Vladas Mozuriunas

(Vladas Mozuriūnas). Born Feb. 1, 1922, in Kaunas; died June 9, 1964, in Vilnius. Soviet Lithuanian poet. Member of the CPSU (1947).

The son of an industrial worker, Mozuriunas graduated from the Higher Party School in 1956. He began to publish in 1939. Mozuriunas’ poetical talent matured during the Great Patriotic War of 1941–45, when he worked for a Lithuanian army newspaper. From 1948 to 1954 he edited the journal Švyturys (Lighthouse) and from 1958 to 1964 the journal Pergalė (Victory).

Mozuriunas’ first collection of verse, A Handful of Earth, was published in 1947. It was followed by the collections Sunrise (1950), Conscience Cannot Be Silent (1952), Ears From the Fields (1955), The Spring by the Road (1957), Vilnius Etudes (books 1–2, 1958–63), and Sea Stanzas (1965, posthumously). Mozuriunas’ lyrical hero, still aware of the hard consequences of war, joyously welcomes the future. Mozuriunas was awarded three orders.