Umarli są szczęśliwi? Dziennik trzeciego roku wojny

The presented book – written in the form of an intellectual diary, intended to refer to Gustav Herling-Grudziński’s “Journal Written at Night”, which was very well-known during the communist era, is the second volume of Grzegorz Przebinda’s war journal, written in the context of the current full-scale war unleashed by Russia against Ukraine on February 22, 2022. The first volume – “Putin’s Last War: a Philologist’s Dispute with Russia”, published in Polish in November 2023, covered events from the period immediately preceding the war to the end of its first year. This second volume was originally intended to be a story about the third year of the war, until the end of February 2025, but due to the accumulation and dynamics of bloody events, mainly related to Donald Trump’s inauguration as US president, it was extended with breaks until July 18, 2025. The author juxtaposes events and war crimes, day by day, with Russian culture, both old and new, and with the history of mediaeval Rus, Tsarist Russia, Soviet Russia, and actual Putin’s Russia. He also analyses the attitudes of contemporary Russian writers toward the war, many of whom he has known personally for many years. An analysis of their attitudes shows that Russian writers, theatre and film directors, etc., when it comes to their attitude toward Russia’s imperial war against Ukraine, can be divided into three groups. Some of them, mainly those living permanently in Putin’s Russia – primarily Zakhar Prilepin and Alexander Prokhanov – openly support the war, while others – mainly those in exile, such as Dmitry Bykov, Boris Akunin, Viktor Shenderovich, and Dmitry Glukhovsky – strongly oppose the war, for which they are wanted by Putin’s Russia and even sentenced in absentia to several years in harsh penal colonies. However, the most numerous group of Russian writers, also mainly those remaining in the country, led by Yevgeny Vodolazkin, are those who, in their speeches and literary works, ignore the war with absolute silence.