Voroshilovgrad (novel)

cover page for the book's first edition (in Ukrainian)

Voroshylovhrad—a city located in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine and, since the fall of the Soviet Union, is called Luhansk. First English translators of the novel (actually professional translators from Russian) used the historical Russian transliteration of the city's name (with i for и and g for г). Since then, Ukraine has been making efforts to break the colonial tradition of writing Ukrainian names in accordance with Russian phonetics. According to the guidelines introduced by the Ukrainian government (with y for и and h for г),[4] the correct name is "Voroshylovhrad". Both titles are used.

Located along the Russian border, the Donbas is an industrial and mining region known for its steppe land and coal mining. Under Stalin, the Donbas became the setting for the Stakhanovite movement. Today the former Voroshylovhrad falls within the territory of the self-declared Luhansk People’s Republic—an entity which, Zhadan wrote in May 2014, “exists exclusively in the fantasies of the self-proclaimed ‘people’s mayors’ and ‘people’s governors.’”[5]

In the novel, Herman, a young political expert working in Kharkiv, takes charge of his brother’s gas station in Voroshilovgrad, where he grew up, after his brother disappeared. Herman works with Kocha and Injured, his brother’s faithful employees. Together, they are protecting the gas station from corporate raids of a powerful local businessman Pastushok. With nostalgia, uncertainty, and drive to fight against injustice, Herman stays in the old-new place, cutting his ties to the life he had before this adventure.

Los Angeles Review of Books summarizes the book:

The main protagonist, Herman, has left his unnamed hometown for Kharkiv, where he earned a degree in history, and where he holds a decent job ghostwriting government speeches. He lives with a friend and employer, a shady businessman from whom he hides money, appropriately but unsuccessfully, in a volume of Hegel. But the novel resists Hegelian dialectics, taking Herman, instead of forward toward progress, into a nonlinear realm of memories and other people’s dreams. He is spirited back to his hometown after the disappearance of his brother.[6]

The novel unfolds in the multi-layered story of coming to terms with the past and old friends. At the same time, it is a portrayal of the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine, which unfolds in a whole variety of aspects, from the legacy of the Soviet past to the troubled trajectories of human life at the Ukrainian-Russian borderland.

"A homecoming is by turns magical and brutal in Zhadan's impressive picaresque novel. . . . For Zhadan, loyalty and fraternity are the life-giving forces in this exhausted, fertile, near-anarchic corner of the country . . . readers will be touched by his devotion to a land of haunted beauty, 'high sky,' and 'black earth.'"[7] — Publishers Weekly

"Voroshilovgrad is an unsentimental novel about human relationships in conditions of brutality in which there is not a single act of betrayal... In his prose there is no nostalgia, but there is genuine affection, rough and profound. Even in this brutish habitus, there is trust, loyalty, and love."[5] — Marci Shore, The New Yorker

"With Voroshilovgrad, Zhadan has created an authentic poetics of post--Soviet rural devastation. His ragged, sympathetic characters aren't the newly rich post--Soviets of Moscow, the urban oligarchs Peter Pomerantsev has described, who "sing hymns to Russian religious conservatism -- and keep their money and families in London." They are individuals struggling to come to terms with their place in history and with the history of their place."[6] — Amelia Glaser, Los Angeles Review of Books.

"Blurring the boundaries between time and space as well as place, Voroshilovgrad narrates the journey of Herman, an advertising executive, who returns to his remote home after years of city living to find his missing brother."[8] — World Literature Today's Recommended Summer Reads 2016

• First published in 2010 by Folio (in Ukrainian) - Kharkiv, 2010. 442 pp. ISBN 978-966-03-5245-2
• at least two reprints and the first translation into Russian were published by Folio in 2010-2015
• three more editions in Ukrainian were prepared by other publishing houses in 2015, 2018, 2022
• In 2011 the first audiobook (CD, voiced by Zhadan himself) published in noncommercial project for people with vision disabilities
• First German translation of the novel by Juri Durkot, Sabine Stöhr was published in 2012 and its title is "Die Erfindung des Jazz im Donbass" (An Emerging of jazz in Donbas) Berlin: Suhrkamp Verlag. 2012. 394 Seiten. ISBN 978-351-84-2335-6
• Hungarian. Szerhij Zsadan. «Vorosilovgrád». Fordította: Körner Gábor. Budapest: Európa Konyvkiado. 2012. 396 oldal. ISBN 978-963-07-9295-0
• French. Serhiy Jadan. «La Route du Donbass». Traduit de l'ukrainien par Iryna Dmytrychyn. Lausanne: Les Éditions Noir sur Blanc. 2013. 368 p. ISBN 978-2-88250-324-4
• Polish. Serhij Żadan. «Woroszyłowgrad». Przekład z języka ukraińskiego: Michał Petryk. Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Czarne. 2013. 376 stron. ISBN 978-837-53-6492-7
• First published in English in 2016 by Deep Vellum. Translated from the Ukrainian: Reilly Costigan-Humes, Isaac Wheeler. Dallas: Deep Vellum Publishing. 2016. 400 pp. ISBN 978-194-19-2030-5
• Belarusian. Сяргей Жадан. Варашылаўград. Пераклад з украінскае: Віталь Латыш. Мінск: Літаратурны Дом «Логвінаў». 2016. 352 с. ISBN 978-609-8147-54-4
• Italian. Serhij Zhadan. La strada del Donbass. Traduzione dal ucraino di Giovanna Brogi e Mariana Prokopovyč. Rome: Voland. 2016. 416 p. ISBN 978-88-6243-198-9
• Latvian. Serhijs Žadans. Džezs pār Donbasu. No ukraiņu valodas tulkojusi Māra Poļakova. Rīga: Jāņa Rozes apgāds. 2016. 374 s. ISBN 978-99-8423-594-3
• Romanian. Serhii Jadan. Jazz în Donbas. Ad. din ucr. și note de: Maria Hoșciuc. Chișinău: Editura Cartier. 2017. 404 p. ISBN 978-9975-86-227-1
• Dutch. Serhi Zjadan. Vorosjylovhrad. Vertaler: Tobias Wals. Amsterdam: De Geus. 2018. 302 s. ISBN 9789044539844 (paper), ISBN 9789044539851 (ebook)
• Georgian. სერგეი ჟადანი. ვოროშილოვგრადი. უკრაინულიდან თარგმნა: ზურაბ ქუთათელაძემ. თბილისი: გამომცემლობა ინტელექტი. 2018. 488 s. ISBN 978-9941-470-67-7
• Slovenian. Serhij Žadan. Vorošilovgrad. Prevod: Primož Lubej, Janja Lubej Vollmaier. Ljubljana: Beletrina. 2018. 450 s. ISBN 9789612843687