Essential Reading

Today, on Maundy Thursday, you’ve probably already finished reading through various recipes and decided which fish you’ll be enjoying—or whether you’ll be having lamb or a vegan dish—to celebrate Easter.

We therefore recommend, as your next read, the new book by author Serhij Zhadan, who was awarded the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade in 2022 at Frankfurt’s Paulskirche.

Reading it won’t take much of your time, since the 165 pages can be read in no time. That leaves plenty of time for all your planned Easter activities.

Serhij Zhadan, now a volunteer soldier in the 13th Brigade of the Ukrainian National Guard, describes daily life in Ukraine in very concise language. They are sketch-like short stories.

Calm

Serhiy Zhadan’s language has changed. It is now stark, unemotional, to the point, and focused on the essentials. The language fits what he describes: People in Ukraine are threatened by deadly Russian weapons at any time and in any place—in a restaurant in Dnipro, on a playground in Krimi Rih, on the way to church, as happened last Palm Sunday in the Ukrainian town of Sumy.

There’s no time for lyrical embellishments. Language focuses on the essentials in the dialogue between people who have no time to waste in the “daily life of war.” They talk about funerals, weddings, the hospital, and children who have been left orphaned. The few words they use are enough to understand everything—even what is left unsaid.

The book is illustrated with sketch-like drawings.

A book about people, for people

It is incredibly compelling to follow the people in the book. As we read the unadorned, seemingly unemotional language through which their lives—in a state of complete vulnerability—become comprehensible, we do not become voyeurs but rather empathetic fellow human beings.

Suhrkamp Verlag published the German translation of the book on March 17, 2025—exactly 17 days after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was humiliated in the Oval Office of the White House in the United States of America.

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“EVERYTHING IS MORE EXPENSIVE THAN UKRAINIAN LIFE”

This spectacle, which was met with jubilation in the Kremlin, showed a complete lack of human empathy for the suffering of the people of Ukraine. There is no need to go along with this contempt for humanity. One can do the opposite—for example, by reading this book.

It keeps us from pushing the daily news from Ukraine to the back of our minds and helps us stay alert and active, just as everyone in Ukraine is inevitably forced to do. Whether you were a child during the war in 1945 and now have to live through the next war in Ukraine, or are experiencing your childhood during the war in 2026: “Very young. Very poor… Mischievous, piercing children’s eyes… They look into the future, seeing something. Something you cannot recognize unless you put yourself in their place. Something enduring, complicated, full of pain, full of joy.”

More direct than any interview

In an interview with the *Frankfurter Allgemeine* on March 22, 2025, Serhij Zhadan responded to the question of why he no longer travels to Germany—as he had in the past—to campaign for support for Ukraine: “It’s difficult to explain to a public watching a burning house why the people inside need to be rescued.”

The Berlin-based Tagesspiegel writes about this book: “Anyone who has read even one of these stories won’t forget it anytime soon.”

Photographs © GloriousMe 2025