Vizma Belševica (May 30, 1931, Riga – August 6, 2005) was a Latvian poet, writer and translator. She was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature. During the post-Soviet period, Belševica wrote three semi-autobiographical books - stories about the girl Bille, following her life from the late 1930s, throughout the first year of Soviet occupation of Latvia (1940–41), the Nazi occupation (1941–45), and the first post-war years under Stalin's Bille (Bille, 1992, 95), Bille un karš (initial Bille dzīvo tālāk) (Bille and War, 1996), Billes skaistā jaunība (The Wonderful Youth of Bille, 1999). This trilogy has been recognized as one of the most important works of Latvian literature. It has been translated into Swedish, but not into English.
