The anniversary of Oles Honchar

Oles Honchar (1918–1995) was one of the leading Ukrainian writers of the twentieth century. He was also a prominent public figure. He left a rich legacy of novels, short stories and diaries. Oles Honchar was indeed a person of high integrity, rectitude and Ukrainian national convictions.
Quite early in life he discovered in himself a talent for creative writing. He studied at a journalists’ training school, then at the Department of Journalism of the University of Kharkiv. When Nazi Germany invaded Ukraine in June 1941, he, still a student, volunteered for the army service. He served bravely and with distinction — his many awards include the Order of Glory, one of the highest awards that was given to soldiers for bravery. He was wounded twice but survived the war to become a writer.
After the WWII O. Honchar resumed his studies, this time at the Department of Philology at Dnipropetrovsk University. Nowadays the University is named after its famous graduate.
Honchar’s novel Sobor (Cathedral), published in 1968, was severely criticized by the soviet authorities for its “nationalistic leanings and religious overtones” and it was the writer’s prominent social position and fame that saved him from downfall and possible ban on writing, or maybe even prosecution and arrest.
He continued writing, and in the 1980s his political and cultural stance became even more nationally oriented. In 1992–1993, he was recognized to be “The World Intellectual” by the Intellectual Biographical Centre in Cambridge, Great Britain.
At the Gabfest Club session dedicated to the anniversary of Oles Honchar  we have read an article about his ties with Dnipropetrovsk region. The local historians proved that the writer was born in Dnipropetrovsk, spent a lot of time in the city and described the nature of our region in some of his novels. Some of the club members even tried to translate excerpts about Dnipropetrovsk from Ukrainian into English.
The quiz about Honchar’s artistic work revealed some curious facts about the genres mastered by the writer. It turned out that he wrote several scripts to the movies. We have watched a short video of the movie “The College Applicant” – about the first terrorist attack on the Soviet airlines in 1970. The movie was based on the real story when a young stewardess of Ukrainian background, Nadezhda Kurchenko, was killed during the high-jacking of a Soviet aircraft.

 

Have a look at more pictures, please