On an ‘unannounced polemic’ that lasted a quarter of a century. The K — K mystification

Abstract

E. Berkovich writes about the polemic around one of the most famous poems about the Great Patriotic War — ‘Felt boots’ [‘Valenki’], more recognisable by its first line (‘My comrade, in death throes…’ [‘Moy tovarishch, v smertelnoy agonii…’]). Krasikov published a posthumous collection of poems Black diamond. Poems [ Chyorniy almaz. Stikhotvoreniya] by the war veteran and poet A. Korenev in 1994, including the poem ‘Blizzard. Night…’ [‘Viuga. Noch…’], which had never been published in Korenev’s lifetime and which echoes almost completely ‘Felt boots,’ penned by I. Degen. Ever since then, a number of people, including Korenev’s daughters, have argued that the poem is authored by Korenev alone and was misattributed to Degen, whereas in reality it was Korenev who happened on a handwritten copy of ‘Felt boots,’ passed from hand to hand during the war, and decided to appropriate what hethought an unclaimed poem. Berkovich retraces the history of the argument around ‘Felt boots,’ incorporating into his article extracts from publications by L. Lazarev, who knew Degen well, and his own correspondence with the author of the mystification Krasikov and the journalist Rakhlin, and confirms the poem’s attribution to Degen.