Kho Хо

An adaptation, not the original text. It is MovaReader’s own retelling in simple standard Ukrainian of Mykhailo Kotsiubynsky’s literary fairy tale Хо, written in January 1894 and first printed that year in the Lviv journal Зоря. The source is the text in volume I of his Works (Knyhospilka, New York, 1955) on Wikisource, the same text that closes Kharytia and Other Stories at B2 in this catalogue. What changed: the spelling is modern (2019 rules, so лампа instead of лямпа), the narration is in the past tense with sentences of about 9 words, and Kho’s long reflections on fear, freedom and whole nations are shortened. The tale of about 9,400 words in five numbered parts and a closing section became about 4,500 words in 7 titled chapters: the episode of Makar Ivanovych became two chapters, and the closing section the last one. The plot, the characters and the order of events are kept. The dedication is left out, the lines the original gives in Russian are told in Ukrainian, and an insulting word the landowners use for peasants is rendered as худоба (cattle).

No, there is no audio version on MovaReader: you read the text on screen. Tap an unfamiliar word to see its translation; here that will often be words of the period like альтанка (a garden arbour) or корчма (a village tavern), or торба, the sack in which the bogeyman is said to carry off naughty children.

Yes: whole-sentence translation comes with the Reader plan. With 9 words per sentence you will want it mostly where a sentence turns, as in Помер чоловік, то треба поховати його тихенько, випити чарку й тихенько піти додому (“A man has died, so he should be buried quietly, and then one has a drink and quietly goes home”). Single words can be translated without the plan, within a daily limit.

Plan on roughly one hour for the whole tale at a learner’s pace, looking up new words along the way. The chapters run from 467 words (I) to 855 (III), so each one is a short sitting, and one or two evenings are enough.

The sentences are fairly even: from 7.8 words on average in chapter II, with the nanny and the children, to 10.1 in chapter VII. The vocabulary is less even: the two chapters about the official Makar Ivanovych (IV and V) are full of words like карбованців (roubles) and небезпечного (dangerous), and chapter IV has 8.8% long words, against 2.6% in chapter I, in the forest. After them, chapter VI is lighter again (4.1%).

Yes. Once you sign in, the reader keeps your place and the words you looked up. The contents on this page open any of the 7 chapters directly, for example chapter IV, “Поганий сон” (A bad dream), where Makar Ivanovych wakes up from a nightmare about a search of his flat.