Poetry
Розсипані перли
Not translated into English
Vasyl Pachovsky · 1901
Synopsis
Love songs and poems, written to the melodies of Galician folk songs. The poet goes to the ball and the village fête, waltzes with the ladies, and addresses his verses to young girls whom he names, Hanusia or Stefcia, down to album pages offered to one of them. From one piece to the next the form changes, stanzas, rhymes, internal rhymes, and the mood passes from the carefree spirit of the ball to lament.
Context
The book appeared in Lviv in 1901, the year its author was expelled from the university of the city, along with four comrades, for reciting a poem at an assembly of students; he went on to finish his studies in Vienna. Ivan Franko, who was then criticising the modernists, wrote a favourable review of it in his article on Ukrainian poetry of the year, in which he welcomed a true talent whose verses flowed naturally; he later spoke of very musical verses with an erotic content. The collection was reissued in 1933.
Who it is for
About one hundred and forty pages of songs and short poems, in the Galician orthography of the time, often on the rhythm of dance songs.
Prizes and reception
Hailed by Franko as an event in literary life, it brought its author into the young modernist poetry of Lviv.
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