ON REMINISCENCES FROM HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN “THE LITTLE MATCH GIRL” FAIRY TALE IN O. KOBYLIANSKA’S STORY “TSARIVNA”

Abstract

The article investigates intertextual inclusions from the fairy tale by Hans Christian Andersen “The Little Match Girl” in O. Kobylianska’s story “Tsarivna”. Given the writer’s fascination with Danish literature, the assumption of the possibility of intertextual interaction and the feasibility of such parallels is made and substantiated (traditionally works by O. Kobylianska were studied in the context of German and Danish literatures, but without direct comparison with Hans Christian Andersen’s texts). It was established that both texts are invariants of archetypal model of an orphan, the archaic origins of which reach folklore motif of the youngest daughter, which was later transformed in a European fairy tale into the image of a stepdaughter. It was found that the heroines of these works, in addition to identical social status, represent similar psychological types. It is determined that O. Kobylyanska’s appeal to the archaic folklore-mythological image is conditioned by the author’s psychological complexes and traumas, which, from the point of view of psychoanalysis, formed a special “melancholic context” of her work, associated with losses of beloved people, in particular. Mythological layers of the story “Tsarivna” (ancient myth of Narcissus and German legends about the mermaid Lorelei), the manifestations of which are found in the personal traits and patterns of behavior of Natalka Verkovych are analyzed, thus the reception of the motif of an orphan is deepened. Associative echoes between the analyzed works at the level of specific fragments of the text were found. The identified examples of typological kinship are interpreted as reminiscence in the understanding of unconscious or involuntary borrowing at the levels of image, motif, plot. In addition, not only similar, but also distinctive features of the poetics of the fairy tale by Hans Christian Andersen and O. Kobylianska’s story, conditioned by non-identity of the authors’ worldviews and intentions (existentialism of the Danish storyteller and the neo-romantic method of the pioneer of Ukrainian modernism), gender and possibly national specifics of understanding the issues raised in the analyzed works, are analyzed.