Olha Kobylianska (1863-1942) was one of Ukraine's most prominent modernist novelists. A self-educated and well-read woman, she wrote her first stories in German. Her friendships with prominent Ukrainians, including Lesia Ukrainka, Natalia Kobrynska, and Osyp Makovei, changed her cultural outlook. She became involved in the Ukrainian women's movement and began writing in Ukrainian. Her early works, including the novels Liudyna (A Person, 1891) and Tsarivna (The Princess, 1895), depict cultured, emancipated women oppressed in a philistine, provincial society. They show a distinct Nietzschean influence. Her later works, including Zemlia (The Land, 1902) and V nediliu rano zillia kopala (On Sunday Morning She Gathered Herbs, 1909), temper the autobiographical individualism of her earlier works with lyrical descriptiveness and superb narrative control.
