Дмитрий Чижевский versus Роман Якобсон (Opuscula Slavica Sedlcensia, Vol. VI) by Roman Mnich

Abstract

Reviewed by: Дмитрий Чижевский versus Роман Якобсон (Opuscula Slavica Sedlcensia, Vol. VI) by Roman Mnich Ostap Kin (bio) Oksana Blashkiv i Roman Mnich. Дмитрий Чижевский versus Роман Якобсон (Opuscula Slavica Sedlcensia, Vol. VI). Siedlce: Instytut Kultury Regionalnej i Badań Literackich im. Franciszka Karpińskiego, 2016. 232 c., илл. Список архивов. Избранная библиография. ISBN: ISBN: 978-83-64884-61-0. It is tempting to start a review of this book with a quote from a wellknown novel: This being Tuesday, he could walk over to his favorite haunt immediately after lunch and stay there till dinner time. No gallery connected Waindell College Library with any other buildings, but it was intimately and securely connected with Pnin's heart. … Besides the big book under his right arm, he carried in his left hand his brief case, an old Central European-looking, black portfel', and this he swung rhythmically by its leathern grip as he marched to his books, to his scriptorium in the stacks, to his paradise of Russian lore.1 The man heading to his books, to his scriptorium, is believed to be [End Page 283] the scholar Dmytro Chyzhevsky.2 (The other protagonist of the book under review is Roman Jakobson, who was not on good terms with the author of the cited work, Vladimir Nabokov, either.) Allegedly, Nabokov was furious at the way Chyzhevsky prepared his commentary to an American edition of Alexander Pushkin's Eugene Onegin, and therefore ostensibly mocked the scholar by portraying him as the absent-minded, bizarre character called professor Timofey Pnin. It is, of course, not the goal of this review to verify or refute this thesis, but the idea is so attention-grabbing that one simply cannot pass it by that easily: the larger-than-life figure of Chyzhevsky is both inspiring and elusive. It calls for biographical research and almost defies it. The publication under review consists of six chapters. Chapters 2–5 are authored by Oksana Blashkiv; chapters 1 and 6, by Roman Mnich. Their work is dedicated to the intriguing story of the inception of Slavic studies in the United States after World War II. The book poses a set of questions: among them, the question of the impact and contribution of Ukrainian scholars in general, and of Chyzhevsky in particular, to the Slavic field in the West. The volume, it may also seem, is about scholarly competition between two eminent figures who had different fates. In the end, both scholars contributed tremendously to what is known now as Slavic studies. Chapter 1 looks into the resonance produced by scholarly works authored by Chyzhevsky and Jakobson. The author compares and contrasts the way these figures are remembered (and appreciated) in the academic world. The differences are significant: Jakobson's writings are better known and, more important, more often studied, cited, republished, and translated than Chyzhevsky's oeuvre.3 Ironically, as Mnich points out, the "Hegel Prize was received not by the author of the monograph Gegel v Rossii and the editor of the book Gegel u slavian [meaning Chyzhevsky] but by his eternal friend/foe/critic who actually never particularly studied Hegel" (Pp. 49–50). Mnich also introduces Jakobson's ties with Ukrainian intellectuals: his correspondence with the poet Pavlo Tychyna and [End Page 284] the linguist Vasyl' Simovych, and the story of the publication of his article in Ukrainian translation in the journal Vaplite, edited by Mykola Khvyl'ovyi. Chyzhevsky and Jakobson made their way to the Czech Republic under dissimilar circumstances. Jakobson officially left Soviet Russia in 1920 to work at the Soviet diplomatic mission in Prague, whereas Chyzhevsky had to flee the country in 1921 lest he be arrested and likely executed because of his political affiliation (he was a member of the Menshevik party). Another difference, which is huge, the author argues, is the way both scholars were perceived in the Soviet Union. Jakobson traveled to the Soviet Union as many as seven times, while Chyzhevsky was not only barred from the country but his name was not allowed to appear in print. Archival findings presented in the chapter suggest that Chyzhevsky decided to terminate his cooperation with Harvard University in 1956 in part because of Jakobson, the one who had put a lot of effort into bringing him...