THE FABLE OF BOHDAN KHMELNYTSKY: TEXT – CONTEXT – INTERTEXT

Abstract

The paper deals with the Ukrainian versions of the narrative plot “grass snake in the hut” and its variant “the just grass snake” (AA 285 and 285А* in Comparative List of Plots: East Slavic Fairy-Tales) that corresponds to the concept of ‘unforgiveness’. Records made in different parts of Ukraine expose the dialectic of folklore tradition that is reflected in polyfunctionality and variability of international parallels of the plot. The fable depicts mythological beliefs about the grass snake as zoomorphic embodiment of the demonological character appreciated in traditional culture as the home demon-protector and wealth bearer. At the same time the formal stability of the plot allows semantic alteration and ambivalent thematic positions while its intertextual transformation in the context of conceptual models of “collective trauma”. From this aspect we examine the same fable narrated by Bogdan Khmelnytsky used in a sense of political metaphor as the example of ‘unforgiveness’ and ‘revenge’ and the historically evidence of “collective trauma”. The main element of the composition is a dialogue with a stable formulaic character which stresses the continuity of cultural heritage and reflects the mode of cognitive model. The historically accurate text by Khmelnytsky was recorded in 1656.by a contemporary of the Ukrainian hetman and historian of his wars with Poland and mentioned in Russian translation by Nikolay Kostomarov in his novel “Bogdan Khmelnytsky“ (1857). The current contextualization of the concept of ‘unforgiveness’ actualizes the opposition one’s own – other’s and reflects the war situation in Ukraine defined as the “war for identity”.