"The Aurora’s Salvo": Projections of a Myth in Soviet Children’s Literature

Abstract

The article examines the representations and reinterpretations of the legend surrounding the shot fired by the cruiser Aurora in Soviet children’s literature. It explores how children’s books and magazines first constructed and later gradually neutralized the myth of the fateful salvo that allegedly signaled the assault on the Winter Palace and subsequently became one of the key symbols of the October Revolution of 1917. The study surveys references to the mythologeme “the Aurora’s salvo” found in children’s prose written from the 1920s through the 1970s and analyzes its various narrative transformations. The material includes novellas and short stories by Veniamin Kaverin, Evgeny Shvarts, Nikolai Zabolotsky, Lev Saveliev, Viktor Dragunsky, and other Soviet authors. The article traces the evolution of the myth, demonstrating how historical fact interacts with artistic invention and how the selection and distortion of historical details served the ideological aims of Soviet children’s literature across different periods. It also proposes a hypothesis that the myth of the Aurora’s salvo developed in children’s literature in three distinct stages. The diafilm Pashka-millionaire (1970), written by Boris Emelyanov, is also discussed.

Keywords: cruiser Aurora, October Revolution, 25 October 1917, children’s literature, Evgeny Shvarts, Nikolai Zabolotsky, Veniamin Kaverin, Lev Saveliev (Lipavsky)