Martin Nõmm

On Belonging and Identity in the Post-WWII Baltic Diasporas as Mediated in Fiction and Life Writing

For the Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian exile communities that emerged in the aftermath of World War II and the occupation of their respective homelands, the arts became a way to both perpetuate their identity in the free world and to explore the predicaments wrought by the condition of exile. Within the diasporas’ literary scenes, the works that touched upon the exilic experience varied from attempts to recapture and preserve lost homelands to contemplations on trauma and displacement.

In approaching this topic, my interest lies more in the latter and the potential of artistic expression to serve as a platform in exploring perspectives often overlooked in greater narratives and discouraged in public discourse. Literary works that dealt with ambivalent and negative themes, such as assimilation, generational conflict and wartime trauma were often met with a mixed response from the exile communities but still represented experiences present within them.

Using the notions of belonging and identity as focal points in piecing together this picture of literary expressions of the post-WWII Baltic diasporas, I will examine a variety of texts, ranging from novels to drama, fictional to autobiographical, that touch upon ambivalent or even polemical experiences of exile. My project will seek to highlight this important perspective within the Baltic exile narrative and demonstrate recurring similarities in how it plays out within different Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian literary works.

• “How to Resolve the Trauma of Exile? Negotiating Cultural Trauma in Three Baltic Exile Plays from the 1970s North America,” Theatre and Social Responsibility, special issue of Nordic Theatre Studies 34,1 (2022): 34-48, https://doi.org/10.7146/nts.v34i1.137924.

• “The ‘Mickeyfied’ Estonian in Humorous Representations,” CELSA conference Humour and Conflict in the Public Sphere, Estonian Literary Museum, Tartu, September 4-6, 2024.
• “Baltic Exile Literatures – World Literatures?,” 29th Biennial AABS Conference The Baltic Way: Unity and Giving Aid, organised by the Association for the Advancement of Baltic Studies (AABS), Yale University and University of New Haven, CT, June 13-16, 2024.
• Participation in the 13th Winter School for Doctoral Researchers Survivance and Survival: Theory and Method, University of Tartu, January 29 – February 2, 2024.
• “Where Do We Go from Here? A Survey of Estonian and Latvian Exile Short Stories from the 1960s,” 10th Student Conference Bridges in the Baltics, University of Tartu, September 22-23, 2023.
• “Does Returning (M)end Exile? A Case Study of Two Autobiographical Works by Elin Toona and Agate Nesaule,” Trauma and Healing: Storying Lives, Literary Engagements, Entangled Memories, 15th International Conference of the Estonian Association of Comparative Literature, University of Tartu, June 8-9, 2023.
• “The Condition of Exile in North American Baltic Drama,” 8^th Baltic Student Conference Bridges in the Baltics, University of Vilnius, October 22-23, 2021.
• “Põlvkondliku konflikti näited Teise maailmasõja järgses Balti diasporaakirjanduses [Examples of Generational Conflict in Post-WWII Baltic Diaspora Literature],” seminar at the Estonian Literary Museum/Centre of Excellence in Estonian Studies, September 23, 2021.
• “Generational Pressures of Identity and Belonging in the Autobiographical Works of Agate Nesaule and Elin Toona,” 4^th International Oral History Conference Generation, Migration and Memory: Narrative and its Transformations, University of Latvia, November 12-13, 2020.