Andrey Kurkov and Language

Today’s SignandSight.com calls attention to this article by Andrey Kurkov from Welt Online (in German) about the language war going on in Ukraine.

All these years I have protested against the plans to raise Russian to the second state language. Then finally I understood that everything was just a political game. It’s only the politicians that need a language debate. The people don’t have any such problems. The differences between Russian and Ukrainian are less than between German and Dutch. In Kiev, I often hear people asking a question in Russian that gets answered in Ukrainian, and no one is bothered in the least.

Article sounds interesting, and if you can get your hands on them, Kurkov’s novels are definitely worth checking out.