“Today this exhibition is more relevant than ever, because the traditions of war correspondents are alive and in demand today,” said Vladimir Gronsky, director of the Russian National Library, a long-time journalist and a member of the Union of Journalists of Russia.
The exposition opens with the name of Leo Tolstoy, whose essay “Sevastopol in December 1854” is rightfully considered the first example of military journalism. And further in the portrait gallery: Vasily Nemirovich-Danchenko, the older brother of the famous director, twice awarded the St. George Cross, Vsevolod Krestovsky, author of the novel “Petersburg Slums”, Valery Bryusov, Ilya Ehrenburg.
The second hall of the exposition is devoted almost entirely to the names of writers and poets who “with a watering can and a notebook” visited the fronts of the Great Patriotic War: Konstantin Simonov, Karim Mustai, Yevgeny Dolmatovsky. The latter, by the way, as a journalist covered the procedure for the surrender of the German command in May 1945.
A separate place in the exposition is occupied by the names of war correspondents who lived and fought in besieged Leningrad: Vsevolod Vishnevsky, Pavel Luknitsky, Nikolai Tikhonov. On Wednesday, January 18, St. Petersburg and the Leningrad region will celebrate together the 80th anniversary of the breaking of the blockade of Leningrad, and on January 27, the day of the complete lifting of the blockade, Leningrad Victory Day.
