HARVARD UKRAINIAN STUDIES - See also - Harvard University

Reviews 549While it is eminently reasonable that short prose be compared to long prose, inthe case of the Ukrainian opovidannja of the early nineteenth century, such a comparisonwould be inappropriate. Relatively little Ukrainian long prose was producedin this period, and the short prose of the period was not and should not be perceivedin any particular opposition to it. This is true, however, only within the boundariesof Ukrainian literature. Early nineteenth-century prose, both long and short, in otherlanguages, particularly Russian, French, and German, does offer a potentially fruitfulmodel to which the Ukrainian opovidannja of the period can be compared.Historically, the Ukrainian opovidannja of the 1830s must be compared to thosegenres that were considered to be related to it in the 1830s. Thus, Denysjuk is notmistaken in comparing the opovidannja to folk literature. Given the peculiarities ofUkrainian literature in the first half of the nineteenth century, the influence of folkliterature and popular culture in general on all genres during that period cannot beignored. However, as Denysjuk's own discussion makes very clear, the folk talewas certainly not an exclusive model for Ukrainian prose writers at the time. Thefirst Ukrainian opovidannja, Kvitka-Osnov"janenko's "Saldac'kyj partret," is aretelling of stories from classical antiquity, specifically incidents from the lives ofthe Greek painters Zeuxis and Apelles as described in Pliny the Elder's Natural History(bk. 35). Whether or not Kvitka used Pliny as a source, the fact remains that"Saldac'kyj partret" is not a literaturized folk motif. Like Kotljarevs'kyj's Enejidaand much of early modern Ukrainian literature, Kvitka's tale is a folklorized orpopularized literary motif. The difference between this formulation and Denysjuk'sis a consequence of Soviet literary dogma.According to Soviet dialectics, early Ukrainian literature must have neither oftwo qualities: (1) it must not be an outgrowth of the cultural intelligentsia, but ratherof the collective mass of the populace; and (2) it must be not a symptom of culturalseparatism based on Western models, but rather a development both parallel to anddependent on the dominant Russian culture. These theoretical constraints areresolved in practice by focusing, as Denysjuk does, on the primacy of folklore.Denysjuk's discussion of the nouvelle suffers from the same weakness thatafflicts his discussion of the opovidannja. The development of the short story inAmerican and European literatures was remarkably similar. Among important factorswere new developments in technique and subject, specifically narrative andpsychological precision, on the one hand, and sex, violence, and the exploited workingclasses, on the other. Some of these elements are acceptable to Soviet dogma,whereas others are not. Narrative pyrotechnics, sex, and violence are symptoms ofbourgeois decadence and naturalism. In the Soviet view of Ukrainian literature,these vices must play a minor role. Realist literature, characterized by shallowpsychological analysis and concern with class conflicts and the oppression of theworking man, must be dominant. The critic must also avoid focusing on foreigninfluence, particularly from French and English literature. Within this framework ofrestraints, Denysjuk could hardly be expected to provide a reasonable description of