READING PRACTICES IN THE TRENCHES OF WORLD WAR I: EXPERIENCES OF EVERYDAY LIFE AND TIME MANAGEMENT
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17072/2219-3111-2025-4-147-157Keywords:
time, World War I, daily life, leisure, newspapers, books, letters, military lifeAbstract
The article analyses various ego-documents (diaries, letters, memoirs), it is devoted to the role of reading books, newspapers and letters in the everyday life of the participants of the First World War on the Russian front. The author pays particular attention to how the descriptions of reading practices reflect the combatants' perceptions of the time they spent reading. From the very beginning of the First World War, there was a need for reading among its participants. Soldiers at the front read the letters they received from home, which allowed them to keep in touch with their small homeland and family. The soldiers read the letters carefully and reread them several times. Even military censorship failed to limit the constant need for communication with home as a reminder of «normal life». The author examines the influence of letters from home on the moral and psychological state of the soldiers. The article analyses the practice of reading newspapers and books by the combatants. Newspapers served primarily an informational function. By reading newspapers, front-line soldiers tried to get an idea of the situation at the front and to learn about life in the rear. This allowed soldiers to synchronise their time with soldiers in other sectors of the front and with the population left behind. Reading newspapers and books was a way to adapt to military reality by continuing to engage in peaceful activities in military conditions. Reading at the front also had a relaxing function, as it was a way of spending leisure time. Front line soldiers used books for self-education, demonstrating the educational role of books. Reading had an escapist function, allowing them to escape from the harshness of the surrounding reality. The author concludes that the practice of reading books, newspapers, and letters by combatants can be considered as a temporal experience, a way to reconfigure the time of war and bridge the gap between the past and future created by battles and trench life.References
Аксенов В.Б. Слухи, образы, эмоции. Массовые настроения россиян в годы войны и рево-люции, 1914–1918. М.: Новое литературное обозрение, 2020. 992 с.
Асташов А.Б. Русский фронт в 1914 – начале 1917 года: военный опыт и современность. М.: Новый хронограф, 2014. 740 с. EDN: VRDZHP.
Валяев Я.В. Фронтовая жизнь солдат Российской Императорской армии в годы Первой мировой войны // Науч. ведомости Белгород. гос. ун-та. История, Политология, Экономи-ка, Информатика. 2010. № 19. С. 159–164. EDN: NWAPHH.
Валяев Я.В. Фронтовой быт военнослужащих российской армии в годы Первой мировой войны: август 1914 – февраль 1917 гг.: автореф. дис. ... канд. ист. наук. Белгород, 2012. 26 с. EDN: ZORAZD.
Волков В.В., Хархордин О.В. Теория практик. СПб.: Изд-во Европ. ун-та в С.-Петерб., 2008. 298 с. ISBN: 978-5-94380-078-8. EDN: YWCDGG.
Голубинов Я.А. Первая грамотная война человечества [Электронный ресурс] // Warspot. URL: https://warspot.ru/8868-pervaya-gramotnaya-voyna-chelovechestva (дата обращения: 12.11.2024).
Гужва Д.Г. Российская военная периодическая печать в годы Первой мировой войны 1914–1918 гг.: автореф. дис. ... канд. ист. наук. М., 2008. 26 с. EDN: NJHUIR.
Егорова Н.А. Книга, библиотека и чтение в лагерях для военнопленных Российской импе-рии в Германии и Австро-Венгрии в период Первой мировой войны // Ежегодник Дома русского зарубежья имени Александра Солженицына. М., 2018. Вып. 8. С. 244–274. EDN: ZDIKAP.
Колоницкий Б.И. «Трагическая эротика»: образы императорской семьи в годы Первой ми-ровой войны. М.: Новое литературное обозрение, 2010. 664 с.
Лютов С.Н. Военная книга в России: вторая половина XIX – начало XX века: дис. ... д-ра ист. наук. М., 2004. 375 с. EDN: ZMTMVP.
Панченко А.М. История военных библиотек в контексте развития библиотечного дела Рос-сии: 1802–1917 гг.: дис. ... д-ра ист. наук. Новосибирск, 2016. 613 с.
Панченко А.М. Распространение произведений печати среди офицеров и солдат Русской армии в Первой мировой войне (1914–1918 гг.) // Тр. ГПНТБ СО РАН. Вып. 3. Книжная культура Сибири и Дальнего Востока в условиях общественных кризисов XIX – начала XXI в. Новосибирск, 2013. С. 81–101. EDN: RAHCFN.
Политика и поэтика: русская литература в историко-культурном контексте Первой миро-вой войны: публикации, исследования и материалы / [редкол.: В.В. Полонский (отв. ред.) и др.]. М.: ИМЛИ РАН, 2014. 878 с.
Розенталь И.С. Война и мир в общественной мысли и массовом сознании // Очерки рус-ской культуры. Начало XX века. М.: РОССПЭН, 2022. С. 101–153.
Рубанова Т.Д. Библиотеки для раненых воинов и военнопленных в годы Первой мировой войны // Библиотековедение. 2015. № 6. С. 98–106. EDN: YLEXPR.
Русская публицистика и периодика эпохи Первой мировой войны: политика и поэтика: сб. ст. / [редкол.: В.В. Полонский (отв. ред.) и др.]. М.: ИМЛИ РАН, 2013. 598 с.
Сенявская Е.С. Окопный быт Первой мировой войны: очерк фронтовой повседневности // Историческая психология и социология истории. 2014. Т. 7, № 1. С. 192–219. EDN: QOASXY.
Сенявская Е.С. Фронтовая повседневность // Очерки русской культуры. Начало XX века. М.: РОССПЭН, 2022. С. 385–428. EDN: TOKMZW.
Фассел П. Великая война и современная память / пер. с англ. А. Глебовской. СПб.: Изд-во Европ. ун-та в С.-Петерб., 2015.
Beaupré N. «Time and the Soldier»: Experiences of Time in the Great War // Time on a Human Scale: Experiencing the Present in Europe, 1860–1930 / eds. by J. Wright, A. Fryxell. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021. P. 257–276.
Ellis J. Eye Deep in Hell: Trench Warfare in World War One. London: Croom Helm, 1976. 215 p.
Reading and the First World War: Readers, Texts, Archives / eds. by S. Towheed, E.G. King. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015. 266 p.
Дата поступления рукописи в редакцию 19.06.2025
References
Aksenov, V. B. (2020). Slukhi, obrazy, emotsii. Massovye nastroeniya rossiyan v gody voyny i revolyutsii [Ru-mors, images, emotions: The mass moods of Russians during the years of war and revolution]. Novoe litera-turnoe obozrenie.
Astashov, A. B. (2014). Russkiy front v 1914 — nachale 1917 goda: voennyy opyt i sovremennost' [The Russian front in 1914 — early 1917: Military experience and modernity]. Novyy khronograf.
Beaupré, N. (2021). "Time and the soldier": Experiences of time in the Great War. In J. Steinberg & B. Ziemann (Eds.), Time on a human scale: Experiencing the present in Europe, 1860–1930 (pp. 257–276). Oxford Univer-sity Press.
Ellis, J. (1976). Eye deep in hell: Trench warfare in World War I. Croom Helm.
Egorova, N. A. (2018). Book, library, and reading in the camps for prisoners of war of the Russian Empire in Germany and Austria-Hungary during the First World War. Ezhegodnik Doma russkogo zarubezh'ya imeni Ale-ksandra Solzhenitsyna, 2018, 244–274.
Fussell, P. (2015). Velikaya voyna i sovremennaya pamyat' [The Great War and modern memory] (A. Glebovskaya, Trans.). Izdatel'stvo Yevropeyskogo universiteta v Sankt-Peterburge.
Golubinov, Ya. A. (n.d.). The first literate war of mankind. Retrieved November 12, 2024, from https://warspot.ru/8868-pervaya-gramotnaya-voyna-chelovechestva
Guzhva, D. G. (2008). Rossiyskaya voennaya periodicheskaya pechat' v gody Pervoy mirovoy voyny 1914–1918 gg. [The Russian military periodical press during the First World War, 1914–1918] [Abstract of Candidate of Sciences dissertation, Military University of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation].
Kolontsikov, B. I. (2010). «Tragicheskaya erotika»: Obrazy imperatorskoy sem'i v gody Pervoy mirovoy voyny ["Tragic eroticism": Images of the imperial family during the First World War]. Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie.
Lyutov, S. N. (2004). Voennaya kniga v Rossii: Vtoraya polovina XIX — nachalo XX veka [The military book in Russia: The second half of the 19th — beginning of the 20th century] [Doctoral dissertation, Moscow State University of Printing Arts].
Panchenko, A. M. (2013). Distribution of printed works among officers and soldiers of the Russian Army in the First World War (1914–1918). Trudy GPNTB SO RAN, 3, 81–101.
Panchenko, A. M. (2016). Istoriya voennykh bibliotek v kontekste razvitiya bibliotechnogo dela Rossii: 1802–1917 gg. [The history of military libraries in the context of the development of library science in Russia: 1802–1917] [Doctoral dissertation, State Public Scientific and Technological Library of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences].
Politika i poetika: russkaya literatura v istoriko-kul'turnom kontekste Pervoy mirovoy voyny: publikatsii, issle-dovaniya i materialy [Politics and poetics: Russian literature in the historical and cultural context of the First World War: Publications, research and materials]. (2014). IMLI RAN.
Reading and the First World War: Readers, texts, archives. (2015). (S. Towheed & E. King, Eds.). Palgrave Macmillan.
Rozental', I. S. (2022). War and peace in public thought and mass consciousness. In Ocherki russkoy kul'tury. Nachalo XX veka [Essays on Russian culture. The beginning of the 20th century] (pp. 101–153). ROSSPEN.
Rubanova, T. D. (2015). Libraries for wounded soldiers and prisoners of war during the World War I. Bibli-otekovedenie, 6, 98–106.
Russkaya publitsistika i periodika epokhi Pervoy mirovoy voyny: politika i poetika: issledovaniya i materialy [Russian journalism and periodicals of the era of the First World War: Politics and poetics: Research and mate-rials]. (2013). IMLI RAN.
Senyavskaya, E. S. (2014). The trench life in the First World War: A sketch of daily life at the front. Is-toricheskaya psikhologiya i sotsiologiya istorii, 7(1), 192–219.
Senyavskaya, E. S. (2022). Frontline daily routine. In Ocherki russkoy kul'tury. Nachalo XX veka [Essays on Russian culture. The beginning of the 20th century] (pp. 385–428). ROSSPEN.
Valyayev, Ya. V. (2010). Life at the front line of the imperial Russian army soldiers during World War I. Nauch-nyye vedomosti Belgorodskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta. Seriya: Istoriya, Politologiya, Ekonomika, In-formatika, 19, 159–164.
Valyayev, Ya. V. (2012). Frontovoy byt voennosluzhashchikh rossiyskoy armii v gody Pervoy mirovoy voyny: avgust 1914 — fevral' 1917 gg. [Front life of servicemen of the Russian army during the First World War: Au-gust 1914–February 1917] [Abstract of Candidate of Sciences dissertation, Belgorod National Research Univer-sity].
Volkov, V. V., & Kharkhordin, O. V. (2008). Teoriya praktik [Theory of practices]. Izdatel'stvo Yevropeyskogo universiteta v Sankt-Peterburge.
