The (un)serious image of Ulas Samchuk in creolized texts Based on satirical and humorous magazines of the Ukrainian diaspora

Abstract

The object of research in the article is creolized texts, in particular friendly cartoons and caricatures. The author defines creolized texts as texts, the structure of which consists of two components of different sign systems — verbal and non-verbal. For interpretation, the author selected eighteen friendly cartoons and caricatures of Ulas Samchuk. These are the works by Edward Kozak, Teodor Kurpita, Mykola Stepanenko, Roman Kupchynsky, and other cartoonists. The purpose of the article is to consider the peculiarities of the representation of Ulas Samchuk in these texts; to add new — (not) serious — details to his image established in literary studies; to reveal the essence of satirical and humorous views of caricaturists on literary and semi-literary processes, in which the writer was an active participant. Contextual analysis, art historical and biographical methods were used to achieve this goal. As a result of the research, it was concluded that caricatures and friendly cartoons of Ulas Samchuk are effective methods for insightful private characterization of a creative personality. They supplement the writer's official biography and activities with fascinating or curious details. The image of the writer is maintained within a certain canon: he is a kind middle-aged man, dressed in an emphatically refined suit with an indispensable bow tie and certain writerly or authoritative (characteristic for artistic circles) attributes. Creolized texts at the artistic level comprehended the creative personality and their activities in time and space, provided information about the attitude of the creative elite towards the artistic processes of the interwar and post-war eras. Caricatures and friendly cartoons have preserved the unpredictability, ambiguity and reticence of Ulas Samchuk’s perceived figure. This made it possible to complete the image of the writer in a different way in the new political and time realities, to interpret his transformations, to supplement the official portrait of the artist with new strokes and details.