Book Launch: Myrna Kostash, Ghosts in a Photograph

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Book Launch: Myrna Kostash, Ghosts in a Photograph

Tuesday, September 26, 2023, 6:30 PM

Join us in person at the Ukrainian Museum of Canada as we proudly host the Saskatoon book launch of 'Ghosts in a Photograph' by acclaimed nonfiction writer Myrna Kostash. This mesmerizing book explores the journey of Kostash’s grandparents from Galicia, now Ukraine, to Alberta at the turn of the twentieth century.

The book’s genius is in how it weaves Ukrainian and Canadian political history, contextualizing the stories of two familes (one homesteaders, one working-class Edmontonian) with the historic struggles for Ukrainian independence and the genocidal “clearing of the plains” in Canada.

With Kostash in attendance to read from and speak about her book, this will be an extraordinary literary event.

Free admission, cash bar

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About Myrna Kostash

Myrna Kostash is an acclaimed writer of literary and creative nonfiction who makes her home in Edmonton when she is not travelling in pursuit of her varied literary interests and passions. These have taken her from school halls in Vancouver, BC, to Ukrainian weddings in Two Hills, Alberta; from the site of the mass grave of Cree warriors in Battleford, Saskatchewan, to a fishers’ meeting in Digby, Nova Scotia; from the British Library in London, UK, to the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul. She is inspired in her work by her childhood in the Ukrainian-Canadian community of Edmonton, her rites of passage through the Sixties in the US, Canada and Europe, by her rediscovery of her Western Canadian roots in the 1980s, by her return to her spiritual sources in Byzantium and the Eastern Christian (Orthodox) Church, and, most recently, by her re-education in the history of Indigenous and Settler relations in western Canada.

Myrna is the author of the multicultural classic, All of Baba’s Children (1978), which has never gone out of print. Her second book, Long Way From Home: The Story of the Sixties Generation in Canada (1980), was the first to narrate the specifically Canadian experience of that era, and has been acknowledged as such by grateful scholars of today.

Links

• Ukrainian Museum of Canada Website umcnational.ca

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Ukrainian Museum of Canada

North America’s first Ukrainian museum, founded by Ukrainian Canadian women.

The Ukrainian Museum of Canada (UMC), in downtown Saskatoon, SK, features three galleries dedicated to celebrating and promoting the arts, culture, and legacy of the Ukrainian Canadian community. We also house archives, a library, community spaces, and a shop carrying a range of authentic Ukrainian giftwares, clothing, and crafts.

The Ukrainian Museum of Canada was established by the Ukrainian Women’s Association of Canada in 1936 with the aim of promoting Ukrainian arts, culture, and heritage. The vision of the women who founded the museum was bold, since Ukrainian culture was not well understood or respected by most Canadians at the time. In Soviet Ukraine, following Stalin’s rise to power, Ukrainian culture and language were being violently suppressed.

Today our museum is home to one of the largest ethnic textile collections in North America, including regional folk costumes, kylym (tapstries), and vyshyvka (embroidery). We also house a suite of 12 paintings, the Ukrainian Pioneer Women series, by the well-known artist William Kereluk, along with many works by Ukrainian Canadian folk artists Dmytro Stryek, Ann Harbuz, and others.

The Museum offers a variety of public programs to empower visitors to explore, learn, and have fun. Our programs, workshops, lectures, and special events inspire people from all cultural backgrounds to connect with Ukrainian Canadian culture, art, and history.

Since February 24, 2022, when Russia invaded Ukraine, the Ukrainian Museum of Canada has been active in welcoming Ukrainian newcomers and bringing community together to learn about modern Ukraine, its history, politics, and culture, and the ways that Ukrainian stories impact Canadians.

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