1st Edition

Fieldwork in Ukrainian Children’s Literature

Edited By Mateusz Świetlicki, Anastasia Ulanowicz Copyright 2025
296 Pages
by Routledge

296 Pages
by Routledge

296 Pages
by Routledge

Fieldwork in Ukrainian Children’s Literature showcases the work of prominent scholars of children’s literature from Ukraine and the diaspora as it traces the history of books written, marketed for, and circulating among young people since the rise of Ukraine’s nationhood in the nineteenth century. This book encompasses a full range of texts and genres (e.g., fiction, nonfiction, poetry,... Read more

Foreword: Toward the World Across Ages, Nations, and Genders (Tamara Hundorova)

 

Introduction to Ukrainian Children’s Literature (Mateusz Świetlicki and Anastasia Ulanowicz)

 

PART I - The Sources of Ukrainian Children’s Literature

 

1.     Fairy Fales, Folk Traditions, and the Formation of Ukrainian National Identity (Katarzyna Jakubowska-Krawczyk)

 

2.     Classics for Children and Crossovers into Children’s Literature: Taras Shevchenko, Ivan Franko, and Lesia Ukrainka (Mateusz Świetlicki and Anastasia Ulanowicz)

 

PART II - Ukrainian Children’s Literature in the Century of Repressions

 

3.     Moms at Factories: Ukrainian Children’s Literature of the 1920s and 1930s (Snizhana Zhygun)

 

4.     Russophone Ukrainian Children’s Literature: To the Roots of the Phenomenon (Anna Boginskaya)

 

5.     Children of Genocide and War: Depictions of Post-War Soviet Ukrainian Childhood in the Works of Vsevolod Nestaiko and Hryhir Tiutiunnyk (Mateusz Świetlicki)

 

6.     “What is Your Identity?”: Ukrainian Idea in Diasporic Children’s Literature (Maryna Vardanian)

 

PART III - The Present and Future of Ukrainian Literature for Young People

 

7.     Contemporary Ukrainian Children’s Poetry and Prose: An Overview (Tetiana Kachak and Tetyana Blyznyuk)

 

8.     The Coming of Age of Ukrainian Young Adult Literature After 1991 (Halyna Pavlyshyn)

 

9.     Ukraine’s Cultural Ambassadors: Contemporary Ukrainian Picturebooks (Anastasia Ulanowicz)

 

10.  Memories of the Future: Ukrainian Children’s Literature about War (Aliona Yarova and Björn Sundmark)

 

Afterword: Evelyn Arizpe

Biography

Mateusz Świetlicki is an associate professor at the University of Wrocław’s Institute of English Studies (Poland). His most recent book, Next-Generation Memory and Ukrainian Canadian Children’s Historical Fiction: The Seeds of Memory (Routledge, 2023), examines the transnational entanglements of Canada and Ukraine.

Anastasia Ulanowicz is an associate professor of children’s literature at the University of Florida (USA). She is the author of Second-Generation Memory and Contemporary Children’s Literature (Routledge, 2013), which received the Children’s Literature Association Book Award in 2015.

"Fieldwork in Ukrainian Children’s Literature offers a timely and welcome introduction to Ukrainian children’s literature and informatively brings global audiences into its subject, while also offering valuable analysis and original studies of a wide variety of texts for experts in relevant regions and topics that will have lasting import in the field. From introductory chapters that situate the reader in Ukrainian history, culture, and folk tales to sensitive studies of Ukrainian books for young readers in the present day and in war time, Fieldwork in Ukrainian Children’s Literature makes a valuable and lasting contribution to multiple fields, including Slavic studies and children’s literature research."

--Sara Pankenier Weld, University of California, Santa Barbara

"The first English-language companion to Ukrainian children’s literature will familiarize global audiences with its rich history, from folklore roots to award-winning international bestsellers."

--Svetlana Efimova, Assistant Professor of Slavic Literatures and Media Studies, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich