ABSTRACT
It would be almost impossible to understand the character of Russian literature immediately before and during the Second World War without mentioning some of the facts typical of the havoc on the eve of the recent cataclysm. People are perhaps too near to the war itself to be able to assess the real value of the novels and narratives, reflecting the travail of a whole nation during the greatest crisis in its history. Still, it is highly interesting that during that crisis literature never ceased to play its part of a great spiritual and moral factor, unequaled by the war literature of any other belligerent nation. This is why the best known Soviet authors, such as Leonid Leonov, Sholokhov, Valentin Katayev, Panferov, Venyamin Kaverin, Yury Gherman, regarded it almost as their duty to contribute what they could in order to keep up the heroic confidence and faith in the future.
