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Jaremčuk, Belej: The Spirit of the Age, or Through Wild Ukraine

Illustration
  • Where: Václav Havel Library, Ostrovní 13, Prague 110 00
  • When: November 24, 2017, 19:00 – 21:00

For several years the report genre has been developing rapidly in Ukraine. The best literary writers have been describing the fast-changing country, threatened by military conflict, in creative long-form pieces. Topics: The wild ‘90s. Untrammelled markets and mafia gangs. The interlacing of political, business and mafia groups. Fast cars, shootouts, moonshine and euro dance. The other within: Crimean Tatars. Crocodiles in swimming pools – pets of the wealthy. The spirt of the age: games consoles and Slovak wafers. They supported the Maidan, thinking victory had been won. Then came the men in green and they had to flee...

The initial spur for this development was the “Eyewitness” Literary Reporting Prize, named after an anonymous 17th century Cossack chronicle and run for six years by the Kiev publishing house Tempora. One of its jurors is a writer well-known to Czechs, Ukraine, Scale 1:1 author Oleh Kryshtopa.

Discussing contemporary reporting will be Olesja Jaremčuk and Les Belej, two writers whose work has been published in Czech in the magazines NaVýchod and Plav.

Hosted by Radko Mokryk. Interpretation by Alexej Sevruk.

The event is part of the accompanying programme to the International Conference of Ukrainian Studies Experts in Prague entitled “Ukraine as a cultural and historical narrative (language, history, literature)”.

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