The question of Nikolai Gogol’s “belonging”—especially now, as Ukrainian and Russian cultures, long bound by an imperial past, are severing their ties before our eyes—remains a deeply painful issue for Ukrainians. Gogol, one of the most gifted writers ever born on Ukrainian soil, loved Ukraine profoundly as a civilization, was Ukrainian-speaking by origin, yet chose Russian as his language of expression, thereby enriching Russian literature, whose importance not only for Ukraine but also for th

Udmurt scholar Albert Razin ended his life in front of the Udmurt Republic’s State Council Building in Izhevsk, Russia, on Sept. 10, 2019, setting himself ablaze. His desperate act serves as a haunting emblem of Russia’s national policy under Russian President Vladimir Putin’s reign. Today, Russification has reached unprecedented heights, eclipsing even the Soviet era in its scope and intensity. The marginalization of national cultures and languages is taking place with the active assistance of

Editor’s Note: This guest essay is written within the PEN Ukraine “Dialogues on War” project, supported by the U.S. Embassy in Ukraine. The opinions expressed in the op-ed section are those of the authors. They do not purport to reflect the opinions of the Kyiv Independent. Three decades after Ukraine’s independence, many Ukrainians have yet to cross the borders of their country, let alone their native regions. The world “on the other side” remains reduced to a scene on TV, left to the imagina