I. Розділ 1
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A 1920s expressionist novella for C1
I (Romanticism) Я (Романтика)
Mykola Khvylovy, 1928
Mykola Khvylovy’s complete 1924 novella in Ukrainian, not an adaptation, in the text of the 1928 Kharkiv edition. For advanced learners (C1) who want the most charged Ukrainian prose of the 1920s: about 4,700 words in a prologue and three chapters, about an hour of reading, with the hardest part in the prologue and chapter I.
- C1
- 4 716 words
- 1 hour
Will this text hold?
B2
Earlier
At B2 the story is easy to follow, but the clipped, elliptical sentences, the old spelling (инший, матери) and words like жирандоля or синедріон will stop you in almost every paragraph of the prologue and chapter I.
B2C1
This text
At C1 it reads in one or two sittings: take the prologue and chapter I slowly, tapping single words; chapters II and III move in short lines and dialogue.
Check this passageC2
With room to spare
At C2 the language sets no obstacles; what remains is the style: the ellipses, the returning images (мати, тьма, загірна комуна) and the narrator’s split voice.
Start readingOne word in nine has 9 letters or more (11.1%), one of the highest shares among the Ukrainian books in the catalogue, more than Zakhar Berkut (10.4%) and almost twice Intermezzo (6.3%). Sentences average only 8 words, but that is style, not simplicity: clipped lines, 75 ellipses, dashes and fragments leave the reader to rebuild the links. The vocabulary mixes Soviet revolutionary words (чека, ревком, версальці, штаб Духоніна) with lyrical images (загірна комуна, перломутри). The 1928 edition keeps the spelling of its time: инший for інший, матери for матері, мойого for мого, молодости for молодості. The prologue and chapter I are the densest (11 and 10 words per sentence, about 12% long words); chapters II and III move in shorter lines, about 8. Hence C1. This is the catalogue’s assessment, not a certificate.
- 4 716
- words
- 8
- words in an average sentence
- 1
- hour of reading
- 1928
- Державне видавництво України
Державне видавництво України, 1928. Wikisource
What it is about, without the ending
Civil war, a besieged town in Ukraine. The narrator heads the local Cheka, the Bolshevik political police, and with his comrades (the cold Doctor Tahabat, the timid Andriusha and a brutish guard) sits at night in a nobleman’s requisitioned mansion as a “black tribunal” that signs death sentences. In a small house on the edge of town lives his mother, gentle and devout, whom he sees as an image of the Virgin Mary and from whom he hides his work. As the enemy closes in, a group of nuns arrested for agitation is brought before the tribunal, and among them is his mother. Torn between his love for her and his fanatical loyalty to the revolution, he has to decide. What he does is not revealed here.
Compare two places
Я (Романтика)
II. Розділ 2
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The spelling of 1928
The edition writes мойого where today’s Ukrainian has мого (“my”, genitive), and молодости for молодості: in the spelling of the time, feminine nouns in -ість took -ости in the genitive. Likewise азіятське is today’s азіатське (“Asian”). Expect the same in the rest of the text: инший for інший, матери for матері.
Versaillais and Dukhonin’s headquarters
Two pieces of Red slang. версальці (“Versaillais”) are the enemies of the revolution, named after the government troops who crushed the Paris Commune in 1871. штаб Духоніна (“Dukhonin’s headquarters”) means death by shooting: General Dukhonin, the last commander-in-chief of the Russian army, was lynched by revolutionary soldiers in 1917, and “sending someone to Dukhonin’s headquarters” became a euphemism for execution.
Where the text gets harder
II-IIIshorter sentences
Translation while you read
The book stays free on every plan. Reader, €1 a month, removes the daily limit on words and sentences.
Reader
€1 a month
Chapter I has the longest sentences, and whole-sentence translation in Reader helps with lines like “І в цій надзвичайній суворості я відчуваю весь древній світ, всю безсилу грандіозність і красу третьої молодости минулих шляхетних літ” (“And in this extraordinary severity I feel the whole ancient world, all the powerless grandeur and beauty of the third youth of bygone noble years”).
ReaderIf this book is not the one
Ukrainian books B2 Earlier A Sentimental Story Сантиментальна історія Another book by the same author C1
All books at this levelBefore you read
Is this the original or a learner adaptation?
It is the original, not a learner’s version: Mykola Khvylovy’s complete novella, first published in 1924, with its dedication “Цвітові яблуні” (a nod to Mykhailo Kotsiubynsky’s story Цвіт яблуні), the prologue and all three chapters. The text follows volume II of Khvylovy’s Works (Державне видавництво України, Kharkiv, 1928) as transcribed on Wikisource, so the spelling is that edition’s: инший for today’s інший, матери for матері, мойого for мого, молодости for молодості.
Is there an audiobook?
I (Romanticism) has no audiobook on MovaReader: the novella is read on screen. Tap a word to see its translation; you will need it for rare words such as жирандоля (a branched candelabrum) or синедріон (Sanhedrin, here the secret tribunal).
Can I translate a whole sentence?
Yes, with the Reader plan. It helps most in the prologue and chapter I, where sentences are longest, for example “Тоді проноситься передо мною темна історія цивілізації, і бредуть народи, і віки, і сам час…” (“Then the dark history of civilisation sweeps past me, and peoples wander on, and ages, and time itself…”). Without the plan, single words are translated up to the daily limit.
How many hours does it take?
The whole novella takes about an hour: the pace of someone reading with translation of new words, slower than a native speaker’s. The prologue is about 280 words and each chapter about 1,300 to 1,700, so it fits into one evening.
Where does the text get easier?
From chapter II. The prologue and chapter I are the densest part: 11 and 10 words per sentence on average, with about 12% long words. Chapters II and III move in short lines and dialogue, about 8 words per sentence and about 10% long words.
Will my place in the book be saved?
Yes. Once you sign in, the reader keeps your last place and the words you opened. Any part also opens from the contents on this page, for example the prologue or chapter II (II. Розділ 2).