Siddhesh Joshi (Editor)

Vasyl Symonenko

Updated on
Edit
Like
Comment
Share on FacebookTweet on TwitterShare on LinkedInShare on Reddit
Occupation
  
poet, public activist

Name
  
Vasyl Symonenko

Ethnicity
  
Role
  
Poet

Citizenship
  
Books
  
Shore of anticipation

Literary movement
  
60ers



Born
  
January 8, 1935Lubny Raion, Ukrainian SSR (
1935-01-08
)

Alma mater
  
Kiev State University (1957)

Died
  
December 13, 1963, Cherkasy, Ukraine

Education
  
Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv (1957)

Parents
  
Hanna Shcherban, Andrii Symonenko

Awards
  
Shevchenko National Prize in Literature

Similar People
  
Lina Kostenko, Vasyl Stus, Oleksandr Oles, Oles Honchar

Vasyl Symonenko. Famous Ukrainian


Vasyl Symonenko (Ukrainian: Василь Андрійович Симоненко; January 8, 1935 – 1963) a well-known Ukrainian poet, journalist, activist of dissident movement. He is considered one of the most important figures in Ukrainian literature of the early 1960s. By the opinion of the Museum of dissident movement in Kiev, the works and early death of Vasyl Symonenko had an enormous impact on the rise of the national democratic movement in Ukraine.

Contents

Vasyl Symonenko wwwencyclopediaofukrainecompic5CS5CY5CSymone

Дарка і Славко - Darka & Slavko Reunion Concert (2012) + (слова пісень)


Biography

Vasyl Symonenko Symonenko Vasyl

The poet was born in a peasant family in the village of Biyivtsi, Kharkiv Oblast (today - Poltava Oblast).

Vasyl Symonenko picSYSymonenko Vasyl at workjpg

After graduating from Kiev State University in 1957, Vasyl Symonenko worked as a journalist in several newspapers in Cherkasy Oblast.

Vasyl Symonenko Ukrainian art song on poem of Vasyl Symonenko

The debut book of poems "Tysha i hrim" ("Silence and thunder") came in 1962 and made clear the talent of Symonenko among the young poets, though he had only one year to live (cancer of kidneys was diagnosed later). His literary environment included the poets Mykola Vinhranovsky, Ivan Drach and Lina Kostenko, the publicists, critics Ivan Dziuba, Ivan Svitlichny, Y. Sverstyuk and other "shestydesyatnyky" (Sixtiers).

During his last year of living Vasyl Symonenko wrote his second book – "Zemne tyazhinnya" ("Earth’s gravity"), the verses from which were quoted, written out (adding what the censor had omitted), learned by heart and compared with the poetry of Taras Shevchenko.

In 1962, Symonenko together with his friends A.Horska and Les Tanyuk found the burial places of NKVD repressions in Bykivnia, Lukianivskyi and Vasyslkivskyi cemeteries near Kiev. For the fact he appealed to the Kiev City Council. In 1963 Symonenko was brutally beaten up by operatives of the Soviet Ministry of Interior at the Shevchenko rail station in the city of Smila from which he suffered a failure of kidneys and soon died in the main oblast hospital on December 13, 1963.

Already after his death there was published his satiric tale-poem "Travel to the country of Vice-versa" (1964).

His works have been translated into English and published mostly among the Ukrainian diaspora in the Americas and Western Europe.

The fullest collection of Symonenko’s works was published abroad under the title "Bereh chekan" ("Shore of anticipation") in Munich (1963).

In 1967 the publishing house "Smoloskyp" was created in Baltimore by Ukrainian emigrants and named after Vasyl Symonenko.

In December, 2008, the National Bank of Ukraine issued into circulation a commemorative coin "Vasyl Symonenko" within "Outstanding Personalities of Ukraine" series.

Examples of Vasyl Symonenko works

1
2
3

References

Vasyl Symonenko Wikipedia