«За что пацаны воюют?» Образ гея в кривом зеркале пропаганды (на материале сборника рассказов Молчание о войне) .......... 481

“WHAT ARE THE BOYS FIGHTING FOR?” THE REPRESENTATION OF GAY MEN IN THE DISTORTING MIRROR OF PROPAGANDA (BASED ON STORIES FROM THE COLLECTION SILENCE ABOUT THE WAR)

In this paper, I reflect on the functioning of the image of the gay man in a collection of short stories about the war in Ukraine entitled Silence About the War, which constitutes the first prose response to the events of 2022–2023. It is noteworthy that out of nine stories devoted to the ongoing war, the figure of a homosexual man appears in as many as three (and, additionally, a transgender person in one). This reflects the prevailing homophobia in Russia, which is actively employed by state propaganda. After an introduction in which I present the phenomenon of homophobia as a tool of state ideology in the Russian Federation, I proceed to analyze and interpret the representations of homosexual men in the stories from the collection under discussion. I examine these gay characters in the context of propaganda and its creative transformation in literary works. Masha Sulianova’s story Z, which is the main focus of my analysis, testifies to the continuity of Russia’s conflict with the West and aligns with the literary tradition of the Soviet era, revealing the harmful effects of propaganda on society.