FACT AND IMAGE IN MILITARY PROSE BY SVETLANA ALEXIEVICH (ON THE EXAMPLE OF WAR’S UNWOMANLY FACE)

Abstract

The article deals with peculiarities of working with the fact as a feature of non-fiction in Svetlana Alex-ievich’s book War’s unwomanly face. The book genre is defined by the author as documentary prose. The work provides an outlook of the events of the Second World war which is atypical for classical Soviet literature shows. The main plot-forming element of the book is a fact that the writer uses in a special manner. The author’s narrative is a military discourse with a gender emphasis. The fact in the text is graded and performs a certain function: one category of facts, usually reflecting “women’s history”, demonstrates the narrator’s desire for “sovereignty”; another category of facts demonstrates the real historical discourse and subordinates the text to the dictates of reality.