Ivan Bagryaniy

Ivan Bagryaniy (http://www.zlodei.net/1147-ivan-bagryanyj-biografiya.html)

When I was a child my hero was a Spider-man. He responds to most of those criteria which I had read about in this year participants’ compositions.

My today’s point of view has changed. Now it seems to me that today’s hero mustn’t be a superman for doing heroic deeds. As for me the real hero is the person who gives an example of his strong life's position. This is someone who has unshakable view and love to Motherland freedom and to expressing his own thoughts and ideas, a person who will never betray his own beliefs.

To my mind Ivan Bagryaniy was such a man. Though I do not fully agree with some of his views and actions, but I deeply respect him for his qualities which I've described above.

Ivan Bagryaniy was born it the family of a stone-cutter in 1906. Ivan got a secondary education and then he entered a fitters' school and after finishing that school he was enlisted into art-ceramic school.

His speaking Ukrainian and his patriotic moods gave him a lot of troubles while studying at school. In 1925 Bagryaniy was expelled from the Komsomol. At the same time he began writing his first works of literature. Most of them had a patriotic theme. It was the reason for the writer's arrest in April of 1932. He was accused in counter-revolutionary propaganda in his poems like "Ave Maria". Bagryaniy had spent in solitary cell for about 11 months. Then he was exiled to the Siberian prison. He tried to escape but without success. For this deed his prison term was prolonged for 3 years. Having returned home Ivan was arrested again but got freedom in 1940. He described his life in prisons in his novel "Gestimanic Garden".

During WW2 Bagryaniy was a member of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army. In 1945 before the end of the war he immigrated to Germany where he lived until his death. In 1947 he wrote one of my favorite novels "Tiger catchers".

In "Tiger catchers" Bagryaniy created an image of the true Ukrainian, real patriots of his Motherland. The writer described the tragedy of the Soviet people in the period of Stalin's governing. Also he described the beauty of Siberian nature and hunting there.

For this novel Bagryaniy was awarded with State Prize by Shevchenko posthumously in 1992.

Thanks to Bagryaniy's talent as a writer, the fact he didn't obey censorship, and because of his love for Motherland he is my hero.

writer's grave (wikipedia.org)

The most his famous works of literature:

Poems
"Mongolia" (Kiev, 1927)
"Ave Marie" (Kharkov, 1928)
"Golden boomerang" (1946)
"Anton Trouble, a hero of a labour (satirical)" (New Ulm, 1947)

Novels
"Little rock" (Kharkov, 1929)
"Tigercatchers" (New Ulm, 1946)
" Gestimanic Garden " (New Ulm, 1950)


Plays
"Lilac"
"General" (1947)
"Defeat" (1948)

Articles
"Why don't I want return to the USSR"

Coin with the writer's image (http://uk.wikipedia.org)