A History of Ukraine

Myroslav Shkandrij is head of the Department of German and Slavic
Studies at the University of Manitoba, and editor of The Cultural
Renaissance in Ukraine: Polemical Pamphlets, 1925–1926.

This book treats the history of the territory of Ukraine from the
earliest times to its independence in 1991. It differs substantially
from similar histories in the attention it devotes to all the peoples
within Ukraine’s borders: Crimean Tatars, Germans, Greeks, Jews,
Poles, Russians, and others. In elucidating the relationships between
Ukrainians and Jews, Ukrainians and Poles, and so on, the work surveys
the wider field of East European history, providing points of
orientation for the student and the general reader aiming to understand
the national relationships in this part of the world.

Professor Magocsi brings considerable erudition and familiarity with
recent research to bear on a range of contentious issues. He often
espouses “heretical” views: the Mongol period, for example, is less
oppressive in his account than has frequently been suggested. His book
describes the economic benefits that immigrant populations brought to
cities; it also illustrates the gradual and contested birth of a
national consciousness. The horrors of World War II and Soviet rule are
presented in a balanced and sensitive manner. The author’s lively and
always lucid text is periodically interrupted by explanatory inserts,
documentary materials, or maps.

This volume and Orest Subtelny’s History of Ukraine now rank as the
two most comprehensive and authoritative accounts of Ukraine’s
development. They will, no doubt, serve as standard reference texts for
English-language readers for many years to come.