The aim of the study is to identify the functions of the Leningrad text as a structural element that determines the representation of historical trauma (the Siege, repressions, the collapse of the USSR) and the mythologization of space in the prose of St. Petersburg authors of the 2010s. The main content involves the analysis of a corpus of texts (by E. Chizhova, Yu. Yakovleva, S. Sinitskaya, etc.) using methods of narratology, cultural trauma theory, and comparative typology. Three narrative models are identified: anthropocentric (interpreting trauma through personal experience), mythopoetic (genre transformations to encode tragedies), and object-oriented (urban landscape as a repository of memory). The scientific novelty lies in the systematic study of the specificity of St. Petersburg’s optics for representing the past through a local urban text. The results reveal the ambivalence of the Leningrad chronotope: it preserves the memory of suffering while affirming a connection to the native city, thereby precluding reduction to nostalgia/critique and structuring the interaction of historical memory layers (imperial, Soviet, post-Soviet). The diversity of strategies demonstrates the role of local narratives in rethinking national history.
Yaqiang Song (2025) studied this question.