Yu.S. Semenov: from “Seventeen Moments of Spring” to “The Third Map”. “Encryption” of historical facts

Abstract

In a study based on the material of the author’s (source) text of the said novel (1973), a “verification” of the key provisions that became the basis of its complex polyphonic conflict was carried out. To achieve this goal, we mainly used the receptive method, which is widespread in modern literary research practice. The concept of “artistic historicism” is emphasized, both its similarities and differences from the realities of history, the details of the historical process. The understanding of the original artistic and documentary style of Yu. Semenov is continued – the specifics of historicism as the “ciphering” of historical facts, which began in the first part of the study. The author’s hypothesis about the “exit” of the conflict embedded within the artistic paradigm of the novel’s text on the geopolitical and psychological levels – into the real vicissitudes of world history in the middle of 20th – 21st centuries was analytically tested. In this regard, the key statements of documentary-fiction characters (A. Dulles, W. Churchill and W. Schellenberg), deliberately removed by the director from the film version (intertext) of the novel, are emphasized and studied. The emergence of a real global geopolitical conflict between the West and Russia of the era of “peace at war” (the author’s term of the article), formed in the spring of 1945, in the days of the approaching defeat of Nazi Germany, but originating in June 1941, is traced (Yu. Semenov’s novel “ Third card"). In conclusion, the foundations of this scientific research are formulated with verification of historical, geopolitical facts set out in the report of a modern Russian statesman, Director of the FSB of Russia, Secretary of the Security Council of the Russian Federation N.P. Patrushev (“They want to turn Russia into Muscovy”: document dated January 10, 2023).