Dybo Iryna.The White Eagle: A Story for Young People.Philadelphia, 1980 — with a gift inscription

Iryna Dibko. White Eagle: Stories for Young People and Older Children = White Eagle / cover illustrated by Larysa Martyniuk; literary and technical editing by B. Romanenchuk.

Philadelphia: Kyiw Publishing (Kyiw Publishing, 4800 N. 12th Street), 1980. — 159, [1] pp.: illus. — 21 × 14 cm. — Parallel English title page. — Typeset and printed by computer: B & B Printing Service, Philadelphia. Print run not stated.

Original publisher's dust jacket in cream-colored paper: the author's name in red, the title in outlined letters, and a color composition in the center featuring a white eagle above snow-covered mountain peaks. The dust jacket shows uniform soiling and wear along the edges, with minor paper loss near the lower spine edge; the back cover has scattered spots and stains, and darkening along the spine. The text block is light, with almost no yellowing; it is firm and intact. On the page with the author's portrait at the top, there is a handwritten inscription in pencil: "For the Ukrainian Studies School named after..." — the surname of the school's patron is only partially legible. Condition: good.

Published during the author's lifetime. The book has historical and cultural value and is of collector's interest.

INFORMATION

The title story is adapted from an Indian tale: in a settlement beneath a mountain, beyond an impassable forest, the remnants of an Inca tribe are living out their final days, and the eldest chief, Grey Wolf, retells to his great-grandchildren how people in military uniforms, never before seen, arrived, took the treasure, and mocked their shrines. This theme of losing one's land and memory runs throughout the book, written for children in emigration. The collection consists of seven longer stories — "White Eagle," "The Secret of Friends," "The Brooch," "The Power of Feelings," "If the Blue Could Speak," "I Met Him," "The Gift" — and a separate section, "Stories for Children," containing five shorter texts.

Iryna Dibko-Filypchak (1925–2012) was a writer, translator, and literary critic, and the daughter of the Galician educator and writer Ivan Filipchak. She was born in Bilshivtsi in the Stanyslaviv region, studied in Stanyslaviv, the Higher School of Music in Łódź, Mozarteum in Salzburg, and the University of Munich; she lived in Poland from 1944, and later in Germany and the United States. She taught at the Ukrainian Studies School in Pasayka and was a member and secretary of the American PEN Club. "White Eagle" was her third book, following the poetry collections "On the Wings of Thought" (1974) and "Along the Paths of the Soul" (1976), and her first prose work.

The literary and technical editing was done by Bohdan Romanenchuk (1908–1989), a literary scholar and publisher, and founder of the Philadelphia journal "Kyiw" (1950), from which the publishing house took its name. In the preface, he explicitly explains the reason for publishing the book: there is a shortage of literature for young people in emigration, and young people are seeking reading material in foreign languages, so an author who writes for young people deserves support. The cover was illustrated by Larysa Martyniuk. Ukrainian diaspora publications for young people were issued in small print runs and did not reach libraries in Ukraine.