The Kherson Science Library, one of the largest in southern Ukraine, is one of around 220 destroyed by the Russian invasion after being attacked in early November, while millions of Ukrainian books are being removed and replaced by others in Russian in the occupied zone, according to the authorities and several witnesses.
“We are heartbroken, but many of you have sent us hundreds of messages of support during this time,” the Library administration published last Wednesday and thanked everyone for “the strength and inspiration even in difficult times.”
The building that housed it, clearly visible to Russian forces stationed on the opposite bank of the Dnieper River, was hit by Russian artillery last Sunday, sparking a fire that consumed part of the books.
Although the most valuable works, hidden in advance, were left unscathed, the attack caused consternation in Ukraine and a wave of support for the city of Kherson, which only a day earlier had celebrated the anniversary of its liberation.
“The enemy kills the word, the thought, our language and our libraries,” wrote Oleksandr Krasovytskyi, CEO of “Folio”, one of the largest Ukrainian publishing houses, and spoke of a “cultural genocide.”
The attack highlighted the danger Ukrainian cultural institutions have found themselves in since the start of the large-scale Russian invasion last year.
More than 220 libraries have been destroyed, completely or largely, according to data from the Ministry of Culture, while another 400 have been damaged.
Like the Jerson Science Library, many have acted as important social centers, hosting lectures and concerts, and neighbors painfully feel their loss, noted Efe Tetiana Teren, director of the local Ukrainian branch of the PEN association of writers and journalists.
Some libraries serve as hubs for civilian volunteers and gathering places for displaced Ukrainians.
The one in Kramatorsk, near the Donetsk front, remains open although its books have been transported to safer places due to the risk of artillery fire and missile attacks.
Some 187 million books have been lost since the start of the war in the attacked libraries, Culture Minister Rostyslav Karandeev said in September.
But even more books are being destroyed by Moscow-installed authorities in occupied areas in the south and east of the country. According to the National Resistance Center of the Ukrainian Army, books in Ukrainian are being deliberately confiscated in these regions, since the pro-Russian authorities consider that all those published between 1994 and 2021 are of an “extremist” nature.
As a result, there are almost no Ukrainian-language books left in the occupied areas of Donetsk and Lugansk, while 2.5 million Russian-language books have been imported in 2023 alone.
Valentina Rubizhanska, a librarian from the town of Malyi Burluk, in the Kharkov region (northeast), which was temporarily under Russian occupation, told EFE at the time that the pro-Russian authorities actively tried to confiscate books in Ukrainian.
Rubizhanska managed to partially copy the list of books to be removed from the library, which included works on the history of Ukraine as well as fiction by modern writers.
According to Tetiana Teren, much information from occupied areas speaks of this type of practices and the replacement of confiscated works with Russian literature.
The Ukrainian PEN club has launched an initiative to collect books for libraries devastated during the occupation from donations from citizens and publishers.
In some areas where electricity supply and communications remain precarious, books remain the main source of entertainment.
Teren also pointed out that in some of the areas that were under Russian occupation, there is now greater interest in Ukrainian history, language and culture, under threat from the invasion.