Gularyan, A. B. The Genre of the ‘Military Utopian Novel’ in Modern Russian Science Fiction

Abstract: One of the most important indicators of a society ready for war is the appearance of scenarios of a future war in literature. Before the Great Patriotic War the Soviet leadership actively used the genre of the ‘military utopian novel’ to prepare the public conscience to the war but when the war was over, the genre of military utopia was prohibited by the public conscience. However, today there are a great number of books about a forthcoming war being published. This allows to analyze and classify scenarios of future wars. The majority of typical scenarios is balancing on the ‘to be or not to be’ edge. Some scenarios can be called pessimistic because they describe the loss of Russia in the future war. Other scenarios are rather optimistic and propagandize the revival of nation through winning the war. Generally speaking, except for unrealizable or alternative history scenarios, modern scenarios of a future war outline the following courses of events: 1) Russia can be involved into a war with the third countries or alliances as a result of the Ukrainian or Caucasian conflict. The Barents Sea and the Sea of Okhotsk are also mentioned as the starting point of a future war but less frequently. 2) Most writers see it as the war between Russia and the United States and their NATO allies although some authors also suspect the war between Russia and Japan or China. 3) The war is most likely to turn into a series of interweaved local conflicts. Otherwise a limited or even full-scale exchange of nuclear attacks may occur. Noteworthy that the Second World War was also meant to be a series of local lightning wars but turned into a global massacre two years after it had started. 4) Most modern writers see the victory of Russia as a miracle. Writers either describe a desired future that has very little to do with the reality or use all kinds of ‘magical’ inventions. However, it is better than the decadent’s moods typical for the same genre of science fiction in the late USSR. 5) Some writers doubt that the modern Russian leadership is able to firmly and adequately defend the country’s interests using the military force. 6) The majority of writers express the opinion that if Russia loses the war, it will not be only occupied but also subject to prolonged genocide. Generally speaking, modern scenarios of future wars perform their main function which is to prepare the public conscience to fighting ‘their own’ war and to mobilize the public conscience during the ‘period of threat’.

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