Tag Archives: GEOGRAPHY OF THE URALS IN MENTAL IMAGES

Yulia S. Podlubnova 
Candidate of Philological Sciences, Institute of History and Archaeology, Ural Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences (Russia, Еkaterinburg)
ORCID: 0000-0001-5210-0861
E-mail: tristia@yandex.ru

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UDC 82-1:913(470.5)”1920″
DOI: 10.58529/2782-6511-2025-4-2-6-19

ABSTRACT. The article describes the parameters of geographical thinking and geographical imagination of the 1920s and the analyses their representations in the «poetry of battles and crusades» which if defined in artistic coordinates was the neo-romantic type poetry and in the regional socio-literary context (we are talking about the Urals) – Komsomol poetry. The 1920s soviet geography permeated with international ideas was shaped by the expectation of a world revolution and military campaigns beyond the borders of the Soviet Union. That is why it did not coincide with a world political and administrative map, offset the significance of state, cultural and other borders and thought rather of frontiers, border zones with landscape, natural or cultural features but at the same time potentially included in the processes of class struggle, change of power/system and subsequent Sovietization. The expectation of a global revolution and at the same time nostalgia for the events of the Civil War which were pushed back with each passing year explains the interest of Komsomol poetry in the Urals of the 1920s (we are talking about such poets as S. Vasiliev, E. Vechtomova, I. Keller, V. Makarov, V. Molchanov, G. Troitsky, V. Shipulin and others) to geography as well as its wide representation in poetic texts (regions, topoi, landscapes, etc.). Hence there was a demand in this poetry for memorial (historically concretized) and militaristic (located mostly in the imaginary zone) discourses differently assembling the historical and geographical, the real and the imaginary but on the whole verifying the present through revolutionary ideals and the romance of armed struggle.

KEYWORDS: geographical imagination, internationalism, revolutionary geography, neo-romanticism, Soviet poetry of the 1920s, Komsomol poetry of the Urals

For citation: Podlubnova Yu. S. [«Here the Dashing Death Will Soon Play with the Crumpled Feather Grass». Geography and Geographical Imagination in the Komsomol Poetry of the Urals in the 1920s]. Istoriko-geograficheskiy zhurnal [Historical Geography Journal], 2025, vol. 4, no. 2, pp. 6–19. DOI: 10.58529/2782-6511-2024-4-1-6-19 (In Russian).

Received 23 January 2025
Accepted 15 May 2025

© 2025 The Author

REFERENCES

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  • Sokolov K. S. [Hero of the Asian Frontier in Soviet Poetry of the Late 20s–30s]. Vestnik Permskogo Universiteta. Rossiyskaya i zarubezhnaya filologiya [Perm University Herald. Russian and Foreign Philology], 2019, vol. 11, iss. 4, pp. 123–130. DOI: 10.17072/2073-6681-2019-4-123-130 (In Russian).
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  • Tintin H. Obraz Kitaya v poezii russkoy dal’nevostochnoy emigratsii (1920‒1940-ye gody): kand. dis. [The image of China in the Poetry of Russian Far Eastern Emigration (1920‒1940s): Diss. Cand.]. Perm, 2024. (In Russian).
  • Vasilyev I. Ye. [The Topics and Mythopoetics of the Revolution in the Mass Poetry of the Urals between 1917 and 1919]. Izvestiya Ural’skogo federal’nogo universiteta. Seriya 2. Gumanitarnyye nauki [Izvestia. Ural Federal University Journal. Series 2. Humanities and Arts], 2017, vol. 19, no. 3 (166), pp. 128–145. DOI: 10.15826/izv2.2017.19.3.048 (In Russian).
  • Vidugirite I. Gogol’ i geograficheskoye voobrazheniye romantizma [Gogol and the Geographical Imagination of Romanticism]. Moscow: NLO Publ., 2019. (In Russian).
  • Vlasova E. [The Urals from the Train Window: Communication Tools and Travelogue]. Kul’tura puteshestviy v Serebryanom veke. Issledovaniya i retseptsii [Travel Culture in the Silver Age. Research and Receptions]. Ekaterinburg; Moscow: Kabinetnyy uchenyy Publ., 2020, pp. 249‒258. (In Russian).

Kristina S. Tretiakova 
Ural Federal University (Russia, Ekaterinburg)
ORCID 0009-0007-9661-1381
E-mail: k.s.tretiakova@urfu.ru

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UDC 82-3:913(470.5)”1930/1950″
DOI: 10.58529/2782-6511-2025-4-2-20-35

ABSTRACT. The article is devoted to the formation of the image of the Ural nature in children and teenagers’ literature of the 1930s–1950s. The need for youth literature that tells the growing readers about the specifics of the country’s regions led to the development of the theme of nature in the texts of the Ural authors in cognitive, pragmatic, and aesthetic aspects. Each of these aspects contributes to the formation of children’s understanding of their native region, allowing the reader to become fully acquainted with its unique characteristics. As material for the analysis the author draws upon the texts of various genres published in the Urals in the specified period, including those published in the literary and journalistic magazine «Uralsky Sledopyt» [«Ural Pathfinder»] (1935), in the collections of the «Ural Library of Entertaining Regional Studies» series (1936–1939), in the literary and artistic almanac for teenagers «Boevye Rebiata» [«Fighting Children»] (1942–1958). The stories of I. I. Likstanov «Malyshok» [«The Little Boy»] (1947) and «Zelen kamen» [«Green Stone»] (1949), poems by E. E. Khorinskaya and others are also considered. An attempt is made to identify the characteristic features of the natural «portrait» of the Urals, constructed by the Ural writers «from within» the region. Conclusions are drawn regarding the connection between the theme of nature during this period and the cultivation of regional identity and patriotism. From an early age, kids were sistematically immersed in the local history agenda — from books for little children to serious texts with social issues.

KEYWORDS: image of the Ural nature, Soviet children’s literature, literature of the Urals, I. I. Likstanov, E. E. Khorinskaya, periodicals of the Urals

For citation: Tretiakova K. S. [The Image of the Ural Nature in Children’s Literature of the 1930s — 1950s]. Istoriko-geograficheskiy zhurnal [Historical Geography Journal], 2025, vol. 4, no. 2, pp. 20–35. DOI: 10.58529/2782-6511-2024-4-1-20-35 (In Russian).

Received 10 February 2025
Accepted 1 July 2025

© 2025 The Author

REFERENCES

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Elena I. Shubnitsina 
Candidate of Engineering Sciences, «Yugid va» National Park
(Russia, Vuktyl)
ORCID 0000-0001-6198-7281
E-mail: shub07@yandex.ru

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UDC 913(470.5)
DOI: 10.58529/2782-6511-2025-4-2-36-49

ABSTRACT. The subject of this research is the history of the Old Believers — settlers of the upper reaches of the tributaries of the Pechora River, using the example of the life story of Alexei Fedorovich Mezentsev, one of the last «guardians of the old faith» of the Pechora region, who lived in the 20th century in the village of Vangyr-Vom on the remote taiga river Kosyu. During the study, the author identified and analyzed documents on Mezentsev’s personality, tracked the main dates, events and facts of his biography, collected the contemporaries’ memoirs: fishermen and hunters, residents of the Pechora region, as well as numerous tourists from all over the Soviet Union. The article summarizes excerpts from documents, photographs, including those from the personal archives of veterans of the 1950s and 1960s tourism. Special attention is paid to the stories of the Mezentsev family by tourists who passed through Vangyr-Vom. For the first time, oral and written memories of meetings with the Mezentsev family are described and analyzed, it allows drawing a portrait of the inner and outer life of the family of a hunter and fisherman in the Pechora region. The importance of the personality of Mezentsev and the Vangyr-Vom izba in the history of the Pechora region, as well as in the history of tourism and local history in the Subpolar Urals is shown. Despite his simple origin and life «in the wilderness», Mezentsev was known throughout the tourist world in the second half of the last century, and tourist groups planned their routes through the Subpolar Urals with the expectation of resting/spending the night in his hut. The relevance of the topic lies not only in the retrospection of the events of a century ago: it has an applied significance for the formation of modern infrastructure on the tourist routes of the Subpolar Urals.

KEYWORDS: genius loci, Alexey Mezentsev, Vangyr-Vom, Kosyu, Subpolar Urals, Ural Old Believers

For citation: Shubnitsina E. I. [Alexey Mezentsev — Genius Loci of the Kosyu River in the Subpolar Urals]. Istoriko-geograficheskiy zhurnal [Historical Geography Journal], 2025, vol. 4, no. 2, pp. 36–49. DOI: 10.58529/2782-6511-2024-4-1-36-49 (In Russian).

Received 1 December 2024
Accepted 15 May 2025

© 2025 The Author

REFERENCES

  • Chernov A. A. Geologicheskoye stroyeniye basseyna r. Kos’yu v Pechorskom kraye. (Otchet geologicheskogo otryada Pechorskoy kompleksnoy ekspeditsii SOPS AN SSSR, 1935 g.) [Geological Structure of the Kosyu River Basin in the Pechora Region. (Report of the Geological Detachment of the Pechora Complex Expedition of the SOPS of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1935)]. Moscow; Leningrad: Izd-vo AN SSSR Publ., 1940. (In Russian).
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