Russia's Hero Cities

Russia's Hero Cities PDF

Author: Ivo Mijnssen

Publisher: Indiana University Press

Published: 2021-05-04

Total Pages: 332

ISBN-13: 0253056217

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World War II, known as the Great Patriotic War to Russians, ravaged the Soviet Union and traumatized those who survived. After the war, memory of this anguish was often publicly repressed under Stalin. But that all changed by the 1960s. Under Brezhnev, the idea of the Great Patriotic War was transformed into one of victory and celebration. In Russia's Hero Cities, Ivo Mijnssen reveals how contradictory national recollections were revised into an idealized past that both served official needs and offered a narrative of heroism. This triumphant narrative was most evident in the creation of 13 Hero Cities, now located across Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine. These cities, which were host to some of the fiercest and most famous battles, were named champions. Brezhnev's government officially recognized these cities with awards, financial contributions, and ritualized festivities. Their citizens also encountered the altered history at every corner—on manicured battlefields, in war memorials, and through stories at the kitchen table. Using a rich tapestry of archival material, oral history interviews, and newspaper articles, Mijnssen provides a thorough exploration of two cities in particular, Tula and Novorossiysk. By exploring the significance of Hero Cities in Soviet identity and the enduring but conflicted importance they hold for Russians today, Russia's Hero Cities exposes how the Great Patriotic War no longer has the power to mask the deep rifts still present in Russian society.

Russia's Heroes

Russia's Heroes PDF

Author: Albert Axell

Publisher: Robinson

Published: 2012-10-25

Total Pages: 160

ISBN-13: 1472103904

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With Hitler's invasion of Russia on 22 June 1941, the Eastern front opened and politicians and generals around the world predicted the swift destruction of the Soviet armies. Nazi Germany threw its might against Russia: 5,000,000 men took part in the blitz attack along the Russian frontier. From interviews and primary evidence, much of it never previously published, unfolds the story of the Eastern Front, interweaving accounts of the men and women who served with the progress of the war itself. A tale of unbelievable heroism.

Young Heroes of the Soviet Union

Young Heroes of the Soviet Union PDF

Author: Alex Halberstadt

Publisher: Random House

Published: 2020-03-10

Total Pages: 320

ISBN-13: 0593133072

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In this “urgent and enthralling reckoning with family and history” (Andrew Solomon), an American writer returns to Russia to face a past that still haunts him. NAMED ONE OF THE NEW YORK TIMES CRITICS’ TOP BOOKS OF THE YEAR Alex Halberstadt’s quest takes him across the troubled, enigmatic land of his birth, where decades of Soviet totalitarianism shaped and fractured three generations of his family. In Ukraine, he tracks down his paternal grandfather—most likely the last living bodyguard of Joseph Stalin. He revisits Lithuania, his Jewish mother’s home, to examine the legacy of the Holocaust and the pernicious anti-Semitism that remains largely unaccounted for. And he returns to his birthplace, Moscow, where his grandmother designed homespun couture for Soviet ministers’ wives, his mother consoled dissidents at a psychiatric hospital, and his father made a dangerous living by selling black-market American records. Halberstadt also explores his own story: that of an immigrant growing up in New York, another in a line of sons separated from their fathers by the tides of politics and history. Young Heroes of the Soviet Union is a moving investigation into the fragile boundary between history and biography. As Halberstadt revisits the sites of his family’s formative traumas, he uncovers a multigenerational transmission of fear, suffering, and rage. And he comes to realize something more: Nations, like people, possess formative traumas that penetrate into the most private recesses of their citizens’ lives.

Heroes for All Time

Heroes for All Time PDF

Author: Nicholas Kotar

Publisher: Waystone Press

Published: 2020-01-13

Total Pages: 118

ISBN-13: 1951536037

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In the darkest of times... they shone brighter than the stars. Many are the stories of that mysterious land of Russia. Stories of heroes who gave their lives for God, Tsar, and country, and who left legacies that many a young child aspired to. Of course, so many of those stories are legends, a lifeline for people who had lost everything, and who preferred to remember a semi-fictional history that left out some of the more disturbing details. But in spite of history's dark reality, you still have bright lights appearing in unexpected places—heroes and heroines whose lives read like adventure tales, whose fates are sometimes stranger than fiction. This little book is a glimpse into the world of that Russia— a world filled with complex characters living out difficult lives in sometimes impossible circumstances. But more often than not, these heroes and heroines rose above all difficulties to become truly inspiring. In our own chaotic time, their stories are worthy of being retold again and again. If you want to be inspired by stories of true heroism in dark times, buy Heroes for All Time today!

A Hero of Our Time

A Hero of Our Time PDF

Author: Mikhail Lermontov

Publisher: Xist Publishing

Published: 2015-09-04

Total Pages: 141

ISBN-13: 1681952610

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A Novel About Opposites “In the first place, [his eyes] never laughed when he laughed. Have you ever noticed this peculiarity some people have? It is either the sign of an evil nature or of a profound and lasting sorrow.” - Mikhail Lermontov, A Hero of Our Time ‘The Hero of Our Time’, Grigory Alexandrovich Pechorin is actually a traditional antihero who destroys the life of others around him. He is a 19th-century Casanova who can’t find peace and happiness, often contemplating on the meaning of life and destiny. His story is seen through many eyes: a fellow brother-in-arms, the narrator and ultimately Pechorin himself. How will he end up: as a misunderstood hero or as a vile villain? Xist Publishing is a digital-first publisher. Xist Publishing creates books for the touchscreen generation and is dedicated to helping everyone develop a lifetime love of reading, no matter what form it takes

The Positive Hero in Russian Literature

The Positive Hero in Russian Literature PDF

Author: Rufus W. Mathewson

Publisher: Northwestern University Press

Published: 2000

Total Pages: 396

ISBN-13: 9780810117167

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"The positive hero was defined by the Soviets as one who set an example for the reader's behavior. As early as 1860, the merits of this ideal model were a central issue in the war between literary imagination and ideological criticism that raged in Russia for a hundred years." "In The Positive Hero in Russian Literature, Rufus W. Mathewson, Jr., brings a period of Russian literature to life and demonstrates how the battles over the positive hero reappeared with dramatic clarity in the dissident literary movement that developed after Stalin's death. Mathewson argues that the true continuity between nineteenth- and twentieth-century Russian prose was to be found in this persistent conflict between contrary views of the real nature and proper uses of literature. This new edition of a widely acclaimed work, first published in 1958 and covering literary developments through 1946, includes chapters on Belinsky, Pasternak, Solzhenitsyn, and Sinyavsky." --Book Jacket.

Heroes of the Soviet Union 1941–45

Heroes of the Soviet Union 1941–45 PDF

Author: Henry Sakaida

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Published: 2012-04-20

Total Pages: 66

ISBN-13: 1780966938

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The Great Patriotic War began on 22 June 1941, when the Germans invaded the Soviet Union. Over 10 million Soviet soldiers took part in the war and of those about 12,600 earned the Soviet Union's highest military award the Hero of the Soviet Union for deeds of great daring and self sacrifice. This book covers the male recipients of the Hero of the Soviet Union award during the Great Patriotic War. Snipers, fighter pilots, partisans and spies are all included, together with the famous aces Pokryshkin and Kozhedub, who both gained the award an amazing three times.

Heroes of the '90s - People and Money. the Modern History of Russian Capitalism

Heroes of the '90s - People and Money. the Modern History of Russian Capitalism PDF

Author: Vladislav Dorofeev

Publisher:

Published: 2014-11

Total Pages: 300

ISBN-13: 9781782670421

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Heroes of the 90s is a book composed by journalists of the newspaper Kommersant. The book sheds light on the transformation of the USSR and the country's social, state, financial, economic and civic institutions into a new state - the Russian Federation. The book covers Russia's first decade as a new country, the turbulent 90s that formed Russia's reality today. The book revisits the storming of the White House, the allocation of vouchers in attempts to set up a new economy of private ownership, Boris Yeltsin and the Chechen wars, hired killers, Ponzi schemes and financial crises, Boris Berezovsky, Anatoly Chubais and others. The book is based on facts and testimonies from those who lived through the era, many of whom share their stories with the world for the first time. Heroes of the 90s offers to the western reader, for the first time in history, a rare opportunity to learn about the developments in the post-Soviet Russia from the perspectives of the Russian journalists who have spent years investigating the ups and downs of the period. Translated by Huw Davies.