', is a work of philosophical fiction written by German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche; it was published in four volumes between 1883 and 1885. ...
'' from German to Lithuanian.
Diplomatic work in northern Europe
In 1915, he was sent to Stockholm to represent the prominent
Lithuanian Society for the Relief of War Sufferers
The Lithuanian Society for the Relief of War Sufferers () was a Lithuanian charity organization that was active from 1914 to 1918. It was founded by various Lithuanian political figures as a committee to assist Lithuanian refugees of the First W ...
. In Stockholm, he quickly learned Swedish and in 1917 he published ''Litauisk Kultur'' (Lithuanian Culture), among other articles about Lithuanian culture. In summer 1915, he married Gertrud Sydoff, who was of Swedish descent. Their son Irvis was born in 1922.
In 1919, after Lithuania gained its independence, he was appointed head of the press office of the Lithuanian representation in Stockholm. From 1919 to 1920, he worked to represent Lithuania in
Copenhagen
Copenhagen ( ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a population of 1.4 million in the Urban area of Copenhagen, urban area. The city is situated on the islands of Zealand and Amager, separated from Malmö, Sweden, by the ...
, and briefly in Finland from 1922 to 1923, where he was partly responsible for preventing the signing of the
Warsaw Accord, in which Lithuania would theoretically be isolated from the
Baltic states
The Baltic states or the Baltic countries is a geopolitical term encompassing Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. All three countries are members of NATO, the European Union, the Eurozone, and the OECD. The three sovereign states on the eastern co ...
,
Poland
Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...
and Finland. In 1923, he returned to Swedish affairs and up until 1927 was the Lithuanian representative to Sweden. During his diplomatic tenure in Sweden, he contributed to the development of economic and cultural relations between Lithuania and Sweden to gain support for Lithuania's stance on the issues of
Vilnius
Vilnius ( , ) is the capital of and List of cities in Lithuania#Cities, largest city in Lithuania and the List of cities in the Baltic states by population, most-populous city in the Baltic states. The city's estimated January 2025 population w ...
and
Klaipėda
Klaipėda ( ; ) is a city in Lithuania on the Baltic Sea coast. It is the List of cities in Lithuania, third-largest city in Lithuania, the List of cities in the Baltic states by population, fifth-largest city in the Baltic States, and the capi ...
on the international stage.

The
December 1926 coup saw a change of political leadership, enabling
Antanas Smetona
Antanas Smetona (; 10 August 1874 – 9 January 1944) was a Lithuanian intellectual, journalist and politician. He served as the first president of Lithuania from 1919 to 1920 and later as the authoritarian head of state from 1926 until the Occu ...
and
Augustinas Voldemaras
Augustinas Voldemaras (16 April 1883 – 16 May 1942) was a Lithuanian nationalist political figure. He briefly served as the country's first prime minister in 1918 and continued serving as the minister of foreign affairs until 1920, representing ...
to form a new government. Conflict with Voldemaras, who was the new chief of foreign affairs, arose, and Šeinius was forced to resign from his work in diplomacy in 1927, as the nationalist party in Lithuania closed embassies in the Nordic states. Šeinius then, until 1930, worked for private firms and paid more attention to his creative work.
Emigration and later years
Sometime in the early 1930s, he returned to Kaunas, Lithuania. He worked as an editor of the newspaper ''
Lietuvos aidas
''Lietuvos aidas'' (literally: ''Echo of Lithuania'') is a daily newspaper in Lithuania. It was established on September 6, 1917, by Antanas Smetona, and became the semi-official voice of the newly formed Lithuanian government. When the government ...
'' and also engaged in larger personal creative work. From 1935 he worked in
Klaipėda
Klaipėda ( ; ) is a city in Lithuania on the Baltic Sea coast. It is the List of cities in Lithuania, third-largest city in Lithuania, the List of cities in the Baltic states by population, fifth-largest city in the Baltic States, and the capi ...
as the governor's press consultant. After
Lithuania was occupied in 1940, Šeinius emigrated to Sweden, in which he changed his surname to Scheynius and ceased to write in Lithuanian, writing novels mainly in Swedish, the most popular of which is ''I Väntan På Undret'' (Waiting for the Miracle). In 1943, he received Swedish citizenship and lived there until his death in 1959.
Literary work
Šeinius already was publishing small
feuilleton
A ''feuilleton'' (; a diminutive of , the leaf of a book) was originally a kind of supplement attached to the political portion of French newspapers, consisting chiefly of non-political news and gossip, literature and art criticism, a chronicle ...
s back in 1910. During his active years, he used many different pen names, like Irvis Gedainis.
Šeinius was the progenitor of
impressionism
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by visible brush strokes, open Composition (visual arts), composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...
in the Lithuanian literature. The main themes of his earlier novels were usually unhappy love and its stoic survival. Šeinius' prose also included themes of
psychology
Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Its subject matter includes the behavior of humans and nonhumans, both consciousness, conscious and Unconscious mind, unconscious phenomena, and mental processes such as thoughts, feel ...
. His novels, such as ''Siegfried Immerselbe atsijaunina'' (Siegfried Immerselbe Rejuvenates) published in 1934, combine features of science-fiction, politics, and satire, and grotesquely satirize the theories of
racism
Racism is the belief that groups of humans possess different behavioral traits corresponding to inherited attributes and can be divided based on the superiority of one Race (human categorization), race or ethnicity over another. It may also me ...
,
Nazism
Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During Hitler's rise to power, it was fre ...
and
eugenics
Eugenics is a set of largely discredited beliefs and practices that aim to improve the genetic quality of a human population. Historically, eugenicists have attempted to alter the frequency of various human phenotypes by inhibiting the fer ...
. After 1940, he mainly published anti-Soviet themed books in Swedish, Danish and Lithuanian, such as ''Den Röda Floden Stiger'' (The Red Flood), ''Den Röda Resan'' (The Red Journey).
''Kuprelis'' is the most prominent of Šeinius' works. It follows Olesis, a
miller
A miller is a person who operates a mill, a machine to grind a grain (for example corn or wheat) to make flour. Milling is among the oldest of human occupations. "Miller", "Milne" and other variants are common surnames, as are their equivalents ...
who gradually recounts his life story to another person as the flour of the windmill is being milled. Olesis, also known as Kuprelis, has been hunchbacked since childhood, and is also poor, but is gifted with artistic talents and a sensitive heart. Realizing his sad fate, and wanting to become closer to God and to art, he decides to become a church organist. He falls in love with Kunigunda (Gundė), but she deceives him and leaves him for someone who holds possession of stolen money and is more attractive. Olesis becomes disillusioned with God, settles far from his birthplace, and becomes a hermit who reads various, mostly German philosophical books. Kuprelis not only tells the events consistently but also stops at the most important places, reflects on them, and comments on them from the perspective of time. Such a plot and narrative composition were new in Lithuanian literature. The theme of nature is important in the novel also – the colors and moods of nature correspond to the inner feelings of the characters. The novel takes place during the time of the
Lithuanian press ban
The Lithuanian press ban () was a ban on all Lithuanian language publications printed in the Latin alphabet, in force from 1865 to 1904, within the Russian Empire, which controlled Lithuania proper at the time. Lithuanian-language publications t ...
, so the theme of Lithuania, the struggle for national consciousness is developed in parallel with the love line of the young people.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Seinius, Ignas
1889 births
1959 deaths
Lithuanian diplomats
Lithuanian novelists
Lithuanian satirists
Lithuanian satirical novelists
20th-century Lithuanian writers
Lithuanian emigrants to Sweden