Description
Book SynopsisThis anthology of seminal texts documents the development of the post-war anti-Soviet Ukrainian dissident movement. The collection is designed to introduce, via some crucial primary sources, Western and other non-Ukrainian readers to various forms of Ukrainian opposition to the communist regime. Stories of ideas and personal undertakings are unfolding before the reader in a vivid pulsation of texts that testify for themselves. The anthology gathers contributions from different genres. They range from poetry, public speeches, and samvydav -- uncensored, self-published -- texts to court speeches. They come from dissidents who were held in jails, special psychiatric hospitals (for not accepting the official ideology), and prison camps. Finally, they include self-reflections by dissidents on their personal experience of opposing the totalitarian system. This variety of contributions creates a multidimensional picture of the Ukrainian dissident movement -- a generation of prominent Ukrainian public and cultural figures who, in one way or another, insisted on their freedom of speech and made history by daring to challenge the official ideology and culture. This remarkable book about the struggle for freedom has been compiled by Oleksii Sinchenko, Dmytro Stus, and Leonid Finberg. Scholarly reviewed by Myroslav Marynovych.
Trade Review"There is a popular belief that the Evil Empire collapsed under its own weight and that independence for Ukrainians dropped out of the blue sky. This is an affront for the Ukrainian dissidents to the communist regime. They were the freedoms yeast. There were only few of them, a handful of men and women. But there would be no bread of freedom without this handful of yeast. This book is about the freedom bread that could not be broken, about freedom overcoming fear. -- Oleksandr Zinchenko, historian and publicist, Kyiv"
This book is about a generation of Ukrainian intellectual and moral leaders who, despite the danger of being apprehended and physically exterminated, resisted the totalitarian Soviet machine. They chose to live in camps with their conscience intact rather than to tolerate the terror and arbitrariness of the authorities on the outside.Taras Vozniak, Editor of the Independent Cultural Magazine ¯, Lviv
Table of ContentsPreface; Poetry; Public Speeches and Statements; Samvydav and Tamvydav Essays; Last Words on Trials; Testimonies from Prisons, Camps and Exile; Interviews; Rethinking; Short Bios of the Authors; Notes.
