Historiographical controversy of the historical drama "Ivan Mazepa" by Ludmyla Starytska-Chorniakhivska

Abstract

The article discusses the historical drama Ivan Mazepa by Liudmyla Starytska- Cherniakhivska, which refuted in artistic form the Moscow myth of the "treason" of the Ukrainian hetman, who was intensively looking for an adequate response to the harsh challenges of cruel reality, ways to return to Ukraine the right to full-fledged subjectivity of national existence. Based on the works of historians, reviewing literary versions, the writer came to understand the interpretation of the tragic past as it was, not from someone else's voice, the motives of the heroic act of I. Mazepa, who influenced the fate of Ukraine, set an example of the struggle for its independence. Without resorting to appeals, Liudmyla Starytska-Cherniakhivska used the possibilities of drama to show the strategy and collisions of state thinking on the existential edge, which is typical of her other historical plays, the thoughts, will, and suffering of the protagonist, who is aware of his responsibility for the fate of his native land, and the collisions of the personal life of an extraordinary figure. Liudmyla Starytska-Cherniakhivska's counterversion did not correspond to the official, Moscow historiography, so instead of discussing it, the Moscow- Bolshevik authorities destroyed almost the entire edition of the historical play and persecuted the writer as the brightest representative of the national elite until the last minute of her life.