New Italian publishing house launched in honor of Ukrainian writer Victoria Amelina

A new publishing house, Vika, is being established in honor of the Ukrainian writer Victoria Amelina. The venture is a collaboration between Italian media group Linkiesta, the European Union, and PEN Ukraine. 

Set to launch in 2025, Vika will focus on publishing Ukrainian and Italian literature, including translations of classic works by notable Ukrainian authors such as Valerian Pidmohylnyi, Viktor Petrov (Domontovych), and Lesia Ukrayinka. 

Vika also plans to release poetry anthologies and contemporary Italian prose translations into Ukrainian. These publications will be distributed through PEN’s “Unbreakable Libraries program.”

According to Linkiesta’s editor-in-chief, Christian Rocca, Vika is named after Victoria Amelina due to her significant contributions to the literary world. “Vika represents Ukrainian classics that resonate with our present and high-quality European literature that fosters the development of the Ukrainian market,” Rocca said.

Valerian Pidmohylnyi’s “A Small Drama” has been selected for translation by the publishing house, publicist and translator Yaryna Hrusha told Chytomo. The choice follows the upcoming Italian release of Pidmohylnyi’s “The City” (available in English by Harvard University Press in early 2025), allowing readers to gain a broader understanding of the author. Similarly, Lesia Ukrayinka’s “Cassandra” will be translated, complementing the existing Italian edition of “The Forest Song.” Viktor Domontovych’s “Girl with a Teddy Bear” was chosen due to its popularity among Italian students.

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“This approach is risky, but it showcases Ukrainian authors’ continuity and diversity beyond a single notable work,” Hrusha said.

Yaryna Hrusha and Alessandro Achilli will compile anthologies of Ukrainian poetry, including works from the Sixtiers and Kyiv School (a literary group of Ukrainian poets from the generation after the Sixtiers, which emerged in Kyiv in the late 1960s and early 1970s), as well as poets Vasyl Stus, Iryna Shuvalova, Halyna Kruk, Yulia Musakovska, and Victoria Amelina.

Yaryna Hrusha at the opening of the reading room in Milan named after Victoria Amelina. Photo: Lorenzo Ceva Valley

The compilers will provide forewords to contextualize the historical background of the selected poems.

Linkiesta is an independent Italian online newspaper known for its investigative journalism, in-depth analysis, and commentary. Launched in 2011, Linkiesta has been led by editor-in-chief Christian Rocca since 2019.

Yaryna Hrusha is a publicist, translator, and culture manager. She graduated in Italian Philology from Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv. Before moving to Italy in 2015, she worked in Ukrainian culture, cinema, and TV, and wrote for LitAkcent and Chytomo. Since 2018, she has taught Ukrainian language and literature at the University of Milan. In 2022, she co-edited the first anthology of Ukrainian poetry in Italian, “Poeti d’Ucraina,” and edited the literary guide “Dimensione Kyiv.” She collaborates with various publishing houses and media outlets, including La Repubblica and Linkiesta.

Alessandro Achilli is senior assistant professor in Slavic Studies at the University of Cagliari, Italy. He was a lecturer in Ukrainian Studies at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia (2017–2020), and a research fellow at the DFG Center for Advanced Studies on Contemporary Poetry at Trier University, Germany (2021). He is the author of a book on the poetry of Vasyl´ Stus (La lirica di Vasyl Stus, 2018) and several articles on modern and contemporary Ukrainian and Russian literature, with special attention to poetry.

RELATED: Victoria Amelina reading room opens in Milan

Cover image: Victoria Amelina. Photo by Juan Vega de Soto 

Copy editing: Aalap Trivedi (Drafted Editorial Services)