Is Ukraine’s Culture Worth Fighting For? With Charlotte Higgins

Welcome to Intelligence Squared, where great minds meet. I'm senior producer Mia Sorrenti. When a country is fighting for its survival, why does culture matter? And what makes people risk their lives to protect poems, paintings, and stories in the midst of war? On today's episode, Charlotte Higgins, chief culture writer of The Guardian, joins Hannah Lucinda Smith to discuss her book Ukrainian Lessons: A Journey into the Art and Life of a Country at War. and what Ukraine's artists, writers and cultural institutions reveal about the role of art in documenting war, resisting erasure, and preserving a sense of national identity. Let's join our host Hamily Cinder Smith now with more.

Russia's invasion of Ukraine in february twenty twenty two heralded a war in which not only people and places, but also language, history, and culture are under attack. When the journalist Charlotte Higgins, who reports on Culture for the Guardian, traveled to the country soon after the war began, It was to take part in the Laviv Book Forum, an event held in defiance of the attempted desecration of Ukrainian culture. Since then she's travelled back to the country repeatedly to report on the impact of the conflict on Ukraine's art and cultural community. She's also been learning the Ukrainian language, and she documents all of this in her new book, Ukrainian Lessons.

Charlotte, welcome to Intelligence Squared. Well thank you so much, and what an honour and a pleasure to be talking to you. So thank you very much indeed, Hannah. Well it's lovely to have you. Um so You are obviously your background is you're a culture correspondent. What first took you to Ukraine and to the war zone and what were your first thoughts

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