The article focuses on social and cultural background of the shifts taking place in the stylistics and contents of Lithuanian love songs. Applying theoretical assumptions from the field of history of emotions, the author analyzes shifting expression of emotions in folksongs on the topic of love. The subject of the article embraces love songs that spread from the 19th to the first half of the 20th century and were shaped not only by the folklore tradition, but also by Lithuanian and foreign poetry of the time, and by popular romances. These compositions differ in terms of poetic quality, displaying both the traditional folksong elements and changing attitudes by the singers and people that are depicted in the songs, as well as a new vocabulary of emotional expression. Applying insights by Peter N. and Carol Z. Stearns (1985) regarding the society’s standards on the expression of emotions, and the concept of emotive, or emotional statement, introduced by W. Reddy (2001), the author regards the shifting expression of emotions in love songs as a reflection of emotionality spreading in written culture (primarily poetry) of the 19th century. Utterances of love-related emotions are essentially perceived as manifestations of the changing poetic vocabulary. The first chapter discusses social and cultural conditions of the changing folksongs, concentrating mostly on the notion of love and its significance in traditional Lithuanian peasant family, and the spread of literacy in the 19th century. The growth of written culture is considered a factor in introducing tropes and prototypes of emotional language that express the notion of romantic love into the sphere of folksong. The second chapter analyzes the relationship between love songs and individual poetry. Various collections of Lithuanian folksongs published in the 19th century, as well as their publications in the press testify to the process of interaction between written and oral culture gaining momentum at that time. This process was further stimulated by the increase of Lithuanian poetry composed by representatives of Lithuanian intelligentsia and literati with roots among the small noblemen and peasants; their compositions were significantly influenced by foreign poetry. Romantic lyrics also grew popular among the peasants. The third chapter explores the distinction between classical folksongs that encode communication of the young people in symbols and draw on the ritual code, and the new love songs that preserve traditional images but lose their symbolic meaning and ritual orientation. The author concludes that these new love songs employ a predominantly poetic vocabulary of emotional expression typical to written culture, their folkloric formulas mixing with new phrases yet unpolished by the tradition and straightforwardly naming certain emotions; a direct relation between “I” and “you” becomes more prominent too. She discusses samples of folksongs that directly name love and openly depict such related emotions as worry, sorrow, or anger, and loveʼs parallel with death. To sum up, it is stated that expressions of personal emotions increasingly become established in the new love songs. Although such expressions are frequently artistically rough and unpolished, they testify to the necessity of mastering new means of poetic expression, acutely felt by the newly literate people. Moreover, the songs also expand the semantic field of love, associating this feeling with intense emotions, overwhelming anxiety and longing, while the absence of love is conceptualized as a failing health and lost inner peace. Obviously, the stylized and frequently sentimental poetic vocabulary of emotional expression, characteristic to individual poetry affected by foreign literature and romances, presented new possibilities to discuss emotions in folksongs. These practices should be regarded mainly as “legitimization” of a new emotionally expressive rhetoric in the sphere of folkloric communication rather than a direct testimony to the experienced feelings.

Reflections of mythical worldview are embedded in traditional oral poetry, viz. Old Icelandic collection of poems Poetic Edda, Old English poem Beowulf, and Lithuanian folk songs. Archaic motifs and archetypal imagery are conveyed by means of poetic grammar (alliteration, kennings, epithets, etc.). Through interpretation, the hidden (symbolic) meaning of the poetic grammar is unveiled, and the connection between the two worlds, the sacred (the divine) and the profane (the human) (Eliade 1959), is exposed. To advance the analysis of poetic narrative, the methodology employed in the paper combines comparative Indo-European poetics (Watkins 1995) and oral-formulaic theory (Kiparsky 1976; Foley 1996). The paper focuses on the poetic narrative’s motifs that encode the archetypal image of the goddess(es) of fate in the Germanic and Baltic traditions. Selected passages from Old Icelandic, Old English, and Lithuanian poetic texts reveal the motif of fate in the following contexts: the establishment of the laws governing human life, the courtship and wedding narrative, the inescapable decrees of misery and death, the warrior’s fame and fate, and the connection between the goddess of fate and the cuckoo bird (in the Lithuanian tradition). The poetic grammar and poetic formulas, in particular, reveal the prototypical characteristics of the supernatural beings who rule fate – Norns, Wyrd, and Laima – and present them as an integral part of the Indo-European mythological system.

The article discusses the world tree as reflected in the Old Icelandic collection of poems the Poetic Edda and in Lithuanian folk songs. The author investigates the poetic diction of the selected sources of traditional oral poetry to disclose their symbolic meaning and connection to myth. The analysis focuses on the poetic manifestations of the world tree as a model of the cosmos and as an evergreen tree of life. The selected Eddic poems and Lithuanian folk songs reveal the significance of the world tree as a structural marker, which defines the relationship of the centre vs. periphery, i.e., the known (organised) vs. the unknown (chaotic) space. The emphasis on the tree's upward orientation is viewed as an implication of its sacred status. The life-giving characteristics of the world tree are explored in relation to the image of dew, which symbolises the fertility and fecundity of nature in the Poetic Edda and the health and fertility of the bride in Lithuanian folk songs.

<p>Poetyka indoeuropejska bada słownictwo wspólne dla różnych języków w ramach całej rodziny językowej. „Mniejsze” tradycje na obszarze indoeuropejskim mają także wspólne elementy mitologiczne. Mitologia porównawcza badająca rolę bogów odsłania następujące warstwy: „magiczną suwerenność (i niebiańskie zarządzanie wszechświatem), moce wojownicze (i zarządzanie niższymi warstwami atmosfery) oraz pełną pokoju płodność (i zarządzanie ziemią, podziemiem i morzem)” (Dumezil 1988: 121). Najistotniejszy aspekt archaicznego obrazu świata przejawia się w sposób następujący: „Życie odbywa się na dwóch płaszczyznach – jest ludzką egzystencją, a jednocześnie ma udział w życiu transludzkim, życiu Kosmosu i bogów” (Eliade 1961: 167). Niniejszy artykuł dotyczy transformacji motywu niebiańskiego ślubu, przejścia od sacrum do profanum z odniesieniem do poetyckiej opowieści Skírnismál i litewskich pieśni ludowych. Przeprowadzono: (1) analizę realizacji motywu mitologicznego w ww. opowieści; (2) odszyfrowanie formuł mitycznych wprzęgniętych w kontekst tej opowieści. W pieśniach ludowych panna młoda i pan młody naśladują czynności swoich niebiańskich pierwowzorów. Motyw trzęsącej się ziemi oddany jest formułami Jörð bifask i žemuže dreba ‘ziemia się trzęsie’, obecnymi w obu tradycjach, i łączy się z metaforycznym „drżeniem panny młodej” w prototypowym mitemie, przywoływanym w celu wyrażenia jej niechęci wyjścia mąż.</p>

This article applies the theory of cognitive semantics as a framework for interpreting the embodiment of the concept of time in two modernist novels written using the stream-ofconsciousness technique: William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying (1930) and Virginia Woolf’s To the Lighthouse (1927). Metaphorical projections of time are investigated as: being based on image schemas, structuring bodily experience, and cross-domain conceptual mappings. The motion of time in accordance with the life events and mental states of the characters is analysed as a reflection of cognitive structures containing the concept of time or referring to it metaphorically. We claim that time in To the Lighthouse is conceptualised by elaborating concepts of distance, space and water, while in As I Lay Dying time is conceptualised in a bidirectional in–out relation with the human body, as a destructive force and as spatial distance. Moreover, as the space of time proposes a model of a continuum in which a certain space may be active only in a certain moment of time, the important notion of being beyond time is discussed. Ultimately, the conclusion is drawn that the conceptualisation of time as distance, noticed in To the Lighthouse, is also found in As I Lay Dying. Both Woolf and Faulkner respond to elusive and obscure modern temporality and succeed in creating links between the past and the present.