Olive oil is a symbol of Mediterranean culture and antiquity, so special that the ancient Romans poured this drink of gods into painted amphorae. It is no coincidence that, for centuries, olive oil has been used as chrism for anointing during worship. It always seemed to me that those who produce olive oil with their own hands belong to some higher, secret culture.

Even in the ancient world, olive oil from Croatia’s Istrian Peninsula had a remarkable reputation and was served to Roman emperors. After the Second World War, when the region became a part of the socialist Yugoslavia, this sector fell into decay. Nonetheless, interest in the cultivation of olives has experienced a true renaissance since the early 2000s, and the area of olive groves in Istria has increased tenfold. It is the revival of tradition that is essential for the local identity, part of its cultural code.

Zbigniew Herbert felt suffocated in communist Poland where he lacked a creative atmosphere. Travelling inspired him and provided him an opportunity to write on a variety of topics beyond social realism. Yet, in the end, he simply could not live without Poland. He disliked communist Poland, but it was still Poland – his homeland.

Zbigniew Herbert is one of those writers that everyone has heard of but very few have read. People in Central and Eastern Europe had high hopes that he might win the Nobel Prize in Literature, but it never happened. Perhaps it was because two Poles (Czesław Miłosz and Wisława Szymborska) were already awarded the prize during that period. Be that as it may, now 20 years after the writer’s death, it is worth looking back and examining this outstanding figure from a different perspective: as a deep poet, a sophisticated essayist, a profound thinker, a dissident and an Eastern European barbarian who saw the garden of Western culture in his own way.

Three years have passed since the onset of war in Ukraine. As a result some changes have occurred in the Ukrainian mentality but questions still remain: How deep are those changes? And what would it take for a reversal in attitudes towards the West? Results from recent opinion polls may come as a surprise in an attempt to answer these questions.

This piece originally appeared in Issue 6/2016 of New Eastern Europe. Subscribe now.