SPRING 2022

"Two Years in the Making: Student and Faculty Projects from the Pandemic" 
March 3, Thursday, 7:30 pm 

The Long Breakup (85 min, USA, 2020). A film screening and Q&A with the filmmaker Katya Solda, joined by Dora Chomiak
April 5, Tuesday, 7:30 pm

Poetry Reading and Conversation with Maria Stepanova, Eugene Ostashevsky and Matvei Yankelevich 
April 28, Thursday, 7:30 pm

​A New Orthography by Serhiy Zhadan. Bilingual Poetry Reading and Q&A with Ostap Kin and John Hennessy
April 29, Friday, 6 pm

The Cherry Orchard by Anton Chekhov, adapted for the stage by Dmitry Krymov. Streaming and Q&A with the director. 
May 2, Monday, 6 pm

"Contraband Literature from the USSR at the New York Review of Books." A conversation with the editor Edwin Frank 
May 9, Monday, 6 pm
"Two Years in the Making: Student and Faculty Projects from the Pandemic." March 3, Thursday, 7:30 pm. Elizabeth Hemmerdinger Center, Room 706, Hunter East. In-person (with proof of vaccination). 

Join us for our first in-person event since February 2020 to celebrate the achievements of our students and faculty over the past two years! With masks still required, we are excited to be back and looking forward seeing familiar faces and welcoming new ones to our series. 

PARTICIPATING STUDENTS: 

Nicole Gonik is a Macaulay Honors student at Hunter College, double-majoring in Russian Language & Culture and Political Science, and minoring in International Relations. She is interested in studying the ways in which Russian literature and culture interact with politics, and hopes to pursue a PhD in Russian Studies. Project: "Borders in Mikhail Lermontov’s A Hero of Our Time and 'The Demon'.” 

Nissan Mushiev is a registered nurse completing his Bachelor’s degree, with hopes of working in the emergency room. His project is a play based on two Russian novels, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and Sofia Petrovna by Lydia Chukovskaya, both set during Stalin’s terror. In the play, the two visions and ideologies clash during the short encounter between the eponymous characters. Project: "Familiar Faces." 

Mecaria Baker is a Comparative Literature major, graduating in Spring 2022. She is interested in the representations of distance and space through literary chronography and deictic relationships, the exile experience and immigrant narrative, linguistic socialization in New York City. She is fascinated by thresholds and absolutely entertained by the dash. Project: "Marina Tsvetaeva's Dash: 'Readers of Newspapers'"

Daniella Drakhler has lived with cats all her life. Her play OMI is inspired by her fur friends, as well as by Chekhov's The Three Sisters and Vampilov's Duck Hunting. "During March and April of 2020 my mom 'exiled' me to my boyfriend’s dacha in the Catskills, while she ended up with Covid-19. The grueling unrest of that condition along with scary uncertainty in the new pandemic reality, and the later cathartic flattening of the NYC curve along with my mom’s recuperation, all got reflected in the little piece where the narrative comes from those who become the most vulnerable in times of the human crisis. Project: OMI (One Act Play) 

PARTICIPATING FACULTY: 

Born in Riga, Latvia, Nadya L. Peterson was educated in Moscow, Russia and received her Ph.D. in Russian literature from Indiana University. She is an Associate Professor of Russian at Hunter College of the City University of New York and the Head of the Russian and Slavic Studies Program at Hunter. Peterson is also on the faculty of the doctoral program in the Department of Comparative Literature at the CUNY Graduate Center. She is a specialist on contemporary Russian prose, women’s literature, Russian education and Anton Chekhov. She is a published translator and editor.

Three-times winner of New Jersey Fellowships in Arts, Professor Emeritus at Hunter College in NYC, Emil Draitser has authored twelve books of scholarly and artistic prose, such as In the Jaws of the Crocodile: A Soviet Memoir; Farewell, Mama Odessa: A Novel; Stalin’s Romeo Spy, and Making War, Not Love: Gender and Sexuality in Russian Humor. His work also appeared in the Partisan Review, World Literature Today, Prism International, and elsewhere.  

Yasha Klots is an assistant professor of Russian at Hunter College, where he teaches a variety of courses on Russian literature and culture and curates the "Russian and East European Cultures at Hunter" series. He also teaches at the CUNY Graduate Center and is directing Tamizdat Project, a public scholarship initiative devoted to the circulation, first publications, and reception of "contraband" Russian literature abroad. His most recent book project is Poets in New York: On City, Language, Diaspora (Moscow, 2016). His monograph Tamizdat, the Gulag, and Contraband Russian Literature is forthcoming in 2023. 
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The Long Breakup (85 min, USA, 2020). A film screening and Q&A with the filmmaker Katya Soldak, joined by Dora Chomiak. April 5, Tuesday, 7:30 pm. Hunter College, Elizabeth Hemmerdinger Center, Room 706, Hunter East Bldg. In-person (with proof of vaccination). RSVP required. 

The Long Breakup is a feature length documentary about Ukraine’s struggle to escape Russia’s embrace, leave its Soviet past behind and become a truly independent nation. Ukrainian-American journalist Katya Soldak, of Forbes Magazine, now living in New York City, tells the story of her home country as it exits the USSR, works through two revolutions, and endures a war with Russia—all through the eyes of her family and friends in Kharkiv, a large Ukrainian city just 18 miles from the Russian border.

Katya Soldak is a New-York-based journalist, born and raised in Ukraine. Katya works as an editorial director for Forbes Magazine’s international editions, having previously toiled in the world of documentary production at CBS News Productions and various production houses in New York City. A Columbia School of Journalism alumna, she has interviewed high-profile politicians and artists and has written cover stories for Forbes about Ukrainian and Russian oligarchs. Katya is the author of the memoir essay This Is How Propaganda Works, about growing up in the Soviet Union.
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Dora Chomiak, a native New Yorker, has been active in the Ukrainian-American community in the United States since the 1980s. Dora has been traveling to Ukraine for 25 years and worked for the independent Soros Foundation in Kyiv from 1991 to 1992 when she co-founded a media incubator that launched non-governmental news organizations in newly independent Ukraine. She then led a $7 million grant from USAID until 1994 with Internews. Dora has grown businesses through marketing at brands such as McGraw-Hill, Thomson Reuters, and Baby Jogger. Dora holds an A.B from Princeton University and an M.B.A. from Columbia University. She speaks English, Ukrainian and Russian. Dora has been involved in the numerous Razom projects, and is also responsible for the Razom Partnership with Hromadske Radio.

Directions: At the reception desk of the Hunter West Building, please present your ID and proof of vaccination to get a pass. From there, take the escalator to the 3rd floor, turn right and walk across the sky bridge to the Hunter East Building, then take the elevator to the 7th floor. Hemmerdinger Center is at the end of the hallway past the turnstiles. 
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Poetry Reading and Conversation with Maria Stepanova, Eugene Ostashevsky and Matvei Yankelevich. April 28, Thursday, 7:30 pm. Elizabeth Hemmerdinger Center, Room 706, Hunter College (East Bldg). In-person (with proof of vaccination). RSVP required. Co-hosted by the REVERIE Poetry Series (CUNY Graduate Center). 

Maria Stepanova is a poet, essayist, journalist, and editor in chief of the online newspaper Colta.ru. In 2018, she was awarded the Bolshaya Kniga Award for In Memory of Memory. 

Eugene Ostashevsky was born in Leningrad, grew up in New York, and lives mainly in Berlin. He will be reading from The Feeling Sonnets, his next poetry collection forthcoming from NYRB Poets. Gwytheth Lewis described the Feeling Sonnets as "an exhilarating and witty enquiry into the designs that language has on us as intellectual, domestic and historical beings. This is poetry as punning philosophy, both entertaining and deeply serious." His most recent translation, Lucky Breaks by Yevgenia Belorusets, a book of short stories about refugees from the war in the Donbas in 2014-2015, was just released by New Directions. 

Matvei Yankelevich is a poet, translator, and editor. His books include the poetry collections Some Worlds for Dr. Vogt (Black Square) and Dead Winter (Fonograf), as well as the translations Today I Wrote Nothing: The Selected Writings of Daniil Kharms (Overlook) and Alexander Vvedensky's An Invitation for Me to Think (NYRB Poets; with Eugene Ostashevsky), winner of the 2014 National Translation Award. He has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York Foundation for the Arts, the National Endowment for Humanities, and Civitella Ranieri. In the 1990s, he co-founded Ugly Duckling Presse where he edited and designed books, periodicals, and ephemera for more than twenty years. As of 2022, he is editor of World Poetry Books, a nonprofit publisher of poetry in translation. He teaches translation and book arts at Columbia University's School of the Arts.

Directions: At the reception desk of the Hunter West Building, please present your ID and proof of vaccination to get a pass. From there, take the escalator to the 3rd floor, turn right and walk across the sky bridge to the Hunter East Building, then take the elevator to the 7th floor. Hemmerdinger Center is at the end of the hallway past the turnstiles. CUNY policy states that to enter the campus, visitors are required to show proof of either full vaccination or a negative PCR test within seven days of their intended visit date. Everyone MUST complete the Cleared4 Access Process, where they will be required to upload a photo of their vaccination card or a negative test result. The Cleared4 Access Process can be accessed here. We HIGHLY recommend that you complete this process prior to your visit in order to avoid a delay in entering the campus. After you have finished the Cleared4 Access Process, email us back and let us know you have completed the process. We will then complete our verification and you will receive a link to your Cleared4 CUNY Access Pass. We recommend that once you receive that link, you save it for future use. 
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A New Orthography by Serhiy Zhadan. Bilingual Poetry Reading and Q&A with the Translators Ostap Kin and John Hennessy. April 29, Friday, 6 pm. Elizabeth Hemmerdinger Center, Room 706, Hunter College (East Bldg). In-person, with proof of vaccination. RSVP is required. 

A New Orthography by Serhiy Zhadan is the 5th volume in Lost Horse Press’s Contemporary Ukrainian Poetry Series. In these poems, the poet focuses on daily life during the Russian-Ukrainian war, rendering intimate portraits of the country’s residents as they respond to crisis. Zhadan revives and revises the role of the nineteenth-century Romantic bard, one who portrays his community with clarity, preserving its most precious aspects and darkest nuances. The poems investigate questions of home, exile, solitude, love, and religious faith, making vivid the experiences of noncombatants, refugees, soldiers, and veterans. Zhadan observes and mirrors the shifts within a country during wartime and offers solace as well.

John Hennessy is the author of two poetry collections, Bridge and Tunnel and Coney Island Pilgrims. He is the co-translator, with Ostap Kin, of A New Orthography, selected poems by Serhiy Zhadan (finalist for the PEN Award for Poetry in Translation, 2021, and co-winner of the Derek Walcott Prize, 2021) and the anthology Babyn Yar: Ukrainian Poets Respond (forthcoming, Harvard Library of Ukrainian Literature/HUP). Hennessy teaches at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and serves as poetry editor for The Common.

Ostap Kin is the editor and co-translator, with John Hennessy, of Babyn Yar: Ukrainian Poets Respond (forthcoming from Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute), the editor of New York Elegies: Ukrainian Poems on the City, and the co-translator, with John Hennessy, of Serhiy Zhadan's A New Orthography. He also co-translated, with Vitaly Chernetsky, Yuri Andrukhovych’s Songs for a Dead Rooster.   

Directions: At the reception desk of the Hunter West Building, please present your ID and proof of vaccination to get a pass. From there, take the escalator to the 3rd floor, turn right and walk across the sky bridge to the Hunter East Building, then take the elevator to the 7th floor. Hemmerdinger Center is at the end of the hallway past the turnstiles. CUNY policy states that to enter the campus, visitors are required to show proof of either full vaccination or a negative PCR test within seven days of their intended visit date. Everyone MUST complete the Cleared4 Access Process, where they will be required to upload a photo of their vaccination card or a negative test result. The Cleared4 Access Process can be accessed here. We highly recommend that you complete this process prior to your visit in order to avoid a delay in entering the campus. After you have finished the Cleared4 Access Process, email us back and let us know you have completed the process. We will then complete our verification and you will receive a link to your Cleared4 CUNY Access Pass. We recommend that once you receive that link, you save it for future use. 
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The Cherry Orchard (2022, 110 min). Based on the play by Anton Chekhov, adapted for the stage and directed by Dmitry Krymov. Digital production followed by a conversation with the stage director. Moderated by Gregory Mosher and Yasha Klots. May 2, Monday, 6 pm. Elizabeth Hemmerdinger Center, Room 706, Hunter College (East Bldg). Co-hosted by Theatre Department. In-person, with proof of vaccination. RSVP is required.  

What is it like to lose your home? The Cherry Orchard centers around a Russian family grappling with the potential foreclosure of their estate, and a community in transition as the old makes way for the new. Volleyballs and sunflower seeds fly, while a giant mechanical train station flipboard tells the future … plus more surprises await in Krymov’s inventive re-interpretation. One family is in danger of losing their home, their comfort, and their power. What comes next... and who will profit?

The New York Times recently called Dmitry Krymov “one of the world’s finest theatermakers.” For this new adaptation of The Cherry Orchard, the world-renowned Russian director collaborates with the Wilma’s acclaimed HotHouse Acting Company to reimagine one of theater’s enduring masterworks.

“Wildly digressive, fascinatingly anarchic” -Washington Post (read the review) 

“Unique, funny, and a must-see” -Philadelphia RowHome Magazine (read the review)
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Directions: At the reception desk of the Hunter West Building, please present your ID and proof of vaccination to get a pass. From there, take the escalator to the 3rd floor, turn right and walk across the sky bridge to the Hunter East Building, then take the elevator to the 7th floor. Hemmerdinger Center is at the end of the hallway past the turnstiles. CUNY policy states that to enter the campus, visitors are required to show proof of either full vaccination or a negative PCR test within seven days of their intended visit date. Everyone MUST complete the Cleared4 Access Process, where they will be required to upload a photo of their vaccination card or a negative test result. The Cleared4 Access Process can be accessed here. We highly recommend that you complete this process prior to your visit in order to avoid a delay in entering the campus. After you have finished the Cleared4 Access Process, email us back and let us know you have completed the process. We will then complete our verification and you will receive a link to your Cleared4 CUNY Access Pass. We recommend that once you receive that link, you save it for future use. 
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"Contraband Literature from the USSR at the New York Review of Books (1960-1980s)." A Conversation with the editor Edwin Frank. May 9, Monday, 6 pm. Elizabeth Hemmerdinger Center, Room 706, Hunter College (East Bldg). Co-hosted by the Department of Comparative Literature at CUNY Graduate Center and Tamizdat Project. In-person (with proof of vaccination). RSVP required. 

Since the New York Review of Books was founded in 1963 and throughout the Cold War, the newspaper reviewed English-language translations of “contraband” literature from behind the Iron Curtain and remained one of the most important outlets for authors denied publication at home to be heard in the West. This panel brings together NYRB editor and poet Edwin Frank, graduate students of the Comparative Literature Department, CUNY Graduate Center, and Yasha Klots, director of Tamizdat Project, whose course "Banned Books in Russia and Beyond" has explored, in particular, the NYRB coverage of "contraband" Russian literature. The panel will look back at the years when tamizdat - literally, “published over there” - took shape as a literary practice and political institution and discuss the vicissitudes of clandestine manuscripts from the USSR on their way from the drawer to the reader abroad.  

Edwin Frank is the editor and founder of the New York Review Books Classics series and the author of Snake Train: Poems 1984-2013. He will be joined by Coco Fitterman, Alex Hall, Jonah Howell, Alexander Pau Soria et al. The discussion will be moderated by Yasha Klots. 

Directions: At the reception desk of the Hunter West Building, please present your ID and proof of vaccination to get a pass. From there, take the escalator to the 3rd floor, turn right and walk across the sky bridge to the Hunter East Building, then take the elevator to the 7th floor. Hemmerdinger Center is at the end of the hallway past the turnstiles. CUNY policy states that to enter the campus, visitors are required to show proof of either full vaccination or a negative PCR test within seven days of their intended visit date. Everyone MUST complete the Cleared4 Access Process, where they will be required to upload a photo of their vaccination card or a negative test result. The Cleared4 Access Process can be accessed here. We highly recommend that you complete this process prior to your visit in order to avoid a delay in entering the campus. After you have finished the Cleared4 Access Process, email us back and let us know you have completed the process. We will then complete our verification and you will receive a link to your Cleared4 CUNY Access Pass. We recommend that once you receive that link, you save it for future use. ​
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Hunter College, CUNY
Russian and Slavic Studies Program
695 Park Avenue, Suite 1425 HW
New York, NY 10065
Email: russhunter@hunter.cuny.edu