Gabrielė Petkevičaitė (; 18 March 1861 – 14 June 1943) was a Lithuanian educator,ėPetkevičaitėBitė writer, and activist. Her pen name Bitė (Bee) eventually became part of her last name. Encouraged by Povilas Višinskis, she joined public life and started her writing career in 1890, becoming a prominent member of the Lithuanian National Revival. She was the founder and chair of the Žiburėlis society to provide financial aid to struggling students, one of the editors of the newspaper Lietuvos žinios, and an active member of the women's movement. In 1920, she was elected to the Constituent Assembly of Lithuania and chaired its first session. Her realist writing centered on exploring the negative impact of the social inequality. Her largest work, two-part novel Ad astra (1933), depicts the rising Lithuanian National Revival. Together with Žemaitė, she co-wrote several plays. Her diary, kept during World War I, was published in 1925–1931 and 2008–2011.
Biography
Early life and education
Petkevičaitė was born in Puziniškis Manor, Panevėžys district to a family of Lithuanian nobility. Her father, a graduate of Kiev University, was a doctor and became director of a hospital in Joniškėlis. He sympathized with Russian Narodniks who emphasized service to the common folk. When she was nine, Petkevičaitė's mother died of typhus and as the eldest child she began looking after her five brothers despite her own disability (deformed spine). Duty and service to others continued to be a prominent part of Petkevičaitė's life and work. She received education at home from Laurynas Ivinskis (in 1866–1868) and other private tutors. After graduation from a private girls' school in Jelgava () in 1878, Petkevičaitė worked with her father in a pharmacy and privately tutored in Lithuanian, violating the Lithuanian press ban. She wanted to continue her education and study mathematics at a university, but her father would not allow it and she felt trapped in the provincial life by her family duties and management of the manor. She completed beekeeping courses in Deltuva in 1885 and even wrote a booklet on beekeeping in 1889, but it was not published. In February 1885, she became the godmother of her cousin, Sofija Chodakauskaitė.
Public work in Russian Empire
Her first article was published in Varpas in 1892 and dealt with women's issues. In 1893, she established the Žiburėlis society to provide financial aid to struggling students and became its driving force. In 1894, she met Povilas Višinskis who gave her Piršlybos (The Proposal), the first manuscript by Žemaitė. The work was edited by Jonas Jablonskis for grammar and spelling and published launching Žemaitė's literary career. Together with Višinskis she staged the first legal Lithuanian-language theater performance. The simple comedy, America in the Bathhouse, was performed in August 1899 in Palanga. After the death of Vincas Kudirka, she edited a regular column in Varpas. She was also a member of the Imperial Russian Geographical Society and contributed articles on ethnographic topics to its publications.
In 1905, she attended the Great Seimas of Vilnius which resolved to demand wide political autonomy for Lithuania within the Russian Empire. She was one of the organizers and chairwoman of the First Congress of Lithuanian Women in 1907 and helped organizing the Lithuanian Women's Union. Petkevičaitė and other more liberal activists' conflict with Lithuanian clergy led to the creation of the separate Catholic-minded Lithuanian Catholic Women's Organization. In December 1908, together with Žemaitė, she participated in the First All-Russian Women's Congress the held by the League for Women's Equality. She read a report on Lithuanian women in family and public life, in villages and cities. The expanded report was published in Lithuania in 1910. In June 1911, she attended the Sixth Conference of the International Woman Suffrage Alliance in Stockholm.