Alhierd Baharevich

Oleg Ivanovich "Alhierd" Bakharevich (Альгерд Бахарэвіч, Alhierd Bacharevič in Belarusian Łacinka; born 31 January 1975 in Minsk) is a Belarusian writer and translator (his actual first name is Aljeh (Алег) ).

In the 1990s, he was one of the founders of the Belarusian literary and artistic avantgarde group Bum-Bam-Lit.

His first texts were published in 1993.

In 1997 he graduated from the Philological Faculty of the Belarusian Pedagogical University in Minsk.

Afterward, Bacharevič worked as a teacher of Belarusian and then as a journalist.

In 1998, this group published the now cult anthology of their poetry, namely, Tazik biełaruski ('The Belarusian Basin').

At that time Bacharevič married Ksienija Brečka (Ксенія Брэчка).

They have one daughter, Uljana (Ульяна).

He had been a member of this Union since 2006.

Bacharevič is a member of the Belarusian PEN Club.

Between 2007 and 2013, Bacharevič lived in Hamburg, Germany.

In 2008, a collection by Alhierd Bacharevič's selected stories was translated into Polish "Talent do jąkania się".

Alhierd Bacharevič is the leading Belarusian-language author of novels, including the novels Magpie on the Gallows (Сарока на шыбеніцы, 2009), and Šabany: The Story of One Disappearance (Шабаны. Гісторыя аднаго зьнікненьня, 2012), Alindarka’s Children (Дзеці Аліндаркі, 2014), or White Fly, Murderer of Men (Белая муха, забойца мужчын, 2015).

Alhierd Bacharevič translated the fairy tale The Cold Heart by Wilhelm Hauff, which was published at the end of 2009 under one cover with an independent work entitled The Translator's Afterword.

Translated from the German language, individual works of the brothers Grimm, Franz Kafka, G. G. Evers, poems by Hans Enzensberger and other modern German poets and the novel by the modern German writer Kathrin Schmidt You will not die.

He took part in the Berlin Literary Colloquium, the Theater Festival in Lublin (Poland), the Literary Festivals Vilenica (Slovenia), the Lesefest Osteuropa (Leipzig, Germany), The Month of Author Reading in Brno, international literary festivals in Sweden, Ukraine, Lithuania, Czech Republic and others.

He has performed at international book fairs in Frankfurt, Leipzig, Warsaw, Lviv, Minsk.

In 2010, in Leipzig, the novel Magpie on the Gallows was published in German in the translation by Thomas Weiler.

In 2012, after the members' angry reaction to the publication of Alhierd Bacharevič's essay The Dark Past of Kajan Łupaka on Janka Kupała in 2011, he left the Union of Belarusian Writers.

In 2013, he returned to Minsk and married the Belarusian translator and poet, Julia Cimafiejeva (Юля Цімафеева Yulya Tsimafeyeva).

In 2014, he represented Belarus at the International European Writers Conference in Berlin.

In 2015, the story of Bakharevich The Talent of Stuttering was included in the anthology of the best European short prose "Best European Fiction".

In 2015, a performance was staged on the Small Stage of the Yanka Kupala State Theater based on the novel Šabany by Alhierd Bacharevič.

The publishing house Lohvinaŭ published an over 900-page novel in six parts Dogs of Europe (Сабакі Эўропы, 2017), which is deemed to be the writer's opus magnum.

The novel received in Belarus the Book of the Year award and was noted in Belarus with the independent Reader's Prize and the second Jerzy Gedroyc Prize.

In 2017, the Small Medical Encyclopedia by Bacharevič was published in Polish in the Lublin Warsztaty Kultury publishing house (translated by Mira Luksha).

In 2018, the novel Children of Alindarki was published by the publishing house "Le ver a soie" in the French translation of Alena Lapatnoiva.

In 2019, the Moscow publishing house Vremia published the Russian translation of this novel (Собаки Европы).

The works by Alhierd Bacharevič were translated into English, French, German, Czech, Ukrainian, Bulgarian, Slovene, Russian, Polish, Lithuanian.

They lived in the Belarusian capital and cooperated in the field of Belarusian literature and culture, until the Belarusian White Revolution of Dignity in 2020–2021.

Subsequently, in order to avoid arbitrary imprisonment and torture, the couple of authors chose emigration and left for Austria.

In mid-2020 Bacharevič resigned from continuing work on his new fantasy-cum-political fiction novel Сьвятая Кацярына Śviataja Kaciaryna [Saint Catherine] (after having completed over 400 pages ), because unexpectedly the socio-political reality of the Belarusian pro-democracy Peaceful Revolution accelerated beyond the book's original plot.

The novel coalesced around the arrival of a female etxraterrestrial on Earth and the revolution that she triggered.

However, in the author's words, 'Mrs Śviatłana Cichanoŭskaja fell from the sky to Minsk, so the manuscript was set aside,' because meanwhile, according to Bacharevič, a peaceful revolution commenced in Belarus.

The novelist proposes that despite violent repressions this revolution still continues, directed against the 'regime of the fascist type.'

Following the Belarus's involvement in the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, on 2 March 2022, Bacharevič's open letter to the Ukrainians was published, in which he stated: 'I am prepared to take upon myself the shame and disgrace of Belarus for what is happening – in exactly the same way as German writers in the emigration did in the times of the Second World War'.

Due to his principled stance, the Belarusian regime's propagandists began to attack and denigrate Bacharevič in the pro-regime Belarusian press.

On 17 May 2022, his novel Сабакі Эўропы Sabaki Eŭropy [Dogs of Europe] was banned in Belarus by placing it on the 'list of extremist material.' In mid-June 2022, the Belarusian Ministry of Education ordered the country's school libraries to be cleansed of the books by over 30 proscribed 'extremist' writers, including.

In late July 2022, the authorities decided that the confiscated copies of Bacharevič's 'extremist' novel Сабакі Эўропы Sabaki Eŭropy [Dogs of Europe] would be destroyed by ploughing them by a tractor into a field.

In March 2023, another book of Baharevich, Апошняя кніга пана А. Apošniaja kniha pana A. [Mr.