Since the beginning of the “partial” mobilization, publishers in Russia have seen a sharp increase in sales of literature about World War II and Nazi Germany. This was reported by Kommersant with reference to the data of the network representatives, the material of the publication was published with the title "The Third Reich has found its reader."
For example, sales of Nicholas Stargardt's book A Nation Mobilized. Germany 1939–1945” grew five times in Chitai-Gorod and 17 times in LitRes.
Since September 21, the segment of literature about the Second World War has seen a 20% increase in unit sales. At the same time, Stargardt’s book, which talks about how the Germans perceived the Second World War, has the sharpest dynamics, it also includes studies of diaries and personal correspondence of citizens of the Third Reich. According to a representative of the book chain "Chitai-Gorod", from September 21 to October 4, book sales increased by 405% compared to September 7-20. Among the bestsellers are also Pavel Sudoplatov's Memoirs classified as "Secret", "Victory in the Secret War. 1941-1945" by Nikolai Nikulin, "Chronicle of the Secret War and Diplomacy. 1938-1941" by Pavel Sudoplatov.
The Bombora publishing house told the publication that they are experiencing an increase in sales of Julia Boyd's book Notes from the Third Reich. Life on the eve of the war through the eyes of ordinary tourists” since February. After September 21, the Russians again began to be interested in this book.
The general director of the Alpina publishing house, Alexei Ilyin, in turn, noted that the demand for books on the history of World War II was recorded after February 24 and remains. Eric Larson's book In the Garden of Monsters about Nazi Germany in the mid-1930s is one of the publisher's bestsellers, and Winston Churchill's History of World War II is also selling well, he said.
The LitRes Group of Companies told the publication that, although they are seeing an increase in demand for individual works, in general, publishers record a general decline in sales.
Literary critic Galina Yuzefovich believes that people need an explanation of what "is happening with our country." According to her, modern Russian media “can hardly offer an exhaustive, clear, conceptual explanation,” so people turn to literature.
“Literature that would directly record the events of the current moment has not yet been written and will not be written for a long time. Therefore, intuitively, people look for historical epochs, the experience of which seems to them to be correlated.
After the start of migration from Russia, people also began to read the books of the first wave of emigrants, Yuzefovich emphasizes. She clarified that the Russians are looking for an explanation of what is happening in books about the Second World War, or about Nazi Germany, or about Stalin's Russia, trying to look for information where you can find "a convincing metaphor or allegory that will allow you to understand something about today."
Despite the fact that the Russian authorities often talk about “the fight against Nazism”, trying to justify their invasion of Ukraine in this way, slogans similar to Nazi ones are heard from the lips of Russian politicians. So, the chairman of the Liberal Democratic Party, Leonid Slutsky, paraphrased the slogan of Nazi Germany at the funeral of Daria Dugina:
“Regardless of the parties, there can be only one approach. One country. One president. One win." “One People, One Reich, One Fuhrer” was the motto printed on the posters with a portrait of Hitler and was intended to reflect the task set by the Nazis to rally the Germans. Under this slogan, a referendum was held in Austria for merging with Germany.
Also, accusing the Ukrainian fighters and the president of using supposedly “Nazi symbols” on their uniforms, propagandists forget about the cases when similar symbols were seen on the uniforms of military personnel in the Donbass. In April, the website of the head of the “DPR” published a video of the awarding of “particularly distinguished” in the “operation to liberate Donbass”. Among the recipients was a militiaman, on whose uniform a stripe in the form of a slightly modified Nazi Totenkopf emblem is visible. It was worn by soldiers of the 3rd SS Panzer Division "Dead Head". Also attached to the sleeve of the militia was the Scandinavian symbol of Odin "Valknut", which is often used by neo-pagans and neo-Nazis. A soldier with Nazi stripes from the Somali battalion, who fought against Ukrainian "nationalists" in Mariupol, is called Roman Vorobyov, Mediazona wrote later. He is the commander of an assault platoon with the rank of senior lieutenant. Pushilin presented Vorobyov with the St. George Cross of the II degree.