FROM THE MEMOIRS ABOUT MYKOLA PAVLOVYCH KOVALSKYI

Abstract

The article presents the memoirs about a prominent Ukrainian historian and source critic Mykola Kovalskyi (1929-2006), which have been written by a person who had known him for almost 40 years (student, doctorate student, colleague). The memoirs include important and unknown facts regarding the scholar’s life and works. Their value lies in the fact that almost all Mykola Kovalskyi’s contemporaries have passed away and his students are of a respectable age. The memoirs concern primarily the scholar’s family life and personal tastes in literature and music, his hobbies (photography, cinema) and his relationships with the colleagues from Dnipro University and the historians who supervised his scientific activities and had a significant impact on him as a scholar. The most important part of the memoir is the one concerning Mykola Kovalskyi’s worldview, including his religious beliefs and his critical attitude to the life in totalitarian society, which could not have been openly discussed at the time for obvious reasons. There are also pages devoted to his teaching and research and the foundation of “Kovalskyi’s school” or “Dnipro school” of Ukrainian historians.