Search

A literary criticism of the book "Life and fate" by Vasily Grossman is presented which revolves around the time when Germany invaded Soviet Union. It explains the meaning of term "Stalingrad" used in the book and also examines the representation of collectivity in the society and conversation amongst friends. An overview of the story is also given.

This article focuses on presenting a more accurate portrait of Arkadii Gaidar (Arkady Petrovich Golikov), a Soviet writer of children's literature and promoter of the pro-Soviet "Timur movement." Gaidar's works focused upon the heroes of the Soviet Union and war (the Russian Civil War and the Great Patriotic War), romanticizing the revolutionary struggle and promoting support for the Red Army and of soldiers' families. The story "Timur and his squad" (1940), propelled Gaidar to fame and sparked an altruistic mass movement among Young Pioneers and other children's organizations all over the Soviet Union. However, recent research reveals Gaidar was a murderer in the Russian Civil War, an alcoholic with mental issues, and that his movement was anything but voluntary and satisfying to members.

The article discusses the life, career, and legacy of the Jewish East German writer Berta Lask, who is particularly remembered for her anti-war poetry, Communist writings on the labor movement, and proletarian children's literature. Lask's persecution under National Socialism, emigration and long exile in the Soviet Union, and writings after her return to (East) Berlin (East Germany) are examined. Her politically controversial story "Flüchtlinge" ("Refugee") is also discussed and presented.

The article focuses on the treatment of human body in the war literature of Soviet discourse in the 1930s and 1940s. It explores the war stories in Soviet, wherein the violence that surrounds the Soviet population was in a form of mass arrests and petitions for death penalties. It discusses official narratives of the 1930s and 1940s such as the "Pravda," which describes the disappearance of the bodies of tortured partisans in the World War II and provided a psychological release to the readers.

El artículo trata la literatura de guerra en la Unión Soviética. El autor nombra varios libros de este género, entre ellos "La Carretera de Volokolamsk" de Alexander Bek así como "Un hombre de verdad" y "Somos hombres soviéticos" de Boris Polevoy. Asevera que esta literatura, que se escribió a mediados del siglo XX, sirvió para recordar a los socialistas los orígenes nobles de se causa en un momento cuando estos origines se habían transformado en desorden, escasez y totalitarismo.

During the Cold War, books and stories for young people became an important weapon in the battle for their hearts and minds. But the propaganda directed at British youth did not suddenly appear as the ‘Iron Curtain’ descended across Europe, for even before the 1917 Revolution Russia had been seen as a major threat to British interests. The Bolshevik Revolution with its expressed intent of world revolution simply intensified that danger. The anti-Soviet writing of a number of authors is examined here, but there is particular emphasis on the novels of Captain W.E. Johns, who from the 1930s to the early 1960s consistently warned his readers of the danger posed by the ‘Red Menace’. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]