ВУЙКОВА КНИГА

“I was, I am, and I will continue to be.”

Uncle Shtif a.k.a. Jacob Maydanyk (Kuchmij 1983)

Jacob Maydanyk left behind a huge legacy of collective memories captured on the walls of churches and pages of almanacs. It is, however, his comic book, Вуйкова книга [Vuikova knyha/Uncle’s Book], that I feel best embodies the cultural memories and contextualizes the artist’s life within the immigrant community on the Canadian prairies. Uncle’s Book is the collection of comic strips that my Dido was referring to when he spoke of Uncle Shtif Tabachniuk. It was one of the primary resources that helped put the author’s life into perspective, and of all the materials produced by Maydanyk, it is this comic book that inspired the direction of my research.

Uncle’s Book was written and illustrated solely by Jacob Maydanyk in 1930. The never-before-published collection of comic strips could easily be considered one of Canada’s first comic books and graphic memoirs. It is formally titled Вуйкова книга – Річник Вуйка Штіфа в рисунках Я. Майданика [Uncle’s Book – Uncle Shtif’s Illustrated Yearly Almanac by J. Maydanyk]. In the 1930s, the reference to it being ‘illustrated’ indicated that the book included hand-drawn pictures; thereby, understood to be like the comic books that were gaining popularity in North America. This chapter is a collection of the insights collected from four sources, the interviews by Lozowchuk, Ewanchuk and Kuchmij, Farkavec’s MA thesis, a psychogeographic analysis of the locations in Maydanyk’s community, and a close reading of Uncle’s Book. As a memoir, it sums up Maydanyk’s life as a cartoonist and Ukrainian immigrant living on the Canadian prairies before 1930. The combination of imagery and dialogue captures the many adventures Maydanyk experienced in his earliest years in Canada.

Sales orders from abroad prove that the immigration narratives in Uncle’s Book must have also resonated within the Ukrainian diaspora beyond Canadian borders. The earliest waves of Ukrainian immigration to Canada (1891 – 1918) correspond to the first settlement of Ukrainians in Brazil, Argentina, and Australia. Subsequently, oral histories, correspondence, and published memoirs of Ukrainian setters in all these countries share similarities during the same era. Consequently, events, material culture, and experiences related to integration and assimilation are similar to those in the tales of Uncle Shtif Tabachniuk.[1] During my research, I only found five copies of Uncle’s Book – three in Canada and the other two in the Prosvita libraries/archives in Buenos Aires, Argentina and Curitiba, Brazil, physically confirming that the stories had made their way south of the equator.

This chapter continues by defining the significance of Uncle’s Book in the canon of Canadian Comics literature, followed by a physical description of Uncle’s Book, then the stories behind the inception of the characters and their connection to the author. I then describe the setting, characters, dialogue, and fandom. This information is the text source for the section dedicated to Uncle’s Book in The Maydanyk Digital Archives. An introduction to the English translation of Uncle’s Book follows in Appendix 6.

A LITERARY INNOVATION

In 1929, Jacob Maydanyk moved his business, Providence Church Goods, and his printing press to 579 McDermot Street, the heart of Winnipeg’s ‘Newspaper Row’. It was a great location - he lived and worked within a five to ten-block radius of the major publishing houses in Winnipeg. Paperboys[2] were hustling the daily newspapers at the major intersections on Maydanyk’s regular route to work and back. The church goods store was also within walking distance of at least ten ethnic and religious printing houses serving the Icelandic (D42; D45), Swedish (D52), German (D40), Ukrainian (D47; 48), Polish (D33), Italian, Norwegian, Mennonite, and Jewish (D54) communities (Bowling and Hykawy 1974). During this era, there was an air of camaraderie and competition as publishers often collaborated and shared equipment and supplies. As pointed out in the previous chapter, comic strips had become a standard feature in daily and weekly newspapers. Cartoonists in the area met up for coffee at the Weevil café (Walz 1; D32), and Maydanyk was probably one of them. During this year and in this space, Maydanyk created and published Uncle’s Book, his legendary comic book.

A comic book is defined as a magazine or booklet consisting of all new, unpublished material presented as framed images connected in strips (Gabilliet, 8). Up until 1929, in North America, there were a few collections of previously published comic strips. However, a comic book with all-new material was rare. “The Funnies” is often cited as the first in North America. The Library of Congress describes it as “a short-lived newspaper tabloid insert” published by Dell Publishing (1929-1930)[3]. Cultural historian Ron Goulart described this newsprint periodical as having only 16 pages and more of a Sunday comics insert, but it was all original material. It was popular, so Humor Publishing (1933) later released three more titles. These “giveaways” were merchandising material distributed in the United States in the early 1930s by Gulf Oil Company and Standard Oil (Gabilliet 7-10). It appears that, at the time, a comic book with all new material was limited to corporate endeavours.

In comparison, Maydanyk’s Uncle’s Book was also comprised of all original, previously unpublished material and was created in 1929 and released in 1930. The significant difference was that the eighty-four (84) page count was considerably larger than any other previously printed comic book. In addition, it was wholly Canadian content illustrated and self-published by the author. Uncle’s Book could therefore be considered one of Canada’s first independently published comic books. I would not go so far as to say that it was the definitive “number 1” because I believe the study of Canadian comics in languages other than English and French is still in its infancy. There are other ethnic publishers in Winnipeg that could have also produced a comic book before Maydanyk’s[4]. Considering that “Uncle’s Book” is a notable piece in the canon of Canadian comics literature, the following is a summary that places it within Maydanyk’s collection.

PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION

Materiality

Uncle’s Book is a unique collection of Canadian comic strips that appeared in 1930 on Frank Dojacek’s newsstand in Ukrainian Booksellers and Publishers on Main Street Winnipeg (D31). When picking up the book, the reader first experiences the materiality and the visual elements that define the book as a collection of comics. Notably, the Maydanyk chose a landscape composition, not the contemporary vertical (portrait) format we now associate with comic books. The eighty-four pages measure 21.5 cm h x 28 cm w and are saddle-stitched (stapled together) on the side. The comic book was printed in “black and white” on a heavy-weight, yellowed manila stock, which theoretically had greater longevity than thin newsprint[5]. Unlike previous publications by Maydanyk, Uncle’s Book did not include a preface or a note from the editor, nor were there any advertisements. Instead, it was created strictly as a collection of new, never-before-published comic strips. The strips were illustrated as sequential monologues and dialogues grouped horizontally. The collection includes thirty (30) comic strips featuring Maydanyk’s infamous character “Uncle Shtif Tabachniuk” and twenty-nine (29) strips interspersed throughout the book that features a new heroine, “Nasha Meri”.

Layout

The cover features a large illustration of Uncle Shtif flashing the ‘dulia” – a clenched fist with protruding thumb – Uncle’s signature symbol of defiance. It appears on the following title page as well (page 1). Copyright information is on page 2. The comic strips then start on page three. As defined by Scott McLeod, Maydanyk’s comics present themselves as “juxtaposed pictorial and other images in deliberate sequence, intended to convey information and to produce an aesthetic response in the viewer” (1993, 9). In keeping with the most straightforward comic strip format, established by comics theorist Renaud Chavanne, the illustrations in Uncle’s Book appear in panels that are arranged in a “regular layout [where] panels are of an unchanging, identical size...” (Gravett, 30); and organized in a repetitive or predictable grid.

Panels correspond to two distinct page layouts in the book. Pages 3 to 20 are each divided into two halves – top and bottom. The top half hosts two panels of an Uncle Shtif narrative separated by a gutter; Nasha Meri, a 4-panel strip, appears in the bottom half. Gutters separate most Nasha Meri panels (eight of the twenty-nine strips do not have gutters). Over the first twenty pages of the book, there are three Uncle Shtif stories of twelve panels each and eighteen Nasha Meri strips. The Nasha Meri narratives are independent of the Uncle Shtif stories. The only correlation between them is that they represent the same era and the Ukrainian community in and around Winnipeg, MB.

The layout then changes on page 21. At this point, Maydanyk switches the Uncle Shtif stories to six panels per page, three on top and three on the bottom. Each story is essentially twelve panels long and distributed over two pages. The two exceptions are Comic #9 - Штіф за ґазду і за пана [Shtif as a Farmer and Businessman] (31-34) and Comic #30 - Вуйко Штіф послом [Uncle Shtif - Member of Parliament] (76-79). They each have twenty-four panels set over four pages. All the Uncle Shtif comics are approximately the same size (6.5 cm H x 8 cm W) with the following exceptions:

- Comic #4, “Вуйко Штіф у Виннипеґу [Uncle Shtif in Winnipeg]” (page 21), the first panel extends over the space of three panels;

- Comic #11, “Буцім тиліґенція” [As If He’s Intelligent]” (page 39), the last panel is a party scene spread over the space of two panels;

- Comic # 19, “Байбел забив штих[6] в Штіфову голову” [The Bible Rammed a Verse into Shtif’s Head] (page 54), the last panel on the page is divided into two smaller panels; and a double-panel party scene appears as the last panel on page 55.

The gutters (spaces between each panel) are consistent throughout the book. Gutters create ‘closure’, and closure is a property of this medium that forges meaning between two juxtaposed images. The mind builds the narrative that could occur in the blank space by using previous information and experience. Closure ultimately moves the story forward without illustrating every moment (McCloud 1993, 67-69; Gravett 30). An example would be the occurrence of closure between the last two panels on page 75 of Uncle’s Book. In the first panel, Uncle Shtif is talking to a lawyer in the back of a wagon; in the next panel, the lawyer is lying in the mud. Without seeing the event, the mind realizes that the lawyer fell from the wagon. In this case, the gutter also helps avoid incriminating Uncle Shtif, leaving it up to ‘reader interpretation’ to decide whether the lawyer was pushed off the wagon or lost his balance. Closure will differ between readers depending on their experience with wagons and lawyers. The panels for all stories in Uncle’s Book are separated by gutters, except for page 32, where, for no apparent reason, the first two panels were aligned without a gutter. There are also several instances where the pencilled guidelines were left visible.

The layout remains the same until the end of the book, except for pages 35 and 82-84. Maydanyk has inserted Nasha Meri strips on these pages – three per page. On pages 80-81, there is a series of twelve caricatures, six per page, of fictitious political/government celebrities (e.g., “Premier Uncle Shtif” and “The Minister of Commerce and Comedy”- who remarkably resembles Jacob Maydanyk).

INSPIRED BY THE PAST

In creating his graphic memoir, Uncle’s Book, Jacob Maydanyk took inspiration from various sources – past and present - including insights from his own experiences as well as the lives lived by the people around him. To fully understand Maydanyk’s source of inspiration, one must explore his exposure to past literary traditions. His initial appreciation for literature and storytelling came from his childhood in Ukraine. The leadership role of the press in Ukraine emerged in the 1800s from an existing artisan movement in Lviv (Western Ukraine). The formation of reading clubs, such as the Prosvita Society, reinforced the press’s role by improving social standards and raising global social awareness (Himka 1988, 59-104). Coinciding with a growing nationalist movement, by 1880, periodicals began to adopt a pure Ukrainian vernacular; language familiarity motivated increased literacy. As teenagers, Maydanyk and his contemporaries would have been reading the latest publications, thus exposing them to current political and social issues. Publication of folklore – songs, proverbs, illustrated narratives, and editorial cartoons that supported a Ukrainian national identity were also popular (Martynovych 2014, 59-60). In interviews with Yaroslav Lozowchuk, Maydanyk shared childhood memories of his father inviting neighbours to their home to read the local papers. Through the reading group connections, Maydanyk first read the works of literary greats Taras Shevchenko, Ivan Franko, and Ivan Kotliarevsk. It was also where his father learned of opportunities in Canada (Lozowchuk).

Jacob Maydanyk’s first exposure to comics most likely came from “Szczutek,”[7] a Polish language almanac of humour published in Warsaw (c 1905) and later Lviv. In Canada, he had access to the same publication and other Eastern European comics that the Ruthenian Bookstore imported in Winnipeg, MB (D30; D31) (LAC Dojacek fonds). By 1910, comics were also an exciting new publication format gaining popularity in the North American press. As an avid reader of the English Press (Manitoba Free Press (D46) and The Tribune (D49), and as one of the editorial cartoonists for The Brandon Sun (D8), Maydanyk would have been well aware of the syndicated comics that were appearing in daily and weekly newspapers in North America. With the list of humorous illustrations and almanacs already credited to his name, producing a book of comics was not much of a creative stretch for him.

Ivan Kotliarevsky

Dmytro Farkavec felt there was an even deeper literary source of inspiration for Maydanyk’s Tabachniuk narratives. In the opening paragraph of his MA thesis J. Maydanyk’s Contribution to Ukrainian Canadian Literature, artist/scholar Farkavec noted that,

“For Ukrainians, humour is one of the hallmarks of their national character. There is even an entire period of Ukrainian language literature that began with the appearance of the well-known humorous-satirical poem “Eneida” by Ivan Kotliarevsky”[8] (Farkavec 1).

This leading statement immediately forms a significant connection between Maydanyk and the author Ivan Kotliarevsky, and it intrigued me to look further. Beyond the fact that Maydanyk named his oldest son “Eney” (after ‘Eneida), I uncovered many other indications that the artist’s foundational inspiration for Uncle’s Book was indeed rooted in Kotiarevsky’s literature and determined that “Eneida” could be considered his muse. Many consider Kotliarevsky to be the “founder” of the modern Ukrainian language” (Petrenko). While working as a tutor at rural gentry estates in the Poltava region of Ukraine, he became familiar with the area’s folk life and peasant vernacular. He noted that although Ukrainian was an everyday language used by all the locals, it was officially discouraged from literary use in the area controlled by Imperial Russia. Hence, Kotliarevsky wrote Eneida as a parody of Virgil’s Aeneid[9], transforming the Trojan heroes into Zaporozhian Cossacks. Notably, as the voice of the people, “Eneida” resonated with the general population; it gave them hope and bolstered their tenacious spirit.

Like the poetry of Kotliarevsky, Maydanyk wrote in the vernacular/language of the streets. They resonated with the target audience because they reflected the lives of new Canadians. Uncle Shtif, his friends, and his family were adjusting to a linguistic transition. By way of multilingual, macaronic dialogues, they communicated amongst themselves in a mix of Ukrainian, Polish, German, and English.

In a similar vein as Eneida, the content of Uncle’s Book also addressed racial tension between the classes. In Maydanyk’s world, it was evident among East European immigrants and the predominantly white Anglo-Saxon community – hegemony not unlike the one left behind in their homeland. In Comic #5, When Shtif Fought with the Irishman, Maydanyk clearly illustrates the developing tensions between ethnic groups due to cultural differences. Maydanyk explained to Halya Kuchmij that Uncle Shtif did not know that Irish fighting protocol involved the removal of gloves. If your gloves were left on, it was understood that the fight was to the death. Unfortunately, Uncle Shtif mistakenly left his gloves on, becoming a legitimate threat to his Irish co-worker (T10/S20). Mirroring Kotliarevsky’s legacy, Maydanyk’s connection to the broader immigrant community was evident in how his comics encouraged reading among the illiterate (Farkavec); they also instigated editorial responses (Slavutych) and engaged the public in a discussion through letters to newspaper editors (Swyrypa 1993, Notes).

“Eneida” was also a satire - a genre echoed in the humorous content of Maydanyk’s almanacs and various narratives. A note attached to the Maydanyk file at Oseredok stated, “cross-reference, Vuiko [Uncle]/Kotliarevsky”, suggesting to a researcher familiar with Ukrainian literature to look specifically for connections between Maydanyk’s work and that of Kotliarevsky. The juxtaposition of time and space between the works of both authors may become more evident from further visual and literary references throughout Maydanyk’s comics. This point is well taken and noted for further research.

An Imagined Community

Like many author-artists, Maydanyk took events and identities from the real world and transformed them into comic strip story worlds (Aldama 2010, 2). In this case, he catered to a predominantly male audience by penning Uncle Shtif narratives that illustrated the activities of the male-dominant community into which he settled. Many of the tales echoed experiences from the perspective of a young man travelling solo to a foreign country.

Maydanyk’s main character in Uncle’s Book was Uncle Shtif Tabachniuk, supported by his wife Yavdokha, his son Nick, and community members. The second set of narratives in the same book is based on the life of a young single woman named “Наша Мері” [Nasha Meri/Our Mary], referred to here-in-after as “Nasha Meri”. Together they represent the community of Ukrainian immigrants, and I looked to the characters to find the roots and inspiration for this imaginary group of people.

UNCLE SHTIF TABACHNIUK

The seed of Maydanyk’s creation was all in a name. While exploring the source of the Tabachniuk narratives, I found that the most popular Uncle Shtif Tabachniuk origin story is over 100 years old. On numerous occasions[10], Maydanyk made it clear that the character, Uncle Shtif Tabachniuk, developed out of a school exercise that dates to 1912-14, when he was a student at the Ruthenian Training School, in Brandon, MB (D7). He explains that when he and fellow students were hired to read letters from the homeland, they came across an envelope written in a hybrid of languages – German, Ukrainian, and Polish. It read: ‘Asobity sofort antwort до nadawca Штифан Табачнюк’ [Asobity sofort antwort (German) до nadawca (Polish) Штифан Табачнюк (Ukrainian)] – which can be loosely translated as ‘Please - reply immediately - to the sender - Shtyfan Tabachniuk’. The students found it amusing. Their teacher, Peter Karmenski, explained that it was probably written by someone who had not long ago shed ‘the Kaizer’s clothing’ and probably wanted to come to Canada. In other words, possibly written by a Ukrainian who had been living under Austro-Hungarian rule (now Polish soil) and was looking to find a suitor in Canada; it would explain the various languages. Subsequently, the letter gave the students the idea to pen their own ‘letters’ in a similar, linguistically hybrid style, and they competed to see who could write the funniest one. Maydanyk enjoyed the exercise. Inspired by Shtyfan Tabachniuk’s letter, he adopted the pseudonym ‘Uncle Shtif Tabachniuk’ and created faux correspondence between Uncle Shtif and his wife, Yavdokha. Maydanyk then sent the made-up letters, together with three drawings of Uncle Shtif, to Новини [Novyny/The News] – a Ukrainian language newspaper in Edmonton, AB. Finally, the submission was printed in the yearly almanac Ілустрований Калиндар Новин – 1915 [The Illustrated News Almanac Novyn– 1915] – and thus a cartoon character was born (Maydanyk 1915, 1958; Cheladyn 2018).