In this episode of the podcast Я чую інших ("I hear others"), Vyacheslav Likhachov (Ukrainian Center for Civil Liberties) discusses xenophobia in Ukrainian society against whom do Ukrainians have prejudices and how do such prejudices arise?

In buff.ly/D9zGOgP the Repainted Fox podcasters use Serhiy Zhadan's "Depeche Mode" to prompt discussion of generational change in Ukraine.

This interview with Oleksandr Demchenko sensitively unpacks the topic of Ukrainians in the occupied territories: why they stayed, collaboration vs survival, and the attitudes of other Ukrainians towards those who stayed - both now and in various possible futures.

In Bohdan Kolomiichuk’s “Etretat” a man wakes in his Lviv apartment with no idea who he is. Prompted by a single memory, he makes his way to Etretat in Normandy - on Christmas Day - where he pieces his own story back together.

In Petro Yatsenko’s short story Шопка на шпалах (“Crib scene on sleepers”) a crabby narrator is stuck on a train to Lviv on Christmas Eve. His sardonic commentary becomes part of a reenactment of the Christmas story. www.yakaboo.ua/ua/take-rizn...

Thank you so much, BBC, for badging this as a Zelenskyy failure rather than, for example, the refusal of a Russian asset to disobey orders. Or even simply trump’s refusal. Zelensky fails to secure Tomahawk missiles at talks with Trump www.bbc.com/news/article...

In Штука (The Unit) Kateryna Babkina explores the emotions of a woman forced by pandemic closures to spend Christmas in a tiny room at an airport instead of with her husband and young child. www.yakaboo.ua/ua/take-rizn...

ТАКЕ РІЗНЕ РІЗДВО is a collection of short stories by contemporary Ukrainian writers. In Гніздо (The Nest) Krystia Venhryniuk gives us a retired schoolteacher alienated from her own family and former colleagues but transformed by caring for an injured swallow. www.yakaboo.ua/ua/take-rizn...

ТАКЕ РІЗНЕ РІЗДВО is a collection of 14 short stories by contemporary Ukrainian writers. In Liudmila Taran’s Miracle on Zhemaitiia Street, a garrulous woman regales her patient friend with the story of a miracle in Vilnius. www.yakaboo.ua/ua/take-rizn...

ТАКЕ РІЗНЕ РІЗДВО is a collection of 14 short stories by contemporary Ukrainian writers. In Vasil Makhno’s New Rochelle, a Ukrainian emigree to New York finds her past unexpectedly mixing with her present. www.yakaboo.ua/ua/take-rizn...

ТАКЕ РІЗНЕ РІЗДВО is a collection of short stories by contemporary Ukrainian writers. In Contra spem spero, Kostyantin Moskalets riffs on Lesia Ukrainka's poem to give us the story of a depressed down and out given unexpected new strength by a meeting with a stranger. www.yakaboo.ua/ua/take-rizn...

ТАКЕ РІЗНЕ РІЗДВО is a collection of short stories by contemporary Ukrainian writers. In Dzvinka Matiiash's Вертеп, кекс та інші чудеса ('A crib scene, a cake, and other wonders'), a family Christmas is enriched by a desire to find wonders and the ability to see them. www.yakaboo.ua/ua/take-rizn...

The Ukrainian-language podcast Я чую інших ('I hear others') is a human rights-oriented podcast hosted by Maksym Butkevych and Daria Bura. In this episode they discuss how, in practice, prisoner exchanges are effected.

Ми повертаємось додому ('We're on our way back home') by Dzvinka Matiiash is a thought-provoking novel in nice, straightforward Ukrainian whose heroine/narrator is Agata, a girl of ten, tall for her age, a misfit. There's much food for thought here about normality and 'fitting in'.

The Ukrainian-language podcast Я чую інших ('I hear others') is a human rights-oriented podcast hosted by Maksym Butkevych and Daria Bura. In this episode they conclude that Russia is simply incapable of becoming a democratic country.

The Ukrainian-language podcast Важко сказати ('Difficult to say') searches for the right words to say at sensitive times. Episode 5 is an interview with medic and mother Nataliia Leliukh and her experiences of counselling ladies who have become pregnant - or want to - during the war.

The Ukrainian-language podcast Я чую інших ('I hear others') is a human rights-oriented podcast hosted by Maksym Butkevych and Daria Bura. In this episode they discuss religious repression inside Russia, which they describe as even worse than in Soviet times.

The Ukrainian-language podcast Я чую інших ('I hear others') is a human rights-oriented podcast hosted by Maksym Butkevych and Daria Bura. In this episode they discuss the issues of demography and migration, which have been greatly exacerbated by Russia's invasion.

The Ukrainian-language podcast Важко сказати ('Difficult to say') searches for the right words to say at sensitive times. Episode 4 is an interview with Kateryna Leshchynyn on obtaining and retaining the support for Ukraine of people in countries currently enjoying peace.

The new Ukrainian-language podcast Важко сказати ('Difficult to say') helps us search for the right words to say at very sensitive times. Episode 3 features an interview with war photographer Stas Kozliuk on the sensitivities, challenges and prioirities of his work.

The Ukrainian-language podcast Я чую інших ('I hear others') is a human rights-oriented podcast hosted by Maksym Butkevych and Daria Bura. In this episode they discuss Ukrainian children stolen by the Russians. hromadske.radio/podcasts/ya-...

The new Ukrainian-language podcast Важко сказати ('Difficult to say') helps us search for the right words to say at sensitive times. Episode 2 deals with issues around the reintegration of veterans - 'people who've gone to meet death and survived' - into Ukrainian society.

The Ukrainian-language podcast Я чую інших ('I hear others') is a human rights-oriented podcast hosted by Maksym Butkevych and Daria Bura. In this episode they discuss the issue of people who cannot prove that they are legally Ukrainian because their papers have been lost or stolen.

The new Ukrainian-language podcast Важко сказати ('Difficult to say') helps us search for the right words to say at very sensitive times. Episode 1 features an interview with Nastya Fedchenko, whose husband was killed in the war when Nastya was eight months pregnant.

Defensive alliance that refuses to let Ukraine join suddenly anxious to learn from Ukraine how to defend itself

З Днем Незалежності України! 🇺🇦🌻Happy Independence Day, Ukraine!

Freeonis are really worth following

I've been asked to translate parts of Lubko Deresh's novel Погляд Медузи for the Frankfurt Book Fair and for other pitches to anglophone publishers. I've done only poems for months, and I'm trying to remember what it felt like to translate 105,000 words, so that I can face these 7750! #translation

I've been listening to an interview with Nastya Fedchenko on Hromadske Radio's podcast "Важко сказати". Nastya's husband was killed fighting six months ago, when Nastya was eight months pregnant. A piercing discussion of what to say and what not to say at such a time. hromadske.radio/podcasts/vaz...

I don’t know how Yevhenia Kuznetsova writes as she does. She’s a genius at seeing inside people, reading their motivations, hearing their speech. Unfortunately I’m already more than three-quarters of the way through her latest novel and I’ve read the others. #ukraine #ukrainianliterature #langsky

I told my friend in Cherkasy I'd bought a new fridge and it’s perfect except that really the door should open the other way; rehanging it requires effort. Seeing the future in a flash, she replied, «Немає нічого більш постійного, ніж тимчасове». “There’s nothing so permanent as something temporary”.

Fame is a fickle food Upon a shifting plate Whose table once a Guest but not The second time is set Whose crumbs the crows inspect And with ironic caw Flap past it to the Farmer’s corn Men eat of it and die Emily Dickinson #poetry #langsky

Another poem by the Ukrainian poetess Marina Ponomarenko.

At Marina Ponomarenko's invitation, I have participated in a Ukrainian Center for Civil Liberties project called "Тримайся! Тримаюсь!" ("Hold on!" "I'm holding on!") designed to publicise the treatment by Russia of prisoners in Russia's latest war on Ukraine. Project Insta link: buff.ly/Kxoa781...

Here is a newly-minted poem by the Ukrainian poetess Marina Ponomarenko. A clip of her reading the poem in situ in the countryside can be found on Facebook, and the importance of hearing the original sounds has persuaded me to include a link to her reading. www.facebook.com/share/r/1B8G...

Just reading a copy of the consumer magazine Which? Here's the start of an electric kettle review: "As a nation known for drinking tea, the loss of a trusty kettle can be bitterer than a badly brewed Earl Grey." #grammar #langsky #language

Thank you, @translatorsaloud.bsky.social

Like London buses, my translations of Marina Ponomarenko get bunched up in the traffic and all arrive together. Well, anyway, the last two did. Here is number 11.

A light in the darkness. Yevhenia Kuznetsova has written a new book

In buff.ly/UfPBUoc the Repainted Fox podcasters use the poetry of Mykola Vinhranovsky to explore themes of: experiencing poetry itself (reading vs reciting, alone vs in discussion); love & fear & self-acceptance; the passage from infatuation to love - and not merely in romantic relationships.

In youtu.be/hgWn1MtTTjo?... the Repainted Fox podcasters use Hryhir Tiutiunnyk's short story "Дивак" ("The Oddball") to prompt discussion of 'difference' and how it can be better managed - by parents, by schools.

In buff.ly/NOcEYPX the Repainted Fox podcasters use Vasyl Barka's Holodomor novel "The Yellow Prince" to prompt discussion of: why talk about the Holodomor; the impact of varied family stories (collaboration, hoarding, sharing); the impact of religious belief on sufferers' behaviour.

In buff.ly/78AyZwm, the Repainted Fox podcasters use Maik Yohansen's "Dr. Leonardo’s Journey" to prompt discussion of (among other things): the usefulness of a text standing the test of time; the usefulness of pseudonyms and role play in helping us find and assimilate new experiences.

In buff.ly/b5wThkG the Repainted Fox podcasters use Mykola Khvylovy's "Sanatorium zone" to prompt discussion of the failure of revolutionaries to identify what should be kept before they dismantle what hinders their plans. So they end up causing ruin. And those who ruin are not capable of building.

In buff.ly/EuiPYPS the Repainted Fox podcasters use Olha Kobylianska's "Earth" to prompt discussion of parental mistakes: measuring one (or more) of our children by reference to another; living our children's lives instead of our own; of blindly repeating the behaviour of previous generations.

... in other news, trump has described his new role as vladimir putin's notetaker as 'beautiful, a beautiful thing, very beautiful, exactly the kind of role that will make america great again, so beautiful after the damage that clone Joe Biden did to this beautiful country ...'

Ukrainians are under no obligation to die silently to spare the rest of us an elevated risk of Russia starting a nuclear war.

In buff.ly/lLWKJNm the poetry of Oleh Lysheha prompts discussion of: issues arising when parents & children grow up in differing circs (eg wartime v peace); the importance of the moment when you realise your parents are not perfect; the impossibility of knowing what's going on inside another person.