If the world was not prepared for something after the horrific covid-19 pandemic, would be the war between Russia and Ukraine. Can this world ever be a better place? One after the other – it was the virus before when everyone blamed China and now? Now, who are we supposed to blame, the authority? Is there no stopping? If you want to know about Russia and Ukraine then read these 5 books – it contains the culture of Russia and Ukraine, their past, fights, issues, and more.
5 Books To Know About Russia and Ukraine:
Red Famine – Anne Applebaum
During 1932-33, about 4 million Ukrainians died due to starvation. It is certainly one of the most horrific and devastating episodes in the history of the 20th century. Applebaum with extraordinary details investigates how this thing happened, who was responsible, and what the results of this period were in Red Famine.
I Will Die in a Foreign Land – Kalani Pickhart
The debut book of Pickhart was published in 2021 and it is set in Kyiv during the 2014 Maidan Revolution. The story portrays the events of 2014 from the comprehensive point of view of several sympathetic characters. It is a personal, evocative, and striving portrait of human perseverance, understanding, and empathy. The story follows four individuals throughout Ukrainian winter as their lives are changed forever due to the Euromaidan protests – Katya, who is a Ukrainian-American doctor based at a makeshift clinic in the St. Michael’s monastery; Slava, a fierce young activist; Misha, an engineer who has lived in the city of Kyiv since the demise of his wife due to radiation sickness; and Aleksandr Ivanovich, who plays piano and is a former KGB agent. In this story, their lives become tangled and each tries to seek solace during a brutal period.
The White Guard – Mikhail Bulgakov
The story is set in Ukraine in late 1918. The novel focuses on the fate of a Turbin family as several armies of the Ukrainian War of Independence – the Whites, the Reds, Ukrainian nationalists, and the Imperial German Army – the battle over Kyiv. Some of the historical figures such as Symon Petliura, Pyotr Wrangel, and Pavlo Skoropadsky appear as the family is caught up in the chaotic consequences of the October Revolution. One of the significant aspects of this book is that contains several autobiographical elements – Bulgakov added some of the features of his younger brother to the character of the younger Turbin brother. Even the description of the house of the Turbin family is the house of the author present in Kyiv.
Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka – Nikolai Gogol
This collection of short stories was written from year 1829-to 1832. Gogol spent the first nineteen years of his life in Ukraine; he put his early memories of childhood into these pictures of peasant life. The frame story of this collection takes place in Dykanka, Ukraine. In a series of letters, Gogol asked his mother to write him about the details of village customs, superstitions, dress, and old stories. These details were also used as the main source in this book. This book is separated into two volumes containing four stories in each volume. The first volume contains – Sorochyntsi Fair, St. John’s Eve, May Night or The Drowned Maiden, and The Lost Letter. The second volume contains – Christmas Eve, A Terrible Vengeance, Ivan Fyodorovich Shponka, His Aunt, and A Bewitched Place.
Babi Yar– Anatoly Kuznetsov
This book by Kuznetsov is an internationally acclaimed documentary book written based on the Babi Yar massacre. The murder count in two days of 33,771 Jewish civilians on September 29 –30, in the year 1941 in the Kyiv ravine was one of the major single mass killings of the holocaust. The mention of the word ‘document’ in the subtitle justifies that this book contains facts and the little literary conjectures are used to let the readers what could have or must have happened.
Also Read: 5 Books Recommended by Haruki Murakami
