Kulzhynsky, Ivan [Кульжинський, Іван; Kul'žyns'kyj], b 26 April 1803 in Hlukhiv, Chernihiv gubernia, d 4 April 1884 in Nizhyn, Chernihiv gubernia. Literary scholar, ethnographer, and educator. A graduate of the Chernihiv theological seminary (1823) (formerly Chernihiv College), he taught at Chernihiv (1823–5), Nizhyn (1825–9), and Kharkiv gymnasiums (1829–32), lectured at Kharkiv University on folk oral literature, directed the Lutsk (1832–9) and Nemyriv (1839–41) gymnasiums, was an inspector of the Nizhyn Lyceum (1841–3), and directed schools in Transcaucasia (1843–7). His Russian historical, literary, and ethnographic articles, poetry, short stories, plays, and novellas appeared from 1825 in various periodicals, including Ukrainskii vestnik (Kharkiv) and Ukrainskii zhurnal in Kharkiv. Published separately were his history of the world (3 vols, 1859), a history of Poland (1864), narratives on Russian history (1863), and several other works. His works dealing with Ukraine include the novella ‘Tereshko,’ the drama ‘Kochubei’ (1841), the novel Fediusha Motovil'skii (1833), and the polemical works O zarozhdaiushcheisia tak nazyvaemoi malorossiiskoi literature (On Nascent So-Called Little Russian Literature, 1863) and Novyi vzgliad na khokhlomanstvo (A New Look at Khokhol-Mania, 1864). His study of Ukrainian folk customs, rituals, folk songs, poems, and anecdotes, Malorossiiskaia derevnia (The Little Russian Village, 1827), influenced the early works of the writers Nikolai Gogol and Yevhen Hrebinka, who were his pupils at the Nizhyn Gymnasium. A Russified obscurantist and supporter of tsarist centralism, Kulzhynsky was condescendingly critical of Taras Shevchenko, Marko Vovchok, Panteleimon Kulish, and others who wrote in Ukrainian, which he viewed as a quaint but spoiled dialect of Russian.

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 2 (1988).]