The article examines the relationship between fact and fiction in I. E. Babel’s autobiographical stories about childhood, which were published in the 1930s. Like most of Babel’s stories based on real historical or autobiographical events, the stories about childhood are told in the first person, and while they provide a reliable and accurate portrayal, there is also a distortion of reality, a “misalignment” of facts, dates, or topography. The story “In the basement” is the only instance where the author reveals the technique of blending real and fictional elements within the story itself. In the autobiographical stories of 1925, a ten-year-old boy who witnessed and suffered from a Jewish pogrom is at the center of the story, while the stories “In the basement” and “Awakening” of the early 1930s focus on a teenager who developed an early passion for literature. In these stories, the character of the narrator’s grandfather plays a significant role. Babel’s virtuosic ability to combine real facts and fictional stories is also evident in his later story “Di Grasso” (1937), where he paradoxically captures the Italian actor’s seemingly improbable performance while also inventing the play and its tour schedule.
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