ETHNOGRAPHIC DRAMAS AND PLAYS OF MANNERS AT THE UKRAINIAN THEATERS IN HALYCHYNA IN THE 1920s–1930s AS IN INSTRUMENT OF NATIONAL SELF-PRESERVATION

Abstract

The issue of preserving the national identity in the conditions of statelesshood is still relevant. Artistic forms of national representation and the preservation of the national ethos, as well as various attempts to foreground it deserve close attention on the part of researchers. This article studies the stage practices of the touring theater companies in Western Ukraine that considered ethnographic dramas and plays of manners as an essential part of their repertoire. It traces the ways those plays were staged by the companies that seemed to pursue the repertoire policy which excluded plays of manners. The article focuses on the attempt of V. Blavatskyi, experimental artist and theater director, to modernize a play of manners as was in the case of the play “Oi, ne khody, Hrytsiu” (Don’t Go to Parties, Hryts) by M. Starytskyi (1934, staged at the Ukrainian young theater “Zahrava”). The article aims to determine the major forms of ethnographic dramas and plays of manners staged by the Ukrainian theaters in Halychyna in the 1920s–1930s, and to highlight the mechanisms of their social impact ranging from mere entertainment and a form of self-abandonment and up to functioning as an instrument of national self-preservation. The following tasks have been accomplished: 1) the historical circumstances in which Ukrainians found themselves in Western Ukrainian lands during the times of the Second Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth were analyzed; 2) the principles underlying the everyday practices of touring Ukrainian theaters, in particular, in the territory of Halychyna, were outlined; 3) theatrical bills were reviewed to select ethnographic dramas and plays of manners, and the range of themes and issues addressed was determined; 4) the forms of foregrounding and modernization of theatrical national mythic imagery were identified; 5) a conclusion was made whether the Ukrainian society is ready to perceive the existing traditional or modernized vision of the national identity. This study relies on theoretical scientific research methods, such as: content analysis (critical discourse in the press regarding the future of ethnographic drama and plays of manners; thematic and ideological spectrum of the repertoire); synthetic method (presenting the activities of different theater companies as a unity), generalization (outlining common trends in the repertoire policy). Given their marginalized status in the interwar Poland, the Ukrainian citizens had to get their act together to counter the governmental policy of Polonization and to wage the “war of cultures”. Theater turned into a major force in the process of formation of the modern national consciousness. It transformed public consciousness “from defeatist to heroic” and created an attractive image of the native land (historical territory), populating this symbolic space with national heroes and providing consistent narratives (common myths and historical memory). It also gave a boost to a powerful layer of common public culture that supported the phenomenon of “nation as a project”.