Abstract
Words from Above, Words from Within. Propaganda as Seen by the Diarists during the Siege of Leningrad. The siege of Leningrad, one of the most horrific episodes of the “ Great Patriotic War”, is a useful place to study Soviet wartime propaganda and its reception by Soviet citizens themselves. how, for example, did the besieged and starving Leningraders react to the news broadcast by the media ? How did they perceive the contrast between the optimistic communiqués full of heroism and the awful reality with which they were confronted on a daily basis ? The many personal diaries written during those years reveal how they perceived the situation. the reactions range from, scepticism and sarcasm to anger and indignation. It emerges that not only were most Leningraders fully aware of the goals of the Soviet propaganda machine, but they also were able to see through official discourse and construct their own alternative version of events.
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