: The Rock Star Poet Playing Concerts to Ukrainians Sheltering Underground From Russian Bombs #WorldNEWS As Russian shells rain down on Ukraine, the country’s most beloved poet cannot write. The

The Rock Star Poet Playing Concerts to Ukrainians Sheltering Underground From Russian Bombs #WorldNEWS
As Russian shells rain down on Ukraine, the country’s most beloved poet cannot write. The inspiration is there: the tale of a schoolteacher who shepherded 10 children away from the front line after being told by the Ukrainian military that there was no hope of escape; old friends in Kharkiv who risked their lives to get neighbors to a shelter; or the discovery of mass graves across Ukraine. In the past 20 years, Serhiy Zhadan has written over a dozen books of poetry and seven novels; he’s also part of the ska-punk band Zhadan and the Dogs.
Now, though, it’s impossible to get the ink to flow; everything is happening too fast. “Ican’t write poetry or prose right now,” Zhadan says during a video call from his apartment in Kharkiv. But music, somehow, keeps up. “I go to the music studio, and together with the band we get some songs out. It’s therapy. Then we go out and perform for our people. ”
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Mention Zhadan’s name in Ukraine and eyes light up. The 47-year-old’s work has long given voice to life in the Donbas, a predominantly industrial region of eastern Ukraine, and one that has endured fierce fighting between the Ukrainian government and Russian-backed separatists since 2014. In his work, Zhadan paints the region where he was born and raised as one intertwined with Russian culture but that is, first and foremost, Ukrainian.
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He belongs to a long line of poets playing a crucial role in Ukrainian culture. “Our leaders for a long time were not kings or queens, but poets,” Zhadan says. Serhii Plokhy, a professor of Ukrainian history at Harvard University, says that many important monuments in Ukraine are dedicated to the 19th century poet Taras Shevchenko, who was born a serf in 1814 and went on to champion political liberalization for Ukraine. “He is considered to be the father of the modern Ukrainian nation,” Plokhy says. Writers also played a major role in the country’s achieving independence in 1991, he adds.
Zhadan is part of this activist-poet tradition. At a time when Russian President Vladimir Putin seeks to erase the very existence of Ukraine—he has denied Ukraine has “its own authentic statehood”—literature and art take on new meaning: they can ensure the country’s spirit is not lost to Kremlin propaganda.

When reports first reached Zhadan about Russia’s invasion, he was on a train heading west from Ukraine’s second largest city, Kharkiv, for a concert. Zhadan and his six bandmates turned back; they wouldn’t abandon the city in its hour of need.

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