Personality versus publicin literary reception of Lesia Ukrainka

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Personality versus publicin literary reception of Lesia Ukrainka

O.V. Chaplinska

Abstract

The article establishes that an important basis of the philosophy of Ukrainian neo-romanticism is the romantic tendency to interpret art as a sacred act capable of uniting and raising people to a struggle. The article outlines a neo-romantic model of understanding the role of the artist in the processes of nation-building. Lesia Ukrainka's neo-romantic interpretation of the poet as a guardian or custodian of spiritual treasures tends to Heidegger's definition of human as a shepherd of existence.

In the poetess's creation of images-symbols, the observance of the conception principles of Prometheus, the principles of individualism of F. Nietzsche and H. Ibsen, L. Stevenson's principle of courageous optimism can be traced. It is substantiated that being in a state of conflict between "substantiality" and the "external" world, the heroes of "The Babylonian Captivity" and "The Orgy" find themselves faced with the existential dilemma of choosing the next vector of creative activity.

Keywords: Philosophy Of Neo-Romanticism, Nation-Building, Person - Nation, Artist-Prophet, Will, Honor, Glory.

Анотація

Особистість versus загал у художній рецепції Лесі Українки

О.В. Чаплінська

У статті встановлено, що важливою засадою філософії українського неоромантизму є романтична тенденція осмислення мистецтва як сакрального акту, що спроможний згуртувати і підняти на боротьбу. У статті окреслено неоромантичну модель розуміння ролі митця у процесах націєтворення. Неоромантичне трактування Лесею Українкою поета як охоронця чи опікуна духовних скарбів тяжіє до гайдеґґерівського визначення людини як пастуха буття. У створенні поетесою образів-символів простежуються дотримання принципів концепції прометеїзму, принципів індивідуалізму Ф. Ніцше, Г. Ібсена. принципу мужнього оптимізму Л. Стивенсона.

Ключові слова: філософія неоромантизму, націотворення, людина - нація, митець-пророк, воля, честь, слава.

Introduction

Ukrainian philosophy is characterized by an organic combination of the humanistic tradition with the idea of the cultural and national identity determining the search for the fundamental principles of national unity. The dynamic transformational changes that took place from time to time in Ukrainian society apart from the instability and contradictions in the social life actualized the awareness of the need to transform society into a "community of forceful and strong-willed individuals". Investigating the phenomenon of the heroic stuff in the Ukrainian literature of the 19 th century, Dontsov noted the desire of Ukrainian writers to "create people of heroes" from "lazy nomads" (I. Franko); cossacks - from "Greek plebeians" (T. Shevchenko); from "slaves, venal slaves" - "brave soldiers" (L. Ukrainka)" [1:9].In the historical development of Ukrainian society, either the selfish or the altruistic solution to the problem of personality - public has been tested. Thus, patriotloving intellectuals preferred an altruistic position, thereby sacrificing their individuality for the sake of the community, giving up their own ideals and losing their leadership qualities: "Their aspirations for harmony with the people mostly turned into a utopia just as a hedonistic personality in harmony with itself under the social conditions of that time became a tragic phenomenon" [2:64].The actualized problem has not lost its significance to this day but in some senses it needs to be reconsidered.

Analysis of basic research and publications. Modern studies of Lesia Ukrainka's work are presented by numerous literary, philosophical, sociopolitical and other researches.First of all, this is the work of V. Aheieva, A. Bychko, T. Gundorova, O. Zabuzhko, N. Zborovska, L. Masenko, S. Pavlychko, O. Polishchuk, Ya. Polishchuk, O. Yurchuk.Methodological pluralism applied by scientists contributes to a polyvector "reading" of Lesia Ukrainka's legacy. However, to this day the problems of the relationship between the individual and the public, the individual and society in the understanding of Lesia Ukrainka remain developedin sufficiently.

In the context of nationbuilding her creative output is of particular importance because her ideas do not lose their relevance in the historical essence of modern Ukraine.

The purpose of the article is an analysis of the neo-romantic understanding of the artist's role in the dichotomy "individual -public" within the context of the transformation of the enslaved Ukrainian society into a nationally oriented "union of independent personalities".

Discussion and results

For Ukrainian philosophical thought anthropological problems remain dominant, and therefore the problem of human is interpreted in the perspective of the problem of his/her improvement because "elevation to" is possible when there is a beyond (a certain ontological space for the unfolding of essences), as well as a limit of reference (an ontological minimum) that provides the need itself for deployment - elevation [3:20].From time to time, the function of such an ontological minimum for the majority of Ukrainians was performed by the nation and the state. Prominent Ukrainian researcher V. Horskyi emphasized that the romantic tendency prevails in the fate of Ukrainian philosophy: "Owing to it, the circle of problems that constitute the core essence of philosophy is enriched by the statement of the problem "man - nation" [4:25].Therefore, it is natural that neo-romanticism inherited the tendency of understanding this problem tested by the romantic tradition. poet art ukrainka nation

Neo-romanticism in Ukrainian literature of the late 19 th and early 20th centuries is vividly represented in the work of Lesia Ukrainka who did not only theoretically substantiate "neoromanticism" but also embodied its principles in her drama. Already at the beginning of her artistic journey she set herself a difficult task: "... to liberate the personality in the crowd itself... in this way, to destroy the crowd as an element, and a society will arise in its place, that is, a union of independent individuals" [5:237].The need for the emergence of a "union of independent personalities" caused qualitatively new semantic accents and loads in the personality - public paradigm. The motivation of man's confrontation with the public has changed: egoistic ambitions give way to the desire to remake this public. In this context, the concept of Prometheus is fundamental in Lesia Ukrainka's work. We usually observe in the work of a writer, there is "an idea to which he/she either periodically gets back, or does not let it out of his/her sight in any of their works. Such ideas are often embodied in one type, in one favorite figure..." [5: 135].The poetess repeatedly got back to the image of Prometheus, painted the courageous face of his soul, enriched his rebellious immortal philosophy with her thoughts interpreting the martyrdom of the titan crucified on the rocks as a human selfless altruism as a human feat in the name of freedom. The Promethean way of existence is based on the hero's conviction in the rightness of the ideas life is given for, in the tension of the will, in the sharpness of impressions, in the belief that the world can be renewed at the price of a sacrifice.

To a large extent the individualism of Lesia Ukrainka's heroes-fighters is based on the principles of individualism of F. Nietzsche, H. Ibsen and the principle of courageous optimism of L. Stevenson. In this regard, the Ukrainian researcher V. Panchenko noted that the individualism of the poetess lacks selfishness or the search for selfpleasure instead "there is self-sacrificing loyalty to one's own maxims, life contrary to "I can't'', a willful challenge to despair, hopelessness, slavish obedience. One is not zero for her..." [6:137].

The poetess uses the method of "symbolic thinking" (according to M. Yevshan) and turns to the heroic past she relays the problems of the presentwith. According to O. Zabuzhko this approach transforms the past into a means of artistic research of the present. It forms the perspective of the vision of the past so that in the canvas of the work there is an overlap, an interference of two cultures with a natural shift of the gravity center towards the one presented by the artistic subject. In neoromanticism, historical time is interpreted from the standpoint of subjective experiencefullness. It causes the birth of a new person with a different psychology and a different nature of evaluation. The time continuum receives an existential load, according to which the past acquires the quality of an ontological law for itself. Since it is always present in the present and its image is determined by a certain goal, its meaning, evaluation of the events happened, depends on the project aimed at the future. In this regard, Zh.-

P. Sartresays: "The past is alive, halfdead, remnants, ambiguities, antinomies - the totality of these layers of the past is arranged by the unity of my project. A complex system of references is established through this project. It causes any fragment of my past to enter a hierarchical polyvalent organization, where, as in a work of art, each particular structure points to other various partial structures and to the total structure in different ways" [7:683]. Therefore, it is no wonder that Lesia Ukrainka examines the problems relevant to Ukraine of that time extrapolating them to the history of ancient countries. At the same time a number of works of the poetess reflect the typical Ukrainian soul split. In general, the problem of the soul duality of a person who lives outside the borders of his historical homeland or is in foreign captivity on his native land was best revealed by M. Buber within the historiosophical perspective. The thinker pointed out the inconsistency of the external ("perceptions and influences") world of such a person with his internal, "substantial" world. The dramatic conflict between gente and natione that authoritatively dictated the finality of the existential choice, was exposed, "revived" gaining development in the Ukrainian soul with the inevitability of fate as soon as the Ukrainian found himself outside the hermetically sealed ethnocultural microcosm..." - states O. Zabuzhko [8:81-82]. In this sense, the conflict between "substantiality" and the "external" world is a characteristic feature of the Ukrainian mentality.

It should be noted that the solution to the problem of the individual - public in the work of Lesia Ukrainka unfolds through the study of the peculiarities of the Ukrainian ascent to the heights of the national spirit. Such a transformation is ensured primarily by the activities of artists. The romantic cult of high art in neo-romanticism receives a different interpretation, dominants acquire the functionality of art. Returning to her favorite images- symbols, the poetess introduces them into dramatic works.It makes possible to develop a holistic concept. The main characters of the dramas "Orgy" and "Babylonian Captivity" are artists who have subjugated the artist's soul to the citizen, creative freedom to the national duty. An existential choice can't be avoided by every artist of an enslaved nation. This was most fully reflected in the images-symbols of the prophet-singer Eleazar ("The Babylonian Captivity") and Antaeus ("The Orgy") where the anxieties and a flash of spiritual enlightenment for choosing in favor of a civic vocation were crystallized. The Ukrainian researcher S. Kozak states out reasonable considerations: "A poet in the concept of neo-romantics is an individual endowed with the ability to create new worlds" [9:36 - 37].This, in turn, determines the understanding of art as a sacred act being capable to unite and raise to a struggle.Alanguage existentially connects an individual with a family, a community, a future. It helps to get out of captivity, survive the break with the old world and give strength to build a new temple. According to the poetess, a new word is the power that can transform a ruin and restore the old glory.

The function of enlightenment is realized by artists and prophets. Their activity is characterized by mystery and sacredness. In some occasions, they have to go from confusion and insecurity to realizing their attachment to native people and their duty to them, for example, Eleazar ("The Babylonian Captivity"). Lesia Ukrainka's neoromantic interpretation of the poet as a temporary guardian, a guardian of spiritual treasures, a priest at the temple, an instrument that sounds in unison with the rhythms of the universe tending to Heidegger's definition of human as a shepherd of existence. The motive of serving the people in the poetry undergoes a kind of transformation as it correlates with the process of spiritual leadership.

In the depiction of transformations on the path of nation-building, the topos of "home" gained importance. Thus, in the dramatic poem "The Babylonian Captivity", Lesia Ukrainka focuses attention on the contrast between the "holy home" - Jerusalem being the center of past glory and a source of creativity for the Palestinians, and the new "home of work" - Babylon. Initially, the mythologeme of the "Babylonian captivity" referred to the history of the wanderings of the Israeli people but later it acquired a wider meaning. Since the elements of the chronotope of the "Babylonian captivity" became apocalyptic symbols-signs of maternal madness, imprisoned girls-priests who went to entertain the enemies - the "sons of debauchery", dishonest artists who are forced to speak in a "foreign language" at the "accursed squares". It was used to indicate the situation of existential loneliness of a person and nation [10:124-125].

Let us note that in the poem "Babylonian captivity" Lesia Ukrainka changes the emphasis in the scheme of dialogue between the spiritual elite with the nation. In the poems, the role of the judge belongs to the prophet-artist and the people are the accused. But in the poem the people take over the function of the judge accusing the artist of treason. Such a change in emphasis allowed the poetess to actualize the inseparable unity of the artist and the people one more time, the unity that is achieved owing to common historical memory, common guilt towards the dead and the obligatory struggle for liberation from captivity.

The songs performed by Eleazar at the court have a parable- symbolic character. They reflect the corresponding degree of national deprivation: "a) a careless attitude towards one's own national-state existence and, as a result, the loss of independence; b) moral worries about the national ruin, futile efforts to find "even a leaf (...) from the grape" and c) an injured mentality leads to a limit beyond which ethnic regeneration begins with general "somatic" health" [11:36]. Eleazar's polemic with his fellow tribesmen acquires a constructive character, raises the general tone of the welcoming forces of the prophet and the people, removes the opposition between the artist and the national community. A sense of honor saved Eleazar from the final moral decline and after the trial he realizes his duty to the people believing in his ability to liberate them. In such a way, the national sense is cleansed of spiritual ruins gradually becoming a conscious national persuasion.

In the poem "The Orgy" we have the opposition of two worldview systems: the world of Antaeus and the world of Maecenas. If the first worldview system is a world of patriotic feelings, passionate overexertion, then in the second - high art is leveled and despised. The relationship between these worldview systems is presented through the collisions of the hero dominant values. For Antaeus the key values are faith, will, duty and honor.At the same time the main emphasis is shifted in favor of duty and honor because duty is a moral requirement that turns into a categorical imperative: to serve your native Hellas with your own talent struggling for the will and independence of people.

In the artistic and philosophical concept of Lesia Ukrainka the category of freedom acquires special importance. A full and real life either of an individual person or "a union of independent individuals" is ensured by the spirit freedom. Undoubtedly, a specific feature of human existence is considered to be the inner spiritual world of a person that can't be reduced to its empirical- corporeal reality because it is "foreign" in relation to the bodily naturalistic existence of a person. Such a person's peculiarity is manifested in freedom but not accidental one defined by the Descartes-Spinoza formula of "known necessity" but in original freedom defined as "the ability to initiate a series of events spontaneously" (I. Kant). Therefore, the will taking the form of an obligation ensures compliance with moral requirements. Having realized his social importance and received recognition of his own importance in the material cosmos, it is a sacred patriotic duty for Antaeusto serve Hellas with his talent to fight for its liberation. According to Lesia Ukrainka, the concept of will functions on two levels: firstly, the will of every conscious patriot is directed outwards (that is, to the struggle for liberation from foreign oppression), and, secondly, to the depths of own being (suppression of the desire for glory in the heart). In this case, the will performs the function of an honor talisman. The poetess believed that only a person with a sense of self-worth and national honor is capable of elevating the patriotic idea to the rank of an ideal. Honor performs a regulatory function, since it involves awareness of own place and importance in society and recognition of a person's social weight and significance by society.

An abyss in the understanding of honor and glory separates Antaeus and Phaedo. For Antaeus the concept of honor is a criterion for the moral validity of his own existential choice in favor of the gente. It is unacceptable for him to achieve personal glory at the expense of humiliating his own people. That's why Antaeus' choice is honor above glory. "The understanding of his own world as a valuable thing pushes Antaeus to establish a "limit of power" (according to A. Camus) over himself. For the artist, such a limit becomes the decision of his wife Nerisa to visit the Maecenas orgy. According to A. Camus, a person of rebellion at a certain moment understands that he is capable of dying for his own ideas. The moment of murder is not a spontaneous revenge of resentment but a deliberate step and some part of a rebellion" [12:60].Honor is characterized by an active nature, it serves as an opinion not about any special properties typical for a certain subject but only about qualities assumed and should be available for him. Antaeus is a Hellene who makes it a matter of honor to serve his own people. Instead, Phaedo, Nerissa and Chilo strive to achieve fame while still alive. They renounce their sense of national honor and personal dignity in pursuit of glory. The dominant value of fame harms the process of nation building and liberation from foreign oppression. The thirst for glory pushes them to join the enemy camp. The priority of careerism proves an existential choice in favor of the natione.Phaedo, Chilo and Nerissa seek glory at any cost through adaptive actions, while Antaeus avoids glory focusing on national revival as dominant. The artist's reward for faithfully fulfilling his public and national duty is immortality and glory. It fills the former existence with deep meaningat the same time.

Both Antaeus ("The Orgy") and Eleazar ("The Babylonian Captivity") are deeply marginal figures. They belong to the artistic elite, they need to fulfill the ethno-protective function of the enslaved people. For Antaeus, the duty to the fatherland and the feeling of national honor acquire a purposeful character determining the meaning of his life. Another choice is illegal for him. Through the act of suicide the main character of "The Orgy" asserts the moral rightness of his own life choice. According to I. Kant, Antei'sact of suicide can be interpreted as courage: the singer did so in order not to be deprived of honor and to confirm the moral correctness of his service to his native people. However, if Eleazar had done so, then his action in the eyes of his demoralized tribesmen would have been perceived as a decline in spirit.

The honor-glory dilemma has acquired an existential character, its solution takes place in the context of the life and dead problem. The insult and humiliation of human dignity (the actions of Phaedo, Chilo, and Nerissa are of such a nature) are aimed at the timeless and extraspatial spiritual essence of the human self. The rightness of the ideas chosen by Antaeus is under threat. He perceives it as a threat not only to individual but also to national honor. Antaeus chooses for himself the path of Jasper's hiddenness in eternity, since the further continuation of earthly existence has lost its expediency and has become undesirable for the ethnogenes is of the nation. The opinions of Lesia Ukrainka regarding the understanding of the dichotomy of personality and public were extremely relevant both for the society at that time and for our society today. After all, according to P. Yurkevych, a person should be such a personality who "does not dissolve in the general and at the same timebeing an individual. This means to reveal the universal nature of humanity in yourself" [13: 695].The personality in the work of the poetess is always a representative of the people enslaved either in the state-national, cultural, or spiritual sense. Lesya Ukrainka interprets the relationship between the individual and the public through ethical categories. Its core is will. Proclaiming will as the main driving force of human existence, the poetess in her understanding clearly tends to Schopenhauer's voluntarism. Duty, honor and dignity are the dominants of human moral consciousness. They determine the stability of the personality and direct volitional, intellectual and spiritual efforts to ensure self-identity. At the same time, the internal choice of the individual acquires an existential meaning. The characters of her dramas are united by the fact that they are all bearers of an indomitable willbeing not susceptible to the pressure of society.

Together they form a world of active personalities, each of them is unique. These heroes themselves are a unique "union of personalities" in society being not representatives of the crowd. At the same time the key goal of the poet's work is the need to awaken the inner personal freedom, to show a high goal and thus to rebirth it - to lead from a slave of everyday life to the path of a creator of a free and proud life. Her heroes are a symbol of citizenship and unique human individuality, they are characterized by the spirit of restructuring the world, the spirit of exaltation of the individual imbued with social passions.

Conclusions and research prospects

So, Lesia Ukrainka's neoromantic perception of reality correlates with the idea of the dichotomous unity of "I-self (personality) and "We-self' (public) in the process of Ukrainian nationbuilding and state-building. The specified dichotomy organically combined the personal and naturalspiritual suprapersonal component. That is, self-improvement, raising personal existence to a higher level is not designed for an egocentric goal but rather has social altruistic goals. Lesia Ukrainka's neo-romanticism was realized in the historical-heroic themes, the depiction of uncompromising conflicts, the typology of the hero-fighter for the freedom and independence of the people. In her understanding the artist is able to change the inert, self-existing ethnic mass, to overcome the dichotomy of the human soul, to awaken the Promethean spirit for the regeneration of an inert ethnicity into a self-existing nation. It will ensure the creation of a new society, "a union of independent personalities. "In our opinion, there are precisely these aspects of Larysa Kosach's creative output that require closer attention in further philosophical studies.

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