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Another prose writer whose position is strong is Alexei Tolstoi. He is undoubtedly a distinguished writer and a fine stylist, but he writes mostly about a fairly remote past and has not identified himself with the war. He is now somewhat disliked by a few younger writers for his pomposity and his airs; he is something of an eccentric — writes standing up, for instance, with his manuscript on an inclined chest-high table, like a speaker's rostrum.
The finest poet seems to be Pavel An-takolski. He recently finished a poem called Son. It is in the ancient style of a scald — as if written by a poet who has marched with troops for the purpose of intoning laments over the dead on the field of battle and calling for revenge. Son is written for Antakolski's own son-warrior, who died for his country.
Below these three the writers look pretty much alike. They are the writers of Agitka — the journalist-artists. One of the best of them, probably the most typical, is Konstantin Simonov. The most promising seems to be Boris Garbatov, author of the record-breaking bestseller, The Unvanquished. He has apparently been much influenced by translations of Hemingway and by Gogol.
The Future. As to the future of Russian literature, I heard the other night a most revealing program set forth by Vsevolod Vishnevsky, a distinguished playwright who is a naval officer and has written mostly about the Baltic Sea and the defense of Leningrad. Speaking specifically for the magazine Snamya, of which he is an editor, but inferentially for all Russian writers, he said that Russia's postwar writing will: 1) gather from partisans, soldiers, sailors, officers and workers the whole truth about this war; 2) glorify Russia's heroic traditions; 3) promote "Slavism" and see to it that the German enemy, which has twice hurt Russia, will never divide the Slavic peoples again; 4) memorialize German bestiality as it was revealed at Lidice and Maidenek; 5) occupy itself with human honor, conscience and soul; 6) call on Russians for a new effort of creativeness and rouse them to transfer the heroism they have shown in war to achievements in peace ; 7 ) explore England and America, whose aid in the war will not be forgotten.
"We shall talk," he said, "plainly, clearly and with polemical incisiveness and we shall expect our British and American colleagues to speak to us in the same language and in the same spirit."