Pchilka Olena

29 June 1849 – 04 October 1930

• Biography
• Bibliography of her publications
• Bibliography of publications about her life and activity
• Establishment bearing her name
• Olena Pchilka Literary Prize
• Full-text documents
• Photo gallery
• Perpetuation of her memory

29 June 2019 marked the 170th anniversary of the birth of Olena Pchilka.

Olena Pchilka (Kosach Olha Petrivna, née Drahomanova) (29 June 1849 – 04 October 1930) was a Ukrainian writer, ethnographer, specialist in folklore, translator, publicist, editor, publisher, pedagogue, public figure, and Corresponding Member of the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences since 1924. She was M. P. Drahomanov’s sister and Lesia Ukrainka’s mother.

In her biography she mentioned, “Working in the field of Ukrainian culture for a long time, O. P. was now ethnographer, now researcher, now playwright and author of other eloquent writings (prose and poetry), now editor and publisher of Ukrainian periodicals and some publications, now teacher, now author of books for children, which are very difficult to compose.”

Olena Pchilka was an author of numerous children’s poems, fairy tales, and plays. She published a supplement Moloda Ukraina (Young Ukraine) to the Ukrainian public, political, economic, scientific, and educational Ridnyi krai (Native land) journal.

Her motherly pedagogy absorbed the ideas about the formation of a citizen, patriot, artist, and a true person. In her pedagogical views Olha Petrivna paid great attention to the purity and innocence of a child’s soul, which is a fertile ground for education, showing good, noble deeds, mercy, and beauty.