„Write as your ear hears it”: Text and pretext in the polyphonic reportages of Svetlana Alexievich

Abstract

The article analyzes the process of incorporation of the witnesses’ verbal testimonies into the public sphere, of which polyphonic reportage is a part. This genre has become known mainly thanks to Svetlana Alexievich, whose works are based entirely on recorded conversations and interviews. Listening to the witnesses enables the reporter facing the dominant discourse of the past to reach out to others, the process of discovering and textualizing of which can be described with reference to the folk tradition of collective singing.