Bohdan Tsymbal

Marko Vovchok’s Correspondence: Unsolved Issues of Attribution, Dating and Commenting

The article deals with the publication of a part of the collection of Marko Vovchok’s letters dating back to early years of the 20th century. In particular, it studies Vasyl Domanytsky’s letters to Marko Vovchok and her letters in reply to him. The story of publishing of the writer’s letters started in 1920s. The fourth volume of Marko Vovchok’s Stories (1928) edited by Oleksandr Doroshkevych contained, among others, 98 letters written by the author to various people and 120 letters addressed to her. Insufficient studying of Marko Vovchok’s collection of letters caused a number of mistakes concerning their attribution in the edition, in particular, her letters to Vasyl Domanytsky were mistakenly attributed as letters to Fedir Matushevsky. The editors corrected this mistake in later editions, but they made some other mistakes during the preparation of the edition. The six letters from Vasyl Domanytsky that are analyzed here, were first published in Letters to Marko Vovchok (1979). Currently, 694 Marko Vovchok’s letters and 527 letters addressed to her are published and available to scholars. The detailed analysis of this collection of letters rises a number of questions that need to be answered. Upon reading carefully correspondence between Marko Vovchok and Vasyl Domanytsky and notes to them as well as comparing their letters to their biographies, the author of the article suggests re-attributing some of the writer’s letters addressed to Vasyl Domanytsky, Volodymyr Naumenko, and Fedir Matushevsky. The article also highlights incorrect commenting of some realia that are mentioned in the letters, which is often caused by incorrect dating. The offered version corresponds fully to well-known facts from the writer’s biography and eliminates inconsistencies that were caused by incorrect attribution.