Zakhidnia Ukraina

Zakhidnia Ukraina. An organization of revolutionary writers. It was established in Kyiv in 1925, as a division of the organization Pluh, and existed as an independent entity from 1926. It consisted largely of writers originally from Western Ukraine, among them Vasyl Atamaniuk, Dmytro Bedzyk, Vasyl Bobynsky, Mechyslav Hasko, Dmytro Zahul, P. Hirniak, Volodymyr Gadzinsky, Volodymyr Gzhytsky, Liubomyr Dmyterko, Y. Zazuliak, Myroslav Irchan, M. Kachaniuk, M. Kichura, Mykhailo Kozoris, Mykola Marfiievych, Hryhorii Piddubny, Dmytro Rudyk, Ivan Tkachuk, Ahata Turchynska, Anton Shmyhelsky, Myroslava Sopilka, and Rostyslav Zaklynsky. Upon the formation of the Writers' Union of Ukraine (1932–4), it was liquidated, and most of its members were either repressed or shot.

The organization controlled a publishing house and issued a publication Zakhidnia Ukraïna, in which the works of its members were published. From 1930 to 1933 a number of Soviet publicist and fictional works by the members of Zakhidnia Ukraina were published in the Masova biblioteka (Mass Library) book series.

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