Epistolary Material Research Articles

Roerich Heritage in Caucasian Culture

The article reveals the main periods and places of actualizing the Roerich heritage in the Caucasian culture. The study of Caucasian culture by the Roerich scholars in a historical perspective is presented in this context. The author attributes the Roerichs' acquaintance with Caucasian culture to the end of the 19th century and describes both the references to the Caucasus in the Roerichs' works and epistolary materials, revealing the most significant cultural treasures of the Caucasus, and Nicholas Roerich' artistic works on the Caucasian theme. The article presents an in-depth study of the Caucasus by two generations of the Roerich family, who promoted the idea of the special significance of the Caucasus for Russia. The author focuses on the places where Nicholas Roerich's paintings and art objects from the collection of the Roerich family are kept in private and museum collections in the Caucasus, Crimea and southern Russia. The Roerich family made a significant contribution to the study of Caucasian culture by making several trips to the Caucasus during the so-called "Russian" period of its existence. The article summarizes the interim results of the cultural, educational and exhibition project "The Roerichs and the Caucasus" organized by the St. Petersburg State Museum-Institute of the Roerich Family with the support of a number of cultural institutions and public associations of the Caucasus and St. Petersburg.

Oblicza samotności w epistolografii rosyjskich emigrantów pierwszej fali

A strong sense of loneliness and alienation was a common feature among Russian emigrants of the first wave, who were suddenly forced to leave the country due to the revolutionary events of 1917 and the civil war. They were unexpectedly deprived of contact with their loved ones and familiar places, losing their common denominator: their homeland. Thrown into a foreign world, they desperately missed their relatives and friends, the sounds of their native language, and the familiar materiality of life. The resulting feeling of loneliness led to various types of problems: lack of adaptation to new socio-cultural realities, social isolation, identity crisis, deteriorating mental and (or) physical condition, and creative impotence. Coping strategies for the traumatic experience of emigration included voluntary ghettoization, linguistic purism, and an extremely active exchange of letters with relatives and friends, which somewhat compensated for the lack of physical contact and direct conversation. Through correspondence, some sought information about loved ones left behind, while others sought deeper understanding, sympathy, and the chance to share their problems and fears. The analyzed epistolary material reveals similarities in the fates of the first wave of Russian emigrants, who, regardless of their origin and financial status, experienced similar problems and emotions. This is evident in the correspondence of both well-known emigrants (Mikhail Arcybashev, Ivan Bunin, Vera Muromtseva-Bunina, Aleksandr Kuprin, Nadezhda Teffi, Boris Zaitsev) and less well-known representatives of the post-October diaspora (Klaudia Fłorovskaya, Alexei Gvozdiński).

‘Forget it’s between two women’: negotiating a queer Virginia Woolf in Chanya Button’s Vita & Virginia

ABSTRACT This article explores the gendered authorial negotiations at work in adaptations of Virginia Woolf’s works and celebrity image in screen media, focusing on a case study of Vita and Virginia (2018) directed by British filmmaker Chanya Button. The article discusses Button’s film’s textual and promotional strategies, considering how it adapts both Eileen Atkins’ 1995 play of the same name and original historical correspondence between Woolf and the writer Vita Sackville-West. It draws upon critical models of literary celebrity, the celebrity biopic, and the concept of adaptation networks to argue that Button’s strategic choices in cinematography and details of mise-en-scène formulate an ‘archival’ gaze in order to forge connections between Woolf and Button as gendered authorial and celebrity personas. This creates a visual dialogue between women authors across media and time. The article suggests that Button’s processes of adaptation work to destabilise the essential queerness of the epistolary material and literary celebrity images as a result of this archival technique. This produces a representation of queer desire that distances body and mind and privileges an intellectual romance above a physical, desiring and embodied queer sexuality. This ultimately reinforces rather than reframes or reimagines a popular image of Woolf’s literary celebrity, focused instead on her status as a melancholic, suffering figure.

Letter as Subject for Anthropological Research

The article discusses the value and possible results of the anthropological research focusing on ordinary letters. An ordinary letter is considered in the article to be written primarily for maintaining a relationship with the addressee, rather than for solving specific problems in a certain field (even if that includes research, culture, art, business, or legal issues). The anthropological research of ordinary letters is valuable in that it reveals the less visible patterns of communication and cooperation. This analysis primarily displays the temporality of communication and togetherness, showing correspondence as a rhythmic bidirectional continuous process of different intensity; secondly, it highlights the composition of the momentary “I”, which depends on the relationship with the addressee and draws together episodes from different spaces and times; and finally, it discloses the constant negotiations with the proposed or imposed roles – these negotiations are most clearly visible in the ordinary letters and, at the same time, they clearly vary depending on the relationship maintained by the particular thread of correspondence.
 The article also uses theoretical insights by scholars researching the epistolary materials (Liz Stanley, Helen Dampier, Aistė Kučinskienė) and those by anthropologists and philosophers (William James, Maurice Blanchot, Judith Butler, Jens Brockmeier, Harold Garfinkel, Hanna Meretoja), including the classical theories of time, yet again reminding us of the heterogeneity of the time experience and human actions. The correspondence of the Lithuanian poet Janina Degutytė was chosen as a suitable example, since it most clearly reveals various aspects of the ordinary letters discussed in the article.

M. Gorky’s correspondence with Kazan children

This article honors M. Gorky, the renowned proletarian writer, and considers his correspondence with Kazan schoolchildren and students of the Kazan Technical Plant in the 1920s and 1930s. So far, these letters have received little attention from researchers, but their value for raising young Soviet citizens in line with the new trends of Soviet education and state ideology is undeniable. Here, M. Gorky’s epistolary heritage and journalistic statements are analyzed, and 12 letters written to him by Kazan children are studied. The letters are available in the A.M. Gorky Archive of the A.M. Gorky Institute of World Literature of the Russian Academy of Sciences (AG IWL RAS) and introduced for the first time into the scholarly discourse. The analysis shows that M. Gorky was always considerate and thoughtful towards his young addressees so that he became a mentor to the younger Soviet generation. The survey reveals that the children’s letters have a rich informational and source potential. They provide a better insight into the psychological and social image of the Soviet people in the 1920s and 1930s. The results obtained are relevant to future studies on the epistolary and journalistic heritage of M. Gorky and add considerably to our understanding of the historical and literary process of that epoch. The epistolary materials involved in the study should be of interest to anyone curious about the Soviet period.

From Letter Collections to Letter Writing Manuals

Abstract It is well known that Byzantine and post-Byzantine manuscript letter collections had a didactic function serving as manuals on epistolary art. An important task is to examine how and to what extent this function influenced the structure of collections and the method of reworking epistolary material. The subject of the present paper is the letter collection surviving in cod. Heid. Pal. gr. 356 ( 13th c. ). The collection contains Pseudo-Libanios’ ‘Epistolary Styles’, letters of Phalaris, Libanios, Gregory of Nazianzos, Symeon Logothetes, Michael Psellos and other authors. The collection is analyzed in terms of its content and structure. Its following features are revealed: Firstly, from letters of different authors, those are selected that correspond to common epistolary situations. Most of the letters presented in the collection are recommending, reproaching for silence, accompanying the gift, etc. Secondly, letters belonging to the same type or epistolary situation are often grouped together. Thirdly, letters are reworked so that it is more convenient to use them as models. Gregory of Nazianzos’ letters are presented in short excerpts, many of them being transformed so that they serve as models for certain letter types – friendly, commendatory, etc.

«…Я всю жизнь ждал радикального изменения в образе моей жизни»: переписка академика И.И. Мещанинова с В.В. Виноградовым 1942–1958 гг.

The article is dedicated to the 140th anniversary of the birth of the outstanding Russian scientist, organizer of Soviet science, first academician-secretary of the Department of Literature and Language of the USSR Academy of Sciences, Hero of Socialist Labor I.I. Meshchaninov (1883–1967). It reflects little-known events in Russian linguistics of 1942–1958. The letters of the greatest linguists of the XX century — academician I.I. Meshchaninov and professor (later academician) V.V. Vinogradov are published for the first time. They set out the facts of the personal life of scientists and the activities of academic institutions during the evacuation and peacetime. The presented selection of epistolary materials tells about the work of V.V. Vinogradov in Tobolsk: an attempt to found there a Research institute for the study of languages, folklore, literature and history of the peoples of Siberia and I.I. Meshchaninov’s response to this idea, about a new book on lexis and phraseology, conveys the scientist’s anxiety about his wife’s Moscow apartment, etc. The prospects of V.V. Vinogradov’s relocation to other cities and his restoration in the staff of the Institute of Language and Thinking of the USSR Academy of Sciences are discussed. Judging by the events described, I.I. Meshchaninov took a lively part in the fate of a disgraced colleague and tried to help him overcome hardships. The letters of the 1950s describe events related to the preparation for the elections of academicians and corresponding members of the USSR Academy of Sciences. The epistolary also includes the names of many famous philologists whose destinies were somehow connected with the personality of I.I. Meshchaninov: S.P. Obnorsky, V.F. Shishmaryov, D.V. Bubrikh, A.V. Mirtov, etc. The published documents are of interest to historians of Soviet linguistics, linguoculturologists, sociolinguists. The letters reveal the rare circumstances of the work of research teams in a difficult time for the country, show linguists from an unusual side, report new biographical details, filling in the gaps in the historiography of the XX century. The article focuses the attention of modern researchers on the need to study archival data and introduce original materials into the theory and practice of general linguistics in order to recreate the annals of Russian science.

Writing Lives in the Eighteenth Century ed. by Tanya M. Caldwell

Reviewed by: Writing Lives in the Eighteenth Century ed. by Tanya M. Caldwell Mark Fulk Tanya M. Caldwell, ed., Writing Lives in the Eighteenth Century (Lewisburg, PA: Bucknell Univ. Press, 2020). Pp. 250; 2 b/w illus., 1 table. $34.95 paper, $120.00 cloth. Tanya M. Caldwell's edited collection of essays focuses on life-writing in the circles of Samuel Johnson and Frances Burney. The six essays and Caldwell's introduction reach beyond the long eighteenth century to model vital practices for the reading of life-writing in a myriad of forms, including letters (original and edited/republished collections), journals, and family memoirs alongside the more traditional categories of biography and autobiography. One of the strengths of Caldwell's collection overall is its tracing of critical strategies across the twentieth and twenty-first centuries in relation to the life writings of Johnson, Burney, and their circles. These essays also provide insight into the significance of works at the margins of the literary and the ways we can incorporate them into our discussions of how various texts shape the interpretation of the lives and the canons that comprise our scholarly and pedagogical concerns. Lisa Berglund's essay on Hester Lynch Piozzi's Letters to and from the Late Samuel Johnson LL.D. (1788) opens Caldwell's volume by examining the ways that Piozzi's editing shapes the publication of Johnson's letters in a way that offers an apologia for Piozzi's second marriage to a younger man, the Italian musician Gabriel Mario Piozzi. Berglund shows how Piozzi's ordering of Johnson's letters, like her other editorial practices (including some but not all of Piozzi's own letters to Johnson), "deliberately construct … from 'found' epistolary materials" the arguments that tell her story in a way that supports her second marriage (27). Berglund explores the reception history of Piozzi's work to highlight the way Piozzi's reconstruction of Johnson (and, indirectly, of herself) is still contested even today. Peter Sabor's continued writing on Alexander D'Arblay, the only son of Frances Burney D'Arblay and the Duke D'Arblay, offers in tandem with his earlier article "Creative and Uncreative Gloom: Frances Burney and Alexander D'Arblay" a fuller picture of a young man who would develop mental illness in later life than has previously been available.1 The essay Caldwell includes is valuable for its insights into the impacts of parental favoritism on child-rearing as well as the situation of an only son in the age of the French Revolution and Romanticism. Describing Alexander's childhood and years at Cambridge as a student and as a fellow, Sabor's essay traces with subtle and arduous detail Frances Burney's views of and concerns about her favorite and only child. Although Sabor determines that "Alexander clearly suffered from depression" even though it remains "difficult to [End Page 508] determine the source of his ill" or assess his parents' "responsibility" for them, Sabor's essay offers valuable insight into these tumultuous times and the case of one, perhaps average, young man of two rather exceptional parents (69). Marilyn Francus's article considers how the family biographies written by Frances Burney (of her father Charles Burney) and Alicia LeFanu (of the Sheridan family) play with the promise of private, secret information. Francus delivers a rich context for the epistemological questions that family biography even today exploits, arguing that these questions concerning methodology and reader expectation shape the ways that family biography is written and consumed. Francus provides the publication history, contexts, and receptions of these biographies, showing how Burney and LeFanu are writing against prevailing notions as well as other unauthorized biographies of their subjects. Through this combining of methodologies, Francus demonstrates that the reading of family biographies and their constructions of privacy create a vexing context for our own reading, ultimately raising profound questions about "knowledge, truth, accuracy, and authorial agenda" that go to the heart of how we read life-writing in this period as well as our own (101). Victoria Warren's detailed treatment of Isabelle de Charrière demonstrates the importance of the inclusion of this remarkable writer in the canon. Normally only considered in...

ГОРОДСКОЙ ГОЛОВА: РЕТРОСПЕКТИВА В КОНТЕКСТЕ СЕМЕЙНОЙ ПЕРЕПИСКИРЕЦЕНЗИЯ НА КНИГУ: МАРГАРИТА АГЕЕВА. УФИМСКИЙ ГОРОДСКОЙ ГОЛОВА АЛЕКСАНДР МАЛЛЕЕВ:ИСТОРИЯ В ПИСЬМАХ. УФА: ИНФОРМРЕКЛАМА, 2020. 448С.: ИЛ.

The new book by Margarita V. Ageeva presents the family correspondence of the Ufa mayor A.A. Malleev and studies his biography. The epistolary finding and the specific historical context of the story introduce different aspects of the history of urban administration and the everyday life of the provincial nobility in the late 19th – early 20th centuries. The book has become an original contribution to regional historiography, and its author has revised some of the conclusions of his predecessors, based on a metahistorical narrative. Information about the origin and genealogical relations of the family surname sheds light on the formation of the official elite in the eastern provinces as a result of the industrial development of the region in the 18th century and the reforms of local government and the court system in the post-reform period. The epistolary material recreates a portrait of personal qualities of the modernizers and testifies to the formation of new personnel in the provinces – the carriers of a genuine democratic culture. The author analyzes the influence of ethical views of officials on managerial decision-making as a central problem poorly developed in institutional history. The author traced it on the example of the events of the 1905 revolutionary crisis in Ufa. The discourse of private correspondence contains a lot of valuable evidence on the family life of the Malleevs, their religious identity and methods of raising children, on cultural and everyday life of the urban elite of a provincial town. The style and spelling of the letters, as well as the turns of phrase and the accepted spelling of certain words at that time, have remained unchanged, which increases the value of the source. The literal capture of the smallest details of everyday history make the book a practical tool for museum workers, fashion historians and other professionals.

A Comparative Investigation of Anaphoric Reference Devices in Anglo-Norman and Middle English Personal Letters

This paper compares the use of anaphoric reference terms, such as le dit (and its English equivalent the said), a characteristic feature of ‘curial style’, in Anglo-Norman (hence AN) and Middle English (hence ME) personal letters. Whilst we know that this style was prevalent in the official AN letters that were used to conduct English parliamentary business until the end of the 1300s, we do not yet have a clear understanding of the extent to which it was prevalent in both AN and ME personal letters, defined here as being written to one addressee who was known to the writer. The results show that there more anaphoric reference terms in the AN epistolary material than in the ME, and that the difference is statistically significant. However, these anaphoric reference devices are very much in evidence in the ME material as well, albeit in smaller numbers, suggesting a degree of influence, or emulation, or both. It is furthermore suggested that the use of anaphoric reference devices in both the AN and ME personal letters is more similar to their use in the literary texts discussed by Burnley (1986) than to their use in their more official, administrative epistolary forebears, i.e., they are often used in a looser, relaxed way, as a kind of ‘connective convenience’ (Burnley 1986: 610). Results relating to diachronic variation demonstrate that the reference terms are most common in the latest (1380s) AN letters and earliest (pre-1431) ME letters, perhaps suggesting a period of overlap. In relation to geographic distribution, ME anaphoric reference terms appear to be used more in letters written in London and Oxfordshire than in the East Anglian or Northern letters. Finally, in the AN corpora, the anaphoric reference devices are most frequently used by writers from the gentry and professions, a finding mirrored in the ME material. Overall, the paper highlights the importance of taking different discoursal contexts, and the deliberate emulation of styles within those contexts, into account when investigating the interaction between Anglo Norman and Middle English during the medieval period.

Mykola Lysenko end Borys Poznansky : intellectual dialogues

The questions of the formation of national identity and the preservation of the historical subjectivity of the Ukrainian people became decisive in the evaluation of the activities of the Ukrainian intellectual elite of the second half of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th centuries. Prominent representatives of the Kyiv community – Mykola Lysenko and Borys Poznanskyi – belong to the ranks of intellectuals to whom Ukraine owes its historical and national legitimation. The topic of the study is determined by the polyethnic basis of the Ukrainian national movement of the second half of the 19th century, which integrated the intellectual practices of Ukrainian patriots regardless of their ethnic origin on the way to protecting national identity. The purpose of the article is to reconstruct the interpersonal intellectual communications of M. Lysenko and B. Poznanskyi, to establish their place and role in the life and work of Ukrainian ascetic scientists. The source base of the intelligence consists of memories of contemporaries, epistolary materials, life notes of citizens and internal documents of the South-Western Department of the Russian Geographical Society – meeting journals and reports on the activities of the local branch for 1873–1875. Methods: historical-genetic, logical, historical-biographical methods, complex and personalistic approaches were used in the research. Main results. The network of interpersonal relationships of prominent representatives of the Ukrainian national movement of the second half of the 19th and early 20th centuries is analyzed. The duration and intensity of the flow of intellectual communications are determined. The peculiarities of the nature of the contacts, caused by an organic combination of ideological closeness and personal sympathies of intellectuals, are revealed. The main directions of their intellectual cooperation within the framework of the Kyiv community and the South-Western Department of the Russian Geographical Society are shown. The content of the written communications of Ukrainian intellectuals between 1885 and 1905 was revealed. Emphasis is placed on the cooperation of M. Lysenko and B. Poznanskyi with social and scientific organizations of Western Ukraine. Concise conclusions. The main content of the intellectual dialogues of M. Lysenko and B. Poznanskyi was not limited to purely scientific and public contacts, creating a significant layer of interpersonal contacts based on common interests, preferences and worldview orientations. They demonstrated the possibilities of creative cooperation in the service of the Ukrainian national idea, in the matter of building national identity. Practical significance: the material of the article may be of interest to scientists for an in-depth study of the figure of the Ukrainian composer. Originality: the network of intellectual communications of M. Lysenko and B. Poznanskyі is reproduced, the main thematic blocks of contacts are highlighted and characterized. Scientific novelty: an insufficiently researched segment of the intellectual connections of representatives of the Ukrainian movement of the second half of the 19th - early 20th centuries is presented. Type of article: scientific, analytical.

THE USAGE OF THE EPISTOLARY HERITAGE IN THE PROCESS OF STUDYING THE BIOGRAPHY OF LESIA UKRAINKA

The article deals with the issue of using the epistolary heritage of Lesia Ukrainka as a significant original source for studying the biography of the writer, true evidence of her life and work.
 It claims that the epistolary heritage is an important source of cognition of Ukrainian fiction. It allows tracing the ways of forming the writer as a professional, the development of their literary and aesthetic views, features of the thinking process. It also highlights the relationship of the artist with famous contemporaries, and helps to understand artistic heritage, historical events.
 It concludes that the letters let scholars learn about writer’s friends, her like-minded people, about the national and cultural life of Ukraine, about the artistic preferences of various cultural and artistic figures of Slavic and European literature.
 It also points out the great cognitive and educational value of the epistolary heritage of writers in the lessons of Ukrainian literature.
 The emphasis is placed on the use of various forms and methods of working with letters that can help to form pupil’s personal attitude. It can be an important means of increasing pupils' interest in literature.
 It states that the epistolary heritage is the significant source for studying the biography of Lesia Ukrainka. It reveals her views on life and work, attitude toward the literary process and social life, especially the spiritual world of the writer. Therefore, the teacher of literature creates a certain emotional mood in the lesson, helps to penetrate into writer’s creative laboratory, to present worldview values, artistic and aesthetic preferences.
 It summarizes that reading Lesia’s letters helps pupils to feel and understand her worries. The epistolary materials make schoolchildren think about their own life and deepen into their own inward worlds. The use of epistolary materials increases students' interest in literature, the ability to understand the thoughts and feelings of others.

Рецепция философских концепций Вл.С. Соловьева в эпистолярном наследии А. Белого

The article presents results of research of Vl.S. Solovyov’s sophiological and theurgic concepts reception in the epistolary heritage of A. Beliy – first of all, the early period of philosopher and symbolist poet until 1905. It is argued, that of all the Young Symbolists, it was Beliy who was the closest to understanding Solovyov's sophiology and creating his own integral system of theurgic symbolism on its basis. It is substantiated, that the starting point in the construction of this system is the direction to synthesis of eschatology, World Soul doctrine and theurgic role of the life-creator artist. The purpose of this research is to trace the origin of Beliy's doctrine of symbolism as a worldview, a self-conscious soul and a collective personality, presented in detail much later, but rooted in the original reading of Solovyov. An appeal to the correspondence between Beliy and A.A. Blok, E.K. Metner, N.I. Petrovskaya, A.S. Petrovskiy and others, is justified by the fact that it is in these letters that the general ideological contours of his concepts are outlined. Later, they turned out to be eclectically complicated in many ways, which makes it difficult for modern researchers to fully understand them, but the epistolary material is a kind of compass in the confused area of Beliy's metaphysics. The epistolary material analysis provides the method of understanding Beliy's metaphysics, taken into account, that later his system concepts turned out to be complicated by the thinker himself, which makes it difficult for modern researchers to understand them holistically.

Peasant Question in the Demian Kochubey’s epistolar heritage of 1857–1858

The article analyzes the letters of 1857–1858 by Demian Kochubey (1786–1859), a high-ranking official in St. Petersburg, to his relative Hryhorii Galagan (1819–1888), a public figure, both of whom belonged to the top local nobility of Left-bank Ukraine. The main theme of these important epistolary texts is the preparation for the abolition of serfdom. This example demonstrates the significant information potential of epistolary materials for the study of emancipatory projects. In particular, from this source we learn about the ideological and moral preconditions of Emancipation reform, from French liberal political economy to Christian humanism, and see the breadth of specific problems facing supporters of peasant emancipation, such as the financial possibilities of the state to ensure the redemption of landed estates for peasants, the principles of peasant land tenure in the post-reform period, the establishment of positive interaction between landlords and peasants after their emancipation for the economic prosperity and avoidance of social conflicts. It is argued that relying on epistolary materials will contribute to the cultural and anthropological understanding of the «emancipation projects» of Ukrainian public figures in the mid-nineteenth century. The need to continue the publication of epistolary materials for further in-depth study of the preparation and implementation of the Emancipation reform was emphasized.

Литературный быт и творчество писателей-современников в эпистолярном диалоге А.А. Измайлова с А.А. Тихоновым-Луговым

The article focuses on the epistolary dialogue between A.A. Izmailov and A.A. Lugovoi, two well-known writers at the beginning of the 20th century. It deals with the most interesting historical and literary facts from the correspondence, e. g. discussion of their works, facts of the literary life of the era, interpretations of the works of brother-writers. Epistolary materials allow to clarify important biographical facts of the two contemporaries. The author examines the method of Izmailov the critic, who, by virtue of his profession, was constantly forced to look for new topics, to think over the structure of more and more new reviews, to incorporate other people’s interpretations prompted in private conversations and personal letters into the texts of his own reviews. The article contains extensive quotations from unpublished letters of two writers.

Епістолярій як джерело до вивчення рецепції творчості Михайла Грушевського

Introduction. Researchers of receptive issues have repeatedly noted the fruitfulness of involving the extensive epistolary of M. Hrushevsky and his correspondents to clarify the complex palette of features of the perception of the intellectual heritage of the historian. Therefore, correspondence is still used today, but mainly as an auxiliary illustrative source, to better understand the specifics of interpersonal communication and the context of publicly expressed assessments. However, careful study of Hrushevsky’s epistolary materials allows us to discuss its independent heuristic value for understanding receptive issues. For example, the letters of correspondents of a prominent historian often raise professional issues that did not appear in the published texts for one reason or another. But much more important for us are the cases when letters to the author of “History of Ukraine-Rus” are the only evidence of the attitude to his work by some contemporaries who did not speak publicly, although sometimes expressed intentions to prepare reviews. Therefore, the discovery of epistolary sources significantly expands our awareness of the perception of the ideas of the historian in the then intellectual space. Drawing colleagues’ attention to this currently underestimated dimension of receptive Hrushevsky studies and realizing the multifaceted nature of the whole problem, below, we will only briefly touch on its most significant aspects. The article aims to clarify the information possibilities of correspondence of figures of the late XIX - first third of the XX century to reconstruct the reception of M. Hrushevsky’s work. Results. According to the study, the correspondence of intellectuals of the late nineteenth - first third of the twentieth century contains much unique information about the peculiarities of the reception of the work of M. Hrushevsky. The popularity of such communicative practice as correspondence at that time allows us to recreate a much richer palette of evaluative interpretations of the author’s work “History of Ukraine-Rus” and expand the problem-thematic horizons of the receptive Hrushevsky studies. Among the least known aspects is reproducing a circle of “unrealized” reviewers, finding out (in) compliance of public criticism with private assessments, as well as identifying noteworthy historiographical observations that never became public property. Conclusion. The study showed the importance of working on a more intensive and coordinated search for new epistolary sources and closer attention to the collections known today.

The Slavic Toponymy of Early 20th Century Austria-Hungary in Epistolary Intercourse

The paper attempts to interpret phonetic, lexical, and graphic features of toponyms mentioned in the letters of the Gradiscan Croats, residents of the Chunovo village (presently, the outskirts of Bratislava in Slovakia on the border with Hungary and Austria). These placenames appear in three languages: German, Croatian, and Hungarian and provide an insight on the whole system of local toponyms (names of villages and towns) in the oral speech of the Chunovo inhabitants of the early the 20th century (1908–1918). About a hundred items are drawn from the correspondence published by local historians in the book of letters from members of the Yandrovich family. The analysis shows that Gradishian-Croatian and German elements predominate over Hungarian ones, even though Chunovo was part of the Hungarian part of Austria-Hungary, and the locals studied the Hungarian language at school and used it in official communication. Particular attention is paid to the specific use of prepositions with toponyms which is an influence of local foreign speech. A significant number of toponymic forms show the traits of Slavic speech rendered in writing, while in some instances the name of the village appears only in the Croatian version. Examples are noted when the Croatian version co-exists with the German or Hungarian. The toponyms with the formant -hof (from German das Hof ‘yard’), which denote parts of villages that have a different proper name, are considered separately. Sometimes the placenames designations in letters can be classified as microtoponyms known only to the correspondents themselves. It is also typical that the names of wealthy employers become the designation of a particular place. The considered epistolary material showcases the specificity of the rural life of Croats at the beginning of the 20th century.

О сотрудничестве С.Ф. Платонова с журналом «Исторический вестник» (по переписке с С.Н. Шубинским)

The goal was set to determine the main areas of cooperation between S.F. Platonov with the editor-in-chief of the journal “Historical Bulletin”. Procedure and methods: a comprehensive analysis of correspondence was carried out using retrospective, chronological and systematic methods. Results: the integrity of correspondence has been restored, which makes it possible to perceive it in an organic unity. The chronological framework of active interaction with the journal and the volume of correspondence with the editor-in-chief are revealed. A number of little-known facts from published letters have been clarified. The list of previously unrecorded works by S.F. Platonov. We manage to involve previously unknown epistolary materials into scientific circula-tion, thereby expanding our understanding of the multifaceted communications of S.F. Platonov with an authoritative publication.

Литовские народные песни в переводе Вяч. Иванова

he study is devoted to the publication of Vyacheslav Ivanov’s Russian translation for Lithuanian folk songs, made for unpublished collection of Lithuanian literature (“Sbornik litovskoj literatury,” Petrograd, [1915–1917]; ed. by Iu. Baltrushaitis, M. Gorky). Around the same time, Baltrushaitis was the editor-compiler and translator of the collection of Lithuanian folklore at the publishing house of M. Sabashnikov. This project was also not implemented. Ivanov’s work on Lithuanian translations is chronologically close to his participation in other collections of national literatures. In an extensive introductory article, the author reconsctucts the history of the creation of translations from Lithuanian, using the correspondence of V. Ivanov, Y. Baltrushaitis, M. Sabashnikov. The research shows that Ivanov’s work on translations for the Lithuanian collection stretched from the beginning of 1916 to the summer months, when the poet’s family lived in a village near Sochi. The preamble also contains information about the first publication of an incomplete collection of these translations, made in 1973 by Yu. Tumyalis using unauthorized typescript from the Manuscript Department of the Institute of Lithuanian Literature and Folklore (Vilnius). In this publication, the texts of Ivanov’s translations are given by autographs from the Manuscript Department of the Institute of Russian Literature (Pushkinskiy Dom) of RAS and the Roman Archive of Vyach. Ivanov. The textual comments describe the currently available sources of Ivanov’s translations, such as correspondence of Iu. Baltrushaitis, epistolary materials of others, Ivanov’s preparatory materials, manuscripts, translations from the archival storages of St. Petersburg, Moscow, Rome, Vilnius.

Professor of History Vitaliy Stetskevich : notes to intellectual portrait

The aim of the article is to characterize the key fragments of life and career of the famous military historian of contemporary Ukraine proffessor V. V. Stetskevych. Research methods: chronological, historical-genetic, historical-biographical. Sources: archival documents of special origin, unpublished epistolary materials and memorials of the scholar, current historiography. Main results. The most distinctive biographical dates, events, facts of V. V. Stetskevych’s life from his birth till nowadays are identified and briefly characterized; his formation as a scientist and an educator at Dnipropetrovsk classical university are specified; the progress of his further career development in the leading technical higher educational institution of Kryvyi Rig (KMU–KTU), which became an integral part of his almost half-century professional activity, is investigated. An attempt is made to discover and outline the factors which determined his choice of the scientific research strategies, at first within the framework of special historical reproduction of Ukrainian life at the final stage of the war of 1941–1945, and then, historiographical understanding of historical science in its most difficult first period. The overall creative heritage of the scientist is preliminary summed up (initiated and implemented scientific projects, published works, defended dissertations, organized conferences etc.).Conclusions. V. V. Stetskevych left a noticeable mark in the professional environment of Dnipro region and Ukraine of the late 20th – first quarter of the 21st century as an authoritative scholar in the field of national history of the Second World War. He went through a difficult path of professional self-improvement, theoretical and methodological transformation, the so-called “paradigm shift”, thanks to which he was able to create intellectual products corresponding to the modern era. Practical value. The material of the article can be used in research projects devoted to the history of war, in the educational process of history departments of universities. Scientific novelty. Some traits of the intellectual portrait of the distinctive historian are foregrounded and defined for the first time. Type of the article: research.