The Artist’s Longing and Belonging: Cultural Sensitivity in Yurii Kosach’s Narratives

Olga Poliukhovych

doi:10.18523/kmhj73946.2016-3.143-159

Abstract

As an emigre writer living outside of Ukraine, Yurii Kosach constructed an “imaginary homeland” through his treatment of history, culture, and memory in his literary works. This article analyzes these categories in Kosach’s meta-narratives of the artist in exile, by focusing on the texts “Zaproshennia na Tsyteru” (An Invitation to Cythera, 1945), Skorbna symfoniia (The Sorrowful Symphony, undated), and Senior Nikolo (Signore Nikolo, 1954). Kosach’s characters are placed between exile and homeland, nation and empire, and self and other. All these notions are included in a discourse that is inclusive rather than oppositional. Following a strategy used by Lesia Ukrainka, Yurii Kosach also tests the artist’s ability to create in lands beyond one’s homeland and in conditions of cultural oppression. Each story plot of the analyzed narratives is constructed in terms of the cultural and national aspects of the artist’s identity.

Highlights

Prose writer, dramatist, poet, essayist, editor, and artist, Yurii Kosach (1908–1990), was a descendent of the Drahomanov-Kosach family, an old Ukrainian family with noble roots
Following a strategy used by Lesia Ukrainka, Yurii Kosach tests the artist’s ability to create in lands beyond one’s homeland and in conditions of cultural oppression
Dramatist, poet, essayist, editor, and artist, Yurii Kosach (1908–1990), was a descendent of the Drahomanov-Kosach family, an old Ukrainian family with noble roots. He was the son of Mykola Kosach, who was the younger brother of Lesia Ukrainka

Summary

Introduction

Dramatist, poet, essayist, editor, and artist, Yurii Kosach (1908–1990), was a descendent of the Drahomanov-Kosach family, an old Ukrainian family with noble roots. In Leonidas Donskis’ terms the silence of the composer is the only way to survive, being a project of resistance, “a reserved political dissidence.” 23 Like Lesia Ukrainka’s Antheus, Bortnianskyi finds the solution in non-creation; he does not want to create in a hostile environment Deprived of his homeland, the artistic nature cannot be realized — ameaningful dilemma for both Lesia Ukrainka’s and Yurii Kosach’s protagonists. A significant influence on Kosach was exerted by Mykola Khvylovyi’s novel Valdshnepy (The Woodcocks, 1927), in which Dmytrii Karamazov, the main character, is marginal in the sense that he has partial identification with both communist and nationalist ideologies, but does not belong to either of them In this sense, Kosach’s Bortnianskyi identifies himself with both the imperial and national projects.

In Search of the Genuine Self

Conclusion