Literary Names of the ‘Undershot’ Authors: History of emergence, functions

Abstract

The article focuses on the pseudonyms of those authors who fell into the category of “undershot” (the metaphor is used to emphasise the incomplete nature of the authors’ works, early deaths and interrupted careers of literary figures). Semen Pidhainyi, a historian and long-term prisoner of the Solovetsky camps, included the generation of the 1920s, i.e. those who came from families of participants in the national liberation struggle, clergymen, dispossessed, repressed, starved to death, and persecuted for offences invented by the authorities. Disillusioned with the communist system, abandoned, persecuted, they were looking for a way to the West to start a different life there and to reveal the horrors of the Soviet concentration camps they had gone through. As living witnesses of the events, they focused their efforts on exposing the crimes of the totalitarian system. Ivan Bahrianyi’s pamphlet “Why don’t I Want to Return to the USSR?”, due to numerous translations, helped many displaced writers and other men of art avoid repatriation. Viktor Kravchenko’s book “I Chose Freedom. The Personal and Political Life of a Soviet Official” was crucial for conveying the truth about the situation of the post-Soviet people, in which the author recreated unique facts from the life of the Soviet elite, the consequences of repression, the atmosphere of fear and persecution. Former prisoners of the Soviet camps Vasyl Dubrovskyi, Mykola Lazorskyi, Yuriy Lavrinenko, Vasyl Savchenko, and Semen Pidhainyi left reliable testimonies about their stay in the camps. It was the literature of fact, which is scrutinized using the historical and comparative method, which allows us to trace the influence of socio-political processes in the country on their narrative. To identify the connection between the author and his / her pseudonym, we use the biographical method, which helps to clarify the origin of a name through the details of his / her life. The biographical method of research enabled us to reveal that writers formed pseudonyms from the names of ethnic regions and settlements of Ukraine (Saltychivskyi, Liskovytskyi), and less often from places of detention, to emphasise the place of torture. Instead of  their names, the “undershot” authors indicated their profession or occupation (Istoryk / Historian), names of plants (Mak / Poppy, Veres / Heather), birds (Horlytsia / Turtledove, Odud / Hoopoe), insects (Gedz / Gadfly, Zhuk / Beetle), names of gods (Svarog), saints (Trifon), historical figures (Zalizniak), and literary characters (Halaida). Although the passionate energy of our compatriots aimed at conveying information about the genocide of the Ukrainian people had a noticeable resonance, it could not change the situation, because the Western world was involved into other problems in the context of confrontation between states with different social systems.