It’s been difficult to focus on finalizing this issue.
As I type these words, my home town of Odessa, Ukraine is bracing for an invasion by Russian forces. The familiar streets and landmarks where I spent my childhood are filled with sandbags and Czech hedgehog anti-tank obstacles. It’s a sobering and surreal thing to see for the first time, and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.
As I proofread and laid out these stories, writers and translators in Ukraine were forced to flee from their homes. They’re finding their way to Western Ukraine or out of the country, forced to leave their belongings and their entire lives behind. Those who’ve stayed are losing access to electricity and clean water, sleeping in metro stations to avoid the bombings, or are directly fighting in the largest war in Europe since 1945.
As I uploaded the issue content to our site, some of my Russian friends were bravely attending antiwar protests, even though they’re fully aware that they could be arrested and beaten up for doing so. Many more have spoken out against the war online, despite facing fines and other forms of persecution. A new iron curtain is quickly descending upon Russia, with news and social media networks from the West being systematically cut off by Putin’s regime.
The instinct, the desire to walk away from the screen, to hide from the onslaught of terrible news and worse predictions, to bury my head in the proverbial sand for a while, is stronger than I’d like to admit. I’m fortunate to be living in New York where I even have this option; my friends in Ukraine can’t simply opt out from being in the warzone. A voice in the back of my mind whispers, “None of this is important in light of what’s happening out there. Why even bother?”
Except that it is important. Despite wars and other calamities, it’s imperative that we continue to create art and to tell stories. That’s how we share the best of ourselves with the world, how we—readers and writers both—sustain our humanity. We need to continue sharing stories of all kinds: dark and melancholy and erudite and optimistic and hopeful. We need to continue cracking jokes, in defiance of the gloomy world at large.
Sharing stories and voices from across the globe is as important as ever.
It is, of course, not the only thing.
In recent days I put together a list of contemporary Ukrainian-born speculative fiction authors whose works are currently available in English.
Our cover for this issue is by the Ukrainian artist Oleksandr Kulichenko.
We’re also featuring a vetted, trusted local charity here in Brooklyn that is sending supplies to people in Ukraine.
In upcoming issues we will be looking to feature more translations of Ukrainian science fiction. We encourage authors and translators to submit their stories for consideration in English, Russian, and Ukrainian.
We will also continue publishing works by authors from Russia and Belarus, save for the few who are actively and gleefully using their notoriety to support the war. It’s counterproductive and downright ludicrous to close one’s mind to the voices of those living under the political regimes one might not like. If given a chance, we’d just as gladly publish authors from North Korea, Iran, the Donbas region, or Venezuela, so long as they wrote a compelling story. In fact, this issue includes a story from Cuba alongside works from USA, the UK, China, and Sweden.
Thank you for reading these stories, and may they bring you a bit of comfort and joy.
