Veronika Chernyakhivska

Veronika Oleksandrivna Chernyakhivska ; – 22 September 1938 in Kyiv) was a Ukrainian poet and translator. Executed during the Great Purge, Chernyakhivska is considered a part of the Executed Renaissance.

Life

Chernyakhivska was born on in Kyiv, Russian Empire (present-day, Ukraine) to (1869–1939), a physician, and Liudmyla Starytska-Cherniakhivska, a writer, translator, and literary critic.

The following year her father and the medical institute were evacuated. Beset by Bolshevik and then " white " rule, she and her mother set out to look for her father. After several weeks they found him in Kamenets-Podolsk. There, Veronika Chernyakhivska translated articles from foreign newspapers into Ukrainian, worked in a military hospital, and helped the sick in a typhus hospital. In May 1920, with the government of Symon Petliuras, the family returned to half-destroyed Kiev. She tried to support herself and, while studying at the Institute of Foreign Relations, worked in jobs including the National Library. After that, she earned her living through literary and translation work. From 1922 to spring 1923 she worked in the parcel office of the American Relief Administration (ARA). After its dissolution, she worked as a clerk and printer in the People's Commissariat. After graduating, she worked mainly as a translator. She was fluent in ancient Greek, Latin, Russian, French, German and English.

On 9 January 1938, as part of the Great Purge, Chernyakhivska was arrested on suspicion of carrying out espionage for Germany.

Personal life She married in 1921, but the marriage fell apart after eight months.

In 1928, Chernyakhivska married the German banker Theodor Hecken.

In 1938, Chernyakhivska married the mathematician Mykola Hansha.

Family Through her mother Chernyakhivska was the granddaughter of Mykhailo Starytsky, a writer, poet and playwright, and , an activist, entrepreneur and actress. Chernyakhivska was the maternal niece of Mariia Starytska, an actress and director, and Oksana Steshenko, a writer, translator and educator.

Chernyakhivska's great-uncle was the composer, pianist, conductor and ethnomusicologist Mykola Lysenko.