In this edition of Knyzka Corner, we will be discussing Serhii Plokhy’s non-fiction thriller, The Man with the Poison Gun – A Cold War Spy Story. The Man with the Poison Gun, Serhii Plokhy’s first non-fiction thriller, focuses on the life of Bogdan Stashinsky, the assassin who killed Stepan Bandera and Lev Rebet. The very first paragraph sets up a shocking comparison between fiction and real life. In the fall of 1961 while, ”David Cornwell, a British spy more commonly known as John le Carré, was contemplating the writing of his first bestselling novel, The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, the West German police were [actually] interrogating a Soviet spy.” (p. xi) That spy was Bogdan Stashinsky. His story begins in 1949 in post-war Ukraine when Nikita Khrushchev, then the party boss of Ukraine, decided that he needed to destroy the Ukrainian resistance by killing the leader of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) – Stepan Bandera. Bandera had spent years in Polish prisons and the German concentration camp of Sachsenhausen. His followers were now headquartered in Munich, the centre of the American occupation zone in Germany. In early 1950, Bogdan Stashinsky was arrested by the Soviets for […]

In this edition of Knyzka Corner, we will be discussing Timothy Snyder’s, The Red Prince: The Secret Lives of a Habsburg Archduke. Who can resist a romantic Hapsburg hero who openly embraces the cause of Ukrainian nationalism in the early 20th century? Wilhelm von Habsburg was such a man. Although he died in obscurity in a Russian prison in 1948, Wilhelm made the creation of a Ukrainian nation the cause of his life. As the son of Archduke Stefan and Archduchess Maria Theresia, Wilhelm led a very privileged life along with his five brothers and sisters. “At the time, their family still ruled the Habsburg monarchy, Europe’s proudest and oldest realm. Stretching from the mountains of Ukraine in the north to the warm water of the Adriatic Sea in the south…” (p. 2) Wilhelm’s parents had castles on a peninsula called Istria on the Adriatic Sea and in Poland. His father believed that Poland would eventually become a separate entity and would need a Habsburg king. He hoped to be that king! During his time at military school in Moravia, Wilhelm became interested in the idea of a Ukrainian state. Perhaps he could eventually rule Ukraine for the Hapsburg monarchy. […]

In this edition of Knyzhka Corner: Communism and Hunger – The Ukrainian, Chinese, Kazakh, and Soviet Famines in Comparative Perspective edited by Andrea Graziosi and Frank E. Sysyn. Communism and Hunger is a collection of scholarly articles examining the similarities and differences of the pan-Soviet famine of 1931-1933, the Ukrainian Holodomor, the Kazakh great hunger, and the famine in China in 1958-1962. The articles were written by scholars who presented their papers at a 2014 conference organized by the Holodomor Research and Education Consortium. “Whatever the economic motivations, the famines were also political events requiring political analysis of their causes and courses.” (p. vii) The first three articles in this collection examine the specific causes, events and results of the famines. Nicholas Werth examines the “man made” famines in the USSR from 1928-1933, which killed between 6.5 to 7 million people – 4.2 million in Ukraine and the Kuban, 1.5 million in Kazakhstan and more than a million throughout the rest of the Soviet Union. Stalin considered peasant resistance to his economic policies a war on the Soviet Union. Werth describes the forced collectivization in Ukraine in brutal terms, “The total confiscation of land and livestock from village communities, the harsh […]

In this edition of Knyzka Corner, we will be discussing Leslie Peirce’s Empress of the East, the biography of Roxelana, a captive slave who became the wife of Sultan Suleyman the Magnificent. Empress of the East is a profoundly insightful look at one of the most mysterious figures of the sixteenth century. Roxelana was a slave captured in Ukraine. At the time, Ukraine was known as Ruthenia. She was sold to the Ottoman harem, but later became the wife of Sultan Suleyman the Magnificent. She ruled with her husband and had a lasting impact on the country known as Turkey today. The subtitle of the book sums up Roxelana’s importance, “How a European Slave Girl Became Queen of the Ottoman Empire.” Leslie Peirce skillfully describes the perilous journey that led Roxelana from “obscurity to the sultan’s bed.” (p. 3) Roxelana was captured at age 13 in her homeland known at that time as Ruthenia. Today, she would have lived in Ukraine. She became a royal concubine, and quickly became a favourite of the Sultan. After bearing him a son named Mehmed, Roxelana retained favour with Suleyman I for fifteen years before marrying him in 1536. In a revolutionary break with tradition, she […]

In this edition of Knyzka Corner, we will be discussing Vasyl Shkliar’s novel, Raven’s Way. Raven’s Way was first published in 2009 in Ukraine with the title Black Raven.  It has recently been translated by Stephen Komarnyckyj and published in English by Kalyna Language Press. It won the Taras Shevchenko Award in 2011, the most important literary prize in Ukraine.  However, Vasyl Shkliar refused to accept this award. and the prize money of $32,000, as a protest against the policies of Victor Yanukovych’s government. The introduction to Raven’s Way states that Shkliar, “was simply continuing the fight for freedom and democracy started by his grandfather and other young men in the forest so long ago.  This time by hurling words instead of grenades.” The novel begins in 1921 with the insurgency against Russian occupiers in Kholodnyi Yar.  The rebels are fighting under a black flag with the inscription, “A Free Ukraine or Death.” In the very first scene, Otaman Veremii is buried in the Hunskyi Forest while a mysterious ancient raven looks on, “observing the strange proceedings of humanity and trying to understand them.” (p. 11)   The events of the novel are told by multiple narrators describing the steadfast […]

In this edition of Knyzka Corner, we will be discussing Maurice Mierau’s award-winning memoir, Detachment: An Adoption Memoir. Readers first meet an emotionally drained Maurice in 2009 in a psychologist’s office in Winnipeg. For three years, his wife Betsy has been urging him to get help. He tells the psychologist, “I have problems in my marriage, marital problems I guess.” (p. 11) He explains that he feels he is a bad husband, as well as an unresponsive parent to his oldest son Jeremy, and his two sons, Peter and Bohdan, who were adopted from Ukraine in 2005. He also worries about his complicated relationship with his father as well as his father’s traumatic past. In order to deal with these issues, Maurice is writing a book. Detachment is the result of his psychological exploration. This memoir is divided into seven chapters exploring the complex adoption process and its aftermath. Maurice and Betsy decided to adopt in Ukraine because of their family connections. Maurice’s family members were Mennonites from Ukraine, who fled the country during World War Two. When they arrive in Ukraine, they discover that instead of a little girl and another child, they are going to adopt two brothers. […]

Bill Browder’s fascinating new book Red Notice, is a roller-coaster ride through post-Soviet Russian history. Bill Browder was one of the architects of Russia’s growing economy during the privatization era. He saw an opportunity to make a great deal of money and created the Hermitage Capital investment fund based in Moscow. Browder became the largest foreign investor in Russia. In 2000, his fund ranked as, “The best performing emerging-markets fund in the world.” (p. 1) However, on November 13, 2005, Bill Browder was expelled from Russia. He would later become one of Russia’s harshest critics after the imprisonment and murder of his Russian lawyer, Sergei Magnitsky. He grew up in the United States as the grandson of the leader of the American Communist Party. In his teens, Browder rebelled against his family’s ideology. “I would put on a tie and become a capitalist.” (p. 17) He studied business at Stanford University in California. After graduation, he moved to England to work for the Boston Consulting Group and Robert Maxwell. His first job led him to Poland where he discovered the immense opportunity for profit in Poland’s privatization process. After setting up his own investment fund called Hermitage Capital, Browder became […]

In this edition of Knyzka Corner, we will be discussing Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch’s new novel, Dance of the Banished. Dance of the Banished explores the tragic history of Canadian internment camps and the Armenian genocide. It is a story of injustice, prejudice and violence. Skrypuch’s novel is loosely based on actual events, and it was published to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Canada’s World War I War Measures Act which set up the internment camps. This novel describes the unbreakable bonds of love in the face of catastrophic conflict. The year is 1913. Teenage lovers Ali and Zeynep live in Eyolmez, Anatolia which is now in Turkey.  They are Alevi Kurds who speak the Zaza dialect and practise a religion which believes “in Jesus, the sun, the moon, the stars and Allah.” (p. 16) One key aspect of their religion is a prayer dance called the semah which is the basis for the book’s title, Dance of the Banished. Ali gets a rare opportunity to immigrate to Canada with his brother Yousef.  He cannot afford to bring Zeynep with him but promises to do so in the future.  They agree to write letters to each other in their journals. However, […]