Gallery"Zelta Zirgs" and its symbols
Literary historians unanimously acknowledge "Zelta Zirgs" as Rainis' finest play. Its material is taken from an Estonian folk tale about a princess asleep atop a glass mountain for seven years. Woven into it are motifs from Latvian folk tales as well as the author's own creations. The play is straightforward, clear, convincing from start to finish. Its words are alive and expressive. "Zelta Zirgs" prove adults something to think about, while entertaining children with a wonderful tale: forest spirits, the princess Saulcerīte atop the glass mountain, and Antiņš, who rescues the princess, bringing her down from the mountain.
In the roles "Zelta Zirgs" comprises, one encounters three symbolic clarifications. The first is already encountered in the subtitle, namely — "a soltice story," which expresses the changes of the seasons: symbolism which has as its foundation an ancient Sun myth. In the text of the play we find unmistakeable indications for such a conclusion. For example, about the poor father — the White Father says:
Your beloved father has died,
Gone, like the old year...
Later, in dialog with the Black Mother, the White Father makes it even clearer:
A father is a year with the seasons of the year,
The new Spring will make repose.
In such an interpretation we can easily imagine the symbols of other roles: the evil prince — the power of winter; the Black Mother — rigor and death; while Antiņš — spring-time, the awakening of nature — the princess Saulcerīte, and the White Father — life in a thousand aspects, which transforms into a lark, the harbinger of Spring.
"Great days! Great days", the people rejoice.1
In the second clarification, Saulcerīte, the princess, is a symbol of the people's lives and freedom, held by a foreign power, and Antiņš — bearer of the Sun, carrying the people's awaited freedom, while the seven ravens — seven centuries under foreign domination.
Here, too, we can find additional symbols among the players: the evil prince — leader of foreign powers, the Black Mother — harbinger of death and destruction, while the White Father — as if a fairy-tale God, guardian of the people's inate strength.
The third clarification, the most important, related to the person of Antiņš.
Indeed, seeing Antiņš selflessly develop into a full-fledged ethical person who is able to renounce his own good by serving others — that is the motif in the play which touches us the most. He gives away his clothes to a beggar, to lost children — kindling for fire, and for princess Saulcerīte — prepared to sacrifice even his own life.
But the White Father offers comfort:
He takes what he returns,
He makes what he loses!
He also teaches Antiņš, when he has doubts, that a hero must be so clear, loving, and strong as the sum, that he must sacrifice his life, his desires, for the sake of others. And he need not listen to what others have to say:
He will fall, who listens to gossip;
He will fall, who strays from his goal...
Words, son, swirl like the winds.
Trust the fire, not the wind!
Antiņs heeds these lessons and indeed receives, when he gives away: the lost children return as spirits of the dawn and awaken him:
I — a kind word, which you said
I — a good thing, which you gave
I — your compassion for strangers...
The spirits also urge Antiņš, to "recite the chant" as the White Father taught. Then the neighing horse will run to him with clothes, for:
Atop the glass mountain, in an ice casket
The princess awaits you...
The copper and silver horses do not yet carry Antiņš to the mountaintop, for he is still thinking about his own good. But when he is truly "able to give himself up completely", the golden horse helps Antiņš to triumph. The feast starts at the castle, while the Black Mother and ravens put the evil prinxce in the ice coffin and whisk him away. Good triumphs, as in all folk tales, the wicked punished.
This molding of Antiņš into a hero, from a development standpoint, is the most significant. According to Jānis Veselis: "The world could be saved from the greatest calamity, if also in other, particularly the largest, peoples rules such a self-sacrificing, selfless spirit of heroism."
"Zelta Zirgs" was written in exile (Switzerland) 55 years ago [as of 1965]. As we now honor Rainis with this production in commemorating the 100th anniversary of his birth, let us wish that Antiņš, as the Bringer of the Sun comes again to us — exiles, and invites us to a new moral clarity, selflessness, and heroism.
N. Kalniņš
— our translation
More reading
- We highly recommend Vilis Inde's translation of Zelta Zirgs. It includes extensive background materials essential to understanding the play, its historical context, and its significance in Latvian culture. Purchase at Amazon
- Another treasure unearthed earlier in 2021 was Maira Bundža's, the Princess Saulcerīte's, costume including her vainags, Latvian folk costume crown, at lapamuzejs.lv (IN LATVIAN)
| 1 | Lieldienas in Latvian, for the spring equinox, Lielās Dienas, co-opted as Easter by Christian missionaries. |
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