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In:The Moving Canon(s) of Slavic Children’s Literature
Edited by Mateusz Swietlicki, Dorota Michułka and Zofia Zasacka
[Children’s Literature, Culture, and Cognition 20] 2026
► pp. 196–217

Chapter 10
A history and geography of happiness in the Russian cinematic (and educational) canon

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Abstract
Stanislav Rostotsky’s Dozhivem do ponedel’nika (We’ll Live Till Monday, 1968), which established the “school film” canon, and Aleksei Veledinsky’s Geograf globus propil (The Geographer Drank His Globe Away, 2013), which developed this canon half a century later, are preoccupied with searching for happiness as part of a purposeful life, itself the goal of education. This chapter argues that the two films foreground this search as the pursuit of meaningful time and place through history and geography, the academic disciplines that define humanity in temporal and spatial terms. Making the teacher-image central to the school’s spacetime, the films define happiness chronotopically. The chapter demonstrates the intersection of place and opportune time in the search for happiness and hence argues for serious geographical instruction as a prerequisite for the study of history.
Article outline
  • The conceptual framework: Happiness, time, and place
  • Teacher figures and canon formation
  • The time and place for history and geography in school
  • The birth of a canon: Happiness as a harmonious kairos
  • The canon roiled: Happiness as a water topos
  • Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
References (29)
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Filmography
Dozhivem do ponedel’nika (We’ll Live Till Monday). Director: Stanislav Rostotsky. USSR 1968. Gorky Film Studio.
Geograf globus propil (The Geographer Drank His Globe Away). Director: Aleksei Veledinsky. Russia 2013. Marmot-film.
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