Memory, Identity, and Belonging in Yuriy Tarnawsky’s Autobiographical Novel Warm Arctic Nights

Abstract

The paper deals with memory, identity, and belonging issues in the autobiographical novel Warm Arctic Nights by a distinguished Ukrainian American writer, Yuriy Tarnawsky. The novel shares the story of a youth whose life was disrupted by the turmoil of World War II in the Polish-Ukrainian borderlands. The analysis aims to establish a connection between identity formation through narration and changing functions of the borders, from reliable and well-protected toward violated and porous ones. Thus, the novel is re-read through the analytical lenses of identity and border poetics. The analysis stems from the concepts of “biographical me” and “identity set” suggested by Neil MacKinnon and David Heise (2010). The paper revises the personal and collective identities of the protagonist, images of Others, and topographical, symbolic, and epistemological borders inside and outside the text. The author of the paper places Ukrainian migrants’ experience of trauma, loss, and displacement into a broader context of border crossings in times of war.

Keywords

• autobiography
• border crossing
• memory
• identity
• ukrainian migrants