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Take My Grief Away: Voices from the War in Ukraine
'Read this book. Don't put it off until you'll supposedly be strong enough and ready for the reading. If you put it off, you'll find yourself defenseless in the face of evil.'
- Svetlana Alexievich, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature and author of Chernobyl Prayer
In the darkest of times, in the midst of it all, a journalist has one single to document everything that is happening. It is time to slow down and listen to the voice of a human being.
On 24 February 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine. Since that day, prize-winning independent journalist Katerina Gordeeva has travelled to refugee centres across Europe to record the human voice and cost of war. Take My Grief Away reveals twenty-four raw, heartbreaking first-person accounts from people united in grief and their first-hand experiences of the brutality and senselessness of war. These twenty-four voices will transform what you think you know about war, grief and human nature.
- Svetlana Alexievich, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature and author of Chernobyl Prayer
In the darkest of times, in the midst of it all, a journalist has one single to document everything that is happening. It is time to slow down and listen to the voice of a human being.
On 24 February 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine. Since that day, prize-winning independent journalist Katerina Gordeeva has travelled to refugee centres across Europe to record the human voice and cost of war. Take My Grief Away reveals twenty-four raw, heartbreaking first-person accounts from people united in grief and their first-hand experiences of the brutality and senselessness of war. These twenty-four voices will transform what you think you know about war, grief and human nature.
320 pages, Hardcover
Published June 6, 2024
11 people are currently reading
76 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
December 1, 2024
russians brutally kill Ukrainians every single day. terror-russia is committing genocide. and therefore miserable russians have no right to say anything about the suffering in this war.
why do the voices of imperialist shit russia sound louder than all the voices of Ukrainians? that is why this book is a parasite on grief.
read history, and do not sympathise with «good russians».
educate yourself:
Big russian lies
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLa...
about propaganda
https://youtu.be/uPF9rInoM94?si=djFmE...
why do the voices of imperialist shit russia sound louder than all the voices of Ukrainians? that is why this book is a parasite on grief.
read history, and do not sympathise with «good russians».
educate yourself:
Big russian lies
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLa...
about propaganda
https://youtu.be/uPF9rInoM94?si=djFmE...
May 13, 2024
How dare you, russian imperial bastard, write about Ukrainians?? Who are killed every day because of weak-willed people like you
August 11, 2024
The Russian journalist wrote stories about the war, interviewed people from Ukraine and russia, putting victims and executioners on the same level.
I found it immoral and disgusting to compare the experience and feelings of people who experienced genocide and inhuman suffering in Bucha, Mariupol, and Mykolaiv (the interviewed Ukrainians were exactly from these cities) with the experience and „suffering“ of russians, among whom literally no one from the civilian population died because of the war. It is the humiliation of the real victims and the glorification of the executioners. People forget history too quickly, when after the end of wwll, ordinary German civilians were not hired for many years and didn‘t have voice anywhere, despite the fact that in those years the civilian population was not so informed about what really was happening in the war. And here the war that is not over, the genocide continues every day and information is not a problem at all, the genocide is happening online, but people continue to justify the nation that attacked, finding excuses for them.
I don't think this book is underrated, I think the level of russian propaganda that permeates everywhere is underestimated, even in so-called "regular" books, violates people's right to access unbiased and expanded information, thereby distorting the perception of reality.
I found it immoral and disgusting to compare the experience and feelings of people who experienced genocide and inhuman suffering in Bucha, Mariupol, and Mykolaiv (the interviewed Ukrainians were exactly from these cities) with the experience and „suffering“ of russians, among whom literally no one from the civilian population died because of the war. It is the humiliation of the real victims and the glorification of the executioners. People forget history too quickly, when after the end of wwll, ordinary German civilians were not hired for many years and didn‘t have voice anywhere, despite the fact that in those years the civilian population was not so informed about what really was happening in the war. And here the war that is not over, the genocide continues every day and information is not a problem at all, the genocide is happening online, but people continue to justify the nation that attacked, finding excuses for them.
I don't think this book is underrated, I think the level of russian propaganda that permeates everywhere is underestimated, even in so-called "regular" books, violates people's right to access unbiased and expanded information, thereby distorting the perception of reality.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 12, 2025
(The English review is placed beneath the Russian one)
Главная проблема не только таких книг, но и видеороликов с YouTube в том, что в какой-то момент все они смешиваются друг с другом из-за их всеобщей похожести. Что может рассказать обычный человек, оказавшийся не по своей воле в эпицентре военных действий? А самое главное, чем один такой рассказ будет отличаться от другого рассказа человека оказавшегося в похожих обстоятельствах? С моей точки зрения, мало чем. Это я к тому, что если читатель уже знаком с историями людей переживших военные действия, он вряд ли найдёт что-то новое в других книгах на эту тему. Эта книга не является анализом ситуации, как не является попыткой многостороннего обзора ситуации с поиском «правых и виноватых». Эта книга является сборником коротких историй о первых месяцев войны и о людях, которые не по своей воле оказались в эпицентре всего этого.
Я бы не стал рекомендовать эту книгу особенно впечатлительным людям или людям, которые особенно остро принимают всё на свой счёт, правда, в данном случаи я говорю не вообще про всех людей, а исключительно про россиян. В этой книге, как ни в какой другой, присутствуют неподдельные эмоции людей, которые по понятным причинам они питают ко всему, что связанно с Россией и русскими.
‘I didn’t want to take you. I agreed because I wanted to say to your face how much I hate you, all of you who are so sweet, so empathetic, so “it’s not me, it’s all Putin”. I thought I’d say that and somehow feel better. But no. All of you always have some kind of excuse: relatives, a good resumé, little children, your charitable organisations.
‘It’s just that none of that matters. It basically doesn’t mean anything, see? All of you – your other brother who’s not Ukrainian, some classmate of yours, your former or current colleague or the guy you kissed under the stairs at school – it doesn’t really matter who specifically – but you’re all coming and killing us. And then you write on your social media how bad you feel, oh-oh, we’re so proper, shit, how is this all possible, it’s not us, it’s some kind of other Russians. It’s you. I wanted to tell you that, Katya.’
Возможно, кого-то такие слова могут задеть, вызвать чувство несправедливости, но в таком случаи возникает вопрос, зачем таким людям вообще читать что-то про российско-украинский конфликт. Люди так реагируют по тому, что другая армия или даже друга нация пришла и разрушила все то, что им было дорого, причём это было сделано без особой причины, просто потому что «можем повторить». Добавим сюда очень непростые отношения между двумя странами, которые начали ухудшаться с первых дней распада СССР. Впрочем, и в СССР отношения между россиянами и украинцами не были особенно дружескими. Вся эта «братская дружба» была пустой политической риторикой, в реальности же отношения намеренно усугублялись по желаниям тогдашних политических элит двух стран. Но вернёмся книге.
Эта книга ценна по двум причинам. Во-первых, книга была написана в первые месяцы боестолкновений, что означает, что в книге представлены искрение мысли и эмоции людей, а не как в последующей литературе – выверенные и идеологически обусловленные. Другими словами, в этой книге нет и намёка на ура-патриотизм, который в книгах изданных после 2023 года стал общим местом. Во-вторых, в книге присутствуют (правда, в меньшей степени) истории жизни и из другого, противоположного лагеря. Конечно, сегодня можно задастся вопросом, как это россияне могли страдать, если они всё это время жили и живут в намного большей безопасности, чем украинцы, у которых вся территория страны простреливается. В этой книге нет историй жителей Белгорода, как нет историй жителей курской области, однако в этой книге есть одна история солдата, который побывал на территории Украины, попал в плен, вернулся назад и…повесился. Почему? Действительно, что мог молодой парень увидеть за несколько дней боёв, ведь самый ужас начался намного позже, включая Бучу, и всё остальное? Не скрою, эта история меня поразила больше всего, и именно эта история показала мне, что мы совершенно ничего не знаем, что происходило в те дни на территории Украины. Я хочу отметить, что в нижеследующих предложениях я не делаю никаких выводов, как я не делал никаких выводом насчёт ситуации, что произошла в Буче. Для всего этого необходимо провести тщательное, независимое и объективное расследование и только после этого можно делать какие-то выводы. Так отчего повесился молодой солдат, который всего лишь несколько дней провёл на территории Украины?
‘When I washed Lyosha before the funeral, I saw everything as it was.
All the fingers on his right hand had been chopped off. There were just purplish stumps sticking out.
‘And that’s it.’
Я повторю, что я не делают никаких выводов, но лишь пытаюсь воссоздать реальную картину того что происходило и происходит на территории востока Украины. В связи с этим я вспоминают совершенно другую книгу на эту же тему, книгу, которая была написана украинцем и которая по духу является полной противоположностью этой книге, ибо написана в духе украинского ура-патриотизма. В книге Our Enemies Will Vanish: The Russian Invasion and Ukraine's War of Independence мы находим следующие слова:
“So what happened to the two Russians in the basement?”
“They didn’t want to surrender, and so they shot themselves, with these guns,” he said, pointing to the two propped-up Kalashnikovs.
И вот сейчас я спрашиваю себя, что могло происходить с пленными российскими солдатами в украинском плену из-чего те готовы были застрелиться, лишь бы не попадать в украинский плен? Я подчёркиваю, это пишет украинский автор, который написал ура-патриотическую книгу. Если он это не скрывает, то можно предположить, что о реальной ситуации знают и российские солдаты? Возможно, именно тут мы находим причину чрезмерной озлобленности и жестокости российских солдат? Если всё так, как описывает Катерина, то возникает вопрос, кто и зачем отрезал пальцы российскому солдату и не является ли это военным преступлением и если является, то, сколько было таких преступлений совершено? Мне могут возразить, что это не может быть военным преступлением, ибо Россия является агрессор и поэтому в отношении её солдат не действуют никакие законодательные нормы в отношении военнопленных. Я так не считаю, потому что насилие плодит насилие и поэтому обе страны, в какой-то момент, попадают в спираль насилия. Но самое главное, люди, которые совершили преступления, оказываются не наказанными, а наказанными становятся совсем другие люди. Такие акты насилия не ведут ни к чему хорошему, а только к ещё большему страданию и усугублению и так плохой ситуации. Но да, в этой книге лишь одна такая история. Подавляющее большинство историй, это истории украинских гражданских, которым никто не помог и никто не предупредил. Вина России не только в начале неспровоцированной агрессии, но и в практике применения чисток, внесудебных казней и в нежелании или неспособности вывести всё гражданское население которое оказавшееся зажато в тисках двух воюющих армий. Если принять российскую точку зрения на тему вторжения (они якобы освобождают жителей Украины от чего-то там), то почему Россия не предупредила гражданское население о необходимости немедленной эвакуации из приграничных регионов и почему она сама не организовала эвакуацию, предпочтя воевать в жилых зонах с использованием тяжёлой бронетехники, да и в целом как можно воевать в черте города зная, что в городе остаются люди? Это, какое такое «освобождение» российская армия и российское руководство проводило? Освобождение от чего?
They came, destroyed life, liberated me from my home, liberated me from my husband, liberated me from my happiness. Thank you, liberators. Damn you.
Вообще, я хотел сказать совсем о другом, о том, что только в этой книге я нашёл – подлинное желание простых жителей. В подавляющем большинстве книг о российско-украинской войне, мы видим привычный ура-патриотизм, но подлинные мысли рядовых граждан на самом деле совершенно другие. Они о том, чтобы сначала перестали стрелять и лишь после этого выяснять кто прав и виноват.
‘What truth? What will happen if I tell it? You and I will stop the war? We’ll punish all the bad people and the good ones will go home if they’re alive?
‘Nobody needs your truth. We need to live. That’s it. None of the rest matters. I hear how everybody around me says, well, what lots of parents say, that my child will grow up and I’ll tell them the whole truth. And I say to them: “What’s your truth?” Well, they’re like this, they’re like that. And I say to go see your neighbour, they’ll tell you the opposite. And a third neighbour will say that, well, it wasn’t like that at all. And the fourth will say a fourth thing. And the war will devour us all while we’re finding out what that truth is and which of us was right. We’re not the ones that started the war but it came to us and took everything. And there’s nothing to sort out here. And there’s no truth here. The war came and untied everyone’s hands. And everyone came to the war with their hands untied.
‘Yes, Russia started the war, it’s you that attacked. But after that, everybody behaved badly on their own. Or not? There’s nobody good in war. And nobody will tell you that truth. Nobody talks about it. Because at war the truth is filtered on both sides. Believe this, that doesn’t apply to you, we’ll sort things out ourselves. The main thing is to soak this up, but you don’t need the rest. Long story short, there won’t be anything for me to tell my son about who behaved themselves well. Everybody showed who they are, let’s put it that way. That’s why it’s war.
‘But I’ll say one thing for sure. I’ll tell him he was born on Ukrainian territory. That Ukraine is his native country, his land. He’ll have a Russian passport but I have no illusions: everything is what it is, but I won’t hide our family’s truth. He should know. And hold that in his heart: I’m a Ukrainian. The rest is details we might not reach in our lifetime. Maybe later, at some point. But, personally, I don’t believe it.
Вот это – самый искренние и реальные слова, что я читал за всё это время и именно этим книга ценна.
-----------------------
The main problem, not only with such books but also with YouTube videos, is that at some point they all blend into each other because of their universal similarity. What can an ordinary person who finds himself unwillingly in the epicenter of warfare tell us? And most importantly, how will one such story differ from another story of a person in similar circumstances? From my point of view, not much. This is to say that if the reader is already familiar with the stories of survivors, he is unlikely to find anything new in other books on the subject. This book is not an analysis of the situation, nor is it an attempt at a multilateral review of the situation with a search for “right and wrong”. This book is a collection of short stories about the early months of the war and the people who unwittingly found themselves in the midst of it all.
I wouldn't recommend this book to particularly impressionable people or people who take things personally, but in this case, I'm not talking about all people, but only Russians. In this book, more than in any other, there are genuine emotions of people, which, for obvious reasons, they have for everything that is connected with Russia and Russians.
‘I didn’t want to take you. I agreed because I wanted to say to your face how much I hate you, all of you who are so sweet, so empathetic, so “it’s not me, it’s all Putin”. I thought I’d say that and somehow feel better. But no. All of you always have some kind of excuse: relatives, a good resumé, little children, your charitable organisations.
‘It’s just that none of that matters. It basically doesn’t mean anything, see? All of you – your other brother who’s not Ukrainian, some classmate of yours, your former or current colleague or the guy you kissed under the stairs at school – it doesn’t really matter who specifically – but you’re all coming and killing us. And then you write on your social media how bad you feel, oh-oh, we’re so proper, shit, how is this all possible, it’s not us, it’s some kind of other Russians. It’s you. I wanted to tell you that, Katya.’
Perhaps, someone may be offended by such words, causing a sense of injustice, but in such a case, the question arises: why should such people read something about the Russian-Ukrainian conflict? People react this way because another army or even another nation came and destroyed everything that was dear to them, and it was done for no particular reason, just because “we can do it again”. Add to this the very difficult relations between the two countries, which began to deteriorate from the first days of the collapse of the USSR. However, even in the USSR, relations between Russians and Ukrainians were not particularly friendly. All this “brotherly friendship” was empty political rhetoric, while in reality, relations were deliberately aggravated according to the wishes of the then political elites of the two countries. But let us return to the book.
This book is valuable for two reasons. First, the book was written during the first months of the fighting, which means that the book presents the sparkling thoughts and emotions of the people, and not as in subsequent literature, calibrated and ideologically conditioned. In other words, there is no hint of the hurrapatriotismus that has become commonplace in books published after 2023. Secondly, the book contains (albeit to a lesser extent) life stories from the other, opposite camp. Of course, today one may wonder how Russians could suffer if they have lived and are living in much greater security than Ukrainians, whose entire territory is shot through. There are no stories of the inhabitants of Belgorod in this book, just as there are no stories of the inhabitants of the Kursk region, but there is one story in this book of a soldier who visited the territory of Ukraine, was captured, came back, and...hanged himself. Why? Indeed, what could a young boy see in a few days of fighting, because the most horrific events began much later, including Bucha and everything else? Yes, this story struck me the most, and it was this story that showed me that we know absolutely nothing about what was happening in those days in the territory of Ukraine. I want to point out that in the following sentences, I do not draw any conclusions, just as I did not draw any conclusions about the situation that happened in Bucha. All of this requires a thorough, independent, and objective investigation, and only then can we draw any conclusions. So why did a young soldier who had spent only a few days on Ukrainian territory hang himself?
‘When I washed Lyosha before the funeral, I saw everything as it was.
All the fingers on his right hand had been chopped off. There were just purplish stumps sticking out.
‘And that’s it.’
I repeat that I am not making any conclusions, but only trying to recreate the real picture of what was and is happening in the territory of eastern Ukraine. In this regard, I recall a completely different book on the same subject; a book that was written by a Ukrainian and which, in spirit, is the complete opposite of this book, for it is written in the spirit of Ukrainian hurrapatriotismus. In the book "Our Enemies Will Vanish: The Russian Invasion and Ukraine's War of Independence", we find the following words:
“So what happened to the two Russians in the basement?”
“They didn’t want to surrender, and so they shot themselves, with these guns,” he said, pointing to the two propped-up Kalashnikovs.
Now I ask myself, what could have happened to the captured Russian soldiers in Ukrainian captivity that made them ready to shoot themselves to avoid Ukrainian captivity? I emphasize that this is written by a Ukrainian author who has written a patriotic book. If he does not hide it, we can assume that the Russian soldiers know about the real situation as well. Perhaps this is where we find the reason for the excessive cruelty of Russian soldiers? If everything is as Katerina describes, then the question arises, who cut off the fingers of a Russian soldier and why, and if so, how many such crimes have been committed? One might argue that this cannot be a war crime because Russia is the aggressor, and therefore, no laws regarding prisoners of war apply to its soldiers. I don't think so, because violence breeds violence, and so both countries, at some point, fall into a spiral of violence. Most importantly, the people who committed the crimes end up not being punished, but other people get punished. Such acts of violence do not lead to anything good, but only to more suffering and aggravation of an already bad situation. But yes, there is only one such story in this book. The vast majority of stories are those of Ukrainian civilians who were not helped or warned. Russia is to blame not only for launching the unprovoked aggression, but also for its practice of cleansing, extrajudicial executions, and its unwillingness or inability to withdraw the entire civilian population trapped in the grip of the two warring armies. If we accept the Russian point of view on the invasion (they are supposedly liberating the inhabitants of Ukraine from something), then why did Russia not warn the civilian population about the need for immediate evacuation from the border regions and why did it not organize the evacuation itself, preferring to fight in residential areas with the use of heavy armored vehicles, and in general, how can you fight in the city limits knowing that people remain in the city? What kind of “liberation” did the Russian army and the Russian leadership carry out? Liberation from what?
They came, destroyed life, liberated me from my home, liberated me from my husband, liberated me from my happiness. Thank you, liberators. Damn you.
I wanted to say something else entirely, something that only in this book I found - the genuine wish of ordinary citizens. In the vast majority of books about the Russian-Ukrainian war, we see the usual hurrapatriotismus, but the real thoughts of ordinary citizens are quite different. They want to stop shooting first and only after that to find out who is right and who is guilty.
(see quote from the Russian version)
These are the most sincere and real words I've read in a while, and that's what the book is valuable for.
Главная проблема не только таких книг, но и видеороликов с YouTube в том, что в какой-то момент все они смешиваются друг с другом из-за их всеобщей похожести. Что может рассказать обычный человек, оказавшийся не по своей воле в эпицентре военных действий? А самое главное, чем один такой рассказ будет отличаться от другого рассказа человека оказавшегося в похожих обстоятельствах? С моей точки зрения, мало чем. Это я к тому, что если читатель уже знаком с историями людей переживших военные действия, он вряд ли найдёт что-то новое в других книгах на эту тему. Эта книга не является анализом ситуации, как не является попыткой многостороннего обзора ситуации с поиском «правых и виноватых». Эта книга является сборником коротких историй о первых месяцев войны и о людях, которые не по своей воле оказались в эпицентре всего этого.
Я бы не стал рекомендовать эту книгу особенно впечатлительным людям или людям, которые особенно остро принимают всё на свой счёт, правда, в данном случаи я говорю не вообще про всех людей, а исключительно про россиян. В этой книге, как ни в какой другой, присутствуют неподдельные эмоции людей, которые по понятным причинам они питают ко всему, что связанно с Россией и русскими.
‘I didn’t want to take you. I agreed because I wanted to say to your face how much I hate you, all of you who are so sweet, so empathetic, so “it’s not me, it’s all Putin”. I thought I’d say that and somehow feel better. But no. All of you always have some kind of excuse: relatives, a good resumé, little children, your charitable organisations.
‘It’s just that none of that matters. It basically doesn’t mean anything, see? All of you – your other brother who’s not Ukrainian, some classmate of yours, your former or current colleague or the guy you kissed under the stairs at school – it doesn’t really matter who specifically – but you’re all coming and killing us. And then you write on your social media how bad you feel, oh-oh, we’re so proper, shit, how is this all possible, it’s not us, it’s some kind of other Russians. It’s you. I wanted to tell you that, Katya.’
Возможно, кого-то такие слова могут задеть, вызвать чувство несправедливости, но в таком случаи возникает вопрос, зачем таким людям вообще читать что-то про российско-украинский конфликт. Люди так реагируют по тому, что другая армия или даже друга нация пришла и разрушила все то, что им было дорого, причём это было сделано без особой причины, просто потому что «можем повторить». Добавим сюда очень непростые отношения между двумя странами, которые начали ухудшаться с первых дней распада СССР. Впрочем, и в СССР отношения между россиянами и украинцами не были особенно дружескими. Вся эта «братская дружба» была пустой политической риторикой, в реальности же отношения намеренно усугублялись по желаниям тогдашних политических элит двух стран. Но вернёмся книге.
Эта книга ценна по двум причинам. Во-первых, книга была написана в первые месяцы боестолкновений, что означает, что в книге представлены искрение мысли и эмоции людей, а не как в последующей литературе – выверенные и идеологически обусловленные. Другими словами, в этой книге нет и намёка на ура-патриотизм, который в книгах изданных после 2023 года стал общим местом. Во-вторых, в книге присутствуют (правда, в меньшей степени) истории жизни и из другого, противоположного лагеря. Конечно, сегодня можно задастся вопросом, как это россияне могли страдать, если они всё это время жили и живут в намного большей безопасности, чем украинцы, у которых вся территория страны простреливается. В этой книге нет историй жителей Белгорода, как нет историй жителей курской области, однако в этой книге есть одна история солдата, который побывал на территории Украины, попал в плен, вернулся назад и…повесился. Почему? Действительно, что мог молодой парень увидеть за несколько дней боёв, ведь самый ужас начался намного позже, включая Бучу, и всё остальное? Не скрою, эта история меня поразила больше всего, и именно эта история показала мне, что мы совершенно ничего не знаем, что происходило в те дни на территории Украины. Я хочу отметить, что в нижеследующих предложениях я не делаю никаких выводов, как я не делал никаких выводом насчёт ситуации, что произошла в Буче. Для всего этого необходимо провести тщательное, независимое и объективное расследование и только после этого можно делать какие-то выводы. Так отчего повесился молодой солдат, который всего лишь несколько дней провёл на территории Украины?
‘When I washed Lyosha before the funeral, I saw everything as it was.
All the fingers on his right hand had been chopped off. There were just purplish stumps sticking out.
‘And that’s it.’
Я повторю, что я не делают никаких выводов, но лишь пытаюсь воссоздать реальную картину того что происходило и происходит на территории востока Украины. В связи с этим я вспоминают совершенно другую книгу на эту же тему, книгу, которая была написана украинцем и которая по духу является полной противоположностью этой книге, ибо написана в духе украинского ура-патриотизма. В книге Our Enemies Will Vanish: The Russian Invasion and Ukraine's War of Independence мы находим следующие слова:
“So what happened to the two Russians in the basement?”
“They didn’t want to surrender, and so they shot themselves, with these guns,” he said, pointing to the two propped-up Kalashnikovs.
И вот сейчас я спрашиваю себя, что могло происходить с пленными российскими солдатами в украинском плену из-чего те готовы были застрелиться, лишь бы не попадать в украинский плен? Я подчёркиваю, это пишет украинский автор, который написал ура-патриотическую книгу. Если он это не скрывает, то можно предположить, что о реальной ситуации знают и российские солдаты? Возможно, именно тут мы находим причину чрезмерной озлобленности и жестокости российских солдат? Если всё так, как описывает Катерина, то возникает вопрос, кто и зачем отрезал пальцы российскому солдату и не является ли это военным преступлением и если является, то, сколько было таких преступлений совершено? Мне могут возразить, что это не может быть военным преступлением, ибо Россия является агрессор и поэтому в отношении её солдат не действуют никакие законодательные нормы в отношении военнопленных. Я так не считаю, потому что насилие плодит насилие и поэтому обе страны, в какой-то момент, попадают в спираль насилия. Но самое главное, люди, которые совершили преступления, оказываются не наказанными, а наказанными становятся совсем другие люди. Такие акты насилия не ведут ни к чему хорошему, а только к ещё большему страданию и усугублению и так плохой ситуации. Но да, в этой книге лишь одна такая история. Подавляющее большинство историй, это истории украинских гражданских, которым никто не помог и никто не предупредил. Вина России не только в начале неспровоцированной агрессии, но и в практике применения чисток, внесудебных казней и в нежелании или неспособности вывести всё гражданское население которое оказавшееся зажато в тисках двух воюющих армий. Если принять российскую точку зрения на тему вторжения (они якобы освобождают жителей Украины от чего-то там), то почему Россия не предупредила гражданское население о необходимости немедленной эвакуации из приграничных регионов и почему она сама не организовала эвакуацию, предпочтя воевать в жилых зонах с использованием тяжёлой бронетехники, да и в целом как можно воевать в черте города зная, что в городе остаются люди? Это, какое такое «освобождение» российская армия и российское руководство проводило? Освобождение от чего?
They came, destroyed life, liberated me from my home, liberated me from my husband, liberated me from my happiness. Thank you, liberators. Damn you.
Вообще, я хотел сказать совсем о другом, о том, что только в этой книге я нашёл – подлинное желание простых жителей. В подавляющем большинстве книг о российско-украинской войне, мы видим привычный ура-патриотизм, но подлинные мысли рядовых граждан на самом деле совершенно другие. Они о том, чтобы сначала перестали стрелять и лишь после этого выяснять кто прав и виноват.
‘What truth? What will happen if I tell it? You and I will stop the war? We’ll punish all the bad people and the good ones will go home if they’re alive?
‘Nobody needs your truth. We need to live. That’s it. None of the rest matters. I hear how everybody around me says, well, what lots of parents say, that my child will grow up and I’ll tell them the whole truth. And I say to them: “What’s your truth?” Well, they’re like this, they’re like that. And I say to go see your neighbour, they’ll tell you the opposite. And a third neighbour will say that, well, it wasn’t like that at all. And the fourth will say a fourth thing. And the war will devour us all while we’re finding out what that truth is and which of us was right. We’re not the ones that started the war but it came to us and took everything. And there’s nothing to sort out here. And there’s no truth here. The war came and untied everyone’s hands. And everyone came to the war with their hands untied.
‘Yes, Russia started the war, it’s you that attacked. But after that, everybody behaved badly on their own. Or not? There’s nobody good in war. And nobody will tell you that truth. Nobody talks about it. Because at war the truth is filtered on both sides. Believe this, that doesn’t apply to you, we’ll sort things out ourselves. The main thing is to soak this up, but you don’t need the rest. Long story short, there won’t be anything for me to tell my son about who behaved themselves well. Everybody showed who they are, let’s put it that way. That’s why it’s war.
‘But I’ll say one thing for sure. I’ll tell him he was born on Ukrainian territory. That Ukraine is his native country, his land. He’ll have a Russian passport but I have no illusions: everything is what it is, but I won’t hide our family’s truth. He should know. And hold that in his heart: I’m a Ukrainian. The rest is details we might not reach in our lifetime. Maybe later, at some point. But, personally, I don’t believe it.
Вот это – самый искренние и реальные слова, что я читал за всё это время и именно этим книга ценна.
-----------------------
The main problem, not only with such books but also with YouTube videos, is that at some point they all blend into each other because of their universal similarity. What can an ordinary person who finds himself unwillingly in the epicenter of warfare tell us? And most importantly, how will one such story differ from another story of a person in similar circumstances? From my point of view, not much. This is to say that if the reader is already familiar with the stories of survivors, he is unlikely to find anything new in other books on the subject. This book is not an analysis of the situation, nor is it an attempt at a multilateral review of the situation with a search for “right and wrong”. This book is a collection of short stories about the early months of the war and the people who unwittingly found themselves in the midst of it all.
I wouldn't recommend this book to particularly impressionable people or people who take things personally, but in this case, I'm not talking about all people, but only Russians. In this book, more than in any other, there are genuine emotions of people, which, for obvious reasons, they have for everything that is connected with Russia and Russians.
‘I didn’t want to take you. I agreed because I wanted to say to your face how much I hate you, all of you who are so sweet, so empathetic, so “it’s not me, it’s all Putin”. I thought I’d say that and somehow feel better. But no. All of you always have some kind of excuse: relatives, a good resumé, little children, your charitable organisations.
‘It’s just that none of that matters. It basically doesn’t mean anything, see? All of you – your other brother who’s not Ukrainian, some classmate of yours, your former or current colleague or the guy you kissed under the stairs at school – it doesn’t really matter who specifically – but you’re all coming and killing us. And then you write on your social media how bad you feel, oh-oh, we’re so proper, shit, how is this all possible, it’s not us, it’s some kind of other Russians. It’s you. I wanted to tell you that, Katya.’
Perhaps, someone may be offended by such words, causing a sense of injustice, but in such a case, the question arises: why should such people read something about the Russian-Ukrainian conflict? People react this way because another army or even another nation came and destroyed everything that was dear to them, and it was done for no particular reason, just because “we can do it again”. Add to this the very difficult relations between the two countries, which began to deteriorate from the first days of the collapse of the USSR. However, even in the USSR, relations between Russians and Ukrainians were not particularly friendly. All this “brotherly friendship” was empty political rhetoric, while in reality, relations were deliberately aggravated according to the wishes of the then political elites of the two countries. But let us return to the book.
This book is valuable for two reasons. First, the book was written during the first months of the fighting, which means that the book presents the sparkling thoughts and emotions of the people, and not as in subsequent literature, calibrated and ideologically conditioned. In other words, there is no hint of the hurrapatriotismus that has become commonplace in books published after 2023. Secondly, the book contains (albeit to a lesser extent) life stories from the other, opposite camp. Of course, today one may wonder how Russians could suffer if they have lived and are living in much greater security than Ukrainians, whose entire territory is shot through. There are no stories of the inhabitants of Belgorod in this book, just as there are no stories of the inhabitants of the Kursk region, but there is one story in this book of a soldier who visited the territory of Ukraine, was captured, came back, and...hanged himself. Why? Indeed, what could a young boy see in a few days of fighting, because the most horrific events began much later, including Bucha and everything else? Yes, this story struck me the most, and it was this story that showed me that we know absolutely nothing about what was happening in those days in the territory of Ukraine. I want to point out that in the following sentences, I do not draw any conclusions, just as I did not draw any conclusions about the situation that happened in Bucha. All of this requires a thorough, independent, and objective investigation, and only then can we draw any conclusions. So why did a young soldier who had spent only a few days on Ukrainian territory hang himself?
‘When I washed Lyosha before the funeral, I saw everything as it was.
All the fingers on his right hand had been chopped off. There were just purplish stumps sticking out.
‘And that’s it.’
I repeat that I am not making any conclusions, but only trying to recreate the real picture of what was and is happening in the territory of eastern Ukraine. In this regard, I recall a completely different book on the same subject; a book that was written by a Ukrainian and which, in spirit, is the complete opposite of this book, for it is written in the spirit of Ukrainian hurrapatriotismus. In the book "Our Enemies Will Vanish: The Russian Invasion and Ukraine's War of Independence", we find the following words:
“So what happened to the two Russians in the basement?”
“They didn’t want to surrender, and so they shot themselves, with these guns,” he said, pointing to the two propped-up Kalashnikovs.
Now I ask myself, what could have happened to the captured Russian soldiers in Ukrainian captivity that made them ready to shoot themselves to avoid Ukrainian captivity? I emphasize that this is written by a Ukrainian author who has written a patriotic book. If he does not hide it, we can assume that the Russian soldiers know about the real situation as well. Perhaps this is where we find the reason for the excessive cruelty of Russian soldiers? If everything is as Katerina describes, then the question arises, who cut off the fingers of a Russian soldier and why, and if so, how many such crimes have been committed? One might argue that this cannot be a war crime because Russia is the aggressor, and therefore, no laws regarding prisoners of war apply to its soldiers. I don't think so, because violence breeds violence, and so both countries, at some point, fall into a spiral of violence. Most importantly, the people who committed the crimes end up not being punished, but other people get punished. Such acts of violence do not lead to anything good, but only to more suffering and aggravation of an already bad situation. But yes, there is only one such story in this book. The vast majority of stories are those of Ukrainian civilians who were not helped or warned. Russia is to blame not only for launching the unprovoked aggression, but also for its practice of cleansing, extrajudicial executions, and its unwillingness or inability to withdraw the entire civilian population trapped in the grip of the two warring armies. If we accept the Russian point of view on the invasion (they are supposedly liberating the inhabitants of Ukraine from something), then why did Russia not warn the civilian population about the need for immediate evacuation from the border regions and why did it not organize the evacuation itself, preferring to fight in residential areas with the use of heavy armored vehicles, and in general, how can you fight in the city limits knowing that people remain in the city? What kind of “liberation” did the Russian army and the Russian leadership carry out? Liberation from what?
They came, destroyed life, liberated me from my home, liberated me from my husband, liberated me from my happiness. Thank you, liberators. Damn you.
I wanted to say something else entirely, something that only in this book I found - the genuine wish of ordinary citizens. In the vast majority of books about the Russian-Ukrainian war, we see the usual hurrapatriotismus, but the real thoughts of ordinary citizens are quite different. They want to stop shooting first and only after that to find out who is right and who is guilty.
(see quote from the Russian version)
These are the most sincere and real words I've read in a while, and that's what the book is valuable for.
September 26, 2024
Some previous reviewers have expressed their outrage at the presumption of a Russian author in representing Ukrainian responses to the war. I have read several accounts by Ukrainian writers and foreign correspondents, but for me the value of this book is precisely that it is written by a Russian, even though it is unlikely to be available in her home country. Understandably, she was received with mild scepticism and occasional hostility by some of her interviewees, but as an outspoken critic of her own government Gordeeva has doubtless alienated many more of her compatriots. She cannot stop the aggression, but by transmitting the voices of the victims she may succeed in informing her fellow citizens and weakening support for the war.
May 20, 2024
Ukrainians do not need the mediation of Russians to be heard. It's not about support, it's about appropriation. Read Ukrainian writers and journalists while they are still alive. I am very sad that not everyone is.
May 17, 2024
24 testimonianze molto forti, senza filtri emotivi, di ucraini, ucraini russofoni e russi che ci mostrano il lato umano, le tragedie da una parte e dall'altra del conflitto in corso.
Gordeeva non nasconde il dolore e soprattutto la vergogna di appartenere al popolo aggressore e fa parlare chi quella guerra la vive.
Testimonianze di persone che odiano, non odiavo, provano a non odiare, che hanno perso tutto. Si capisce la difficoltà umana dietro a un conflitto come questo.
Uno di quei libri che va letto.
Gordeeva non nasconde il dolore e soprattutto la vergogna di appartenere al popolo aggressore e fa parlare chi quella guerra la vive.
Testimonianze di persone che odiano, non odiavo, provano a non odiare, che hanno perso tutto. Si capisce la difficoltà umana dietro a un conflitto come questo.
Uno di quei libri che va letto.
December 2, 2024
A piece of sh&t written by a piece of sh&t
July 23, 2025
One. More. Time: this is not your story to tell, Katerina Gordeeva. Let Ukrainians tell their own stories. Don’t re-traumatize Ukrainian civilians by allowing russian journalists to interview them.
February 2, 2025
"They came, destroyed life, liberated me from my home, liberated me from my husband, liberated me from my happiness. Thank you, liberators. Damn you."
"See, ever since 2014, from the point your soldiers started killing us, it became obvious that this is a fight to the death, that nothing will be left of our dealings but pain. Nothing but pain and hatred."
This book is one tough read. I have ploughed through some harrowing writing, but this raw and unprocessed first person telling of the lives of ordinary people torn apart by a brutal war of aggression was hard to read. I had to put it aside numerous times to regain my composure. It is not what you'd call a great literary work in the conventional sense. It is what you'd call the use of a pen as a weapon against human evil by laying bare the reality of warfare on the lives of humans, the good, the bad, and the ugly.
The author, a Soviet born Russian exile journalist with, like so many, family living in both Ukraine and Russia, which she states "... means that my state, both formally and acting in my name, too - went to war against people I love". She has collected the stories of individuals whose lives have been destroyed by Putin's aggression. The people featured largely identify as Ukrainian, although there are interesting discussions with Russians and Gordeeva discusses her own experience of being a Russian in the current circumstances.
Essential to maintaining conflict is mistrust, fear, hate and/or indifference. Without those ingredients persuading people to kill each other, or allow people to be killed on their behalf is difficult. It is no wonder that those who advocate peace and understanding and who attempt to build bridges across divides often become an enemy of both protagonists. It is a human enough reaction for those whose lives have been destroyed by those claiming to represent a country, belief system, religion etc to react by hatred that extends to a blanket hatred to the entirety of any of the former or latter. It is super human to see beyond the mass and to recognise the individuals with all their faults who constitute it. This book is full of understandable hatred and anger. However, as all post war situations show it is only by overcoming these feelings that peaceful futures can be built. The blame for Nazi Germany and its crimes can be placed at the door of a large part of the German population, yet it was Germans who were the first to feel the persecution of totalitarianism. Rehabilitating Germany and welcoming Germans back into the "civilised" world was essential to building peace, and it should be remembered that some Germans continued to fight the Nazi regime throughout the war at terrible cost to themselves and their families. Ukraine's future depends upon building a stable inclusive domestic system while having friendly relations with its neighbours in an international system that provides real security guarantees (not worthless Minsk Agreements!). This means fighting natural urges to hate and demonise and building bridges especially in the younger generations whose happy futures depend upon removing sources of conflict and areas of discontent that could be exploited by those seeking to benefit from hate.
At one point a Ukrainian woman gives a lift to the author to meet some Ukrainian women, raped by Russian troops, being cared for in Germany, she states: "I didn't want to take you. I agreed because I wanted to say to your face how much I hate you, all of you who are so sweet, so empathetic, so "it's not me, it's all Putin". I thought I'd say that and somehow feel better. But no. All of you always have some kind of excuse: relatives, a good resume, little children, your charitable organisations. It's just none of that matters. It basically doesn't mean anything, see? All of you - your other brother who's not Ukrainian, some classmates of yours, your former or current colleague or the guy you kissed under the stairs at school - it doesn't really matter who specifically - but you're all coming and killing us. And then you write on your social media how bad you feel, oh-oh, we're so proper, shit, how is this all possible, it's not us, it's some kind of other Russians. It's you. I just wanted to tell you that, Katya."
When I searched for this book on Goodreads I was a little surprised to find it running at a 2.50 rating. This seems to be due to exception taken to the author being Russian and therefore intolerable for some Ukrainians, and possibly some Russian trolls. However, for me the Russian authorship is a strength and I find it hard to believe anyone who actually reads the book would not have at least a grudgingly positive view of its contribution to exposing Putin's fascism for what it is. I came across the book in the bookshop at Pushkin House in London (An independent organisation formed in 1954 that focuses "...on the contested legacies, tumultuous present and possible futures of Russian, Eastern European, and post-Soviet geocultural spaces".). I am boringly native English but have long been interested in the politics, history and culture of Central and Eastern Europe, and Russia and have travelled quite extensively in the regions. I have friends from across the regions too, some of whom were born in the USSR, or other countries which have ceased to exist. The history of this great joined continent is one of endless cultural, religious and political mixing and conflict. Barely a generation has passed without some war leaving an indelible scar to be passed down the family lines. Human made divisions have been repeatedly weaponised in the service of peoples, parties and assorted despots, these have then been manipulated by great powers to advance their own interests, economic, political and religious. Every time it is thousands of human beings of the same species who end up living under human invented divisions and who end up being slaughtered due to intolerances that are indoctrinated into them based on these divisions. These invented differences, that are presented as so unchangeable and so important, are schooled as inviable, yet are nothing compared to the unique lives that every individual born into this strange existence for such a blinkingly short time experiences. It is cliched but we all bleed the same blood and experience the same range of complex emotions and suffer the same way in the face of adversity. Yet many never seem to see or feel life in this way and offer themselves for slaughter and support those to enact it.
This book is not going to end human hatred, it will not prevent discrimination and persecution based on national identity, ethnicity, politics, religion and so on. It will not prevent genocide, torture, crimes against humanity. It will not prevent the human misery displayed in these pages from continuing to happen again and again. However, it might help end and heal some of these horrors individually. It might help some people to think. It might challenge some who would otherwise subscribe to the doctrines that create the misery exposed in these pages in all its rawness. If it does that, and can help in some healing processes it will be providing a valuable service beyond being a book of individual misery and horror.
"It seems like I am losing my mind. Hatred is driving me out of my mind. I'm not a person capable of hating. It's hard for me to maintain such a degree of it in me, it's eating me up inside. But do you know what I'm feeling? I'm feeling like I've lived my life completely in vain. I loved Ukraine, but I also loved Russia. We had relatives who stayed there in Pervouralsk. And I cultivated in my children a love and respect for Russia, as a second motherland. You can't expect such treachery, such barbarity, such brutality from someone you love. You simply don't expect that..."
"See, ever since 2014, from the point your soldiers started killing us, it became obvious that this is a fight to the death, that nothing will be left of our dealings but pain. Nothing but pain and hatred."
This book is one tough read. I have ploughed through some harrowing writing, but this raw and unprocessed first person telling of the lives of ordinary people torn apart by a brutal war of aggression was hard to read. I had to put it aside numerous times to regain my composure. It is not what you'd call a great literary work in the conventional sense. It is what you'd call the use of a pen as a weapon against human evil by laying bare the reality of warfare on the lives of humans, the good, the bad, and the ugly.
The author, a Soviet born Russian exile journalist with, like so many, family living in both Ukraine and Russia, which she states "... means that my state, both formally and acting in my name, too - went to war against people I love". She has collected the stories of individuals whose lives have been destroyed by Putin's aggression. The people featured largely identify as Ukrainian, although there are interesting discussions with Russians and Gordeeva discusses her own experience of being a Russian in the current circumstances.
Essential to maintaining conflict is mistrust, fear, hate and/or indifference. Without those ingredients persuading people to kill each other, or allow people to be killed on their behalf is difficult. It is no wonder that those who advocate peace and understanding and who attempt to build bridges across divides often become an enemy of both protagonists. It is a human enough reaction for those whose lives have been destroyed by those claiming to represent a country, belief system, religion etc to react by hatred that extends to a blanket hatred to the entirety of any of the former or latter. It is super human to see beyond the mass and to recognise the individuals with all their faults who constitute it. This book is full of understandable hatred and anger. However, as all post war situations show it is only by overcoming these feelings that peaceful futures can be built. The blame for Nazi Germany and its crimes can be placed at the door of a large part of the German population, yet it was Germans who were the first to feel the persecution of totalitarianism. Rehabilitating Germany and welcoming Germans back into the "civilised" world was essential to building peace, and it should be remembered that some Germans continued to fight the Nazi regime throughout the war at terrible cost to themselves and their families. Ukraine's future depends upon building a stable inclusive domestic system while having friendly relations with its neighbours in an international system that provides real security guarantees (not worthless Minsk Agreements!). This means fighting natural urges to hate and demonise and building bridges especially in the younger generations whose happy futures depend upon removing sources of conflict and areas of discontent that could be exploited by those seeking to benefit from hate.
At one point a Ukrainian woman gives a lift to the author to meet some Ukrainian women, raped by Russian troops, being cared for in Germany, she states: "I didn't want to take you. I agreed because I wanted to say to your face how much I hate you, all of you who are so sweet, so empathetic, so "it's not me, it's all Putin". I thought I'd say that and somehow feel better. But no. All of you always have some kind of excuse: relatives, a good resume, little children, your charitable organisations. It's just none of that matters. It basically doesn't mean anything, see? All of you - your other brother who's not Ukrainian, some classmates of yours, your former or current colleague or the guy you kissed under the stairs at school - it doesn't really matter who specifically - but you're all coming and killing us. And then you write on your social media how bad you feel, oh-oh, we're so proper, shit, how is this all possible, it's not us, it's some kind of other Russians. It's you. I just wanted to tell you that, Katya."
When I searched for this book on Goodreads I was a little surprised to find it running at a 2.50 rating. This seems to be due to exception taken to the author being Russian and therefore intolerable for some Ukrainians, and possibly some Russian trolls. However, for me the Russian authorship is a strength and I find it hard to believe anyone who actually reads the book would not have at least a grudgingly positive view of its contribution to exposing Putin's fascism for what it is. I came across the book in the bookshop at Pushkin House in London (An independent organisation formed in 1954 that focuses "...on the contested legacies, tumultuous present and possible futures of Russian, Eastern European, and post-Soviet geocultural spaces".). I am boringly native English but have long been interested in the politics, history and culture of Central and Eastern Europe, and Russia and have travelled quite extensively in the regions. I have friends from across the regions too, some of whom were born in the USSR, or other countries which have ceased to exist. The history of this great joined continent is one of endless cultural, religious and political mixing and conflict. Barely a generation has passed without some war leaving an indelible scar to be passed down the family lines. Human made divisions have been repeatedly weaponised in the service of peoples, parties and assorted despots, these have then been manipulated by great powers to advance their own interests, economic, political and religious. Every time it is thousands of human beings of the same species who end up living under human invented divisions and who end up being slaughtered due to intolerances that are indoctrinated into them based on these divisions. These invented differences, that are presented as so unchangeable and so important, are schooled as inviable, yet are nothing compared to the unique lives that every individual born into this strange existence for such a blinkingly short time experiences. It is cliched but we all bleed the same blood and experience the same range of complex emotions and suffer the same way in the face of adversity. Yet many never seem to see or feel life in this way and offer themselves for slaughter and support those to enact it.
This book is not going to end human hatred, it will not prevent discrimination and persecution based on national identity, ethnicity, politics, religion and so on. It will not prevent genocide, torture, crimes against humanity. It will not prevent the human misery displayed in these pages from continuing to happen again and again. However, it might help end and heal some of these horrors individually. It might help some people to think. It might challenge some who would otherwise subscribe to the doctrines that create the misery exposed in these pages in all its rawness. If it does that, and can help in some healing processes it will be providing a valuable service beyond being a book of individual misery and horror.
"It seems like I am losing my mind. Hatred is driving me out of my mind. I'm not a person capable of hating. It's hard for me to maintain such a degree of it in me, it's eating me up inside. But do you know what I'm feeling? I'm feeling like I've lived my life completely in vain. I loved Ukraine, but I also loved Russia. We had relatives who stayed there in Pervouralsk. And I cultivated in my children a love and respect for Russia, as a second motherland. You can't expect such treachery, such barbarity, such brutality from someone you love. You simply don't expect that..."
May 24, 2024
r*ssians can not talk about the war in Ukraine through their lens.
January 13, 2026
For the unbombed people, who never went to a shelter because russian drones and missiles were heading their way, this is the kind of book they might consider reading, as this is dedicated "to everyone I love on both sides of the war".
I borrowed this from the library by mistake. I don't need to go beyond the introduction. She had no problems with what her country has done to other countries - Moldova, Chechnya, Georgia, until it got to 2014 Ukraine. She might be better than most russians, but the bar is so low it makes little difference.
I should also point out that I'm not Ukrainian. I am just a volunteer who has spent months over the last 2 years in Ukraine. Going to shelter to avoid being killed by russian missiles, going to the cemetery to pay tributes to Ukrainian soldiers who lost their lives, and going to interact with children who have lost their fathers and homes due to russian aggression means I am not in the mood to read how some russians are so-called victims. This was a DNF.
I borrowed this from the library by mistake. I don't need to go beyond the introduction. She had no problems with what her country has done to other countries - Moldova, Chechnya, Georgia, until it got to 2014 Ukraine. She might be better than most russians, but the bar is so low it makes little difference.
I should also point out that I'm not Ukrainian. I am just a volunteer who has spent months over the last 2 years in Ukraine. Going to shelter to avoid being killed by russian missiles, going to the cemetery to pay tributes to Ukrainian soldiers who lost their lives, and going to interact with children who have lost their fathers and homes due to russian aggression means I am not in the mood to read how some russians are so-called victims. This was a DNF.
November 13, 2025
Czytałam to tygodniami, bo nie mogłam zbyt długo ciągiem.
Po raz pierwszy zaczęłam myśleć o rzeczach, o których nigdy nie myślałam - o tym jakim językiem kto mówi, o tym, że czasem chce się uciec z miejsca, w którym bombardują GDZIEKOLWIEK, o tym, że kolejne pokolenia i kolejne pokolenia i kolejne pokolenia…
I o tym, że mózg nie potrafi pojąć tego, co to znaczy wojna.
Po raz pierwszy zaczęłam myśleć o rzeczach, o których nigdy nie myślałam - o tym jakim językiem kto mówi, o tym, że czasem chce się uciec z miejsca, w którym bombardują GDZIEKOLWIEK, o tym, że kolejne pokolenia i kolejne pokolenia i kolejne pokolenia…
I o tym, że mózg nie potrafi pojąć tego, co to znaczy wojna.
May 13, 2024
By reading this book you're essentially listening to the voice of the bearer of imperialistic genocidal culture who's responsible for the Russian killing regime. Russians themselves might not agree with the concept of collective responsibility, but that doesn't mean that we have to empower these fascists. You want to learn how Russians are killing Ukrainians every day, wiping away schools, hospitals and entire cities? Just listen to Ukrainians, goddamnit. Russians have plenty of platforms and plenty of influence, don't give them yet another one! Would you read a Holocaust story written by the Nazi camp officer? Then why would you read the story of Ukrainian war from a Russian journalist, who's been indoctrinated into this 'Russia is a great mother of all, Ukrainians is our small brothers we need to own and guide' pathos her whole life? Just get a grasp, god.
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