Interview:   Andrei Kurkov

His screenplay for A Friend of the Deceased was nominated for the 1997 European Film Award.

Kurkov calls Kyiv, where he has lived since childhood, home, but now spends much time in London, England (his wife, whom he married in 1988, is British). A regular speaker at international book fairs, Kurkov is an ambassador for Ukrainian literature in the global arena.

Yet, Kurkov writes his novels in Russian, was born in St. Petersburg in 1961 and has Russian ancestry. Nevertheless, he corrects anyone who refers to him as a Russian writer.  He regards himself as a Ukrainian.

Last month, Kurkov delivered the 13th annual J.B. Rudnyckyj Distinguished Lecture at the University of Manitoba. While he was in Canada, The New Pathway’s Olena Wawryshyn spoke to Kurkov about national identity, literature and politics in Ukraine.

NP: You write in Russian, yet refer to yourself as a Ukrainian writer. What does it mean to you to be a Ukrainian writer?

AK: I write fiction in Russian, but I write essays and journalism in Russian, Ukrainian, English and German. It is a question of mentality, self-identification and maybe pragmatic patriotism. We have a lot of professional patriots who are defending the ethnic idea and I’m defending the state idea. For me, patriotism should be state patriotism, not only ethnic patriotism.

NP: What are the common characteristics of Ukrainian literature?

AK: Contemporary Ukrainian literature is quite apolitical. Ukrainian writers like Yuri Andrukhovych, Sergei Zhadan and Lubko Deresh are, in principle, against Ukrainian politics. They don’t want to have anything to do with politics, the state, the establishment. It is slowly changing now because the new government has a better image. Writers like Oksana Zabuzhko have agreed to work on the cultural commission under President Yushchenko. 

I write on political [themes], describing inventive or exaggerated events with the real Ukraine as the setting.

Ukrainian literature is also very original in its essence because we have a very good group of writers in western Ukraine...But, we don’t have young literature of a national level nor enough young, active writers. We have maybe 20 writers who are regularly published.

NP: When you say literature of a “national level” do you mean that’s read across the country?

AK: Yes. Until now all the literature in the Ukrainian language has been considered Ukrainian literature. Yet, half of Ukraine speaks Russian and there are 400,000 Crimean Tatars in Ukraine. Literature in Ukrainian is read only in central and western Ukraine and by Ukrainian intellectuals in the other regions. But, the eastern and southern parts of Ukraine are Russian-speaking and they read books imported from Russia.

The Crimean Tatars have about 80 poets and writers who write in the Tatar language. Their books are not translated into Russian or Ukrainian.

Ukraine has 48 million people. The average print-run of the best Ukrainian writer, like Andrukhovych, will probably be 3,000 copies, and he is read mostly by intellectuals and the younger generation, the students.

NP: Why do you think there are so few young Ukrainian writers?

AK: From 1991, the government was not interested in promoting young Ukrainian writers. The old Ukrainian literature of the Soviet time was gone immediately.  The vacuum that appeared was taken over by Russian publishers and Russian books, and the new Ukrainian literature was somehow ignored and pushed to the margin of cultural life.

But, there was an excellent breakthrough last year, when seven books by young Ukrainian writers were published in Poland by Polish publishing houses. One of these novels, Collection of Passions, by Natalka Sniadanka, became a bestseller in Poland….It’s a story about a young Galician girl from a very conservative family in today’s Lviv and her love for a German. It’s a very interesting picture of youth life and generational conflict.

NP: You’ve often said Ukraine lacks a book distribution system and publishers are not promoting Ukrainian books enough. How can the situation be improved?

AK: The distribution is still in a very bad state. We have 550 towns with 15,000 people where there are no bookshops. What can be done? The state ministry of education could promote Ukrainian literature. We need propaganda for Ukrainian literature inside the country, literary festivals and more local book fairs. I was involved in organizing the first small-town book fair in Ukraine in Zhytomyr three years ago.

Now, we are a team of about ten writers, between 30 and 45 years old, who travel around Ukraine, organizing different events like gala readings. For example, for three hours, we replace shop sellers in bookshops–the writers sell their and other writers’ books. This has become very popular.

NP: What is it about your books that appeals to European readers?

AK: Black humour, normal humour, irony, elements of surrealism and the optimistic attitude of my books. Russian authors like Vladimir Serokin and Victor Pelanin were translated. But their novels are quite grim and depressive. The ordinary reader does not want to read black stuff. At the same time, the Western reader is curious about post-Soviet life.  I often describe tragic situations, but not in a depressed way. It makes my stories more acceptable.

NP: In addition to the Ukrainian writers you’ve already mentioned, which others are noteworthy?

AK: Maria Matios wrote a novel called Solodka Darusia: I love it. It is a story of one girl, and three generations of one family living in Bukovyna on the border with Romania. Matios got a state literary prize for it a year ago. Another writer is Taras Prohasko. [He writes in] a very specific style. He writes short sentences that are very direct, precise. In Ukraine, there’s a tradition of very emotional and sentimental literature. But, his fiction has almost no emotions, a lot of philosophy.  It’s completely different than anything else that is being written in Ukraine and he has a good number of followers among the students in western Ukraine.

NP: You recently gave a lecture in Winnipeg. What are your impressions of Canada and Ukrainian-Canadians?

AK: I spent two days in Toronto in 2001 where I had book-signing sessions and a public reading. In Toronto, I met a lot of representatives of the younger generation who spoke very good Ukrainian, and these young people were very well educated. When I spoke to the Winnipeg Ukrainians, I noticed that many of them don’t speak Ukrainian.

I had expected some aggressive questions from the audience because I had such experiences with the Ukrainian diaspora in France and Germany. There, I met a lot of people who would not accept me as a Ukrainian writer because I am of Russian origin and I write in Russian.  There was no question like this from the Winnipeg audience. Canadian-Ukrainians seem much friendlier than the Western European Ukrainians and maybe more liberal.

At the Elizabeth Dafoe Library, at the University of Manitoba, I had a look at the books in the Slavic Collection that were published in Canada by Ukrainians. A part of Ukrainian culture and history immigrated with people to Canada.  I received a book by poet Petro Karmansky and books by Yurij Kosach. It’s very interesting to see what Karmansky writes about Ukrainians and Ruthenians who went to America and how he defended the Ukrainian language in Canada against Americanization.

In Canada, I learned there was an official document accepted with the Ukrainian [community’s] support dealing with multiculturalism, in Canada. It is a good idea that could probably be accepted by the Ukrainian state. It would help to consolidate the country and the nation, for the Russian speakers and other minorities to not feel excluded.

NP: What are your thoughts on the Orange Revolution’s legacy?

AK: The situation today is a result of several serious mistakes by Yushchenko’s team. In Kuchma’s time, western Ukraine was purposely ignored. Kuchma believed he could not really influence the mood and attitude of Western Ukrainians towards Kyiv or his government. After the Orange Revolution, Yushchenko, instead of fighting to promote his ideas in the eastern part of Ukraine, decided to ignore the east and south. He didn’t even prosecute those who were organizing falsifications in those regions. Now these people are [running for] parliament, in the main lists of the opposition part, and [if they are elected] he won’t be able to prosecute them.

Also, I think Yushchenko had a personnel problem. He had a lot of people who supported him, and he felt obliged to give them high positions in the Cabinet of Ministers and in his administration, and they were not fit for the job.

He obviously didn’t have a ready plan for the whole of Ukraine, so the revolution was more a protest against the old, corrupt Ukraine, than the beginning of the construction of a new Ukraine.

NP: What about the future?

AK: After the [March 26] elections, the local council in eastern and southern Ukraine will be run by ex-Kuchma people and in central and western by Orange politicians. We should try to keep the population politically engaged to a maximum. The ordinary people should be educated that they are capable of controlling their local councils and authorities. If they are not happy with the things going on in their town or village they should look for alternative political parties to support.

With the political reforms, Ukraine will now be a parliamentary presidential republic so the local councils and authorities will in a way be much more important and influential locally and in the regions than the authorities in Kyiv.

The main goal of the Orange Revolution was achieved. People understood that they can influence politics and the situation in the country. I’m quite hopeful about the future.