Ivan the Crimson.Morituri: A Dramatic Novella.[Munich; Augsburg], 1947

“And you said that Ukraine did not exist…”

Ivan Bahrianyi. Morituri: A Dramatic Novella.

[Munich; Augsburg]: Zolotna Brahma, [1947]. — 124 pp. — (Library of Modern Literature).

Publisher’s softcover: the author’s name and title in red against a light stone-colored background; the title is rendered in a broad, brush-like typeface; the publisher’s mark “Zolotna Brahma” on the back cover. The cover is worn and soiled, with frayed edges and corners and minor paper losses, the largest of which is in the center of the lower edge of the front cover; there is a dark stain in the lower left corner of the front cover and a gray smudge on the back cover. The edges of the spine are rubbed. The paper is uniformly yellowed, the edges of the title page are frayed, and there is an ink mark on p. 86. The text block is tight. The title page bears a “Prometheus Publishing House” stamp, a faded rectangular stamp, and the ink number “287.” Condition: good.

Lifetime edition. The book has historical and cultural value and is of collector’s interest.

INFORMATION

The novella opens two minutes before midnight on June 22, 1939: from beyond the walls of the special prison corps, a loudspeaker broadcasts the chimes of the Kremlin clock, and to this metronome the cell of the condemned lives. The title is taken from the Roman gladiators’ greeting “Morituri te salutant” (“Those who are going to die salute you”). Among the prisoners are Shturman and Komandarm; an old prisoner is brought into the cell, whom the debilitated men, in a collective delirium, greet as Karl Marx himself and beg to save. Scenes of interrogations, in which Komandarm is forced to testify against Shturman, alternate with arguments between “Marx” and Shturman about who created the system. The novella concludes in a prison wagon, where Shturman shares bread from his mother’s parcel with “Marx.”

Ivan Bahrianyi (1906–1963), born Lozovyagin, was a prose writer, poet, and publicist. In 1932 he was arrested and exiled to the Far East; in the late 1930s he again passed through the Kharkiv NKVD prison—this experience formed the basis of the novella. In exile in Germany, he wrote “Tygroliv” and “The Gethsemane Garden,” founded the Ukrainian Revolutionary Democratic Party, and edited “Ukrainski Visti.”

The book was published in the “Library of Modern Literature” series by the camp publishing house “Zolotna Brahma.” The stamp on the title page belongs to the Novoulymsk “Prometheus,” which published “Tygroliv” and distributed Bahrianyi’s books. Printed on cheap, porous paper in softcovers, such editions have fared poorly over time, and copies in a complete cover are rare.