MARS

MARS (Майстерня революційного слова; Maisternia revoliutsiinoho slova [Workshop of the Revolutionary Word]). A literary organization established in 1924 in Kyiv under the name Lanka by some of the former members of Aspys; it adopted its new name in 1926. It included a group of talented writers of varying literary predilections who were united by their desire to be independent of official politics in the area of literature. They included Valeriian Pidmohylny, Borys Antonenko-Davydovych, Hryhorii Kosynka, Teodosii Osmachka, Yevhen Pluzhnyk, Dmytro Falkivsky, Yakiv Kachura, Ivan Bahriany, Maria Halych, Borys Teneta, and others. Most of them were all also members of the editorial board of Zhyttia i revoliutsiia. Together with the Neoclassicists, for a long time they continued their opposition to the politicization of literature. They were forced to disband in 1929. Most of the members were executed during the Stalinist terror; Osmachka managed to emigrate at the end of the Second World War, and B. Antonenko-Davydovych was persecuted until his death in Kyiv in 1984. In the late 1980s all of the members were rehabilitated, and their works began to be republished.

[This article was originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 3 (1993).]