ARTISTIC MEANS OF REPRESENTING LOSS EXPERIENCE: M. MATIOS’ “MOMS” IN TRAUMA STUDIES CONTEXT
Authors:   Vasyl Stefanyk Precarpathian National University, Maftyn Nataliya V. , Cheripko Serhii I. ,   State University “Kyiv Aviation Institute”
Published: December 2024

The article explores the latest work of the contemporary Ukrainian writer Maria Matios – “Moms”, in
which the author continues the study of female trauma, which has remained overlooked by literary schol-
ars until now. Therefore, the purpose of the research is to identify the genre-compositional and artistic-im-
agery aspects through which the theme of “maternal loss” is developed in Matios’s work. The objective of
the study is to examine how, through narrative strategy realised in compositional mastery and in the spec-
ificity of artistic imagery of the work, the author transforms her own traumatic experience into the discov-
ery of therapeutic possibilities.
To achieve the set purpose, the authors resorted to the methodology of trauma studies. Authors also
employed various interpretative methods, including psychoanalysis, hermeneutics, receptive aesthetics,
interpretative, and structural analysis.
The study of the genre-compositional and artistic-imagery features of Maria Matios’s work “Moms”
reveals the writer’s skill in addressing the “maternal loss” theme.
The work of the writer chosen for the study is distinguished by a special composition, a specific nar-
rative structure due to the inclusion of the author’s personal traumatic experience in the artistic fabric. “Moms” is a real “way out of silence” and a narrative practice of overcoming the repressive effects of trau-
ma; it is notable for its emotional and figurative component, as well as for its genre specificity (the author’s
definition of “drama in six acts”) and architectonics. The common theme here unites six separate parts,
two of which form a circular frame and unfold according to the musical principle of lyrical prose composi-
tion. The plot revolves around the stories of five mothers, not only different in social status, time of trau-
ma-loss, and openness of their inner world to the reader, but also united by the trauma of losing their dear-
est ones – their sons.
In Maria Matios’s novel, trauma emerges as “the central intra-textual category” (Olivier), and it defi-
nitely determines the narrative strategy. While the narrative organisation of the first short story is formed
as an internal monologue, the other four short stories, which constitute the actual plot of the work, are
dominated by dialogues combined with an internal monologue, which often transforms into a stream of
consciousness.
The narrative strategy of overcoming the repressive effect of trauma is determined by the genre and
compositional specificity of the work: the author’s definition of “drama in six acts” emphasises the cate-
gory of the tragic as one of the fundamental factors of human existence in the artistic world of the novel.
However, based on the traditional interpretation of literary categories and genres in literary criticism, we
classify this work as a novel in short stories, and, in terms of emotional tension, a novel-drama.
The specificity of the composition of the work lies primarily in the fact that each part of it – a sepa-
rate short story – has its own structure of a completely independent, complete literary text, while the ar-
chitectonics of the entire work is characterised by an orientation towards enhancing the emotional and fig-
urative, lyricised component combined with the plot. Each of the short stories has its own temporal and
spatial framework (while in “Mom Verontsia” it is limited to one day, the chronotope of the short story
“Mom Mykhailyna” covers the period “between 1952 to 2015”). Moreover, certain fragments of one nov-
el have their own specific model of chronotope (the climactic episode in “Mom Mykhailyna” clearly resem-
bles the “The Road to Calvary”; “Mom Sidoniia” contains an allusion to the “The Virgin’s Walk Through the
Torments”). The time-space framework of the whole novel unfolds in the final section, where the allusion
to Michelangelo’s “Pietà” expands the narrative’s scope to the dimensions of eternity. The space of memo-
ry in Maria Matios’s work is marked by “mnemonic marks”: the locus of the cemetery, the image of a can-
dle, the White Dove, a viburnum bush, and towels on the crosses of unmarked graves.
The main compositional technique in the novel used by the author is contrast, which is manifested in
compositional elements, narrative strategy, and the lexical coloring of the dialogues. Contrast also serves
as the main principle of developing the internal monologue-stream of consciousness of the protagonists,
reproducing the depth of their pain. The analysis of the psychological modeling of the work’s figurative sys-
tem reveals the representation of trauma through the use of elements of expressionist poetics (in “Mom
Mykhailyna”) and oneirism (in “Mom Maria”), emphasising the state of altered consciousness, suffocation,
and the contrast between screaming and whispering. The artistic world of Maria Matios’s novel is also rich
in speaking signs and symbols. The depth of the trauma is also conveyed through the use of psychologically
charged metaphors and similes that encode a sense of distress. The symbolism of such image-signs expres-
sively fills the textual world in the novel with the memory of the body, they reveal the spontaneous bodily
expression of the traumatised individual and unfolding the semantic fabric of the act.