Welcome to this edition of What about Ukraine?, a newsletter that helps you keep updated about what has been said recently about Ukraine in Ukraine, and in the international media.

This first newsletter of 2024 focuses on books and literature, offering a selection of texts published in Bulgaria, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy and Spain: novels, analysis, journalistic reports and poems, about politics, human stories and war. "Every work of literature commemorating those killed becomes a reflection of war, not its actor. Unlike the victims, its privilege is to survive no matter what:" this is a passage from this week's Ukrainian article, shared below, about literature in Ukraine during wartime, reflecting on "memory as a cultural phenomenon". 

The impact of the war is visible also on literature: the way writers change their work, with some Ukrainian novelists who write in Russian dropping their mother tongue, and others choosing to keep writing in Russian. An article published in The Guardian reports that Ukrainians were not used to buying books, in particular before 2014. Since then, programs related to the book industry have been launched, leading to an increase of Ukrainian publishing houses and new writers. Moreover, writer Andrei Kurkov states that since 24 February 2022, Europeans have been rediscovering Ukrainian literature, that for years has been drowned out by Russian voices. 

Have a good read.

Marika Ikonomu
Editor of this week's edition

In the 5th edition of our newsletter, we shared an article about at least 23 new publishing houses launched in Ukraine during the pandemic and war. Every couple of weeks a new bookshop opens in Kyiv, and people are queuing to be the first visitors at these stores. But what about books published during the full-scale invasion?

Writers must search for a way to document this new reality and to reflect on it. They need to look for their own path to commemorate fallen soldiers and killed civilians. How should they do it? Should their role be to heal the wounds of readers, or at least to stop them hurting? In a piece translated by n-ost this week, literary critic Hanna Uliura shows different approaches used by contemporary Ukrainian and foreign authors. Some of them are members of the military themselves, and a few of them have already been killed by Russians, either as soldiers or as civilians.

This piece was originally published by Chytomo, one of the major Ukrainian online-media that writes about the literature and publishing markets.

Translated by Tetiana Evloeva.

Italy

Fire (L’incendio, 2023, Mondadori), by Cecilia Sala. Podcaster and foreign correspondent for Il Foglio, Cecilia Sala tells the stories of the generation of twentysomethings in three different areas that are "on fire": Afghanistan, Iran and Ukraine. "In 2014, young Ukrainians changed the fate of their country out of the orbit of Russian influence. And the full-scale invasion is Putin’s punishment against the success of that generation," Sala says, presenting the book. One story focuses on Kateryna, who is 28 and a soldier in Ukraine. In January 2022, she was hoping that war would break out, and says: "I am not so cowardly as to wish to live under Vladimir Putin's blackmail for years, since the task of dealing with him would then fall to another generation."

Kyiv (Kiev, 2022, Garzanti), by Nello Scavo. War correspondent at the daily newspaper Avvenire, Scavo arrived in Kyiv on 21 February 2022, right before the beginning of the full-scale invasion, when still few people believed a military invasion by Vladimir Putin was possible. "The bombing kept us awake, I kept this diary day by day," says Scavo, who records the rapid collapse of an increasingly dangerous situation. The journalist describes a modern city full of culture turning into a place of fear, and documents the civilians resisting, becoming soldiers, and preventing Russian advance towards the Ukrainian capital.  

Ukraine in 100 dates (L’Ucraina in 100 date, 2022, Della Porta), by Giulia Lami. Historian and university professor Lami helps understand the milestones, explaining one hundred symbolic dates that led to full-scale invasion on 24 February 2022, starting from the dawn of Kyivan Rus’. The author, offering an historical overview, recalls that the ongoing war "is the latest in a long history of battles and disputes over the territories of Ukraine, whose independence as a sovereign state was the outcome of a complex and troubled historical journey."

Bulgaria

Bulgaria and Ukraine. Civilization fractures and political comparisons (България и Украйна – цивилизационни разломи и политически успоредици, 2023, VUSI), by Teodor Dechev. Have Bulgaria and Ukraine experienced similar political journeys, a few decades apart? Dechev's book draws a parallel between Bulgaria’s political path at the beginning of the 2000s and Ukraine’s post-Maidan one: reforming governments followed by the victory of "populist" forces led by charismatic personalities, the former king Simeon Sakskoburggotski in Bulgaria and Volodymyr Zelensky in Ukraine. The book tries then to predict the potential outcomes of the Russian full-invasion on Bulgaria: Dechev’s analysis does not hide the fear of a deepening of divisions in Bulgarian society.

A prayer for Ukraine (Молитва за Украйна, 2023, Siela), by Teodora Dimova. "The heroism of the Ukrainian people kindles [our] respect and inspiration, but the pain [we feel] for the evil that has befallen them is even stronger. Sharing this pain pushed me to write these verses." The writer, playwright and poet Teodora Dimova, one of the most read voices in modern Bulgarian literature, dedicates a collection of verses to Ukraine, dreaming that "a book or a poem can stop wars". This is a declaration of love and hope for the Ukrainian people, mixed with the pain of a writer, and of an entire generation, convinced that there would no longer be room for wars and conflicts on European soil.

Hungary

Everyone mourns differently (Mindenki másképp gyászol, 2023, Kalligram Kiadó), by Sándor Jászberényi. Hungarian reporter, war correspondent and writer Sándor Jászberényi's new novel takes the reader to Kyiv in spring 2022, when the Russian army was closing in on the capital. The author himself spent those weeks in the Ukrainian capital, just like his protagonist, the veteran war correspondent Daniel Maros, who also decides not to flee. He is hospitalised in Kyiv due to Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. The novel shows everyday life during wartime from his perspective, mainly through individual human stories.

Under the shadow of war (A háború árnyékában, 2022, Ad Librum Kiadó), by László L. Murányi. The journalist László L. Murányi is mostly interested in the personal stories of people in war-torn Ukraine, where he travelled as a volunteer for aid organisations in 2022. His latest book of reports is the result of these journeys. He talked to people, who decided to stay in Kyiv in the difficult winter of power cuts, and to people who fled to the western part of the country or even further, to a neighbouring country. He also tries to explore the historical, security and economic aspects of the war, by interviewing security and political analysts.

Spain

A Rus' story: The war in eastern Ukraine (Una historia del Rus. Crónica de la guerra en el este de Ucrania, 2020, LHG) by journalist Argemino Barro. An on-the-spot chronicle of the war in Donbas takes us back to the origin when Ukraine and Russia were the same mediaeval "state", the Kyivan Rus’. The topical reportage is interspersed with the Cossack rebellions, the Second World War, and the famine caused by Stalin in the 1930s, which helps to better understand the context of the current invasion and how we got here in 2023. It’s the same conflict with different masks.

Station Ukraine. The country it was (Estación Ucrania. El país que fue, 2022, Libros del K.O.), by Borja Lasheras. The Russian invasion of Ukraine generated a quick rush of publishing titles. This book does not belong to that category. The author began writing it in 2016, after several years travelling around the country. It now offers an important portrait of Ukraine before 24 February 2022, and the germ of the country that it could be in the future. Throughout the book activists, politicians, filmmakers, musicians, and novelists recount their aspirations, fears and frustrations. 

Ukraine: Resisting horror (Ucrania: Resistir el horror, 2023, Fundación Anastasio de Gracia & URJC), by Luis de Vega. In one hundred images, the journalist and photographer of El País documents the barbarism and pain produced by the Russian full-scale invasion. "Many of the images published [in the media] last no more than three seconds on a reader’s smartphone. We wanted people to know the context of a photo, to stop and look at it," the author explains. For him, the book also reminds us that citizens are the real victims of the war.

France

Olga’s and Sasha’s diary (Le Journal d’Olga et Sasha, 2023, Actes Sud), by Elisa Mignot, Olga Kurovska and Sasha Kurovska. Both an intimate and public diary written four-handed by two Ukrainian sisters - one in Paris, the other in Kyiv - throughout the first year of the war since the beginning of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Elisa Mignot, the journalist behind the project, finds a way to accompany her interpreter in Ukraine, Olga, through her ordeal, but it’s also a report on Russia’s aggression, by assuming a very subjective, embodied role. This book is based on a log-book published regularly during a year in the French weekly Le Monde M.

An inconvenient place (Un endroit inconvénient, 2023, Gallimard), by Jonathan Littell and Antoine D’Agata. A book about Ukraine and its "inconvenient places": a battered region yearning for peace and tranquillity. French novelist Jonathan Littell and photographer Antoine d’Agata launched this project in 2021, focusing on Babyn Yar, scene of the  massacre of 33,771 Jews in Kyiv in 1941. Their book was ready and supposed to be published in 2022, but they decided to postpone and update it after the full-scale Russian war against Ukraine started, adding a focus on 2022 Russian war crimes in Bucha.

Never brothers? Ukraine and Russia: a post-soviet tragedy (Jamais frères ? Ukraine et Russie : une tragédie post soviétique, 2022, Seuil), by Anna Colin Lebedev. Anna Colin Lebedev is a French researcher born in Moscow, whose work focuses on post-soviet history. She has been interviewed intensively since 24 February 2022, explaining Russia’s imperialist war to French audiences. In this book she retraces the path of Russian and Ukrainian society in the post-soviet years, showing the different directions they have taken. This includes the annexation of Crimea in 2014, and the Russian full-scale invasion in 2022, and how the Russian atrocities further widen the gulf that had always existed between the two countries.

Germany 

Putin’s War. How people in Ukraine are fighting for our freedom (Putins Krieg. – Wie die Menschen in der Ukraine für unsere Freiheit kämpfen, 2022, S. Fischer Verlage), by Katrin Eigendorf. After the outbreak of the full-scale invasion, the international correspondent for ZDF, Katrin Eigendorf, has travelled through several Ukrainian cities to collect material for her book. In the foreword, she explains her goal: "I wrote this book with the aim of giving us a different, realistic view of what is happening in Ukraine and Russia, and what it means for us. It is a war in which an autocratic regime uses its soldiers, mercenaries and weapons to brutally subjugate the people and destroy their identity, whatever it costs."

Ukraine and us: Germany’s failure and the lessons for the future (Die Ukraine und wir. Deutschlands Versagen und die Lehren für die Zukunft, 2022, Ch. Links Verlag), by Sabine Adler. Unlike her colleague Katrin Eigendorf, radio reporter for ARD Sabine Adler did not interview eyewitnesses, but dedicated herself to in-depth research. "Germany has overlooked Ukraine for years, even though it is the second-largest country in Europe," argues the author. Analysing mistakes made by Germany, the senior correspondent for Deutschlandfunk looks back in history to gain insights. She retraces the Chechen war, characterising it as a "blueprint" for the situation in Ukraine, and reflects on pivotal moments such as the fall of the Soviet Union and the Second World War, for which Germany bears tremendous responsibility towards Ukraine.

In mid-February 2024, before the presidential election in Russia, Adler will also publish her new book What will become of Russia? About a nation between war and self-destruction, where she argues the future of this country "also determines ours."

The Europe-Ukraine Desk curated this newsletter. This week's edition has been composed by our team all over Europe: Marika Ikonomu, Kornelia Kiss, Katarina Kukla, Sarah Lou Lepers, Oksana Mamchenkova, Francesco Martino, Antonina Rybka and Fermin Torrano.
Michael Bird was our proofreader. 

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