From the left: Fridrihs Milts, Gunars Saliņš, Linards Tauns, Teodors Zeltiņš, Mirdza Nāruna–Bogdanoviča, Vitolts Kalniņš (at a dining table in the artist’s workshop in Fridrihs Milts’ basement). New York, Hell’s Kitchen neighbourhood. Early 1960s. RTMM 552518

Admission ticket (of a humorous nature). Manhattan, New York, USA. 1955–1963. RTMM 833546

View of the neighbourhood of Hell’s Kitchen from above. New York, 1986. RTMM p87380

Would you like to hear a romantic elegy? Would you like me to tell you a story about princes and princesses of poetry as I sip my tea? Or perhaps, in a Dickensian manner, about poverty, dirty stairways, littered streets, homeless people and drunkards?

/Gunars Saliņš in conversation with Aina Zemdega/[1]

The current age of technological development has made us used to dazzling and breathtaking myths being commonplace and within our reach at any moment. Sometimes it is difficult to imagine how the world got by without various social networks – a source of inspiration, a channel of communication, a means of reaching, together with many others, the most pleasant, the most correct or simply the most beautiful lifestyles and kinds of life. But how can we capture and experience the myths that were just as blinding and breath-taking but have remained out of reach in time and space?

Hell’s Kitchen, a neighbourhood in New York, was a real place and not a consciously chosen identity for this group of poets. It was a place, which, by chance, took in some of the people who had fled Latvia after the Second World War. These people – Linards Tauns, Gunars Saliņš, Jānis Krēsliņš, Baiba Bičole, Aina Kraujiete, Rita Gāle, Teodors Zeltiņš, Nikolajs Kalniņš, Sigurds Vīdzirkste and Frīdrihs Milts, among many others – adorned the name of Hell’s Kitchen with various hellish and bohemian descriptions, creating a myth about youth, enviable talent and conquest of a new world.

Hell’s Kitchen is still a neighbourhood in west-central Manhattan. In the early 1950s, Linards Tauns found himself there, and took up a small apartment, which was far from being high-quality or attractive, but was sinfully cheap. Gunars Saliņš recollected: “An entire block of Hell’s Kitchen had a kind of self-appointed landlord captain – a bright and good-natured Latvian, Brunis Igals. He had a weakness for the servants of the Muses. The rent for his pads was minuscule (…). Many Latvians settled between 41st Street and 42nd Street to the west of 10th Avenue – Nikolajs Kalniņš, the writer (Linards shared a room with him in the beginning); Frīdrihs Milts, Igals’ helper and a painter; Vilis Krūmiņš, the graphic artist; Bruno Rozītis, the photographer; Vilis Osītis, a devotee of all art forms; Vitolds Kalniņš, alias Vitauts Kalve, the historian; among many others. As time went by, some moved away, and others passed away, but Hell’s Kitchen long remained our “place of anchor”. (…) In its way, Hell’s Kitchen was like a Latvian republic within a republic, especially because we had veterans with the baggage of the Rīga period among us.”[2] In other words, those who liked to imagine that they could recall everything ever said related to the pristine area that was called the Moscow District (“Maskavas forštate” in Latvian); emotionally, culturally and economically, that’s not far from the truth. During the 1950s, Hell’s Kitchen was a neighbourhood of old houses, not too far from Times Square, “with small, cheap stores, diners and taverns, as well as Salvation Army and Jesus Saves establishments; with sailors and “brothers of the sun” (hobos) in the streets, Puerto Rican and black teens; smelling of the Hudson harbour, fish and food, with aromas from the fruit and vegetable piles all along 9th Avenue; with mooing and smells from slaughterhouses along the dyke, with the foghorns of ocean liners and the noises of the streets and the booming of the docks; with the crush of the traffic from the Lincoln Tunnel and the buses making their way along the winding overpasses to or from the rooftops of the terminal; such was the vibration of Hell’s Kitchen upon arrival: secluded, yet close to main roads and close to everything that was happening in New York.”[3]

Somewhere, amidst these streets and walls, another Hell’s Kitchen was born – something of an abstract myth and a group of living people at once; a group of people who talked, sung, read and drank more than others. J. Sīka wrote in a letter to Ojārs Jēgens: “Jānis Kalmīte lived with me for about a month, painting during the day, and talking and drinking at night. Every night something was happening here. One day the entire gang of poets barged in – Saliņš, Tauns, Zeltiņš, Krēsliņš and Roberts Mūks. It was a very noisy group, all debating passionately and defending their opinions, which they could never agree on.”[4] Generally speaking, this kind of thing was nothing out of the ordinary. However, when looked at from a broader perspective, such power, lust for life, and emotional energy that does not tremble in the face of the future served not only as a source of inspiration to many in the Latvian exile world, but also made them talk about Hell’s Kitchen, entwining around it ever-new narratives – stories, anecdotes, tales of adventures and memories of unbelievable events that had taken place while visiting the already-legendary group. Gunārs Irbe documented his feelings in writing a mere two hours after visiting Hell’s Kitchen: “At first, New York seemed like a sooty hole. After this meeting, it no longer sneered with its cheap lights, the Empire State Building stuck in the clouds, and its half-grey crowds. This metropolis of the world pulsed with Latvian life, and it could be felt and perceived that it was not through imagination alone, but because of a heritage acquired from an old and rich culture, one that we all care for even if we do not call it by its name; it’s at the end of a sentence.” He concluded, “that is why Hell’s Kitchen in the middle of New York is a good place for a home, a place one wants to return to.”

Fragments such as these, captured in letters, notes and even in creative work, in which different people mention coming in contact with this group or give detailed descriptions of the members of the group, can be found in abundance in the collection of the Museum of Literature and Music. The Latvian-language press at that time also included material that was not typical for the printed media. For example, stories about Hell’s Kitchen were published in the magazine Latvija Amerikā. The issue of 9th September, 1959 gives an account of various people and their everyday activities. It mentioned that Jautrīte Saliņa “should be considered as unfashionable non-conformist, refusing to present herself in a photograph in the papers wearing a Master of Arts hat.”[5] In the same issue, some young artists comment on paying someone a visit: “from Anna’s to Marta’s and Zenta’s, we sat on the floor and other cushioned furniture; we sweated, dried our necks with towels and chatted.” It also mentions that “approximately two dozen” poems by Linards Tauns have been translated into English, while Gunars Saliņš “has recently started writing such long poems that the pages of magazines are too short for them”. Would such marginal details attract readers globally? Obviously not. It could be said that if Instagram or Facebook had been available in the USA in the 1960s, the Hell’s Kitchen coterie would have had more followers than any other Latvian group of its kind in New York. And if we look at it from this perspective, publishing information of this nature in a magazine no longer seems so unusual. But can odds and ends of facts and opinions like this, picked up at random, solve the myth of the Hell’s Kitchen poets, their identity and worldviews, and the stories that will be told for future generations?

“Oh, how good it was back then!”, exclaimed Gunars Saliņš during a conversation with Aina Zemdega. “We didn’t have to tell anyone anything or explain anything. It was not mute porridge that we cooked up in that kitchen of New York. We did not keep quiet there, nor did we tiptoe. The black waters of Hudson got goosebumps when we passed them at nights, singing at the top of our lungs. And on poetry mornings, evenings, afternoons and nights, the walls of buildings of New York and New Jersey soaked up the poets’ voices, words and rhythms. Whilst others, the annoyed ones, squabbled and hushed: “It’s impossible! How is that poetry!” (…) What I want to say is – what more is there to say? Read for yourself everything that was written long ago during those days and nights of Hell’s Kitchen!”[6] This leads one to believe that everything of importance has already been said and is readily available.

And so, the myth can be revived by reading the work of the Hell’s Kitchen poets. Of course, it begs the question of whether the myth of Hell’s Kitchen is useful to a present-day Latvian reader. Rita Laima Bērziņa, writing for the oldest exile publication Jaunā gaita about the impact that this group of artists had on Latvian literature and literature published in exile, referred to it as the best poetry written in exile: “This exile (…) poetry did not possess an insipid nostalgia for the lost homeland; it was a synthesis of what had passed and what “was”: a fantastic metropolis, dense with cultures of the world and richness of impressions. Never forgetting their roots, these Latvian “creatives” opened themselves up to new impressions, which created a unique perspective. References to famous artists, musicians and writers from other nations entered their poetry, but at the same time they kept a connection to their past and their Latvian roots.”[7] Writers outside exile occasionally wrote about Hell’s Kitchen or made mention of people associated with it. For example, Kārlis Vērdiņš began his article on Linards Tauns in the May 2007 issue of the journal Karogs[8] with the words: “there are poets who become legends after their deaths.”[9] He also reminded readers about G. Saliņš’s and L. Tauns’ decision to turn to the “new poetry”, deliberately discarding everything of the old.[10] However, it should be admitted that no attempts to redefine, adapt or make this myth current among modern Latvian readers in Latvia itself have been noticed. It appears that the Latvian public in Latvia is mostly interested in the poetic heritage of Hell’s Kitchen, which is (indisputably) high-quality.

“My neighbourhood is real – just like this bar is,” Linards Tauns said, speaking of the nearby Lidotāju Krogs; the dark-skinned population, who were increasing in number in the neighbourhood; and about the fact that it most definitely can’t be considered a criminal neighbourhood and that he respects it more than Greenwich Village (the artistic neighbourhood of New York).[11] It is likely that the creative work of all of the Latvian poets of New York, both those who are still read and those who are forgotten, is also real – the texts, the music, the artworks, which, when all combined together, create a kind of magic, a not quite fully formulated reality. Perhaps the myth of Hell’s Kitchen poets cannot be solved without losing the “realness” that L. Tauns spoke of. However, the fact that Hell’s Kitchen never belonged to anyone means that everyone can get to know it and become personally involved.

“Apmežosim Ņujorku“: read by Gunārs Saliņš. Before the reading, he spoke to Māra Krēsliņa. (RTMM p45974)

Under the photographs: “Plīvošana ar izkārtnēm” read by Linards Tauns. (RTMM p45498)

[1] Zemdega, A. Saliņš, G. “Pastāsti par Elles ķēķi.” Jaunā Gaita. No. 182. August 1988.

[2] Saliņš, G. “IEDVESMAS no Naudītes līdz Elles ķēķim.” Editor: Laila Saliņa.

[3] Ibid.

[4] 6th June, 1959, New York. RTMM 715947, O. Jēg K13/40

[5] Skorpions. “Viesības ar dvieļiem.” Latvija Amerikā. 9th September, 1959.

[6] Zemdega, A. “Pastāsti par Elles ķēķi.” Jaunā Gaita. No. 168. August 1988.

[7] Bērziņa, Rita, L. Jaunā Gaita. No. 286. Pp. 17.

[8] Vērdiņš, K. “Atkalredzēšanās ar Linardu.” Magazine Karogs. No. 5. 2007. Pp. 91.

[9] Kārkliņš, V. “Dzejnieks Elles ķēķī.” Laika Mēnešraksts. No. 5. Pp. 91.

[10] Ibid., pp. 93.

[11] Ibid.