Vilde, Iryna

Vilde, Iryna [Вільде, Ірина; Vil'de] (pseudonym of Daryna Polotniuk), b 5 May 1907 in Chernivtsi, d 30 October 1982 in Lviv. Writer. She graduated from Lviv University in 1933 and then worked as a teacher and contributed to the journal Zhinocha dolia in Kolomyia (1933–9). Under Soviet rule she wrote for Pravda Ukrainy as a special correspondent and headed the Lviv branch of the Writers' Union of Ukraine. Her work was first published in 1930. Some of her prose works from the prewar period are Povist' zhyttia (The Novelette of Life, 1930), the anthology of short stories Khymerne sertse (The Whimsical Heart, 1936), the novelettes Metelyky na shpyl’kakh (Pinned Butterflies, 1936) and B’ie vos'ma (The Clock Strikes Eight, 1936), and novelettes based on the life of the intelligentsia and students, such as Povnolitni dity (Grown-up Children, 1939). Her postwar works include Istoriia odnoho zhyttia (The History of One Life, 1946), Nashi bat'ky roziishlysia (Our Parents Have Separated, 1946), Stezhynamy zhyttia (Along the Paths of Life, 1949), Iabluni zatsvily vdruhe (The Apple Trees Have Blossomed Again, 1949), Kury (Chickens, 1953), Nova Lukavytsia (1953), Zhyttia til’ky pochynaiet’sia (Life Is Just Beginning, 1961), and Troiandy i ternia (Roses and Thorns, 1961). In all of those works Vilde showed herself a master at describing the life of Galicians from a variety of social classes. The work most highly rated by literary critics is the novel Sestry Richynski (The Richynsky Sisters, 2 vols, 1958, 1964), in which she portrays the intelligentsia and townspeople from a wide range of social backgrounds. A collected edition of Vilde's works, Tvory (Works, 4 vols, 1967–8), has been published, as well as a Russian translation in five volumes (1958).

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Val'o, Mariia. Iryna Vil'de (Kyiv 1962)
Val'o, Mariia; Lazeba, E. Iryna Vil'de: Bibliohrafichnyi pokazhchyk (Lviv 1972)

Ivan Koshelivets

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 5 (1993).]