Pavlo Tychyna

Pavlo Hryhorovych Tychyna (23 January 1891, Pisky, Chernihiv region – 16 September 1967, Kyiv) was a Ukrainian poet, translator, publicist, and public and state figure, an academician. He was one of the leading figures of the Ukrainian literary revival of the 1920s. He studied at the Chernihiv Theological Seminary and the Kyiv Commercial Institute. His early collection "Clarinets of the Sun" ("Soniachni klarnety," 1918) became a peak of Ukrainian modernism and symbolism, uniting the musicality of verse with innovative imagery; the collections "Pluh" ("The Plough") and "Wind from Ukraine" followed. Under the pressure of the Stalinist regime — as a whole generation of his contemporaries was repressed (the "Executed Renaissance") — Tychyna's work changed in character, drawing closer to official Soviet themes. He held high offices: People's Commissar (Minister) of Education of the Ukrainian SSR (1943–1948), Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian SSR, and academician of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR. He translated from many languages. He died in Kyiv and is buried at Baikove Cemetery. Tychyna remains a symbol of the tragedy of the twentieth-century Ukrainian artist, torn between brilliant early genius and forced conformity.

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