Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures
SLA238, Literature of the Ukrainian Canadian Experience
The following works will be required reading:
(Please note, this list is in the order that we read the works numbered by weeks, so there is no number 1.)
Students must purchase two texts, 4. Vera Lysenko. Yellow Boots and 11. Jars Balan, ed. Yarmarok: Ukrainian Writing in Canada Since World War II. These texts are not available online. They can be ordered from the publisher (see links above) or purchased at the University of Toronto Bookstore.
Three further texts are classics of Canadian literature: 5. Margaret Laurence. A Jest of God, 6. Gabrielle Roy. Where Nests the Water Hen, and 10. Janice Kulyk Keefer. The Green Library. Laurence and Roy are in every library on campus and in most new and used bookstores. They are very inexpensive paperbacks. Along with Janice Kulyk Keefer's The Green Library they should all be at the bookstore.
Otherwise, the items for weeks 2, 3, 7, 8, 9 and 12 are available as pdf files that can be downloaded to your computer and printed. Items 4 and 11 are published by the Canadian
Institute of Ukrainian Studies Press and are available for purchase on-line (see links above) or from the U of T bookstore or from the offices of CIUS Press at U of T. Many of the strongly recommended readings are available at the University of Toronto
Bookstore.
Students are invited to read Prof. Tarnawsky's paper comparing Janice Kulyk Keefer's The Green Library and Askold Melnyczuk's What is Told.
Strongly Recommended Reading
The following books are also recommended for background reading.
- Frances Swyripa. Ukrainian Canadians: A Survey of Their Portrayal in English-LanguageWorks.
- Manoly Lupul, ed.A Heritage in Transition: Essays in the History of Ukrainians in Canada.
- Orest Martynowych. Ukrainians in Canada: The Formative Period, 1891-1924 or purchase.
- Ukrainians in Canada, A special issue of the Journal of Ukrainian Studies (1991).
- Frances Swyripa.Wedded to the Cause.
- Sonia Mycak. Canuke Literature: Critical Essays on Canadian Ukrainian Writing
- Ledohowski, Lindy. “Canadian Cossacks: Finding Ukraine in Fifty Years of Ukrainian-Canadian Literature in English.” PhD Thesis, University of Toronto, 2008.
- Tuchynska, Nataliia. “From Ethnic Towards Transnational: The Green Library by Janice Kulyk Keefer.” MA Thesis, Lakehead University, 2002.
- Pawlowsky, Alexandra. “Ukrainian Canadian literature in Winnipeg: a socio-historical perspective, 1908-1991.” PhD Thesis, University of Manitoba, 1997.
- Lehr, J. C. Homesteading on the Prairies: Iwan Mihaychuk. Grolier. (1990) OISE and here.
- Re-Imagining Ukrainian-Canadians: History, Politics, and Identity: History, Politics, and Identity.
Edited by Rhonda L. Hinther and Jim Mochoruk. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2010. Particularly these two essays:
- "'A Vaguely Divided Guilt': The Aboriginal Ukrainian" by Lindy A. Ledohowski. pp. 85–102,
- "The Populist Patriot: the Life and Literary Legacy of Illia Kiriak" by Jars Balan. pp. 129–72.
- Wsevolod W. Isajiw. The Process of Maintenance of Ethnic Identity: the Canadian Context. http://hdl.handle.net/1807/75 https://tspace.library.utoronto.ca/handle/1807/75
- Isajiw, W. W. (1977). Olga in wonderland: Ethnicity in technological society. Canadian Ethnic Studies = Etudes Ethniques Au Canada, 9(1), 77. Retrieved from http://myaccess.library.utoronto.ca/login?url=https://search-proquest-com.myaccess.library.utoronto.ca/docview/1293200440
- Padolsky, E. (1996). "Olga in wonderland": Canadian ethnic minority writing and post-colonial theory. Canadian Ethnic Studies = Etudes Ethniques Au Canada, 28(3), 16. Retrieved from http://myaccess.library.utoronto.ca/login?url=https://search-proquest-com.myaccess.library.utoronto.ca/docview/1293147752
Some videos about Ukrainians in Canada that are shown in class.
Suggested further reading: (and topics for presentations)
Schedule of Class Reports
- Margaret Atwood. Life Before Man.
- Maara Haas. The Street Where I Live.
- Vera Lysenko. Westerly Wild.
- Sophia Slobodian. The Glistening Furrow.
- Gloria Kupchenko Frolick. The Green Tomato Years.
- Frederick Philip Grove. Fruits of the Earth.
- Paper Wheat. The Book.
- Yuri Kupchenko. The Horseman of Shandro Crossing.
- Sinclair Ross. Sawbones Memorial.
- Two Lands, New Visions: Stories from Canada and Ukraine. Janice Kulyk Keefer & Solomea Pavlychko, eds.
- Echoes of Ukrainian Canada. A special issue of Prairie Fire: A Canadian Magazine of New Writing, Vol. 13, no. 3 Autumn, 1992.
- Helen Potrebenko. Hey Waitress and other stories.
- Janice Kulyk Keefer. The Ladies' Lending Library
- Myroslav Petriw. Yaroslaw's Treasure
- Elizabeth Bachinsky, God of Missed Connections, poetry
- Shandi Mitchell, Under This Unbroken Sky
- Marusya Bociurkiw, Comfort Food for Breakups: The Memoir of a Hungry Girl
- Laura Langston, Lesia’s Dream, Juvenile
- Larry Warwaruk, Andrei and the Snow Walker, Juvenile
- Alexandra Tesluk, The Ashes of Innocence
- Larry Warwaruk. The Ukrainian Wedding
- Molly Anne Warring, Paradise Acres: The Stryker Family Saga
- Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch, Kobzar’s Children: A Century of Untold Ukrainian Stories, Juvenile
- Other works by writers on the reading list.
- Non-fiction works about Ukrainians in Canada.
- Janice Kulyk Keefer. Honey and Ashes: A Story of Family
- Roman Fodchuk, Zhorna: Material Culture of the Ukrainian Pioneers
- Kassandra Luciuk, Enemy Alien: A True Story of Life Behind Barbed Wire. Graphic novel, Illustrated by Nicole Marie Burton
- Barbara Sapergia, Blood and Salt
- Grant Buday, The Delusionist