Timothy Snyder, a US historian and a Yale University professor, has been in Ukraine since the beginning of this week. The aim of his visit is to launch the Russian-language publication of his worldwide bestseller Bloodlands: Europe between Hitler and Stalin. The book came out in the translation of Lukia Zurnadzhi at the Duliby publishing house with support from the US Embassy in Ukraine. Mr. Snyder is going to visit Kyiv, Kharkiv, and Dnipropetrovsk for a series of presentations timed to the anniversary of the beginning of a Hitler-Stalin war. His book is about tragic pages in the history in Eastern Europe: the Ukraine Holodomor, Stalin-inspired mass-scale executions, deportations and killings of Poles, deliberate starvation of Soviet prisoners of war, the Holocaust, shootings of civilians by the Nazis in the course of anti-partisan operations, and postwar ethnic cleansings. The two totalitarian systems were committing the same crimes at the same time, in the same places, helping and inciting each other. Bloodlands has received nine first prizes in various nominations and was declared Book of the Year on the basis of 20 literary lists. The book immediately became a worldwide bestseller and ran into 29 editions in 26 languages, including, for the first time, Russian. Ukrinform reports that the goal of this publishing and educational project is to spread scientific and historical information about the two criminal regimes among the Russian-speaking population of Ukraine and other countries. The book will be distributed free of charge. The book’s e-version will be available for loading onto all electronic carriers and gadgets.
