Lusatian Folklore in the Slavic Research of the Italian Wolfango (Wolf) Giusti

Abstract

Purpose: The article is devoted to the Sorbian studies work of the Italian Slavic scholar of Lusatian origin Wolfango Giusti (1901-1980) “The Folk Lusatian Serbian Song” (1926), totally unknown in Ukrainian Slavic scholars’ circles. The author of a large number of Sorbian studies publications printed in the 1920s and 1930s in the pages of Italian Slavic editions, he became a true popularizer of Lusatian culture, and his works found a special reverberation in the research papers of authoritative Sorbian scholars. W. Giusti’s name as researcher and translator has recently been more frequently mentioned in Slavistic publications, his interest in Ukrainian poetry, esp. in the 1920s, is written about. The interest in W. Giusti’s literary legacy is linked, in particular, to his being interested in T. Shevchenko’s and M. Shashkevych’s lyrics. In the research under analysis, the Italian scholar stressed that “the soul of the Lusatian people has found its best and fullest expression in their folk song”. Also mentioned by W. Giusti were Ukrainian folk songs, rich in their multi-genre samples. Results: The paper presents a classification of the most characteristic folk songs, the classification coming to be basis-providing for the Italian scholar: W. Giusti relied on authoritative research papers, including those by the scholars K. Fiedler and B. Krawc. The Italian Slavicist acquaints us with songs of love between brother and sister, love songs about the way of life of the whole people, songs resonating with the motif of fidelity. Neither has the literary scholar bypassed the issue of the neighbouring peoples’ influence experienced by Lusatian culture, particularly that of a Germanic culture, providing some examples of a “spiritual analogy” with German folk songs. W. Giusti completed his short essay by promising to offer the reader, before long, “other genres of the extremely rich Lusatian folklore”. The promise came to be fulfilled as early as the next year, in the work published under the title “Folk Lusatian Serbian Songs”. Key words: Lusatian folklore, Wolfango Giusti, folk song, motif of fidelity/infidelity, dramatic mood, classification of songs, aspects of “Wendish” folklore, Germanic influence.