Bondarev took part in
World War II as an artillery officer and became a member of the
CPSU in 1944. He graduated in 1951 from the
Maxim Gorky Literature Institute. His first collection of stories entitled
On a Large River was published in 1953. His first successes in literature, the novels
The Battalions Request Fire (1957) and
The Last Salvoes (1959) were part of a new trend of war fiction which dispensed with pure heroes and vile villains in favor of emphasizing the true human cost of war. In the novel
The Hot Snow (1969) he again used the theme of war, creating an epic canvas dealing with the
Battle of Stalingrad from the viewpoint of its many participants including common soldiers and military commanders. In his novel
The Shore (1975), a Soviet writer learns that a German woman, with whom he had a passionate love affair as a young officer, still loves him. He dies before reaching the promised "shore" of his youthful dream. ==Awards==