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LESSYA UKRAINKA (Excerpts from Percival Cundy’s introduction to the collection of works of the poetess) To two great names in Ukrain ian literature, those of Taras Shevchenko and Ivan Franko must be added a third, that of a woman, Lessya Ukraimka, a poet ess- of rare scholarship, with an expert's knowledge of poetical technique, famdli-ar with the prin cipal European languages and li teratures (including English), an unbounded imagination, keen psy chological insight, and a power and vigor of -expression not sur passed 'by any woman writer who has made a name for herself in Western literatures. This is not fulsome praise, but sober fact; hence she is worthy of study by all who take any interest in the Literary achievements of another race, especially when its literat ure manifests throughout its en tire course two outstanding prin ciples, namely: a keen sense of realism and an invincible faith in freedom and democracy. A fierce love of liberty, an abhorrence of tyranny and imperialism, a cham pionship of the rights of the com mon people—these are some of the notes continually sounded in the workis of Ukrainian authors. In reading the work of any writer, the reader insensibly gains a general impression of his pre dominant traits and circumstanc es and so arrives at a certain con ception oif the personality and en vironment of t'he author whose work he is reading. After reading some of her best work, lyrical and dramatic, one would certainly conceive Leis-sya Ukrainka to have been a vigorous, robust person, physically as well as spiritually. Actually, nothing could be fur ther from the fact. $he had tre mendous energy, but little physic al strength to serve it. She was a small, f.rail woman, delicate as a child and, from the age of twelve or thirteen until her death some thirty years later, she was a hopeless invalid, doomed to spend months at a time in bed and compelled for the greater part of her life to live abroad from her beloved homeland, traveling from one health resort to another in search of relief and possible re covery. Unlike other writers who were able to turn out a daily stint of work, she could work only at irregular intervals, often in pain and fever and ’the heightened pe riods of activity always left her physically and mentally exhaust ed from the strain. She began by writing lyrics, and at the age of twenty-one pub lished her first volume, “On Wings of Song,” 1892. This was followed by “Thoughts and Dreams,” 1896, and “Echoes,” 1902, each collection marked by an advance in imaginative power and technical skill. Great however as are Lessya Ukrainka’s merits in the field of the Ukrainian lyric, her greatest achievement were in the form of “dramatic .poems,” a genre which she developed herself and used al most exclusively from about 1902 on. The transition between the two forms may perhaps be indi cated by a series of lyric-narra tive poems, all of which contained a considerable element of the dra matic. Her work increased in brillian cy during the closing and most tryinjg years of her life. In June, 1911, at Kutai-s, Transcaucasia, she produced her masterpiece “Forest Song” in the space of three days after having previous ly re-written it three times in or der to condense and shorten it. The appreciation of Lessya Uk- rainka’s contribution to Ukrainian literature began to be widely ex pressed only after her death. This, however, is usually the case with most innovators in the fields of art and literature. Their stature grows more imposing as the time goes on. The heroic tone and the neo-Romanticism of her dramatic OLENA PCHILKA, AN EXAMPLARY MOTHER AND EDUCATOR It behooves to point out the work of O'lena Pchilka, an ex- amplary mother and educator of more than half a century back. She refused to send her six chil dren to official Russian reaction ary schools. Instead she became their elementary teacher and ed ucator at home and thereafter she was hiring instructors to continue the teaching of her children. She wrote many poems and fairy tales for her children which are consid ered even now as valuable pieces of literary work. Her ability, pro ficiency and competence as an ed ucator were best demonstrated in rearing and shaping the creative powers of her daughter, the cele brated Ukrainian poetess Lessya Ukrainka whose selected poems and dramas were published in En glish translation by the Ukrain ian Women's League of America in 1950. poems- based on hitherto unfami liar themes did not meet with a wide response at first, except among the discerning, but admi ration and appreciation i,s steadily growing as the years go by. It is now realized that she possessed a remarkable strong- poetic imagin ation, a universalism in her -choice of themes, a profound penetration of the variations of human psy chology, together with a style both highly lyrical and charged with dramatic power. She had a vast amount of energy, but un fortunately, little physical strength to support its output. In her soul she cherished an ideal of harmonious life from which all that defiles was to be swept away by human hands; to achieve the realization of this ideal she was ready to battle as far as lay in her power, if not with her hands, then by her words. The pity is that she who had the soul of a fighter was precluded by physical weakness from entering more actively and personally into the arena where the great conflict was and is stilil beimg waged. Видання C оюзу Українок A мерики - перевидано в електронному форматі в 2012 році . A рхів C У A - Ню Йорк , Н . Й . C Ш A.
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