Ukrainian bookshelves in the world's leading libraries as part of the project of the First Lady of Ukraine Olena Zelenska have been supplemented with Mykhailo Hrushevsky's History of Ukraine-Rus'.
The project to distribute Ukrainian books includes more than 190 shelves in 46 countries (Austria, Türkiye, Lithuania, Slovakia, Sweden, Czech Republic, France, the Netherlands, Greece, Latvia, Finland, Jordan, Croatia, Lebanon, Japan, Belgium, Albania, Republic of Korea, Poland, Switzerland, Germany, Spain, Norway, Moldova, Qatar, Slovenia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Portugal, South Africa, Cyprus, UAE, Namibia, North Macedonia, Hungary, Indonesia, Armenia, Great Britain, Serbia, the United States, Romania, Singapore, Mexico, Denmark, Argentina, Canada), as well as at the headquarters of the international organization UNESCO. The assortment of shelves includes more than 47 thousand books.
The wife of the President of Ukraine emphasizes that this is not just a reading project. After all, in the context of Ukraine's struggle for survival, books are also part of the struggle to preserve cultural identity, memory, and history.
The Embassy of Canada in Ukraine and the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies donated ten sets of Mykhajlo Hrushevsky's ten-volume edition (12 books) of the History of Ukraine-Rus' to the Ukrainian Bookshelf project. The English translation and publication was carried out by the Peter Jacyk Centre for Ukrainian Historical Research at the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies at the University of Alberta.
The presentation and transfer of the edition, which took place on the territory of St. Sophia of Kyiv, were organized with the support of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, the Ministry of Education and Science, the Embassy of Canada in Ukraine, the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies at the University of Alberta, the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, and the St. Sophia of Kyiv National Conservation Area.
The event was attended by well-known contemporary historians of Ukraine, the United States, and Canada who study Ukrainian history, such as Yaroslav Hrytsak, Serhii Plokhii, and Frank Sysyn.
Olena Zelenska thanked for the unique edition and emphasized its importance.
"This is not only Mykhailo Hrushevsky's work of a lifetime, but it is the first academic history of Ukraine as a separate state, dating back to Kyivan Rus'. For us, modern Ukrainians, it seems to be an ordinary fact. But at the time when Hrushevsky began his work, the era of Kyivan Rus' had long been "monopolized" by the Russian Empire. Thus, Hrushevsky radically changed the imperial focus, revealing the history of an entire nation to the world and to himself. And today, when Russia is once again trying to rewrite history and erase Ukraine from it, Professor Hrushevsky's work is once again upholding the facts and historical truth. And it is especially important that through the Ukrainian Bookshelf project, the book will reach not only academia but everyone," the First Lady summarized.