Our last Slavonic item of the month for 2023 is a newly purchased ebook about the history of books and printing in Ukraine.  Z istoriï knyz︠h︡kovoï kulʹtury Ukraïny [From the history of the book culture of Ukraine] looks at items in the Vernadsky National Library of Ukraine.  It contains the following 4 main sections, which contain a total of 15 chapters.  I give the 3 chapters that fall under the all-important library section.

1. The historical traditions of Ukrainian book culture
2. The art of Ukrainian early printed books.
3. The book culture of the Ukrainian diaspora.
4. The culture of book-collecting : library collections and historical collections as part of the history of book culture.
   1. Book culture and the characteristics oflibraries of
      Orthodox clergy from the 17th to the early 20th century
   2. Characteristics of historical libraries in state educational institutions in Kyïv from the 19th to the start of the 20th century
   3. The sheet music library of the choir of the Kyïv Theological academic.

The book’s illustrations are largely in black and white but there are some colour reproductions among the many illustrations in chapter 2.2, which looks at engravings done by the Kyi︠e︡vo-Pechersʹka lavra printing press and provides lots of examples of printing plates (which are, of course, in reverse).

There are other books about Ukrainian books among this latest batch of ebook purchases.  The others are a book about the printing press of a monastery by Iryna T︠S︡iborovsʹka-Rymarovych and four multi-volume bibliographies about diaspora publications compiled by Serhiĭ Kozak.

• Drukarni︠a︡ Berdychivsʹkoho monastyri︠a︡ bosykh karmelitiv: istorii︠a︡ ta vydavnycha dii︠a︡lʹnistʹ, 1758 – 1844
• Rarytety ukraïnsʹkoï diaspory : u 4-kh tomakh
• Istorii︠a︡ ukraïnsʹkoï diaspory na storinkakh chasopysu “Ukraïnsʹki visti” (Nimechchyna, 1945 – SShA, 2000): systematychnyĭ pokaz︠h︡chyk zmistu : u 3-kh tomakh
• “Ukraïnsʹki visti” v I︠E︡vropi ĭ Ameryt︠s︡i (1945 – 2000) : bibliohrafichnyĭ pokaz︠h︡chyk zmistu hazety “Ukraïnsʹki visti” : u 2-kh tomakh

Mel Bach