How to write for children about “our land”: a version of the writers of Western Siberia in the late 1920s and early 1930s

The study analyses the publications in “Siberian lights” and “Siberian pedagogical magazine” of the 1920s - early 1930s and the reports of the First Congress of writers of Western Siberia (1934). The opinions of writers, teachers, publishers, and representatives of the party bureaucracy about the tasks and thematic priorities of regional children’s literature and future children's writer qualities are studied. The activities of the children’s section of the West Siberian Committee of the Union of Writers are considered. The Committee meetings focused on the tasks, thematic priorities of Siberian children’s literature, and working methods of children’s writers with the members organizing literary evenings for schoolchildren, competitions for the best works for children, promoting children’s books about the region. Encouraging motivations for addressing the Siberian children’s literature issue were the party resolutions “On the publishing house “Molodaya Gvardiya” (1931), “On the perestroika of literary and artistic organizations” (1932), “On the establishment of the publishing house “Children’s literature” (1933), preparation for the First Writers’ Congress of Western Siberia, the First Congress of Soviet writers. Also, the lack of works about the region for children, the growth and differentiation of the professional community of local writers were vital. The author concludes that for Siberian children’s literature, the 1920s were a period of the active search for themes, images, literary forms, calls for party mobilization in the “workshop of children’s writers and poets.” It was not until 1933-1934 when the socialist-realist canon of children’s books was established, with the main requirements for children’s artistic works being ideological conformity, pedagogical potential, and fascinating content.

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