Čerėja (near Mogilev, Belarus). He graduated from Lycée Janson de Sailly in Paris. In 1920, when France recognized the independence of Lithuania, he was appointed Chargé d’Affaires for Lithuania. His publications included a 1928 collection of 26 Lithuanian songs, Lithuanian Tales and Stories (1930), Lithuanian Tales (1933), and The Origin of the Lithuanian Nation (1937). His mysticism and visions were influenced by Emanuel Swedenborg. Milašius identified as a Lithuanian poet writing in French. Balys Sruoga (1896–1947) wrote dramas based on Lithuanian history or mythology: Milžino paunksmė (Under the Shade of a Giant, 1932), Radvila Perkūnas (Radvila the Thunder, 1935), Baisioji naktis (1935) and Aitvaras teisėjas (1935). During World War II, after the Nazis occupied Lithuania, in March 1943, together with forty-seven other Lithuanian intellectuals, he was sent to Stutthof concentration camp after the Nazis started a campaign against possible anti-Nazi agitation. Based on this experience, Sruoga later wrote his best-known work Dievų miškas (Forest of the Gods, 1957). In this book, Sruoga revealed life in a concentration camp through the eyes of a man whose only way to save his life and maintain his dignity was to view everything through a veil of irony and sarcasm. He exposed both torturers and victims as imperfect human beings, far removed from the false ideals of their political leaders. For example, he wrote "A man is not a machine. He gets tired.", referring to the guards (kapo) beating prisoners. Ieva Simonaitytė (1897–1978) represented the culture of Lithuania Minor and Klaipėda Region, territories of German East Prussia with a large, but dwindling, Lithuanian population. She received critical acclaim for her novel Aukštujų Šimonių likimas (The Fate of Šimoniai from Aukštujai, 1935). Antanas Maceina (1908–1987) - philosopher, existentialist, educator, and poet. His main research objects were philosophy of culture, ethics and religion. In a series of books Maceina discusses the existential questions of being and deals with the old theodicy puzzle concerning the genesis and justification of evil: Didysis inkvizitorius (The Grand Inquisitor, 1950), Jobo drama (The Drama of Job, 1950) and Niekšybės paslaptis (The Secret of Meanness, 1964). Vytautė Žilinskaitė (b. 1930) received, among other awards, two prizes for her children's books, a 1964 Journalists’ Union prize and a 1972 state prize for works classified as humorous or satiric. In 1961 she published Don’t Stop, Little Hour, a collection of poetry. Marcelijus Martinaitis (1936–2013) was a poet and essayist. The main theme of his