Lviv historian focuses on poor state of book publishing (07/29/01)

Lviv historian focuses on poor state of book publishing

by Roma Hadzewycz

EAST HANOVER, N.J. - Historian Yaroslav Isaievych, director of the Ivan Krypiakevych Institute of Lviv, addressed the essential topic "Why Are There No Ukrainian Books in Ukraine?" during a recent visit to the United States.

At the outset of his talk, Dr. Isaievych pointed to once-vibrant publishing activity in Ukraine, when many private publishers were engaged in printing diverse works. He cited the defeat of Hetman Ivan Mazepa by tsarist Russian forces in 1709 at the Battle of Poltava as marking the beginning of Ukraine's colonial status and, as a result, the decline of book publishing in the country.

Once Ukraine found itself under tsarist Russian rule, the Valuev Ukase of 1863 banned all publications in Ukrainian except belles lettres, and the Ems Ukase of 1876 attempted to halt the printing and distribution of Ukrainian-language publications within the Russian empire. Dr. Isaievych said that by 1889, to cite just one example of the Russian imperial policy, Ukrainian-language book publishing in Odesa occupied sixth place after Russian, Hebrew, French, German and Greek publications.

According to the Lviv historian, the state of Ukrainian book publishing did not change significantly until World War I. Ukraine's domination by foreign powers was reflected in the fact that some 95 percent of the books published in eastern Ukraine were in Russian, while in western Ukraine they were in Polish or Hungarian. That changed during the period of Ukrainian statehood, 1917-1920, as there was much book publishing in Ukraine and abroad, for example in Vienna, where books were published for distribution in Ukraine.

With the Soviet occupation of Ukraine, he continued, there was an initial period of Ukrainianization during which Ukrainian-language book publishing, though state-controlled, increased.

Under the Stalin regime and after World War II, when all Ukrainian lands came under Soviet rule, came steady Russification. Thus, while in the 1960s some 60 percent of the books published in Ukraine were in Ukrainian, by the 1980s, during the Brezhnev era, that figure had declined by half to 30 percent. Dr. Isaievych added that the books published were subject to heavy censorship.

Since the proclamation of Ukraine's independence there has been no censorship of books, but the state of book publishing has not been good, said the speaker. In fact, due to decades of destruction of the independent book publishing industry, the number of publications declined markedly. Anyone who has funds can freely publish books, but who has such funds?

Thus, in 1998 7,000 book titles were published in Ukraine, and only 38 percent of these were in the Ukrainian language. In 1999 the number of titles dropped further, to just over 6,300 - compared to 361,000 in Russia, 70,000 in the United States and 100,000 in the United Kingdom and China during the same period.

While the number of copies of books and brochures published in Ukraine in 1998 was 44.1 million, by the following year that number dropped by half to 21.9 million. Right now, half a book per citizen of Ukraine is published per year, Dr. Isaievych explained. The result: the number of books per capita in Ukraine is several times less than in any developed country.

And what is most dangerous to Ukrainian book publishing today? According to Dr. Isaievych it is the importation of cheap Russian books that flood the market.

Dr. Isaievych concluded his presentation by offering some other sobering statistics: only 2 percent of the population of Ukraine has Internet access (as compared to 4 percent in Russia and 25 percent in Estonia), and there are only 52 copies of newspapers per 1,000 population (compared to 220 for the United States and 380 for Russia and the United Kingdom). Furthermore, there is no truly good national daily newspaper, though Ukrainian editions of Russian papers are distributed nationwide.

All of the above facts, Dr. Isaievych underscored, point to the need for Ukraine's leaders to take a close look at the state of publishing, and to take steps to bolster an industry that is so important to raising public awareness and nation-building.

Dr. Isaievych's presentation was sponsored by the Ukrainian American Professionals and Businesspersons Association of New York and New Jersey at the Ramada Hotel in East Hanover, N.J., on April 7.

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