“THE MUST-DOS OF EVERY DAY”: THE CALENDAR IN THE CULTURE OF RUSSIAN AND SOVIET CHILDHOOD. REVIEW OF THE BOOK BY M. KOSTYUKHINA ALL YEAR ROUND: CHILDREN’S LIFE BY THE CALENDAR. MOSCOW: NOVOE LITERATURNOE OBOZRENIE, 2024

Abstract

The review of the monograph by Marina Kostyukhina, All Year Round: Children’s Life by the Calendar, published by Novoe Literaturnoe Obozrenie in 2024, characterizes the content and structure of the research, while also providing remarks and questions. The reviewer positively assesses the research results, emphasizing its scope and breadth of material coverage. Marina Kostyukhina examines the history of children’s calendars of the 19th and 20th centuries and offers an original interpretation. The reviewer notes some contentious interpretations and factual inaccuracies but commends the author’s enthusiasm, dynamic narrative, and unexpected perspectives and approaches to the topic of children’s calendars. Various forms and genres of printed calendars (desktop, wall, tear-off, universal, thematic, published as almanacs, and others) are analyzed and considered by the author of the monograph in the context of children’s lives in all its aspects. The author of the book pays special attention to the Soviet period, focusing not only on the calendars themselves but also on the conceptualization of the category of time as it applied to the lives of children during that era.

Keywords: culture of Soviet childhood, children’s literature, children’s calendar, Marina Kostyukhina