Postmodernistic Project and Contemporary Ukrainian Literature

Abstract

The main subject of the research in this article is the exhaustion of postmodernism as a philosophical doctrine and aesthetical practice. Postmodernism has not became a universal phenomenon in contemporary Ukrainian literature, which is reliving the difficult process of emerging from colonial dependence. It existed in Ukraine between 1986-1991 as an answer to the worldview that was popular in the West. The end of this artistic direction the author associates with those events which took place in 2013-2014, when Ukrainian society and Ukrainian culture moved into a new phase of existence. The consequences of these events, reflected in the media, public opinion and also in literature, led to the rejection of the postulates of postmodernism. It should be said that these postulates reveal a clear dysfunctionality. The postmodernist play and general scepticism, as can be seen, can be not only a position taken by an independent, intellectual person, but also an imitation strategy that conceals a neo-imperial doctrine which is portrayed as a liberal project. Sometimes it is too difficult to distinguish one from the other. Thus, the boundaries of postmodernism are clearly defined, or more precisely, the prevalence of its basic principles are. Over time, this phenomenon has received radically different interpretations, which is why a systemic deconstruction of the whole project is required. From such a point of view, therefore, a thesis about the death of postmodernism has its reasons, especially in Eastern Europe. From the Ukrainian perspective, the characteristic crossing of time and place (Eastern Europe) has put the Western project of postmodernism into a stupor, prompting us to search for alternative worldviews and aesthetic models. However, this artistic direction can motivate modern Ukrainian intellectuals in its own way, opening up new horizons in the comprehension of this epoch.