Journalist-Writers: How Media and Literature Intertwine in Ukraine

A different view of Ukraine's literary-media space.

Ukraine's cultural space has no shortage of examples where journalistic work moves beyond the newsroom and into literature. Some authors combine media work with writing prose and poetry.

Journalists' books serve to document events and preserve facts. They carry experience gained from working with archives, participating in public events, or speaking with eyewitnesses. On some of these authors and their manuscripts — read on in this DeTalks article.

Vakhtang Kipiani, The Vasyl Stus Case

Vakhtang Kipiani is a journalist, historian, and civic activist. Since 2010, he's held the position of editor-in-chief at the newspaper Istorychna Pravda ('Historical Truth') and is the founder of the Museum-Archive of the Ukrainian Press.

Vakhtang Kipiani's book The Vasyl Stus Case is based on declassified KGB archival materials, made accessible thanks to reforms at the Institute of National Remembrance under Volodymyr V'iatrovych. The author notes that thanks to this reform, he was able to get all six volumes of the Vasyl Stus case on a flash drive, which significantly sped up the book's writing process. The journalist stresses that no one knows whether this window of access will still be open tomorrow.

Kipiani stresses that his book isn't a work of literary scholarship, but rather a documentary account of events tied to Vasyl Stus's life and his fight for freedom. The book is built on documents, newspaper articles, announcements, and the memories and reflections of the poet's wife and friends. The author aims to explain why Stus, the judges, and the witnesses behaved the way they did, and why the authorities feared the poet enough to hand him such a harsh sentence.

While preparing The Vasyl Stus Case, Vakhtang Kipiani worked through KGB archival materials, documents, and eyewitness testimony, letting him reconstruct the timeline and circumstances of events with a high degree of accuracy. Every fact in the book is backed by documents and verified sources.

Yevheniia Podobna, Cities of the Living, Cities of the Dead

Journalist and media trainer Yevheniia Podobna published the book Cities of the Living, Cities of the Dead: Stories From the War in Bucha and Irpin, which documents Russian occupiers' war crimes against Ukraine's civilian population. The book is based on material gathered while working as a correspondent in the combat zone, and includes eyewitness testimony, documents, and medical records, letting her reconstruct events with factual precision.

Podobna has described how much she would give for this book to not exist, and for none of what it describes to have happened, saying it only contains part of the material gathered over the summer and fall, and that this matters deeply to her, adding that in a time when tomorrow might not come, her greatest fear is simply not having time to record, find, and retell what happened, notes the journalist.

While preparing the book, Podobna cross-checked data and compared testimony with documents to reconstruct the real sequence of events. Every fact in the book is backed by primary sources, letting her build a systematic, documented account of events in Bucha and Irpin.

The author spent part of her book's royalties on seasonal medication for troops.

Khrystyna Kotsira, Yeva's Apples

Khrystyna Kotsira is a journalist and writer, laureate of the 'Honor of the Profession' professional journalism award (2021) for her report 'Callsign Domovyna: A Prisoner's Story,' and winner of the 2019 nationwide 'Open World' short prose contest.

Khrystyna Kotsira's novel Yeva's Apples reveals the lives of four women whose fates intertwine with tragic chapters of Ukrainian history — from the Polish-Soviet war to the events of the Anti-Terrorist Operation and contemporary independent Ukraine. The author has dedicated the book to everyone who has fought and continues to fight for Ukraine, saying they inspired her to write it, notes the author.

The book consists of five chapter-novellas, each named after its heroine. The novel's central figure is Yeva, whose life reflects the bitter reality of war, loss, and deportation — she lives grateful to God that her husband works hard and her children are healthy and that the great war passed them by, without realizing that their land no longer belongs to them.

Khrystyna Kotsira's journalistic experience shows through in the book's ability to gather material, verify facts, and portray her characters' inner worlds without exaggeration. For this book, Kotsira was awarded second prize in the Novels category of the 2021 international literary contest 'Koronatsiia Slova' ('Coronation of the Word').

Kotsira has explained that dry facts like 'a deportation took place' or 'this many people were deported' are already widely known, but that what matters most to her is the human question — what it was actually like for people, what it felt like to endure weeks or even months where no one was waiting and no one cared, notes Khrystyna.

Impact on Society and Young People

Journalists' books draw significant reader interest. Vakhtang Kipiani's The Vasyl Stus Case, for instance, made the bestseller lists at Ukrainian bookstores and PEN Ukraine's list of 'Best Ukrainian Books of 2019.' Yevheniia Podobna's Cities of the Living, Cities of the Dead has been featured in war literature roundups recommended to students and young readers. Khrystyna Kotsira's Yeva's Apples, meanwhile, made the longlist for the BBC Book of the Year Award 2022 and continues to receive numerous reviews on book platforms.

The blend of journalism and literature gives young readers examples of creators who combine multiple professional roles and prove that journalistic experience can serve as the foundation for literary work. This format shows that the written word can preserve documented facts while also conveying human stories.