Home – Home – Jornals – Humanitarian sciences in Siberia 2016 number

The paper considers the origin and evolution of literary-art journals in Siberia and the Far East. It also attempts to identify common features of the journals’ development specific to these regions. Much attention in this work is paid to the origin of the journals since much of them were established under similar spontaneous conditions. The mode of their further development also followed a similar pattern. Periods of repressions were followed by “thaws”. Pressure on the journals in one region entailed the revision of editorial policies in the neighboring regions. Many authors and critics, and with them the journals, at one time or another, fell from grace. Often these were writers who brought fame to the national literature. Finally, by the end of the Soviet period the journals had reached their peak when they published a number of works of the “returned literature”, i.e. works that had been previously censored or forbidden. But in the 1990s much of the formerly unavailable materials were published, so the journals lost their popularity and were on the verge of being closed. However, forces accumulated by the literary journals during the Soviet age helped them to survive later. Special emphasis is placed on changing circulation and periodicity of journals, as well as changing status of periodicals from the literary miscellanies to the literary journals. Chronicle of events that took place at the same time in different places allows to make generalizations not only about the history of Siberian and Far Eastern literature but also, with certain assumptions, about the history of these regions. In conclusion the author pays attention to the literary interests of Siberians which can be identified by analysis of publishing and socio-political activities of the journals. They portray a specific image of Siberians, that is a unique combination of the strive for independence and commitment to social order. This paradoxical combination is explained by their love for homeland every inch of which was reclaimed from nature with great difficulty.