“Blok's canon” in literature of Great Patriotic War

The article is devoted to the problem of Alexander Blok’s written heritage reflected in the literature of the Great Patriotic War period and in the works of Soviet criticism written during the war decade. The research examines quotations, allusions, reminiscences, images, and motifs of A. Blok’s repertoire in the works of multiple Russian writers in 1941-1945. Special attention is paid to the role of A. Blok’s images and motifs in the war poetry by Vs. Rozhdestvensky (poem “Grave fighter”); to the problem of hidden citations (poem by Alexander Blok “Scythians” - essay by Leonid Leonov, “To the unknown American friend. First letter”); to the “Blok’s code” employed in the war prose written by Andrey Platonov (stanzas “A girl sang...” - the story “spirited people”). The author concludes that “the Blok’s Canon”, incorporated into the literature of the war period, contributed to the restoration of Russian spirituality and patriotism in the fullness of national historical memory.