Militarization of reading: the portrait of the reader of journals “Znamia” and “Zalp” in questionaries of 1933 and 1934

Thematic journals “Zalp” and “Zmania” were one of the instruments of Soviet military propaganda in the 1930s and tended to establish contact with the reader in order to correct their publishing policy as well as understand how the reader can be influenced. Their auditory consisted of members of the military, peasants, workers all over the country, their educational level was different. The article aims to reconstruct the portrait of the reader based on the question-aries preserved in archives (Russian State Archive of Literature and Art, Manuscript Department of the Institute of Russian Literature of the Russian Academy of Sciences). Most of comments were positive, some of them criticized the journal. Members of military were the part of the journals’ auditory who tried to demonstrate their knowledge and gave their advices. In the questionaries of “Znamia”, the assessment of literary criticism stands out. It demonstrates how the common reader sees the texts from literary experts. A lot of the readers were undereducated, they saw reading as a mean of making themselves better, and their comments allowed them to feel as a part of Soviet literary process. A lot of them wanted to become a writer and asked for an advice. The analyses revealed the readers of the thematic journal demanded “the truth” in literature. Some of them used literary formulas - not only those who tried to write fiction. The questionaries demonstrate that in 1933-1934 the reader felt their agency and that they could make an impact in the editorial policy of the journal.