Commemorating the 85th anniversary of the Babyn Yar massacre. Presentation of the new translation of Anatoly Kuznetsov’s “Babyn Jar. Roman eines Augenzeugen”

In commemoration of the 85th anniversary of the Babyn Yar massacre, we present the new translation of Anatoly Kuznetsov’s Babyn Jar. Roman eines Augenzeugen (Matthes & Seitz Berlin 2026; english edition: Babi Yar: A Document in the Form of a Novel).

On September 29 and 30, 1941, the German occupiers drove more than 33,000 Jews from Kyiv and the surrounding area to the Babyn Yar ravine, where they murdered them. In the Soviet Union, this mass crime remained a taboo subject for decades. It was not until 1966 that Kuznetsov’s documentary novel about the Babyn Yar tragedy was first published there, albeit in a heavily abridged and censored version. The novel was first published in its entirety abroad, after the author’s emigration in 1970.

Anatoly Kuznetsov (1929–1979) witnessed the German occupation of Kyiv and the near-total annihilation of the Ukrainian capital’s Jewish population as a twelve-year-old boy. His novel is a unique literary work of remembrance that gives voice to the victims of this crime through a testimony explicitly grounded in the author’s autobiography.

Translator Christiane Körner and Ukrainian journalist Kateryna Mishchenko, who wrote the afterword, will introduce the novel and discuss its publication history and reception. Christiane Körner will read excerpts from her translation, followed by a discussion moderated by Irine Beridze and Nina Weller.

Christiane Körner is a translator of Russian-language literature into German. Her translations include authors such as Leo Tolstoy, Tatyana Tolstaya, Vladimir Sorokin, and Vasily Grossman. In 2017, she received the Paul Celan Prize. In addition to her work as a translator, she is a journalist and actively promotes German-Russian literary and cultural exchange.

Kateryna Mishchenko is a Ukrainian journalist, essayist, translator, and publisher. She co-founded the independent Kyiv-based publishing house Medusa and regularly writes on culture, memory, politics, and the experience of war in Eastern Europe. She is widely regarded as one of Ukraine’s leading intellectual voices. She currently lives in Berlin, where she works for the Federal Agency for Civic Education.

Irine Beridze is a literature and film scholar and is currently a postdoctoral researcher in the DFG project “Jewish Film Heritage” at the University of Potsdam.

Nina Weller is a slavist and literary scholar at the ZfL. Her research focuses on Eastern European cultures of remembrance, popular culture, and contemporary literature, particularly in Belarus.

The Selma Stern Center for Jewish Studies Berlin-Brandenburg, the DFG project “Jewish Film Heritage” / Priority Program “Jewish Cultural Heritage” (University of Potsdam), and the publisher Matthes & Seitz generously support this event.

Books will be available for purchase from the ebertundweber bookstore.

Fig. above: Babyn Yar ravine (1943), source: Wikimedia Commons