Summary

The author attempts to answer the question: In what degree did literature contribute to the creation of the myth of Lvov batiar (street urchin)? For that purpose she sought traces of that figure characteristic of Lvov in the works of writers associated with Lvov. It was also necessary to trace literary and situational contexts, in which the term batiar appeared in imaginative literature. It has been found that not all Lvow writers and poets saw a positive hero of a Lvov street in the batiar, who should be glorified or admired. Not all writers mentioned that figure with sympathy and nostalgia. If we have to do with a clear process of mythologisation of the Lvov batiar in diaries, radio dialogues, and films, imaginative literature participates in this process only partially, and this is discussed in the present article.