Representation of the Great Terror in Children's Literature ("The Girl at the Door" by M. Kozyreva and "Stalin's Nose" by E. Yelchin)

The thesis is devoted to the representation of the “Great terror” in the literature for children. Based on the examples of the texts by M. Kozyreva “The Girl at the Door” (1976) and E. Yelchin “The Stalin's Nose” (2013), we describe from the point of view of plot and poetics, how the repressions of the 1930s are depicted in children's literature context and how authors experience historical trauma in their works. The analysis “The Girls at the Door” examines the signs, time markers, literariness of the novel and the function of intertexts, the specifics of narration, the space of the novel and the psychologization of the novel’s narrative. In Stalin's Nose, we analyze the narrative specificity and the narrator’s point of view, the function of Gogol's references, grotesque and phantasy. Furthermore, the initial target audience of each text and the opinion poll on the understanding of texts by modern adolescents are important components of the comparative analysis of two texts. In addition to the analysis of texts, the paper explains important theoretical concepts for overcoming historical trauma - the theory of trauma, the phenomena of grief, and postmemory. Interviews with Kirill Kozyrev, the son of Maryana Kozyreva, and Eugene Yelchin contributed to a more accurate interpretation of the texts.