Overview

American-born Larissa Babij is at home in Kyiv when Russia launches its full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. Her grandparents left Ukraine amidst the violence of World War II, and nearly 80 years later, she is fleeing the advancing Russian army. A Kind of Refugee chronicles the first year of all-out war in Ukraine through vivid dispatches that Babij sent to readers abroad. In cities flooded with refugees and bustling with humanitarian aid efforts, or while supporting an innovative military unit making DIY drones, Babij examines Ukrainian cultures of cooperation. Reflecting on her American upbringing, she ponders the premium that Western societies-shaped by the traumatic history of WW II-place on security. When she returns to Kyiv, sirens, Russian missile strikes, and long periods of darkness organize her days. This moving account of taking responsibility for your home and your history concludes with several essays on theater published between 2015 and 2021. Written with a fierce love for Ukraine and its people, this book is a testament to the courage of ordinary people committed to freedom while defending their homeland.

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9783838218984

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Good writing collapses space and time---what's far grows near, turning »the other« into us. »When your conscience says >Pay attention! Larissa Babij's vital dispatches from Ukraine humanize people subject to the dehumanizing conditions of war. In her letters, we meet those who are learning to live and make meaning despite it all, those dancers driven to armed defense, and the IT experts learning to make drones. Babij's unique voice bridges worlds, weaving together her experiences between the US and Ukraine, between the diasporic imagination and blunt local realities. At times meditative, at others sharp as shrapnel, Babij's testimonies slice through the fog of this ongoing war, making the existential stakes of this battle for Ukraine clear as day.--Maria Sonevytsky, Professor of Anthropology and Music, Bard College This is a vivid and vital personal account of the first year of Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Determined to support her country, Babij stayed in Ukraine, directing resources and attention from abroad toward local initiatives aiding displaced people, transporting medical and military supplies, and building drones to improve the military's defense. A powerful war diary written amid air strikes, relocations, and power outages, Babij's book is deeply thoughtful and thought-provoking, moving, and necessary.--Anya Yurchyshyn, author of My Dead Parents

"“Larissa Babij’s vital dispatches from Ukraine humanize people subject to the dehumanizing conditions of war. In her letters, we meet those who are learning to live and make meaning despite it all, those dancers driven to armed defense, and the IT experts learning to make drones. Babij’s unique voice bridges worlds, weaving together her experiences between the US and Ukraine, between the diasporic imagination and blunt local realities. At times meditative, at others sharp as shrapnel, Babij’s testimonies slice through the fog of this ongoing war, making the existential stakes of this battle for Ukraine clear as day.” —Maria Sonevytsky, Professor of Anthropology and Music, Bard College “This is a vivid and vital personal account of the first year of Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Determined to support her country, Babij stayed in Ukraine, directing resources and attention from abroad toward local initiatives aiding displaced people, transporting medical and military supplies, and building drones to improve the military's defense. A powerful war diary written amid air strikes, relocations, and power outages, Babij’s book is deeply thoughtful and thought-provoking, moving, and necessary.” —Anya Yurchyshyn, author of My Dead Parents ""Good writing collapses space and time—-what's far grows near, turning »the other« into us. »When your conscience says ›Pay attention!‹ and you cannot look away, even though its scary, even though you are tired, even though you risk losing ... something inside you shifts,« writes Larissa Babij. Decades from now, when Russia's savage attack on Ukraine enters the catalogue of 21st century disasters, historians will turn to this chronicle by a courageous American woman of Ukrainian ancestry who chose to stay in Ukraine when others fled. By all accounts, the experience of war with all its urgencies, shocks, horror, and unexpected intimacies is incommunicable but 'A Kind of Refugee' comes close to achieving the impossible. Babij's vivid account of her days in Kyiv and traversing the war-ravaged country, together with a brief but illuminating return to the US, offers a paradigm and becomes an essential contribution to the growing body of what's known as 'the literature of witness.'"" —Askold Melnyczuk, author of The Man Who Would Not Bow"

Author Information

Larissa Babij is a Ukrainian-American writer, translator, and dancer based in Kyiv, Ukraine, since 2005. She holds a BA from Barnard College, Columbia University, New York, USA, and an MA in Cultural Studies from the National University “Kyiv-Mohyla Academy” in Ukraine. She is also a practitioner of the Feldenkrais Method of somatic education. Her writing has appeared in The Evergreen Review, Arrowsmith Journal, The Odessa Review, Springerin, and other publications. She reports on living in Ukraine at war and participating in the country’s civic-military defense at a Kind of Refugee (see https://akindofrefugee2022.substack.com/).

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