| This dissertation analyzes Gogol's Ukrainian stories---the Dikan'ka and the Mirgorod cycles---as a unique artifice constructed by using syncretic layers of paganism and Christianity. Syncretism, in this dissertation, is defined as an attempted union or reconciliation of diverse or opposite tenets or practices, which considers the interaction between paganism and Christianity. Gogol's Ukrainian stories derive much of its originality from the creative adaptation of pagan and Christian motifs, which are interwoven repetitively, to achieve structural and thematic amplification.;This dissertation considers historical and literary aspects of syncretism in tandem, by taking into account the various levels of syncretism reflected in folk tales, folk belief, pagan and Christian rituals, Bible, sermons, major events in the history of religion for the Eastern Slavs as well as Gogol's biography. When discussing syncretism through these sources, the categories---impure power, variants of solar heroes and their journey, totemism, animism, food, and merrymaking---function as bridges linking disparate pagan and Christian elements, and thereby contextualizing Gogol's stories in various settings.;The close textual analysis of the Ukrainian stories reveals that syncretism exists on lexical, stylistic and semantic levels. First, on the lexical level, pagan and Christian texts are often expressed through parallelism. Second, the lexicons are expressed in the body of stylistics, which reveals the semantic level of syncretism. The lexical, stylistic and semantic levels are discussed simultaneously in relation to one another, since they are not separate, but different aspects of Gogol's syncretism.;In the majority of the Dikan'ka cycle, the pagan force occupies an outer space as visible agents of action. Towards the end of the Dikan'ka cycle, it begins to be internalized as a part of human psychology. At the end of the Mirgorod cycle, the pagan force becomes an invisible devil sitting in men's soul. In both cycles, even though Christianity clashes with inner and outer pagan force and creates tension, it does not occupy the center of the text-forming mechanism, so as to demonize and relegate pagan elements. It is a dynamic tension between paganism and Christianity that serves as the central text-forming energy in Gogol's Ukrainian stories. |
