Lesya Ukrainka

This file contains early 20th century scans of letters by Lesya Ukrainka (b. Novohrad-Volynskyi, Russian Empire, 1871 – d. 1913, Surami, Tiflis Governorate, Russian Empire), a Ukrainian writer, best known for her poems and plays. She was also an active political and feminist activist. Among her most renowned works are the collections of poems On the wings of songs (1893), Thoughts and Dreams (1899), Echos (1902); the epic poem Ancient fairy tale (1893), One word (1903); plays Princess (1913), Cassandra (1903—1907), In the Catacombs (1905), and Forest Song (1911). Ukrainka’s illness made it necessary for her to travel to places where the climate was dry, and, as a result, she spent extended periods of time in Germany, Austria, Italy, Bulgaria, Crimea, the Caucasus, and Egypt. Lesya Ukrainka actively opposed Russian tsarism and was a member of Ukrainian Marxist organizations. In 1902 she translated the Communist Manifesto into Ukrainian. She was briefly arrested in 1907 by tsarist police and remained under surveillance thereafter. In 1907, Lesya Ukrainka married Klyment Kvitka, a court official, who was an amateur ethnographer and musicologist. They settled first in Crimea, then moved to Georgia. Ukrainka died on 1 August 1913 in a health resort in Surami, Georgia.