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OUR LIFE Monthly, published by Ukrainian National Women's League of America Vol. XLVIII OCTOBER 1991 Editor: Marta Baczynsky LUBOV DRASHEVSKA OLENA PCHILKA — STAR OF UKRAINIAN REBIRTH (This article in Ukrainian was reprinted from a book Vyznachni Zinky Ukrainy (Outstanding Women of U- kraine) published by the Union of Ukrainian Women in Diaspora, Western Germany, 1950. The article was based on the ’’Autobiography” of Olena Pchilka (1930) and on To frolic on the high bank of the Dnister River, on the Sharhorodska hill, to enjoy the landscape and the ravines with their multicolored clay, to gather flint stones — that was called “going to the garden.” Olesia and grandmother walked to the garden. Olesia is seven, grandmother — seventy. Grand mother walks slowly, for her legs are old, but her gray eyes are young. She sits and contemplates the wide span of the Dnister River valley. Olesia gathers unusu ally shaped flint stones. She has a whole bunch and each stone resembles the form of some animal. Later, grandmother takes Olesia by the hand and they go from house to house. Grandmother copies pic tures she finds in the peasant houses — the rich orna mentation of the Podolia region found on the clay ovens and around the windows. At home, grandmother sits at her desk, copies the ornamentation or reads. This is a quiet sunset to a long, industrious life. Quietly, Olesia plays near grandmother. From neighboring villages students, school children and teachers come to Mohyliv Podilsky to speak with Olena Pchilka — Olha Petrivna Kosach — to consult with her, to show her their poems. The Ukrainian intelli gentsia, the old and the new, spawned from the revolu tion and lifted from the villages know who Olena Pchilka is. They all read the books and publications which she wrote, published, translated and edited; they saw the embroidery patterns which she collected. They heard about her activism and with reverence they approach the mother of Ukraine’s greatest poetess, Lesia Ukrainka. The end of life. In the portrait painted three years before her death by artist Krasycky, one sees an old woman with a piercing gaze and straight features. In the portraits of her young years, she is an attractive woman in Ukrainian folk costume or an elegant lady with a recollections of her daughter Isydora Kosach-Borysova, as told to Lubov Drashevska over an extended period of time. The article appeared in OUR LIFE in installments: first installment — June 1991.) curly coiffure, dressed in an old fashioned lace gown. She lived for 81 years. She worked all her life, raised children and grandchildren, wrote and translated, edited, collected Ukrainian ethnographic material and researched her findings in a scholarly fashion. She was an active proponent of Ukrainian rebirth and an individ ual full of life. She loved nature, music, singing, flowers, the theater, children, good company and books. In her youth she loved to dance and dress nicely. She was multitalented: she wrote novels, poems, articles, scho larly works and was one of the creators of the Ukrainian literary language. She acted in the theater, painted, designed a house, and with great enjoyment and suc cess cultivated flowers and fruit bearing plants. Olha Petrivna Kosach was a bright star within the talented Ukrainian intelligentsia. She was friends with Lysenko, Starytsky, Nechui-Levytsky. Like a magnet she attracted the young writers — Kotsiubynsky, Oles, Franko. From her youth to old age she was true to her ideals, decisive, active and industrious. The Primary Years June 30, 1949 marked the 100th anniversary of the birth of Olena Pchilka. It is the year 1849 in the heart of picturesque Pol tava region — the town of Hadiache. The clear waters of the river Psol flow quietly. Meadows and forests sur round the provincial town. In a straw covered house lives landowner Petro Yakymovych Drahomaniv. At one time an illustrious official in Petersburg, he was a graduate of the aristo cratic school “ Uchylyshcze Pravovedenyia,” was part of the social life of the capital city, wrote poetry and later
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