The Prologue to the Narcissus of Hryhorii Skovoroda as a Philosophical Testament
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.18523/kmhj51026.2015-2.83-98Keywords:
Narcissus, know thyself, heroic frenzies, Plutarchism and Stoicism in Skovoroda, Skovoroda and BrunoAbstract
The article points out the composition and publication of the dialogue Narcissus and its Prologue, why the figure of Narcissus is for Skovoroda so unusually positive and why it is connected to the theme of “know thyself.” The article also draws an unprecedented parallelism between the “sacred narcissism” of Skovoroda and the “heroic frenzies” of Giordano Bruno. The theoretical meaning of the Narcissus’ figure in Skovoroda’s philosophy is the link between epistemological idealism, self-love (which is a strong ethical and personal commitment, a love of own character and fate) and deification. From the ontological point of view, it is suggested that Skovoroda’s ontology is a Christian Plutarchism: a transformation (by Platonizing and Christianizing it) of the Stoic individual hegemonic into an ability to grasp the invisible divine, in a perspective close to St. Augustine. Finally, we find, in Skovoroda’s philosophical testament, an original synthesis of Latin culture and humanism with modernism and Hesychasm’s spirituality.References
Arnou, René. Le désir de Dieu dans la philosophie de Plotin. Paris: Alcan 1921.
von Balthasar, Hans U. Massimo il Confessore. Liturgia Cosmica. Milano: Jaca Book, 2001.
Bartolini, Maria G. “Poesia e filosofia nell’Ucraina del Settecento. Motivi epicurei nel Sad božestvennych pesnej di H. S. Skovoroda.” In La poesia filosofica, edited by Alessandro Costazza, 129–43. Milano: Cisalpino, 2007.
Bruno, Giordano. “De gli eroici furori.” In G. Bruno, Dialoghi filosofici italiani, 755–960. Milano: Mondadori, 2000.
Čyževs’kyj, Dmytro. Filosofija H. S. Skovorody. Warszawa: Institut Scientifique Ukrainien, 1934.
Čyževs’kyj, Dmytro. “An Introduction to the Life and Thought of H. S. Skovoroda.” In Hryhoryj Savyč Skovoroda. An Anthology of Critical Articles, edited by Richard H. Marshall and Thomas E. Bird, 1–60. Edmonton-Toronto: CIUS, 1994.
von Erdmann, Elizabeth. Unähnliche Ähnlichkeit. Die Onto-Poetik des ukrainischen Philosophen Hryhorii Skovoroda (1722–1794). Köln; Weimar; Wien: Böhlau, 2005.
Faggionato, Raffaella. A Rosicrucian Utopia in Eighteenth-Century Russia: The Masonic Circle of N. I. Novikov. Dordrecht: Springer, 2010.
Hippisley, Anthony. “Introduction.” In Emvlemy i simvoly (1788). The First Russian Emblem Book. Leiden: Brill, 1989.
Isaievych, Iaroslav. Ukrainske knyhovydannia. Vytoky, rozvytok, problemy [Ukrainian Publishing Activity: Origins, Development, Problems]. Lviv: Instytut Ukrainoznavstva im. Krypiakevycha NAN Ukrainy, 2002.
von Ivánka Endre. Plato Christianus: Übernahme und Umgestaltung des Platonismus durch die Väter. Einsiedeln: Johannes, 1964.
Kashuba, Mariia. “Traktuvannia Heorhiem Konyskym problemy materii.” [“The Interpretation of the Problem of Substance by Heorhii Konysky.”] In Vid Vyshenskoho do Skovorody (z istorii filosofskoi dumky na Ukraini XVI–XVIII st.), edited by Valeriia M. Nichyk, 96–102. Kyiv: Naukova Dumka, 1972.
Koultchytskyi, Alexandre. “Skovoroda philosophe de la connaissance de soi-même et précurseur du personnalisme.” In Skovoroda philosophe ukrainien, 55–110. Paris: Institut d’Etudes slaves, 1976.
Kovalynsky, Mykhailo. Žizn’ Grigorїja Skovorody. In H. Skovoroda, Povna akademična zbirka tvoriv, 1343–86. Charkiv; Edmonton; Toronto: CIUS-Majdan, 2011.
Nichyk, Valeriia. Kyievo-Mohylianska Akademiia ta nimetska kultura [Kyiv-Mohyla Academy and German Culture]. Kyiv: Ukrainskyi tsentr dukhovnoi kultury, 2001.
Nizhenets, A. Na zlami dvokh svitiv. Rozvidka pro H. S. Skovorodu i Kharkivskyi kolehium [In the Intersection of Two Worlds: Research on Hryhorii Skovoroda and the Kharkiv Kolehium]. Kharkiv: Prapor, 1970.
Ordine, N. La soglia dell’ombra. Letteratura, filosofia e pittura in Giordano Bruno, Marsilio, Venezia 2003.
Praz, Mario. Studies in Seventeenth-century Imagery. Roma: Edizioni di Storia e Letteratura, 1975.
Pich, Roland. “Skovorodynivskyi mif pro Narkisa v svitli romantychnoi konceptsii mifotvorchosti.” [“The Skovoroda Myth of Narcissus in The Context of the Romantic Conception of Myth Making.”] Suchasnist 10 (1995): 161–67.
Pylypiuk, Natalia. “The Primary Door: At the Threshold of Skovoroda’s Theology and Poetics.” Harvard Ukrainian Studies 3–4 (1990): 551–83.
Pylypiuk, Natalia. “Skovoroda’s Divine Narcissism.” Journal of Ukrainian Studies 1–2 (1997): 13–50.
Ricci, Saverio. La fortuna del pensiero di Giordano Bruno. Firenze: La Nuova Italia, 1990.
Scherer, Stephen P. “The Narcissus: Skovoroda’s ‘First-Born Son’.” Journal of Ukrainian Studies 1–2 (1997): 51–64.
Scherer, Stephen P. “Enlightment Elements in the Tought of Hryhorij Skovoroda.” Michigan Academician 38 (2008): 61–77.
Skovoroda, Hryhorii. Povne zibrannia tvoriv u dvokh tomakhv [Collected Works in Two Volumes]. Kyiv: Naukova dumka, 1973.
Skovoroda, Hryhorij. Povna akademična zbirka tvoriv, edited by Leonid Uškalov. Charkiv; Edmonton; Toronto: CIUS-Majdan, 2011.
Symbola et Emblemata Jussu atque aspiciis Petri Alexeidis. Amsterdam: Henricus Wetstein, 1705.
Uguccioni, Alessandra. “L’iconografia di Narciso nel Roman de la Rose, esempio di amore cortese.” In Studi per Pietro Zampetti, edited by Ranieri Varese, 71–75. Ancona: Il Lavoro Editoriale, 1993.
Ushkalov, Leonid. Z istorii ukrainskoi literatury XVII–XVIII stolit [From the History of Ukrainian Literature of the 17th–18th Centuries]. Kharkiv: Akta, 1999.
Ushkalov, Leonid. Hryhorii Skovoroda: seminarii [Hryhorii Skovoroda: The Seminary]. Kharkiv: Maidan, 2004.
Ushkalov, Leonid. Esei pro ukrainske baroko [The Essays on Ukrainian Baroque]. Kyiv: Fakt, 2006.
Uškalov, Leonid. “Hryhorij Skovoroda”, in H. Skovoroda, Povna akademična zbirka tvoriv, 9–48. Charkiv; Edmonton; Toronto: CIUS-Majdan, 2011.
Yates, Frances. Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition. London: Routledge, 1964.
Yefremov, Serhii. “Masonstvo v Ukraini.” [“Freeasonry in Ukraine.”] Ii: Nezalezhnyi Kulturolohichnyi Chasopys 54 (2009): 166–79 (article’s first edition: 1918).
Zakydalsky, Taras. “Skovoroda’s Moral Philosophy.” In Hryhoryj Savyč Skovoroda. An Anthology of Critical Articles, edited by Richard H. Marshall and Thomas E. Bird, 239–50. Edmonton-Toronto: CIUS, 1994.
Downloads
Issue
Section
License
Kyiv-Mohyla Humanities Journal provides free access to original research without restriction barriers (i.e. subscription fees, licensing fees etc.). The journal allows re-use of content for non-commercial/educational purposes indexing the source.
Unless otherwise indicated, content is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) license, which means you are free to:
copy
distribute
transmit
adapt
and make commercial use of the work
...provided that any use is made with attribution to author(s) and Kyiv-Mohyla Humanities Journal.
The author passes copyright of the article to the journal and Kyiv-Mohyla Humanities Journal; author can archive post-print articles (PDF versions) on s/he web-site (http://www.sherpa.ac.uk).
