Ihor Myronovych Kalynets (; 9 July 1939 – 28 June 2025) was a Ukrainian poet and

Soviet dissident Soviet dissidents were people who disagreed with certain features of Soviet ideology or with its entirety and who were willing to speak out against them. The term ''dissident'' was used in the Soviet Union (USSR) in the period from the mid-1960s ...

Background

Kalynets was born in

Khodoriv Khodoriv (, ; ) is a city in Stryi Raion, Lviv Oblast, western Ukraine. It hosts the administration of Khodoriv urban hromada, one of the hromadas of Ukraine. Its population is approximately History The city was first mentioned in 1394. In m ...

, the son of an

agronomist An agriculturist, agriculturalist, agrologist, or agronomist (abbreviated as agr.) is a professional in the science, practice, and management of agriculture and agribusiness. It is a regulated profession in Canada, India, the Philippines, the Uni ...

. His parents upheld Ukrainian cultural traditions. As a child, Kalynets read banned literature in the

Ukrainian language Ukrainian (, ) is an East Slavic languages, East Slavic language, spoken primarily in Ukraine. It is the first language, first (native) language of a large majority of Ukrainians. Written Ukrainian uses the Ukrainian alphabet, a variant of t ...

, and watched the mass

deportations Deportation is the expulsion of a person or group of people by a state from its sovereign territory. The actual definition changes depending on the place and context, and it also changes over time. A person who has been deported or is under sen ...

of Ukrainians by the communists. He graduated from

Lviv University The Ivan Franko National University of Lviv (named after Ivan Franko, ) is a state-sponsored university in Lviv, Ukraine. Since 1940 the university is named after Ukrainian poet Ivan Franko. The university is the oldest institution of highe ...

in 1961. He began writing in the 1950s, and his first book of poetry was published in 1966. Because of censorship, the rest of his works were published in the West.

Writing

One of the main themes of Kalynets's poetry is cultural glorification. Much of his writing uses a vocabulary full of cultural allusions. His work reflects his pride in Ukrainian culture and the country's ancient pagan and early Christian heritage. In ''Kupalo's Fire'' (1966), Kalynets connects the country's folklore and ancient traditions to modern, Soviet life. Most of his works do not contain glaring political criticisms, rather unexpressed denunciation. He drew strong influence from

Bohdan Ihor Antonych Bohdan-Ihor Vasyliovych Antonych (; 5 October 1909 – 6 July 1937) was a 20th-century Ukrainian poet. In 1934 Antonych received third prize honours from the Ivan Franko Society of Writers and Journalists for his work ''Three Signet Rings''. Bi ...

and dedicated one of his poems to him. He also dedicated poems to various Ukrainian cultural icons, including

Taras Shevchenko Taras Hryhorovych Shevchenko (; ; 9 March 1814 – 10 March 1861) was a Ukrainian poet, writer, artist, public and political figure, folklorist, and ethnographer. He was a fellow of the Imperial Academy of Arts and a member of the Brotherhood o ...

, filmmaker

Alexander Dovzhenko Alexander Petrovich Dovzhenko, also Oleksandr Petrovych Dovzhenko (, ; November 25, 1956), was a Soviet film director and screenwriter of Ukrainian origin. He is often cited as one of the most important early Soviet filmmakers, alongside Sergei ...

, and composer Stanislav Liudkevych among others. He refused to dedicate any poems to the Soviet leaders, breaking from the custom which was typical among poets in that time.

Arrest

As a "Ukrainian bourgeois nationalist", opposed to the policies of

Russification Russification (), Russianisation or Russianization, is a form of cultural assimilation in which non-Russians adopt Russian culture and Russian language either voluntarily or as a result of a deliberate state policy. Russification was at times ...

and general Soviet lawlessness, he was sentenced to nine years in a

labour camp A labor camp (or labour camp, see British and American spelling differences, spelling differences) or work camp is a detention facility where inmates are unfree labour, forced to engage in penal labor as a form of punishment. Labor camps have ...

and exile. His wife, Iryna, was arrested in January 1972. Kalynets refused to cooperate with the KGB and began behaving in a defiant manner. In March 1971, the 24th Congress of the

Communist Party of Ukraine The Communist Party of Ukraine (CPU or KPU) is a banned political party in Ukraine. It was founded in 1993 and claimed to be the successor to the Soviet-era Communist Party of Ukraine, which had been banned in 1991. In 2002 it held a "unifi ...

denounced Kalynets' poetry as "reprehensible", made worse by the fact that he allowed his work to be published in the West. He was then indicted on the grounds that he "issues a veiled appeal to struggle against the Soviet government", "calls for a revival of the Uniate Church", "covertly presents the idea that the Ukrainian people are oppressed by the Soviet government", and "articulates a nationalist ideology, as well as nostalgia for the past and for an independent state". On 11 August 1972, he was arrested, and on 15 November 1972, he was convicted for anti-Soviet activities by a closed court and sentenced to six years in labour camps and three years in exile.На дві країни. Як український письменник Василь Махно живе в Америці
.

Українська правда ''Ukrainska Pravda'' is a Ukrainian socio-political online media outlet founded by Heorhii Gongadze in April 2000. After Gongadze’s death in September 2000, the editorial team was led by co-founder Olena Prytula, who remained the editor-in ...

. Життя, 2 травня 2018 He served out his sentences in the

Perm Perm or PERM may refer to: Places * Perm, Russia, a city in Russia **Permsky District, the district **Perm Krai, a federal subject of Russia since 2005 **Perm Oblast, a former federal subject of Russia 1938–2005 ** Perm Governorate, an administr ...

political

labour camps A labor camp (or labour camp, see spelling differences) or work camp is a detention facility where inmates are forced to engage in penal labor as a form of punishment. Labor camps have many common aspects with slavery and with prisons (especi ...

, first at No. 35 at Vsechsvyatskaya, but he was then moved to No. 36 in the village of Kutchino, Perm Region. While in prison, he took part in the resistance movement. He was involved with hunger strikes, the writing of appeals and the writing of chronicles of the two camps. After being released from prison in 1981, he worked in the

Lviv Academy of Sciences Lviv ( or ; ; ; see #Names and symbols, below for other names) is the largest city in western Ukraine, as well as the List of cities in Ukraine, fifth-largest city in Ukraine, with a population of It serves as the administrative centre of ...

of the Ukrainian SSR library.

Personal life and death

Kalynets was married to poet and fellow dissident Iryna Kalynets (died 31 July 2012, aged 72), who also actively opposed the suppression of the

Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church The Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church (UGCC) is a Major archiepiscopal church, major archiepiscopal ''sui iuris'' ("autonomous") Eastern Catholic Churches, Eastern Catholic church that is based in Ukraine. As a particular church of the Cathol ...

and was a professor of Ukrainian language and literature at the

Lviv Polytechnic Lviv Polytechnic National University () is a public university in Lviv, Ukraine, founded in 1816. According to the Times Higher Education, as of 2024, it ranks first as a technical institution of higher education and second among all instit ...

. She was sentenced to six years of hard labor. He died on 28 June 2025, at the age of 85.

Honors

* 1992: Shevchenko PrizeKobets, Svitlana. "Fire of Kupala by Ihor Kalynets", ''Censorship: an International Encyclopedia''. (London: Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers) 200

/ref> * 1997: Antonovych prize * (2009)

Collections of Poetry

*''Kupalo's Fire'' (1966) *''Poetry from Ukraine'' (1970) *''Summing up Silence'' (1971) *''The Crowning of a Scarecrow'' (1972) translated into German in 1975 *''The Awakened Muse'' (1991)

References

External links

*
Notice of death of Iryna Kalynets
(in Ukrainian) {{DEFAULTSORT:Kalynets, Ihor 1939 births 2025 deaths People from Khodoriv Ukrainian male poets Ukrainian dissidents University of Lviv alumni Date of birth missing Soviet dissidents Recipients of the Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise, 4th class Recipients of the Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise, 5th class Recipients of the Order of Liberty (Ukraine)