From: New Voice of Ukraine by Theo Griffin
The owner of Savchuk publishing house, a newer name amongst the grand old houses of the ancient book city, imparts a little wisdom from his decade of fighting on Ukraine’s second front: the cultural war.
Ukrainians are well aware that Russia aims not only to take their land, but exterminate their identity. This has led to a war-time resurgence of interest in Ukrainian history and culture, but crucially, by Ukrainian authors.
I met publisher and scholar Oleksandr Savchuk in his new bookshop, Knyhoukryttia (translated from Ukrainian – ‘Book Shelter’), on 14 Alchevskykh Street in Kharkiv’s old town. One of the country’s frontline cities, prior to the war, Kharkiv was Ukraine’s second largest metropolis. Now, Knyhoukryttia, with its blast-proof windows, doubling as a bomb shelter, exemplifies Kharkiv’s transformation from teeming cultural center to embattled stronghold – a few dozen kilometers from Russia itself.
“But not only a physical shelter,” Savchuk told me.
“The books give us protection: knowledge about Ukraine.”
The Savchuk publishing house was founded in 2010, specializing from its inception in the history of Ukraine. Yet the publisher said that, at the time, Ukrainians seemed skeptical of the importance of reading local authors and historians.
Voice of Ukraine 