Kobzar

The Kobzar is a book of poems by the Ukrainian poet and painter Taras Shevchenko, first published in 1840 in Saint Petersburg, then part of the Russian Empire. Shevchenko had been born in Moryntsi, in the Kyiv Governorate, in what is now Ukraine. After the collection appeared, he was nicknamed the Kobzar, a word that in Ukrainian designates a wandering bard who sings and accompanies his narratives on the kobza, an instrument similar to a lute. In time the term came to refer to Shevchenko's poetry as a whole and took on a symbolic weight tied to the national and literary revival of Ukraine.

The first edition, printed in an initial run of one thousand copies at E. F. Fischer's private press, gathered eight early poems, among them "Perebendya," "Kateryna," "The Poplar," "Thought," and "Taras's Night." According to the sources, the tsarist censor forced the withdrawal and destruction of much of the early print run, so only a handful of copies survived. After the poet's arrest in 1847 the book was banned and confiscated from libraries, bookshops and private owners, which made it scarce during his lifetime.

Three editions appeared in Shevchenko's lifetime. The 1844 edition, titled "Chyhyryn Kobzar," reprinted the original collection and added the poem "Haidamaky," published in 1841. The 1860 edition, financed by the sugar producer and philanthropist Platon Symyrenko, was the fullest so far, with seventeen works, though censorship kept several texts out. Censorship also led to publication beyond Russian control, in Prague, Leipzig and German-speaking areas.

After the poet's death in 1861 the book was reissued many times, often abroad, including the Prague edition of 1876 and the pocket edition promoted by Mykhailo Drahomanov in Geneva in 1878. A nineteen-volume edition prepared by Vasyl Domanytsky appeared in 1911. Today the Kobzar is regarded as a foundational work of modern Ukrainian literature, and its title still names the poet's collected works.