On May 24-25 of this year, the International Scientific Seminar "Universal Human Values and National Mentality in the Mirror of Slavic Literatures" was held at Lesya Ukrainka Volyn State University, co-organized by Lesya Ukrainka Volyn State University, I. Hnatiuk Ternopil State Pedagogical University, the Volyn Academic House, and the Volyn Museum of Local Lore. In the context of the seminar, a presentation of the book "Riznotsvittia" (Koszalin, Republic of Poland, 2003) by Yakiv Hudemchuk (compilation, afterword, editing: Mykola Ivanovych Zymomria, Doctor of Philological Sciences, Professor, Head of the Department of History and Practice of Translation at Ivan Franko Drohobych Pedagogical University) took place. Andrii and Mykola Hudemchuk — the poet's sons — and the compiler of the volume — Mykola Zymomria — took part in the events. Yakiv Oleksiiovych Mushynskyi-Hudemchuk was born on September 12, 1922, in the city of Lutsk. He was left without a mother early (she died in 1926) and lived under the care of his own aunt, his mother's sister. After graduating from the Lesya Ukrainka Lutsk Ukrainian Gymnasium, he entered the Lutsk Pedagogical Institute (graduated in 1941). He began writing poems while still in the gymnasium; he continued as a student. His passion for poetry was supported and encouraged in every way by his godmother — Hanna Shchehynska. After graduating from officer school in Zhytomyr, in 1944-45 he participated in World War II as part of the Polish Army, which he finished in Poland. From 1947 he lived in Koszalin, where many Ukrainian families had been resettled as part of Operation "Vistula." In 1954 he lost his father, who perished in Stalin's camps (he was exiled to Siberia in 1950). In Koszalin, Yakiv Hudemchuk launched extensive cultural and educational activity and participated in the founding of the Ukrainian Social and Cultural Society, whose board he headed in 1956-73. From there, from Pomerania, only in thoughts and lines of poetry did he fly to Lutsk, to his native Volyn, to his beloved Ukraine, which he sang of and longed for; whose joys, pains, and anxieties he lived by. He wrote poems and published in Ukrainian periodicals, in journals, almanacs, and calendars. The literary anthology "Homin" (Warsaw, 1964) included about 70 of his poetic works. Separate editions included the collections "Baltic Seagulls" (Warsaw, 1975) and "Prymoria" (Warsaw, 1980). In the poet's overall creative output — nearly a thousand poems published in Ukraine, Poland, Czechia, Slovakia, Belgium, Romania, and Canada. The establishment of radio broadcasts in the Ukrainian language in 1956 is one of many of Yakiv Hudemchuk's merits in the cause of reviving and affirming Ukrainianness in Pomerania, on the coast of the Baltic Sea, where thousands of Ukrainian families live. He acts as a popularizer of the achievements of Ukrainian literature in Poland, while also translating and interpreting into Ukrainian the works of H. Heine, J. W. Goethe, Wl. Broniewski, J. Kochanowski, J. Iwaszkiewicz, M. Konopnicka, and others. In 1985 he became a member of the Union of Polish Writers. Yakiv Hudemchuk did not live to see the release of his single-volume collection of poetry, which under the title "Riznotsvittia" appeared in Koszalin at the end of 2003, already after the poet's death (he died on June 4, 2003). I will return to Ukraine And gather happiness — blossoms, I will press them to my heart And will not wander the world, — with these words ends Ya. Hudemchuk's poem "The Fern Flower." Today the poet has returned to Ukraine in a wonderful book. This time — forever.