Poet Larysa Hienijush
(August 9, 1910 - April 7, 1983)
Artist: Alies' Mara Pocket Calendar Copyright ©2000 by TBM (Click on the photo to see a larger image; use your Web brower's "Back" button to return to this page. Photograph taken 1940) |
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![[ Photograph: Larysa Hienijush ]](geniush-y-s.jpg)
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(also "Larysa Heniyush", and "Larisa Geniush"; Ларыса Геніюш) |
From the "Notes on Authors" section in Like Water, Like Fire (Vera Rich, translator and editor; 1971; pp. 336):
News Article: Will Authorities Rehabilitate Larysa Heniyush?
The proposal has been written by Academician of the Belarusian Academy of Science Radzim Haretski, writers Vasil Yakavenka, Ales Pashkevich, and Nil Hilevich; human rights activists T. Protska and H. Pahanyajla; and more than 70 other well-known public figures of Belarus.
From 1937 Larysa Heniyush had been living in the Czechoslovakia and was a citizen of that country. However in 1948 on order of Moscow she was repatriated to the Soviet Union. There she was arrested and sentenced to 25 years of imprisonment “for assisting world bourgeoisie in hostile activities against the Soviet Union” and “counter-revolutionary activities.”
Larysa Heniyush was released on July 1, 1956, but the unfair sentence hasn’t been reversed.
The name of Larysa Heniyush could be compared to names of Belarusian classics Kupala, Kolas, and Tsyotka and other prominent Belarusian workers of culture. Her books Trammel Net from Nyoman, Thyme infusion, and others show their nobleness of thoughts and feelings. A film Birds without nests based on “Confession” by Larysa Heniyush was created by the Belarusfilm film studio. A play White Dream was also created. A documentary about Larysa Heniyush, Thorn Wreath of Cornflowers, was created by Letapis studio. Her monuments have been put up in Zelva and Staryja Darohi.
Maxim Tank wrote: “Poems by Larysa Heniyush are not just remarkable. They combine the eternal anguish of the nation and of a human who had gone through awful trials of life, which was impossible even for saints in our time”."
Source: Charter 97, 11/02/2007
News Article: Lukashenko to Refuse Larissa Geniush’s Rehabilitation
"Proving the necessity of the rehabilitation BHC in particular emphasized that Geniush is well-known poet in Belarus and abroad. Her works are full of love towards Belarusian people and country. However they are not accessible for our citizens as the poet was repressed in 1949 and still isn’t rehabilitated. Owing to this fact, Geniush’s poems are no more included in school program; it’s prohibited to carry out official events, in commemoration of her creative works.
"During the mass punitive measures at the end of 1937 the patriot Larissa Geniush has been forced to leave Belarus for Prague to her husband where she became the citizen of the Czechoslovakia. On August 20 1948 the USSR government ruled to deprive her of the Czech citizenship and she was by force deported to BSSR. On February 7 1949 she was sentenced to 25 years of corrective labor in the Northern camps of the USSR by the Supreme BSSR court’s verdict. On July, 1 1956 Larissa Geniush was liberated and lived until she died in the settlement of urban type Zelva of Grodno region observed by KGB.
"Geniush told the court about her creative work: "Everything I wrote, wasn’t anti-Soviet. I love my people and I wrote about it and only for Belarusian people.”
"Taking into account the recent president’s utterances on the national sovereignty BHC hoped to get positive answer that would have been the step to restoration of historical equity and fairness. Lukashenko didn’t answer to this letter and gave it to the Supreme Court. The decision of the Supreme Court has been “ Geniush was recognized not to be subject to rehabilitation.”"
Source: Charter 97, No. 19; Tuesday, 11:54, 29/07/2003, from Belarusian Helsinki Committee’s press-service
News Article: Evening on Poetess Larysa Heniyush's Birthday to be Held in Mensk
"Larysa Heniyush was born in the Volkovysk district, Hrodna (Grodno) region, on July 27, 1910, and lived in Prague after the graduation from a secondary school in Volkovysk. She worked as secretary for Vasil Zakharka (Zacharka), the president-in-exile of the Belarusian National Republic from 1928 to 1943. She kept the presidential archives, supported Belarusian emigrants, political refugees and prisoners of war. Heniyush was arrested on March 5, 1948, and kept in prisons in Czechoslovakia, then in Soviet prisons in Vienna, Lviv, and Mensk."
"She was sentenced to 25 years for a conspiracy against the Soviet Union in 1949. She served her term in Stalinist labor camps. Heniyush was released in 1956 before the end of her term, but she has not been exonerated. The poetess lived with her husband in the village of Zelva, Grodno region. She did not accept Soviet citizenship until her death on April 7, 1983."
"Heniyush published two collections of poetry and verses for children with the help of her friends in 1967. A book of her poetic heritage and memoirs, in which she recalls the years that she spent in labor camps, the tragic destiny of her family and co-prisoners, was published after her death."
Source: BelaPAN, No. 27; Monday, August 7, 2000; 7:10 p.m.
"There is no evidence in the case to prove charges against the Geniushes nowadays, Garry Pogonyailo, BHC deputy chairman said."
"The Geniushes were convicted of 'counterrevolutionary activities' and 'assistance to international bourgeoisie in conducting hostile activities against the USSR' because of their membership in the Mutual Assistance Committee, a Belarusian organization that collected funds for the Red Cross Society. 'There is no crime in their activities according to today's standards,' Mr. Pogonyailo said. The Geniushes were sentenced to 25 years in prison but released on parole in 1956. Their case was reviewed in 1956 but they were not cleared of the charges."
"The BHC wants the Geniushes honor to be vindicated before the poetess' 90th birthday, which will be celebrated in Belarus and by UNESCO in 2000. Mr. Pogonyailo hopes that the Procurator General's Office will support the BHC's initiative and that the Supreme Court will fully exonerate the Geniushes."
Source: BelaPAN, No. 19; Tuesday, October 5, 1999; 5:40 p.m.
"After a religious service, those attending shared recollections about the poetess' life and lowered a white-red-white national flag to half-mast. Geniush had not accepted Soviet citizenship."
"Her poetry and biography were not included in secondary schools' curriculum this year, as well as poetry by Masei Sednev, another prisoner of Stalinist labor camps. In the early 1990s, there was much talk about establishing the poetess' museum in Zelva, but the house, where Geniush used to live, have been renovated beyond recognition of new inhabitants."
"Meanwhile, rumors have been circulating that the government intends to exonerate Larisa Geniush."
Source: BelaPAN, No. 46; Thursday, August 12, 1999; 1:40 p.m.
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Examples of Her Poetry
Photograph from: Ларыса Геніюш: Выбраныя Вершы, Менск, 1997
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![[ Photograph: Larysa Hienijush ]](l-geniush-s.jpg)
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