The glow of someone else’s glory

Conclusion. For beginning see The Day No. 10

An open face-off between national-minded Ukrainian intellectuals and adherents of a “united and undivided Russia” began after the first Russian revolution in 1909, when Ukrainian civic organizations and political parties came up with the idea of erecting a monument to Taras Shevchenko to mark his 100th birth anniversary. Before this, in 1900, the Kharkiv City Duma member Mykola Mikhnovsky had proposed building a monument to Shevchenko, but the Duma turned down the proposal and resolved, instead, that a monument to [the Russian poet] Mikhail Lermontov be erected in Kharkiv. On November 3, 1904, the Ukrainian Defense organization attempted to explode the bust of Aleksandr Pushkin, a “symbol of Russian domination,” in a Kharkiv theater garden. A leaflet, “Independent Ukraine – Defense of Ukraine,” said: “Pushkin is a Moscow man of letters, who portrayed in his works the figure of our patriot Hetman Ivan Mazepa in an ignoble and deceitful way. Ukraine still does not have a monument to Shevchenko, while the government is building monuments to hostile persons at the expense of taxes collected from the Ukrainian populace. Shevchenko is our great poet, while Pushkin is yours…”

The Ukrainian historian Kostatukha wrote in 1920: “What actually provoked such a violent outburst of national intolerance as an attempt to destroy a monument to Pushkin was an unhealthy public environment which the Ukrainian people had to live in.” Mykola Shapoval, member of the Ukrainian Defense organization in the Ukrainian People’s Party, reminisces: “I was convinced that no other monuments had the right to stand in Ukraine as long as there was no monument to Shevchenko. Also of the same nature was the attempt of independence advocates to blow up the Glory Monument in 1909. This explosion was timed to the 200th anniversary of the victory over the Swedes. The attempt was only partly successful: the monument was damaged but not destroyed. Nor did they succeed in demolishing monuments to the Romanovs in Kyiv and Odesa.”

The truth is that Ukrainians wished to have just one monument to Taras Shevchenko erected at the turn of the 20th century, but their efforts were thwarted. At the same time, the authorities built as many as five or six monuments that asserted Russianness and rejected the Ukrainian national idea, thus imposing the myth about a “single Rus people” with the same history, language, imperial ideology and culture. This was shown again when the tsarist family arrived in Poltava to attend celebrations of the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Poltava. As the newspaper Poltavsliy vestnik reported on July 27, 1909, a combined choir of 500 people, conducted by Dmitry Akhsharumov, sang the finale of Mikhail Glinka’s opera A Life for the Tsar. That was an all-Russian celebration. A French economist and Constituent Assembly member wrote in 1869: “The entire Europe was defeated by Peter I near Poltava. The next day after this victory, the Muscovites invaded Europe for the first time and seized Little Russia (Ukraine). This victory was so important for them that they are celebrating its anniversary even today – at a time when other victories have already been forgotten. Now the Ruthenians, also known as Little Russians, do not call Muscovites Ruthenian; they are striving for independence, and the Petersburg government considers them even more dangerous enemies than the Poles.”

As time went by, the Ukrainian people made some attempts to regain their traditions and their national heroes at the period of the national liberation movement. For example, on June 15, 1918, a proposal was made at the Poltava City Duma that Korpusny Park Square, where the Glory Monument was located, be renamed Mazepyn Hai (“Mazepa’s Grove”). This name of the city’s main square would have radically changed the monument’s message and would have revived the name of Ukraine’s hetman. Unfortunately, when the Bolsheviks seized power, they restored the old name.

The Glory Monument irked the Soviet government, too. They even considered tearing it down because it “scared the working-class masses that relaxed in the park.” It was intervention of the Ukrainian Committee for the Protection of Cultural Monuments (UKOPK) that saved the monument from demolition, for it was undoubtedly a precious object of the Empire-style art.

There were also encroachments on the Glory Monument by the Ukrainian nationalists who stayed in the occupied Poltava during the Second World War. This information comes from the writer Volodymyr Starytsky (Hofmann) who worked for the newspaper Holos Poltavshchyny: “The brother of Halyna Viun (chairperson of the Ukrainian Red Cross) and Hryshko (a political prisoner during the Bolshevik rule) also published political articles in the newspaper. He insisted on ruining the Glory Monument: ‘The Glory Monument is the Ukrainian glorification of Ukrainian shame, so it should be torn down.’ I said to him: ‘Let it go on showing our political stupidity – maybe, this will some day help overcome it.’ He cooled off. Word has it that German tanks failed to crush the monument, so it is still standing for us to see.”

There is no documental proof that German tanks ever tried to ruin the monument, although this is mentioned in Oles Honchar’s novella The Earth Drones.

After World War II, the restored Glory Monument was unveiled on May 1, 1953. The structure was re-lined, polished and had the damaged slates replaced. The monument was last repaired in 1974, when the eagle and the wreath were re-gilded.

As Ukraine proclaimed its independence, the Glory Monument was again in the spotlight. It was not accidental, in my view, that in 2000 (like in 1872) some “sculpture buff” spoiled the monument: he partially ripped off the wrought-iron grating and high-relief bronze compositions. The city fathers announced that it was just a theft of scrap metal and soon renovated the monument, forgetting (deliberately or undeliberately) to re-furnish the high-relief bronze parts with spears that resembled, at least to some extent, the Ukrainian Cossack weaponry. The local press was full of articles that bitterly condemned the act of vandalism. But there were other opinions, too. For instance, a reader wrote to the newspaper Poltavska dumka: “Poltava has inherited from the imperial era a calling card in the shape of the Glory Monument crowned with an eagle that holds a wreath which symbolizes the victory of Peter I. I think the wreath should be laid on the mass grave of all the Ukrainians who have fallen victim to this ‘victory’ in the course of three centuries. So the obelisk can be a monument to common history only when a monument to the victims is erected next to it.”

The Poltava-based journalist Ihor Cherchaty compares in one of his articles the battles of Trafalgar and Poltava. In his opinion, the Battle of Poltava determined the “face” of Eastern Europe for several centuries (excluding today), while the Battle of Trafalgar determined the face of Western Europe until this day, and what still unites the two great battles are the almost identical in structure Nelson’s Column in London and the Golden Eagle column in Poltava. What disunites these great battles is that for Swedes the Poltava defeat is an event which they do not want to forget, for Russians it is a triumph, and for Ukrainians it is a horrible tragedy. The author goes on: “And how can one advertise, if at all, the 300th anniversary of the Battle of Poltava throughout the world? In spite of the battle’s consequences and latter-day emotions, it is necessary that the entire world come to know about Poltava.”

The journalist suggests that, since there are different views on the Battle of Poltava in Russia, Sweden and Ukraine, there should be three – Russian, Swedish and Ukrainian – museums of this battle.

The idea of establishing these museums being questionable, there came other proposals. For instance, in July 2007 the Poltava community in Moscow supported the suggestion of the Poltava City Council that a Friendship Monument be erected in honor of the Cossacks, Russians and Swedes killed inn the Battle of Poltava. This reminds me of the notorious Friendship of Peoples Rotund (“White Pergola”) built to mark the 300th anniversary of the “reunification of Ukraine and Russia” with the following words on the front plate: “Glory to the Soviet Union, Glory, Glory to the Fatherland of Fraternal Peoples.” History is returning according to its circle again. A question arises again: does Poltava need monuments to Mazepa or Petliura?

The Poltava branch of the Taras Shevchenko Enlightenment Society (Prosvita) has released a statement: “There the Glory Monument in downtown Poltava, a monument to our colonial, incredibly cruel, past. What “Menshikov’s eagles” did to residents of Baturyn and a number of other Ukrainian cities and towns is difficult to fathom by a human mind. The world had never known such a sadistic cruelty. To counterpose this monument of cruelty and oppression of Ukrainians by Russian imperialism, we should erect the symbol of a new Ukraine which finally gained, in spite of tragedies and incalculable losses on its historical path, its independence and unity. As inheritors the glorious Cossack chivalry, modern-day Poltava residents should create in their city a dominant entity, a symbol, which would assert independence of our spirit and aspiration to regain the lost freedom and statehood. A monument to Ivan Mazepa must be this symbol. Meanwhile, contrary to the President of Ukraine’s decree ‘On Immortalizing the Memory of Outstanding UNR and Western Ukrainian People’s Republic Figures’ which also calls for erecting a monument to Symon Petliura, the city authorities have opposed the actions of the state administration which had initiated putting up a commemorative sign at the place where it is planned to build a monument. The commemorative sign was still put up, which forced the city authorities to take legal action. There is a face-off between political parties and civic associations in the city. In August 2007 some unidentified persons damaged the commemorative sign.”

The poet Yevhen Malaniuk wrote: “Little Russianness is not Moscowphilia or any other philia. It is an intra-national malady, illness, injury. It is national defeatism.” The poet associates these words with the Poltava Colonel Martyn Pushkar whom he calls “father of Little Russianness.” It is he who, vying for hetmanhood, betrayed the Ukrainian nation and came out against the legitimate Hetman Vyhovsky. He suffered a defeat and was killed. Pushkar’s cut-off head was put up for Poltava residents to see.

Now, too, this stone head (commemorative sign) reminds Poltava dwellers of a great treason which caused a great deal of Ukrainian blood to spill and turned Ukraine into a major ruin. This commemorative sign, as well as such a sculptural piece as monument to halushky (kind of ravioli) – on Cathedral Square, – stirred up no protest. This is why they cropped up without a problem. And while we are coming to blows either over Petliura, or Mazepa, or Virka Serdiuchka (a stage drag queen whom the Poltava authorities propose to make an honored citizen), the invincible Poltava halushka may still remain the symbol of our contribution to civilization. I cannot help recalling Volodymyr Sosiura’s words from the poem Mazepa:

“Whoever lives the life of an abject slave / Will not live at all. / For life is an eternal struggle / And only strong peoples will forge into nations / And go marching in joy, braving the storms / And blazing the trail for descendants.”

Meanwhile, the Glory Monument still symbolizes, as it did 200 years ago, “a victory of Russian arms” and a tragedy of the Ukrainian nation. At the same time, it is a calling card of Poltava.

“Poltava, Poltava, tell Ukraine / Why the eagle is still over you?/ Did the aliens not trample on you? / Did the Muscovites not pour scorn on your songs?/ Poltava, where are Churaivna, Mazepa, Petliura? /Only janissaries and slaves have remained behind.”

N. Poklad

Characterizing the building of the Poltava Gubernia’s Zemstvo (now an ethnographic museum) as one of the spiritual sources of the Ukrainian people’s national identity and dignity, Mykola Stepanenko, a well-known researcher, Vice-President of the UNR, also points to the Glory Monument with “a blood-sucking tsarist eagle on the obelisk, which every God’s day tears apart the heart of Prometheus – the people – and drinks his blood.”

As for marking the 300th anniversary of the Battle of Poltava as such, this should be a requiem for Ukrainian heroes and a joint prayer for all those who died in those cruel years.

Anatolii Chernov is chairman of the Poltava Regional Association of Tour Guides and recipient of the title “Meritorious Worker of Tourism of Ukraine”