Alexander Motyl

Dr. Alexander Motyl is a scholar and an artist. By day he is a professor of political science at Rutgers-Newark. A specialist on Ukraine, Russia, and the USSR, and on nationalism, revolutions, empires, and theory, he is the author of 10 books of nonfiction, including Pidsumky imperii (2009); Puti imperii (2004); Imperial Ends: The Decay, Collapse, and Revival of Empires (2001); Revolutions, Nations, Empires: Conceptual Limits and Theoretical Possibilities (1999); Dilemmas of Independence: Ukraine after Totalitarianism (1993); and The Turn to the Right: The Ideological Origins and Development of Ukrainian Nationalism, 1919–1929 (1980); the editor of 15 volumes, including The Encyclopedia of Nationalism (2000) and The Holodomor Reader (2012); and a contributor of dozens of articles to academic and policy journals, newspaper op-ed pages, and magazines. He also has a weekly blog, “Ukraine’s Orange Blues.”

By night Motyl is a novelist, poet, and painter. His novels include The Taste of Snow (Cervená Barva Press, 2013); My Orchidia (BrickHouse Books, 2012); The Jew Who Was Ukrainian (Cervená Barva, 2011); Who Killed Andrei Warhol (Seven Locks Press, 2007); Flippancy (Cantara Books, 2007); and Whiskey Priest (iUniverse, 2005). His poems have appeared in Counterexample Poetics, Istanbul Literary Review and New York Quarterly, and he has performed his fiction at the Cornelia Street Café, the Bowery Poetry Club, and the Ukrainian Museum in New York. Shown in solo and group shows in New York, Philadelphia, and Toronto, Motyl’s artwork is represented by the Internet gallery, www.artsicle.com.

A native New Yorker, Motyl received his doctoral degree in political science, master of philosophy in political science, and master of international affairs from Columbia University. He earned his bachelor of arts in history from Columbia College.