Mykhailo Mykhailovych Kotsiubynsky ( uk, Михайло Михайлович Коцюбинський), (September 17, 1864 – April 25, 1913) was a
Ukrainian author whose writings described typical Ukrainian life at the start of the 20th century. Kotsiubynsky's early stories were described as examples of ethnographic
realism
Realism, Realistic, or Realists may refer to:
In the arts
*Realism (arts), the general attempt to depict subjects truthfully in different forms of the arts
Arts movements related to realism include:
*Classical Realism
*Literary realism, a move ...
; in the years to come, with his style of writing becoming more and more sophisticated, he evolved into one of the most talented Ukrainian
impressionist and
modernist
Modernism is both a philosophy, philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western world, Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new fo ...
writers.
The popularity of his novels later led to some of them being made into Soviet movies.
Life
He grew up in
Bar,
Vinnytsia
Vinnytsia ( ; uk, Вінниця, ; yi, װיניצע) is a city in west-central Ukraine, located on the banks of the Southern Bug.
It is the administrative center of Vinnytsia Oblast and the largest city in the historic region of Podillia. ...
region and several other towns and villages in
Podolia
Podolia or Podilia ( uk, Поділля, Podillia, ; russian: Подолье, Podolye; ro, Podolia; pl, Podole; german: Podolien; be, Падолле, Padollie; lt, Podolė), is a historic region in Eastern Europe, located in the west-central ...
, where his father worked as a civil servant. He attended the
Sharhorod
Sharhorod (; , ), also known as Shargorod, is a town located within the Vinnytsia Oblast, Ukraine. It serves as the administrative center of Sharhorod Raion, one of 33 regions of Vinnytsia Oblast. Population:
History
Early history
Sharhorod was ...
Religious Boarding School from 1876 until 1880. He continued his studies at the
Kamianets-Podilskyi
Kamianets-Podilskyi ( uk, Ка́м'яне́ць-Поді́льський, russian: Каменец-Подольский, Kamenets-Podolskiy, pl, Kamieniec Podolski, ro, Camenița, yi, קאַמענעץ־פּאָדאָלסק / קאַמעניץ, ...
Theological Seminary, but in 1882 he was expelled from the school for his political activities within the socialist movement. Already he had been influenced by the awakening Ukrainian national idea. His first attempts at writing prose in 1884 were also written in the Ukrainian language: ''Andriy Soloviyko''(Ukrainian: Андрій Соловійко).
Early work and research
From 1888 to 1890, he was a member of the
Vinnytsia
Vinnytsia ( ; uk, Вінниця, ; yi, װיניצע) is a city in west-central Ukraine, located on the banks of the Southern Bug.
It is the administrative center of Vinnytsia Oblast and the largest city in the historic region of Podillia. ...
Municipal
Duma
A duma (russian: дума) is a Russian assembly with advisory or legislative functions.
The term ''boyar duma'' is used to refer to advisory councils in Russia from the 10th to 17th centuries. Starting in the 18th century, city dumas were for ...
. In 1890, he visited
Galicia, where he met several other Ukrainian cultural figures including
Ivan Franko
Ivan Yakovych Franko (Ukrainian: Іван Якович Франко, pronounced ˈwɑn ˈjɑkowɪtʃ frɐnˈkɔ 27 August 1856 – 28 May 1916) was a Ukrainian poet, writer, social and literary critic, journalist, interpreter, economist, ...
and
Volodymyr Hnatiuk
, image = Hnatiuk Volodymyr.jpg
, imagesize =
, caption = Volodymyr Hnatiuk
, pseudonym =
, birth_name =
, birth_date =
, birth_place = Velesniv, Galicia, Austria-Hungary
, death_date =
, death_place = Lwów, Poland (now Lviv, Ukrai ...
. It was there in
Lviv
Lviv ( uk, Львів) is the largest city in western Ukraine, and the seventh-largest in Ukraine, with a population of . It serves as the administrative centre of Lviv Oblast and Lviv Raion, and is one of the main cultural centres of Ukrain ...
that his first story ''Nasha Khatka'' (Ukrainian: Наша хатка) was published.
During this period, he worked as a private tutor in and near
Vinnytsia
Vinnytsia ( ; uk, Вінниця, ; yi, װיניצע) is a city in west-central Ukraine, located on the banks of the Southern Bug.
It is the administrative center of Vinnytsia Oblast and the largest city in the historic region of Podillia. ...
. There, he could study life in traditional Ukrainian villages, which was something he often came back to in his stories including the 1891 ''Na Viru'' (Ukrainian: На віру) and the 1901 ''Dorohoiu tsinoiu'' (Ukrainian: Дорогою ціною).
During large parts of the years 1892 to 1897, he worked for a commission studying the grape pest
phylloxera in
Bessarabia and
Crimea
Crimea, crh, Къырым, Qırım, grc, Κιμμερία / Ταυρική, translit=Kimmería / Taurikḗ ( ) is a peninsula in Ukraine, on the northern coast of the Black Sea, that has been occupied by Russia since 2014. It has a pop ...
. During the same period, he was a member of the secret
Brotherhood of Taras.
He moved to
Chernihiv
Chernihiv ( uk, Черні́гів, , russian: Черни́гов, ; pl, Czernihów, ; la, Czernihovia), is a city and municipality in northern Ukraine, which serves as the administrative center of Chernihiv Oblast and Chernihiv Raion within ...
in 1898 where he worked as a statistician at the statistics bureau of the Chernihiv
zemstvo
A ''zemstvo'' ( rus, земство, p=ˈzʲɛmstvə, plural ''zemstva'' – rus, земства) was an institution of local government set up during the great emancipation reform of 1861 carried out in Imperial Russia by Emperor Alexande ...
. He also was active in the
Chernigov Governorate
The Chernigov Governorate (russian: Черниговская губерния; translit.: ''Chernigovskaya guberniya''; ), also known as the Government of Chernigov, was a guberniya in the historical Left-bank Ukraine region of the Russian ...
Scholarly Archival Commission and headed the Chernihiv
Prosvita
Prosvita ( uk, просвіта, 'enlightenment') is a society for preserving and developing Ukrainian culture and education among population that created in the nineteenth century in the Austria-Hungary Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria.
By the ...
society from 1906 to 1908.
Writings
After the
Russian Revolution of 1905
The Russian Revolution of 1905,. also known as the First Russian Revolution,. occurred on 22 January 1905, and was a wave of mass political and social unrest that spread through vast areas of the Russian Empire. The mass unrest was directed again ...
, Kotsiubynsky could be more openly critical of the Russian tsarist regime, which can be seen in ''Vin ide'' (Ukrainian: Він іде) and ''Smikh'' (Ukrainian: Сміх), both from 1906, and ''Persona grata'' from 1907.
''Fata Morgana'', in two parts from 1904 and 1910, is probably his best-known work. Here he describes the typical social conflicts in the life of the Ukrainian village.
About twenty novels were published during Kotsiubynsky's life. Several of them have been translated into other European languages.
English translations
English translations of Mykhaylo Kotsyubynsky’s works include:
* Short stories, “On the Road” and “The Unknown One” (Tr. from Ukrainian by Roma Franko.);
* "Fata Morgana" (Tr. from Ukrainian by Arthur Bernhard.).
Interesting facts
* He was called the Sun Worshiper and the Sunflower, because above all he loved the sun, flowers and children. He served as an ordinary clerk in the statistical department of the Chernihiv administration, went to work with an essential flower in a boutonniere.
* He knew nine languages - three Slavic: Ukrainian, Russian, Polish; three Romance: French, Italian, Romanian; and three eastern ones: Tatar, Turkish and Romani.
* Mykhailo Kotsyubynsky never received an official higher education (he graduated from the Shargorod Theological Seminary, and the university remained a dream).
* Mikhail's literary career began with a complete failure. In 1884 he wrote the short story "Andriy Solovko, or The Doctrine of the World and the Ignorance of Darkness." This first attempt by the young author was very skeptical. After that, he did not make new attempts for several years.
* It was his work that for the first time in Ukrainian literature included Impressionism, deep psychology, elements of expressionism, neorealism and others.
* Kotsyubynsky, an impressionist and a remarkable representative of psychologism, was also greatly influenced by Nechuy-Levytsky, Panas Mirnyi, Guy de Maupassant, Chekhov, Swedish writers, and a number of other notable writers.
* Kotsyubynsky was arrested in 1882 for his connection with the national liberation movement, and after his release the police established secret surveillance over him. His apartment was searched several times.
* Kotsyubynsky traveled a lot. He often visited Italy on the island of Capri.
* 1970 at the film studio. Dovzhenko made a feature biographical film "The Kotsyubynsky Family".
* At the age of 12, young Mikhail fell in love with a 16-year-old girl, and in order to attract her attention, he decided to become a "great man", and for this he began to read books with special zeal. Thus, under the great influence of the work of T. Shevchenko and M. Vovchok, he has a desire to become a writer.
Death
Because of a heart disease, Kotsiubynsky spent long periods at different health resorts on
Capri from 1909 to 1911. During the same period, he visited Greece and the
Carpathians
The Carpathian Mountains or Carpathians () are a range of mountains forming an arc across Central Europe. Roughly long, it is the third-longest European mountain range after the Urals at and the Scandinavian Mountains at . The range stretches ...
. In 1911 he was granted a pension from the Society of Friends of Ukrainian Scholarship, Literature, and Art that enabled him to quit his job and solely concentrate on his writings, but he was already in poor health and died only two years later.
Honors
During the Soviet period, Kotsiubynsky was honoured as a ''realist'' and a ''revolutionary democrat''. A literary-memorial museum was opened in
Vinnytsia
Vinnytsia ( ; uk, Вінниця, ; yi, װיניצע) is a city in west-central Ukraine, located on the banks of the Southern Bug.
It is the administrative center of Vinnytsia Oblast and the largest city in the historic region of Podillia. ...
in 1927 in the house where he was born.
Later a memorial was created nearby the museum.
The house in Chernihiv where he lived for the last 15 years of his life was turned into a museum in 1934; the Chernihiv Regional Literary-. The house contains the author’s personal belongings. Adjacent to the house is a museum, which opened in 1983, containing Kotsiubinsky’s manuscripts, photos, magazines and family relics as well as information about other Ukrainian writers.
Several Soviet movies have been based on Kotsiubynsky’s novels such as ''Koni ne vynni'' (1956), ''Dorohoiu tsunoiu'' (1957) and
''Tini zabutykh predkiv'' (1967).
Family
In January 1896, he married Vira Ustymivna Kotsiubynska (Deisha) (1863–1921).
One of his sons,
Yuriy Mykhailovych Kotsiubynsky (1896–1937), was the
Bolshevik
The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...
and the
Red Army
The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army ( Russian: Рабо́че-крестья́нская Кра́сная армия),) often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and, afte ...
commander during the 1917–1921 Civil War. Later, he held several high positions within the
Communist Party of Ukraine
The Communist Party of Ukraine, Abbreviation: KPU, from Ukrainian and Russian "" is a banned political party in Ukraine. It was founded in 1993 as the successor to the Soviet-era Communist Party of Ukraine which was banned in 1991 (accord ...
, but in 1935, he was expelled from the party. In October 1936, he was accused of having
counter-revolutionary
A counter-revolutionary or an anti-revolutionary is anyone who opposes or resists a revolution, particularly one who acts after a revolution in order to try to overturn it or reverse its course, in full or in part. The adjective "counter-revolut ...
contacts and together with other Bolsheviks have organized a Ukrainian
Trotskyist
Trotskyism is the political ideology and branch of Marxism developed by Ukrainian-Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky and some other members of the Left Opposition and Fourth International. Trotsky self-identified as an orthodox Marxist, a ...
Centre. The year after, he was sentenced to death and executed. He was
rehabilitated in 1955. Yuri had a son Oleh.
His daughter Oksana Kotsyubynska was married to
Vitaliy Primakov.
The fate of his other children Roman and Iryna is less known.
His niece,
Mykhailyna Khomivna Kotsiubynska (1931–2011), was the Ukrainian philologist and literary specialist. She was an honorary doctor of the
Kyiv Mohyla Academy
National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy ( NaUKMA) ( uk, Національний університет «Києво-Могилянська академія» (НаУКМА)) is a national, research university located in Kyiv, Ukraine. The ...
.
Further reading
Mykhailo Kotsiubynsky ''Shadow of Ukrainian History''
* Michailo Kotsiubinskij: ''Berättelser från Ukraina''. Bokförlagsaktiebolaget Svithiod, Stockholm 1918.
* ''Ukraine. A Concise Encyclopædia, vol 1'', p. 1032–1033. University of Toronto Press 1963.
* ''100 znamenytykh liudey Ukraïny'', s.204–208. Folio, Kharkiv 2005. .
* [http://www.day.kiev.ua/154362/ Volodymyr Panchenko: “I am better off alone”. Mykhailo Kotsiubynsky’s correspondence with his wife. ''Den 2005, # 40, 41.'']
References
External links
*
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Kotsiubynsky, Mykhailo
1864 births
1913 deaths
Writers from Vinnytsia
People from Vinnitsky Uyezd
Ukrainian novelists
Ukrainian male short story writers
Ukrainian short story writers
Mykhailo
Prosvita
People from Bar, Ukraine