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Ukraine 22: Ukrainian Writers Respond to War
A selection of Ukraine's leading writers convey the reality of life within Ukraine during the first year of the invasionOn 24 February 2022, the lives of Ukrainians were devastatingly altered. Since that day, many of Ukraine's writers have attempted to fathom what is happening to them and to their country. This anthology brings together writing from inside Ukraine, by Ukrainians, available in English for the first time. Here they document everyday life, ponder the role of culture amid conflict, denounce Russian imperialism and revisit their relations with the world, especially Europe and its ideals, as they try to comprehend the horrors of war.From tearing-downs of Russia's use of culture as justification of the war to moving descriptions of nights spent sheltering in corridors, poignant snatched moments with a husband on his single night away from the army, to descriptions of the eerie weather in the months leading up to the invasion, as if nature was trying to warn Ukraine, these essays reveal the texture, rawness and reality of life in Ukraine under war as never before.
192 pages, Paperback
Published April 16, 2024
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126 people want to read
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If an editor is known, however, Various is not necessary. List the name of the editor as the primary author (with role "editor"). Contributing authors' names follow it.
Note: WorldCat is an excellent resource for finding author information and contents of anthologies.
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
March 29, 2025
5 ⭐
An anthology of 28 pieces, essays and diary entries, written by 9 Ukrainian writers between the 24th of February and the 23rd of August, 2022. I was looking, specifically, for the personal perspective and experiences of the Ukrainian people at, and immediately after, the time that war forced itself across their borders and in this I was not disappointed. If you’re after an objective account of events (whatever that could mean in this context) following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, this is not it.
There are a couple of pieces included here that feel particularly venomous. Venomous in the sense that they were obviously written in a retaliatory state of rage and displayed a level of hate that I generally feel uncomfortable with but my immediate thought was that, given the immediacy with which they were written after the authors’ home was invaded, deserved a good degree of empathy and understanding. An understanding that I soon realised could only come after listening and hearing the stories of the people themselves and developing at least a fragmented comprehension of the bigger picture.
What made me initially feel uncomfortable were passages that condemned not just Putin and his administration but the people of Russia. Comments like:
’...I was in such shock that I would have also preferred to hide somewhere and sleep until the end of the war. Until the end of Russia. To the bitch’s end. Until that country is replaced with a large black ocean, frigid like the cosmos.’
‘... I do not cry. I hate them. I hate them, the Russians. I will hate them until the very end. All of them’.
“Why the people?”, I thought. And my ignorance would be addressed in resounding fashion, which I will get to shortly, with “justification” or, at the very least, a logical reasoning that could be empathized with.
A multitude of areas are addressed throughout the entries.
There is an appeal to Europe to better understand the nature of the war along with a disbelief of the hypocricy, inaction and lack of historical recall, particularly with regard to countries like Germany and Hungary. There is an urge for leaders to recognise the genocides in Bucha and Mariupol and reject “that absurdity about the ‘denazification and demilitirisation of Ukraine”.
There is exploration of historical cyclicality in Yuri Andrukhovych’s essay, ’About bullets in the back of the head’, regarding Russians torturing Ukrainians in places like Bucha and Demianiv Laz during WWII.
And there are stories, harrowing and saddening, of what has become of the lives of those living in the war-torn nation.
The fear and the unknowing:
’What am I afraid of? I am afraid of being raped. I am afraid of pain, torture and mutilation. I am terribly afraid of being under occupation, in a trap where people like me or my husband or the rest of the people in our “bubble” are put on special blacklists’
’We are a generation with emergency escape-bags on our backs’
And events that will rattle the faith of even the most ardent proponents of the good of mankind:
’The entire history of world experience, centuries-old culture, all our skills and tools of modernity powerlessly surrender the moment a six-year-old girl dies under the ruins of her own house from dehydration.’
There are also a couple of common threads which run through several of the pieces giving a sense of cohesiveness to the book as a whole and possibly, without going as far as to generalize across the board, giving a fair representation of the views of the average Ukrainian.
The first is that the Russo-Ukrainian War is broadly considered to have begun not on the 22nd of February, 2022 but, indeed, in 2014 with the annexation of Crimea and the conflict in the Eastern Donbas region. The all-out invasion of 2022 is simply an escalation of the same war.
The second of the common threads was the most eye-opening to me. At least I initially felt that way but the more I thought about it, the more obvious it seemed with history's perspective.
I was naively seeking clarification, some time back, on an update of one of my friends here on GR, in which she lamented the present-day Western glorification of Russian literature (as well as the perceived lack of interest in Ukrainian literature). I realise now that it was naivety tinged with personal bias and I wasn’t viewing the update with compassion or empathy for what she was going through but rather through the lens of my own selfish disappointment that I might be morally obligated to alter my altogether positive position on Classic Russian literature (for which my sample size is rather small anyway). See, the strongest, most regularly occurring common thread throughout all of these essays is the idea that this is not the war of a single tyrant in Putin but a symptom of Russian culture itself. The “blessed Russian culture”, the “Great Culture”; these are terms that you’ll see time and time again throughout the essays and the war itself is seen as a symptom of this insidious culture, this ’Imperial identity that... has never undergone decolonisation’.
One would like to believe that we can view culture and politics as two separate elements but the overwhelming belief amongst the authors here is that by doing so, by expressing mantras like that of Claudia Roth’s (German Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media)’This is Putin’s war, not Pushkin’s’, or ’culture beyond politics' we are narrowing ’politics to processes and events only, leaving culture an exalted, sentimental superstructure freed from the nerves of national cultural dominance or imperial colonial mechanics. Culture is seen to function as if cleansed of ideology’.
Classic Russian literature is seen to Ukrainians as both a reflection of Russia’s imperial past and a propagator for the fulfilment of its people’s present-day delusions and will to dominate and oppress. ’Culture in totalitarian societies is always an instrument, not a goal.’ One writer even goes so far as to suggest that ”without Pushkin’s poems ‘To the slanderers of Russia’ and ‘Mazepa’ there would be no Putin”.
There seems a burning desire and an urgent need for the Ukrainian people to disassociate themselves from Russian culture, a kind of de-Russification, in as many ways as possible so as not to be engulfed by it. This search for self-identification, which I’m beginning to understand is an issue of utmost importance to many of the “little nations” of Central Europe, has in itself made Ukrainian culture a target for aggression.
In all of this, there’s not much room for interpretation. The belief, at least of several of these authors, is that Putin and the people are seen as one. The Russian people are complicit in the wrongdoings of their leader (at the time this book was published he apparently had 80% support from the Russian citizens) and there is, in public, a kind of servitial surrender of one’s own individualism or a ‘collective dissolution in the image of the leader, an unconscious desire to copy not only his words but also what lies behind them’.
’When they talk in the West today about 'one man's war', they once again offer us a riddle about the chicken and the egg, and also attempt, simply and beautifully, to separate the leader from his people. Western counter-propaganda hints at the 'alien nature' of Putin and his regime, attacking the fascist love for the father of the nation in the hope of seeing cracks in the monolith. But these attempts are illusory and naive. They'll never want to kill the father and be orphaned. None of them wishes that Putin had never been born. Everyone loves and cherishes his actions and words. Everyone shares responsibility for the blood and tears, destroyed cities, raped women and murdered children.’
Very intense at times and a lot to take in but many of the essays were very well-written and I got the perspective I was looking for here. Thanks to the aforementioned GR friend for inadvertently giving me the kick up the backside I shouldn’t have needed, but did, to tackle the subject.
An anthology of 28 pieces, essays and diary entries, written by 9 Ukrainian writers between the 24th of February and the 23rd of August, 2022. I was looking, specifically, for the personal perspective and experiences of the Ukrainian people at, and immediately after, the time that war forced itself across their borders and in this I was not disappointed. If you’re after an objective account of events (whatever that could mean in this context) following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, this is not it.
There are a couple of pieces included here that feel particularly venomous. Venomous in the sense that they were obviously written in a retaliatory state of rage and displayed a level of hate that I generally feel uncomfortable with but my immediate thought was that, given the immediacy with which they were written after the authors’ home was invaded, deserved a good degree of empathy and understanding. An understanding that I soon realised could only come after listening and hearing the stories of the people themselves and developing at least a fragmented comprehension of the bigger picture.
What made me initially feel uncomfortable were passages that condemned not just Putin and his administration but the people of Russia. Comments like:
’...I was in such shock that I would have also preferred to hide somewhere and sleep until the end of the war. Until the end of Russia. To the bitch’s end. Until that country is replaced with a large black ocean, frigid like the cosmos.’
‘... I do not cry. I hate them. I hate them, the Russians. I will hate them until the very end. All of them’.
“Why the people?”, I thought. And my ignorance would be addressed in resounding fashion, which I will get to shortly, with “justification” or, at the very least, a logical reasoning that could be empathized with.
A multitude of areas are addressed throughout the entries.
There is an appeal to Europe to better understand the nature of the war along with a disbelief of the hypocricy, inaction and lack of historical recall, particularly with regard to countries like Germany and Hungary. There is an urge for leaders to recognise the genocides in Bucha and Mariupol and reject “that absurdity about the ‘denazification and demilitirisation of Ukraine”.
There is exploration of historical cyclicality in Yuri Andrukhovych’s essay, ’About bullets in the back of the head’, regarding Russians torturing Ukrainians in places like Bucha and Demianiv Laz during WWII.
And there are stories, harrowing and saddening, of what has become of the lives of those living in the war-torn nation.
The fear and the unknowing:
’What am I afraid of? I am afraid of being raped. I am afraid of pain, torture and mutilation. I am terribly afraid of being under occupation, in a trap where people like me or my husband or the rest of the people in our “bubble” are put on special blacklists’
’We are a generation with emergency escape-bags on our backs’
And events that will rattle the faith of even the most ardent proponents of the good of mankind:
’The entire history of world experience, centuries-old culture, all our skills and tools of modernity powerlessly surrender the moment a six-year-old girl dies under the ruins of her own house from dehydration.’
There are also a couple of common threads which run through several of the pieces giving a sense of cohesiveness to the book as a whole and possibly, without going as far as to generalize across the board, giving a fair representation of the views of the average Ukrainian.
The first is that the Russo-Ukrainian War is broadly considered to have begun not on the 22nd of February, 2022 but, indeed, in 2014 with the annexation of Crimea and the conflict in the Eastern Donbas region. The all-out invasion of 2022 is simply an escalation of the same war.
The second of the common threads was the most eye-opening to me. At least I initially felt that way but the more I thought about it, the more obvious it seemed with history's perspective.
I was naively seeking clarification, some time back, on an update of one of my friends here on GR, in which she lamented the present-day Western glorification of Russian literature (as well as the perceived lack of interest in Ukrainian literature). I realise now that it was naivety tinged with personal bias and I wasn’t viewing the update with compassion or empathy for what she was going through but rather through the lens of my own selfish disappointment that I might be morally obligated to alter my altogether positive position on Classic Russian literature (for which my sample size is rather small anyway). See, the strongest, most regularly occurring common thread throughout all of these essays is the idea that this is not the war of a single tyrant in Putin but a symptom of Russian culture itself. The “blessed Russian culture”, the “Great Culture”; these are terms that you’ll see time and time again throughout the essays and the war itself is seen as a symptom of this insidious culture, this ’Imperial identity that... has never undergone decolonisation’.
One would like to believe that we can view culture and politics as two separate elements but the overwhelming belief amongst the authors here is that by doing so, by expressing mantras like that of Claudia Roth’s (German Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media)’This is Putin’s war, not Pushkin’s’, or ’culture beyond politics' we are narrowing ’politics to processes and events only, leaving culture an exalted, sentimental superstructure freed from the nerves of national cultural dominance or imperial colonial mechanics. Culture is seen to function as if cleansed of ideology’.
Classic Russian literature is seen to Ukrainians as both a reflection of Russia’s imperial past and a propagator for the fulfilment of its people’s present-day delusions and will to dominate and oppress. ’Culture in totalitarian societies is always an instrument, not a goal.’ One writer even goes so far as to suggest that ”without Pushkin’s poems ‘To the slanderers of Russia’ and ‘Mazepa’ there would be no Putin”.
There seems a burning desire and an urgent need for the Ukrainian people to disassociate themselves from Russian culture, a kind of de-Russification, in as many ways as possible so as not to be engulfed by it. This search for self-identification, which I’m beginning to understand is an issue of utmost importance to many of the “little nations” of Central Europe, has in itself made Ukrainian culture a target for aggression.
In all of this, there’s not much room for interpretation. The belief, at least of several of these authors, is that Putin and the people are seen as one. The Russian people are complicit in the wrongdoings of their leader (at the time this book was published he apparently had 80% support from the Russian citizens) and there is, in public, a kind of servitial surrender of one’s own individualism or a ‘collective dissolution in the image of the leader, an unconscious desire to copy not only his words but also what lies behind them’.
’When they talk in the West today about 'one man's war', they once again offer us a riddle about the chicken and the egg, and also attempt, simply and beautifully, to separate the leader from his people. Western counter-propaganda hints at the 'alien nature' of Putin and his regime, attacking the fascist love for the father of the nation in the hope of seeing cracks in the monolith. But these attempts are illusory and naive. They'll never want to kill the father and be orphaned. None of them wishes that Putin had never been born. Everyone loves and cherishes his actions and words. Everyone shares responsibility for the blood and tears, destroyed cities, raped women and murdered children.’
Very intense at times and a lot to take in but many of the essays were very well-written and I got the perspective I was looking for here. Thanks to the aforementioned GR friend for inadvertently giving me the kick up the backside I shouldn’t have needed, but did, to tackle the subject.
September 9, 2023
This is not an easy read but I felt it was an essential read right now. You may not.
The book is made up of 28 short essays, some in the form of diary entries, written between February and August 2022 by nine contributing Ukrainian writers. They are presented in chronological order. There are contributions by Sofia Andrukhovych, Yuri Andrukovych, Oleksandr Boichenko, Andriy Bondar, Olena Huseinova, Taras Prokhasko, Volodomyr Rafeyenko, Olena Stiazhinka, and Iryna Tsilyk.
Some contributions are published here for the first time.
The translations into English are by the editor, Mark Andryczyk, Michael Naydan and Alla Perminova. All the writers and their translators are to be congratulated for the quality of their contributions and the speed at which this volume has been produced given the circumstances in which it was created.
The essays present a number of views but it won't surprise anyone that it does not present an impartial reading, that some of the contributions condemn Putin's Russian imperialism, rooted as it is in Russian culture (fans of Pushkin and Joseph Brodsky may have a hard time with some of the condemnation) and there are essays that condemn the acceptance of the Russian public of the 'justification' for the invasion, as well as the wavering support for Ukraine of the Western powers.
The writings reflect the circumstances in which they were produced, some are raw, some are cynical, some are humorous, some are denunciations. The writers manage to cover quite a wide range of approaches in a short book: from documentation of life during wartime, to more philosophical considerations of history and culture and international relations. They demand to be read.
The book is made up of 28 short essays, some in the form of diary entries, written between February and August 2022 by nine contributing Ukrainian writers. They are presented in chronological order. There are contributions by Sofia Andrukhovych, Yuri Andrukovych, Oleksandr Boichenko, Andriy Bondar, Olena Huseinova, Taras Prokhasko, Volodomyr Rafeyenko, Olena Stiazhinka, and Iryna Tsilyk.
Some contributions are published here for the first time.
The translations into English are by the editor, Mark Andryczyk, Michael Naydan and Alla Perminova. All the writers and their translators are to be congratulated for the quality of their contributions and the speed at which this volume has been produced given the circumstances in which it was created.
The essays present a number of views but it won't surprise anyone that it does not present an impartial reading, that some of the contributions condemn Putin's Russian imperialism, rooted as it is in Russian culture (fans of Pushkin and Joseph Brodsky may have a hard time with some of the condemnation) and there are essays that condemn the acceptance of the Russian public of the 'justification' for the invasion, as well as the wavering support for Ukraine of the Western powers.
The writings reflect the circumstances in which they were produced, some are raw, some are cynical, some are humorous, some are denunciations. The writers manage to cover quite a wide range of approaches in a short book: from documentation of life during wartime, to more philosophical considerations of history and culture and international relations. They demand to be read.
January 12, 2024
Ivan Turgenevs story 'mumu'
About a deaf and mute serf whose life of poverty is brought into sharp relief by his connection with Mumu, a dog he rescues and then drowns at the order of his landlady. Story of the little man having not the strength to take action, save the dog or take it away. Little people who cannot decide any thing and the God who are capable of doing something.
Russians slogan 'I am not ashamed' cannibals
Gauleiters - term for people who a propoganding for Russia, it comes from the German name for regional leaders of nazi party
Sovok - means shovel and people who mindlessly belive in the USSR
The population of Russia lives and cherishes his actions and words. Everyone wants him to live for ever, because they are nothing without violence. Without the sanction to commit violence, they are nothing. This is the only thing they have and what makes them one people.
No artistic or even pragmatic expression exists beyond the political sphere. Russian imperialism the politics are the culture always have been. The quote this is Putins war, doesn't work.
In a novel every fully realized character can become an image of an entire society. Every well captured city can become an image of the whole world.
Russia no culture but violence, the need to fully eradicate ukraines
About a deaf and mute serf whose life of poverty is brought into sharp relief by his connection with Mumu, a dog he rescues and then drowns at the order of his landlady. Story of the little man having not the strength to take action, save the dog or take it away. Little people who cannot decide any thing and the God who are capable of doing something.
Russians slogan 'I am not ashamed' cannibals
Gauleiters - term for people who a propoganding for Russia, it comes from the German name for regional leaders of nazi party
Sovok - means shovel and people who mindlessly belive in the USSR
The population of Russia lives and cherishes his actions and words. Everyone wants him to live for ever, because they are nothing without violence. Without the sanction to commit violence, they are nothing. This is the only thing they have and what makes them one people.
No artistic or even pragmatic expression exists beyond the political sphere. Russian imperialism the politics are the culture always have been. The quote this is Putins war, doesn't work.
In a novel every fully realized character can become an image of an entire society. Every well captured city can become an image of the whole world.
Russia no culture but violence, the need to fully eradicate ukraines
March 24, 2024
“You can save your life, but not save yourself.”
Impressive collection of reflections on the war that are brutal, sensitive, cruel and tender: all at the same time.
Like usual some I might like more than others, yet the collection is important to read since each one sheds a light on how someone reacts to the atrocity of war.
It is like the intensity of war enlarges the differences in perception of people more than happiness.
Most impressive to me, the “Complete Dissolution” story, underlining the impact of propaganda on each Russian. And yes there are thousands of dissenting Russians as the flowers on Navalny’s grave show. However, despite the fact that many Russian people might not agree with the war, the majority does not dissent, they accept and understand. The power of propaganda on the average Russian, passed down via generations of totalitarianism is well outlined in this story.
Also impressive, the statement that in totalitarian regimes, culture is always political. With artists growing up and being educated in these regimes, culture = political. So Putin’s war does becomes Pushkin’s. Of course written from Ukrainian perspective yet it did make me shift my thinking on this topic.
I so hope that the phrase “No situation in life is so complex that it can’t be made significantly worse,” will not become even more true and that “the power in people that moves mountains and destroys cruelty,” will prevail.
Slava Ukraine!
Impressive collection of reflections on the war that are brutal, sensitive, cruel and tender: all at the same time.
Like usual some I might like more than others, yet the collection is important to read since each one sheds a light on how someone reacts to the atrocity of war.
It is like the intensity of war enlarges the differences in perception of people more than happiness.
Most impressive to me, the “Complete Dissolution” story, underlining the impact of propaganda on each Russian. And yes there are thousands of dissenting Russians as the flowers on Navalny’s grave show. However, despite the fact that many Russian people might not agree with the war, the majority does not dissent, they accept and understand. The power of propaganda on the average Russian, passed down via generations of totalitarianism is well outlined in this story.
Also impressive, the statement that in totalitarian regimes, culture is always political. With artists growing up and being educated in these regimes, culture = political. So Putin’s war does becomes Pushkin’s. Of course written from Ukrainian perspective yet it did make me shift my thinking on this topic.
I so hope that the phrase “No situation in life is so complex that it can’t be made significantly worse,” will not become even more true and that “the power in people that moves mountains and destroys cruelty,” will prevail.
Slava Ukraine!
June 19, 2025
Its basically impossible to describe what war does to a person or a people, especially to people that have never experienced it. I think this could be as close as you can get, but that is also not the point. What is the point of explaining pain and suffering in its unique manifestations to those who will never understand? Maybe its to make sure there’s a record out there, of a life that still occurred under such injustice, and of the lives that didn’t.
I think everyone should read this book. Even if they never understand it all. I don’t think I could ever understand it all, but I need to hear it anyway.
I think everyone should read this book. Even if they never understand it all. I don’t think I could ever understand it all, but I need to hear it anyway.
January 7, 2025
This isn't an "easy" read, but it is a short and engaging one that speaks to a terrible and terrifying reality. I think I would have benefited a bit from more knowledge of Ukraine going in, but that's a personal issue. What I was able to draw from this is a more comprehensive understanding of what living in the midst of a war is like. I was also able to ruminate on some of the philosophical queries, notably the role of the arts and the place of great Russian works (think Tolstoy) in the modern world. I'd recommend this one. It's worth the time.
July 1, 2025
A collection of essays by Ukrainian writers from the first few months of the onset of war in 2022, that were originally published in blogs, and Ukrainian and European newspapers. At times it is a properly harrowing read. Topics vary but what holds true throughout is the despair, the shock, the grief, the sorrow and the white-hot rage. 2025 has been one of the most unstable years I can ever remember in global politics, but this book is an urgent reminder of the war on our doorstep.
February 4, 2024
Fairly harrowing accounts of the realities of war which we should all engage with. Biggest takeaway was how the writers referred to the “war” as starting in 2014 with the annexation of crimea which is very different to our media narrative.
Struggled to focus/get into it because there is no clear narrative really as it’s a selection of texts. But that’s fine
Struggled to focus/get into it because there is no clear narrative really as it’s a selection of texts. But that’s fine
March 31, 2024
Another recent book that upon completion had me instinctively looking for six stars. Alas, I had to settle on five. This was an outstanding read for anyone who wants to get into the hearts and minds of Ukrainians during the first six months of the Russian full-scale invasion. It’s a short book but not an easy one.
February 9, 2024
The last entry in the collection includes the following passage, which sums up the sentiments of the contributors well:
"...the world broke once again and revealed its ancient, rotten, black guts." (Iryna Tsilyk)
Small, but mighty. A necessity. The only downside is that it isn't longer.
"...the world broke once again and revealed its ancient, rotten, black guts." (Iryna Tsilyk)
Small, but mighty. A necessity. The only downside is that it isn't longer.
January 6, 2025
I never know how to rate books like this. Superb translation.
October 21, 2023
These heartbreaking essays, written by Ukrainians, detail their on-the-ground experiences as Russia invaded their country. A sobering and necessary read.
December 23, 2023
These meditative reflections from diverse sources on incidents that occurred far from the frontline, most of them adding to the reportage I've read daily since the war began. Some of these personal observations and bizarre conversations are strangely resonant, recalling not the horror of war, to which one can so easily become at best inured, at worst indifferent after so much coverage, but the curious pleasure and indulgence in pathetic fallacies and unheroic survival strategies. Thus Volodymyr Rafeyenko's angry birds, Olena Huseinova's war stories of selling the family silver --in this case, a grandmother's Czech crystal wine glasses -- on instagram, as the price of escape from or entry to either safety or oblivion. Taras Prokhasko recalls his eclectic childhood reading of books that had survived WW1, among them Oscar Wilde's Fairy Tales, years later supplemented by smuggled copies of novels by Bohumil Hrabal and Gabriel García Márquez, and savouring them because, 'as the poet used to say, 'I won't die from war going on in the world...', which of course could yet be a beautiful anthem for doomed youth.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews