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[AN EXTREMELY RARE EXAMPLE OF THE UKRAINIAN CHILDREN’S LITERATURE] Hrytsevi kurchata [i.e. Grigoriy’s Chickens]

Oles, O.

Prague: 1941. Item #1160

14 pp.: ill. 18.5x13.4 cm. In original illustrated publisher’s wrappers. Wrappers detached, loss of the small pieces of the wrappers. Otherwise in good condition.
Extremely rare. First edition. Wrapper design and black-and-white illustrations throughout by the graphic artist K. Antonovich.
An extremely rare edition of the children’s poem Hrytsevi kurchata [i.e. Grigoriy’s Chickens] written by the noted Ukrainian writer and poet Olexandr Oles (1879-1944) during his emigration years in Prague. After leaving Ukraine in 1919, the author mainly concentrated on children’s fairy-tales, poems and short stories publishing some of the best examples of Ukrainian children’s literature: Po dorozí v Kazku [i.e. On the Way to a Fairy Tale] (Prague - 1939), Lísoviy Tsar Okh [i.e. Fox Tsar Okh] (Prague - 1938), Babusya v hostyakh u Vedmedya [i.e. Grandma Visiting the Bear] (1941), Vedmid’ v hostyakh u Babusi [i.e. Bear Visiting the Grandma] (1941), Babusina prigoda [i.e. The Grandma’s Adventure] (1941), etc.
Hrytsevi kurchata tells the story of the peasant Maxim and his family, who are waiting for their hen to lay eggs for Easter. One day, happy kids draw different animals, elephants, giraffes, wolves, etc., which come alive in Grigoriy’s dreams and hatch from the hen’s eggs.
The poem was printed in 1941 in the German-occupied territory of Prague only 3 years before the author’s death.

No copies found in Worldcat.

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