Mykola Bazhan

Mykola Bazhan

MFSTUkrSSR
silver coin with face of Bazhan in the center, name of poet on the edge of the left, years alive on edge of the right
Bazhan in 1928
BornSeptember 26, 1904
Kamianets-Podilskyi, Russian Empire (today Khmelnytskyi Oblast, Ukraine)
DiedNovember 23, 1983 (aged 79)
Kiev, Ukrainian SSR, Soviet Union
Occupationwriter, poet, academician
LanguageUkrainian
NationalitySoviet
Notable awardsShevchenko National Prize

Mykola Platonovych Bazhan (Ukrainian: Микола Платонович Бажан; 9 October [O.S. 26 September] 1904 – 23 November 1983) was a Soviet Ukrainian writer, poet, highly decorated political and public figure. He was an academician of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR (1951), Merited Functionary in Science and Technology of Ukrainian SSR (1966), Distinguished Figure in Arts of Georgian SSR (1964), People's Poet of Uzbek SSR.

Career

Bazhan was a People's Deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union for two of five convocations (1946–1962), and the Supreme Council of the Ukrainian SSR for six of nine convocations (1963–1980). He was a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and was elected to the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Ukrainian SSR on several occasions at the party's congresses (17 of and 21 of 25). In 1943–49 Bazhan was a Deputy Chairman of the Council of Minister (Commissars) of the Ukrainian SSR.

Biography

Early career

Mykola Bazhan was born in city of Kamenyets, an administrative center of Podolia Governorate, yet his youth years he spent in Uman, Kiev Governorate. His father Platon Artemovych Bazhan, a native of Poltava region, was a military cartographer and a veteran of the Ukrainian People's Army.[1]

In 1923 Mykola Bazhan graduated from the Uman Cooperative College[2] and moved to Kiev where he studied at the Kiev Cooperative Institute (1921-1923) and in the Kiev institute of foreign relations (1923-1925).[2] He was active in the Futurist literary movement, and his first poem «Ruro-marsh» («Руро-марш») was published in Kiev in 1923. Bazhan’s first book of poems, Seventeenth Patrol, published in Kharkiv in 1926, was markedly Futurist. Yet, in the same year Bazhan left the Futurist groups and joined VAPLITE, an artistic union affiliated with classic models of European culture and demanding literary excellence from its members. In this period, Bazhan developed a unique style combining features of Expressionism, Romanticism and Baroque art. The Buildings (1929) epitomized these literary ideas via complex imagery of a Gothic cathedral, a gate in the style of Ukrainian Baroque, and a Modernist house.[3]

Work for the Soviet government

During the 1930s Bazhan's works were viewed as "anti-proletarian" and became a subject of a number official anti-nationalist campaigns. In 1937 he felt his arrest was imminent and he rarely slept at home.[4] In 1939 Bazhan was awarded the Order of Lenin for his translation into Ukrainian of the epic poem "The Warrior in the Tiger's skin" by the medieval Georgian poet Shota Rustaveli. Bazhan found out about this, from a newspaper, while hiding from his imminent arrest in a city park in Kiev.[citation needed] He was eventually told by Nikita Khrushchev that his arrest had been ordered, but Stalin was fond of his Rustaveli translation, and changed his mind.[5] In 1940 Mykola Bazhan joined the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and in the same year became a member of the Presidium of the Writers' Union of Ukraine.

During the Great Patriotic War Bazhan became a military reporter and the editor of the newspaper For the Soviet Ukraine. In 1943 he published a book, Stalingrad Notebook, for which in 1946 he received the Stalin Prize. In 1953-59 Bazhan headed the Writers' Union of Ukraine. As head of the Union, in May 1954, at the beginning of the Khrushchev Thaw, he sent a letter to the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine, in which he raised the issue of publishing works and introducing creative biographies of Vasyl Chumak, Myroslav Irchan, Mykyta Cherniavsky, Ivan Mikitenko, and Pilip Kapelhorodsky, most of which were killed or executed in 1937-1938, into the course of the history of Ukrainian Soviet literature. On July 2, 1956 he raised before the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine the issue of rehabilitation of several repressed writers: Vasyl Bobynsky, Hryhorii Epik, Ivan Kulyk, Mykola Kulish, and many more.[6]

Later years

In 1970 Bazhan was nominated for the Nobel Prize in literature, but was forced by Soviet authorities to write a letter refusing his candidature.[7]

From 1957 and until his death, Bazhan was the founding chief editor of the Main Edition of Ukrainian Soviet Encyclopedia publishing. The publishing was not completed in his lifetime; the first edition was, however, released as Ukrainian Soviet Encyclopedia in 17 volumes in 1959–1965. A second (and final, as events would develop) 12-volume work was released in 1977–1985. The enterprise was additionally responsible for a large number of other major Ukrainian reference works. Bazhan also was one of co-authors of the Anthem of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. He died in Kyiv on 23 November 1983.[8]

Personal life and contacts

In 1926 Bazhan married Ukrainian writer and native of Kiev Halyna Kovalenko. They divorced in 1938, and he remarried, to Nina Lauer, shortly thereafter.[9]

Moisei Fishbein, a notable Ukrainian poet was Bazhan's literary secretary.

Bazhan in English

A collection of English translations of Bazhan's futurist poetry titled Quiet Spiders of the Hidden Soul was published by the Academic Studies Press in 2019. These include translations by Roman Turovsky.[10]

Awards and prizes

Coin of Bazhan by the National Bank of Ukraine

References

  1. ^ Kotsarev, Oleh (20 August 2024). "Mykola Bazhan's literature juggling and whirlpools of compromises". Chytomo.
  2. ^ a b "Мемориальная квартира-музей Н.П.Бажана в г.Киеве". Шукач. Retrieved 3 April 2024.(in Russian)
  3. ^ "Mykola Bazhan".
  4. ^ Orel, Maya (5 August 2024). "Mykola Bazhan. Stalin's order-bearer who retained his genius". Hromadske.
  5. ^ Bezelyansky, Yuri (2017-09-05). 69 этюдов о русских писателях. Litres. ISBN 9785457055421.(in Russian)
  6. ^ ""Пильніше й глибше вдуматися в себе..."". Голос України. 18 October 2014. Retrieved 3 April 2024.(in Ukrainian)
  7. ^ Grossman, Vasily (2011). "Winning Back the Motherland". In Beevor, Antony (ed.). A Writer at War: Vasily Grossman with the Red Army. Toronto: Random House of Canada. ISBN 978-0307363787.
  8. ^ "Николай Платонович БАЖАН" (PDF). Sovetskaya kultura. 26 November 1983. p. 8. Archived (PDF) from the original on 11 December 2025.
  9. ^ ""Вона – любов, спасенна і єдина…" (роздуми над рядками неопублікованого вірша Миколи Бажана та його листами до дружини) - Національний музей літератури України". Archived from the original on 2018-11-01. Retrieved 2016-05-14.(in Ukrainian)
  10. ^ ""Quiet Spiders of the Hidden Soul": Mykola (Nik) Bazhan's Early Experimental Poetry".
  11. ^ "В СОВЕТЕ МИНИСТРОВ СОЮЗА CCP О ПРИСУЖДЕНИИ СТАЛИНСКИХ ПРЕМИЙ ЗА ВЫДАЮЩИЕСЯ РАБОТЫ В ОБЛАСТИ ИСКУССТВА И ЛИТЕРАТУРЫ ЗА 1945 ГОД" (PDF). Sovetskoe iskusstvo. No. 27. 28 June 1946. p. 1.
  12. ^ "В Совете Министров Союза ССР О присуждении Сталинских премий за выдающиеся работы в области литературы и искусства за 1948 год". Pravda. No. 100. 10 April 1949. p. 2.
  13. ^ "О ПРИСУЖДЕНИИ ПРЕМИЙ ИМЕНИ Т. Г. ШЕВЧЕНКО ЗА ВЫДАЮЩИЕСЯ ДОСТИЖЕНИЯ В ОБЛАСТИ ЛИТЕРАТУРЫ И ИСКУССТВА". Pravda Ukrainy (in Russian). No. 55. 9 March 1965. p. 3.
  14. ^ a b "Указ Президиума Верховного Совета СССР О присвоении звания Героя Социалистического Труда группе писателей" (PDF). Vedomosti Verkhovnogo Soveta SSSR (in Russian). No. 40. 2 October 1974.
  15. ^ "Указ Президиума Верховного Совета СССР О награждении советских писателей". Pravda. No. 31. 1 February 1939. p. 2.
  16. ^ "Указ Президиума Верховного Совета СССР О награждении писателя Бажана Н. П. орденом Ленина". Izvestiya. No. 241. 10 October 1954. p. 1.
  17. ^ "Указ Президиума Верховного Совета СССР О награждении орденами и медалями СССР работников литературы и искусства Украинской ССР" (PDF). Vedomosti Verkhovnogo Soveta SSSR (in Russian). No. 47. 1 December 1960.
  18. ^ "Указ Президиума Верховного Совета СССР О награждении писателя Бажана Н. П. орденом Ленина" (PDF). Vedomosti Verkhovnogo Soveta SSSR (in Russian). No. 42. 14 October 1964.
  19. ^ Kozhukhar, Oleg. "Бажан Николай Платонович". warheroes.ru. Retrieved 2026-02-01.
  20. ^ "Указ Президиума Верховного Совета СССР О награждении орденами партизан Украинской ССР" (PDF). Izvestiya. No. 77. 2 April 1943. p. 1.
  21. ^ "О Президиума Верховного Совета СССР О награждении орденами и медалями работников промышленности, сельского хозяйства, науки, культуры и искусства Украинской ССР". Izvestiya. No. 20. 25 January 1948. p. 2.
  22. ^ "Указ Президиума Верховного Совета СССР О награждении орденами и медалями СССР деятелей советской литературы" (PDF). Vedomosti Verkhovnogo Soveta SSSR. No. 44. 1 November 1967.
allikas: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikola_Bazhan