A HISTORIAN OF LITERATURE AHAPII SHAMRAI: TEXT, WORK, AND ENVIRONMENT

Abstract

The paper aims to reconstruct the research activity of the Ukrainian literary scholar Ahapii Pylypovych Shamrai (1896—1952) in the period from 1922 to 1929. For this purpose, the works of the scholar, his personal files, materials from the newspapers and journals of the time, as well as correspondence have been examined. It was necessary to describe A. Shamrai’s postgraduate studies at the Research Department of History of Ukraine (literary and ethnographic section) (1922—1924). Much attention is given to the textbook “Ukrainian Literature. A Brief Survey” (1927, 1928) that was among the first structured presentations of the history of Ukrainian literature. The paper analyzes the perception of the textbook by contemporary readers and outlines the specifics of Shamrai’s sociological method of this period. Considering the research work of A. Shamrai in the context of literary criticism of the 1920s, the author of the paper reconstructs the scholar’s dialogue with M. Zerov and the polemic with “New Generation” magazine. One of the central topics for A. Shamrai in the 1920s is examined in detail: it is his study of H. Kvitka-Osnovianenko’s work. In particular, the discussion between A. Shamrai and Ye. Aizenshtok on the publication of H. Kvitka’s works in 1928 has been highlighted. A. Shamrai’s scholarly concepts of the 1920s characterize him as a textual critic (‘text of the work’, ‘canonical text’) and historian of literature (‘literary fact’, ‘work’, ‘environment’, ‘style’, ‘literary school’, ‘template’, ‘minor writers’, ‘influence’). The category ‘reader’ was also very important for Shamrai’s works of this period. A range of examples shows how Shamrai used the methodology of comparative studies.