“We must win this war”
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The “Bard of Eastern Ukraine” has devoted himself entirely, since the beginning of the Russian invasion, to humanitarian aid and support for the Ukrainian army.
The courage and mobilization of Ukrainian society will enable it to win the war against Russia, says Ukrainian writer Serguiï Jadan, convinced that a country “transformed” is being born.
“I am impressed by the ability of Ukrainians to defend their freedom, their land, their territory”he said in an interview with AFP in mid-August, a few minutes before a recital of his poems in a kyiv performance hall. “That’s what gives me strength and confidence.”
The “Bard of Eastern Ukraine”
Piercing blue eyes, blond hair slicked back and shaved on the side, the writer who has just celebrated his 48th birthday, a key figure in Ukrainian culture, sticks to his image as a punk poet.
Baptized on “Bard from Eastern Ukraine” by american magazine The New Yorker, Serguiï Jadan is the emblem of a city, Kharkiv, where he has lived since he arrived there in the 1990s to study from his native Donbass. It is in this largely Russian-speaking region of north-eastern Ukraine, the epicenter of the fighting for several weeks, that he sets his novels written in Ukrainian which speak with tenderness of the left behind in post-Soviet Ukraine. .
It never left Kharkiv, even when Russian troops who still bombard it regularly — 21 civilians were killed there last week — seemed poised to seize it in March. In April, the AFP had met him, reciting verses under a purple neon in an underground bunker transformed into a refuge, to raise the morale of the inhabitants.
Read alsoIn Kharkiv air raid shelters, puppeteers and poems soften the brutality of war
“Conscience” of Ukraine
But Serguiï Jadan, poet, novelist and cult musician, stopped writing six months ago to devote himself to humanitarian aid and support for the Ukrainian army. “All these activities, I put them on hold”he explains, before speaking on behalf of the Ukrainians: “We are citizens mobilized in the defense of our country”.
Since the beginning of the Russian invasion, Ukrainian civil society has mobilized massively to help the victims of the conflict or to raise funds. “When I see the number of people going to fight or volunteering, I realize how much potential Ukrainian society has. There’s a huge force in that.”continues the writer, convinced that his country “is going through very profound transformations”.
It is moreover to raise funds for the purchase of vehicles for the armed forces that he is performing in kyiv. Two evenings in a row, the 670 seats of the Maison du Cinéma are sold out. His arrival on stage provokes a standing ovation. For 1h30, he recites his short poems, composed in the years preceding the invasion. But the themes are more topical than ever: the city of Mariupol now razed to the ground, life or love during the war in the Donbass, where fighting has been going on for eight years… “Jadan is our conscience (…) His poems are about ourselves, who we are and what surrounds us”says Taras Katrytchenko, a 34-year-old spectator.
“Do not forget”
During the winter of 2013-2014, an already recognized writer, Serguiï Jadan had actively participated in the pro-European Maidan movement in Kharkiv. When a Kremlin-backed armed movement took control of the regional capitals of Donetsk and Lugansk in the east, Kharkiv was divided.
Pro-Russian demonstrations had broken out, Serguiï Jadan gave of his person: while protecting the building of the regional administration that assailants sought to occupy, he had been beaten up, his nose broken, after having refused to kneel in front of the prorussians.
This year, his hometown of Starobilsk, near Luhansk, was occupied from the start of the invasion. Enough to leave him with few illusions. “I don’t really like the sentence saying that the “culture is a weapon” because it is imprecise. A gun is a gun, and you win wars with guns.”says the writer. “Culture will be important after the victory, to live life to the full”.
A week ago, Serguiï Jadan left his country to raise funds and mobilize Europeans in support of his country. “It is essential not to forget Ukraine, to talk about Ukraine, because we must win this war”he says. “We are going to remind the world that a military operation, the biggest since the Second World War, is taking place. And in this operation, you have to have very clear-cut positions: either you support the occupier and the aggressor, or you support Ukraine”.
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