Outsight Book Reader Diary: May 2022

Monday, May 30, 2022

Review: Not One Inch: America, Russia, and the Making of Post-Cold War Stalemate

Not One Inch: America, Russia, and the Making of Post-Cold War Stalemate by Mary Elise Sarotte
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

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Thursday, May 26, 2022

Review: The Lonely Crowd: A Study of the Changing American Character

The Lonely Crowd: A Study of the Changing American Character by David Riesman
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

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Wednesday, May 25, 2022

Review: Speed the Plow

Speed the Plow by David Mamet
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

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Review: The Gates of Europe: A History of Ukraine

The Gates of Europe: A History of Ukraine by Serhii Plokhy
My rating: 0 of 5 stars

On August 24, 1991, the day after Yeltsin took control of the union government, the Ukrainian parliament held a vote on independence. “In view of the mortal danger hanging over Ukraine in connection with the coup d’état on 19 August 1991, and continuing the thousand-year tradition of state building in Ukraine,” read the declaration of independence drafted by Levko Lukianenko, the longest-serving prisoner of the Gulag and now a member of parliament, “the Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic solemnly declares the independence of Ukraine.” The results of the vote came as a surprise to everyone, including Lukianenko himself: 346 deputies voted in favor, 5 abstained, and only 2 voted against. The communist majority that had opposed independence since the first session of parliament in the spring of 1990 was no longer in evidence. Kravchuk and his “pro-sovereignty communists,” under attack from the opposition for not having opposed the coup, closed ranks with the national democrats and brought along the hard-liners, who felt betrayed by Moscow and threatened by Yeltsin’s attack on the party. Once the result of the vote appeared on the screen, the hall exploded in applause. The crowds outside the parliament building were jubilant: Ukraine was free at last!

Lukianenko’s declaration referred to the thousand-year history of Ukrainian statehood, meaning the tradition established by Kyivan Rus’. His declaration was in fact the fourth attempt to proclaim Ukrainian independence in the twentieth century: the first occurred in 1918 in Kyiv and then in Lviv, the second in 1939 in Transcarpathia, and the third in 1941 in Lviv. All those attempts had been made in wartime, and all had come to grief. Would this one be different? The next three months would tell. A popular referendum scheduled for December 1, 1991, the same day as the previously scheduled election of Ukraine’s first president, would confirm or reject the parliamentary vote for independence. The referendum provision was important for more than one reason. On August 24, it helped those members of the communist majority who had doubts about independence to vote in favor of it—theirs, after all, was not the final decision and could be reversed in the future. The referendum also gave Ukraine a chance to leave the union without open conflict with the center. In the previous referendum organized by Gorbachev in March 1991, about 70 percent of Ukrainians had voted to stay in a reformed union. Now another referendum would enable it to make a clean break.

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