Jānis Jaunsudrabiņš

The White Book 
Graphic design: Sandra Krastiņa
research Dolf Pauw

Jānis Jaunsudrabiņš (1877–1962) was a famous Latvian author and painter. His life and work were imbued with bright light and clear vision. Having come from the countryside, Jaunsudrabiņš was well familiar with the life on the traditional Latvian farm and its intimate connection to the cycles of nature. As many Latvians he, too, had to experience personally the dramatic shifts and collisions of the 20th century. During World War I, Jaunsudrabiņš shared the fate of many refugees in Northern Caucasus; then he experienced peace and relative prosperity of newly independent Latvia and familiarised himself with Western culture. At the end of World War II, Jaunsudrabiņš was once again a refugee – this time in Germany where he settled in Kerbeck, living there until his death in 1962. In 1997, Jaunsudrabiņš was reburied in Latvia, near his Nereta birthplace. 

During a stay at the writers' retreat Burtnieku Nams on the outskirts of Riga, Jaunsudrabiņš started writing his masterpiece, 
"The White Book", one of the most outstanding works of Latvian literature. The first part of it was published in 1914 and the second followed in 1921.
LINK Bank of Latvia