A well-known Ukrainian poet, Vasyl Symonenko was one of the most important figures in Ukrainian literature of the early 1960s. Rose Petal Wine is a collection of short stories about life in Ukraine in the 1960s during the times of the Soviet Union (USSR). "His voice is bold, and fearless... He stands for originality and creative experimentation... His images are immediate, as only a direct personal experience can be... An important device in Symonenko's short stories is his ability to involve the reader, to make him a part of the story... The fact that Symonenko was primarily a poet, allowed him to enrich his prose with devices borrowed from poetics..." Igor Shankovsky in Symonenko. A Study in Semantics
