Vasil Bykaŭ, Belarusian war novelist (born 1924)

Vasil Uladzimiravič Bykaŭ was a Belarusian dissident and opposition politician, junior lieutenant, and author of novels and novellas about World War II. A significant figure in Soviet and Belarusian literature and civic thought, his work earned him endorsements for the Nobel Prize nomination from, among others, Nobel Prize laureates Joseph Brodsky and Czesław Miłosz.