This is a story about violence.

After the war began, I started talking to children and recording our conversations. No video or audio, just a pen and a piece of paper; there were neither last names nor school numbers. At first, they were my friends’ kids, then they were kids of my acquaintances, and finally, kids of total strangers. I did not know these kids personally before the war, and they did not know me. We were like accidental travel companions. Or more precisely, they could have known of my series of books called The Leningrad Fairy Tales. The publishing house, Samokat, had been releasing them for seven years, and the first book of the series, Raven’s Children, was released in 2015; so the kids who liked that book were no longer kids, but adults, independently thinking people. The Leningrad Fairy Tales series takes place in the period from 1938 to 1946, and these books describe what it’s like to grow up while the world around you is crumbling. Perhaps, this explained to the children I talked to why it was specifically me asking questions—I did write about the war, and there is a war going on now. But it does not explain why they agreed to talk to me. Or perhaps, it really does explain it—because there is a war going on now. And their world is also crumbling.

There are no bombs falling on these children. These kids did not hear the howls of rockets above their heads. They did not have to leave their hometowns and villages. The war breaks through to them only through narrow windows of their cell phones, and even then, not to everyone. Perhaps this is why so many of my adult acquaintances considered my project questionable. Or definitely idiotic, and perhaps even immoral. They raised their brows, why are you talking to them? What can they tell you? It is not their business. Why do you want to write about it? Who would be interested? I said that hearing the voices of children in Germany in 1933–1945 would have been equally important. Some agreed, but without enthusiasm. These were happy kids, people objected. They all have a mother and a father. They live at home and not in the subway. They go to school, and on their blackboards there are no written messages from enemy soldiers. Their parents were not killed. These kids were not wounded by shrapnel. Rather, let’s talk about those who have it worse. And more bluntly (with a severe glimmer in their eyes), the only suffering we can talk about right now is the suffering of Ukrainians.

At first it seemed entirely correct to me. In the beginning, this is how I also felt; I remember this blind spot well—the black horror of what was going on rose like a wall, and against it, all of my worries, emotions, and thoughts became completely uninteresting even to myself. I even don’t remember how and why I began talking to children, but from the beginning, I knew that I was doing it to put it in writing later. To leave a testimony. Of what? I had no doubt that I would see how the war that was happening far away—“many thousands of kilometers away from me,” as one boy described it—was seeping through to these children, saturating their days and dreams, their arguments and friendships. I already knew how it happens, because in order to write The Leningrad Fairy Tales I read reams of other people’s diaries, letters, and memoirs. This war was no exception. It is happening thousands of kilometers away from the kids I talked to, but it is here, and they are the children of wartime.

I am not the first, the only, or the last one who realized that during the war she can no longer talk to her friends. The language has mutated. Macbeth has killed not only sleep, but also speech. It hurts to speak. I do not want to talk. It is not clear how one can speak.

But here’s the thing. When talking to children, I quickly found out, and then would just become more and more convinced, that for them, the problem of how and what to say during the war did not exist. They were able to talk about our new reality—the cracked, distorted, and twisted that it is. With them, there was no feeling that now frequently appears with adults—that they are saying not what they should, speaking not about things that matter, and not how they should. Why? Is it them? Is it me? I don’t know. Perhaps, it is because of all of this, and also because our current moment is asking us questions that under regular circumstances would have been considered “childish.” For example, “do you support the killing of people?”

You can’t answer that question with a “we will never know the whole truth.” Or “everything is not so simple.”

By the way, I asked them the simplest questions. My goal was to write down testimonies, as I repeatedly told parents, teachers, and children themselves. Not to argue, persuade, or to change anyone’s mind. I tried to make sure that my own views never entered the conversation, and that the questions took into account the extreme polarization of our society. There were no right or wrong answers. Are you against this? Tell me why. Are you for this? Tell me why. I did not use the word “war,” unless my interlocutor said it first.

What do you call what is happening now when you think about it?

War.

War.

This horror.

The shitshow.

Total wreck.

War.

THE BIRTH OF TRAGEDY

“My mom said, ‘We did invade after all.’ ”

“I learned about the start of this horror in the morning of February 24, when I was getting ready for school. To be honest, I still can’t really believe that it is happening. No matter how strange, I didn't really have any immediate emotions. I walked up to my mom and said, ironically, ‘Congrats on the start of the war,’ and then went to school.”

“On February 24, I woke up, but was not rested, it was all dark outside. I took out my phone. And my friend from Ukraine wrote on Twitter that they were being bombed.”