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This article brings together political, poetic, and philosophical themes to discuss the war in Ukraine and the disruptive and damaging effects that war—this war in particular—has on language and shared meaning. It accomplishes this using empirical and factual reporting on the gruesome events which took place in Mariupol and Bucha in March and April 2022, a literary analysis of the poetry of Paul Celan, and remarks on language and war made by Serhiy Zhadan during an acceptance speech at the German Book Trade. The author offers a poetic analysis of the war in Ukraine and shows how war fundamentally alters how language conveys and communicates meaning. And yet, this article maintains, following Zhadan, that language—and our shared hope in its meaningfulness—is, nevertheless, a profound source of healing and restoration after the trauma of war—and a significant and substantial site of justice.
Chaz Holsomback (2024) studied this question.