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[NOVEL ABOUT OIROTS OF ALTAI] Chorne ozero (Kara-Kol). Ekzotychnyi roman [i.e. Black Lake (Kara-Kol). An exotic novel].

Hzhitskyi, Volodymyr

Item #2323

Second edition of the original, unrevised text. Kraków: “Nova Drukarnia Dennykova” for Ukrainske vydavnytstvo, 1944. 228, [2] pp. 21 x 15 cm. Contemporary owner’s cloth. In Ukrainian.

Good to very good condition. Minor restoration to the title and publisher’s cover. Stamped Podaruvala Myroslava Savchak [Presented by Myroslava Savchak] on the title. Hzhitskyi is listed as a writer involved in what was called “bourgeois-nationalist literature” in “spisok no. 5” sent from UkSSR to Glavlit at 08.09.38. as the convict number 14 with whole 11 works
ordered to be banned in all forms and editions (Bilokin, p. 77); in later library requests he is labelled as “the enemy of the state” with orders to liquidate every findable text of his. Spisok no. 5 lists another writer, Ostap Vyshnia, with whom Hzhitskyi served his sentence in GULAG.

The cover art depicts a chanting shaman, signed М. Біл sided with the publisher’s (Ukrainske vydavnytstvo) monogram. Artist’s signature attributing the cover design to Myron Bilynskyi (also noted on the title reverse). Bilynskyi (1914-1984) was a Galician painter active within the German and, later, US art scene. The artist’s style exhibits monumental qualities, characterized by contrasting and spacious compositions featuring bold angular figures reminiscent of his mural and mosaic pieces.

The book opens with an introduction by the Ukrainske vydavnytstvo editor, poet and artist Sviatoslav Hordynskyi. Hordynskyi provides some information on the author and also covers
the novel’s publication history, the central themes and concludes with how own persional fierce attack on the Soviet regime. Chorne ozero author, Volodymyr Hzhitskyi (1895-1973) was born in Western Ukraine, then a part of Austro-Hungary. After serving army duty, he joined the progressive Pluh literary union and his first poetic publications appeared already
in 1922. A debut collection of verses followed in 1924. In the subsequent years Hzhitskyi wrote realistic plays; those were staged. His first novel Mutsa was published in 1928, but what attracted reader’s attention was this very title Chorne ozero: a multi-layered novel, inspired by a joint travels with renewed cinematographer A. Dovzhenko to Altai mountains.

The story follows some characters who encounter indigenous people of Altai, the Oirots. It is not the expected easy adventurous travelogue one can expect, but rather a psychological study on the effects of the traditionalist territorial culture meeting the aggressively expanding ideology. The secluded, mountain-based traditional lifestyle of Oirots could be compared
to Chechens and Boykos. The novel was clearly protesting the wiping of the Oirot culture that was shared by only some 50 thousand locals. The story brings together intellectual elite, shamans and sympathetic ordinary people in social and interpersonal conflicts: all express the different aspects of the core of the nation that culminates in a tragic loss. The first variant of the text was again published in Ukraine by Akademia only in 2015, almost 90 years after the first publication.

Vyshnivetska A. Porivnialnyi analiz dvokh redaktsii romanu «Chorne Ozero» (1929 r. ta 1956 r.) V. Hzhytskoho // Literatury svitu: poetyka, mentalnist i dukhovnist, – Vol. 3 - Kryvyi Rih, 2014 - pp. 66-77 Zhyhun, S. Postkolonialne prochytannia romanu Volodymyra Hzhytskoho “Chorne Ozero” // Literaturnyi protses: metodolohiia, imena, tendentsi. Zbirnyk naukovykh prats (filolohichni nauky) - Vol. 7 - Kiev, 2016 - pp. 82-85 Bilokin, S. Repressed editions. Kiev, 2018.

Scarce. WorldCat shows 3 copies of this 2nd edition, all in the US: Saint Basil's College Library, Ohio State University Library, University of Illinois. KVK additionally finds 3 copies: 2 in Poland and one in the Czech Republic.

Price: $750.00