Konstantin Simonov was one of the most awarded writers in the Soviet Union. He received six Stalin Prizes, headed key editorial offices, and had access to those in power. Despite this, the full version of his account of the first hundred days of the German-Soviet War was not published until 1999—fifty-seven years after the manuscript was dictated.

This story is not a simple account of a writer battling censorship. Simonov co-signed the rejection of "Doctor Zhivago," helped pave the way for "The Master and Margarita," denounced Sakharov and Solzhenitsyn, and later supported the late debut of front-line fighter Vyacheslav Kondratiev. September 1939 is also important for Polish viewers: Simonov reacted differently to the German aggression and to the Soviet invasion of Poland.

The film draws on archival materials, library catalogs, published documents, and memoirs. The short atmospheric passages are a reconstruction; We don't attribute invented quotes to heroes.

How should we judge a man of the system: by the documents he signed against others, or by the texts his position helped survive?

Chapters

0:00 The File That Wasn't Allowed to Open
4:13 Poland: Two September Days
7:10 Kirill Becomes Konstantin
12:38 Khalkhin Gol and the Birth of a Correspondent
14:28 The Catastrophe of 1941
19:58 The Buinitka Field and Thirty-Nine Tanks
21:58 How Six Hundred and Twenty-One Cards Were Made
25:05 Wait for Me
29:20 From Stalingrad to Berlin
32:11 The Six Stalin Prizes
37:00 The War Archive and The Living and the Dead
44:11 Pasternak: Signature Under Refusal
45:24 One Hundred Days of War Stopped by Censorship
52:33 Bulgakov: A Name as a Shield
54:28 Sakharov and Solzhenitsyn
56:14 Poland's Different Days of War
58:55 Kondratiev and Sashka
1:02:36 The Last Reckoning with Stalin
1:06:42 Bujnice Field, Death, and the Archive
1:09:10 1999: Fifty-seven Years Later
1:11:17 Four Documents and One Man
1:17:15 What Remains of This History in Poland
1:20:48 Why the System Didn't Have to Burn the File

Main Sources

RGALI — Konstantin Simonov's 1814 Fund and a Description of the "One Hundred Days of War" Manuscript:
https://www.rgali.ru/storage-unit?fun...
Institute of National Remembrance — Soviet invasion of Poland on September 17, 1939:
https://ipn.gov.pl/pl/dla-mediow/komu...
Police History and Tradition — USSR propaganda and Simonov's memoirs about September 1939:
https://hit.policja.gov.pl/hit/aktual...
Kultura.RF — Konstantin Simonov's biography:
https://www.culture.ru/persons/8786/k...
National Electronic Library of Russia — collection dedicated to Simonov:
https://rusneb.ru/collections/3463_si...
Electronic Library of Documents Historical — Simonov's letter to the Central Committee of the CPSU of April 25, 1955:

https://docs.historyrussia.org/ru/nod...
Electronic edition of "One Hundred Days of War" and data from the 1999 edition:

https://militera.lib.ru/db/simonov_km...
Russian State Library — "Through the Eyes of a Man of My Generation" record:
https://search.rsl.ru/ru/record/01001...
Publication history of "The Master and Margarita":

https://m-bulgakov.ru/glavnyj-roman/i...
National Library — "Publishing Movement in Numbers 2017," data on Simonov's Polish editions:

https://www.bn.org.pl/download/docume...
Catalog of the Polish edition of "Different Days of War":

https://www.jaworzno-mbp.sowa.pl/inde...

This material is based on archival documents, library catalogs, and published memoirs. The short atmospheric scenes in the hook are reconstructed. A full list of sources and licenses for the visual materials can be found in the episode documentation.

#history #WorldWarII #Simonow