Василь Портяк. У снігах

Василь Портяк

Work proposed for translation:

У снігах
Short stories (2006)
Length: 120 pp.
Copyright: Publisher: karpiuk.brustury@gmail.com

Vasyl Portiak (1952–2019) is a Ukrainian writer, journalist, screenwriter and film playwright. He graduated from the Faculty of Journalism of the Taras Shevchenko University of Kyiv. He also studied at the Higher Courses of Directors and Screenwriters. The author’s works include collections of short stories Kryslachi (1983), In the Snow (2006), Guardians of the Virgin (2016) as well as the posthumous publication Skoryi’s Choice (2021). 10 feature films have been made based on his scripts, including those based on the works of Ukrainian writers. Vasyl Portiak is considered one of the most prominent Ukrainian masters of short prose, along with Vasyl Stefanyk, Hryhorii Kosynka, and Hryhor Tiutiunnyk. His works have been translated into English, Hungarian, Czech, Slovak, Japanese, and Belarusian. The writer was twice nominated for the highest state award in literature — the Shevchenko Prize. And in 2020, the Vasyl Portiak International Literary Prize for Short Prose was established.

The collection In the Snow includes eight laconic, deeply dramatic short stories. Their leading theme is the Ukrainian national resistance movement in the Carpathians after World War II. The topic is very close to the writer and painful, because it directly affected his family. Therefore, many of his characters have real prototypes. The short stories are constructed according to the principle of montage, with minimal author presence in the text and maximum objectivity. At the centre of each plot is a pure story about a dramatic human situation, such as in the short story Before the Mowing Season, when a young son recognizes his murdered father, whom the occupiers took around the village for identification, by his knitted socks. An unknown enemy soldier unexpectedly saves the entire family from deportation. Portiak’s short stories are about a person in history, the ability (or not) to extract humanity from oneself, regardless of the circumstances. They illuminate the fates of people who find themselves on the existential border, so even gestures are important in these texts, and details (such as cherry blossoms in a pocket, lost deer antlers) become symbols. Despite the historicism of the plots, some texts are more about love, sanctified by mystery and even mysticism.