News

News

Day of Memory and Sorrow

On June 22, 1941, 79 years ago, the Great Patriotic War began, which became a difficult trial for the all Soviet people. And they beard it with honor.

On the Day of Memory and Sorrow, we recall those who defended their homeland and, not sparing themselves, brought closer the Victory over the Nazi invaders. An unfinished novel by Mikhail Sholokhov “They Fought for their Country” is dedicated to this terrible war. In it Mikhail Sholokhov described one of the most tragic moments of Second World War: the retreat of troops to the Don in the summer of 1942. In the novel there is a deep knowledge of people, the truth of history and the truth of art.

May 24, 2020, on the birthday of Mikhail Sholokhov, the museum-reserve launched the All-Russian literary action-reading “Together with Sholokhov “They Fought for their Country”, in which famous politicians, representatives of culture, art, athletes, and doctors take part.

One of the participants was the Chairman of the Federation Council Valentina Matvienko. She reads an extract about the thoughts of one of the main characters, Nikolai Streltsov, before the fight.

Valentina Matvienko: “I remember the novel very well and, when I was offered to take part in the action, I already knew which fragment to choose. Even when I was reading a book in my youth, I was struck by the description of the person before the fight: his thoughts about death, the feelings that he experiences in the moments of “tremendous internal tension” ... When reading these lines, you especially feel the war in its “human” dimension.

There is a man there. The novel itself is about war, yes. But also about love, about human feelings, both in civilian life and at the front. About the completely natural fear of death and its - not so much to overcome, - but the departure to the second, third plan. Don't heroes cherish life? They DO. But hatred of enemies, the bitterness of retreat and the desire to fight for their people, to liberate the "endless Don steppe" and all the land captured by the fascists from the Nazis is stronger".