Today marks the 150th anniversary of the birth of Lesya Ukrainka – Ukrainian poet, playwright, and public figure, and one of the Ukrainian literary classics.
Kiev. Ukraine. Ukraine Gate – February 25, 2021 – Art and Celebrities
Lesya Ukrainka is one of the most prominent figures in the history of Ukrainian literature as she left behind a wonderful literary work – great poems, prose works, poems, newspaper articles, and translations of world classics.
Larysa Kosach, whose real name is Lesia Ukrainka, was born on February 25, 1871, in Novohrad-Volynsky.
Her father, Petro Kosache, was a writer, and her mother, Olga Draumanova-Kosache, was a writer who was published under the pseudonym Olena Pechilka.
Their home was often a meeting place for writers, artists, and musicians, and artistic evenings and home concerts were held.
Uncle Mikhailo Draumanov, a well-known public figure, and cultural figure had a great influence on the spiritual development of Lesia Ukrainka.
Lycia wrote her first poem – “Hope” – when she was nine years old. It happened under the impression that her aunt, Olena Kosache, had been arrested and exiled, who belonged to the “rebel” circle in Kiev.
And already at the age of thirteen Larisa Kosache began to print. In 1884, two poems (“Lily of the Valley” and “Sappho”) were published in the magazine Zorya in Lviv, where the name Lesya Ukrainka appeared for the first time. At the beginning of 1893, the first collection of poems by the poet was published in Lviv – “On the wings of songs”.
When she was a child, Lycia became ill with tuberculosis, which she suffered throughout her life and the disease caused the girl not to go to school, but thanks to her mother, as well as Mikhail Drahumanov, she received a deep and varied education, the writer knew 11 languages, local and international literature, history, and philosophy.
After visiting Galicia in 1891, and later in Bukovina, Lesia met many prominent personalities in western Ukraine: Ivan Franco, Mykhailo Pavlik, Olga Kobylianska, Vasil Stefanik, Ozip Makovi, and Natalia Kubrenska.
Because of her views and actions, the poetess was under the secret supervision of the police, and her works were repeatedly banned by censorship. Most of her work was published abroad in the Russian Empire – Berlin, Dresden, Prague, and Vienna.
Throughout her life, Lesya Ukrainka had to undergo treatment, undergo painful medical procedures, as well as search for places to live that would slow the progression of the disease.
In recent years, Lesya Ukrainka has lived in Georgia and Egypt, where she worked with her husband, Clement Kvitka, on a range of folklore and her own dramas.
But in early July 1913, the disease progressed, as Lysine’s condition deteriorated sharply.
On August 1, 1913, the Georgian city of Surami Lisia Okranca died. Her funeral took place a few days later in Kiev at the Baikovo cemetery.
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Source: Ukrgate