In Ukraine, the foremost woman poet and playwright is Larysa Petrivna Kosach-Kvitka, but she is much better known by the pen name her mother gave her: Lesya Ukrainka (Lesya of Ukraine)—a name as highly recognizable as her famous braided hair. Lesya Ukrainka is seen everywhere on statutes, postage stamps, paintings, films, and certainly in books by and about her.
Her very name “Lesya Ukrainka” was itself a brave and radical act for identifying as a Ukrainian during the oppressive regime of Imperial Russia which considered Ukrainian nationalism and the language as subversive and treasonous.
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