The concept of national resistance in the emigrant memoirs of 1960–1980 by combatants of the Liberation Struggle

Abstract

Non-fiction literature is a powerful mediator of ideological influence and a tool for shaping individual / collective historical memory, which is why it is a relevant subject in contemporary humanities. This article uses the prism of autobiographical synergy to examine the ideological dimensions of the concept of national resistance as manifested in the ego-documents (memoirs, recollections, notes) of combatants who participated in the Liberation Struggle of 1917–1921 and who emigrated after the armed defeat of the Ukrainian Revolution. Originally published abroad in the 1960s–1980s, the memoirs of I. Lyuty-Lyutenko, M. Doroshenko, Y. Horlis-Horsky, O. Vyshnevsky and others were republished at the beginning of the 21st century as part of the creation of a national-historical discourse to counter the pro-imperial narratives disseminated in the media. Thanks to its attractive artistic form, confessional sincerity, anti-colonial pathos, and heroization of a century-old patriotic deed, this segment of émigré literature has gained significant popularity among a wide audience readers and professional researchers. After examining the artistic concept sphere of these texts, we can conclude that the memoirs under consideration are valuable not only for their source, didactic,
factual, symbolic, and commemorative functions, but also as a promising direction for studies in the history of literature.