Lepky, Sylvestr

Lepky, Sylvestr [Лепкий, Сильвестр; Lepkyj, Syl'vestr; pseudonyms: Marko Murava, Borys Boryslav, Borys Lepky, Vasylyshyn, M-o], b 31 December 1845 in Kulykiv, Zhovkva circle, Galicia, d 5 June 1901 in Zhukiv, Berezhany county, Galicia. Priest, writer and community activist; father of Bohdan Lepky and Lev Lepky. He graduated from the Greek Catholic Theological Seminary in Lviv in 1871 and then served as a parish priest in various Galician villages. He established a number of Prosvita and Sich society reading rooms and assisted in the publication of an edition of Taras Shevchenko’s works (1867). His poetry and fiction, intended to arouse the national consciousness of Ukrainians, appeared in the newspapers Bukovyna, Dilo, the journal Pravda, and Zoria (Lviv). He also published a number of articles and pamphlets on philosophy, literature, sociology, economics, and agronomy. His story Horyt' (It Burns, 1901) was given a prize by the Prosvita society and was published under separate cover in Lviv. A collection of his verse, Knyzhka horia (A Book of Grief, 1903), appeared posthumously.

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