On “concentrating thoughts”

In line with The Day’s earlier information (see No. 52, September 11), the first copies of this newspaper’s latest publications, namely the photo album People of the Maidan: a Chronicle and the book Ukraine Incognita. TOP 25, will go to Dnipropetrovsk. Their future owner is Liubov Koshova, director of the foreign languages school at Honchar Dnipropetrovsk National University, formerly employed by the university’s sub-department of English philology.

“I have been reading Den for a long time,” Koshova told us. “I find it to be an interesting and intelligent publication. I like the newspaper being published in three languages, and sometimes even managed to buy the English version. The problem is that Den has recently been in limited availability in Dnipropetrovsk, so I often have to be content with the online version.”

“I have always taken an interest in history, and even wanted in my youth to study history at the university, but was unable to do so. However, I have kept it as a hobby, and am attracted to historical themes and topical essays,” she continued. “I have read a number of books from Den’s Library series, including The Power of the Soft Sign and essay collections ‘Armor-Piercing Political Writing’ and ‘Subversive Literature.’ Your projects are very interesting. Keeping all the newspapers at home becomes difficult sometimes, while books concentrate thoughts to a certain extent.”

“When teaching a foreign language and talking a lot with students, one touches upon various aspects of life, including the situation in the country and its current problems. One needs a basis, and The Day is very helpful in that regard. It is impossible to learn a foreign language by speaking only about other countries. We are interesting to the world such as we are, so I think we should be able to express that for the world. I see this as part of my job,” Koshova shared her thoughts with us.

“I remember I was once teaching a pretty talented group of students, and as the anniversary of the Holodomor was upon us, we talked and read about British scholars and American researchers who studied it. In particular, we discussed James Mace. Very often, people are discovering something new during such lessons. In addition, we often look for information about Ukrainian diaspora in English-speaking countries, the people who have left Ukraine, but still work for our country. It is newspapers such as Den that provide such information. Unfortunately, few of these topics are covered at all in our media space. I think were such materials to be published, they would be in demand, as it is all up to us. Den, for its part, has never followed the demand, but shaped it. Even if your journalists do not approve of these epithets, I still think that this newspaper has an important educational function. Our nation has hit a rough patch on its path, and we need a philological, humanistic array to be created, to allow people to rethink everything,” Koshova maintained.

On her latest reader’s choice, she said: “As soon as I saw a Facebook link to the new books published by Den, I became very interested, in particular, about the People of the Maidan: a Chronicle. We all lived in that atmosphere, worried together with other people, so we would like to have some reminder of these events. Our family has such a tradition since the Orange Revolution, as we concentrate memories of important landmark events in our country’s history. The Euromaidan involved an incredible kaleidoscope of emotions and variability of events, so we still cannot understand the whole, and won’t be unable to do so for a long time to come. Therefore, I really liked the description of the book as ‘the vitamin of memory.’ Our forgetting the past has often been a major issue for us. Looking at the experience of some European countries, I see that they remember and know their pasts. Our history is much richer, but we have not yet learned to properly treat it.”

P.S. Thank you, dear Ms. Koshova! Den/The Day is proud of having such a reader!