Serhiy Zhadan as a chronicler of war: The mosaic nature of his diary entries Our flags fly over the city

Abstract

The article addresses a timely and significant topic within contemporary Ukrainian war literature, focusing on Serhiy Zhadan’s wartime diaries as an example of a new literary form documenting the experience of full-scale aggression. The author examines the mosaic structure of these entries, with particular attention to their temporal and spatial organization, the functioning of a dual narrative subject, the portrayal of the city as a community, and the mechanisms through which national identity is constructed under conditions of trauma. The aim of the study is to demonstrate how the diary becomes a medium of testimony, memory, and social mobilization. The findings indicate that the fragmentary form of the entries effectively conveys the authenticity of wartime experience, while recurrent motifs–pain, anger, faith, and love–construct a coherent vision of collective subjectivity. The conclusions underscore the significance of Zhadan’s diaries as an important document of the cultural and emotional history of contemporary Ukraine. Analytical and hermeneutic methods were applied.