Genre searches in ukrainian playwrights’ plays about hybrid war

Abstract

The tragic events of the Revolution of Dignity and the hybrid war have been reflected in various stylistics and genre parameters of dramatic works. The brightest of them were included in two recent anthologies, which were prepared and published thanks to the efforts of the Department of Drama Projects of the National Center for the Performing Arts named after Les Kurbas. The first of them, “Maidan. Before and After. Anthology of the Actual Drama” (2016), has absorbed 9 plays by the authors of different generations (Yaroslav Vereshchak, Nadiia Symchich, Oleg Mykolaychuk, Neda Nezhdana, Oleksandr Viter, Dmytro Ternovyi, etc.). The completely new second anthology “The Labyrinth of Ice and Fire” (2019) also consists of 9 plays (three of which are also part of the previous anthology), which are the reflections of the modern history of Ukraine. The texts about the hybrid war, which are included in two anthologies, are the subject of our analysis. The focus is on the genre specificity of these drama works. The genre modifications of archaic genres inherent in the Ukrainian theatrical tradition (vertep, mystery) are studied in the plays “Vertep-2015” by Nadiia Marchuk and “Maidan Inferno, or On the Other Side of Hell” by Neda Nezhdana. The functioning of the documentary and epic drama (“The Chestnut and the Lily of the Valley” by Oleg Mykolaychuk, “The People and Cyborgs” by Olena Ponomareva and Dario Fertilio) is analysed. The processes of episation and lyricization are considered. The peculiarities of intergeneric diffusion and the creation of a specific genre type — lyrico-epic drama are analysed. The actual monodramas of Neda Nezhdana “The Cat in Memory of the Darkness” and “OTVETKA@ UA” are highlighted, as well as the intermedial character of the genre transformations of Igor Yuziuk’s drama “C-sharp Sixth Octave”