Exhibition from the Collections of the National Library of Russia

This exhibition illustrated one of the reports made at the Tenth Plekhanov Readings which were held in the National Library in May and June 2012. The main theme for the Jubilee Conference was "Russia as the Crossroads of Nations and Civilizations", so it raised issues of integration of Russian and Jewish cultures, among others.

The report reviews the children's books in Yiddish and Russian, much of which represent works by L. Kvitko. This exposition takes a much broader approach: it also includes the publications by the most beloved and popular Soviet children's writers - Korney Chukovsky, Samuil Marshak, Agniya Barto and others, not only in Russian and Hebrew, but also in the other languages of the USSR. As many as three units of the NLR, namely the Russian book stock, the Department of National Literatures and the Yiddish collection of the Department of the Literature of Asian and African Countries, prepared the exhibition, and this determines its unique character. The exhibition features more than a hundred books published from 1918 to 2000.

Almost nobody can remain indifferent to children's literature. Everyone remembers perfectly well their first books, and pictures from them are stamped on memory forever. Many managed to preserve books of their childhood in the family library. But it is obvious that the holdings of the National Library are much richer than any private collection. Book exhibitions are the best evidence to prove this.

Most of the books, presented in the exibition, date from to the Soviet period - it was a time of a true flowering of children's literature. The Soviet Government had always paid special attention to it. Following V. Belinsky, who stated that 'Children's books are written for upbringing, and the upbringing is a great thing: it decides the fate of a person', the government raised children's literature to the level of the primary ideological objectives. But at the same time, in the Soviet Union, the authorities steadily followed another Belinsky's teaching that 'It is better to read nothing at all, than to read bad and poor quality books.' This explains the highest quality of children's books, both in design and content.

At the dawn of the genre, such books were illustrated by really outstanding artists. A true gem of the exposition are Zagadki (Riddles) by the founder of Soviet children's literature Samuil Marshak with drawings by the famous painter Kuzma Petrov-Vodkin.

Also noteworthy is Krokodil (The Crocodile) by Korney Chukovsky illustrated by Nikolai Remizov (also known by the nickname Re-Mi). This book may seem unusual for the modern reader, it is different from the canonical text, and its drawings are defiantly original. It belongs to the era when the "standard" of children's books did not yet form.

A few years later, works by Vladimir Konashevych, Konstantin Rotov, Vladimir Lebedev, Yuri Vasnetsov, Nikolay Radlov, Vladimir Suteev and many others have determined some concepts that are very difficult to express, but at the same time, easy to feel: looking through beautiful children's books, created by them, seems to bring a breath of warm air…

The Great Soviet Encyclopedia states that 'the Soviet Union's literature are developed on the scientific and educational basis, publishing plans are built according to age, theme and genre sections. Every year, almost 3000 children's books are issued, in a total number of more than 320 million copies. They are published in 65 languages of nations of the USSR'.

Catalogues of the departments of the NLR, which take part in the exhibition, prove this statement.

The bibliographic aids of the NLR, in addition to purely utilitarian function of searching relevant literature, can be regarded as an unrivaled historical source. All over the world, traditional catalogues are gradually replaced by electronic, but the information they currently bear will never become obsolete, because of its specific character. Take, for example, various notes and marginalia on catalogue cards. Ho