Ukraine Books

Mary Halasz is an American woman who has spent the last 63 years in the small western Ukraine city of Uzhhorod. Her Hungarian parents moved with the infant Mary from newly-formed Czechoslovakia to Trenton, New Jersey in 1921. While growing up she visited Uzhhorod with her mother a couple of times. On one of these visits she met her future husband and started a correspondence. She moved to Uzhhorod in 1938 on the eve of World War II to marry the Hungarian man she had fallen in love with. Mary had two children and lived through World War II, the Holocaust, the transfer of Uzhhorod to Soviet Ukraine and her husband's imprisonment in the Siberian Gulags. She is kept apart from her American family by Soviet bureaucracy until her mother is finally allowed to visit in 1962.

The story of her life will give American readers a very accessible point of view on the history and society of the Soviet Union and western Ukraine. Her experiences as a single parent in a small regional capital in the Carpathian Mountains will be of interest to students of women's studies, Soviet history, and Ukrainian life.

My parents are from a small town just outside Uzhhorod and I have visited the city four times. I found her story to reflect the charm and mystery of this remote corner of the world very accurately and completely.

As of 2007, two editions of this book have been published (11,000 copies in all). Copies of the original book "Zloczyn" [Genocide]--in Ukrainian--have been distributed free of charge throughout Ukraine. This English translation publication will be distributed free of charge to the United Nations in New York and to all of the Ukrainian embassies throughout the democratic world.

In the Foreword written by journalist Bohdan Rudnytski, he quotes from eminent human rights defender Levko Lukianenko, who is the Head of the Association of Researchers on the Holodomors in Ukraine and was awarded an honorary Doctor of Law Degree: "Historical accountability between Ukraine and Russia should commence from the seventeenth century. Indeed, the art of politics is based not on satisfying emotions of revenge, which are focused on the past, but rather on creating a positive basis and conditions for the future development of the [Ukrainian] nation."

Australian activist Peter Kardash is the compiler and publisher of "Genocide in Ukraine." His words are as follows: "Through this book the tragic history of Ukraine down the centuries is speaking to you. The truth about the horrific legacy of violence, terror, denationalization, Russification, deportations, and the three Holodomors is finally beginning to emerge. This book describes the terrible wars, cruel occupations, and the destruction of the political, intellectual, and spiritual leadership of the Ukrainian nation. The entire world watched as Nazi war criminals were tried in Nuremberg. It is my firm belief that Ukraine has suffered more than any other nation in the world."

Further, the section entitled Nuremberg-2 states, in part: "...the All-Ukrainian Society of Political Prisoners and Repressed Persons, the Association of Researchers of the Holodomors in Ukraine, and the Memorial Society, together with twenty-three political parties and organizations, founded the Ukrainian National Committee at the Writers' Building [in Kyiv] on 21 March 1996, whose goal is to organize an international court to try the CPSU (Communist Party of the Soviet Union) for totalitarian crimes (Nuremberg-2).

...While our committee, Nuremberg-2 in the Verkhovna Rada, enlisted sixty-eight deputies to the informal group tasked with preparing for an international court and initiated energetic activity in all directions, no assistance has been forthcoming from the pro-communist leadership in the Verkhovna Rada...On 6 November 1997 the Lithuanian parliament passed a resolution on mass repressions, genocide and other crimes against humanity and war crimes perpetrated during the period of occupation. The parliaments of the Czech Republic and Poland passed similar documents.

On 29 November 1997, on the initiative of Lithuanian organizations consisting of people who resisted the occupation and of victims of communism, an organizational committee was formed to prepare an international public tribunal to assess the crimes of communism.... In July 1998 discussions that began more than fifty years ago culminated in a resolution passed in Rome by world states to create the International Criminal Court to prosecute crimes and against humanity and their perpetrators, no matter who committed these crimes or where...

The Lithuanian organizing committee sent an invitation to Ukraine, to the Society of Political Prisoners and Repressed Persons as the organization most directly interested in the work of the international court"....Although, the Association of the Holodomors in Ukraine was informed very late about the preparations for the Vilnius court, at which time a group of ten patriotic scholars from Kyiv was formed to prepare the Ukrainian side for the trial, they prepared appropriate materials on the basis of which Levko Lukianenko drew up a twenty-two page bill of indictment. Levko Lukianenko presented the bill of indictment in the name of Ukraine.

There is very much of Ukraine's history recounted in the voluminous "Genocide in Ukraine." Some of the numerous articles deal with topics such as: The Destruction of the Sich; Ivan Mazepa; The Kruty and Bazar Tragedies; The Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church; How Bolsheviks Imprisoned Priests; How the Communists Turned Churches into Prisons; The Union for the Liberation of Ukraine (SVU); The Persecution of the Kobzars; The Deportation of the Ukrainian Intelligentsia; The Thorny Road of the Ukrainian Language; Purged Ukrainian Intellectuals; Profiles of Four Ukrainian Freedom Fighters: Petliura, Konovalets, Bandera and Shukhevych; In Auschwitz; Nil Khasevych, Hero of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army; The Murder of the Composer Volodymyr Ivasiuk; Operation Wisla; Jaworzno (Concentration Camp); Crime: Ukrainian Catholicism's Way of the Cross; Patriach Volodymyr of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of Kyiv and All Ukraine-Rus; Kolyma Soviet concentration camp; and, Nuremberg-2.

The table of contents lists 140 entries in this extremely well documented, over-sized book with large type, numerous black and white archival photos, copies of documents and newspaper articles, eyewitness accounts, and lists broken down by region, raion, city, and village.

Although Amazon shows that this book is unavailable, keep checking other sources--Yevshan has it in stock. This is a must-read book that should be part of history curriculums and should appear on library shelves worldwide!--Mandrivnyk, Arlington Heights, IL

Book review by Edna Boardman, Bismarck, North Dakota

Drawing on his first hand experiences and knowledge, Landau native John Philipps begins with a once-over-lightly history of the area above the Black Sea in which the German colonists settled. He recounts this history from memory, mixing major historical movements with lesser details. He includes the full text of "The Memorandum of the Secretary of the Interior Ratified by Alexander I," the February 20, 1804 document under which the Black Sea Germans entered Russia. It is interesting to see how this differs from Catherine the Great's manifesto which set the guidelines for the first Germans who settled along the Volga. (Catherine's manifesto does not appear in this book but will be known to many readers and is readily available elsewhere.)

About the first half of the book is made up of thumbnail histories of individual mother colonies. A difference from brief histories that one might find in other books is that Philipps brings the story of their development into the time of the Bolshevik revolution. He tells of the deterioration of the villages and what became of the village and/or villagers. Brief essays in the book bear titles such as "Expansion and Founding of Daughter Colonies," "The Barges of Ulm (Ulmer Schachtel)," "The 100th anniversary of the Beresan colonists in Landau," "The College for Girls, During the Soviet Period `Agrotechnikum," "The Educational system," "The St. Raphael Church Built in 1863," "The Immigration of the Beresan Colonies," and "The Development of Agriculture."

On page 110, about the middle of the book, essays titled "Phases of the Deprivation of Rights," and "World War I and Its Results," move the reader into the era when things begin to deteriorate for the German colonists. A law passed on July 4, 1871, "revoked the privileges given upon settlement to the German colonies." The administration of the villages was put under Russian provincial governors, keepers of records had to do their work in the Russian language, and Russian patriotism was given primacy. Many colonists voted with their feet. They migrated to farms in Siberia (where laws were more loosely enforced), Canada, the U.S., and South America. Philipps then guides the reader through the sequence of accelerating degradation and destruction--the Civil War of 1917-1921, the famine of 1921-1922, the New Economic Policy of 1021-1929, the collectivization of agriculture, 1928-1933, and the terrible famine of 1932-1933. Of this period he says, "There was no end to this brutality, mass arrests, and deportations."

His accounts, though told in straightforward narrative, are powerful because Philipps, as a young man, became an agronomist at the Machine Tractor Station in Speyer. The MTS units provided
machines to collective farms in the area and served as political centers. He tells of one chilling incident when army officers stopped at the station. "One of the officers asked ironically, `Can you tell me the name of this place?' The accountant, Rafael Bleile, gave the answer, `This is Speyer.' The officer, `O, yes, Speyerburg.' the accountant, `No, just Speyer." The officer asked, `Why are you still here? Waiting for your friend Gitter (Hitler)? But don't rejoice too soon; we will return again and settle with you fascists.' And we asked ourselves, `What will become of us when the Germans really come into our villages and the Soviets come back again.'" He had the opportunity to find out.

Philipps suffered deeply in the years that followed his departure from Russia but before he was able to emigrate to the United States. His mother and son died on the train back into the Soviet
Union.

Philipps includes black and white photographs of major buildings and of a few homes. Many of the photographs were taken in recent years by visitors to the Ukraine; others, which show steeples missing from churches and ruined homes, reflect the earlier communist period. He adds
maps and the dorfplans which also appear in the books by Joseph S. Height (Paradise on the Steppe and Homesteaders on the Steppe). The book ends with the German occupation of the
Ukraine, the dissolution of the colonies, the trek to the Warthegau in Poland with the German army, and a brief mention of the enforced repatriation of many ethnic Germans from Russia after the war. Philipps reviews the scope of the Gulag, gives present-day population figures in the former Soviet Union, and closes with 36 pages of names of men executed during the time the communists consolidated their power, 1932-1938. The list, he says, is not nearly complete. Subject and name indexes are so useful for researchers. His work does not have the precision a scholar would bring to a history, but he was a keen observer who felt the era in his bones, and that has great value too.

Ably edited and with informative commentary by Joan Aruz, Ann Farkas, Andrei Alekseev, and Elena Korolkova, The Golden Deer Of Eurasia: Scythian And Sarmatian Treasures From The Russian Steppes is a showcase volume of spectacular artifacts crated from about the fifth to the fourth century B.C.E. by the nomadic people who lived on the steeps of the southern Ural Mountain region and uncovered by recent archaeology expeditions in Filippovka, Russia. The objects include wooden, deer-like creatures overlaid with sheets of gold and silver, as well as gold attachments for wooden vessels, leather, and fabric. Very highly recommended for art history, anthropology, and archaeology reference collections, The Golden Deer Of Eurasia is the catalogue for an exhibition presented by The Metropolitan Museum of Art and is a 320-page compendium of 335 illustrations (280 in color) and seven maps.

The storytelling here is very compelling. While the basic ideas - the complexities of love and family, the denial of roots, the search for hope, the debilitation of despair and the sweetness of redemption - are classic, the characters and plot details in "The Green Library" are refreshingly original. They have a strong Canadian or even North American resonance. They are all magically woven into a beautiful and moving novel. Kulyk Keefer's descriptive talents are especially rewarding. While I enjoyed this book as part of my 'summer holiday reading,' I recommend it to anyone to enjoy at anytime.

Excellent book about a personal experience of immigration from Russia to Canada. In addition, a lot of general information of Mennonite settlements in Russia, experience during the Russian revolution, and immigrations.

The author downplays his own evolution from being born in Russia, extreme poverty in Alberta, and how he managed to obtain an education and many considerable achievements and contributions.

I cannot express how moving these poems are. I had to stop at several points to simply cry and reflect on what I was feeling and I am not easily moved by words. A beautiful memorial to the people of Chernobyl. I do not think you can read this and not see the humanity reflected in his words. This should be required reading for every person living in a country that is a nuclear power. Please read these poems.

Stanislaw Lem's writing is beautiful in this brief work. Fans of his science fiction will surely want to read this to get behind the artifice and learn about the writer. But those who are not familiar with his work will also enjoy this as a meditation on memory, growing up in Poland, and this writer's power to evoke meaning. I read it mostly before falling asleep and it gave me wonderful dreams.

Fr. Pekar gives a stunning and vibrant view of a turbulent history of a people who have been up till now relegated to the shadows of both European and Catholic history.He traces the story of the Carpatho-Rus as both an historian and as a theologian, carefully sorting and placing together those forces that helped to shape their identity as well as their survival against numerous odds.I highly recommend this book for those who wish to know the struggles of these people as well as for those who seek to understand the true universality of the Catholic Church.

Like the Abel Paz classic,"Durrutti,The people armed."This is one essential book.Second only to Durrutti in time.The place for the drama is the Ukraine,circa,1917-20.The history of the Makhnovista's is truly epic,gut wrenching and incredible.It is almost totally forgotten or ignored now,yet,this is one of those points in History with a capital H.The ripples of these extraordinary events and superhuman feats are still rippling outward in spite of several genocides wreaked on this reigon.The writers style seems a little old fashioned and unusual,yet, you get drawn in by the human interest story of the education and stellar rise of a genuine working class hero and revolutionary Icon,"Batko",Nestor Makhno met the author in prison and learnt the basics of anarchism from him.They were released in the febuary revolution and their battles in the south against tyranny's of white and red armies have become the stuff of legend.The study of what ordinary people actually do in revolutionary periods is intrinsically interesting.I would suggest that close study of the makhnovist libertarian socialist revolution should be rewarding,if only for entertainment.(Its 70mm cinematic.)