Artistic journalism and artistic texts in the newspaper “Novgorod Veche” (1917–1918)

Abstract

The article is devoted to artistic journalism and artistic publications in the newspaper “Novgorod Veche”, published in Novgorod from the autumn of 1917 to the summer of 1918. The newspaper publishers were V.S. Kolomensky and A.E. Gogolev, who were representatives of the Association of Cooperators Unions of the Novgorod Province. The content of this newspaper was devoted to the activities of the cooperative in the Novgorod province and country. The texts are mainly concerned with politics and economics, although the publication was of a universal type. “Novgorod Veche” was in opposition to the Bolshevik government. The creators of the publication relied on the self-organization of society and defended the legal right of the Constituent Assembly to determine the future of Russia, even despite the dispersal of the meeting by the Bolsheviks on January 7, 1918. The newspapers’ opposition was pamphlet through the publication of pamphlets and feuilletons, which discussed local and Russian events. The Bolsheviks and the political decisions they made were assessed negatively. According to the newspaper’s editors, the Bolshevik power aggravated the catastrophic situation within the country and at the international level. There are few literary texts in the newspaper “Novgorod Veche”: poems, stories, essays, literary criticism. A special place in the first issues of the newspaper is occupied by the column “Calendar of the Novgorod Assembly”, where V. Molochnikov intended to place quotes from wise men, as well as excerpts from books by L.N. Tolstoy.