打不垮的乌克兰：战争中的欢乐与幽默

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{"text":[[{"start":9.34,"text":"It seems almost wrong to describe a book about the war in Ukraine as a deeply enjoyable read. "},{"start":14.519,"text":"But Julian Evans’ Undefeatable has a lust for life on its side from the very first page. "},{"start":19.237000000000002,"text":"This is a memoir brimming with emotion and good humour, even as Evans arrives back in Odesa — the city he loves — under bombardment and in the midst of a blackout in November 2022. "}],[{"start":30.25,"text":"The book features a wealth of insightful fly-on-the-wall detail from the front line and volunteer convoys over the past two years. "},{"start":36.992,"text":"In that sense it fits well with other recent reads by western journalists, including Night Train to Odesa by Jen Stout and The War Came To Us by Christopher Miller, the FT’s chief Ukraine correspondent. "},{"start":47.484,"text":"But this book is also something very unusual and different because of Evans’ relationship history. "}],[{"start":53.42,"text":"Undefeatable is ostensibly a love story between the writer and Odesa, zigzagging back and forth in time over three decades. "},{"start":60.437,"text":"Evans first visited the city in 1994 at the end of a 10-day boat trip down the Dnipro river from Kyiv. "},{"start":66.57900000000001,"text":"But really it is about a far more literal love. "},{"start":69.322,"text":"A few years after that trip, Evans falls for Natasha, an Odesan painter. "},{"start":73.852,"text":"It’s a stop-start romance that tips unexpectedly quickly into marriage and two children. "}],[{"start":79.52000000000001,"text":"After their first child is born in London, Evans finds he is nostalgic for Odesa and they return. "},{"start":85.224,"text":"Until their divorce in 2015, their family life is filled with attempts to give their children glimpses of a modern Ukrainian childhood: TV cartoons, dumplings, cheap holidays by the Black Sea. "}],[{"start":97.14000000000001,"text":"Ultimately, though, the marriage does not survive the couple’s differences. "},{"start":101.63200000000002,"text":"The pressures on the relationship seem to be both internal and external. "},{"start":105.37400000000001,"text":"In 2014, Evans’ in-laws are split along cultural lines as Russia invades Crimea: “My mother-in-law, from Siberia, and my Moldovan-Ukrainian father-in-law stopped talking to each other for nine months. ”"},{"start":117.01700000000001,"text":"Despite the atmosphere, his taciturn mother-in-law still irons his clothes, meticulously. "}],[{"start":123.31000000000002,"text":"But after covering the Orange revolution of 2004 (“a straight fight between Ukrainian disobedience and Russian docility”) and the Revolution of Dignity in 2014, Evans comes across as more or less burnt out. "},{"start":134.91400000000002,"text":"He turns away from Ukraine for a while. "},{"start":137.34400000000002,"text":"Until 2022, when he feels compelled — and energised — to return. "}],[{"start":null,"text":"<div class=\"pic leftPic\"><picture><img src=\"https://thumbor.ftmailbox.cn/unsafe/400x0/https://d1e00ek4ebabms.cloudfront.net/production/1f3f0d81-216b-4426-8000-03b06bdd31bd.jpg\"></picture></div>"}],[{"start":143.14000000000001,"text":"Evans is a radio and TV documentary-maker as well as a writer, and you sense he is someone who is always looking for the story even if that pushes him in directions that are uncomfortable and inconvenient for him. "},{"start":153.43200000000002,"text":"He describes Ukrainians as “having learned over centuries that they were usually shedding their blood for someone else’s power interests”. "}],[{"start":160.67000000000002,"text":"He observes reality as an outsider with some skin in the game — but not too much. "},{"start":165.38700000000003,"text":"He talks to fighters who admit they know some of the local people would rather have “peace” even if it means capitulating to Russia. "},{"start":171.442,"text":"And yet they fight: “Europe doesn’t understand that this is its front line. "},{"start":175.222,"text":"It has forgotten that a single enemy rocket can destroy all of your plans. ”"}],[{"start":179.62,"text":"Journalistic rigour is at work here (even though Evans admits travelling to the front line without accreditation more than once) but the narrative is largely driven by a quiet charm, especially when a hapless awkwardness pierces through: “The dumplings were grey and lukewarm. "},{"start":193.274,"text":"My food poisoning lasted three days. ”"},{"start":195.62900000000002,"text":"The book is packed with memorable snapshots: the trolley bus conductor in the purple chiffon blouse; the bear of a man who distributes food parcels; the ramshackle Soviet beach camp by the Black Sea that occasions more food poisoning. "}],[{"start":208.66,"text":"At the start of this book, on his first romantic trip to Odesa, Evans finds it to be exactly as it is described in the literature of the 19th and early 20th century: “the Paris of Eastern Europe. ”"},{"start":219.002,"text":"By the end of the book, 30 years on, the city is being bombed on a daily basis. "}],[{"start":224.7,"text":"Despite this, Undefeatable is a reminder that Ukraine is a place of joy and humour that defiantly resists being defined by the imposed experience of war. "},{"start":233.129,"text":"Evans recounts a trip with volunteers to distribute food parcels near Kherson, close to enemy lines. "},{"start":238.909,"text":"“One of Vitaliy’s volunteers asked a man in his eighties, ‘Are you okay? "},{"start":242.964,"text":"You have no light no heat, no gas, no phone signal. "},{"start":246.66899999999998,"text":"Nothing. "},{"start":247.612,"text":"The old man gave a thumbs up. "},{"start":249.504,"text":"‘Also no Russians. "}],[{"start":252,"text":"Undefeatable: Odesa in Love and War by Julian Evans Scotland Street Press £24.99, 240 pages "}],[{"start":260.65,"text":"Viv Groskop is the author of ‘One Ukrainian Summer’ "}],[{"start":264.23999999999995,"text":"Join our online book group on Facebook at FT Books Café and subscribe to our podcast Life and Art wherever you listen "}],[{"start":270.84999999999997,"text":""}]],"url":"https://creatives.ftmailbox.cn/album/84ab5579-c7f4-40a6-8313-dc6cc23437f9-1735543525.mp3"}

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打不垮的乌克兰：战争中的欢乐与幽默

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