Ivan Franko - stories. Works by Ivan Franko for children Oriental flavor and Ukrainian motifs
In addition to a significant number of works of art (prose, poetry and poems), journalistic, philosophical and scientific works, there are many fairy tales in the works of Ivan Franko. Most of them are known to us from childhood. Initially, the writer composed fairy tales for his four children, but soon these works became a treasure not only for the children of his contemporaries, but also for future generations of Ukrainian children. The most popular of them are: “Kitty”, “Turnip”, “Nikita the Fox”, “The Painted Fox”, “The Court of St. Nicholas”, “The Holy Evening Tale”, as well as a collection of stories for children “When the animals still spoke”. Among the plots of I. Franko’s fairy tales are both original works of authorship and borrowings from various sources. The texts are written in prose and poetry.
A special place in the “fairytale” heritage of I. Franko is occupied by two Arabic tales - “The Shoes of Abu Kasim” and “The Blacksmith Bassim”. They attract attention, first of all, with their exoticism, because at the end of the 19th century. The East was perceived by the Ukrainian reader as a kind of terra incognita, and reliable information and contacts with eastern countries were virtually absent. Therefore, literary subjects remained unknown.
Franko was the first in Ukrainian literature to use Arabic subjects, borrowed from the multi-volume Arabian Nights, the German edition of which he came across in one of the Viennese antique shops.
“The Shoes of Abu Kasim” is one of the most famous poetic tales of I. Franko, the beginning of which is probably familiar to each of us:
In the glorious city of Baghdad,
In the time of viziers and qadis
Once upon a time there was an old widower,
A cunning miser and a greedy person.
It's for the whole district
There was one such miser!
(translation by V. Tushnova)
The first edition of this work appeared in Lvov in 1895 under the title “The Shoes of Abu Kazem” and received significant success! It so shocked the outstanding orientalist and friend of Franco Agafangel Krymsky that he, like a true scientist, could not help but write a review. True, while expressing admiration, he made several critical remarks.
On the eve of the second edition (1902, Lvov), I. Franko shared the history of the creation of “The Shoes of Abu Kasim.” According to the writer, the plot was known in Ukraine (in Galicia), and the author only translated it into lines. Apparently, oriental “tunes” penetrated Ukrainian territory from the pages of European publications, undergoing various changes along the way, because the stories were transmitted orally. Be that as it may, I. Franko first heard about Abu Kasim while studying at the Drohobych gymnasium from the lips of an illiterate local resident. This is how he remembers it: “instead of Abu Qasim, he called the hero Kazoem, and instead of shoes he said “boots.” “Now listen to Kazoem’s boots,” - this is how he began his story, when many young people, equally illiterate boys and girls, gathered with him on a holiday. Everyone listened and laughed. Me too". The writer’s next “meeting” with Abu Qasim took place in Vienna, when he came across the famous “A Thousand and One Nights” in one of the antique shops. In the 4th volume of this impressive 11-volume collection, I. Franko discovered his “old acquaintance Kazoem.” And only then he gave the prose a poetic coloring.
The plot of the fairy tale-poem
The main character of the work - the old merchant Abu Qasim - is described very colorfully:
Although he didn’t know the account for the money,
But he walked dirtier than the devil.
Dressed worse than a beggar!
Like decayed matting,
Clothes are all coming apart at the seams,
There is no living space in it.
A merchant of incense, he was famous for his incredible stinginess. He was always dressed beggarly, but the most repulsive thing was his shoes, famous throughout Baghdad:
But the strangest thing was
Brown with dust
The shoes he wore.
Shoes of this type:
Damn grandma anyway
He danced as hard as he could.
Even the ship of Elder Noah
Didn't have to have this
A sea of all kinds of patches...
The deck shoes are wider,
Hanging on my feet like weights,
Like sacks of oats hanging.
It is on these “unpresentable” shoes that I. Franko bases the main line of the work. Abu Qasim, well aware of the terrifying appearance of his shoes, tries to get rid of them throughout the entire work, but he fails. Each of the attempts ends in failure - sometimes comical, sometimes tragic. The story ends with Abu Qasim losing, due to stinginess, not only all his wealth, but also his mind. Therefore, until the end of his life he walks with his terrible shoes on his shoulders, becoming a blessed beggar. These shoes accompany him on his final journey.
Moral and ethical accents of the tale
Like any other fairy tale, the story of the “shoes” carries many messages. In particular, the theme of stinginess appears here in a special tone, not only turning Abu Qasim into a laughing stock for the whole of Baghdad, but ultimately destroying his life, turning him into a beggar. According to I. Franko, he “looked at this comic story from its tragic side and, reducing the comedy, tried to imagine its tragedy.” In an allegorical form, the writer also depicted the society of that time with its inherent shortcomings, which we have not been able to get rid of to this day. In particular, it addresses the issue of bribery.
At the same time, the work also reflected other nuances inherent in that time. For example, judicial practice (when Abu Qasim is tried) resembles Austrian, not Eastern: a judge in uniform draws up a protocol, has a stamp and does not require a fee - all these words are from the Ukrainian (Austrian) realities of the era of I. Franco. At the same time, while depicting the life of the East, European details are used by the author, most likely for the purpose of more detailed illumination of the exoticism of medieval Baghdad. It is no coincidence, according to A. Krymsky, that I. Franko, using the plot of an oriental fairy tale, created his own original work, “seasoned with strong satirical salt,” with the ideas of humanism (seasoned with lyricism), with the author’s digressions and reflections.
Therefore, “The Shoes of Abu Qasim” is not just a fairy tale, but a real poem with bright characters, diluted with witty jokes and humor.
Oriental flavor and Ukrainian motifs
I. Franko conveyed the realities of eastern life in a colorful way, using a number of conceptual and lexical forms. Let us quote a few lines of poetry:
All the people during the day
Dozing, hiding from the heat
(It's hot there - be healthy!)
Only when it gets dark,
The Tiger will blow a chill,
Everyone leaves their houses.
Where are they going? On the roofs!
People there breathe coolness,
They look at Baghdad at night.
In parallel with introducing readers to the nuances of life in the eastern city, I. Franko weaves Ukrainian motifs into the text of the work, using many local dialectical words, Ukrainizing some Arabic concepts. As A. Krymsky emphasized, “Franco’s Baghdad is not a foreign city for us, but to a certain extent our own.”
Thus, at a time when the East was practically a closed region for Ukrainians (and Europeans too), I. Franko managed to bring the eastern “rhythm” closer to the Ukrainian reader. Perhaps for the first time in Ukrainian literature, the writer spoke about such a phenomenon as dervishism (“it is covered by Franko as if he was carefully reading the entire dervish literature” - A. Krymsky). The writer showed the path of the main character from a miser-rich man to a beggar-dervish, elements of his comprehension of the philosophy of dervishdom, his asceticism, the transition to a higher, spiritual life and recognition from people after death:
Soon the unfortunate old man will really be
Became a beggar pilgrim
I wandered through the alleys,
I prayed under mosques,
I visited Mecca three times.
True to this vow,
He died a beggar in a hole somewhere,
He was buried like a beggar...
And how they buried it in the ground -
They began to magnify and glorify,
And he became a saint!
Thus, the famous shoes can be considered not only as the source of all Abu Qasim’s troubles, but also as an instrument of his salvation. Having lost all his property and home through these ill-fated shoes, he begins to understand that the only real treasure of a person is a pure soul. Therefore, he decides to wear these shoes on his shoulders throughout his life as atonement. Following which he becomes a dervish. Not just a beggar, but a holy sage.
Conclusion
Even during I. Franko’s lifetime, “The Shoes of Abu Qasim” went through several editions. By the way, the fairy tale poem was also published in Canada (1914) thanks to the local Ukrainian society. Later, “The Shoes of Abu Qasim” were published in Ukraine several times (1924, 1965, 1984, 1998 and 2008), and one of the best is considered to be the edition with beautiful illustrations by the Ukrainian artist Ivan Krislach (1977 and 2017).
For over 100 years now, the work has been not only one of the most beloved books of Ukrainian children, but, according to A. Krymsky, “it is also read willingly by adults.”
Solomiya Vivchar
“He robs purely, but doesn’t want it personally, he sends Bears and Wolves.” The small inhabitants of the brutal kingdom - hares, birds - have no life, they have no rights, they are destroyed with impunity, devoured by all-powerful predators.
In his fairy tale poem, Ivan Franko widely used Ukrainian folk art - fairy tales, fables, songs about animals. In it we also find a number of paintings reproducing folk life and customs. “I wanted not to translate, but to remake the old story about the fox, to make it our people's good, to give it our national character. I, so to speak, applied our Ukrainian colors to someone else’s drawing,” wrote Ivan Franko in the preface to “Nikita’s Fox.”
Ivan Franko used the same method when creating the fairy tale “Turnip”. He translated the old folk tale in a new, rhythmic language, saturated with elements of Ukrainian folk life. The fairy tale teaches us to live, work together, amicably.
Reflecting the life, way of life and customs of the Galicians, Ivan Franko used all the riches of their language, which differs from the language spoken by the Ukrainian population of other regions. The writer widely used dialectisms in his works - peculiar words, expressions, syntactic constructions characteristic of the language of a certain area.
At the same time, he constantly strove to bring the language of his works closer to the all-Ukrainian literary norm. From edition to edition, I revised the texts, removed dialecticisms, outdated forms
The fairy tale in Franco’s work, and indeed in fiction in general, acts not only as a genological category (that is, an independent genre, for example, most of the fairy tales about animals from the collection “When the Animals Still Spoke,” or a dominant or recessive genological factor in combined genre structures - fairy tales - poems, fairy tales - dramas, fairy tales - parables, etc.), but also the functions of paratext (as a component of heading and sub-heading structures) and an optional element of poetics, an additional (and therefore not genre-fictional) visual means. Therefore, one should distinguish between the fairy tale itself, as a genological concept, and fabulousness, which is an ideological concept, as a type of imagery.
at the level of content: the problems of good and evil, truth and untruth, the idea of the inevitable victory of good over evil, optimistic life-affirming pathos, magical-heroic, social, everyday and natural themes;
at the level of the internal norm: in the plot-shaped organization of the work there are elements of fairy-tale fiction, that is, fairy-tale events (chains of events) and characters (groups of characters), fairy-tale chronotope (conditionally fantastic, metahistorical; opposition of one’s own and another’s kingdom, forest as space danger, crossroads as a product situation; in compositional organization (fairy-tale closes and limbs, tripartite action, image of a fairy-tale narrator)
at the level of the external form of the work: linguistic-stylistic fairy-tale formulas and cliches (initial, medial, final), typical fairy-tale tropes and figures (hyperboles, litotes, personifications; threefold repetitions, amplifications, etc.).
Of course, all partial manifestations of fabulousness in themselves are not genre-twirling, only style-twirling.
I was just listening to the radio. And I really liked the phrase: “ I’ll take a walk and I’ll fall on my beetles". My every morning begins with this ritual, because “Life from Life” - life is living, it is growth, development. How the Buryaks grow is more important than all the Abams and Ladens...
Well, then, after listening to the fairy tale, I remembered that I had read it and watched it in cartoons.
Even teachers of the Ukrainian language say about Ivan Franko that no one has read all of his “creations” in their entirety, and his language cannot quite be called Ukrainian. But everyone knows that Ivan Franko is a classic. This is already enough. I suggest reading (or watching) the fairy tale “The Hare and the Hedgehog”. For this alone it is quite possible to earn the title of a classic.
Zaєts and Їzhak
The hedgehog stood near the door of his hole, tucked his paws into his belt, pointed his nose into the warm wind, and hummed a verse of a song to himself - whether it’s bad or bad, who cares? As he knows, so he sleeps.
Muttered to himself quietly, and then thought:
“While my wife is there with the children and gives them fresh shirts, let me go out into the field, take a walk, and marvel at my beetroots, how well they have grown.”
The Buryaks were not far from his house. He took them as much as he needed to fight for his homeland, and told him in advance “my Buryaks.”
Well, okay. Carefully closing the doors behind him, he stitched into the field. It’s not far from here, and right here I’m talking about a Zayets. You can also take a walk and visit “your own cabbage”.
Having treated the Hare, the hedgehog greeted him a little. That Hare is a great panic and a very proud thing. You didn’t confirm his greetings, but just looked at someone very high and called out:
Wow, why are the axes dragging across the field so early?
“Let’s go for a walk,” he said.
Take a walk? - Zayets registered. - And I think that with your crooked legs it would be better to lie down than to climb for a walk.
This ridicule really angered the hedgehog, because his legs were crooked.
You, singingly, think, - like a hedgehog to the Hare, - what will you beat with your long paws?
“Azhezh,” said Zayets.
“We can try,” he said, “Anu, I’ll bet you that I won’t marry you.”
It’s a funny thing to say to people. Are you getting ahead of me with your crooked faces? - the Hare smiled.
Well, about me, let’s try it if you want.
Garazd! - says the Hare. - Give me your hand. And now let's run.
Well, well, why be in such a hurry,” said the hedgehog. “I need to go home first, eat three rubles, and after a few days I’ll be back at the same place.”
I didn’t mind the hare, because I wanted to crunch the fresh cabbage beforehand. And this time the hedgehog got home.
Come home as soon as possible and even before your wife:
Zhenko, get ready quickly and come with me to the field.
Why am I in the field? - the hedgehog feeds.
You know, I can run ahead with the Hare.
Have you lost your mind, man? - the hedgehog screamed. “Do you want to run ahead with the Hare?”
I really want it. And you must help me. Why is a little hedgehog so timid? She got together and went with the man.
And on the way, the hedgehog has to go to her:
Bachish otsyu dovgu niva? Our stages loom here. The hare runs along one furrow, and I run through another. From the grief, we begin to run away. Father, stand by yourself here, by the furrow, and if the Hare comes running here, then raise your head and shout: “And I’m already here!”
So, while praying, the stinks came to the washed-up field.
The hedgehog put his wife at this place, and he walked along the furrow at the other end.
Come, and Zayets is already there.
Well, what then, let's go? - feeds Zayets. - Well, one... two...
One stood in one furrow, the other in another.
The hare shouted “three” and destroyed himself like a cowlick.
And the hedgehog runs for maybe three miles, then hides by the furrow and turns back in its first place. And the Hare wanted to run. So when you reach the end of the field, the hedgehog’s wife will already shout at you from another angle:
And I’m already here!
The hare only saw his eyes: it didn’t occur to me that it was not the same hedgehog, because, you know, the hedgehog and the hedgehog are the same in appearance.
But what could have happened? - Hare shouted. “Let’s run again, back!”
And, without a moment's rest, he flew through the whirlwind of the field, laying his ear on his back. The hedgehog lost her peace of mind in her place. And if you reach the other end of the field, then there’s something on the alert:
And I’m already here!
The hare got angry. What a miracle? Should the bandy-legged hedgehog get ahead of me? I, don’t mumble to yourself out of annoyance by shouting:
Anu, let's run again!
About me, Semyon,” he said, “I want to say it ten times, or even less.”
The Hare escapes, and from below I smell again:
I'm already here!
If you run again, you'll know the same. So you, poor girl, ran, ran as many as seventy and three times back, and every time the hedgehog was “already here.” Whether the Hare reaches one edge of the field or the other, everyone feels the same thing: “I’m already here.” And the seventy-fourth time the Hare didn’t make it. In the middle of the field, he fell to the ground and landed on the spot.
And the hedgehog honked at his wife, and both went home happily. And live, maybe, and still, if you haven’t died.
After that, the entire hare row swore to run ahead of the hedgehogs.
source: http://ukrlib.com/FrankoZviryHovorili.html
Cartoon Hare and Hedgehog
Year of release: 1963
The film belongs to the genre: cartoon
Director: Irina Gurvich
Actors who took part in the filming: N. Panasiev, G. Loiko, V. Dukler
Brief description: Based on the fairy tale by Ivan Franko. Included in the 3rd edition of the Best Cartoons of the Kyiv Film Studio.
The postman dog brought a telegram to the Hedgehog - the Hare, with whom the Hedgehog once sat at the same desk, is coming. Kosoy arrived in his own car with a medal on his chest and a cigarette in his mouth. The Hare became a champion and believed that he could do anything. When asked about his place of work, the Hare answered that he was a champion. The meeting of friends took place, but the Hedgehog was extremely surprised by the changes in his classmate. Then a competition was held with the arrogant bunny...
Ivan Franko. Someone else's biography.
17.12.07
Whoever tried to mold him into a hero and revolutionary. Socialists of all stripes affirmed and affirm Franco as the founder of Ukrainian socialism (social democrats - social democracies). Communists are the forerunners of Ukrainian communism. Nationalists are ardent nationalists and fighters for the national idea, and Russophiles are consistent supporters of the joint Ukrainian-Russian path. Polish nationalists, too, managed to find in Ivan Yakovlevich a painter of “the tragedies of the Polish and Little Russian peoples, finally humiliated by tsarist despotism. A writer whose works provide a convincing contrast to the life of the peoples of the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, in an inert and cruel empire, with the liberties of the glorious past described by the brilliant Sienkiewicz” (J. Kontowski “Polish Biography”). What about the Poles! Even the Nazis managed to borrow quotes from Franco and publish it in a collection calling on Ukrainians to fight Jews, Poles and Russians. In general, everyone found something they liked in Franco. As a result, most Ukrainians don’t really know anything about the real Ivan Franko. This is not surprising, because he lived not his own biography, but someone else’s biography. In the sense that it was not Franco himself who determined his fate, but completely different people and circumstances.
Paper revolutionary
Open any biography of this person. Just, I beg you, don’t look at the portrait, but just read what’s written there. Here’s one example: “An outstanding representative of Ukrainian literature of the 19th-20th centuries, writer, poet, fiction writer, scientist, publicist and activist in the revolutionary socialist movement in western Ukraine.” So you imagine a sort of cross between Dzerzhinsky and Lunacharsky, with a pencil in one hand and a revolver in the other. In fact, Ivan Yakovlevich Franko was a typical paper rebel and revolutionary. He rebelled only on paper and looked like a rebel only on it. By and large, the biography of Ivan Franko is a chain of misfortunes and accidents. However, judge for yourself.
Failure first. Childhood
Who knows what the fate of Franco, who was born at the turn of the century in 1856, would have been like if not for his childhood. He hardly knew his father; his mother also died early, but before that she managed to remarry. As a result, Franco grew up and was brought up in his stepfather’s family - actually a stranger to him. It is unlikely that they treated their adopted son badly, but the restless old Freud could have said a lot of interesting things about this. In addition, Franco clearly did not have a good relationship with his school teachers. This is clearly evident from his works and articles dedicated to the school. A normal child can (and does) find an outlet from school troubles in the family. But Franco chose his option - to become the best student. And he became one - first at school, then at the gymnasium. Moreover, by his own admission, he did this not out of love for learning as such, but simply trying to prove to everyone his superiority in at least something. It also had an effect that the health of the future writer was weak since childhood. Accordingly, he could not gain authority among his peers in the traditional fun and pranks of boys. I bet Franco would have maintained this lifestyle until the end of his days. But fate decreed differently.
Second failure. Herd feeling
In 1875, Franko entered Lviv University. For many, the university gives a chance to start life anew, and the rural youth Franco took full advantage of it. Having practically no friends at school and gymnasium, he joins the so-called “Academic Circle”. A little clarification is needed here. The fact is that in those good times, the Ukrainians of the Austro-Hungarian Empire were practically not interested in politics. Two movements in Ukraine could be considered at least somehow close to politics - Muscovophiles and Ukrainophiles. By and large, these were two large clubs of interest. Muscovophiles got together and talked abstrusely about pan-Slavic cultural unity (neither my God nor political!). Ukrainophiles considered Galicians to be a valuable “thing in themselves,” and all other Ukrainians as inferior “Little Russians.” The “academic circle” that Franco joined belonged to Muscovophiles. It is difficult to say why he entered there. Either from a herd feeling (“Everyone ran – and I ran”), or from an ambitious desire to publish. After all, the circle had its own magazine, “Friend,” where they took student works. True, I strongly advise against reading what Franco wrote for this publication. The members of the circle wrote in a monstrous “language” - a mixture of Russian, Ukrainian, Polish, German and Hungarian words. To be fair, it should be noted that it was at the university that Ivan Franko first tried himself as a translator - he tried to translate ancient Greek tragedies into Ukrainian. But in general, Muscovophiles were guided by the traditions of Russian literature of the late 18th and early 19th centuries - hopelessly outdated.
This is how the young writer would finish his studies at the university, publishing obscure imitations of Hoffmann and Zhukovsky once a month. But in the life scenario he got the “queen of spades”, played by Kyiv University professor Drahomanov. The aforementioned professor decided not to limit himself to Kyiv students and to participate in the education of Slavic brothers from Austria. To this end, he sent them several letters and helped them obtain samples of the “golden age” of Russian literature. And so it began.
Members of the circle became fascinated by the new style and social ideas, vying with each other to publish socially harsh works and articles in Friend. Franco, who edited the magazine, to his own advantage, as it later turned out, became especially fascinated by the highly social works of Saltykov-Shchedrin and Chernyshevsky. Imitating these authors, Franco himself published several social works in the magazine. Perhaps the members of the circle could have gotten away with this, but the older generation of Muscovophiles had their own special opinion on this matter. Of course, the attempt to reason with the unbridled youth by pressing with authority failed successfully. The youth, with their characteristic maximalism, sent the former “gurus” to hell. Those, of course, were offended and wrote a denunciation to the circle. Almost all members of the circle got away with it, but not Franco, who was openly set up. The fact is that it was Franco who edited the notorious magazine and was best suited for exemplary punishment. The denunciation accused him and the members of the circle of creating a secret socialist organization. The result was expulsion from the university in 1878 and 9 months in prison. Whatever Franco himself later wrote about this, the prison seriously affected not only his future work. First of all, it affected his health, both physical and mental.
Failure three. A reluctant hero
From prison, Ivan Franko emerged as an outcast for most of his former comrades and opponents. Ukrainophiles never particularly liked him, the older generation of Muscovophiles turned their backs on him, considering him a traitor, and the youth, frightened by the defeat of the Academic Circle, sat as quiet as water. Here Franco would calm down. You could try to recover at the university and forget about politics. Get serious about literature. In the end - to heal. Indeed, despite the time spent in prison, the official punishment was rather declarative. It is unlikely that he was seriously considered a malicious criminal. Franco himself admitted in one of his autobiographies that he was not expelled from the university, he was simply deprived of his scholarship. But either something broke in Franco, or we don’t know some facts of his biography, but from that moment he begins a life full of tossing and unintelligible actions. He tries to do everything at once - literature, journalism, ethnography, philology, correspondence studies. However, his works are not published in his homeland. Except, of course, for the magazine “Hromadsky Friend”, which he published together with his friend Mikhail Pavlik.
It is precisely to Pavlik that we owe the image of “Ivan Franko – hero and revolutionary.” By 1878, Pavlik himself had finally decided to become a professional revolutionary. At the same time, he actively pushed Franco, who was easily influenced by others, towards socialist ideas. Actually, the idea of the magazine “Civil Friend” belonged to Pavlik. In addition to the magazine, Pavlik and Franko studied the works of the founders of Marxism. And not without benefit for yourself. From the works of Marx and Engels, they compiled brochures that were distributed among workers and the agitated intelligentsia. They don’t like to mention this, but the distribution of brochures and leaflets was usually accompanied by a request to “help a just cause.” Of course, financially. At the same time, it was Pavlik who managed the money. Franco worked practically for free, especially since the magazine, as they say, “didn’t take off.” It was obvious from the very beginning that it would be closed by the Imperial censors and that their authors and editors would be in serious trouble. And so it happened. Pavlik, as the main initiator of the publication, even had to escape arrest. He escaped by emigration. Having certain means, he settled in the Mecca of the then revolutionaries - Geneva. There, enjoying the beauty of Lake Geneva, he could do what he loved - argue with other socialists and publish articles in local publications.
Another thing is Franco, around whom a real detective revolves. Pavlik understood perfectly well that the emerging socialist movement needed a hero-martyr. A kind of living icon that can always be used in the fight against opponents and to agitate supporters. Of all Pavlik’s acquaintances, Franco was best suited for this role. Of course, against the backdrop of the “knights-martyrs of the revolution” in Russia, Franco “didn’t look right.” But competent “promotion” played its role. In fact, the method of creating a “martyr for an idea” was worked out on Franco. And even during his lifetime. Under Franco, a standard set of cliches was created - progressive views, the struggle for social justice, court and prison. Even Ivan Franko’s poor health was used to create and exploit the image of a fighter and revolutionary. Please note that in modern biographies of Franco, references to poor health, as a rule, follow the story of imprisonment. So that readers get the strong impression that his illnesses are a consequence of his imprisonment.
In general, in 1879 Franco was left without an emigrated partner and means of subsistence. Literature did not bring in money - after the story of the magazine’s closure, no one wanted to publish it. Franco did not have any education or crafts that could provide at least some profit. Doing odd jobs, he got to the point where he had no permanent place of residence. And, nevertheless, we must give him his due - he continued to write. And not only literary works, but also works on the theory of socialism, thus fulfilling the program laid down in it by Pavlik. Finally, despairing of finding a stable income in the city, Franco decides to go to villages with private lectures. I decided, so to speak, to combine “revolutionary activity” with the process of getting my daily bread. The appearance of the “revolutionary lecturer” by the rural police was perceived quite adequately - Franco was arrested for the second time. This time the imprisonment was limited to approximately three months.
Second chance
Probably, fate gives every person a second chance. She gave it to Franco too. Returning to Lviv in 1881, he, quite unexpectedly, received an offer to edit the newspaper of Lviv printers - “Praca”. The newspaper, although it was a recognized newspaper of Lvov workers, was published completely legally and was not particularly radical. In addition, Franko is published in the magazine “Svit”. After four years of ordeal and a miserable existence, punctuated by arrests, he finally has the opportunity to make money through journalism and literature, receiving a completely stable income. In the end, no one stopped Franco from pursuing his beloved philology and ethnography.
But this clearly did not fit into the image of a “fiery revolutionary.” Moreover, Mikhail Pavlik had by that time become a member of the “Polish-Ukrainian Socialist Committee.” To maintain his reputation, he urgently needed to present to his party comrades the fruits of the socialists’ work in Ukraine. Therefore, Franco took advantage of his second chance in a very original way - he turned the newspaper entrusted to him into a militant leaflet of the revolutionaries. In particular, it is in it that he publishes his “Eternal Revolutionary”. Moreover, using the resources of the newspaper, he publishes a brochure “About Labor. A book for workers,” which is already direct revolutionary agitation. The prospect of a third arrest seriously loomed before Franco. In addition, it was popularly hinted to him that the owners of the newspaper he edited saw its content completely differently. In general, Ivan Yakovlevich’s nerves could not stand it, and he quickly curtailed all his affairs in Lvov.
To the village, to my aunt, to the wilderness...
Of course, not to my aunt, but otherwise everything is correct. Deciding not to tempt fate, Franco left for the village of Naguevichi. There he spent two years studying literature in its purest form, writing occasional articles and... ordinary peasant labor. There was an obvious nervous breakdown and a desire to get away from both the police and fellow revolutionaries, who stubbornly pushed the weak and tired of living in fear Franco along the path of “an ardent fighter for the happiness of the common people.” This can be clearly seen at least from Franco’s works of that time. While living in the village, he wrote a series of literary articles, translated Goethe and Heine, and wrote perhaps his best work - the novel “Zakhar Berkut”. This historical novel, describing the events of the 13th century, was completely different from everything written by Franco both before and after. By the time he left for the village, Franco had developed a rather unique literary style that was difficult to understand and perceive. This was connected, on the one hand, with the desire to work in the style of realism, which at times reached naturalism, and on the other hand, with the eternal lack of time for literary finishing of works. The result is perceived by some as the most brilliant phenomenon in the history of Ukrainian literature, while by others it is not perceived at all. A number of Polish, Austrian and Russian writers of that time viewed Franco exclusively as a journalist and publicist, but not a writer. Some even openly called him a graphomaniac. Nevertheless, the writer Franco enjoyed a certain popularity, largely due to the fashion for “acute social themes.” “Zakhar Berkut” reconciled Franco with his critics and a wide range of readers, giving him a chance to become a truly popular writer, and not just “widely known in narrow circles.” Moreover, the quality of the novel was appreciated by the Zarya magazine, declaring it the winner of the magazine’s literary competition in 1883. In the same year, the magazine, which took very moderate national and bourgeois-democratic positions, offered Franco cooperation. By this time village life was over. Thanks to a wealthy landowner who invited Franco to conduct research on his genealogy. Not free of course. For this work I had to return to Lvov and delve into the archives.
...In fact, the method of creating a “martyr for an idea” was worked out on Franco. And even during his lifetime. A standard set of cliches was created for him - progressive views, the struggle for social justice, court and prison. Even Ivan Franko’s poor health was used to create and exploit the image of a fighter and revolutionary.
Return of the "revolutionary"
Working for Zarya, publishing a popular novel and publishing articles on scientific, social and economic topics, Franco did little to resemble a socialist revolutionary. Quite a respectable journalist, writer and publicist. True, without higher education, but this was a fixable matter. There would be money. And the money began to appear slowly. In addition to Zarya, Franco got a job at the Delo newspaper, which was similar in views to Zarya, where he quickly became a member of the editorial board. In addition, he actively wrote for Polish magazines and newspapers. Especially in “Lviv Courier”, where he became an almost constant author. However, the idyll ended rather quickly. His evil genius fell on Franco’s head - Mikhail Pavlik, who had returned from emigration a year before and surrendered to the authorities. After spending about a year in rural exile, Pavlik arrived in Lvov and immediately went to see his “comrade in the struggle.” It’s hard to say how happy Franco was to see him. However, at first, Franco exists as if separately from Pavlik. Franko took some part in his fate - he helped him return to the journalistic world of Lvov. Soon Pavlik worked in several publications in the city, one way or another connected with the legal superstructures of socialism. In 1885, Franco himself went to Kyiv to ask for money from the local “sponsors of the national movement.” No matter how much Ukrainian nationalists and socialists are portrayed as fiery revolutionaries, without money, a revolution, as you understand, turns out poorly. And the national revival is the same. Although if you look at it objectively, it didn’t work out very well with money. The reason for this was that most of the “revolutionaries” were accustomed to eating tasty food and sleeping softly. And they didn’t give anything for free. It is interesting that Franco went on such a responsible business trip on the instructions of the aforementioned newspaper “Zarya”, of which by that time he had become the editor. How much Franco has changed can be judged by the fact that in Kyiv, he coped with the mission of raising funds more than successfully. While solving financial matters, he did not forget about personal ones - it was on this trip that he met Olga Khoruzhinskaya, his future wife. Franco met 1886 as the editor of a popular publication, an employee of a number of equally popular publications, a married man and, as they say, with a future. What else does a person need to be happy? Moreover, the restless Pavlik, by that time, had once again managed to “check in” and receive a short sentence for “revolutionary agitation” among the peasants. After that, he went to Krakow and left Franco alone for two years. True, Pavlik returned two years later. But this time I calmed down a little. To the surprise of many, instead of the usual circle of “agitation-prison-exile”, he moved towards rapprochement with the moderate majority among Ukrainian nationalists and socialists. It was in 1889 - the last calm year in Franco's life. And although by this time Franco’s affairs had deteriorated - he lost his editorial post due to internal editorial intrigues, he, while remaining an employee of the Lviv Courier, earning money as translations and publishing in several periodicals at once, lived quite well. In 1890, taking into account the unification of socialists and Ukrainian nationalists in Galicia, the imperial authorities entered into an agreement with their leaders, according to which the Ukrainian language was granted the broadest rights in education, culture, media and office work. In exchange, the authorities demanded loyalty to the unity of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Uniate Church and the existing economic system. And here Pavlik could not stand it - he broke with the nationalist majority and founded the Russian-Ukrainian Radical Party. Moreover, the party defended precisely those positions that the authorities, having made concessions, demanded to abandon. Pavlik urgently needed Franco in party work. First of all, in order to work on the party organ - the newspaper "People". The question arises - why did Franco agree? There were two reasons for this. Firstly, he was offended by the authorities. In 1889, Franko accompanied a group of Kyiv students on a trip to Galicia. The authorities saw the tourists as instigators of a riot with the aim of annexing Galicia to Russia and subjected Franko and Pavlik to preventive arrest until the circumstances were clarified. Secondly, Pavlik played on the writer’s ambition by offering him the post of co-leader of the party and editor of the newspaper. And Franco, as they say, fell for it.
Donkey and carrot
Remember the beautiful allegorical image of a donkey constantly running after a carrot hanging in front of its nose, which it is not destined to get. It was precisely this kind of donkey that Franco actually turned into in pursuit of the carrots hung by Pavlik. He worked for five years at Naroda, not only editing the newspaper, but also publishing a lot of articles in it. He spoke at rallies and prepared a brochure for publication. He practically abandoned his literary and scientific activities. And everything is free. The only consolation for him was the long-awaited completion of his university course and the defense of his doctoral dissertation. Obtaining a doctorate gave Franco the chance to get a professorship at Lviv University, and these were not empty dreams. His candidacy was not just nominated for the post of professor of the department of Russian literature - it was actively supported by the university professors and Franco already saw himself in the professorial mantle. But it was not there. No one has ever managed to chase two birds with one stone at the same time. Either you are a revolutionary and a fiery fighter, or you are a scientist and a writer - this is what the university board decided. And Franco’s candidacy was not approved. The formal reason was that Franco had a criminal record and three arrests. It was easy to understand the education officials. And so there are a lot of problems with maintaining order among students, and if you also let a person into a professorship who will “disturb students” for the revolution, instead of teaching them... In short, running after the party-revolutionary carrot once again deprived Franco of the opportunity to occupy a worthy position in society and doing what you love. As a result, Franco's family rapidly became poor, since a thin trickle of money came to him exclusively from paid publications in Polish, Russian and Viennese newspapers. Franco's health, which had improved, began to rapidly deteriorate. Publishers began to turn away from him again. The image of the “poor knight of the revolution”, so necessary for any self-respecting radical party, was again brought to life. The fact that his wife and children were suffering from hunger only added urgency to the situation.
By that time, the ideology of the RURP had changed greatly. Now they advocated the so-called “peasant socialism” - a utopian idea that was not popular, especially among the peasants themselves. The peasants, of course, were asleep and saw how to divide the landowners' lands. However, they had no desire to collect them for community use, dreaming of their own farms. It is not surprising that Franco and Pavlik failed in the parliamentary elections in 1897. RURP was rapidly turning into a dwarf rogue party. The death of the party's ideologist, Professor Drahomanov, in 1895 undermined its position in Russia, from where the flow of money ceased. The newspaper “Narod” closed. An attempt to publish the magazine “Civil Voice” quickly dried up due to lack of money. And finally, in 1898, Franco received a blow from which he never truly recovered. In one of the Viennese publications, on the 100th anniversary of Adam Mickiewicz, he published an article dedicated to the poet, which was reprinted by several Polish newspapers and magazines. What was Franko thinking when, instead of an anniversary eulogy, he wrote an article debunking the romantic aura around the Polish literary idol? Why did he need a detailed dissection of Mickiewicz’s life and work at that moment? Probably, Franco himself could not answer this question. A terrible scandal broke out. The Poles were offended in the best of feelings. Polish publications were closed to him. Poverty, a miserable apartment, the threat of starvation to the family - this is how Franco greeted the next year - the year of the anniversary of his literary activity.
From anniversary to grave
A repeated slide into poverty and the absence of any prospects drove Franco into severe depression. Realizing that a depressed comrade would not bring him any benefit, Mikhail Pavlik tried to get him out of this state. This was largely dictated by his organization of a wide celebration of his literary 25th anniversary. But this attempt led to nothing. Franco becomes irritable, quick-tempered, and finally loses any consistency in his actions. In his articles, he sarcastically criticizes bourgeois democracy, socialism, nationalism and the people in general. Pessimism becomes Franco's main literary trait. In 1899, he broke with Pavlik and, as if in defiance of him, founded the Ukrainian National Democratic Party, finally moving away from the ideas of socialism. True, he is practically not involved in the party - he doesn’t care if he lives. Franco, who has no sources of income, practically does not look for them, as if by inertia, publishing in several Russian newspapers. The income from this work is enough to not die of hunger and that’s all. What saved him was his invitation to the post of editor of the Literary-Scientific Bulletin, published by the society named after. Shevchenko in Lviv. Mikhail Grushevsky, who headed the society and managed to break through the “sponsors,” was in dire need of “icons” for his activities. Franco became the first of these “icons”. The second one was... Mikhail Pavlik, whom Grushevsky assigned to manage the Shevchenko members’ library. Two impoverished “fighters for the people’s happiness,” who had recently quarreled to pieces, no longer had the strength to seriously engage in politics. Despite their comparative youth, each of them had already sufficiently undermined their health and mental strength. Franco received another blow in 1906, when his candidacy for membership in the Russian Academy of Sciences was unsuccessful. He was nominated by Kharkov University, which recognized him that year as an honorary doctor of Russian literature. Offended by Franco's non-election on this occasion, he mustered several times
IVAN FRANKO
A grave historical catastrophe befell the Ukrainian people about six hundred years ago. Foreign conquerors tore Western Ukraine away from Eastern Ukraine. State borders lay between two parts of a single people, and the further time went, the higher the border walls became. The history of eastern Ukrainians and the history of western Ukrainians took different paths.
In the middle of the 17th century, Eastern Ukraine, relying on the help of the Russian people, freed itself from Polish oppression. In 1654 it joined the Russian state.
Western Ukraine remained under German and Polish rule for hundreds of years. Since 1772, under the name of Eastern Galicia, it was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
Western Ukrainians passionately hated their oppressors and never ceased to believe that a happy hour would come when all Ukrainians would once again unite into one family. Despite severe persecution, they firmly held on to their native language. From generation to generation they passed on their songs, thoughts, and stories about the heroic struggle as national shrines.
Western Ukraine has produced remarkable writers and public figures from among its people. The most prominent of them is Ivan Yakovlevich Franko. His literary fame is great in Western Ukraine. But she also went far beyond the borders of his homeland. From the very first years of his literary activity, Franko became a favorite writer of the entire Ukrainian people. The Russian reader soon recognized and appreciated him. His talented works are remarkable. His personality is no less remarkable.
Ivan Franko was born in 1856 into the family of a village blacksmith. He recognized the need early. The backward Ukrainian village in Galicia was poor, the peasants were in bondage to the Polish landowner. The boy, who early showed the makings of outstanding talent, managed to avoid a common fate. He suffered a lot of grief, but, as they said in those days, he “made it into the people,” received an education, and became a student. Still, he did not break away from the working people, from the peasantry, as happened sometimes with Ukrainians who received higher education. Franco remained with his people. He loved his native village and was faithful to it. As the son of a blacksmith, he highly valued the skill of a worker and artisan.
Young Franco had a poetic soul. He knew and loved Ukrainian songs and Ukrainian fairy tales. Until the last years of his life, he collected monuments of Ukrainian folk literature, folklore, studied these monuments, and wrote about them. In this area, no artificial state borders could stop him. The Ukrainian people were a single people for him, Kyiv was his hometown. Kotlyarevsky and Shevchenko were for Franko the great national writers of the Ukrainian people, he loved them dearly, and learned the literary Ukrainian language from them.
As a passionate and convinced Ukrainian patriot, Franco strove to unite the torn parts of his homeland. He knew and loved her heroic story.
Ukrainians were prevented from reunifying in their independent state, on the one hand, by the Austro-Hungarian Empire, on the other, by Russian tsarism. Franco became an enemy of both the bureaucratic Austrian and the despotic tsarist government. While still a student, he joined those circles of youth that were considered revolutionary, dangerous in the eyes of the Austrian-German gendarmes, the Polish gentry and tsarist officials. Ardent by nature, courageous, selfless, Franco became the leader of the Ukrainian democratic youth in Galicia. He had to make acquaintance with an Austrian prison very early on.
Franco passionately loved his people and strove for their national liberation. But no less ardently he loved the world of work and hated all oppressors, everyone who lives on the labor of others, predatory, usurious profit, regardless of nationality.
The life of a working person in backward Galicia at that time was terrible and hopeless. Capitalist industry was just beginning to develop. Workers in the oil fields and Borislav lived in terrible conditions. The life of construction workers was difficult. Franco's first poems are rich in social motives. The mason is a frequent hero of his first literary works. He portrays himself in the image of a builder-mason when he dreams of the future of his country, his people.
Franko’s essays “Borislav Laughs” attracted the attention of a wide range of readers. They had knowledge of the lives of working people and ardent sympathy for them.
On the path of his search for national and social justice, Franco could not help but encounter advanced Russian literature. Reactionary German and Polish circles had a savage hatred of everything Russian. These circles in Austria were obediently followed by those Ukrainian bourgeois reactionaries who sought reconciliation with their oppressors and tried to beg them for grains of reform for the Ukrainian people. They were hostile to everything Russian; for them, all Russians were equally “Muscovites.”
Franco led those Ukrainian youth who, in the eighties of the last century, decisively opposed the Ukrainian reactionaries in Galicia, against obscurantism, backwardness, and narrow nationalism. Franco was a member of the student “Muscovophile” circle. Together with his comrades, he enthusiastically studied Russian progressive literature, fiction and journalism. Franco knew Pushkin. Turgenev, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Nekrasov. The Russian populist writers Gleb Uspensky and Pomyalovsky were close to him.
A great role in the development of Franco as a writer, publicist and public figure was played by the remarkable Russian-Ukrainian scientist, writer and politician Mikhail Petrovich Drahomanov.
He was a professor at Kyiv University, a gifted historian and literary critic, an active participant in the Ukrainian society “Gromada,” which united representatives of the Ukrainian intelligentsia in Russia. Drahomanov defended the national independence of the Ukrainian people, fought against the tsarist government and at the same time advocated the close friendship of all Slavic peoples, especially the fraternal friendship of the Russian and Ukrainian peoples. In his own person, Drahomanov expressed the commonality of Russian-Ukrainian culture. He wrote in both Russian and Ukrainian, and was a participant in both Russian and Ukrainian publications.
The tsarist government persecuted the young progressive professor, and he eventually had to leave Russia. He joined revolutionary circles abroad and published the Ukrainian magazine Hromada in Switzerland.
Drahomanov, even before his expulsion from Russia, came to Galicia, to Lvov, and became acquainted with local Ukrainian literary and social circles. The youth called him their teacher. From Drahomanov she learned about the great Russian democratic literature. The friendship that developed between Drahomanov and Franco continued until the end of the life of Drahomanov, who died in 1895 in Bulgaria, where he was a professor of general history at Sofia University.
Belinsky, Chernyshevsky, Dobrolyubov, Herzen became teachers in literature for Ivan Franko. His talent developed more and more powerfully. Poems, stories, great stories followed one after another. He wrote a large historical novel “Zakhar Berkut” from the early history of Carpathian Rus', stories from the life of Borislav workers, the story “Boa Constrictor”, exposing the exploitation of miners, etc. His works are imbued with love for the working people. They are written in strong and clear literary language. Franco himself is visible in them - an intelligent democrat, sensitive to the people's grief, infinitely devoted to his homeland. There are many features in Franco’s work that make him similar to such Russian writers as Garshin, Korolenko, and Gleb Uspensky.
At the end of the last century, the situation of the Ukrainian people in Galicia became especially difficult, and the reaction intensified. Franco's activities were attacked by Ukrainian chauvinists. He sometimes felt powerless, loneliness, he did not see where salvation for his native people could come from, and these moods were reflected in notes of sadness in the poems of the last period of his life.
But he did not lose faith in the victory of the Ukrainian just cause. He only had a presentiment that he would not be able to see with his own eyes the liberated Western Ukraine in a single Ukrainian family, in friendly proximity with the Russian people. He wrote the symbolic poem "Moses". This is a very strong poetic and philosophical work. It speaks of the tragedy of the people's leader, who fights all his life for the happiness of the people, leads the people through the desert to the cherished country, suffers because the people do not believe in this happy country, but persistently continues their work. The biblical Moses dies without seeing the triumph of his idea, but his very death inspires a people faithful to his memory. The words of the leader live, and the people achieve victory.
