Witnesses to Interwar Subcarpathian Rus’: The Sojourns of Petr Bogatyrev and Ivan Olbracht

In the midst of a contentious atmosphere of the interwar period, the far-eastern province of Subcarpathian Rus’ attracted the personal curiosity and professional attention of Russian ethnographer and theoretician Petr Bogatyrev and Czech journalist-writer Ivan Olbracht. Both traveled extensively in the region and immersed themselves deeply in the life and culture of the local residents, Carpatho-Rusyns, and Hasidic Jews. Witnesses to Interwar Subcarpathian Rus’ The Sojourns of Petr Bogatyrev and Ivan Olbracht explores for the first time in English the legacy they bequeathed in their respective work: Bogatyrev as an apolitical ethnographic collector and theoretician and Olbracht as a passionately committed Communist whose reports and brilliant stories from the region, including Nikola Suhaj, Brigand, and The Sorrowful Eyes of Hannah Karadjic capture a glimpse of a world destined to change radically as a result of the ravages of war.

Patricia A. Krafcik is professor emerita of Russian language and literature and Slavic culture and folklore at The Evergreen State College.