Olena Pchilka

Olha Petrivna Drahomanova-Kosach, known under the literary pseudonym Olena Pchilka (29 June 1849, Hadiach, Poltava region — 4 October 1930, Kyiv), was a Ukrainian writer, ethnographer, translator, publisher and civic activist, mother of Lesya Ukrainka and sister of Mykhailo Drahomanov. From the age of twelve she studied at the Model Boarding School for Noble Girls in Kyiv directed by A. Hanf-Nelhovska. On 28 July 1868 she married Petro Antonovych Kosach, with whom she had six children, among them the poet Lesya Ukrainka. In 1876 she published the study 'Ukrainian Folk Ornament', becoming the first scholar of this branch of Ukrainian art. In 1880 she funded the publication of Stepan Rudanskyi's 'Spivomovky' out of her own pocket. In 1887 together with Nataliya Kobrynska she edited the almanac 'The First Wreath', the first Ukrainian feminist anthology. In 1903 at the unveiling of the Kotliarevskyi monument in Poltava she delivered a Ukrainian-language speech in defiance of the official censorship ban. She published and edited the journal 'Ridnyi Krai' (1906–1914) with its children's supplement 'Moloda Ukraina'. In 1925 she was elected a corresponding member of the All-Ukrainian Academy of Sciences.

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