State Publishing House of Ukraine

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State Publishing House of Ukraine
Native name
Державне видавництво України
IndustryPublishing house
FoundedMay 19, 1919 (1919-05-19)
DefunctAugust 21, 1930 (1930-08-21)
SuccessorState Publishing Union of Ukraine
Headquarters
Kiev (1919-1922), Kharkov (1922-1930)
,
Ukrainian SSR

The State Publishing House of Ukraine (Russian: Государственное издательство Украины or 'Госиздат Украины', Gosizdat Ukrainii, Ukrainian: Державне видавництво України, abbreviated 'Держвидав' or 'ДВУ', Derzhvydav or DVU) was a publishing house in the Ukrainian SSR 1919-1930. During the 1920s it was the biggest literary publisher in the Ukrainian SSR and published large amounts of books of different types in Ukrainian language.

Vseukrvydav (1919-1920)

The publishing house was founded as the All-Ukrainian Publishing House (Russian: Всеукраинское издательство, abbreviated 'Всеукриздат', Vseukrizdat in Russian, Ukrainian: Всеукраїнське видавництво, abbreviated 'Всеукрвидав' or 'Всевидав', Vseukrvydav or Vsevydav in Ukrainian), being set up in Kiev on May 5, 1919 following a decree of the All-Ukrainian Central Executive Committee which ordered the merger of all soviet publishing houses into a single entity.[1][2] Vseukrvydav was given monopoly on printing activities.[3] Vseukrvydav was placed in charge of regulation the publishing activities of scientific, cooperative, military and literary organizations and associations, and it held the power to determine the number of publications and their circulation and was in charge of distributing paper for publishing activities.[4] Branches of Vseukrvydav were set up in Kiev, Kharkov, Volyn', Poltava and other locations.[5]

By October 1919 the Vseukrvydav became defunct as Ukraine came under the control of the forces of General Anton Denikin.[1] Vseukrvydav resumed activities in December 1919, being managed under the All-Ukrainian Revolutionary Committee.[1] Vseukrvydav published the arts journal Mystetstvo [uk] during a short period.[6]

Vseukrderzhvydav (1920-1922)

All-Ukrainian State Publishing House symbol

A decree issued by the All-Ukrainian Central Executive Committee on August 18, 1920 renamed the entity as All-Ukrainian State Publishing House (Russian: Всеукраинское государственное издательство, abbreviated 'Всеукргосиздат', Vseukrgosizdat, Ukrainian: Всеукраїнське державне видавництво, abbreviated 'Всеукрдержвидав', Vseukrderzhvydav or VDV).[7][8][9] Vseukrderzhvydav was controlled by the Presidium of the All-Ukrainian Central Executive Committee.[10] In May 1921 the publishing house was placed under the management of the People's Commissariat for Education of the Ukrainian SSR.[1][10]

From khozraschet to Ukrainization

In 1922 the entity was renamed the State Publishing House of Ukraine, in line with a reorganization occurring following decisions by the Central Committee of the Communist Party (Bolsheviks) of Ukraine and the Council of People's Commissars of the Ukrainian SSR.[3][8][11] Publishing activities would have to conform to self-financing and accountability of allocated capital (khozraschet).[12] The erstwhile branches of the All-Ukrainian State Publishing House were converted into bookstore or trade offices.[11]

From August 1922 onward the headquarters of the State Publishing House of Ukraine was located in Kharkov, albeit the company had representative offices in other Ukrainian cities.[10] Moreover the company had representation offices in Moscow and Leningrad.[10] A number of other publishing houses existed alongside DVU in the Ukrainian SSR, by 1922-1923 there were 49 publishing houses in the republic - 23 state-owned, 10 belonging to cooperatives, 4 belonging to party organs, 5 to trade unions and 7 private.[3]

DVU printed a lot of books in Ukrainian language, for example textbooks, series of classics and translations of Western European literature.[3] It also published some technical literature.[3] DVU published almanacs and magazines such as Pluh [uk], Hart [uk], Chervonyi Shliakh, Zhyttya y revolyutsiya [ru], Kritika and Krasne Slovo.[2] Ukrainian writers working for DVU included Vasyl Ellan-Blakytny, Ivan Bagmut [ru], Maik Yohansen, Volodmyr Koriak [ru], Sergey Pilipenko [ru] and Pavlo Tychyna.[2]

During the first years after the 1922 reorganization DVU struggled to stay afloat, as resources allocated by Moscow Centre to DVU in terms of printing press and paper resources were meagre.[12] In 1923 DVU published 2.2 million books in Ukrainian language and 1.5 million school primers.[13] Furthermore in 1923 DVU published a new edition of Mykhailo Kotsiubynsky's works, a Ukrainian-language translation of Vladimir Korolenko's works, two dictionaries, a series of popular theatrical books and a peasants wall calendar.[13] In the first 11 months of 1924, 67% of the works published by DVU was in Ukrainian language.[14]

In 1925 DVU began receiving economic support from the government of the Soviet Union, as 10% of the all-Union budget for publishing activities was allocated to Ukraine.[12] But the allocated resources were insufficient to meet its needs. In 1925 the financial crisis of DVU reached a point where the entity stopped paying royalties to its writers.[12] DVU had to prioritize printing of school textbooks, with some 80% of its printed material being allocated to education sector.[12] For the 1924-1925 school year printed 105 school text books and 37 teacher instruction books.[15] As of 1925 DVU was also supplying 5 textbooks each for the Yiddish, German and Polish schools in the Ukrainian SSR, 3 textbooks for the Bulgarian schools and 2 textbooks for the Moldavian schools.[14] But the amount of printed textbooks didn't meet the demand, and schools outside of larger cities often had difficulties acquiring them.[15]

As DVU mainly printed textbooks there has a large unmet demand for Ukrainian-language fictional prose literature. Belles-lettres literary works published by DVU would sell out in about in half the usual press run of one and a half years for its Soviet counterparts.[12] This in spite of higher prices of DVU literature compared to general Soviet literature.[12]

In 1927 Mykola Skrypnyk became the People's Commissar for Education of the Ukrainian SSR, and after taking office Skrypnyk pushed for a new round of 'Ukrainization'. With Skrypnyk as the Education Commissar several new literary and cultural publications were launched, such as Nova Generatsiia and Avangard almanakh [uk] which were published by DVU.[6][16] By the late 1920s DVU was the largest publisher in Ukraine[3], as well as being the second-largest publisher in the Soviet Union as a whole.[5] 1929-1930 DVU published a 18-volume translation of the Works of Émile Zola.[17]

DVU literature was distributed by the Ukrainian Book Distribution Center (Ukrknigotsentr), a body that organized deliveries of literature to trade unions, factory reading rooms, collective farms and raion-level libraries.[5]

Merger into DVOU

The publishing activities in the Ukrainian SSR were reorganized in 1930 in the midst of a crack-down on nationalist tendencies.[3] On August 21, 1930, by decision of the Council of People's Commissars of the Ukrainian SSR, DVU was replaced by the State Publishing Union of Ukraine (DVOU) which was formed through the merger of ten publishing houses.[3][1][2]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c d e М. С Куповецкий. Документы по истории и культуре евреев в архивах Киева: путеводитель. Дух и литера, 2006. p. 271
  2. ^ a b c d Бондарчук П.М. ДЕРЖАВНЕ ВИДАВНИЦТВО УКРАЇНИ [Електронний ресурс] // Енциклопедія історії України: Т. 2: Г-Д / Редкол.: В. А. Смолій (голова) та ін. НАН України. Інститут історії України. - К.: В-во "Наукова думка", 2004. - 688 с.: іл..
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h Allen Kent, Harold Lancour, Jay E. Daily. Encyclopedia of Library and Information Science: Volume 31 - Toronto to The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. CRC Press, 1981. pp. 296-297
  4. ^ З історії книги на Україні. Наукова думка, 1978. p. 41
  5. ^ a b c Poster Plakat. All-Ukrainian State Publishing House
  6. ^ a b Peter Brooker, Andrew Thacker. The Oxford Critical and Cultural History of Modernist Magazines. Oxford University Press, 2009. pp. 1245, 1358
  7. ^ Volodymyr Kubiĭovych. Ukraine: a Concise Encyclopaedia, Vol. 2. Published for the Ukrainian National Association, University of Toronto Press, 1971. p. 459
  8. ^ a b История Российской книжной палаты: вспомогательные указатели. Российская книжная палата, 2009. p. 72
  9. ^ Volodymyr Viktorovych Kalinichenko. Istorii͡a Ukraïny: 1917-2003. Kharkivsʹkyĭ nat͡sionalʹnyĭ universytet im. V.N. Karazina, 2004. p. 154
  10. ^ a b c d Dorohyĭ Arkadii︠u︡: lystuvanni︠a︡ ta arkhivarii︠a︡ literaturnoho seredovyshcha Ukraïny, 1922-1945 rr. Klasyka, 2001. p. 36
  11. ^ a b О. В Молодчиков. Книга радянської України. Вид-во політичної літератури Украіни, 1974. p. 54
  12. ^ a b c d e f g Bohdan Krawchenko. Social Change and National Consciousness in Twentieth Century Ukraine. Springer, 1987. pp. 95-96
  13. ^ a b Yohanan Petrovsky-Shtern. Anti-Imperial Choice: The Making of the Ukrainian Jew. Yale University Press, 2009. p. 81
  14. ^ a b The Ukrainian Soviet Republic, in Russian Review, April 1, 1925. p. 145
  15. ^ a b Matthew D. Pauly. Breaking the Tongue: Language, Education, and Power in Soviet Ukraine, 1923-1934. University of Toronto Press, 2014. p. 120
  16. ^ Myroslava Mudrak. The New Generation and Artistic Modernism in the Ukraine. UMI Research Press, 1986. p. 46
  17. ^ Christopher Rundle, Anne Lange, Daniele Monticelli. Translation Under Communism. Springer Nature, 2022. p. 145
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