Irenos Ermanytės nuopelnai leksikografijai

VIOLETA ČERNĖ Institute of the Lithuanian Language IRENA ERMANYTĖ’S CONTRIBUTIONS TO LEXICOGRAPHY VIOLETA ČERNĖ. Irenos Erm anytės nuopelnai leksikografijai | 2 Together with colleagues Bronius Savukynas, Aleksandras Vanagas, Vytautas Vitkauskas, and Klementina Vosylytė, she prepared the Gazetteer of Lithuanian SSR Rivers and Lakes (1963). Irena contributed to the collection of data for the Atlas of the Lithuanian Language, vols. 1–3 (1977–1991) (Zinkevičius 1994: 252–253; Sabaliauskas 2012: 247–250). Later she moved to the Dictionary Division and devoted all her energies to the Word, which was gathered into the twenty volumes of the scholarly Dictionary of the Lithuanian Language. Thus I. Ermanytė took the main road of lexicography, immersed herself in dictionary-making, and devoted herself to work that, in the linguist’s words, demands iron patience, intense concentration, and extraordinary endurance1. All lexicographers, according to Vytautas Vitkauskas, pioneer of Lithuanian terminological lexicography and editor-in-chief of vols. XVII–XX of the Dictionary of the Lithuanian Language, needed to understand semantics, even the minutiae of dialects, historical grammar, and all kinds of peculiarities in old writings, and to present them all scientifically (Vitkauskas 2001: 2). Leafing through the Dictionary of the Lithuanian Language, often called the Great Dictionary, we find I. Ermanytė’s name as a dictionary-text writer beginning with volume IX (1973). In his History of Lithuanian Language Studies, the historian of linguistics, Professor Algirdas Sabaliauskas, states that Irena wrote about 110 author’s sheets of text for the scholarly Dictionary of the Lithuanian Language, from volume IX through volume XVIII (Sabaliauskas 2012: 247–250). The lexicographer took cards from the boxes assigned to her, sorted words by meaning, distinguished primary and figurative meanings, and carefully checked the sources. And so, from palnyčiai to pamplūtis, from peikikas to penėgubas, from piestà to piktasnikus (vol. IX, 1973), from plėstrà to parplėžuoti, from pradiedas to prametūmas, from provėieniu to puikžolė (vol. X, 1976), from r to rai tšulė, from rūgtiniai to užrupšnoti (vol. XI, 1978), from savìtaiga to sekšmė, from skylė to skriestūvas (vol. XII, 1981), from spievokas to spyžius, from spjovà to spraktūkas, from stòp to stovimóji (vol. XIII, 1984), from sùltė to suńkvežimis, from sutrūkelis to pasverdúoti, from šaudalai to užščūti, from šliùbas to šliuožti (vol. XIV, 1986), from šliùp to šnėruoti, from tākas to talpūs, from teišku to užtektinùmas (vol. XV, 1991), from traìnis to traškė, from trauktūkas to treputė, from trìbelė to trimitúotojas (vol. XVI, 1995), from turguolė to turtúotas, from valdīnis to valgùs (vol. XVII, 1996). The work continued steadily, and volume XVII of the Dictionary of the Lithuanian Language appeared, with I. Ermanytė’s name listed both among the text writers and the editors. In 1996, in recognition of her work on the Dictionary of the Lithuanian Language, Irena, together with other institute lexicographers, was awarded the prestigious Science Prize of the Republic of Lithuania. Palnyčiai burst into Irena’s life—or perhaps, rather, antonyms quietly came knocking. In an interview, Irena once remarked that lexicographer Jonas had steered her toward this field. 1 Interview of the author of these lines with I. Ermanytė, 2007 04 21. Audio recording from the author’s archive. BENDRINĖ KALBA 90 (2017) www.bendrinekalba.lt ISSN 2351-7204 VIOLETA ČERNĖ. Irenos Erm antytės nuopelnai leksikografijai | 3 Paulauskas, kuris visaip skatino jaunąją kolegę (Babickienė 1997: 14–18). Beje, žodynininką J. Paulauską I. Ermanytė laiko savo Mokytoju. 1973 m., turėdama dešimties metų leksikografinio darbo patirtį, – o liaudies išmintis byloja, kad be praktikos ir ausin nepataikysi, – Irena pradėjo kaupti lietuvių kalbos antonimų kartoteką (Ermanytė 2008: 134). Teorijos klausimus gvildeno studijuodama rusų, anglų, vokiečių kalbininkų darbus. 1985 m. iš spaudos išėjo I. Ermanytės parengtas Lietuvių kalbos antonimų žodynas, pirmas tokio pobūdžio specialusis žodynas Lietuvoje, dar palyginti nedidelės apimties, jame pateikta apie 920 antoniminių porų (Ermanytė 1985: 8). 1 PAV. I. Ermanytė. Lietuvių kalbos antonimų žodynas. Kaunas: Šviesa, 1985. In 1994, I. Ermanytė defended her dissertation externally, Lithuanian-language antonymy and antonyms (supervisor A. Vanagas). Although the linguist continued to devote most of her energy to work on the Dictionary of the Lithuanian Language, writing and editing it, antonyms remained a particular focus. In 2002, the School Dictionary of Lithuanian Antonyms appeared, augmented with new data and a richer range of illustrative material. The dictionary’s “Introduction” explains that the work is an attempt to create a normative educational School Dictionary of Lithuanian Antonyms that teachers could use to teach pupils vivid language (Ermanytė 2002: 6). BENDRINĖ KALBA 90 (2017) www.bendrinekalba.lt ISSN 2351-7204 VIOLETA ČERNĖ. Irenos Erm enytės nuopelnai leksikografijai | 4 2 PAV. I. Erm anytė. Mokyklinis lietuvių kalbos antonimų žodynas. Kaunas: Šviesa, 2002. Soon we were able to read and study the substantial, nearly 600-page Dictionary of Antonyms (2003). This work of Lithuanian lexicography is the result of lengthy work that demanded extensive knowledge and meticulous care (Jakaitienė 2005: 176–182). In the “Introduction,” the dictionary’s author admits that collecting and systematizing the antonyms was no easy task. She gleaned illustrative material from a wide variety of sources, of course first and foremost from volumes I–XX of the Dictionary of the Lithuanian Language, the Dictionary of the Lithuanian Language Supplement Card Index, collections of folklore, works by Lithuanian literary classics—Antanas Baranauskas, Kristijonas Donelaitis, Balys Sruoga, Vaižgantas, Motiejus Valančius, Antanas Vienuolis, and Žemaitė—the Holy Scripture and the New Testament, and periodicals (Ermanytė 2003: V–XII). This Dictionary of Antonyms contains 5,259 antonym entries. Some words form many antonym pairs: for example, kalnas (“mountain”) has thirteen, džiaugsmas (“joy”) eleven, pakilti (“rise”) ten, žalias (“green”) nine pairs, darbas (“work”) eight, atsikėlti (“get up”) seven, and so on. The dictionary also includes synonyms. For example, under angelas, meaning “good spirit,” come the evil spirits demonas, šėtonas, velnias, vėlnis (“demon, Satan, devil, fiend”); beside kalniau, meaning “more uphill,” the words kloniaŭ, lobiāu, lomiāu, pakalniaŭ are listed alphabetically; beside kalvūs (“hilly”) are dubūs, lomūs, slėnūs, slėsnūs (“hollow, low-lying, valley-like, sunken”); next to kilnū – meñka, niekšinga, žẽma (“of noble character” – “mean, vile, low”) and so forth. Perhaps, as the French poet Charles Baudelaire says, the flowers of virtue cannot bloom without the flowers of evil. Leafing through the Dictionary of Antonyms, it is striking that nearly all parts of speech display antonymy, including interjections. BENDRINĖ KALBA 90 (2017) www.bendrinekalba.lt ISSN 2351-7204 VIOLETA ČERNĖ. Irenos Ermანტytės nuopelnai leksikografijai | 5 (for example, márš - stòp), nor prepositions (for example, į – iš). The dictionary also includes idioms originating in antonym pairs, for example, sooner or later; [both] cold and hot; [both] winter [and] summer, and so on. The overall lexicographic quality is enhanced by the “Index of Antonym Entries” (Jakaitienė 2005: 176–182). The Dictionary of Antonyms was edited by lexicographer Dr. J. Paulauskas. 3 PAV. I. Ermантytė. Antonimų žodynas. Vilnius: Lietuvių kalbos institutas, 2003. I. Ermanytė explored issues related to antonyms in various articles. For example: The Stylistic Functions of Words with Two Contradictory Meanings (Language Culture 42, 1982), On the Meanings and Use of Antonyms in Language (Language Culture 46, 1984), Antonymous Meanings of the Same Verb (Language Culture 61, 1991), Contextual Antonyms (Language Culture 65, 1993), Opposition as the Semantic and Logical Basis of Antonymy (Issues in Lithuanian Linguistics 35, 1995), A Few Remarks on Enantiosemy (Issues in Lithuanian Linguistics 37, 1997), Idioms Originating in Antonym Pairs (Native Language 6, 2004), Notes on the Structure and Semantics of Antonyms (Language Culture 77, 2004). In 2008, the Institute of the Lithuanian Language published I. Ermanytė’s monograph Antonymy and Antonyms. In this work, the author discusses the theory of antonyms, examines the links between antonymy, polysemy, and synonymy, and provides a comprehensive overview of the experience accumulated by Lithuanian, Russian, German, and English linguists in examining theoretical and methodological issues in the study of antonymy. The monograph devotes considerable attention to enantiosemy—a linguistic phenomenon in which the same word has two opposing meanings. BENDRINĖ KALBA 90 (2017) www.bendrinekalba.lt ISSN 2351-7204 VIOLETA ČERNĖ. Irenos Ermanytės nuopelnai leksikografijai | 6 4 PAV. I. Ermanytė. Antonimija ir antonimai. Vilnius: Lietuvių kalbos institutas, 2008. I. Ermanytė calls antonyms the great love of her life. Whether she is listening to the radio or reading, she already hears or sees pairs of antonyms. Irena says that she thinks in antonyms, cannot live without them, and even dreams about them at night. Incidentally, when the author of these lines asked the Jubilant this summer whether that love had faded, the answer was: “Oh, no!” I. Ermanytė did not limit herself to these works. She is one of the authors of the Dictionary of Phraseology. Alongside Irena, the Institute of the Lithuanian Language lexicographers Ona Kažukauskaitė, Gertrūda Naktinienė, Jonas Paulauskas, Zita Šimėnaitė, and Angelė Vilutytė-Rimševičienė worked on the idioms. This nearly nine-hundred-page work of Lithuanian lexicography was published in 2001. For her work on the Dictionary of Phraseology, I. Ermanytė, together with the other dictionary makers, received the Lithuanian Republic Science Award (2002). I. Ermanytė’s work (along with that of other colleagues) on the School Dictionary of International Words is also worth mentioning; it appeared in four editions—in 1995, 1998, 2000, and 2010. Another important area of the linguist’s work was collecting words on field expeditions, which the future lexicographer joined while in her fourth year of study. Irena first went to collect words in 1958, travelling to Varniai. The expedition was led by the future professor Vladas BENDRINĖ KALBA 90 (2017) www.bendrinekalba.lt ISSN 2351-7204 VIOLETA ČERNĖ. Irenos Ermanytės nuopelnai leksikografijai | 7 Grinaveckis. Later, while working at the Institute, she crisscrossed nearly all of Lithuania. Irena even had occasion to talk with a shepherd sitting among the cows2. She knew how to draw out the villagers, so that they would open their hearts, let their memories flow, and pour out the riches of their language. In 1962, I. Ermanytė and her colleagues spoke with people in Akmenė and Mažeikiai; in 1963, they collected dialect vocabulary in Vėšėvnos (Telšiai district) and Zervynos (Varėna district); in 1964, their travels took them to Gadūnavas (Telšiai district) and Gegužinė (Kaišiadorys district); in 1971, they collected material for the Dictionary of the Lithuanian Language in Pelsoja, Ródūnia, and Gervėčiai. In 1972, she set off for Žilinai (Varėna district); in 1973, she made her way to Kruopiai (Akmenė district); the following year, she travelled to Rūdninkai. She collected linguistic data in Punsk and Sejny. And what of the Kupiškis region and the environs of Rokiškis?! More than 20,000 dialect lexical items were recorded. Like the other word collectors, Irena went on her first expeditions without a tape recorder, writing everything by hand in notebooks and pocketbooks, of which she has amassed a whole stack. Many of the sentences she recorded now live on in the pages of the Dictionary of the Lithuanian Language. 2 Interview of I. Ermanytė by the author of these lines, 2007 04 21. Audio recording from the author’s archive. BENDRINĖ KALBA 90 (2017) www.bendrinekalba.lt ISSN 2351-7204 VIOLETA ČERNĖ. Irenos Erm anytės nuopelnai leksikografijai | 8 FIG. 5. I. Erm anytė on a word-collecting expedition (1971, Gervėčiai) FIG. 6. An excerpt from I. Erm anytė’s notebook. 1964 word-collecting expedition (Gegužinė, Kaišiadorių district) BENDRINĖ KALBA 90 (2017) www.bendrinekalba.lt ISSN 2351-7204 VIOLETA ČERNĖ. Irenos Erm anytės nuopelnai leksikografijai | 9 Lexicography and lexicology were not the only fields that drew Irena’s attention. She was also interested in Lithuanian language culture, toponymy, and other subjects that found their way into articles and short pieces in Lietuvių kalbotyros klausimai (Acta Linguistica Lithuanica), Kalbos kultūra, Gimtoji kalba, and other publications. Here are a few: S. Daukanto offering and other words from the same root (1967), Clock and newspaper (1967), The Language of the Earth (1968, with K. Eigminas), Nature and character (1969), View, perspective, and their synonyms (1971), Noble and lofty (1972), Work, activity, and creativity (1974), and so on. I. Erm anytė translated scholarly literature from Latvian. Years later, Irena would call her work on the two-volume Encyclopedia of Mythology (1997–1999), which she translated together with other translators3, “a workout for the mind.” There is no way to list here all the work linguist I. Erm anytė did for the benefit of the Lithuanian language. It seems that each of us has a certain side to our personality. Irena, whom colleagues and friends call Irutė, is no exception. You will never hear Irena speak ill of anyone. Wonderful, sincere, warm, radiant, subtle, knowing every dialect down to the tiniest detail, with the penetrating thought of a Suvalkian4... In these colors, I. Erm anytė paints portraits of the people with whom she had the opportunity to work and socialize. Perhaps that is why her colleagues speak of Irena only with respect. And a kind word is better than a gift. LITERATŪRA Babickienė Z. 1997: „Kalba yra sistema, prilygstanti tiksliesiems mokslams“ (pokalbis su I. Erm anyte). – Gimtoji kalba 8, 14–18. Erm anytė I. 2008: Antonimija ir antonimai, Vilnius: Lietuvių kalbos institutas. Erm anytė I. 2003: Antonimų žodynas, Vilnius: Lietuvių kalbos institutas. Erm anytė I. 2007: Bibliografijos rodyklė. Sudarė Zita Šimėnaitė, Vilnius: Lietuvių kalbos institutas. Erm anytė I. 1985: Lietuvių kalbos antonimų žodynas, Kaunas: Šviesa. Erm anytė I. 2002: Mokyklinis lietuvių kalbos antonimų žodynas, Kaunas: Šviesa. Jakaitienė E. 2005: [Recenzija]. Acta Linguistica Lithuanica LII, Vilnius: Lietuvių kalbos institutas. 3 Šių eilučių autorės pokalbis su I. Erm anyte 2007 04 21. Garso įrašas iš autorės archyvo. 4 Šių eilučių autorės pokalbis su I. Erm anyte 2007 04 21. Garso įrašas iš autorės archyvo. BENDRINĖ KALBA 90 (2017) www.bendrinekalba.lt ISSN 2351-7204 VIOLETA ČERNĖ. Irenos Ermanytės nuopelnai leksikografijai | 10 LKE 2008: Lietuvių kalbos enciklopedija. Sudarė Kazys Morkūnas, redagavo Vytautas Ambrazas. 2-as patiksl. ir papild. leidimas, Vilnius: Mokslo ir enciklopedijų leidybos institutas. Sabaliauskas A. 2012: Lietuvių kalbos tyrinėjimo istorija, 1980–2010 m., Vilnius: Lietuvių kalbos institutas. VLE 2004: Visuotinė lietuvių enciklopedija 5, Vilnius: Mokslo ir enciklopedijų leidybos institutas. Vitkauskas V. 2001: Esame vos ne nušvilpti ir neminėtin i. – Literatūra ir menas, Nr. 48 (2876), lapkričio 30. Zinkevičius Z. 1994: Lietuvių kalbos istorija 6: Lietuvių kalba naujausiais laikais, Vilnius: Mokslo ir enciklopedijų leidykla. Gauta 2017 09 28 VIOLETA ČERNĖ Lietuvių kalbos institutas Petro Vileišio g. 5, LT-10308 Vilnius [email protected] BENDRINĖ KALBA 90 (2017) www.bendrinekalba.lt ISSN 2351-7204