Museum Person of the Year – Liuda Skripkienė, Editor at the Palace of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania

Liuda Skripkienė, Senior Editor at the Exhibition and Publishing Department of the Palace of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania, was named Museum Person of the Year. The Museum community traditionally awards the most outstanding employee of the past year. This was the eleventh time that the award was presented. L. Skripkienė was recognized for her professionalism, careful and responsible approach to text, and meaningful contribution to the museum's publishing and exhibition projects. The editor's work was recognized for her ability to look not only at the language of the text, but also at its content – sensitively and deeply, working with the authors to find the best solution, regardless of the length or scientific value of the text. This consistent and meticulous work confidently strengthens the culture of the Museum's publications and exhibitions.

"It was a complete surprise to me. After all, an editor is usually invisible, but the mistakes they leave behind are very noticeable," says Liuda Skripkienė, senior editor and Museum Person of the Year at the Palace of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania. The daily routine of an editor, the kitchen of a wordsmith, and artificial intelligence in conversation with L. Skripkienė.

 

I was somewhat shocked when Vydas Dolinskas, director of the Palace of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania, called to tell me that I had been selected. I said, "Are you serious?" I thought he was joking. Now I've calmed down, but I see it more as recognition of the meaningfulness of editorial work in general, confirming the well-known truth that every job done sincerely is important, meaningful, and valued.

 

The work of an editor is difficult to quantify. Of course, we can evaluate it in terms of press coverage or authorial lines, but quantity does not always reflect the amount of work put in, because not all texts are the same: some can be read very easily, just by skimming through them, while others can take you all day to get through a few pages. Museum publications are really complex—they are heavy exhibition catalogs, conference materials, scientific works—they require a lot of refinement and meticulous work.

Sometimes I wonder how editors used to work before the internet existed. Today, of course, it's easier, as you can find a lot of things online. But there are still quite a few open windows. First of all, of course, there are Lithuanian language dictionaries – now most of them are conveniently compiled on one website, the Lithuanian Language Resource Information System "E. kalba". I can't imagine how I would work without the World Place Name Dictionary, the Historical Place Name Database, the encyclopedia, and sometimes I also have to use name lists, the Surname Database, and many other sources. However, sometimes I have to look for information in paper publications because I need to check a page in the bibliography, so the search takes quite a long time.

We have to do this kind of research work. For example, when preparing for the last exhibition of Napoleon Orda's watercolors, we compiled a map of the places the artist visited and depicted. Some of these places have now been erased from the maps of those countries—the villages or towns no longer exist, they have been incorporated into larger cities, or they belonged to one country and now belong to another, and their names have been changed. We had to find Lithuanian equivalents that could have been or could be used to name the area, which required a lot of knowledge and effort: searching, trying to find some kind of system based on old names, and Lithuanising them. There is no end to such work.

Sometimes an author comes up with their own term or interprets a foreign word in their own way. I see this as a necessary part of collaboration, after all, each of the people I work with, whether they are authors or exhibition curators, are specialists in their field, so I can only express my opinion based on the information I have found, give advice, but the final decision always lies, or at least should lie, with the author, researcher, or copywriter. I feel more confident if the problem is only related to language, then I can insistently ask for attention to be paid to one thing or another. On the other hand, we were taught that an editor can never impose their opinion, they can only advise, and the author decides what will happen, so it should be left to the author's responsibility. Sometimes I do that, but it's rare; most of the time, we manage to agree on the best solution so that the text doesn't suffer scientifically, but is also easy for the reader to understand.

The work of an editor is both an art and a science, because it is necessary to preserve the author's voice so that the style is recognizable, but at the same time to edit it so that it is easy to read and there are no ambiguities. This comes with experience; you gain more courage to suggest changes.

I can tell who wrote almost 80% of the texts received by the museum (laughs), of course, if they are authors who write regularly. In addition, I can often tell from the text whether it was written by a young person or an older person, because certain sentence structures and specific vocabulary are used.

The most interesting and relevant ones are those related to literature, as I am a philologist. At the Palace of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania, I had the opportunity to contribute to several very large and significant projects, the first of which was an exhibition dedicated to Adam Mickiewicz, or more precisely, his poem Pan Tadas. I found it particularly interesting because it linked both literary and historical contexts, revealing one through the other. We also published a catalog containing several excellent articles by Polish authors, but the translations were quite tricky and required a lot of work. Nevertheless, I am happy with the result.

The exhibitions about the Dukes of Radziwill and the Pac family of nobles were unforgettable – impressive simply because of their scope, and memorable because of the work involved in creating countless label descriptions and genealogical charts. After all, you probably appreciate most what requires the most effort.

It depends. Sometimes artificial intelligence can help you find what you are looking for: tell you where to look. Or, for example, it can ask whether a term is used and how many times it has been used in historical texts, because sometimes you wonder: did I come up with this, or is it actually legitimate? When it comes to editing, there is no competition yet, so let those artificial intelligence tools continue to improve. After all, language is not just a means of exchanging information, it is also a way of sharing feelings and emotions, and this is certainly not the strong point of artificial intelligence.

I try to avoid this, but I do notice it. However, if we are communicating on a daily basis, it is not so important to me how a person speaks, what words they use, and how they stress them, as my own pronunciation is certainly not perfect. However, when speaking in public, as well as in publications and works of fiction, I do notice certain things that irritate me. For example, the use of incorrect syntactic constructions, such as the preposition "apie" (about), borrowed from English. The use of words in the wrong sense and a lack of understanding of semantics are also annoying.

I am probably one of those people who have managed to turn their hobby into a job, speaking more about fiction. However, even though I hardly have any time left to read for pleasure, I listen to audiobooks. This allows me to combine several hobbies: long walks and reading books. I won't stand out with my travels – we all love to travel. Another activity that allows me to escape from everyday life is the book club. I attend the Rara publishing house book club, where we meet every few months to discuss the books published by this publishing house. Meeting other readers, translators, and editors is enriching—you understand how differently a text can be perceived and hear new insights.