Courage and Fear

Courage and Fear is a meticulously documented study of Lviv’s intelligentsia during the Second World War, as the Soviet and German occupations obliterate the intricate social fabric of the city. This micro-history is told from the perspective of individuals, whose stories lost out to grand national narratives.

Ola Hnatiuk is a professor at the University of Warsaw and at the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy. She also served in the Polish diplomatic corps (2006–2010). She is the recipient of numerous awards, including Polonia Restituta (Republic of Poland highest state award), the Antonovych Foundation Award for fostering Polish-Ukrainian cultural cooperation, and the Pruszynski Polish PEN-Club Award. Her book Courage and Fear (originally published in Polish in 2015) received awards in Ukraine and in Poland.

“Courage and Fear is an ambitious, significant... work. Its intentions are humane, its detail is impressive; the scope of research into ego-documents, such as diaries or memoirs, outstanding. … [I]t offers empathic renditions of individual experiences embedded in webs of personal connections and intellectual and artistic influences…”

—Tarik Cyril Amar, Slavic Review

“[Ola Hnatiuk’s] unusual book, combining memoir and scholarly research, provides a wealth of detail about key intellectuals and artists in Lviv during the fateful years 1939–1945. … She portrays the impact of the political changes in these terrible years on Lviv’s intellectual communities without flinching but also without making excuses. For anyone interested in the clash of culture and political repression or in Ukrainian and Polish culture during WW II, this book is an excellent read. … Highly recommended.” —T. R. Weeks, Southern Illinois University, CHOICE Reviews

“[Courage and Fear] is an exemplary history of the city of Lviv and its intellectual milieu during World War II. The book is not a typical history of war and destruction in the standard sense; rather, Hnatiuk chooses to construct a narrative built from carefully examined sources that provide the reader with intimate insight into the personal lives of academics, scientists, painters, musicians, and nationalist sympathizers as they navigate their lives during the war. … To write a book that privileges the experiences of individuals rather than states requires a master historian. Hnatiuk is this and much more. She is a tactician of sources, moving seamlessly between Ukrainian, Polish, Russian, and English. … The book will be mandatory reading for those interested in central and east European history, intellectual circles, and urban studies. For those wishing to read a book that creatively and intelligently untangles the entanglements of personal motivations and actions, this is simply one of the best.” —John Vsetecka, Michigan State University, H-Empire

“Dr. Hnatiuk’s work stands at the intersection of history, memoir, and literary criticism. She presents the testimony of ordinary people—though those from the Polish aristocracy and intelligentsia dominate—as they experienced the Soviet invasion in 1939 following the signing of the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact. … In telling the stories of people who didn’t change the course of history and whose lives show the range of choices people made under duress—the good, the bad, and the ugly—Dr. Hnatiuk calls for empathy and understanding of how they suffered. She defines the Non-Heroic Narrative as the untold story: personal, displaying many shades of gray, calling on us to empathize with the Other rather than othering, looking beyond the master narrative of world-changing action or heroic martyrdom, and identifying ways that people were forcibly marginalized or oppressed.” —Lyn Miller-Lachmann, Times Union