Turning the pages back...February 10, 1773 (02/08/98)

Turning the pages back...

February 10, 1773

Vasyl Karazyn had members of the Greek nobility among his forebears; thus, perhaps his fondness for democracy was genetic.

Born on February 10, 1773, in Kruchyk, near Bohodukhiv in Eastern Ukraine, he studied in St. Petersburg to be an engineer, specializing in mining and metallurgy, then secretly traveled to Western Europe to complete his education.

A committed liberal, he worked tirelessly to reform the Russian Empire. He wrote a series of memoranda to the tsar and various influential officials, urging the establishment of a constitutional monarchy and the abolition of serfdom.

In 1801 he was appointed director of schools in the imperial Ministry of Education, and during his term (ending in 1804) he began reforming the system along Western lines. He also convinced the nobility and merchants of his native Eastern Ukraine to establish and fund Kharkiv University, which came about in 1805. A largely foreign-born faculty was assembled, tapping into the latest intellectual currents in Western Europe.

Intellectually restless, he tried his hand at literary criticism (some of his attempts at poetry were published in Aleksandr Herzen's Poliarnaia Zvezda), and wrote articles on history, economics, agronomy, chemistry and various branches of industry. He also made several important contributions to climatology and meteorology, and established one of the first meteorological stations in the Russian Empire.

Karazyn's political and economic theories helped lay the basis for modern Ukrainian territorial autonomy. He strongly criticized policies that concentrated industry in central Russia, leaving Ukraine to simply supply raw materials. He also stressed the need to expand foreign trade and improve agricultural practices, and devoted considerable energy to developing agricultural and metallurgical machinery.

Karazyn pushed for the creation of a historical-literary journal (eventually realized, though not under his direction, as Kievskaia Starina) and helped the young Mykola Kostomarov publish the journal Molodyk. In 1811 in Kharkiv, Karazyn founded the Philotechnical Society in order to popularize his scientific ideas and to promote the modernization of agriculture. He served as its director until 1818.

Karazyn died in Mykolaiv on November 16, 1842. A monument to him stands in Kharkiv.

Sources: "Karazyn, Vasyl," Encyclopedia of Ukraine, Vol. 2 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1988); "Karazin, Vasyl Nazarovych," Ukrainska Literaturna Entsyklopedia, Vol. 2 (Kyiv: Ukrainska Radianska Entsyklopedia, 1990).

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