Town and country: the phenomenon of interrelation of cultures in rural tradition (as exemplified by the novel by Olga Kobilyanska and the poem by Yakub Kolas

Abstract

The article is devoted to research on the opposition “country vs. city”, as one of the most characteristic features of the peasant society in Ukraine and Belarus during in the late 19th - early 20th centuries. The author investigates the causes of the opposition development, reveals in particular its mythological origin as well as its transformation within the context of the archaic worldview and binary oppositions “nature vs. civilization”, “own vs. alien”, “we vs. they”, “ good vs. bad”. The analysis is based on the poem New earth [Nova zemlya] by Yakub Kolas and novel Earth [Zemlya] by Olga Kobylianska and presents the most important expressive means used.