FEDORCHENKO, Sofya Zakharovna.

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Narod' na Voinye. Frontovye zapisi ("The People at War. Letters from the Front"). First edition of this popular and influential Russian account of soldiers' testimonies, gathered by the Russian author Sofya Fedorchenko (1888-1959) in 1914-17. The cover design and seven woodcut vignettes were produced by artist Eugeniia Pribyl'skaia (1899-1938), who was greatly inspired by folklore arts and made them the focus of her work.After studying at the University of Kyiv, Fedorchenko joined the Red Cross to help on the Eastern Front near St Petersburg. There she spent two years. Published between the February and October Revolutions of 1917, Narod' na Voinye was her first work - a collection of short stories, war songs, fairy tales, and everyday reflections heard from the ordinary Russian soldiers she met and treated. It became an instant best-seller - as a fine example of non-fictional, documentary narrative - and provided to Russian society important first-hand testimonies of the First World War. In the preface, Fedorchenko explains that "while the material could have been 'systematized' by subject", she had decided against it, to convey its liveliness. Indeed, the narratives follow freely from one another, touching on a variety of subjects such as domestic memories, the death of a soldier's beloved mare on the battlefield, feelings during military attacks, perceptions of German soldiers, a ghostly woman whose soul lingered on after she took her own life, childhood and family memorie

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