Stepan Protsiuk

• Name — Stepan Protsiuk • Born — 13 August 1964 • Birthplace — Kuty, Lviv Oblast, Ukrainian SSR • Occupation — Novelist, essayist • Genre — Ukrainian literature • Notable Works — Infection (2002), Pan (2024) • Awards — Merited Art Worker of Ukraine (2026)

Stepan Protsiuk was born on 13 August 1964 in small village Kuty in Lviv Oblast of Ukrainian SSR. His parents were school teachers, and his father was a political prisoner who was sentenced for anti-Soviet propaganda before Stepan's birth. Shortly after his birth, Protsiuk's parents moved to Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast. Stepan Protsiuk studied in Vasyl Stefanyk Precarpathian National University and obtained a PhD (Candidate of Sciences) degree in philology in the Institute of Literature of National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine. Since the early 1990s, he has been living in Ivano-Frankivsk; he taught Ukrainian literature at the Precarpathian National University alongside his writing career until 2020. Stepan Protsiuk is a member the Ukrainian center of PEN International. Protsiuk was a member of National Writers' Union of Ukraine since 1995 until he quit the organization in 2017, claiming that he had "different views on the development of the Ukrainian literature". Protsiuk is married, he is a father to two sons. He currently lives in Ivano-Frankivsk.

Stepan Protsiuk started his literary career as a poet in the early 1990s. Along with Ivan Tsyperdiuk and Ivan Andrusiak, he founded poetic group New Degeneration, which was among the most famous Ukrainian poetic groups in the early 1990s. New Degeneration created a controversy among prominent Ukrainian writers and literary critics as, for example, Oles Honchar criticized the group's approach to literature, while Lina Kostenko praised it. In 1992, the group published their first book New Degeneration (foreword by Yurii Andrukhovych), which included Protsiuk's collection of poems titled At the Edge of Two Truths. New Degeneration was active until the mid-1990s. In the late 1990s, Stepan Protsiuk stopped writing poetry and gradually switched to prose works. His first novel Infection, which is one of his most famous works, was published in 2002 and devoted to social and psychological issues, being set in 20th-century Ukraine. Protsiuk received both praise and criticism for his depiction of national and mental problems of Ukrainians. In his works, Protsiuk explores various social problems facing Ukraine today (Infection) or in the past (Tenth Line, The Grass Cannot Die), as well as existential problems, such as individual and collective being (Destruction of a Doll) or relationship between parents and children (Hit Your Head against the Wall). His literary style has been described as a mix of postmodernism and neo avant-garde. In the late 2000s, Protsiuk debuted with his novels for children. First novel, Mariyka and Kostyk, was followed by two sequels, In Love with the Sun and Argonauts. All of them were published in Kyiv-based publishing house Grani-T. Protsiuk also authored three books for children published in Vinnytsia-based publishing house Teza. Protsiuk is also known for what he calls his psychobiographical novels, devoted to prominent figures of Ukrainian culture. The cycle began with books on the writers Vasyl Stefanyk (The Rose of Ritual Pain), Volodymyr Vynnychenko (Masks Fall off Slowly) and Arkhyp Teslenko (Black Apple). It was continued by Hands and Tears (2022), about Ivan Franko, and Moon, Moon (2023), about Hryhir Tiutiunnyk; the latter was finished in early 2022 but its publication was delayed by the full-scale Russian invasion. In 2024, Protsiuk published Pan, a novel about the entrepreneur, publisher and philanthropist Yevhen Chykalenko, which became his most decorated book. Since 2019 he has also run a YouTube channel, A Writer about Writers, devoted to the lives and works of 19th- and 20th-century Ukrainian authors; a book of essays under the same title appeared in 2024. Protsiuk's major books include: • At the Edge of Two Truths (1992; part of book New Degeneration, foreword by Yurii Andrukhovych), a book of poems. • Always and Never (1999), a book of poems. • Infection (2002), a novel. • Totem (2005), a novel. • Sacrifice (2007), a novel. • Tightrope Walkers (2007), a book of essays. • Destruction of a Doll (2010), a novel. • Blood Test (2010), a book of essays. • The Rose of Ritual Pain (2010), a novel. • Masks Fall off Slowly (2011), a novel. • Black Apple (2011), a novel. • Hit Your Head against the Wall (2011), a novel. • Tenth Line (2014), a novel. • Under the Wings of the Great Mother (2015), a novel. • The Grass Cannot Die (2017), a novel. • Fingers in the sand (2017), a novel. • Rejected and Risen: Essays on Writers and Society (2020), a book of essays. • Hands and Tears: A Novel about Ivan Franko (2022), a novel. • Moon, Moon (2023), a novel about Hryhir Tiutiunnyk. • Pan: A Novel about Yevhen Chykalenko (2024), a novel.