Іван Багряний. Людина Біжить Над Прірвою

Іван Багряний

Work proposed for translation:

Людина Біжить Над Прірвою
A novel (1965)
Length: 448 pp.
Copyright: Orphan work

Ivan Bahrianyi (real name Ivan Lozoviaha, 1906–1963) was a Ukrainian poet, prose writer, publicist, and political figure. He studied at the Kyiv Art Institute but was unable to complete his education due to his financial difficulties and mistrust of the political regime. His first published poem, Ave Maria, was confiscated due to ideological differences between the text and the official ideology of the USSR. In 1932, Bahrianyi was arrested on charges of creating a counter-revolutionary organisation. Bahrianyi wrote his novel Tiger Trappers, which was later translated into many languages, about his imprisonment in a force labour camp in the Far East. In 1938, he was arrested for the second time. He later recounted his two years in prison in the novel Garden of Gethsemane, which became one of the most famous works about Stalin’s repressions. During World War II, he managed to move to Galicia, where he collaborated with the Ukrainian underground. In 1944, he emigrated to Germany, where he became an important figure in the Ukrainian emigration community, leading intense political and cultural activities.

The novel A Man Runs Over an Abyss is set during the Second World War. It depicts man’s struggle against the evil, despair and hopelessness that hang over him. The main character, Maksym Kolot, a Ukrainian architect, intellectual, and at the same time a death row inmate, prisoner, and fugitive, finds himself caught between two authoritarian forces, each of which spells death for him. In the midst of the struggle between two systems, Maksym searches for ways to save himself. The man runs over an abyss, falling into which threatens not only the death of his body, but also the spiritual death of his faith in humanity. When he is already on the verge of physical survival, his main battle takes place in his soul: is there anything left in man of his divine essence? But Maksym manages to find answers to his questions. The novel explores the tragedy of a 20th-century man who, due to the widespread devaluation of life, finds himself on the brink of despair. Therefore, the theme of humanism in extremely unfavourable conditions is the main theme of this work.