“When I passed the book into her hands, I felt her trembling”

Mrs. Holovko, you were the initiator of the new edition of Berestechko. How did you and your creative team like working on it?

“Lina Kostenko and the Lybid Publishers is a separate page we dreamt about. Any publisher would like to have works by Lina Kostenko in its publishing arsenal. It’s not a secret that Lina Kostenko didn’t publish anything for a long time. When we studied her ‘publishing history,’ we found out that it wasn’t too fortunate: Lina Kostenko had about a dozen books published. Only Marusia Churai had a happier fate, but the rest of the books were published only once, and the author wasn’t satisfied with any of them. Our dreams coincided in this: we both dreamt of an edition that would be worthy of the author. And not even an edition but a publishing pro-ject. It’s the only thing that would enable her to return to the readers. Therefore, in the publishing house (I can speak about it with pride) by means of the will, efforts, dreams, and intellect of many people the Berestechko project appeared – because the historical theme is natural for us. However, a single project of republishing a work wasn’t an overarching goal either for us or Lina Kostenko. The overarching goal is to create an absolutely new format. Serhii Yakutovych, the artist who did the graphics design for the book, is also a big advantage, since Lina appreciates his creative work very much.

“Other information we found let me know that Lina Kostenko listens with pleasure to installments of the radio program Berestechko narrated by Petro Boiko. That is why the voice of Boiko and his personality became a natural part of our project. Then the project was filled in with strokes — Ivan Dziuba’s historical research on Kostenko’s creative works appeared, as well as the essay ‘Bohdan Khmelnytsky. Catharsis’ specially written by Volodymyr Panchenko. That is how the project endorsed by Lina Kostenko was initiated. And she even said that she appreciated the work and creative activity of the people involved in republishing the novel so much that she wouldn’t interfere with the creative process — she’d be with us, but not over us.

“Many people say that Lina Kostenko is a difficult author. Perhaps the reason is in the absence of publishers who could offer the level which would correspond to her level, her intellect, her emotions, her elevation, and her national and social spirit. She was with us in her soul and spirit, but at the same time she worked on her new novel Zapysky ukrainskoho samashedshoho (A Diary of a Ukrainian Madman). We believe that this is a new starting point in her literary life.

“The process of cooperation was very selfless. And also on the part of Lina Kostenko’s daughter, Oxana Pachlovska, who is a brilliant publicist and a person of a high social spirit with a deep perception of the national idea. She joked that she took the role of a literary agent, but she was more than a literary agent. Without Oxana’s help this edition might not appear.

“The novel is unexpected in its construct. But these are not formal quests. Our vision of this text is shown in this, since Berestechko is a novel-monologue of Bohdan Khmelnytsky, who encounters his defeat face-to-face. Every page is a page of life, and thus, it looks as if we were turning over a roll of life (the text has a vertical structure).

“We discovered this novel for us as a novel of a genius, and we don’t want to avoid or feel ashamed of this word. Today Lina Kostenko believes that now is the time [to publish her works]. This is a time of poets and writers, since intellectual assessment of everything happening in our country is necessary. Today we are at the crossroads again – as Khmelnytsky was at his time. Certain historical lessons and their conclusions are laid in Berestechko.”

Indeed, Berestechko sounds very symbolic today …

“The time of publication of the first edition of the novel, 1999, was also very dramatic. Elections were ahead. Since that time Ukraine has had many elections, but Berestechko becomes topical again. In fact, it is a version of a historical event, but one of high artistic value and with a powerful publicist perception, which gives reasons to read the novel as a modern one. This cultural product is so timely that it will become an incentive for many people’s meditations.

“The linguistic aspect is very important, too. In Berestechko the language of the 18th century is so organically intertwined with the modern literary language that we can only read and memorize it.”

How did Lina Kostenko evaluate the ready book?

“I had the opportunity to hand a page proof to her. We came to her before the New Year. When I passed the book into her hands, I felt her trembling. After all, although she didn’t thoroughly examine it while we were there, she was satisfied. She said she wouldn’t see it until her birthday. And she really didn’t see it, although the book was already published, many people bought it already, and it is being discussed. By the way, the first print run of this new edition of Berestechko is 7,000 copies.”

Did the success of Berestechko urge you to launch some new projects?

“Yes. This project is Lina Kostenko’s poems that became Olha Bohomolets’ songs. We found a title that is very beautiful, lyrical, on the level of revelation — Hyacinth Sun. This is the sun that someone very romantic, profound, and warm can see up in the sky.

“The book will include 35 poems. We looked for an artist to illustrate them for a long time. Unfortunately, we didn’t have enough time for special illustrating, but Ivan Marchuk was found. And Oxana Pachlovska wrote an essay about Olha Bohomolets as a bard, about bard songs per se, and their philosophy. The presentation of this book will take place at an Olha Bohomolets soiree on March 28.

“We also hope to initiate other projects with Lina Kostenko. At least there are plans for such projects, and Lina Kostenko also aspires to their implementation. She already rose over the works written in the previous years and now she wants to provide a new — reinterpreted — product.

“During these years Lina Kostenko really created a lot, but all of this is in the writer’s table. It’s even difficult to say what efforts are required on our part — on the part of publishers and society — to publish all of this, since she is a classic of our times. And if Lina Kostenko’s texts don’t get their second life in books, it will be a failure for Ukrainian society.”