Mariyka Pidhiryanka
Encyclopedia
Mariyka Pidhiryanka (1881-1963) was a Ukrainian
poet, best remembered for her children's poetry
though she also wrote adult work on patriotic themes.
on the edge of the Carpathian
forest, in what was then Austrian
Galicia. The landscape inspired her poem Верховина (Uplands):
Блакитне небо в головах,
А в ногах - ліси сині.
Орли мандрують в небесах,
Овечки - в полонині.
My head is in a sky so blue,
But I stand true in woods on high.
Sheep now shelter where I grew,
Where eagles freely fly.
Her father was a forester with a large family, who decided that he could only afford to send his sons to school. Instead, she was taught to read and write and subsequently given a literary education by her grandfather, a Greek Catholic priest. She subsequently won a scholarship to a girls' secondary school and in 1900 gained a place at a teacher training academy in L'viv, the provincial capital of eastern Galicia.
The city was the leading centre of Ukrainian literary life and political activism, led by the poet Ivan Franko
and his admirers. Unlike Tsarist Russia, Austria
allowed publication in the Ukrainian language
and Pidhiryanka's first collection of poetry appeared in L'viv in 1908. By then she was married and officially Mariya Lenert-Dombrovs'ka.
During the First World War, with her husband conscripted into the Austro-Hungarian army
, Pidhiryanka was evacuated with her children away from the Russian advance. Ukrainians were suspected of pro-Russian sympathies and the family was placed in civilian internment camps in Transcarpathia
(then part of Hungary
) and in Austria. She described the experience in her 1916 poem На чужині (In a strange land):
День розсвітає і минає,
Мов немає
Кружевом чорним тьма кружляє,
День спиває.
Each day dawns and dies,
Without surprise,
Then in dark’s deep sighs,
Nightmare cries.
After Austria-Hungary
collapsed, Pidhiryanka remained in exile across the Carpathians from war-torn Galicia, where the West Ukrainian People's Republic was defeated by the Poles, who then fought off the Bolsheviks and annexed the territory. Poland
was much less tolerant than Austria of Ukrainian aspirations. Transcarpathia, however, passed from Hungary, which had banned education in minority languages, to the more liberal new state of Czechoslovakia
.
Pidhiryanka organised schools to teach children in Ukrainian and became a prolific children's writer, with poems, plays and fables appearing in books, newspapers and magazines. Meanwhile, her poetry for adults, about her wartime experiences, found an audience among Ukrainian émigrés in North America
, where it was published in Philadelphia in 1922.
In 1927, she lost her job as a result of a Czech government campaign against Ukrainian schools and the following year she returned to Galicia in search of work. In 1929 Pidhiryanka and her sister-in law took charge of the village school at Antonivka, near Tlumach
. She is now remembered by a plaque on the school wall in Antonivka.
According to the memoirs of one of her pupils, Stefan Terlezki
, the two women taught more than a hundred children between them. The main medium of instruction had to be Polish but teaching of the Ukrainian language and literature was permitted. Terlezki recalls how his teacher instilled her love of Ukrainian culture in her pupils. Pidhiryanka was in turn inspired by her noisy class to write Гомін (Chatter) in 1934:
Ходив гомін у літі
Стежечками пільними,
Дзвонив гомін у житі
Дзвіночками дрібними.
Chattering voices sang
On summer pathways,
Chatter in rye rang
On bluebell bright days.
Дзвенів гомін в леліях,
Бринів гомін в струмочках,
І шуміла надія
В молоденьких листочках,
Що промовляться слова,
Проспіваються пісні
І сповняться мрії
Всі.
Chatter in the breeze,
Chatter in the trees,
Hope’s sound was found
In young leaves,
Words will resound
And songs be sung,
Dreams spun
Every one.
Все ж листки ті зотлілі
З вітром кануть та кануть,
Заспівають в могилі
Всю надію весняну…
Непромовлені слова,
Непроспівані пісні,
Несповнені мрії
Всі.
Where leaves are lost
In windblown frost,
In graveside prayers
When hope despairs…
No words resound,
No songs are sung,
No dreams spun
Not one.
In 1937, Pidhiryanka moved to the school in the neighbouring village of Bratishiv, where she taught until shortly after eastern Galicia was occupied by the Soviet Union
in 1939. Her career was abruptly ended in the spring of 1940, when a horse bolted in the market in the small town of Nizhniv. Pidhiryanka was trampled under its hooves and left bedridden. As a teacher, poet and Ukrainian patriot she would have been a likely target of the NKVD
, both before the invasion
by Nazi Germany
in 1941 and during Joseph Stalin
's post-war campaign against Ukrainian nationalism
. However, her injuries had consigned her to obscurity and she was spared.
In 1957, Pidhiryanka went to live with one of her daughters, who taught in a village school near L'viv. Even her children's poetry was now only published in the Ukrainian diaspora in North America. However, as Nikita Khrushchev
slightly relaxed the political climate, some of her poems began to appear in children's magazines in Ukraine.
In 1960 she was admitted to membership of the writers' union of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. This official recognition encouraged her to write one of her final poems Плине життя (Life flows):
Плине життя і плине
мов по воді.
Відпливли вже від мене
дні молоді.
Коли я в ніч темнісеньку
у сяйві мрій
Співала першу пісеньку
Землі своїй.
....
Світельця розсій в ранній
Райдузі снів
На дні мої останні
Й останній спів.
Life flows –onward it flows
Then ebbs away
Like water my life goes
Far from youth’s day.
I’ll hear in dark of night
My song’s first verse
Bright dreams that still delight
Brought back to earth.
....
My world will soon disperse
In sleep’s rainbow
I’ll sing my final verse
And then I’ll go.
Her official status allowed the publication in L'viv of a collection of her children's poetry, shortly before her death at the age of 82 on 20 May 1963 but republication of her adult work had to wait for Mikhail Gorbachev
and glasnost
. A forestry industry newspaper published one of her first World War poems in 1989 and it was then reprinted in local newspapers serving Nizhniv and Nadvirna. After Ukrainian independence Pidhiryanka was included in a collection of Transcarpathian poetry and her children's work remains popular in 21st century Ukraine.
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...
poet, best remembered for her children's poetry
Children's poetry
Children's poetry is poetry written for, a stupid reson as she says or appropriate for children. This may include folk poetry ; poetry written intentionally for young people Children's poetry is poetry written for, a stupid reson as she says or appropriate for children. This may include folk...
though she also wrote adult work on patriotic themes.
Life and work
Pidhiryanka was a pen-name, meaning "from under the mountains" and she was born Mariya Omelyanivna Lenert on 29 March 1881, in the village of Bili Oslavy near the town of NadvirnaNadvirna
Nadvirna is a city located in the Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast in western Ukraine. It is the administrative centre of Nadvirna Raion.Until World War I, Nadvirna was integrated into the Austro-Hungarian Empire, in the province of Galicia. In the inter-war years, the borders changed and it was annexed...
on the edge of the Carpathian
Carpathian
Carpathian may refer to:*Carpathian Mountains of Central and Eastern Europe*Carpathian Convention on sustainable development in that region*Carpathian Shepherd Dog, a Romanian sheep dog*Subcarpathian Voivodeship, an administrative division of Poland...
forest, in what was then Austrian
Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary , more formally known as the Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council and the Lands of the Holy Hungarian Crown of Saint Stephen, was a constitutional monarchic union between the crowns of the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary in...
Galicia. The landscape inspired her poem Верховина (Uplands):
Блакитне небо в головах,
А в ногах - ліси сині.
Орли мандрують в небесах,
Овечки - в полонині.
My head is in a sky so blue,
But I stand true in woods on high.
Sheep now shelter where I grew,
Where eagles freely fly.
Her father was a forester with a large family, who decided that he could only afford to send his sons to school. Instead, she was taught to read and write and subsequently given a literary education by her grandfather, a Greek Catholic priest. She subsequently won a scholarship to a girls' secondary school and in 1900 gained a place at a teacher training academy in L'viv, the provincial capital of eastern Galicia.
The city was the leading centre of Ukrainian literary life and political activism, led by the poet Ivan Franko
Ivan Franko
Ivan Yakovych Franko was a Ukrainian poet, writer, social and literary critic, journalist, interpreter, economist, political activist, doctor of philosophy, the author of the first detective novels and modern poetry in the Ukrainian language....
and his admirers. Unlike Tsarist Russia, Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
allowed publication in the Ukrainian language
Ukrainian language
Ukrainian is a language of the East Slavic subgroup of the Slavic languages. It is the official state language of Ukraine. Written Ukrainian uses a variant of the Cyrillic alphabet....
and Pidhiryanka's first collection of poetry appeared in L'viv in 1908. By then she was married and officially Mariya Lenert-Dombrovs'ka.
During the First World War, with her husband conscripted into the Austro-Hungarian army
Austro-Hungarian Army
The Austro-Hungarian Army was the ground force of the Austro-Hungarian Dual Monarchy from 1867 to 1918. It was composed of three parts: the joint army , the Austrian Landwehr , and the Hungarian Honvédség .In the wake of fighting between the...
, Pidhiryanka was evacuated with her children away from the Russian advance. Ukrainians were suspected of pro-Russian sympathies and the family was placed in civilian internment camps in Transcarpathia
Carpathian Ruthenia
Carpathian Ruthenia is a region in Eastern Europe, mostly located in western Ukraine's Zakarpattia Oblast , with smaller parts in easternmost Slovakia , Poland's Lemkovyna and Romanian Maramureş.It is...
(then part of Hungary
Hungary
Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
) and in Austria. She described the experience in her 1916 poem На чужині (In a strange land):
День розсвітає і минає,
Мов немає
Кружевом чорним тьма кружляє,
День спиває.
Each day dawns and dies,
Without surprise,
Then in dark’s deep sighs,
Nightmare cries.
After Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary , more formally known as the Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council and the Lands of the Holy Hungarian Crown of Saint Stephen, was a constitutional monarchic union between the crowns of the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary in...
collapsed, Pidhiryanka remained in exile across the Carpathians from war-torn Galicia, where the West Ukrainian People's Republic was defeated by the Poles, who then fought off the Bolsheviks and annexed the territory. Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
was much less tolerant than Austria of Ukrainian aspirations. Transcarpathia, however, passed from Hungary, which had banned education in minority languages, to the more liberal new state of Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...
.
Pidhiryanka organised schools to teach children in Ukrainian and became a prolific children's writer, with poems, plays and fables appearing in books, newspapers and magazines. Meanwhile, her poetry for adults, about her wartime experiences, found an audience among Ukrainian émigrés in North America
North America
North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...
, where it was published in Philadelphia in 1922.
In 1927, she lost her job as a result of a Czech government campaign against Ukrainian schools and the following year she returned to Galicia in search of work. In 1929 Pidhiryanka and her sister-in law took charge of the village school at Antonivka, near Tlumach
Tlumach
Tlumach is a small city located in the Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast, in western Ukraine. It is the administrative center of the Tlumach Raion .The current estimated population is around 8,800 .-History:...
. She is now remembered by a plaque on the school wall in Antonivka.
According to the memoirs of one of her pupils, Stefan Terlezki
Stefan Terlezki
Stefan Terlezki, CBE, was a British Conservative politician who served as Member of Parliament for Cardiff West from 1983 to 1987. Terlezki was born in Oleshiv, a village near the town of Tlumach in what is now western Ukraine but was then part of Poland...
, the two women taught more than a hundred children between them. The main medium of instruction had to be Polish but teaching of the Ukrainian language and literature was permitted. Terlezki recalls how his teacher instilled her love of Ukrainian culture in her pupils. Pidhiryanka was in turn inspired by her noisy class to write Гомін (Chatter) in 1934:
Ходив гомін у літі
Стежечками пільними,
Дзвонив гомін у житі
Дзвіночками дрібними.
Chattering voices sang
On summer pathways,
Chatter in rye rang
On bluebell bright days.
Дзвенів гомін в леліях,
Бринів гомін в струмочках,
І шуміла надія
В молоденьких листочках,
Що промовляться слова,
Проспіваються пісні
І сповняться мрії
Всі.
Chatter in the breeze,
Chatter in the trees,
Hope’s sound was found
In young leaves,
Words will resound
And songs be sung,
Dreams spun
Every one.
Все ж листки ті зотлілі
З вітром кануть та кануть,
Заспівають в могилі
Всю надію весняну…
Непромовлені слова,
Непроспівані пісні,
Несповнені мрії
Всі.
Where leaves are lost
In windblown frost,
In graveside prayers
When hope despairs…
No words resound,
No songs are sung,
No dreams spun
Not one.
In 1937, Pidhiryanka moved to the school in the neighbouring village of Bratishiv, where she taught until shortly after eastern Galicia was occupied by the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
in 1939. Her career was abruptly ended in the spring of 1940, when a horse bolted in the market in the small town of Nizhniv. Pidhiryanka was trampled under its hooves and left bedridden. As a teacher, poet and Ukrainian patriot she would have been a likely target of the NKVD
NKVD
The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs was the public and secret police organization of the Soviet Union that directly executed the rule of power of the Soviets, including political repression, during the era of Joseph Stalin....
, both before the invasion
Operation Barbarossa
Operation Barbarossa was the code name for Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II that began on 22 June 1941. Over 4.5 million troops of the Axis powers invaded the USSR along a front., the largest invasion in the history of warfare...
by Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
in 1941 and during Joseph Stalin
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...
's post-war campaign against Ukrainian nationalism
Ukrainian nationalism
Ukrainian nationalism refers to the Ukrainian version of nationalism.Although the current Ukrainian state emerged fairly recently, some historians, such as Mykhailo Hrushevskyi, Orest Subtelny and Paul Magosci have cited the medieval state of Kievan Rus' as an early precedents of specifically...
. However, her injuries had consigned her to obscurity and she was spared.
In 1957, Pidhiryanka went to live with one of her daughters, who taught in a village school near L'viv. Even her children's poetry was now only published in the Ukrainian diaspora in North America. However, as Nikita Khrushchev
Nikita Khrushchev
Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev led the Soviet Union during part of the Cold War. He served as First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964, and as Chairman of the Council of Ministers, or Premier, from 1958 to 1964...
slightly relaxed the political climate, some of her poems began to appear in children's magazines in Ukraine.
In 1960 she was admitted to membership of the writers' union of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. This official recognition encouraged her to write one of her final poems Плине життя (Life flows):
Плине життя і плине
мов по воді.
Відпливли вже від мене
дні молоді.
Коли я в ніч темнісеньку
у сяйві мрій
Співала першу пісеньку
Землі своїй.
....
Світельця розсій в ранній
Райдузі снів
На дні мої останні
Й останній спів.
Life flows –onward it flows
Then ebbs away
Like water my life goes
Far from youth’s day.
I’ll hear in dark of night
My song’s first verse
Bright dreams that still delight
Brought back to earth.
....
My world will soon disperse
In sleep’s rainbow
I’ll sing my final verse
And then I’ll go.
Her official status allowed the publication in L'viv of a collection of her children's poetry, shortly before her death at the age of 82 on 20 May 1963 but republication of her adult work had to wait for Mikhail Gorbachev
Mikhail Gorbachev
Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev is a former Soviet statesman, having served as General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1985 until 1991, and as the last head of state of the USSR, having served from 1988 until its dissolution in 1991...
and glasnost
Glasnost
Glasnost was the policy of maximal publicity, openness, and transparency in the activities of all government institutions in the Soviet Union, together with freedom of information, introduced by Mikhail Gorbachev in the second half of the 1980s...
. A forestry industry newspaper published one of her first World War poems in 1989 and it was then reprinted in local newspapers serving Nizhniv and Nadvirna. After Ukrainian independence Pidhiryanka was included in a collection of Transcarpathian poetry and her children's work remains popular in 21st century Ukraine.