The Belarusian emigration magazine “News from Belarus,” published in New York since 1963 by the Radio Free Europe Committee (143 issues were released until 1969), drew attention to the research of Uladzimir Anichenka titled Belarusian-Ukrainian Written-Language Connections (Minsk 1969), in which the author synthesized the literary norms of Old Belarusian with the facts of the living folk language into a single coherent system. However, this is not the main achievement of U. Anichenka’s work – reports the New York magazine (Belarusian-Ukrainian Language Connections, in: “News from Belarus,” No. 18 (137), New York, September 30, 1969, pp. 4-5), referring to the publication by Yevhen Komarovsky Linguistic Connections of Brother Peoples (in: “Zvyazda,” 23.09.1969). U. Anichenka made a quite successful attempt at a comparative-historical study of Belarusian-Ukrainian written connections in times long past.
“The defined topic is based on a rich factual material from Belarusian and Ukrainian primary sources – manuscript copies and early printed editions, many of which have been introduced into scientific use for the first time. […] U. Anichenka thoroughly described the most important specific linguistic phenomena in the literary and written development of Belarus and Ukraine during the 14th-17th centuries. At that time, the territory of Belarus and most of Ukraine were part of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and later – the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. […]
Based on careful study of the rich factual material, the author proved that in Belarus and Ukraine, there have long existed two independent (Belarusian and Ukrainian) living languages, but from the 14th to the 17th centuries, Belarusians and Ukrainians essentially used a common literary language. The commonality of this language in the book is explained by the identical historical fate of Belarusians and Ukrainians within the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, their common cultural origins, and more. A separate place in U. Anichenka’s research is occupied by the division of the single Belarusian-Ukrainian literary language into independent – Belarusian and Ukrainian. This process is observed by the author in the writings of the 17th century. […] The author elaborates on the participatory role of Belarusianisms in Ukrainian literature and Ukrainianisms in Belarusian literature. He notes that Belarusianisms penetrated more intensively into written monuments created in Ukraine during the 14th-17th centuries.
As for Belarusian literature, it was significantly enriched by Ukrainianisms in the 17th century. The author sees the reason for this phenomenon in the fact that in the territory of Belarus, including the Vilnius lands, more literature was created during the 14th-17th centuries than in Ukraine. Often, Belarusian monuments were copied or reprinted in Ukrainian territory while preserving the linguistic features of the originals. In the 17th century, the opposite phenomenon was observed: many monuments that originated in Ukraine had widespread distribution in Belarusian lands. […] It is sufficient to refer here to the printed editions of Skaryna, which were copied in Ukraine with prefaces and afterwords by Skaryna. A vivid example in this regard is Vasily Zhuhalov from Yaroslavl-Galitsky, who in 1568 copied six translated books of Skaryna. Or consider this fact. The Lithuanian statutes (1529, 1566, 1588) originated in Belarusian territory, which included the Vilnius lands, and were later copied in Ukraine. […]” (Belarusian-Ukrainian Language Connections, in: “News from Belarus,” No. 18 (137), New York, September 30, 1969, pp. 4-5)
Uladzimir Anichenka’s research on Belarusian-Ukrainian written-language connections is a significant contribution to Slavic linguistics,” it is noted in the pages of the New York magazine “News from Belarus.”