“Intellectual melioration”

Like Mykola Hrytsenko, chairman of the Charitable Foundation in Support of the Newspaper Den’s Initiatives, said, the cozy old yard in Andriivsky uzviz, kindly provided for the foundation by the director of the Aqua-Vita Company Tetiana YURKOVA, turned out to be the place where friends and partners of the newspaper Den could get acquainted with one another and feel like one team. Proof of this was “Spring Den.” Therefore such meetings, which give an opportunity not only to talk, but also discuss the plan of further actions and positive “subversive” work, according to patron of the Foundation of The Day Vasyl KRYVOBOK, are extremely important.

“Over these years, when the newspaper was trying to break through to its reader, I was living with anticipation of our people, who will come at last,” the Editor-in-Chief of Den/The Day Larysa Ivshyna said at the opening of the action. “I was waiting for the second front to open at last. Things got delayed, therefore without waiting for our people to come, we started to gather and find close people in society and unite them. By this year, which is so complicated and turbulent, and light has just started to gleam, we have not finished the process yet. We have a task to find a big circle of partners of our country who understand that we need to plough this field intellectually. The saplings are ready. We have achieved much: this is an experiment field and the Summer School of Journalism. There is a need to continue this work, because without an intellectually strong citizen Ukraine will be an easy game.”

The activists of the foundation understand this pretty well and are trying to help broaden the intellectual map of our country with their activity. “I got to know The Day from history articles,” Oleksandr YURKOV, deputy director of Akva Service told The Day. “I was surprised that they had a totally different emphasis. Not the one we were taught in schools and universities. This was captivating, because this was a pro-Ukrainian history. Later I started to read other materials, too. For me the Friday issue is always especially interesting. And if I don’t have an opportunity to read it on weekend, I have a feeling that the day was incomplete. I already have several favorite authors. It is very important that I get qualitatively selected and well-analyzed information. This is a ready, full-fledged information product that meets my demands and my world outlook, which was by the way created with the participation of the newspaper Den as well. These days I try to promote the newspaper among my friends and partners. In the office instead of chocolate on New Year we presented our employees with subscription to the newspaper Den. What is interesting, it is changing the world outlook of our colleagues and partners. And when you share a stand, world outlook with a client, this is very helpful at work. This is a successful business step to improve the cooperation with our partners.”

Like Mykola HRYTSENKO noted, the Charitable Foundation in Support of the Newspaper Den’s Initiatives is constantly growing and draws people from all over Ukraine. So, this year’s “Spring Den” was attended by representative of Chernihiv Office of the Foundation Viktor MOLOCHKO and a delegation from Sumy. Anatolii YEPIFANOV, Iryna DIADENKO and Alla YAROVA thanked The Day for discovering the city of Sumy for Ukraine in Route No. 1. “We don’t have any intention to stop on this: we together ponder over several projects, which, I am sure, will be interesting for our student youth, and hopefully will be interesting for Den,” pro-rector of Ukrainian Banking Academy Alla Yarova commented to The Day. “Above all, we are attracted to the high level of literature in the Den’s Library, the circle of authors who cooperate with the publication. Larysa Oleksiivna has proved how important it is today to understand that high intellect, heroism, and positive things on the whole are not far away from here: they are here, in Ukraine.”

“I even try to arrange some leisure time to visit such Den’s events, to simply rest spiritually – absorb the atmosphere of positive things,” says Viktoria VOLOSHYNA, chairperson of the board of insurance company Nova. “With the Foundation in Support of the Newspaper Den’s Initiatives we have been working for nearly two years. Of all the projects I like Den’s photo exhibit the most. It always produces an incredible impression, evokes a storm of emotions, because the works so successfully convey the inner state and emotions of our people. After these events, probably due to the atmosphere, people, and conversations, I personally always enrich myself with new ideas.”

The circle of activists of the foundation is broadening not only due to appearing of new partisans, but also because of many-year support of the friends of the Den. So, for example, Hanna HOPKO started to work with Den when she was a student. Currently she is a civic activist, who does not forget her old acquaintances. “I very much like Den, because it is an outpost and fundament of our journalism,” Hanna Hopko says. “This is one of the most qualitative newspapers in post-Soviet, and probably even European and world space. This is a publication which in recent years has been putting effort for Ukraine to assert itself, so that we all understood after all who we are and modernized ourselves. I bow low before Larysa Ivshyna for all of the years of untiring work. The number of readers, admirers, subscribers of Den/The Day, and simply of our friends, increases by the year, and this is a merit of the entire team. Like Larysa Oleksiivna said once, ‘my hobby is to discover talents.’ In my opinion the editor-in-chief of the newspaper wonderfully fulfills this task she set before herself.”

WHEN THE YOUNGER GENERATION’S WORLDVIEW IS BASED ON A PRIEST-APPROVED SECULAR NEWSPAPER… FATHER IVAN HRYTSIUK AND HIS SON ANDRII AT “SPRING DEN”

So, Den not only enriches us with new ideas, but also discovers new talents. This year such new star is Mykola VOLOSHYN, a graduate of Kyiv gymnasium no. 283 and member of All-Ukrainian Civic Cossack Children’s Organization, who took the first place in All-Ukrainian Competition for the best recital of poems, dedicated to the 200th anniversary of Taras Shevchenko’s birth. The boy recited a poem by Lina Kostenko at the “Spring Den.”

“When a young man was reciting the poems by Lina Kostenko, I came up with a thought that there are no epochs for poets, but every time has poets of its own. I would interpret this in connection with the newspaper Den. For every time there is a newspaper of its own. And now it is the time of Den,” Ivan PIETUKHOV, president of a group of IT companies “Adamant.” “Without such newspaper as Den, without such standards of journalism, we would be apparently lacking something in Ukraine. There are newspapers publishing some hot news, there are newspapers that publish something light – everything people like, things that satisfy certain instincts. And here is a newspaper that publishes profound analytical materials which make people think, only one. And it is Den.”

“Our state has practically paid no attention to Prosvita activity,” Hanna SVYRYDENKO, a human rights champion, ascertains. “Today, in conditions of Russian aggression and ATO, not only should patronage exist, but it should help and support Den’s initiatives. Ukraine will win for sure. Life continues: children go to schools, students – to higher educational establishments. The youth should get decent moral and intellectual guidelines. And the projects of Den, which we eagerly support, help in this.”

Among the people present, MPs Yurii DEREVIANKO and Mykola KNIAZHYTSKY marked the importance of the work of the Charitable Foundation in Support of the Newspaper Den’s Initiatives. Media experts agree with them: “I recalled the differentiation of Ancient Greek philosophers: a thought which is a word simply thrown in the air was called doxa, and knowledge – episteme,” head on program activity of Internews Ukraine Andrii KULAKOV commented to The Day. “Many of our media have become such ‘doxaphones.’ If we use this terminology, Den is an ‘epistemograph,’ which records real knowledge and tries to translate it further – via authors, experts, and its projects. This can be compared to the hard work of a miner. I come up with this comparison in connection with Den and all the projects connected with this newspaper. We should orient at the readership the newspaper is oriented at, because these people spread this knowledge further and mutually translate the meanings of the newspaper. Actually, this was how my cooperation with the newspaper began, and hopefully it will continue.”

Unlike usual society events, “Spring Den” was attended by archpriest of the church of Assumption of Virgin Mary “Pyrohoshcha” in Kyiv (UOC KP), Father Ivan HRYTSIUK, who emphasized the high level of the periodical: “When I open a newspaper, I, a spiritual man, look for corresponding texts. And it is very gratifying for me that Den does not avoid either urgent topics, or church topics, which now are important as well. I have discovered this periodical for me, I will subscribe to it and recommend to others. And its authors should not only be called ‘wordsmiths,’ but write acutely, without pitying either the church, or the presidents. It is not without a reason that the action is called ‘Spring Den’: 80 percent of the people present are active youth, the ‘blossom of the nation,’ as they say. You sow grain in the minds and souls of people, and they must bring rich harvest. The newspaper Den should become not just all-Ukrainian, but top Ukrainian medium.”

The guests of “Spring Den” said that the event brought new impressions, new ideas, and opened new horizons.