When Memory Is Not Enough: Roaming and Writing the Spaces of the Other Europe

Abstract

The Ukrainian revolution of February 2014 has mobilized Europeans to reconsider their greatest project — Europe.¹ Reflecting on what Europe means and how far it extends, some commentators are anxious about the common past, while others fear for the future. Anxiety and fear, however, is where European involvement in the current crisis ends, as Andrzej Stasiuk laments in his essay published in the German national daily newspaper Die Welt (2014). Poles often recall their solidarity with Ukrainians, marching and singing together during demonstrations that followed the defrauded presidential election of 2004. Today, however, ‘silence has fallen over Kiev’s Maidan’,² Stasiuk continues (2014). The writer is fascinated with geography: he examines Europe, measures it, and concludes that ‘in such a density of territories, nations, and towns which are tight for space, loneliness is a very perverse and cruel experience, most of all, however, it reflects European defeat’ (2014).