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The President and Fellows of Harvard College
Mythologizing Lviv/Lwów: Echoes of Presence and Absence
Author(s): GEORGE G. GRABOWICZ
Source:
Harvard Ukrainian Studies,
Vol. 24, LVIV: A CITY IN THE CROSSCURRENTS OF
CULTURE (2000), pp. 313-342
Published by:
Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute
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http://www.jstor.org/stable/41036821
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Lviv/Lwów:
EchoesofPresence Absence
and
Mythologizing
GEORGE G. GRABOWICZ
Introduction
and
Ukrainian Polishhis-
in,
Imagesand visionsof Lviv/Lwów respectively,
and
heart national
of
and
for
tory culture to thevery
go
memory provide each
of
as
societypowerful
symbolsof nationalidentity,
particularly narratives
collectivestruggle,
and
Even though
theseidentities in
are
victory, defeat.1
and forlong periods(especiallyin terms modern
of
political
largemeasure
and presumably
the
antithetical, symbols
history)
counterposed,
antagonistic,
-
that
themare remarkably
similar even while their
and narratives subtend
of
and
mirror
each other
have forthemostpart
points contact thewaysthey
Whilepartaking variouscommon
of
been studiously
themes,
ignored.
topoi,
and (often
or
intertextualities coalesce intona-
repressed unconscious)
they
to
national
tional
which central therespective
are
collective,
experiences
myths
and
confrontation
with
defined an implicit explicit
andarecharacteristically
by
for
of
the Other.Although each societythe collectiveexperience the city
all
encompassesvirtually seven centuriesof Lviv's existence,the focus
on
wheretheoppositionsand
herewill be primarily thetwentieth
century
the
actual conflicts,the narrativeand modal nuances, and ultimately
and politicalpatterns,
The
resonanceare mostcrystallized. cultural
mythic
were alreadyformedin
however,and the modernhistoricalbackground
centuries.
thepreceding
In
as
of
of
is
as
The notion myth, course, often nebulous it is fashionable.
or
often is tantamount
it
to
than
theme topos;more
various
usagesitis no more
indeedanylargecollec-
belief,
collective,
irrational)
any(especially
popular,
In
its
narrative. ourcontext, adequateuse of myth, cultural
an
resonant
tively
and
on
and
(notpublicistic political)
applicability,
depends breadth collective
of
as
resonance, wellas on narrative
scope,on thenecessary
presence variants,
of
and psychological
and above all on symbolic
roots,on the articulation
that to thevery
truths values,and indeedtraumas fears,
and
and
go
profound
of
For
of
and
heart a society itsperception itself. thisreasonwe can speakof
of
thesetwomajor
botha Polishand a Ukrainian
mythos thecity.However,
versionsdo not exhaustthe subjector the mode: one may also speak of
constructions Lviv in the otherimportant
of
and indeedmythical
symbolic
- particularly Austrian theJewish, perhaps
the
the
and
and
legaciesofthecity
them.
studies
needto address
Armenian well,andfuture
as
XXIV (1/4)2000: 313-342
HarvardUkrainian
Studies
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314
GRABOWICZ
Lvivexem-
East
and
Evenintheconvoluted multifaceted European
context,
and
Its
at
plifiesa cityof different, timespolar,experiences interpretations.
and
were,and to a large measurestillare, as much
history historiography
and
to
and national
exclusiveness,
experiences,
perspectives,
hostages ethnic
in
of
denialas is theteaching history thecountries former
of
Yugoslavia.
This polarization
was perceived
ago. In 1665-
alreadyseveralcenturies
Zimorowicz
wrotea
1672 the Polish poet (and mayorof Lviv) Bartlomiej
in
to
of
under title
the
Leopolistriplex, whichhe referred the
history thecity,
of
the
the
three
(ca.
phasesofthegrowth thecity: first, Ruthenian 124Q-1340);
colonists the
of
thesecond, German
the
as he saw it,to theGerman
(referring,
two
and
from
1549,thePolishperiod
subsequent centuries); thethird,
proper.
as
As schematic thisparsing
as
maybe, and as modest itsoppositions
maybe
to
it
the
of
claimsof
developments,presages pattern competing
compared later
the
and
and
and
that
ownership identity of a history historiography resemble
of
that
layerings an archeological - complicated thefact eachexpedition
dig
by
it
different
and
and
approaches with
premises priorities hencealso blindspots.
Lviv is not unique in thisregard, course.It is one of manydivided,
of
contested
citiesthat
switched
handsandnowbelongto twoseparate
and
cities,
In
often
histories. Eastern
is
of
Europethere theprominent
competing
example
Vilnius(also formerlyPolishcity), thenow Polishand formerly
a
or
German
in
that, the moredistant
(and before
past,Polish) citiesof Gdañsk/Danzig,
- in
Szczecin/Stettin fact,the whole so-
Wroclaw/Breslau,
Poznan/Posen,
calledregained
territories
the
context,
(ziemie
(Thislarger
odzyskane).
political
westward
shift Poland's boundaries,
of
framed postwar
for
Polishsociety
the
of
and
with loss
the
overarching
psychological
problem conceptualizing coping
of Lwów.) Otherexamples are not hard to find: Trieste,Fiume/Rijeka,
andmany
Czernowitz/Cernäuti/Chernivtsi, others.
as
and
involvement investment
and
are
However, faras historical emotional
it
concerned, seems at timesthatthe nearestanalogue (touteproportion
-
The
of
gardée) is thatof Jerusalem. latter, course,is a holycity forthree
and
On
major
religions civilizations. thefaceofit,Lvivanditscultural
spaceis
more
modest more
and
but
of
and
secular, thedegree cathexis, ofsheer
psycho-
is
For
logicalinvolvement,notmoderate. bothsidesitis close to transcendent.
In bothUkrainian
and Polish culture
Lviv/Lwów
becomes the preeminent
correlative narratives national
of
of
self-assertion.
objective
These narratives,
become inextricably
linkedin the late nine-
moreover,
teenth
after Ukrainian-Polish of 1918-1919. The
the
War
century,
certainly
one requires other. in virtually suchcases,itis through
the
As
all
to
opposition
the Otherthatthe collectiveself,thatwhichis one's own or "native,"is
defined. theprocess Other often
In
In
that
is
and
marginalized evendemonized.
- that interms psychological
itsmost
form
of
and
is,
developed
depth narrative
-
extension thisbecomestheprocessofprojecting shadow, phenomenon
the
a
that as central theformation collective
is
to
of
as
in
identity itis underexamined
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MYTHOLOGIZING LVIV/LWÓW
3 15
formal
studiesand especiallyin the largerpublic domainof
culturological
various
societies.
The question theyoked
of
nature thetwoperspectives, Polishandthe
of
the
can
of
shownthrough
Ukrainian, their
interpénétration, againbe dramatically
the alreadymentioned
one of the first
Zimorowicz,
exampleof Bartlomiej
in
of
The interesting is that hisoverallartistic-literary
fact
chroniclers thecity.
-
the
that
assurehis place in Polishliterature
achievement, twomajorworks
Roxolanki
noweruskie
animated their
(1654) andSielanki
(1663)- areboth
(as
titlesimply)by thesurrounding
Ukrainian/Ruthenian
the
setting: landscape,
the
and
thefolklore, peasant
(evenifin Arcadian
society
garb), theethos(even
iffiltered
conventions).2
through
Baroqueandclassicizing
their
and
The twinned
placedon them
settings, thematization, theemphasis
of
in
revolution 1648 described
arehighly
Thus,theKhmernytsTcyi
revealing.
- i.e., in "Kozaczyzna" and "Burda Ruska" (one
the Sielankinowe ruskie
note
shouldparticularly heretheBaroque paradoxof dealingwitha bloody
-
of
and religious
war in terms an "idyll,"sielanka) is
civil, social, ethnic,
and not Polish
its
shown as finding victimsamong the city's Ukrainian
In
and
its
processes
complex
among Uniates nottheCatholics. short,
burghers,
are
of projection
and of concealing/revealing alreadyat workhere. These
side
are
on
moreover, mirrored theother
(Ukrainian/Ruthenian)- as
processes,
writer
Ivan
out in his seminalstudyof the Ukrainian
Ivan Frankopointed
in
and
and
presence Lvivinthelate
political cultural
VyshensTcyi theUkrainian
and
sixteenth earlyseventeenth
centuries, in thedecadesleadingup to the
i.e.,
and corrosive
What he pointsto is a profound
revolution.
Khmel'nytsicyi
Ukrainian
of
and
processat workin theinterrelation theminority subordinate
-
Polishone theprocess self-imposed
of
with dominant
the
(Ruthenian)
society
-
causes the dis-
WithtypicalacuityFrankonotesthe historical
separation.
Polish
of
and
crimination,
by
oppression, ridicule theRuthenians thedominant
-
and
at
and
resentment rancor thistreatment
"natural" "inevitable"
side,their
funda-
articulation theresponse,
of
andtheideological,
VyshensTcyi's
religious
to
to
flock:"be prepared separate
mentalist
yourself
injunction theOrthodox
of
Antichrist thesinofSodom."He adducesthestudy
and
the
from destructive
Loziñski
and
theLviv patricianate burghers thePolishhistorian
Wladyslaw
by
was
that
to showthat program indeedsuccessful:
one
stoodoutsideof Lviv, outsideof its burghers,
The Ruthenian
burghers
for
learned
almost
of
evensayoutside themselves, they
alwaystodraw
might
and
not
their
material moralsustenance from
and
amongthemselves within
but fromthe outsideand indeedfromoutsidethe Ruthenian
themselves,
[Rus'].Theyweremorea foreign
city
colonyin theRuthenian
community
eventhan Armenians.3
the
than
than Germans, thefirst
the
Poles,more
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316
GRABOWICZ
FortheUkrainian
sees it,this
cultural
led
side,as Franko
separatism to far-reaching
and
consciousness:
false,
self-impoverishment a profoundly
self-deluding
Fromthis[Loziñski's]characterization can see how dangerous mor-
we
and
was thisprogram separatism,
of
whichimmediately the
ally injurious
put
Ruthenians
thepale of civic lifeand civilcompetition thearea of
in
beyond
common
which
them concealtheir thoughts, sayand
to
real
to
interests,
taught
do one thing to think
and
in
another,
whereby timethemaskbecamepartof
theface,so that personno longer
a
knewwhatis authentic truein him
and
and whatis masked,
in
whichmeant
that theend true,
sincere
and
thoughts
died away and character demoralized.
was
The results thispro-
of
feelings
cess are all too obvious:Rus' lostfaith itself, lostthesense of its own
in
it
and thatnatural,
live solidarity
whichholds together
dignity
everyliving
and constantly
renewsit,doubling strength; becameaccus-
its
Rus'
society
tomed
to
someone'sfavor, bow and
to
alwaysto lookto others, beg,tocurry
life
with short of
the
rod
need,to measure and social matters
scrapewithout
4
utilitarianism.
personal
What is particularly
notable here is thatthe process of marginalization,
of
"making invisible" is, so to say, self-imposed.(Indeed, as we can inferfrom
Franko's biographyand his writings, picturehe paints is even more appli-
the
cable to his times thanto those of VyshensTcyi.)
Franko wrote this in the early 1890s- when he still believed in Polish-
Ukrainiancooperationand complementary
developmentand indeed placed his
own political hopes on such an alliance. A few years afterhis hopes for such
cooperation were dashed, Franko wrote Ein Dichter des Verrates (which he
publishedin 1897 in theViennese newspaperDie Zeit) about theleading Polish
cultural figure,Adam Mickiewicz (on whom he had frequently
written
with
and preciselyin termsof the paradigmof influence),and on
greatadmiration,
theeve of thecentennialof thepoet's birth
accused him of poisoning theminds
of his countrymen
withthe ideal of "Wallenrodism,"i.e., withthedoctrinethat
-
all means, even themostfoul,are fairif used fora higherpatriotic
purpose in
thiscase, forPoland. With this attackFranko (a full one-fifth whose prodi-
of
- belles lettres,criticism, scholarship, and
gious literaryoutput
publicistic
-
works was in Polish) broke offvirtually contactswithhis manyerstwhile
all
-
Polish colleagues and collaboratorsand became in Polish circles and literally
-
in Polish Lviv, where he was hanged in effigyin the streets a persona
non grata. This sorry, perhapsinevitable,developmentcan serve
but
ultimately
as a dramatic introduction the conflictsand the seeming irreconcilability
to
betweenthe Polish and the Ukrainiansides in thetwentieth
century.
*
♦
*
-
Underlyingthe contexts evoked both by Zimorowicz and Franko and
frequently,indeed purposefully, overlooked- is demographic reality: the
or
simple factthat
just as Ukrainiansocietyin the seventeenth in thenineteenth
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