Lyubov Sirota


Lyubov Makarivna Sirota is a Ukrainian poet, writer, playwright, journalist and translator. As a former inhabitant of the city of Pripyat and an eyewitness of the Chernobyl disaster, she has devoted a great part of her creative output to the 1986 catastrophe. She writes in both Ukrainian and Russian, and also translates from Ukrainian into Russian and vice versa. Her poems have been translated into many languages, including English.
WWW orantas.livejournal.com

Life

Sirota was born in Irtyshsk, Pavlodar Province, Kazakhstan to a large family which had been deported from Ukraine. When she was one, her family moved to the Kyrgyzstan capital, Frunze. Her mother wanted to move to the city so that her children could have more opportunities for education and development. Sirota spent her childhood in Frunze, where she was a member of the city literary studio. There she developed a dissident spirit: fostering freedom and love of truth. Her first literary works were printed in Kyrgyzstan magazines.
In 1975, Sirota moved with her parents to their ancestral homeland, Ukraine. There, she received a degree in Russian language and literature from the philology department at Dnipropetrovsk National University. In 1983 she moved with her son Alexander to the new city of Pripyat, where she headed and a literary studio for children. She also managed department of the Palace of Culture Energetik. At the Palace of Culture, Sirota wrote and directed two plays: the musical and, a biography of the Russian poet Marina Tsvetaeva. The latter play was more successful, and was scheduled to be repeated. When the Chernobyl nuclear station exploded on 26 April 1986, Sirota and her son were among the tens of thousands evacuated from the area following the event. Their lives were forever changed due to the evacuation, the loss of friends and acquaintances, and the assault on their health due to radiation exposure.
After her evacuation from Pripyat she reorganized "Prometheus", using poetry and music to proclaim the truth about the Chernobyl area and its people. However, repeated hospitalization for fatigue and pain increasingly interfered with her work. Despite her suffering, the experience enhanced Sirota's poetic talent. To express her grief and rage, she wrote poetry and collected them in a book, . Burden was published in 1990 in Kyiv. Since 1992 Sirota has been an invalid; however, at home she continues her efforts to prevent another Chernobyl. Sirota, with her family, moved to Kyivin 2011. In Kyiv, Sirota worked as a film editor at Dovzhenko Film Studios.
Her poems have been translated from Russian into other languages, and are known in many countries from the translation of Burden into English by Elisavietta Ritchie, Leonid Levin and Birgitta Ingemanson, with the assistance of Professor Paul Brians. Sirota's poetry has been published in magazines and anthologies in the United States, Canada and the UK.
In 2022, after a full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine and a month-and-a-half stay under occupation, Lyubov Sirota was forced to leave her homeland and now lives abroad. In August 2022, she participated in the 75th anniversary of the Edinburgh International Festival in "the Poetry Reading: Art and Activism in the Nuclear Age" at the Scottish Poetry Library.
On 7 January 2023 Lyubov Sirota's poetry was presented at the Modern Language Association of America convention in San Francisco, where her poetry was presented by past president of the Joseph Conrad Society of America, Ph.D. Debra Romanick Baldwin from the University of Dallas.

Work

Poetry

Sirota's poetry became more widely known after Rollan Sergienko's 1988 film about the Chernobyl catastrophe, and her 1990 anthology Burden, published in Kyiv.
Burden opens with a triptych of poems devoted to the evacuated city of Pripyat. The dead city only comes to life at night, in the dreams of people who have fled from it:
"At night, of course, our town
though emptied forever, comes to life.
There, our dreams wander like clouds,
illuminate windows with moonlight."

In the second verse, we see stars falling on a city roadway:
"…And stars are thrust down
onto the pavement,
to stand guard until morning."

The city dies at each dawn:
"…We are doomed to be left behind by the flock
in the harshest of winters…
But when you fly off
don't forget us, grounded in the field!
And no matter to what joyful faraway lands
your happy wings bear you,
may our charred wings
protect you from carelessness."

Sirota's poetry is, at times, full of indignation:
"…But nothing will silence us!
Even after death,
from our graves
we will appeal to your Conscience
not to transform the Earth
into a sarcophagus! …

The third poem of the triptych is devoted to reflection on moral responsibility and civil duties:
"...Life went up in smoke from somebody's campfire
.
Everything burned,
burned up.
Even the ashes
were not always left behind...
...But with merciful hands you extinguish
the fatal fire under me.
May the flame of the redeemed soul shield you!"

Sirota is especially angry in her poem, Radiophobia.
Radiophobia, featured in Threshold and on radio, inspired Julio Soto to be the writer-director of the Spanish-American film and artist Michael Genovese to paint window frescoes containing the poem in the Ukrainian Village, Chicago, in 2006.
Before the Chernobyl catastrophe, Lyubov Sirota wrote more the lyrical poems, which were published in Kyrgyzstan periodicals and in newspapers of Ukraine: "Dnepr Miner", "Tribune of Power Specialist", "Flag of the Victory", etc.; in the literary almanac "Literary Ukraine"; in the collective poetic collections of Ukraine — "The Steps" and of Russia – "The Sources", etc.
After Chernobyl, her products were published in newspapers and almanacs of Ukraine: “The Truth Ukraine”, “Literary Ukraine”, "National newspaper", "Independent Ukraine", "Our Ukraine", "Your Health ", "Ukrainian Forum ", "Education", "Chernobyl Newspaper", "Post Chernobyl " and in many other; in the magazines “Ukraine”, “Dnipro”, "Extreme Situation", "Scientific World", etc., in Latvian magazine " Cinema " No.4/1989; and in the poetic collections: "Chernobyl. Days of tests", "Passing in a zone" — the poetic anthology, "Chernobyl beside...", etc.
Now her poems are known all over the world, thanks to the translations into English, German, Japanese, Italian, Polish. Paul Brians and his web page about Lyubov Sirota has helped spread word of her works. Her poems have been read on NPR of America, have been issued in English in anthologies, almanacs, magazines and poetic collections of US and Canada: "Life on the Line: Selections on Words and Healing"; "Perspectives from the Past"; "A Fierce Brightness: Twenty-Five Years of Women's Poetry", and also in the Canadian and American magazines: "Calyx", "Woman World", "Promin'", "Journal of the American Medical Association"; "New York Quarterly", "WISE", "The Russell Record Magazine", "The Modern Review", "In Our Own Words", etc.
Her own translations of the poetry of known Ukrainian poet Vasyl Stus in Russian have been issued in the book "Vasyl Stus", "And you same burn down".

Plays

  • – a one-act musical.
  • – two-act biography of the Russian poet Marina Tsvetaeva.
  • .

Article and essays

  • – ПОСТ ЧЕРНОБЫЛЬ/POST CHERNOBYL", 2004.

Books and publications

  • : Lyrics. Kyiv, 1990. 77 pages. The book cover and pictures of the known Ukrainian artist –
  • : the film-story – Poltava, 2009, 196 pages –
  • by Lyubov Sirota; Language: English, ASIN: B08WX8D7BY Publication date: 17 February 2021, File Size: 447 KB, Print Length: 311 pages
  • ; Language: English, Publisher: Independently published, Paperback: 202 pages, – Lyubov Sirota, Birgitta Ingemanson, Paul Brians, A. Yukhimenko, Natalia Ryumina
  • . Poetry. Kyiv, 1990. 77 pages. – – translator Lyubov Sirota
  • : the poetic photo album – Kyiv, PH "ADEF-Ukraine" with " Center PRIPYAT.com", 2010 г., 40p., in Russian and English languages. –
  • : poetry, prose, Kyiv, Publishing house "Kyiv-Mohyla Academy", 2013, 208 pages, in Russian and Ukrainian languages, hardcover.—
  • : S-40 Pripyat birchbark / L.M. Sirota, poetry, Kyiv: Prosvita, 2016: ill, 328 pages, in Russian and Ukrainian languages, hardcover. — ISBN 978-617-7201-29-7
  • : novel, Kyiv, Publishing house "Kyiv-Mohyla Academy", 2024, 224 pages, in Ukrainian languages, hardcover. — ISBN 978-966-518-817-9.
  • "Journal of the American Medical Association" JAMA Vol 268, No 5, 5 August 1992
  • The New York Quarterly" – a magazine devoted to the craft of poetry, Number 48, 1992, pages 128 – ISSN 0028-7482 / Library of Congress
  • – Mobile, Alabama: Negative Capability Press, 1992, pages 647 – HBK; PBK; Library of Congress Card Number: 91-091330
  • "Calyx" – a journal of art and literature, Winter 1992/1993, Volume 14 number 2, pages 126
  • "WISE" – World Information Service on Energy, Vol. 449/450, 10 April 1996
  • "The Russell Record Magazine" – Summer 1999, Volume 27/ Number 3
  • "Promin” is published monthly by Ukrainian Woman Association of Canada Vol. XXXVIII April No 4, 1998
  • Magazine "Woman's World", Canada
  • "Chornobyl' – poruch: Fotoal'bom. Chernobyl Concerns Everyone: Photoalbum. In English and Ukrainian" – Rare Ukrainian Album-Book. Published in "Dnipro", Kyiv, 2000, pages 217
  • , Corvallis, Oregon: Calyx Books, 2002, pages 217 –
  • "Perspectives from the Past: Primary Sources in Western Civilizations". W.W. Norton & Company. New York – London. College Book, 1998, Second Edition, Volume 2, pages 628 –
  • "Perspectives from the Past Primary Sources in Western Civilizations". W.W. Norton & Company. New York – London. College Book, 2005 –Third Edition, pages 840 –
  • , Volume 7, 2007, pages 283 –
  • "The Modern Review" is published quarterly by the Parsifal Press Literary Arts Association. – Volume II / Issue 1, September 2006, pages 172, Canada
  • , Cinnamon Press, 2007, page 78 –
  • , Greenhaven; 1 edition, – ;