Leo Tolstoy’s ‘War and Peace’ and other works that supposedly glorify the Russian military will no longer be taught in Ukrainian schools, Kiev’s ministry of education announced on Tuesday.
Tolstoy’s internationally recognized masterpiece joins other classic Russian books banned in Ukraine long before the current conflict.
“All these will be completely excluded from foreign literature,” first deputy Minister of education Andrey Vitrenko said in an interview with the TV channel Ukraine 24. “So, for example, ‘War and Peace,’ this will not be studied in Ukraine anymore.”
The ministry is still working on the final list of works by Russian writers that will be excluded from the curriculum, Vitrenko added.
His comments follow last month’s announcement by Kiev’s Ministry of Culture and Information Policy that works of literature “promoting Russian propaganda” would be removed from Ukrainian libraries and replaced by Ukrainian books.
“Propaganda is a dangerous weapon. Russian lies are poisons all around today,” deputy minister Larisa Petasyuk said on Facebook at the time.