"My grandmothers didn't live to see the war": Who allowed us to live so well?

With this publication, Intent continues its series of reviews dedicated to contemporary Ukrainian publications. The reviews for Intent as part of this project are written by Maria Galina—a Ukrainian writer, poet, and literary critic, and winner of literary awards.

Yevheniia Genova is an author from Odesa associated with the Odesa-based publication Intent. The publication’s website features a separate page dedicated to her, so it’s no surprise that Intent readers are somewhat familiar with her work. All the more so because she has presented her books at the iconic Odesa Bookstore-Café, which in its day was perhaps the city’s only cultural hub that brought together Ukrainian readers. In particular, it was there that her novel *My Grandmothers Didn’t Live to See the War* (2025), published by the Kyiv-based publishing house “Nika-Center,” was presented. This is the author’s second book.

Her first—*Crimean Tatar Families* (Kharkiv, “Folio,” 2024)—can be considered entirely documentary in nature. It tells the stories of 14 Crimean Tatar families who endured all the hardships of the Russian Empire’s criminal colonial policy, no matter what label it hid behind. It’s important to note that the book was published, as we’ve already mentioned, in 2024—that is, during the full-scale war. So it’s no surprise that the first story begins precisely on February 22, 2022. Well, just as it begins—it continues. The deportation of the Tatars from Crimea took place in May 1944. We all know all too well what it’s like to be without one’s homeland, without what is part of one’s life. It’s telling that apricots become a symbol of home in *Genova*—apricots to which one of the author’s characters was able to return, before once again becoming a stranger in his own land following Russia’s occupation of Crimea. Why did I mention apricots here? The fact is that Lyubov Yakymchuk, a native of Luhansk, published a collection of poems titled *Apricots of the Donbas* in 2015. So, in a strange way, apricots have become a symbol of a lost home. Apricots remember. People return to the apricots. They’re worth fighting for. Because they’re part of life. Childhood memories.

What do people feel when their land has been taken away from them twice? What is it like for those who, upon returning to their homeland in the ’80s—spontaneously (they had been deported with the terrifying efficiency of the state apparatus)—left everything behind in a place where they never managed to put down roots, only to find themselves in a state of uncertainty and limbo? The mother of one of the protagonists, who had taught English in Uzbekistan, worked as a calf-raiser for the rest of her life after returning. But on her own land. On her own land, but still…

In fact, many of us are currently in a state of uncertainty—including internally displaced persons (standing next to me in the crowd are girls from Hola Prystan and Nova Kakhovka, whose status back home was much higher than it is here), and those who have left the country. Crimea is, after all, a slightly different case. Because people returned to their homes. They returned only to lose them again. Or to stay and become hostages of the regime.

Those who chose Ukraine are united by a shared experience. It is precisely this experience that is now shaping us into a society. Almost all of us woke up to explosions on February 22… And then… Some found themselves under occupation, enduring everything that, say, the people of Kherson endured—a wave of painful memories, diaries, and memoirs still awaits us, which will be terrifying but necessary to read. Some joined the ranks of the Armed Forces of Ukraine—like Gulnara Asan’s husband. But Crimean Tatar families are united by yet another experience—the experience of ancient exile and return. And a new exile. “Today you have a gold-embroidered headscarf, beautiful tableware, and delicious food, but tomorrow you’ll find yourself on the filthy floor of a cattle car, dreaming of drinking water from a puddle. The memory of our lineage is very strong among us Crimean Tatars. Maybe that’s why we survived?” one of the protagonists reflects. This, by the way, is where she explains why you shouldn’t deny yourself joy. Because soon, it might be gone. And, by the way, it’s a very therapeutic passage, because many people (mostly those abroad) are currently criticizing Odessa residents: “You,” they say, “are living too merrily—look, the restaurants are open and music is playing on Deribasovskaya Street...”

You read these family stories and realize how everything is intertwined here—the experience of Stalinist repression, the experience of the German occupation, the experience of deportation, the experience of a new occupation (this time by Russia), a new war, and the loss of home once again. Sometimes it seems like history goes in circles… I suppose it’s up to us whether we can break that cycle.

In fact, Genova continues to explore these themes in one way or another, from various angles.*My Grandmothers Didn’t Live to See the War* is what is commonly called a “documentary novel.” And once again, the trigger for its creation was a modern war. “This book was born in 2023—partly as a recollection of 2022, partly as an attempt to capture my feelings. Like many people these days, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about my ancestors—those I managed to remember and those I never got to know. The generation of our grandmothers, grandfathers, and their parents. They all lived through the war—some more than once,” says the author.

I’ve noticed that it’s precisely during terrible trials that the need arises to turn to our roots, to our family’s experiences. Because, in reality, such trials seem to befall almost every generation, and if we are alive, it means that our family histories have been more or less successful. These are stories of survival. Yes, we didn’t live to see this war—this brazen and cynical attack by a neighboring state—but we did live through the one before it, and before that there was another, and before that—yet another. It’s no coincidence that Timothy Snyder titled his book about Ukraine *Bloodlands*.

If we take “Crimean Tatar Families” as a starting point, it becomes clear right here that we all share a common experience. We are all people of the bloodlands. We all hold on to what is ours and return, despite the danger. And here, the author no longer interviews her respondents but conveys her own experience—both familial and personal. “I understand my grandmothers, who wanted more than anything to die at home <…> Only now do I understand those who refuse to leave their homes until the very end, taking refuge in damp basements.”

The first shelling. The first blackout. Silent mornings. Meetings with friends. Refugees’ stories. A city plunged into darkness. A bitter irony—the war has given us an opportunity for self-reflection. Here, we can compare our own experiences with the author’s. And the author can compare her own experiences with those of her family, with her grandmother’s memories. The Holodomor, the repressions. War. War again. “Women’s lives were measured by letters from their loved ones—sons, brothers, husbands, uncles. By the seasons—time to sow, time to tend the crops, time to harvest, time to prepare for planting. Children <…> Did my great-grandmother ever have a moment to pause amid this whirlwind of war?” And then—about the constant waiting. The return of loved ones from the war. Victories. Reconstruction. And the main conclusion—“a forbidden life.” Life in spite of everything.

“Who gave you permission to live so well?”—as if those who recently came to destroy our homes were asking.

We can now see for ourselves just how important simple daily routines and simple joys are during wartime. Frying pancakes. Spreading jam on bread. Making yourself some tea or coffee... It’s the simple things that keep us going. Perhaps our grandmothers, too, the author writes... The worst thing is when there’s no one to feed. No one to get up for at the crack of dawn. “Their lives, their world, their daily rituals were shattered several times—and not by the passage of time, but by brazen, brutal outside interference: wars, famines, and the mockery of those for whom this very simple yet deeply rooted way of life was a thorn in their side.”

“Who gave you permission to live so well?” Well, yeah, that’s it.

History repeats itself. Well, sort of—things are a little different for us. Because, unlike our grandmothers, we use gadgets: power banks, rechargeable batteries. Electric stoves instead of wood-burning stoves. But the irony is that it’s precisely those who have electric—rather than gas—stoves at home who found themselves in a difficult situation during the blackout. On the one hand, the war has stimulated demand for the latest tech gadgets—power banks, “trendy lamps for bloggers,” state-of-the-art rechargeable batteries, and solar panels; on the other hand, it has plunged us back into the past: yes, the author writes, the twenty-first century has collided with the beginning of the twentieth.

We all now share a common experience, and in the scenes unfolding before us, we recognize ourselves from time to time. I, too, groped my way through the darkness, searching for a power bank and a flashlight; I walked through dark streets to a lit theater for the first wartime performances and along the seashore, where signs reading “Caution: Mines!” jutted out from the shore. “My Grandmothers Did Not Live to See the War”—is, above all, a record of a new experience we have not yet encountered (though someone who was attacked earlier by an empire gone mad has, indeed, faced it). I believe that someone will eventually compile our reactions to a world that has fallen into a single record—for future researchers. All the more so because we ourselves now have the experience not merely of researchers—but of self-researchers. Can we anticipate explosions and feel relief at the sound of them? Which is worse—rockets or drones? And so on...

For example, many of us have developed the habit of commenting aloud on every action we take. Or our preferences regarding fiction and movies have changed. As an author myself, I too obsessively rewatched *The Lord of the Rings* at the start of the war, trying at least that way to escape into a world where evil is ultimately punished.

But one of the new lessons is realizing that evil isn’t always punished, no matter how much books and movies try to convince us otherwise. The author’s favorite childhood book was about King Matyusz. Its author, the educator Janusz Korczak, died in the ghetto alongside his students, whose fate he consciously chose to share. He stayed with them so that they wouldn’t have to face death alone, in such fear and despair. So if you can’t fix the world, you can at least be responsible for yourself.

So it’s no surprise that the author’s latest book—*They Chose Ukraine*—is dedicated to the real-life stories of “children and teenagers who survived occupation, deportation, or a long life in Russia, but did not renounce Ukraine.” Genova recently presented the book in Odesa. Actually, I had planned to write specifically about this latest book, but it’s only available in digital format, and the publisher asked me to wait for the print edition. Given that the Russians are deliberately destroying our books, I believe that digital versions are what will save us, but let’s hope everything turns out all right, and we’ll have the chance to support the publisher and buy hard copies. After all, the chronicles of the war really do need to be preserved on a physical medium.

Марія Галіна