1st part of the novel, pp. 1-49

Class 1

What are the setting and time-frame of the novel’s events?

What is the incentive for the three companions’ search? Why are they all interested in Mykyta?

How is Mykyta presented in the beginning of the novel?

On page 2 the narrator mentions for the first time the Eye of the Abyss. What is it?

What questions and problems torment the narrator?

Does Pavlo’s faith resemble those of Sozont and the narrator?

What do the three companions think about miracles?

 

Class 2

 Why would a contemporary author turn to the Middle Ages as a time period?

If you had to divide all of this narrative’s characters into representative groups, what would these groups be? What role does each of these groups play in the narrative?

In the novel Eye of the Abyss, hagiography, or writing the lives of saints, is one of the central themes. How does it evolve? Who in the narrative pursues hagiography writing?

 

Class 3

1. The narrator, Mykhailo, is a translator, illuminator and monk. What is his role in the novel? What is his cultural significance in the narrative?

2. Is Sozont’s story believable? Who is Sozont’s helper? What questions do the events in his dream pose? Did he accomplish his quest?

3. What kind of character (and person) is Sozont? Is he an original or derivative narrator? Does he base his narrative on facts?

4. How does Sozont come across through his comments, attitudes and biases?

5. Sozont and Pavlo relate adopted stories and pass them as their own. Why do they do it? What is the significance of Pavlo’s claim that they do not commit any evil but just teach each other through parables?

6. Is Pavlo’s story about the raven feeding three female hermits believable? What are the magic components of this story? Why does Pavlo make a pre-existing story, a tenth-century work of Paul, the bishop of Monembasia, his own?

7. What is Pavlo’s experience with the Eye of the Abyss? What does his mention of this entity add to our understanding of it?

8. Shevchuk’s novel features a number of dichotomies, conflicts and antinomies. What are they?

9. As an example of Magic Realist genre, Shevchuk’s novel is a subversive text. What are the examples of subversion in the text?

10. How does Shevchuk’s narrative blur the boundaries between real and imaginary?

11. The novel’s narrative features numerous dreams or dream-like states. What is their role in the novel?

12. Later in the book the narrator realizes that the Eye of the Abyss is the name of an existing geographical location and that he was brought to it through his visions. Did this realization dismantle or diminish the meaning of the Eye of the Abyss as the omniscient divine observer?

13. How does the narrative develop the image of Mykyta the Stylite (Pole-Sitter)? Where does our information about him come from? What are the most important characteristics of this figure? 

14. Kuzma claims that he knows nothing about Symeon the Stylites (Pole-Sitter) and that, “when people live similar lives, a repetition of events can occur.” (chapter 9, p. 31) Is his claim convincing?

15. List at least five characteristics attributed to Mykyta by his disciples, worshipers and hagiographers. Which stories about his life are truthful? Which of them are not believable? How do we recognize truthful information?

16. What is the role of Kuzma in the narrative? Why does he die in the swamp?

17. How is asceticism presented in this text? What characters represent the ascetic movement? Comment on their asceticism.

 Class 4

1. What kind of people are Mykyta’s disciples? Why did they take the names of Simeon’s hagiographers? What do they tell us about Mykyta?

 

2. In the beginning of Chapter 14, the narrator expresses astonishment by Sozont’s composure and indifference to Kuzma death. Why does he behave as if nothing happened?

 

3. What does Antonii refer to when he says, “all of us here are in our own way afflicted”?

             

4. The brigand/thief was murdered in front of the pilgrims. Why was he killed?

 

5. What are Sozont’s insight’s in his sermon-lecture about the game? Do you agree with them?

 

6. Sozont states that “The evil spirit is one of God’s gaming dice.” (Ch. 15, p. 63) He goes on to say that “Reality itself is an outcome of a game.” What does he mean? What does this sermon-lecture tell us about Sozont?

 

7. Which of  Mykyta’s deeds do his disciples regard as miracles? What kind of miracles does Mykyta perform?

 

8. What is Mykyta’s credo? Why does Mykyta extoll Death?

 

9. What is Musii’s dilemma? Why do the three companions believe him over Mykyta’s inner circle? What does Musii’s story reveal to us?

 

10. Mykyta’s inner circle is suspicious from the very beginning and the pilgrims come to realize that their actions are immoral and unjustifiable. Why do the three pilgrims, despite all the alarming evidence, continuously try to justify Mykyta et al? (e.g. Chapter 18, p. 81 Pavlo says “But the acts of these people can be understood differently.” P. 151 Narrator says “The Christian church wills us to believe in saints…”)

 

11. Mykhailo continues seeing dreams about his quest. What do you think is the significance of his dream about Mykyta’s attempt to fly? (Chapter 18)

 

12. On page 85 the narrator, Mykola, notes that Sozont was happy to uncover Mykyta and his inner circle but suggests that his joy was not wholly good-natured but rather malicious. He goes on to compare Sozont with a hunter and to state that “The hunter is urged by a passion to lure and destroy the animal, which is, after all, less powerful.” Do you agree with this assessment?

 

13. The narrator is alarmed that “Sozont did not want to sympathize with them and therefore did not strive to save them.” What do you think about this concern?

 

14. Musii’s trial and execution evokes allusions to Jesus and Pilate yet he is proclaimed a debaucher and a sinner. How would an unbiased observer assess this event? What really happened?

 

15. What is Mykyta’s take on Christianity? What does he teach?

 

16. How do Pavlo and Mykhailo take Mykyta’s teachings and his refusal to help them?

 

17. What does Sozont believe?

Class 5

1. After the Trinity festivities and Mykyta’s night show, Mykyta and his disciples left while the Narrator and Sozont stayed behind. Why did the narrator comment on it saying, “Suddenly it became clear that it was not these people who were blockheads – we were.”?  How do you understand these words?

 

2. How does Sozont explain Simeon/Stepan’s conspiracy?

 

3. When discussing his conjecture, Sozont posits that he saw the sect’s hypocrisy but not their villainy. “Pretense and villainy are not the same.” Do you agree with his conclusions and his reluctance to blame Simeon and his followers?

 

4. Sozont and narrator Mykhailo resemble soviet intelligentsia who continuously discussed the murderous and tyrannical soviet regime, saw its numerous victims but failed to consistently deal with it and to eradicate its roots. Can they be held responsible for it’s current resurrection, for what is going on in today’s post-soviet states? (The come-back of the soviet legacy is gaining momentum. It reifies itself as rampant censorship, lack of civil society, corruption, war-mongering, return to the values and the set up of the Soviet state that are taking place in today’s Russia)

 

5. Why does Sozont risk his life trying to leave rather than stay (at least for some time) on the island?

 

6. What significance has the modern Gospel (143) that Mykhailo, the narrator carries with him as he leaves Mykyta’s island?

 

7. Why does Simeon spare Mykhailo’s life?

 

8. Would you consider Mykhailo’s pilgrimage to a famous saint, Mykyta the Stylites, a fiasco or a success?

 

9. In the first paragraph of the epilogue, Mykhailo contemplates his pilgrimage in terms of numbers. What is the significance of these numbers?

 

10. Do you share Mykhailo’s opinion that he is guilty of Sozont’s death?

 

11. What are Mykhailo’s most important insights after his pilgrimage?

Additional questions:

The three pilgrims first meet Mykyta’s disciples. What kind of people are they?

 What do you think their names (the exact names of Simeon the Stylite’s hagiographers) reflect?

Comment on the theme of wisdom and folly. How is it presented in the narrative? How does it contribute to the overall textual meaning?

 Shevchuk’s Eye of the Abyss is a quasi-historical novel, yet it contains a number of accurate historical details. Which are they?

 What significance do citations have in this narrative? What units of this text can be identified as citations?

 What role is assigned in the narrative to the theme of ‘truth’ and ‘truthfulness’? What is its connection with the discussion of miracles?

 What is the symbolism of Mykyta’s island?

 What symbolic meaning is assigned to the community of people living on the island?

 What role does Musii play in the narrative? Comment on his personality and ‘philosophy.’ Why do you think he was executed? How does Musii’s execution characterize the island’s rulers/regime and the community?

 In your opinion, what are the most interesting concepts, discussions and ideas offered by this narrative?

 Why in your opinion was Mykhailo the only survivor?

 What are the conclusions offered by the narrative/narrator?