Accessibility Tools

  • Content scaling 100%
  • Font size 100%
  • Line height 100%
  • Letter spacing 100%

The Hand That Signed the Paper by Helen Demidenko

by
October 1994, no. 165

The Hand That Signed the Paper by Helen Demidenko

Allen & Unwin, $13.95 pb, 1863736549

The Hand That Signed the Paper by Helen Demidenko

by
October 1994, no. 165

Whether you track backwards in time from the hidden pestilence that is Chernobyl, or forwards from the vengeful terror of Stalin’s collectivisation and anti-nationalist policies, it is an inescapable fact that the Ukraine has had a bloody and awful century. In the winter of 1932-33 alone some four to five million Ukrainians died in the famine caused by Stalin’s brutal agricultural ‘reforms’.

A brief flowering of Ukrainian national culture in the 1920s paralleled a period of Jewish freedom following the Bolshevik revolution, with terrible consequences; the pre-revolution anti-Semitism of the Ukraine found new vigour in the 1930s, as the bitterness caused by Stalin’s policies was focused by the Ukrainians on the Jewish Bolsheviks who held positions of authority in the new regime. It is not surprising that Hitler’s invading armies were at first welcomed by Ukrainians as liberators, and Nazi anti-Semitism found many sympathisers in this brutalised nation.

Some fifty years later the ugly history of the Second World War in the Ukraine became the stuff of daily news presented to a largely bemused Australia, when several old men of Ukrainian descent were charged here with war crimes, and one case in particular – that of Ivan Polyukhovich – was brought to trial in Adelaide.

Helen Demidenko has written The Hand That Signed the Paper as a fictionalised account of the life of a Ukrainian man thus charged. The book is written from the point of view of the man’s niece, who interviews family members and records their view of the events that took place. We are, then, as readers, given the opportunity to act as the jury for a case that is ultimately not brought to trial, because of the poor health of the defendant.

Cathrine Harboe-Ree reviews 'The Hand That Signed the Paper' by Helen Demidenko

The Hand That Signed the Paper

by Helen Demidenko

Allen & Unwin, $13.95 pb, 1863736549

You May Also Like

Leave a comment

If you are an ABR subscriber, you will need to sign in to post a comment.

If you have forgotten your sign in details, or if you receive an error message when trying to submit your comment, please email your comment (and the name of the article to which it relates) to ABR Comments. We will review your comment and, subject to approval, we will post it under your name.

Please note that all comments must be approved by ABR and comply with our Terms & Conditions.