A History of Ukraine

by Mykhailo Hrushevsky and Michael Hrushevsky

Book by Michael (Mykhailo) Hrushevsky This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: B000GPLVK2
• Release Date: January 1943
• Publisher: Yale University press
• Length: 574 Pages
• Weight: 2.90 lbs.

Customer Reviews

History of Ukraine by "the most distinguished Ukrainian historian" provides objective, accurate info

As background on why Mykhailo Hrushevsky's A History of Ukraine is such an important tome, it's important to at least be familiar with his academic and professional credentials. Mykhailo Hrushevsky (1866-1934) was born in Kislovodsk, North Caucasus krai, RSFSR. He was the "most distinguished Ukrainian historian; principal organizer of Ukrainian scholarship, prominent civic and political leader, publicist, and writer; member of the Shevchenko Scientific Society from 1894, the All-Ukrainian Academy of Sciences from 1923, and the USSR Academy of Sciences from 1929." His father was a pedagogue and a Slavist. In 1869, his family moved to Caucasia, where Hrushevsky graduated from the classical gymnasium in 1886. While still there, he began to write belles-lettres in Ukrainian. In 1890, Hrushevsky graduated from the Historical-Philological Faculty at Kyiv University; there, he was a student of Volodymyr Antonovych (historian, archeologist, archeographer, professor of history at Kyiv University from 1878, editor-in-chief of the publications of the Kyiv Archeographic Commission, patron and head [from 1881] of the Historical Society of Nestor the Chronicler in Kyiv, and organizer of archeological conferences in Ukraine). Much more detailed biographical information on both Mykhailo Hrushevsky and on Volodymyr Antonovych is available on the website of the Encyclopedia of Ukraine. Hrushevsky published, perhaps, his most important essay in 1904. In that article, he traced Ukraine's history and that of the Ukrainian people to the period of Kyivan Rus--"he argued that the history of the Ukrainian nation is distinct from that of the Russian both in its origin and in its political, economic, and cultural development" (translations appeared in English in 1952 and in German in 1935). Most Russian historians rejected Hrushevsky's argument (they "believed that the modern Russian state was the only direct descendant of Kyivan Rus and did not accept that the Ukrainian nation had developed as a result of a separate and unique history"). Nevertheless, most Ukrainian historians (including those in Soviet Ukraine (until 1929) accepted, with some changes, Hrushevsky's scheme and periodization of Ukraine's history, as did the emigration. Following a brief stay in Saint Petersburg, Hrushevsky returned to Kyiv. In 1907, he cofounded the Ukrainian Scientific Society, which was modeled on the Shevchenko Scientific Society. In the fall of 1914, during the First World War, he was arrested, imprisoned in Kyiv for two months, and exiled to Simbirsk, then to Kazan, and finally to Moscow. He continued his scholarly work despite his repression. After the February Revolution of 1917, he was released from exile and emerged as the leader of the Ukrainian national revolution. The Central Rada elected him chairman on March 17, 1917 while he was still in Moscow. And, it was under his direction, that the Central Rada became the revolutionary parliament of Ukraine. Hrushevsky

An Oustanding Volume on Ukrainian History!

If you're lucky enough to find this terrific 629 p. volume, published by Yale University Press way back in 1941, and since reprinted, even in translation, you will be rewarded with a first rate account of Ukrainian history by the legendary Ukrainian scholar and patriot, Michael Hrushevsky, who died in 1934 as a result of his imprisonment by the Soviet authorities. It's authoritative, scholarly and very readable.