23rd annual scholarly conference honoring Shevchenko held in New York (04/13/03)

23rd annual scholarly conference honoring Shevchenko held in New York

by Dr. Orest Popovych

NEW YORK - The 23rd annual scholarly conference honoring Taras Shevchenko, which was hosted by the Shevchenko Scientific Society (NTSh) at its headquarters here on March 8, presented a distinct international flavor. While the introductory and concluding remarks belonged to its American hosts, the five scholarly lectures were apportioned between four guest speakers from Ukraine and one from Canada.

Co-hosting the event were the Ukrainian Academy of Arts and Sciences in the U.S. (UVAN), the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute (HURI) and the Harriman Institute of Columbia University. The program was chaired by Dr. Myroslava Znayenko, chairperson of the NTSh International Liaison Committee and president of the American Association of Ukrainian Studies.

The opening remarks by Dr. Larissa Zaleska Onyshkevych, president of NTSh in America, were followed by some introductory thoughts by Dr. Mark von Hagen of the Harriman Institute, who is the president of the International Association of Ukrainian Studies (IAUS). Dr. von Hagen spoke of his lifelong connection with the legacy of Taras Shevchenko.

Recently this connection has grown in scope due to the collaboration of NTSh with both the IAUS and the newly inaugurated program of Ukrainian Studies at Columbia University, in which Dr. von Hagen is active. The latter program is co-sponsored by NTSh.

The first scholarly lecture was by Prof. Pavlo Mykhed, chairman of the department of literature and of the Hohol Research Center at Nizhyn Pedagogical University in Ukraine, who spoke about "Materials on the Theme of Shevchenko as a Prophet." Prof. Mykhed analyzed this theme in the context of 19th century Romanticism, in which, he said, the idea of a poet-prophet, acting as an intermediary between man and God, was well established in European literature. In Shevchenko's poetry God is present as participant and interlocutor.

Prof. Mykhed quoted Mykola Hohol, another Ukrainian genius of the 19th century, who is known to the world as master of the Russian prose, who said: "the word is God's most important gift to man," but conceded, perhaps reluctantly, that "poetry is the voice of a prophet."

Dr. Oleh Ilnytzkyj, a professor in the department of Slavistics at the Univer-sity of Alberta in Edmonton, titled his talk " 'The Others' in Shevchenko's Poetry," with the term "the others" being his preferred translation of the Ukrainian "chuzhi ludy," which literally means "foreign people" or "strangers."

Dr. Ilnytzkyj put to good use his "Concordance to the Poetic Works of Taras Shevchenko" (which he had compiled together with George Hawrysch) in determining that Shevchenko resorted to the term "chuzhyi," as well as its various grammatical forms and derivatives, 153 times in 58 poems. "The others" could range in meaning from the neighbors, to non-Ukrainians, to bad people, to enemies. Similarly, in Shevchenko's poetry the word "chuzyna" could denote not only a foreign country, but also a place of suffering, or even death. Shevchenko's usage of "chuzhyi" and its derivatives resonates with the well-known modern concept of "the other" as applied to the relationship between Europeans and the post-colonial peoples, said Dr. Ilnytzkyj.

Dr. Ivan Bazhynov, a senior research associate at the Institute of Ukrainian Literature at the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, and currently a Fulbright fellow at the Harriman Institute, lectured on "M. Kalynovych: An Unknown Page in the Shevchenko Studies." The speaker took us back to the years immediately following the Russian revolution of 1905 in the Russian capital St. Petersburg. There the previously censored works of Shevchenko were published in 1906, followed by the full edition of the "Kobzar" in 1907.

Dr. Bazhynov did some detective work in trying to identify the "M. Kalynovych" who was instrumental in these publishing efforts. Eventually he traced the story to a group of Ukrainian female students at the St. Petersburg Medical Institute, who at the time were meeting in secrecy to take courses in the Ukrainian language and literature. Dr. Bazhynov said he thinks that the cited M. Kalynovych was one of these students, whose first name was really Natalya.

Dr. Natalya Slukhay of the Kyiv National University sent in the text of her lecture titled (in loose translation) "The Archetypes in Shevchenko's Poetry," which in her absence was read by Prof. Assya Humesky, director of the NTSh Philology Section.

This was a lengthy and elaborate treatise, resorting at times to language that was excessively complex. According to Dr. Slukhay, central to Shevchenko's poetry is the archetype of matriarchalism, which has deep ethnocultural roots in Ukraine, deriving its origins in mythology. The Ukrainian mythological pantheon comprises not only the proto-goddess, Magna Mater, who in Shevchenko's works finds embodiment in the images of a woman, mother, motherland and earth, but also in the goddess of love - Lala or Lada, pervading his poetry as the girl, sweetheart or wife, wrote Dr. Slukhay.

In addition to the anthropocentric archetype, which conveys the poet's evident desire to place in the center of the cosmos a young woman or a girl - as the personification of Ukraine - Shevchenko employs also the animistic archetype, which aims to endow natural phenomena with a soul and, less obviously, the archetype of time and place, which Dr. Slukhay feels reflects the view of the world expressed in Ukrainian mythology.

Analysis of Shevchenko's poetry in terms of these archetypes can serve as a complement to the conclusions that might be drawn from classical psychoanalysis of his poetry according to the teachings of Freud and Jung, concluded Dr. Slukhay.

Last to lecture was Prof. Larysa Briukhovetska of the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, who spoke on "Shevchenko in Cinema." The first biographical movie about Shevchenko appeared in 1925-1926, at the time of the brief renaissance of Ukrainian culture. It took 25 years before another Shevchenko film was produced. In the 1964 motion picture "Son" (The Dream) Shevchenko's life was traced from his childhood as a serf to his enrollment in the Academy of Fine Arts in St. Petersburg.

In the 1990s, a film titled "Taras Shevchenko: The Testament" was produced jointly by Ukraine's Ministry of Education and the Prosvita Society. It was planned as a 12-part educational television series, but only nine of the parts have been produced and the project to have it distributed to schools on videocassettes never got off the ground. Thus, Shevchenko is still awaiting the screen presentation he deserves, said Prof. Briukhovetska.

In his closing remarks, Dr. Olexa Bilaniuk, the president of UVAN, congratulated the organizers for presenting a conference of such high caliber. He urged NTSh chapters to promulgate the celebration of Shevchenko's anniversaries throughout Ukraine and at all levels. Our hope of achieving a truly Ukrainian state in the 21st century lies with Taras Shevchenko, concluded Dr. Bilaniuk.

The conference was filmed by cinematographer Slavko Nowytski for the program "Windows on America," which is telecast to Ukraine by the Voice of America. Prior to the conference, Dr. Onyshkevych made a repeat presentation of "The Concordance to the Poetic Works of Taras Shevchenko" - this time for the TV program for Ukraine.

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