Abstract:
This article examines contemporary Ukrainian war literature as a site where the experience of war reveals a fundamental breakdown of meaning, knowledge, and selfhood. Analyzing works by Artur Dron, Artem Chapeye, Artem Chekh, and Oleksandr Mykhed, it argues that war produces an irreducible gap between mediated knowledge and lived experience, akin to the philosophical problem of qualia. Drawing on Heidegger, the article shows how war disrupts the background horizon of meaning, rendering the world fragmented. Finally, through Locke and Ricoeur, it explores memory and narration as essential practices for reconstructing identity and preserving meaning. Ukrainian war writing thus emerges as both testimony and existential response to a world that no longer “works.”
Keywords:
war experience, Ukrainian literature, meaning disruption, memory, narrative identity
How to cite:
Bagatska, Oleksandra, “War Experience and the Breakdown of the World: Ukrainian War Literature.” Eidos. A Journal for Philosophy of Culture 9, no. 4 (2025): 201-218. https://doi.org/10.14394/eidos.jpc.2025.0041.
Author:
Oleksandra Bagatska
Faculty of Philosophy, University of Warsaw
Krakowskie Przedmieście 3, 00-927 Warsaw, Poland
o.bagatska@student.uw.edu.pl
References:
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