William Shakespeare.
Kurt Vonnegut.
John Tolkien.
Taras Shevchenko.
Lesya Ukrainka.
Serhiy Zhadan.
Tove Jansson.
Astrid Lindgren.
Roald Dahl.
An ordinary bookshelf somewhere in Ukraine.
Judging by the book spines, the resident of this apartment is the most ordinary person interested in literature. If the books are lined up on the bookshelves in orderly rows, curated by subjects, it means that person loves books. And if the books are beautiful, and there are many of them in this ordinary apartment, they are clearly much valued here.
The emergency grab bags that Ukrainians have packed since February 24 contained various things. Often, there were books in those bags. Old books passed down from generation to generation. Thick novels and poetry collections. All kinds of books.
I spend a long time drawing up a list of contemporary books, must-haves for every Ukrainian library. I make a poll on Instagram Stories among my followers and add new titles to the list. Who knows how many books one needs to make up for their previous life?
Since the big war broke out, libraries with Ukrainian books have opened across countries. “Hi,” a friend of mine texts me. “Could you please send me a list of books that Ukrainians find important? I need it for a library opening in the Netherlands.” She is a writer with a novel to her name.
“Hello,” another friend of mine emails me. “A Ukrainian library is scheduled to open in Luxembourg.” He is a publisher and a curator of the parliamentary book club.
Ukrainian book is packing a suitcase. A long journey lies ahead.
Meanwhile, reports are coming from Ukraine: 101 libraries have lost part of their collections; 21 libraries lost their entire collections. Missile strikes have destroyed books from home libraries that will never be included in the official statistics of destroyed bookshelves.
My dear friend is now living in Amsterdam. She is a children’s author and a publisher. The books she has written in Ukraine have already been delivered to her new place abroad. She feels uncomfortable without her books.
The emergency grab bags that Ukrainians have packed since February 24 contained various things. Often, there were books in those bags. Old books passed down from generation to generation. Thick novels and poetry collections. All kinds of books.
I am standing in front of my home library in Kyiv. It is large.
A mobile app sends me an air raid alert. 123 days of full-scale war. I wonder about the size of a suitcase that could fit all our books signed by contemporary Ukrainian writers. It should be bottomless, I guess.
Since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, 121 public libraries in Ukraine have been damaged. The number of destroyed bookshelves in private apartments is still unknown.
Author: Svitlana Stretovych, Ukrainian essayist, program director of Litosvita
Translator: Hanna Leliv
Illustrator: Victoria Boyko
Content Editor: Maryna Korchaka
Program Directors: Julia Ovcharenko and Demyan Om Dyakiv Slavitski
The morning begins with a final farewell to a soldier in our yard. He died in the war. A message about this appeared in the neighbor chat yesterday, indicating the building number and the entrance. High-rise buildings, just like low-rise ones, can’t avoid loss in wartime. There are more than 800 apartments in our building. Is there at least one unaffected by the war?
He was so eager to join the army. Finally, he got conscripted. We couldn’t get in touch with him for several days, I already began bracing ourselves to say goodbye to him. And then in the evening Valerik sent me a message: ‘Alive. Love you’.
During Andriy Lyubka’s literary soiree, we talk about literature and travel around Ukraine, about how we manage to help the Army, about the importance of every person working for our victory. Andriy reads his texts, which send waves of eager joyous laughter throughout the audience. At the end of the event, visitors applaud for a long time.
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