The contents of this volume of the World Literature Library are defined by its name. The volume includes poetry from eight European countries - Albania, Bulgaria, Hungary, the German Democratic Republic, Poland, Romania, Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia. There are more national poems than countries. In Czechoslovakia - two peoples, two languages, two poetry: Czech and Slovak. In Yugoslavia, where the federation consists of six republics, the poetry of Serbia, Croatia, Montenegro and Bosnia-Herzegovina, where they write in Serbo-Croatian, as well as the poetry of Slovenia and Macedonia, are highlighted, respectively. Thus, the geography of the volume is a whole world: fourteen poems. As for the chronology of the volume, its framework is less defined. All these countries have a common historical destiny. Their peoples experienced the oppression of fascist regimes, took part in the Second World War and underwent all its disasters, were liberated by the Soviet Army and national liberation movements, and entered the path of socialism from the mid-forties.