Znakomita książka! Chociaż czytana w naprawdę wyjątkowych i trudnych (i niezapomnianych!!) okolicznościach. Kawał mądrej i pięknej literatury.
Wzruszający jest ten ukraińsko-stepowy magiczny realizm.
Czyta się wręcz ze sciśniętym gardłem, wiedząc, jaki ciąg dalszy Ługańskowi dopisała za Żadana wstrętna historia.
Wielki talent!

Back when I was first starting my Global Challenge, trying to find a book for each country, I asked my boyfriend which book I should read for Ukraine, considering he and his family are Ukrainian. He lent me this one. He'd never read it, but he liked Serhiy Zhadan—he listened to his music and had met him once or twice (for a fairly large country, Ukraine is also pretty small, if you get my meaning). So I took the book and proceeded to not read it for several months.

Then Ukraine was invaded. My boyfriend's family imploded; friends and relatives were in peril, suddenly a week without texts wasn't just someone forgetting to write, it was something terrifying, something so much bigger. They worked to send supplies and aid over. We went to protests and fundraisers. And, for several more months, I didn't read this book.

I don't know what finally made me open it up, but I'm glad I did. In Voroshilovgrad—the title itself referencing the Russified name of a place now called Luhansk—Serhiy Zhadan writes of a Ukraine which is at once living and dead, simultaneously dying and being resurrected. He describes broken asphalt and train tracks that go nowhere, wandering dogs, endless wheat fields and sun-bleached negatives where portraits of Lenin once hung. It feels wrong to say this is eerily prescient, presaging the now-nearly-obliterated state of many of these places in Eastern Ukraine since the war began... It feels wrong because all of this really started long before 2022 or 2014 or even 1991, and so in a way Zhadan is observing the past just as much as he is telling the future.

I've been vague about what Voroshilovgrad actually is, and it's basically a Ukrainian odyssey, a road novel where the road just keeps bringing you back to the place you were trying to leave. There is an overarching narrative, but it's very loose, and you find yourself caring less and less about it as the story moves along: the real meat here is the series of surreal episodes our main character Herman experiences. A midnight soccer match with ghosts, a wedding at a village of Stundist smugglers, a drink of cognac with a psychopathic capitalist, an auspicious birth in the middle of the steppe. It is, by turns, contemplative, hilarious, mysterious, erotic, tense, depressing, and absurd.

The writing here is superb. Really, really wonderful. Zhadan is a master of simile.

Here is how he describes taking shelter in a building during a rainstorm: "...as if we were diving into a tin cookie jar while kids happily drummed on it with sticks."

Or his description of the desolate cornfields: "...yellow cornstalks that swayed in the wind like hangers in an empty closet..."

And this lovely sentence about a man entering a house where the main character has been cooped up for a while: "There was fresh air nestled into his leather jacket, as though he had come carrying scraps of an October morning in his pockets."

Just wonderful. I should mention the translation, though. It is, in the broad strokes, magnificent—perfectly representing Zhadan's expansive, textured, visual prose—but sloppy in the details. Missing punctuation, duplicate words, and omitted phrases are common. There are a few sentences that are totally botched and garbled beyond comprehensibility. Deep Vellum is an indie publisher and a nonprofit and I respect their mission (and in fact I did buy two more books from them after I finished this) but come on guys, hire a copyeditor, please!

_____________________

Global Challenge: Ukraine

De Oost-Oekraïense stad Loehansk heette van 1935 tot 1958 Vorosjilovgrad, vernoemd naar generaal Vorosjilov uit de Sovjetunie. Het gelijknamige boek van Serhi Zjadan – kennelijk een groot schrijver in eigen land – speelt zich af na 2000, maar het verleden manifesteert zich hier in het heden. Vanaf de eerste pagina zet Zjadan een wereld neer die ver weg lijkt te zijn van West-Europa, niet eens zozeer in geografisch als wel in cultuur-historisch opzicht. Hoofdpersoon Herman wordt onverwacht teruggetrokken naar de stad waar hij vandaan komt. De spreekwoordelijke ‘vaart der volkeren’ is aan de stad en haar bevolking voorbijgegaan: alle personages in het boek lijken de boot gemist te hebben, ze slijten hun leven in apathie en zoeken hun heil in goedkope alcohol of zelfs in kleine of grotere criminaliteit.

De grote kracht van het verhaal van Zjadan zit naar mijn idee in het scheppen van een belevingswereld die voor mensen in West-Europa vaak niet goed te begrijpen is. Het boek is niet cynisch: hoewel het een paar grimmige passages bevat, zit er ook een zekere luchtigheid in de beschrijvende schrijfstijl. Mijn bezwaar tegen het boek is dat het verhaal zelf wat voortkabbelt; de ‘omwenteling’ speelt zich al op pagina 1 af. Ik heb ‘Vorosjilovgrad’ vooral met plezier en soms verbazing gelezen en er veel van geleerd.

Pirmās ~simts lapas klaji jūsmoju, bet ap vidu jau pamatīgi no visa šī nomoda murdziņa-jociņa piekusu un nevarēju sagaidīt beigas. Feini, absurdi dialogi, bet aprakstos autors ir līdz šķebināšanai pārcenties ar tēlainās izteiksmes līdzekļiem.

I like this, didn't love it. It is a worthwhile read, and I intend to continue reading Zhadan, this one started strong and struggled to reach the finish line. I've give this another go in a year or so. For now, three and a half stars.

Kuri notikumi ir īsti un kuri - iedomāti? Šo jautājumu ir labāk aizmirst, lasot šo grāmatu. Autors meistarīgi veido noskaņu stāstu par nekurieni Ukrainā ar kolorītu tēlu plejādi. Tas viscaur ir papildināts ar atsvaidzinoši autentiskiem dialogiem, kuri arī tulkojumā nav neko zaudējuši. Kā lasītājam Tev ir vienkārši jāļaujas notikumu plūdumam, nemēģinot tajā visā saskatīt loģiku. Lai arī es ilgi baidījos lasīt šo grāmatu, man ir prieks, ka beidzot tai devu iespēju mani iepazīstināt ar mūsdienu ukraiņu literatūru.

Serhiy Zhadan is a very descriptive writer who paints his scenes elaborately. I enjoy reading him and look forward to reading "The Orphanage." I am told it is his best novel. In this book, the author weaves the story of a young man searching not only his past but his country's recent past in a mixture of sharp images of his internal and external realities. His characters are often tragic yet strangely heroic. Compelling reading as the world struggles to understand political forces at work in his part of the world.