Аннотация:The Era of the Helsinki MovementResponding to the Call of the DayThe year 1976 didn't seem any different than any other year, except for scattered whispers that confirmed that the cup of Ukrainian suffering runneth over.Oles Berdnyk, the science fiction writer who had been expelled from the Writers' Union of Ukraine for his freethinking, had just declared a hunger strike.And on August 13, 1976, his books were removed from all libraries and bookstores and destroyed.Interestingly, the decision to excise this renowned science fiction writer was made by the main administration for the Protection of National Security in Print, at the Council of Ministers of the USSR, even though the relevance of Berdnyk's work to national security was not particularly obvious.Around this time, intellectual and artistic property was destroyed throughout the Mordovian prison camps, resulting in several protests and hunger strikes by those who were affected.For example, news came from the women's camp in the village of Barashevo, Mordovia, that 150 of Stefa Shabatura's paintings had been burned by the KGB. 1 I no longer remember what exactly we did, but Mykola Matusevych and I protested against this vandalism, expressing our solidarity with the artist.Remarkably, she got word of our support, and soon thereafter we got a thank-you note from her.1 Stefaniia Shabatura (1938-2014
