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“НАШЕ ЖИТТЯ”, ЧЕРВЕНЬ 201 2 WWW. UNWLA.ORG 5 E XILE M EMORIES : Juliana Starosolska's Book on Kazakhstan i n English by Olesia Wallo First published in the late 1960s, Juliana Starosolska's touching memoir about her own and her family's exile experiences in a remote Siberian corner of Kazakhstan is now finally available in a beautiful English translation done by Marie Chm i lewsky Ulanowicz. Reading Woman in Exile: My Life in Kazakhstan leaves one with the i m- pression that only a very gentle and compassi o- nate person, and a genuine writer at that, could have authored such a book. Perhaps this is b e- cause the story of Ms. Starosolska’s personal a n- guish and suffering is communic ated indirectly, frequently ceding center stage to colorful and o f- ten bittersweet snapshots of memorable people and events that made up her life in exile. Whether it is the little Kazakh boy who loves to ride horses with his grandfather, the guard of the deportee convoy; the pitiful cleaning lady Pasha Kopieikina who gives up her young daughter to rich strangers in exchange for a few bags of flour; or the pretty Kazakh “landlady” K a- riss who worries whether her husband would leave her after he comes back fr om the war — the author draws each portrait with warmth and compassion. She underscores every act of human kindness and tells of her pain and loneliness simply and without excessive sentimentality. She finds the odd and the humorous in the drab, e x- hausting d aily struggle for survival, and with a keen writer's sense of what makes for a poignant moment, she builds meaningful stories around seemingly insignificant objects and memories. But the book is not just a series of well - crafted and amusing vignettes. I t explores the role of memory, family, and culture in the making of the self; it ponders the big question of what it means to be human amidst dehumanizing ci r- cumstances; and it powerfully conveys the a u- thor's sense of wonder, which managed to survive even after decades of terrible hardships unjustly inflicted by a cruel regime. In the past year, presentations of Woman in Exile: My Life in Kazakhsta n have taken place in St. Petersburg, FL, Chicago, IL ( the Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art ), and Baltimor e, MD ( o r- ganized by UNWLA Branch 59). On November 3, 2012, the translated book will also be presented at the Ukrainian Museum in New York. From Woman in Exile: My Life in Kazakhstan Two more energetic steps toward the mirror. Eyes downcast. I began by looking at my reflected feet. There they were, the familiar old shoes, tied together with string to keep the soles from co m- ing apart. In the mirror, they looked even larger, with their upturned scuffed noses and the string, tied in bows falling off to the side. Just above the shoes were two skinny legs wrapped in heavy grey socks. They had been sent to us from Lviv when packages were still allowed. Then the hem of the long coat, almost touchin g my a n- kles. It had been Father’ s old coat. My eyes traveled quickly upward, taking measure of myself. The sides of the oversize coat were tightly w rapped one over one another and tied with a belt at the waist to make for greater warmth. Finally, my eyes rose to my face. “That’s me,” I wh ispered, “that’s me!” I took a hand out of its huge mitten and lifted it up to my face. The person in the mirror also raised her hand. It was reddish - blue in color, swollen and covered with frostbite lesions. It touched the face where a red patch of frost bite from the previous year looked like greasepaint applied by a clown. The hand dropped. Now I couldn’t tear my eyes from the woman in the mirror. It seemed to be me, but maybe it was someone else? (P. 149)
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