This weekend, on 9 and 10 November, Lviv hosted the Land of Poets International Festival, held under the slogan ‘Poets Create the Nation’. The event, which took place for the first time, aims to become an integral part of Lviv’s space and Ukrainian culture in general. “Our land is the land of poets. Our mission is to be the soil from which important meanings sprout,’ said Mariana Savka, the founder of the Land of Poets festival, at the opening . It is our resistance and our struggle. This is a great path we have to follow. Every Ukrainian poet is more than a poet, because his or her word becomes an action. Sometimes you have to be very careful with your words. But above all, we must have our weapon – our word – and always stand up with it in defence of our country, our state, our nation.”
Mariana Savka, Yuriy Andrukhovych, Ihor Kalynets, Kateryna Kalytko, Dmytro Lazutkin, Ivan Malkovych, Kostiantyn Moskalets, Yaryna Chornohuz, Kateryna Mikhalitsyna, Vasyl Makhno, Marianna Kiyanovska – these powerful voices were heard from the stages of the Land of Poets for two days. An important part of the festival was also discussions about the meaning, present and future of Ukraine, and the role of poetry in times of war, with the participation of Ukrainian intellectuals Rostyslav Semkiv, Alim Aliyev, Tetyana Teren, Yevhen Hlibovytskyi, Ostap Slyvynskyi, Yurko Prokhasko and others.
The festival’s programme was complemented by musical performances by poets, including the Dead Cock together with Yulia Musakovska, Maryna Ponomarenko and Maryana Savka, Pirig i Batih and Kateryna Kalytko, Komu Vnyz with Dmytro Lazutkin and Yaryna Chornohuz, and the NAZVA concert. In addition, the festival guests had the opportunity to listen to a concert by Yuriy Andrukhovych and Carbido, Viktor Morozov performing the legendary song ‘She’ with lyrics by Kostyantyn Moskalets, and the Telnyuk and Solomiya Chubai sisters.
Famous Ukrainian actors also joined the Land of Poets festival. In particular, Rimma Zyubina and Oleksiy Hnatkovsky read poems by poets who were killed in the war: Maksym Kryvtsov, Ilya Chernilevsky, Yuriy Ruf, Volodymyr Vakulenko, and Viktoria Amelina. The festival also featured two films: ‘Chubai. Speak Again’ by Mikhail Krupievsky and “Wind from the East” by Kateryna Stepankova.
An important interactive zone of the Poets‘ Land was the Voices of the Poets’ Land project, created in partnership with the LitCom platform, Audiostories, and Radio Culture. Thanks to it, the festival guests had the opportunity to hear the voices of those poets who are no longer with us in the recordings: Pavlo Tychyna, Oleh Lyseha, Yurko Pokalchuk, Maksym Rylsky, Volodymyr Sosiura, as well as those who died as a result of Russian aggression – Maksym Kryvtsov, Viktoriia Amelina, and Hlib Babich.
An integral part of both days was the charity component: the festival participants and guests had the opportunity to donate to raise funds for night sights for the 225th separate assault battalion, as well as to support the Public Library of Snihuriv City Council in Mykolaiv region, which was under occupation, by bringing books for young and adult readers of the library.
The Land of Poets festival was held with the financial support of the International Renaissance Foundation. The content of the event does not reflect the official position of the IRF.
Source: Staryi Lev Publishing House
