The present thesis is the first systematic study of Ivan Franko’s scholarly heritage in the field of medieval Ukrainian literature. It takes into account the relevant works by I. Franko, as well as the works of the 19th-century scholars and recent studies.
The author clarifies the definition of the “discourse”, applied to the “History of Ukrainian literature” of the Ukrainian Early and High Middle Ages period, as a process of shaping the scholarly discipline. The analysis embraces the research works by O. Biletskyi, T. Hundorova, D. Kozii, L. Makhnovets, Y. Melnyk, O. Moroz, V. Mykytas, V. Sulyma, B. Tykholoz, M. Vozniak, O. Zabuzhko, and others concerning I. Franko’s conceptions of Ukrainian national literature, his communication with medievalists, and parallels between his scholarly and literary works.
The discursive creation of the history of Ukrainian national literature as a scholarly discipline in the late 19th – early 20th centuries is associated with I. Franko. He was an active member of Shevchenko Scientific Society and a publisher of his own journal Zhytie i Slovo. In his creative and research work he established international scholarly relations and encouraged young people to study literature and contribute to it as authors. The scholar published appeals to everyone for collecting and recording the folklore samples and sending them to Shevchenko Scientific Society. All this social activity influenced the formation and consolidation of statements about Ukrainian literary writings as a literature of the national type with a continuous history preserved in folklore and medieval texts.
I. Franko’s concept of the literature of the Ukrainian Early and High Middle Ages does not have a strict division into translated and original texts. He often uses the term “semi-original literature”; usually it concerns such collections as Izbornyk Sviatoslava 1073, Izbornyk 1076, Izmarahd, Proloh, etc. As regards the translated novels, he considers them as secular fiction and emphasizes the oriental features of these works. The researcher points out the fact that Kyiv-Rus translators did not strictly follow the original text and paid a lot of attention to parables.
The discussion about the probable Buddhist origin of the Tale of Barlaam and Joasaph in the late 19th century was an important point of Franko’s scholarly interest. He traced the influence of this scholarly discourse on religious practice. Having taken into account the scholars’ statements, the Catholic Church removed the names of St. Barlaam and St. Joasaph from the Roman Martyrology. I. Franko emphasized the need of publishing all the apocryphal texts, as it would provide researchers with material for comparative analysis, making possible the identification of typological coincidences, direct borrowings, or “free imagination of the author”. It might also help to clarify the origin of some apocrypha and their subsequent impact on Ukrainian literature. For example, Pseudo-Clementine’s analysis reveals the origin of many texts, motifs, and plots, including Zhytiie Dionisiia Areopahita, popular in Ukraine Zhytiie Yevstakhiia Plakydy, and the legends of Evladii and Kerasiia, etc.
The discourse of Ukrainian medieval literature in the scholarly heritage of I. Franko is formed by the following functional statements: continuity of national literature; the close connection between written and verbal texts; “duality” of the literary language (coexistence of Church Slavonic and native languages); the impossibility of establishing the authorship and exact date of writing / compiling / translating the medieval texts (for most of them, these data remain hypothetical); “semi-original” texts of the Ukrainian Early and High Middle Ages; “legendary style” of medieval texts; traditional, stereotypical, impersonal Kyiv-Rus literature.
