Encyclopedia of Rusyn History and Culture

University of Toronto Press © 2002.

8.5x11 / 816 pp / 10 b&w maps
World Rights

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Petrovtsii, Ivan

Petrovtsii, Ivan (b. May 22, 1945, Osii [Soviet Union], Ukraine) ≈ belletrist, editor, and translator of Rusyn national orientation in Subcarpathian Rus▓. Petrovtsii completed a program in French language and literature at Uzhhorod State University (1973), taught elementary school (1973-1975), then worked as a journalist for various newspapers in Soviet Transcarpathia. He has published in Ukrainian several collections of poetry and a detective novel (Manumissio, 1991). Of particularly high quality are his translations into Ukrainian of several French-language texts, including the challenging poetry of Charles Baudelaire, the French writings of classic Russian poets (Pushkin, Lermontov, Tiutchev), and a wide range of Hungarian poetry from the Baroque period to the present (Iskry chardashu, 1998).

During the last years of the Soviet regime Petrovtsi welcomed the Rusyn national revival in Subcarpathian Rus▓, spoke at several of the Rusyn world congresses, and began to publish in Rusyn. Among his works are a unique Rusyn dictionary in verse, Dialektarii, abo zh myla knyzhochka rusyns▓koi bysidy u virshakh (1993), and a collection of poems, Nashi spivanky (1996). Several of his poems provoked a literary and political scandal, as they openly denigrated radical Ukrainian nationalists and the government of independent Ukraine, including its president. Petrovtsii is also the founding editor of the Rusyn-language newspaper, *Rusyns▓ka bysida (1997- ), and he has translated several classic works of world literature into Rusyn (Nashi y nynashi spivanky, 1999). In 1998 he was awarded the Aleksander Dukhnovych Prize funded by the Rusyn-Canadian Steven *Chepa for the best work in Rusyn literature.

The Carpatho-Rusyns are central European people, numbering approximately 1.2 million, who live within the borders of five states: Poland, Slovakia, Ukraine, Romania, and Hungary. They have never had a state of their own. Disregarded and suppressed by most governments that ruled over them in the past, the Rusyn people have had to fight to retain their identity, culture, and language. This work is an attempt to redress the loss of historical memory and knowledge caused by decades of repression by investigating and explaining the historical past and culture of Rusyns in all countries where they live, including immigrant communities in the United States, Canada, and Yugoslavia.

The encyclopedia contains over 1,000 alphabetically arranged entries in areas such as individuals, organizations, political parties, periodicals, historical terms, geographic regions, historical events, and on themes such as architecture, archaeology, cinema, ethnography, geography and economy, language, and literature. The first encyclopedic work on Rusyns to appear in English, this book will be an indispensable resource for European area and Slavic studies specialists, and for general readers interested in international relations and nationalism.