Exhibition 'The Literary Rear: Kazan'

About exhibition

The exhibition is dedicated to the fates of Soviet writers who found themselves in Kazan during the Great Patriotic War. After the outbreak of the war, Kazan became a major rear hub of the country's cultural, scientific and industrial life. The routes of most evacuated writers passed through the capital of the Tatar ASSR, and the Kazan headquarters of the Union of Soviet Writers was located in the House of Printing on Baumana Street. From autumn 1941 to the summer of 1943, Kazan, Chistopol, Yelabuga and other towns and district centers of the republic became a second home for many Soviet literary figures. The exhibition shows items from the collections of the National Museum of the Republic of Tatarstan: letters, photographs, books published during the war by Tatknigizdat, portraits of writers who lived in evacuation in Kazan, and propaganda posters produced in collaboration with poets and illustrators. For example, among the unique items are an autograph of Boris Pasternak, a rare copy of the book 'A Letter from the Trenches' by the poet Musa Jalil, and a letter by Alexander Tvardovsky. The exhibition also recreates the interior ensemble of the office of the Union of Writers, which was located in the House of Printing and where evacuated writers and members of the Union of Writers of Tatarstan gathered and worked together.