Creative artist specializing in both poetry and prose. - A Sorbian journalist, Mina Witkojc, safeguarded the heritage of her culture.
Mina Witkojc, born on May 28, 1893, was the daughter of a Wendish maidservant and an innkeeper from Burg im Spreewald. She studied at the local village school there, where her passion for literature blossomed in higher education. After several years working as a manual labourer in Berlin, she settled in Bautzen in 1922, a city with a larger Sorbian population.
Brought up in a Sorbian family, she had a profound knowledge of the language and customs from a young age. This heritage was reflected in her poems and essays published in Sorbian and German periodicals. Her writing often featured nature imagery to convey her deep affection for her culture and homeland. She also translated poems from other Slavic languages. Eventually, she became the editor of the Lower Sorbian newspaper Serbski Casnik ("Sorbian Newspaper").
Mina Witkojc stood up for Sorbian culture
Aside from her literary pursuits, she was an advocate for her people. She was a member of numerous Sorbian organizations and strived to protect their culture. However, her passionate defense of the Sorbian way of life in the 1930s under the strain of Nazi rule caused disputes. When the Nazi government prohibited the Sorbian languages and completely forbade her to write, she was forced to resign from Serbski Casnik. Her bold and fearless demonstrations of loyalty to her homeland in her texts and poems, as well as her connections with intellectuals from other Slavic nationalities, led to a residence ban in the Dresden and Frankfurt/Oder administrative districts in 1941 and 1942, respectively. This situation drove her to leave the Lausitz region. She was taken into custody in Bautzen for distributing Sorbian-language posters about municipal elections.
In 1954, Mina Witkojc returned to her hometown of Burg and continued to write. She wrote stories and poetry for Nowy Casnik and published a poetry collection entitled K swětłu a słyńcu (To the Light, to the Sun). In 1964, she received the Ćišinski Prize. Despite living in exile, she maintained a significant influence on Sorbian culture until her passing on November 11, 1975.
Today, there are two schools and a library in Burg that bear her name. A street in Cottbus is also named after her. Advocates for the Sorbian language are awarded the Mina-Witkojc Prize.
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Source: www.stern.de
