280 24 20MB
English Pages 736 Year 1999
Russia Abroad
Writers, History, Politics
for Larisa
Russia Abroad Writers, History, Politics
by John Glad F o re w o rd by V ic to r T erras
a jo in t publication Herm itage & B irchbark Press
1999
John Glad R ussia A b ro a d
W riters, History, Politics Copyright © 1999 by John Glad All rights reserved
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Glad, John. Russia abroad: writers, history, politics / by John Glad : Foreword by Victor Terras p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 1-55779-115-5 (alk. paper) 1. Russians-Foreign countries. 2. Russia-Emigration and immigration-History. 3. Soviet Union Emigration and immigration-History. 4. Russian literature-Foreign countries-History and criticism. I. Title. DK35.5.G5 1999 325’.247-dc21 98-48570 CIP
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Contents Foreword by Victor Terras Introduction Definitions Tradition The Interaction of Russian Expatriate W riters with the W est
11 14 18 28 30
The Pre-Soviet Period Origins
32 Oleg's shield, Treaties with Byzantium, Anna Yaroslavna
Pilgrims
34 Abbot Daniil, Archbishop Antony of Novgorod, Stefan, Anonymous Travel Guide to Byzantium, Ignaty of Smolensk, Zosim a of the Trinity-Sergiev Monastery, Varsonofy, Vasily Gagara, Arseny Sukhanov, Vasily Polozov, Ioann Luk'yanov, Andrei Ignat'ev, Ippolit Vishensky, Varlaam Lenitsky, Matvei Nechaev Travellers 41 The Deacon Aleksandr, The Merchant Vasily, Afanasy Nikitin, Sergy Cherkashenin, Vasily Trediakovsky, Mikhail Lomonosov, Denis Fonvizin, Nikolai Karamzin, Nikolai Bestuzhev, Fêdor Dostoevsky, Vasily Botkin Diplomats 48 Vasily Poznyakov, Trifon Korobeinikov, Pëtr Tolstoi, Ivan Neplyuev, Antiokh Kantemir, Aleksandr Griboedov, Fêdor Tyutchev, Pêtr Kapnist, Pëtr Vyazemsky, Konstantin Leont'ev Expatriates 54 Zinaida Volkonskaya, Karolina Pavlova, Vasily Zhukovsky, Nikolai Gogol', Ivan Turgenev, Vladim ir Pecherin, Ivan Gagarin, Pavel Annenkov, Pëtr Boborykin, Elena Blavatskaya, Elena Kryzhanovskaya, Leonid Andreev, Maksim Gor'ky, Maksimilian Voloshin The Politicals Exile W ithin the Empire 67 Aw akum , Aleksandr Radishchev, Aleksandr Pushkin, Mikhail Lermontov, Aleksandr Bestuzhev-Marlinsky, Wilhelm Kuchelbecker (Vil’germ Kyukhelbeker), Pëtr Chaadaev, Mikhail Lunin, Fêdor Dostoevsky (once more)
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Exiles Abroad Pre-Nineteenth Century 76 Andrei Kurbsky, Grigory Kotoshikhin, Nikolai Turgenev, Nikolai Sazonov, Ivan Golovin Nineteenth Century Moderates 79 Pëtr Dolgorukov, Aleksandr Gertsen (Herzen), Nikolai Ogarëv Early Radicals 85 Nikolai Vorms, Sergei Nechaev, Mikhail Bakunin, Pëtr Lavrov, Pëtr Tkachêv, Pëtr Kropotkin, Georgy Plekhanov, Sergei Stepnyak-Kravchinsky, Feliks Volkhovsky, Boris Savinkov Future Soviet Leaders 91 Vladim ir Lenin, Vatslav Vorovsky, A le ksa n d r B o g d a n o v-M a lin o vsky, Anatoly Lunacharsky, Lev Trotsky, Nikolai Bukharin Religious Dissenters 94 Vladim ir Chertkov, Vladim ir Bonch-Bruevich America: Economic and Religious Emigration Alaska 95 Demographics 95 Poverty 98 Journalism 99 The Jews 101 W riters 104 A. S. Kurbsky, G. A. Machtet, Vladim ir Stoleshnikov, Osip Dymov
The Soviet Period The First Wave Statistics Politics Rage Political Fragmentation & Hopes for Intervention The Church The Constitutional Democrats(Cadets) The Social Revolutionaries (SRs) The Men'sheviks Monarchism
105 108 112 114 117 119 118 121
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The Changing Landmarks Movement (Sm ena vekh) Eurasianism The Mladoross (Young Russian) League Solidarism The Russian Fascists Postrevolutionary (porevolyutsiomiye) Movements The Trust Émigré Terrorism in Russia Freemasonry and the Jews The Soviet Government and the Émigré Press Repatriation Soviet-Ém igré Relations Geography Gallipoli and Istanbul Berlin Paris Brussels Prague Belgrade W arsaw Sofia Riga Tallinn Finland and Scandinavia Kovno (Kaunas) Zörich-Geneva Kishinêv (Chisinau) Uzhgorod London Rome Harbin Shanghai Buenos Aires Sao Paolo Jerusalem British Columbia San Francisco-Los Angeles New York Athens Tokyo Sydney/Melbourne O ther Locations The Nansen Certificate
7
124 126 129 131 133 135 136 137 138 140 142 148 150 154 164 172 174 180 185 191 195 199 202 206 208 209 210 212 215 216 221 223 224 224 226 226 228 232 232 233 234 234
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The Publishing Marketplace 235 Philosophers and Essayists 240 Nikolai Berdyaev, SergeiBulgakov, Lev Shestov, Dmitry Filosofov, Georgy Fedotov Self-Evaluation: A Mission? Keepers of Culture 244 Literature "Older” and "Younger” Generations 249 Symbolism 256 Lev Kobylinsky (Èllis), Konstantin Bal'mont, Vyacheslav Ivanov, Zinaida Gippius The Parisian Note 260 Georgy Ivanov, Anatoly Shteiger Experimenters 265 M arina Tsvetaeva, Boris Poplavsky, Igor1 Severyanin Independents 270 Vladislav Khodasevich, Dovid Knut, Aleksandr Vertinsky The Realists 273 Ivan Bunin, M aksim G or'ky, Sem ën Yushkevich, Mikhail Artsybashev, Mikhail Osorgin Exaggerated Prose 279 Andrei Bely, Evgeny Zamyatin, Vladim ir Nabokov (Sirin) Historical Novelists 284 Dmitry Merezhkovsky, M ark Aldanov W himsical W riters 286 Viktor Shklovsky, Gaito Gazdanov, Arkady Averchenko, Nadezhda Tèffi,Aleksandr Am fiteatrov Theater 291 Poverty and Isolation 296 Former Tsarist Exiles in Positions of Power 299 The Approaching W ar 305
The Second Wave W orld W ar II The Early Postwar Period Cynicism Further Dispersion The Late 1940s and 1950s Composition of the Émigré Community
312 328 340 341 346 347
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Political Groupings 348 Relations Between "First” and "Second” Waves 351 Geography 353 Periodicals and Radio 357 Shul'gin's Open Letter 362 Prose W riters 363 Sergei Maksimov, Anatoly Darov,Tafyana Fesenko, Nikolai Narokov (Morshen), Irina Saburova Poets 365 Igor' Chinnov, Ivan Elagin,NikolaiMorshen, Dmitry Klenovsky, Oleg ll'insky, Yury Ivask The 2Vz W ave 371 Alla Ktorova, Valery Tarsis, Arkady Belinkov, Anatoly Kuznetsov
The Third Wave Leaving
374 Russian Jews or Jewish Russians? A Crisis of Identity, Background, Self-Image, The Soviet Position on Emigration, Deprivation of Citizenship Émigré Politics 395 Malaise, Ideology, America, Israel, Germany, Stay or Go Home? B elles Lettres 425 The Mission and Role of Russian Émigré Literature, Assim ilation, Attem pts at Soviet-Émigré Literary Detente, The Apolitical Reaction, The W ar of W ords: Publications Prose W riters W riters of High Seriousness 443 Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Fridrikh Gorenshtein, Yury Kashkarov, Georgy Vladimov The Aesthetes 450 Boris Khazanov, Andrei Sinyavsky, Sasha Sokolov, Aleksei Kovalêv, Boris Fal'kov Creators of Situations and Ideas 454 Aleksandr Zinov'ev, Vasily Aksênov, Aleksandr Suslov The Natural School Reborn 458 Èduard Limonov, Yuz Aleshkovsky, Vladim ir Voinovich, Vladim ir Maramzin, Zinovy Zinik, Anatoly Gladilin, Arkady Lvov, Mark Girshin, Sergei Dovlatov, Yury Mamleev, Igor' Efimov
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Poets Poets of High Seriousness 465 Joseph Brodsky, Lev Mak, Yury Kublanovsky, Valery Petrochenkov, Vadim Kreid, Naum Korzhavin, Natal'ya Gorbanevskaya, Dmitry Bobyshev, Aleksei Tsvetkov Light-Hearted Poets 474 Mikhail Kreps, Mikhail Vasserman, Igor* Guberman, Bakhyt Kenzheev, the "avantgarde,” Lev Losev, Aleksandr Galich Dissolution of the Empire Reunification at Last! 478 The Near Abroad (blizhnee zarubezh'e) 481 Conclusions 483 Chronology 490 Secondary Sources 616 Annotated Index of Personal Names 640
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Foreword Any history of a national literature is a problem atic undertaking for several reasons, particularly if it is to be in the form of a continuous narrative, rather than of a chronicle or a series of synchronic surveys. There is the question of what it should cover: only "serious" ("art”) literature, or also "slick” and "pulp” genres? And should it concentrate on highlights, seek out the typical, or simply cover as much material as possible? And where is the presumed continuity to be sought? In the nation's history at large, in literature's social and cultural role, or in the developm ent of literature's form al side (genre, style, devices)? Or perhaps in u n iv e rs a l of human existence: creativity, progress, and freedom? Furthermore, should literary history seek to restore its object to the condition in which it appeared to its contemporaries, or should it be dealt with as it appears to us today? Finally, should a national literature be seen as an autonomous entity, or in context with world literature? The fact is that narrative histories of Russian literature are few and that it is widely believed that no single scholar can possibly gather enough knowledge and understanding to write a satisfactory history of any m ajor national literature. As a result, the authoritative histories of Russian literature, East and West, have been collective enterprises. An alternative to a history of a national literature is provided by a body of works which cover a particular part or aspect of literature diachronically. We have for Russian literature creditable diachronic surveys of dram a and theater, of versification, of the short-story, of certain themes, ideas, types, and literary devices. John Glad's undertaking is unique in that he has chosen to present a diachronic survey of a category of literature that is defined by extra-literary circumstances, yet virtually unlimited with regard to literary criteria. It is obvious that Glad's work goes far beyond doing what past studies of Russian literature in exile had done, namely provide some inform ation on a body of works ignored in Russia because of censorship. Rather, his treatm ent of literature abroad raises questions that are relevant to an assessment of the nature and course of Russian literature as a whole, for example: do the advantages of freedom from censorship and the demands of the literary marketplace in Russia outweigh the disadvantage of losing touch with the immediacy of day-to-day life and the living language? Is the possible gain of a new perspective on things at home, or on the world at large, worth the loss of the intimacy of life observed at close range? Is it true that Russian literary exiles, like their political confrères, have in a way conquered their home country, as happened elsewhere, say, in Poland?
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And on a purely literary level, how valuable is direct contact with writers of other nations? Can a literary community survive in exile beyond a single generation, or can it in fact create a bridgehead abroad, securing contact and acceptance for itself and for the whole literature it presents? It appears that these questions may receive different answers in different European literatures. The position of Châteaubriand and Mme de Staël, of Heine and Herwegh, of Mickiewicz and Stowacki was different from that of Gertsen and Ogarêv, and their respective roles in their national literatures are analogous only in the most general way. Russia's peculiar geographic and political position accounts for much of the importance, relative as well as absolute, of Russian literature in exile. Due to the absence, for much of Russia's history, of a free press, of a parliamentary forum, and of free universities, Russian literature represented for long stretches of tim e the only arena of political discussion in Russia. The constraints of censorship which significantly affected not only the content but even the form of literary discourse cause Russian literature in exile to be the living conscience and persistent com m entator of literature at home. But then, Russia was also at all tim es a powerful m ulti-national empire, in which the Russian language drew a variety of ethnic m inorities into its orbit. Thus, while the very existence of Polish or Ukrainian literature at tim es depended on writers and poets living abroad, Russian literature was enriched by works which, under different political conditions, might have been written in a language other than Russian. The question whether Russia, a Christian nation for a thousand years, is a part of the W estern world, albeit marginal and backward, or if it represents an emergent culture of its own, as Oswald Spengler asserted, is answered, at least in part, by the fact that many of the forem ost works of Russian literature were in fact written and/or published in the West, were inspired by or written in response to works of W estern literatures, and have long since joined the canon of W estern literature. All of the above thoughts and questions arise as one follows John Glad's remarkably objective presentation of the facts, literary as well as extra-literary, that make up the vast subject which he has grasped with insightful erudition. I believe that it will not only serve as an indispensable source of information, but also promote the general understanding of the past, the present, and even the future of Russian literature. Victor Terras
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Though sent to this city, I com e in fear, an exile's book. Stretch forth a kindly hand to m e in m y weariness, friendly reader, and fe a r n o t th a t I m ay perchance bring sham e upon you.... If any expressions seem no t Latin, the country wherein he wrote was a barbarian land. Tell me, readers, if it is no t a trouble, w hither I ought to go, what abode I, a book from foreign lands, should seek in the city. Ovid
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Introduction E xile is life . Ovid Exile is death. Hugo This study started out as a history o f Russian authors in exile, but, as the reader w ill see, it ended up being not ju s t that. The m ore I worked on the book, the clearer it became to me that exile is sim ply the la st and m ost extrem e step in a continuum o f foreign experience growing in increm ents. Russia is not, after all, an isolated geographic-cultural entity, and no po litical regim e lasts forever. During the Soviet period, which drew such a sharp line between Russia’s ém igré writers and those who rem ained in Russia, even the ém igrés seem ed not to realize the continuity o f their experience with that o f pre-1917 writers, w ho— to r any num ber o f reasons— found them selves abroad. Inevitably, those who le ft behind the Ksacred, inviolable” Soviet border became fixated on their own banishm ent. It was hard enough fo r non-writers to acclim atize them selves to life abroad, but exile cut the creative writers o ff from the ir audience. Their livelihood, indeed their very way o f life, was threatened. The traditional view o f literature has linked life and art. T. S. Eliot, to r example, concurring with the French novelist and critic Rémy de Gourmont, wrote that nthe great poet, in writing him self, writes his tim e.” In the 1920s, however, the Russian Form alist critics attem pted to establish a school o f literary scholarship which sought to divorce the literary work from the author's personality, experience, and p o litica l views. Since the Soviet governm ent viewed the arts as essential propaganda tools, Formalism was rejected out o f hand. Among the ém igrés, too, this was an approach that was to find few supporters. As the German exile Lion Feuchtwanger convincingly argued, the politicizing o f ém igré literature would seem to be inevitable in any tradition: I have never believed the argum ent that the banning o f Ovid, L i Po, Dante, Heinrich Heine, Victor Hugo influenced only the topics o f these poets. It seemed to me that the innerm ost essence o f the works written by these poets during their period o f banishm ent was conditioned by external circum stances, by their exile. The infernal hatred o f certain o f Dante's terzinas, the b rillia n t sharpness o f Victor Hugo's polem ical writings, L i Po's cheerful-m elancholic, sweet and deep love o f country, the elegant and murderous scorn o f Heine's poem s are a ll unthinkable without the exile o f the authors themselves. It is not the them atics o f these poets which has changed, but the ir essence.
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Literature can exist outside o f politics, but this is the exception rather than the rule, and studies o f exile in literature in particular exist within the juncture o f politics and literature — by definition. Many, though by no means all, expatriate literary works are straight-forw ard artifacts o f this politicized culture. The ém igré historian N ikolai Andreev soundly adum brated som e o f the touchstones which dem onstrate the intertw ined nature o f these two areas: O ur understanding o f m any works would be im poverished if we were unaware o f the “ideological background” o f ém igré life : toe novellas o f M. Osorgin (M ikhail ll'in ), the novels o f G eneral Krasnov, toe officer stories o f General A. I. Denikin, the books o f Roman G ul' o r Black Horse (Kon' voronoi) by V. Ropshin (Boris Savinkov), The Secret and the Blood (Taina i k ro v j by P. Khrushchëv (pseudonym o f P êtr Pil'sky), toe sketches o f G allipoli by I. Savin (Ivan Savolainen), o r the historical— im perial — stylizations o f Ivan Lukash. In an irony o f history Lukash began in 1917 with ecstatic praise o f the Volynsky and Pavlovsky regim ents, which doomed the empire. Then there are the stories o f Sergei Èfron and Vladim ir Sosinsky, the poetry o f Arseny Nesmelov, even The Home in Passy by Boris Zaitsev, and m any others. How can we understand Cavalry (Konnitsa) by A leksei Èisner o r The Poem of Bygone Years (Poèma vremennykh let) by Lebedev if we are unaware o f the nature o f Eurasian constructs and the devastating counterattacks o f the neo-W esternizers? Is a true com prehension o f S irin's (Nabokov's) Glory (Russian title : Podvig) possible without sensing the hero's lack o f confidence in Russian social ideals and, even m ore so, in the bearers o f these ideals? These are the persons he depicts with deadly irony in The Gift (Dar). Even in the classic works o f Bunin and his exquisite Life of Arsen'ev (Zhizn' Arsen'eva) there are pages linked to the name o f the Grand Duke N ikolai Nikolaevich which lose their effect fo r readers who are not aware o f the significance to r ém igrés o f the Grand Duke's name — including the circles in which Bunin him self moved. This lis t could be extended, but suffice it to say that ém igré publicistic writings are an essential p a rt o f the history o f ém igré literature. The exile's sense o f im potence has engendered “ w riter's itch,” which, to r better o r worse, has gone hand in hand with a politicization o f literature, a fact bem oaned by m any observers. The prose w riter A lla Ktorova com m ented to me in 1986 that toe m ain theme o f ém igré literature seem ed to be a tiresom e exposure o f the e vil Soviet governm ent. A grudging adm ission o f this im position o f politics on literature was made by Joseph Brodsky: Viewed less chronologically and m ore exaltedly, history has im posed its reality on art. W hat we im ply when we speak o f
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modem aesthetics is nothing but the noise o f history jam m ing o r subjugating the song o f art. Every ism is both evidence, direct o r indirect, o f a rts deteat and a scar covering up the sham o f this defeat. Though it m ay be crass to say so, existence has proved capable o f defining the a rtists consciousness.... W hatever the faults o r m erits o f this book, I have held to an unabashedly eclectic, holistic approach in assem bling it (not really " w ritten” it, fo r such a topic lite rally writes itself) in large p a rt from the non-literary artifacts o f expatriate existence. To have done otherwise would have been to lose sight o f entire dimensions. In the process, people and politics often ge t m ore attention than the literary artifacts which they create. This was a deliberate attem pt to break down the a rtificia l barriers that s till arbitrarily cage so m any scholars. The tim e period covered here begins with the East-Slav siege o f Byzantium in 906 A.D. and ends with the breakup o f the Soyiet Union a t the end o f 1991, when some 25 m illion ethnic Russians plus m ore than 19 m illion Russophones residing in the various form er republics o f the Soviet Union discovered that they were living in the so-called "near abroad” (blizhnee zarubezh'e). In sheer numbers this immense new diaspora dwarfs the total Russian presence outside Russia during the com bined tsarist and com m unist periods. In fact, this volume could w ell adopt as its subtitle a term from old Russian literature — the "prologue.” The com plex history o f Russian cultured life in the other republics o f the form er Soviet Union deserves special treatm ent, but those parts o f the Russian Em pire which had not enjoyed a t least a tem porary period o f independence p rio r to 1992 do not fa ll within the scope o f this particular study. Few if any books command a universal audience. Inform ation that the professional requires often is viewed by the general reader under the rubric o f "m ore than you ever wanted to know.” To ge t around this dilemma, I have provided inform ation o f interest largely to the specialist on Russian literature and to the well-read Russian in the form o f footnotes. In view o f the broad scope o f the subject m atter covered in this book, it would be unrealistic to expect the general reader to come to the topic with an extensive fam iliarity with it. I have therefore made broad use o f background quotations so as to give a "hands-on” feel fo r the topic as a whole. A ll verse translations, unless otherwise attributed, are m y own. In a ll honesty, I m ust confess that this sort o f study deserves to be done not by a single scholar, but by an entire institute. M y files contain over 3,000 authors over a period o f 11 centuries and cover a veritable avalanche o f historical, political, and dem ographic data. To cope with this vast am ount o f m aterial I have tried to avoid intruding into the course o f events, while attem pting to provide the broad outlines o f
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development. This is a nJust give me the facts. M a'am ” approach, with no apologies intended. Readers interested in learning m ore about the topic are referred to m y collection o f interviews Conversations in Exile, Duke U niversity Press, 1993 (fu lle r version, in Russian, Besedy v izgnanii, Knizhnaya palata, M oscow, 1991). For a discussion o f w orld literature in exile, see m y Literature in Exile, Duke U niversity Press, 1990. I apologize fo r the inevitable errors residing in the text. W riters are often less than honest about th e ir lives, and the m em ory o f w ellintentioned witnesses is fa r from perfect. B ut each yea r carries aw ay persons who m ight have been able to id en tify errors, and so this book is the only way to give those who are s till living a chance to m ake th e ir contribution by pointing them out. I take special pleasure in acknow ledging the contribution m ade to this study by colleagues who generously sacrificed so m uch o f th e ir tim e in carefully com bing through the m anuscript, suggesting changes and catching errors. The geographical and tem poral scope o f the study is such th a t I rea lly could not have com pleted the w ork w ithout them . F irst o f all, I wish to thank D avid Arans o f the Library o f Congress, Laszlo Dienes o f the U niversity o f M assachusetts, D. Barton Johnson o f the U niversity o f C alifornia a t Santa Barbara, and m y erudite publisher Igor* Efim ov fo r having worked through the m anuscript in its e n tirety and supported me in m ore ways than I can acknowledge. V ictor Terras o f Brown University, who has w ritten a foreword, also carefully w ent through the m anuscript, both in an e a rlier version and in this the fin a l one. Jam es W oodbury, who generously em ployed his unique com bination o f exceptional editorial skills, knowledge o f w orld histo ry and culture, and background in Russian literature in preparing the book fo r publication, and w hile I groaned under his kindly tyranny, I accepted it because I needed it. I w ant to especially thank Èngel'sina Pereslegina o f the G or'ky Institute fo r W orld Literature and her dedicated colleagues fo r helping so m uch in working on the annotated Nam es L ist: Tat'yana Bychikhina, Vera Sokolova, Tat'yana Seleznëva, Tat'yana Vladim irovna, G alina M anchkha, Valeriya Kudryavtseva, and Tat'yana Voronina. O ther colleagues read individual portions o f the m anuscript in which they had special expertise: A leksei Alm azov o f Coe College, A rash Borm anshinov o f the U niversity o f M aryland, D m itry Breschinsky o f Purdue University, A leksey Gibson, C hristopher M orris o f Trafika M agazine, D m itry Levitsky, A ndrei Fesenko o f the Library o f Congress, m y w onderful w ife Larisa G lad (Voice o f Am erica), Yuly K agarlitsky o f M oscow's Theatrical Institute, Vadim K reid o f the U niversity o f Iowa, V iktor Petrov, R ostislav Polchaninov, the late N ikolai P oltoratsky o f the U niversity o f Pittsburgh, M arc R aeff o f Colum bia University, ll'y a
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Serm an o f Jerusalem 's Hebrew University, Em anuil Sztein, and Ivan Tolstoi o f Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. Larisa Kuznetsova, Vladim ir Butkov, and M urray Feshbach o f G eorgetown U niversity provided im portant consultations, and m y special thanks go to Sarah Form an fo r her keen proofreading skills. Yuliya Vishnevskaya o f Radio Free Europe/Radio Libe rty supplied me with invaluable files on Third-W ave figures. Lastly, I wish to thank the O lin Foundation fo r the financial support it provided to me as S enior Research Fellow a t Radio Free Europe/R adio Liberty in M unich a t the in itia l stages o f work, and also to the N ational Endowm ent fo r the Hum anities whose g ra n t m ade it possible fo r me to com plete the book.
Definitions These days there are a lo t o f things you can becom e besides an exile: you can be an im m igrant, an undesirable alien, a displaced o r stateless person, a dissident, an expatriate, a deportee, a wet-back, a crim inal, a colonist, a tourist, a Flying Dutchman, a Robinson Crusoe, a W andering Jew. W illiam H. Gass Any discussion of Russian literature abroad requires a definition of literature and even of the word "Russian.” These concepts are not at all as clearcut as might appear at first glance. Nowadays we understand literature to constitute aesthetically oriented prose and verse, as distinct from the factual type of writing represented by a newspaper article or a chapter in a history book, but as we examine the earliest works discussed in this book, we will see that this generic estrangement developed only over the course of a very long period of time. Early documentary and factual materials such as diplom atic treaties and pilgrimage accounts served as a bridge to modern secular belles lettres. But if we know, or claim to know, what "literature” is, what then is Russia? As the researcher moves back in tim e to the middle ages, instead of Russia there was R us' and the various principalities of the East Slavs where people spoke, not Russian, but an East Slavic dialect common to today's Russia, Ukraine, and Belorussia. Even today there are Russians who do not recognize either Ukraine or Belorussia as separate nations. And, of course, there are Ukrainians who regard Russia as an upstart colony, in much the same way that
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more than one Briton views the United States. Russian history, they contend, begins only with the subordination of neighboring principalities to Muscovy in the 15th century. According to this view, to claim that Kievan R us' is early Russia is to tumble down the slippery slope of 19th century pan-Slavism and Russian imperialism. So where does such logic lead? And just when and where does Russia begin? This is a crucial point for our purposes, for that will determine where Russian expatriate literature begins. V. M. Piskunov, an otherwise subtle researcher of Russian expatriate thought, has boldly declared that "Russia outside of Russia” begins only as of 1917. This commonly accepted view is unambiguously incorrect, but is routinely taken for granted because of the enormous disparity in the nature of the Russian presence abroad at various periods. Russian refugees fleeing the Soviet Union in 1920 or emigrating in 1980 clearly get lumped together as "Russia Abroad” (Zarubezhnaya Rossiya) or "Russia outside of Russia” (Rossiya vne Rossii), although often with some reluctance on the part of survivors of the earlier group, but it is emotionally difficult for victim s to recognize the continuity of their group with the revolutionaries who returned home to drive them from their country, scattering them across the globe. W hen I first began lecturing in the early 1980s on Turgenev and Gogol' as émigré writers, Russians in the audience expressed surprise. They sim ply were not accustomed to thinking of their classical authors in those terms. Since then, however, this view has come to enjoy greater acceptance. But the further back we move in time, the greater the reluctance to think of Russian writers abroad on the same plane as modern figures, especially since there is very little continuity with these early periods. Nevertheless, that Afanasy Nikitin in India in the 15th century was a Russian creating Russian literature outside the borders of Russia is a simple fact. A history of Russian expatriate literature must, by definition, encompass very heterogeneous traditions, but this is also true of Russian culture in general. Taken as a whole, Russian literature represents a triple tradition: a) Russian folklore, b) the Byzantineoriented tradition of "Old Russian literature,” and c) the secular Russian literary tradition, the font from which Russian expatriate literature derives. But the modern tradition itself has a jerkiness to it, an unflagging rejection of antecedents. The Soviet period represented the most direct challenge to continuity and tradition. Mayakovsky flung Pushkin overboard from the ship of contemporaneity, and the Formalist scholar Yury Tynyanov wrote an apotheosis of literary evolution as revolution. Thus, the discontinuity of Russian expatriate literature is at least partly a reflection of the state of things back home. But that factor alone cannot explain the heterogeneity of the "Russia No. 2”; if
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Russian culture is a disparate mosaic, the composite fragm ents comprising Russian expatriate culture over tim e are them selves the creations of a raucous group of heroes, anti-heroes, and outright villains. Over the Soviet period there did not exist any two-way intercourse between "m étropole” and emigration; instead there was a forced separation, combined with the sporadic injection of totally different generations, who when they left Russia may have been well aware of what was going on culturally back in Russia, but not in the émigré world. Let us assume, however, that we are in agreem ent as to w hat is and is not Russia and what is and is not literature. How do we put the two term s together? Russian literature is defined here as literature written in Russian; this is a linguistic, not an ethnic, geographical, religious, or even necessarily a cultural definition. I have chosen a strictly linguistic definition to avoid the quagmire presented by all other approaches. For centuries the Russian Empire has been home to large populations of persons who are not ethnically Russian, but whose native language and culture is Russian, in every sense of the word. By origin, Blok, Gogol', Derzhavin, Lermontov, and Zhukovsky were, respectively, part German, Ukrainian, Tartar, Scottish, and Turkish. Vladislav Khodasevich possessed not a single drop of Russian blood, while M arina Tsvetaeva was of mixed Russian, Polish, and German origins. "Don't deceive yourself,” she wrote to Yury Ivask, "there is little Russian in me. My blood is too strongly mixed.... I received nothing from Russia on my m other's side, and everything on my father's side. That's the way things are with me — either all or nothing. I'm a halfblood spiritually, as w ell.” Or there is the character in Yuz Aleshkovsky's Flea Tango (Bloshinoe tango) who is half-Polish, halfJewish on his mother's side, and half-Lithuanian, half-Tartar on his father's side, but who feels him self a "pure-blooded Russian.” Sergei Dovlatov, who was half-Jewish and half-Armenian, said that as a Russian w riter he was "Russian by profession” but that he represented no one other than himself. Language is the instrum ent by which a culture is created, developed, and preserved, but a definition of Russian literature as literature created in the Russian language is only one of a number of possibilities. One Third-W ave writer, Èduard Limonov, sees him self as a European w riter and has stated that he no longer wishes to be considered a Russian writer, while Sasha Sokolov and Boris Khazanov take the opposite tack and see their roots, not in Russian culture, but in the Russian language, thus virtually walking away from national culture. A related, but not identical, self-definition was provided by ll'ya
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Suslov, who views him self as "a Jewish writer who writes in Russian.”8 This separation of language and culture was essentially rejected by the ém igré literary historian Gleb Struve when he defined Vladim ir Nabokov as a non-Russian writer after Nabokov switched to English; this was also the point of view of the Slavist Ternira Pachmuss, who writes of Nabokov that he was "formerly” an émigré writer. Certainly, Ayn Rand, who had studied in the same school as one of Nabokov's sisters, but who became a strictly English-language author, could not be classified as a Russian writer. But language defines not only ethnicity; it also is a touchstone for exile status. And even here there is little agreement; Czeslaw Milosz, for example, denies that the writer who has changed languages forfeits the right to consider himself an exile. Since the "rank” of exile can on occasion confer prestige and even money to its possessor, this particular point can be of major import to the writer. Nevertheless, as dem onstrated by the current disinclination of so many Russian "exiles” to return home for more than brief visits, the distinction between exile and expatriate existence is often less significant than is commonly made out. O f course, it also possible to pose the question differently: to define, not the writer, but the work. Invitation to a Beheading was written in Russian, whereas Ada was composed in English. But even here we have an added twist: Lolita was written in English but translated by Nabokov himself into Russian. The significance of language was denigrated by Marina Tsvetaeva: P oetry is translation — from one m other tongue into another, be it French, German, o r any other. P oetry is re creation (Dichten is t nachdichten). That is why I cannot understand how anyone can speak o f a Russian o r French poet. A po e t can w rite French, bu t he cannot be a French poet. That is ludicrous. I am no t a Russian po et and it always am azes me when I am considered to be one. A person becom es a po et (if it is a t a ll possible to becom e a po et if you have not always been one), so as no t to be a Frenchm an, a Russian, etc., so as to be above a ll o f this. (O r: you are a po et because you are n o t a Frenchm an.) Orpheus either destroys nationality o r
■Curiously, this w as essentially the sam e argument advanced by Polish chauvinists who said of Julian Tuwim that he was not a Polish poet, although he wrote in Polish.
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expands it to such dim ensions th a t everyone (form er and present) fits into it Tsvetaeva's words notwithstanding, the linguistic definition of Russian literature is not an artificial construct, a pigeonhole, the invention of a compulsive taxonomist. Language, the very stuff of literature, is acutely sensed by the writer swimming in the sea of a foreign language. Literature as an art form finds its impetus in the verbal; language is not just a mode of expression or an artificial code, it is part of perception itself. Many, perhaps most, exiled writers feel themselves in a constant state of linguistic siege. Inevitably, the experience shapes their thinking along paths different from those they would have followed, had they remained within the sanctuary of their native language. For the majority, the foreign language remains as artificial as a com puter program. Ironically, their children are m ore‘at home in that code than in their parents’ language.3 After a while the expatriate w riter starts wondering if he himself may be forgetting the subtleties of his native tongue. Under conditions of émigré life the writer's healthy linguistic base can be exhausted, forgotten little by little, encroached upon from all sides by Anglicisms and Gallicisms. Of course, there also exists the possibility of a quite different view — that expatriate life can be turned to an advantage in that it perm its the poet to slough off the dross of daily intercourse and local color. But regardless of one's point of view, going abroad is an event in tim e as much as a spatial movement. A great shared language goes hand in hand with a shared historical tradition. The road home runs through the Russian language. And in the process there is a confusion of space in tim e; writers left behind a specific space at a specific time, and these two dimensions become fused for them .b A strictly linguistic definition is at odds with the popular Russian concept of nation as a biological entity — biological in the most literal
aln passing, it should be noted that there are subtle differences between the Russian spoken in contemporary Russia and the Russian spoken by First-W ave ém igrés. Linguistically, the ém igré community can act as a sort of tim e capsule, preserving the norms of a past age, but the Russian ém igré community has replaced itself with sporadic new groups of émigrés, rather than with its own children, w ho— in a long-standing Russian tradition — have usually chosen the path of assimilation. Second-generation Russian émigré writers are virtually nonexistent. This has produced a discontinuity in the linguistic picture atypical, to cite but one exam ple, of English expatriate writings, which have been created by a community enjoying regular and unimpeded access to the mother country. bS ee Brodsky and Khazanov interviews in Conversations in Exile for exam ples.
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sense of the term. In keeping with a long-standing Slavophile tradition, many émigrés have seen Russia as a "living organism .” Marina Tsvetaeva described Russia as "an inevitability of memory and blood, not artificial borders,” while Nikolai Avksent'ev, an editor of the Parisbased journal Sovrem ennye zapiski (Contemporary Annals), placed an equal sign between nation and self. Sergei Chakhotin wrote of the intelligentsia as the "mind of the country” and pleaded that when the nation was "ill” only a "healthy instinct for self-preservation” could induce the "Russian character” to appreciate the seriousness of the "biological moment.” Realists, he proclaimed, could not be "enemies of evolution.” Unquestionably, a genetic definition of Russianness would produce a radically different book from one based on a linguistic definition. Some of the more conservative émigrés in the 1920s were reluctant to recognize even Pushkin as a Russian writer because his great great grandfather was African. There is a political side to the language issue for the Russian writer. The imperial tradition, both in a literary and a political sense, lays a heavy hand on the shoulders of Russia's sons and daughters abroad, and they are constantly aware of its weight. For better or worse, the Russian language has outgrown the boundaries of nation and become an imperial tongue, and the expatriate Russian w riter feels him self to be a part of something that goes beyond his personal experience. Exile is a part, albeit only a part, of the expatriate experience. Exile is when you can't go back. It is the consciousness of this inability that makes one an exile, that violates those collectivist instincts that have been programmed into the majority of humankind by evolution. W hen Gertrude Stein made her permanent home in Europe, she still retained the option of returning home permanently or for a visit. James Baldwin, a black American writer who spent most of his tim e in France, had this in mind when he said he didn't view himself as an exile or expatriate, but rather as more of a commuter. The entire AngloAmerican tradition would be radically altered without its "commuters” — Percy Shelley, Henry James, T. S. Eliot, D. H. Lawrence, Robert Graves, Lawrence Durrell, W. H. Auden, Muriel Spark, Gore Vidal, and many, many others. Up until about 1989 the option of returning was more or less closed to Russia's expatriate writers. As defined by W ebster's Third N ew International Dictionary, Stein was an "expatriate,” i.e. "one who lives in a foreign country,” or an "emigrant" ("a person who leaves a country or region to establish permanent residency elsewhere”), but not an "exile” ("a person expelled from his country by authority”) or an "ém igré” ("a person forced to emigrate ... by political or other reasons beyond his control”).
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The phrase "reasons beyond his control” is far from precise. The case of Solzhenitsyn, who was forcibly placed on an airplane and flown to W est Germany, without even knowing his destination, was atypical. Most of the émigrés left because they "could not stand it any more” or because they were given such unpalatable alternatives to emigration as imprisonment or harassment. Most of them could have stayed, perhaps with disastrous consequences, and this makes their departure semi-voluntary, thus clouding the question of their "exile” status. Some view the writer's country of publication as primary: the Soviet film producer Èl’dar Ryazanov declared that once Vladim ir Voinovich’s Chonkin was published in the Soviet Union, it "ceased to be an artifact of émigré literature and became an artifact of Soviet literature.” The same had been said earlier about Aleksei Tolstoi's Road to C alvary (Khozhdenie po mukam). Both the Soviet and Nazi governments muddied the waters still further by referring to "inner émigrés” — the malcontents who stayed at home while espousing ideas popular abroad but considered unpatriotic by the government. The historical grouping of Russians abroad is in need of reexamination. Émigrés during the Soviet period have traditionally been divided into three broad categories: those who left during or shortly after 1917 (the First Wave), during World W ar II (the Second Wave), and during the 1970s and 1980s (the Third W ave).a Émigrés leaving either after 1985, the introduction of Mikhail Gorbachêv's policy of perestroika, or after the breakup of the Soviet Union are sometimes referred to as the Fourth Wave. On January 1, 1993, a new law entered into effect granting any Russian citizen the right to go abroad for five years for any reason, and concepts such as "exile” and "flight” are not applicable to this group of economic, not political, émigrés. They don’t have to burn any bridges, and they retain the right to return, w ithout having to give up their homes, jobs, friends, and family. Essentially, the notion that Russians abroad before October 1917 were still part of the nation while separation from Russia during the Soviet period meant total alienation was a figm ent of Soviet propaganda, based on the claim that Soviet history was somehow separate from Russian history as a whole. Now that the communist period has come to an end, we can look both forward and backward in tim e and see it within its proper historical framework. It would
•There also exists literature describing the tsarist emigration as the "First W ave," the group that left following the 1917 coup as the "second" and the World W ar II group as the "third," but this terminology never caught on.
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actually be more appropriate to view Russians abroad as consisting of twelve groups: travellers and expatriates; 1) tsarist exiles in Siberia; 2) 19th-century political exiles; 3) Jews fleeing the pogroms of the late tsarist period; 4) 19th-century economic émigrés (the second largest 5) group of all); refugees from the 1905 revolution; 6) refugees from the Russian Civil W ar — the so-called 7) First Wave; W orld W ar II refugees — the Second Wave; 8) the largely Jewish group which left Russia during the 9) 1970s and 1980s, but also including a few individuals who left Russia during the 1960s, such as Valery Tarsis and Arkady Belinkov. Russians in the form er Soviet republics who overnight 10) found themselves living abroad; economic émigrés who left Russia or the form er 11) republics on or after January 1, 1992; and 12) political refugees fleeing violence related to the breakup of the Soviet Union (this group is already turning out to be very large indeed). Many of them, but not all, will be Russians moving in the reverse direction — returning to Russia. This schem atic leaves open the question of what will happen if the Russian Republic breaks up into two or more independent states. Horst Bienek, a German writer who emigrated from the form er East Germany to W est Germany, considered himself a sort of exile from his native land, and Dante thought of himself as having been "exiled” to Ravenna from Florence. If the concept of homeland is narrowed in this fashion, linguistic criteria for determining who is and who is not Russian lose all validity. Lastly, many writers are especially difficult to categorize because of their changing circumstances. The prose writer, memoirist, ethnographer, and political and social commentator Feliks Kon (18641941 ), for example, was born in Poland at a tim e when Poland was part of the Russian Empire. He was arrested and exiled to Siberia, later returned to Poland, emigrated to Switzerland in 1914, and moved to Russia after 1917, and for a tim e was an editor in Kiev. A Jewish Polonophile, he wrote both in Polish and Russian. In such cases, classification can be an exercise in futility.
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The most traditional approach to Russians abroad has been to divide them into two groups — tsarist and Soviet. Somehow tsaristperiod writers in Europe have been viewed as an inalienable part of the general community of Russian writers, while during the Soviet period, writers abroad have been seen as existing in a separate nether world of banishment. W hile this tsarist/Soviet dichotomy is a valid one, it creates an oversimplified, distorted picture when other dim ensions are not taken into account. When all is said and done, Kurbsky and Gertsen lived in the same sort of exile as did Solzhenitsyn; Turgenev and Gogol' were expatriates in much the same sense as Voinovich, Aksênov, or Brodsky after the breakup of the U.S.S.R.; and the 12thcentury abbot and pilgrim Daniil, the 18th-century playwright Denis Fonvizin, the 19th-century memoirist Vasily Botkin, and the 20thcentury novelist Viktor Nekrasov were all authors of travel accounts. To view the Soviet period in isolation is to miss the larger picture. In any case, this book is not a history of any individual group of Russians living abroad, but a portrait of Russian writers and politics abroad as a totality, and as Russia herself changed over the centuries, so have Russians outside her borders. Looking back over a millennium of Russian existence abroad, we can appreciate how Russians in general and writers specifically fit into a multidimensional model of existence abroad. First of all come the causes of emigration. O f course, people rarely em igrate for one reason alone, so that m otivational factors are not mutually exclusive, but among them are criminal, cultural, educational, financial, medical, religious, personal, political, and even sexual considerations. As the readers of this volume can now testify, Russian writers fit into all these categories. People can also be classified according to the circum stances under which they found themselves abroad; this is a som ewhat different breakdown than that given above on the basis of m otivation. Such categories would have to include the "traveller,” whose "trip” was intended from the outset as tem porary; the "expatriate,” who regarded his new address as his "current primary” address, but who returned home from tim e to tim e; the "voluntary émigré,” who selected a new country of residence out of a sense of preference; the "inner ém igré,” who did not emigrate but who would have liked to, or whose sympathies, at the very least, were abroad; the "involuntary ém igré,” who made the decision to leave under coercion; the true "exile,” who was either forced to flee or was transported abroad against his will and was not perm itted to return, even for a visit; and persons whose country of residence changed status. There were also people whose country of residence was incorporated by Mother Russia (the Baltic states after the Second W orld W ar could serve as an example) and
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individuals whose country of residence declared its independence from the country in which the w riter has his ethnic roots (Russians in the form er republics of the Soviet Union after the disintegration of the state). Lastly, there is a tiny group of second-generation writers, but — no third generation. A very significant factor was the difference in the way of life of the host country from that of Russia. In the case of the Soviet Union, it could be roughly comparable (Poland), significantly different Yugoslavia), radically different (U.S.A), or overwhelmingly different (Brazil). Related to this "difference quotient’ was the language of the host country. Unlike the situation enjoyed by writers from some other countries, for Russians it was inevitably a foreign tongue. Ethnicity is defined here on the basis of language, and the unfam iliar linguistic milieu was one of the chief sources of trauma. Nevertheless, very few authors opted to switch languages. The question of repatriation also presents a basis for classification. Theoretically, the option was often open, and the individual could choose to avail himself of the opportunity; some decided to return and bitterly regretted the decision while other returnees claimed never to have repented their return. O r the writer could be forcibly repatriated, as happened to many refugees in Europe at the end of W orld W ar II. At various periods the Soviet authorities were intentionally vague on the question of return. When they barred the door, there were people who either did or did not want to return home, o r — more frequently than n o t— people who were so confused about their own desires that they demanded for decades that they be perm itted to return home and then chose not to do so when the opportunity actually appeared. Naturally, most of the above categories were applicable to anyone abroad, not just writers, but there are other categories which apply exclusively to literature, albeit indirectly. I have in mind classification according to place of publication of the work. Among the possibilities here are the writer's home country. Published in Russia, it was either legal or clandestine {sam izdat); published abroad, it was called tam izdat. The work can also be pigeonholed according to the intended prim ary audience: it can be intended for readers "back home” in a process of legal distribution or to be smuggled into the home country; or the readers may be residents of other countries. Russian writers usually attem pted to serve both markets. During the tsarist and very early Soviet periods the chief audience was back home in Russia; for the greater part of the Soviet era, however, most readers were other émigrés.
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Tradition
... a t th a t tim e I was ju s t beginning to return to life, to recover from an entire series o f tem ble events, m isfortunes, and m istakes. The history o f recent years becam e m ore and m ore clear to me, and I realized with horror tha t no m an knew them aside from m yself, tha t the truth would go w ith me to the grave. So I decided to write. B ut one m em ory awakens another, and a ll th a t which was e ith e r forgotten o r half-forgotten com es alive: the dream s o f childhood, the hopes o f adolescence, the courage o f youth, im prisonm ent and exile. None o f these has le ft any bitterness in m y soul; a ll this has passed like a spring storm whose blow s only freshened and strengthened m y soul. Aleksandr Gertsen How and why d id I and m y w ife end up here? I rea lly d o n t know. O f course, I rem em ber the hustle and bustle o f departure, the steam ship " W indham, ” the skyscrapered shores o f the N ew York p ie r in the lila c tw ilight. I rem em ber a ll this. B ut why am I re a lly here? Who needs m e? A nd why am I destined to die here, in Am erica? I do not understand a ll this very clearly. M ais ne cherchez pas à com prendre. Throughout m y ém igré life, I d rifte d from one chance to another. I never strove fo r much, never p u t o u t m uch e ffo rt o r w orried about "the m orrow .” I accepted w hat sim ply cam e m y way, ju s t as I accepted an Am erica tha t d rifte d past m e. Now I am sitting in a rocking cha ir on a beautiful wide veranda and looking a t the greenery a ll around m e — sm all oaks, apple trees, a garden, birds, bees, patches o f sunlight. I cast back in m y m em ory — fo r w hat? I reca ll the Second W orld War, which I lived through in France. I reca ll it as I experienced it. M y experiences are no t a t a ll the usual ones, and m uch has rem ained in m y m em ory. Roman Gul'
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Here [in G erm any] only the yellow stubble in the harvested fields rem inds you o f Russia. A nd the thought crosses m y m ind: w hat if nothing had ever happened, if there had never been any escape, if I had ju s t been brought here w hile sleeping? I see m yself waking up and standing a t the edge o f a fie ld and w onder if I would realize th a t a ll around me la y a d iffe ren t country? W hat would signal such a change to m e? Really, w hat is different? The grass is the same, and the roadside nettles and w ild flow ers haven't changed. It's like a gam e in which you guess the language o f a text. Some o f the letters are the same, and they form words. B ut the whole thing is void o f m eaning; it's a diffe ren t language. Even the sky, if you look a t it long enough, has a slig h tly d iffe ren t appearance — as if the gases com posing it were d iffe ren t here. An o ld m an strolls in m y direction talking to his dog in so alien a tongue you m ight im agine his vocal cords were constructed diffe ren tly from m ine. The tall-trunked, elegant, sun -lit forest is no t a t a ll like ou r forests; you can ride through it on a bicycle, im agining you rself to be som e sort o f Siegfried. There is nothing le ft o f the forest gam es we played back home, and a new sensation crowds ou t the old, a feeling o f loneliness and freedom . Boris Khazanov These three writers represent very different groups of Russian writers in exile; Gertsen left Russia in 1847, Gul' in 1918, and Khazanov in 1982. In spite of the years which separate them, however, the continuity of their experience is striking. Most of Russia's exiled writers have not attem pted to fit into the traditions of the country which received them, but instead have clung to their native roots, writing chiefly for "the folks back home.” This was understandable in the case of tsarist expatriates and First-W ave émigrés, who left Russia confident, or at least hopeful, that they would eventually return home, but Second- and Third-W ave writers left Russia more or less convinced that they were leaving their native country forever. It might seem logical to assume that, given such a fatalistic view, Russian writers would set their sights on the W estern reader from the very beginning, but such was not the case. The internationalists have clearly been in the minority. The late American Slavist and publisher Carl Proffer at a 1981 University of Southern California conference on émigré literature took
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objection to the term "émigré literature,” saying that the accomplishments of literature written in emigration (not only Russian) were such that they should be recognized as part of the mainstream national tradition. The very term, "émigré literature,” he maintained, is demeaning: It sm acks o f the ghetto. It suggests som ething lim ited, narrow , parochial, perhaps o f interest fo r a tim e, bu t w ith no hope o f entering the perm anent culture o f a language. If w riters are "only ém igré w riters," they w ill probably be forgotten. "Ém igré” literature is by definition a m inority literature, a literature o f special pleading, and like other defensive, m inority types o f literature — wom en's literature, ga y literature, the lite rature o f M ichigan's N orthern Peninsula — the attributive adjective its e lf determ ines its fin a l fate — the com post heap o f culture. Proffer's view was indeed a gloomy one, but to respond to it, we must first work through the history of émigré letters and only then render judgm ent in questions of legitimacy and continuity, and — for that m atter — decide for ourselves whether these two categories are linked.
The Interaction of Russian Expatriate Writers with the West I know how m en in exile feed on dream s o f hope. Aeschylus The 19th century had been a period of rich association between Russian writers and the West. Educated Russians frequently went abroad for medical treatm ent, study, relaxation ... or to lay plans for revolution back home. The opportunities for such travel created a m indset quite different from that of the Soviet period, when foreign travel became virtually impossible and foreign contacts could literally be life-threatening. Paradoxically, even though the roots of modern Russian literature lie in W estern European literature, the interwar period was not one of extensive interaction between Russian émigré literature and the various W estern European literatures surrounding it. In noting this estrangement, Vladim ir Nabokov claimed the Russian ém igré com m unity possessed a higher culture and greater freedom of thought than that of the W estern world in which the exiles found themselves. A s I look back a t those years o f exile, I see m yself, and thousands o f other Russians, leading an odd b u t by no m eans unpleasant existence, in m aterial indigence and inte llectua l luxury, am ong pe rfectly unim portant strangers, spectral
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G erm ans and Frenchm en in whose m ore o r less illu so ry cities we, ém igrés, happened to dw ell. These aborigines were to the m ind's eye as fla t and transparent as figures cut ou t o f cellophane, and although we used th e ir gadgets, applauded th e ir clowns, picked th e ir roadside plum s and apples, no re a l com m unication, o f the rich hum an so rt so widespread in o u r own m idst, existed between us and them . If such a statem ent could be made by Nabokov, a w riter who supposedly read English before he learned to write Russian and whose cosmopolitan credentials were above reproach, how much more was it true for other Russian refugees. After World W ar II this attitude was retained, producing little cross-pollination between Russian ém igré literature in America and the Anglo-American tradition, such stars as Brodsky and Solzhenitsyn notwithstanding.* Russians in Europe both before and after 1917 generally saw themselves as European but often realized that the Europe they loved was an imagined entity. Nabokov’s com m ent in The G ift was quite typical in this respect. W hat has happened to those originals who used to teach natural history to Russian children — green net, tin box on a sling, ha t stuck w ith pinned butterflies, long, learned nose, candid eyes behind spectacles — where are they all, where are th e ir fra il skeletons — o r was this a special breed o f Germans, fo r export to Russia, o r am I no t looking properly? Thus, rather than reaching out to W estern traditions, Russian expatriate writings have displayed a confluence of the traditions of "Russia M inor,” as the émigré community used to refer to itself, with those of the "m étropole.” Russian literature in exile as a whole has been torn by two opposing forces: on the one hand, nostalgia and the desire to retain old traditions, the realism of First-Wave prose writers, the numerous discussions of "bridge building,” and, on the other, political protest and greater experimentation than was possible in Russia proper. Now that Soviet exile has come to an end, this natural attraction and repulsion has resumed, albeit under more normal conditions.
■My view is not shared by ail other scholars. W hen I first m ade this observation in 1976, I w as taken to task by Professor Ternira Pachmuss, who wrote: "Russian ém igré literature w as unquestionably neither static nor irretrievably chained to its 'mother' culture in Russia, as has been incorrectly suggested by some scholars."
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The Pre-Soviet Period Origins 01 a kiss, long as m y exile, sw eet as m y revenge! W illiam Shakespeare O f necessity, this history of Russian literature outside of Russia must begin with the appearance of the first written documents, because we possess no earlier evidence of such a diffusion of Russia's oral tradition. It is entirely likely that the East Slavs travelled to other countries, taking their tradition of folk literature with them, but the Church in its hostility to the Slavs' pagan culture ovqr the course of the centuries strove to wipe out any memory of that tradition. Thus, this book begins, not from the actual beginnings, but from our earliest information. Some of the best sources of knowledge of early East Slavic "statehood” are to be found in the Russian chronicles, the reliability of which, however, becomes increasingly difficult to ascertain the further back they reach in time. We do know that in the ninth century A.D. the northern Russian city of Novgorod was riven by internecine warfare among its rulers. In a not very original justification of the conquering of a foreign state, the chronicles relate that the city supposedly invited three Varangian (Viking) brothers to come and rule it. The eldest, Ryurik, settled in Novgorod, and Igor1, who may have been his son, became the prince of Kiev, the so-called "m other” city of the East Slavs and the capital of a powerful state founded on the intersection of a North-South and an East-W est trade route. After a successful campaign against Byzantium in 906, lgor"s son Oleg hung his shield on the gates of Constantinople as a sign of victory before returning home. The East Slavs still had no alphabet, let alone a written literary tradition, but this prophetically warlike gesture represents Russia's earliest autograph in the West. It was a "sign” eloquent enough to delight the heart of any semiotician, not to mention proponents of later Russian imperialism. In 911 Oleg concluded a treaty with Byzantium, establishing more or less normal diplom atic relations between the two states. In 941, however, Viking traditions were still strong, and Oleg's successor, Igor', evidently decided to demand tribute from his neighbors, supposedly raising an army of 40,000 men in 10,000 boats, but the Byzantines made short shrift of the attackers. Having barely managed to escape, Igor' was forced in 944-45 to reconfirm the earlier treaty, forswear the right to maintain outposts at the mouth of the Dnepr, and
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give up all claims to the Crimea. After his death, his widow Ol'ga was even baptized by the Byzantines. Nevertheless, the Russians’ military fortunes vis-à-vis their Greek neighbors failed to improve: in 971 lgor"s son Svyatoslav was forced to conclude a nonaggression treaty with Byzantiuma, and Svyatoslav's son, Vladimir, ended up converting all of Russia to Christianity. A century later, in 1044, Yaroslav the Wise, Grand Prince of Kiev, intent on forging alliances with the other royal houses of Europe, married off one daughter to the king of Nonway and another in 1046 to the king of Hungary. King Henry i of France, whose first w ife had died w ithout issue, was eager to raise the prestige of the younger French dynasty and ensure himself an heir. Since the Papacy equated marital ties with blood ties and viewed marriages as consanguineous as far as the seventh degree of relation, Henry was forced to look to more distant lands for a spouse. In 1049 he sent a mission to Kiev which returned either that same year or the next with Yaroslav's second daughter Anna, who was forthwith married to Henry at Rheims and sim ultaneously crowned Queen of France. Since Anna claimed descent from Alexander the Great, the match was viewed as advantageous to the French dynasty. During the ceremonies Anna deposited a Slavic Gospel on the high altar of the Cathedral, and it was on this book that subsequent kings of France took their oath of office. Anna bore Henry three sons and possibly one daughter before being abducted in about 1061 by Raoul V, Count of Crépy en Valois, a powerful seigneur who claimed descent from Charlemagne. Anna may or may not have returned to Russia, but in 1063 she wrote out her name and title, Anna regina, in Cyrillic letters in a French document. This is the oldest known signature of any Russian prince or princess and one of the oldest specimens of Russian writing. Some 160 years had passed since Oleg left his shield hanging on the gates of "Tsargrad,” and thus the alternating love-hate pattern which has raged over the centuries between Russia and Western Europe was established early on.
•All three treaties w ere preserved only in Greek, and w ere translated for insertion into the Russian Primary Chronicle only in the early twelfth century.
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Pilgrims B ut one man loved the pilgrim soul in you A nd loved the sorrows o f your changing face. William Butler Yeats Pilgrim accounts represent a genre which had predecessors in Byzantine literature and Western European literature. The East Slavic works were originally dedicated chiefly to descriptions of the sacred shrines of Christianity, and only with tim e began to develop generically. Moving ahead in time, we can also see that these accounts have a later equivalent in the trips of Russians such as Nikolai Karamzin and even ll'ya Èrenburg to the shrines of Western culture. One of the earliest such documents was the early twelfthcentury Life and Pilgrimage o f Daniil, A bbot o f the Russian Land. Preserved in nearly 150 manuscripts representing four different redactions, Daniil's account contains much apocryphal and legendary material. The author created a sort of guidebook, in which he discussed the religious significance of places and relics, providing more and more detail the nearer he reached the Holy Land, which at the tim e was in the hands of the Crusaders. His narration is a personal one, describing places where he spent the night, and placing no little emphasis on the danger of the trip and the return journey via Constantinople. In general, his account is more sophisticated than many written centuries later. Constantinople with its wealth of relics attracted considerable attention on the part of Russian pilgrims from the 13th century until 1453, when the Turks took the city. In this respect the Russians differed from W estern pilgrims, who generally avoided Constantinople after the eighth century out of loyalty to Rome. Altogether six different descriptions of the city have been preserved. These works have a good deal in common, and early manuscripts may have influenced the later ones. The pilgrims were especially drawn by the Hagia Sophia, which supposedly contained the sponge from which Christ drank while on the cross and the lance which pierced his side, Abraham 's table, the doors of Noah's ark, and many precious icons from Jerusalem. In 1200, just four years before the knights of the Fourth Crusade conquered Constantinople and carried off many of the sacred relics, Archbishop Antony of Novgorod travelled to Constantinople to study the liturgy of the Church. W hile Antony failed to include his travel route, his description of the city is quite detailed and the work is not unsophisticated, particularly in its sermonizing (a well-defined genre in old Russian literature):
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N ow has Christ our God visited us thanks to his m ercy and the intercession o f the Holy Sophia, the Wisdom o f God, and through the prayers o f Em peror Constantine and his m other Helene: G od shall grant us life, ju s t as under Constantine, and much more in addition. He will lead the pagan Jews to the baptism al font, and the Christians shall remain within his love and feel no hostility to each other, and do battle only with those who refuse to be baptized, for whether they like it o r not, they shall be forced to approach the font. There w ill be much wealth o f a ll sorts and truth on earth, and men w ill commence to live holy lives, without illnesses, and the Earth shall bring forth the fruits o f the Earth like honey and m ilk for the sake o f C hrist’s good life. Nearly 150 years passed before the next description of "Tsargrad” was written (or, at least, preserved). The lengthy tim e span is perhaps explained by the intervening invasion of southern Russia by the Mongols in 1237-38. This was the beginning of the so-called Tartar Yoke, which laid waste to much of the previously flourishing culture of Kiev, although the Golden Horde was more interested in tribute and empire than in transplanting its own culture and religion. From the fall of Kiev till the disintegration of the Tartar empire in the mid-15th century, the northwestern cities of Novgorod and Pskov served as unique and unspoiled bearers of the religious culture of the East Slavs. Thus, the next Russian visitor to "Konstantingrad” was, like Antony, also from Novgorod; the name of this pilgrim was Stefan, and he had come "to bow to the holy places and kiss the bodies of the saints” (poklonitisya svyatym mestom and tselovati telesa svyatykh). Like Antony, Stefan provides virtually no information on his travel route. The narration is more highly personalized than that of Antony, and the descriptions of the city's holy places are very detailed. In 1389 Metropolitan Pimen of Moscow made his third trip to Constantinople, taking with him an official record keeper, Ignaty, from the city of Smolensk. The see of Moscow was attempting to establish its legitim acy vis-à-vis Kiev, and Pimen wanted the support of the new Patriarch Antonios IV in Constantinople. Evidently Pimen hoped the existence of a written document would help to bolster his position in his quarrel with Kiprian of Kiev. Ignaty describes the route followed by Pimen — down the Oka and Don rivers to the Black Sea. Previous travellers had made the journey by way of western Russia so as to avoid the danger of Tartar attack. Even at that tim e the route was not the safest. Although this route was shorter, it still took the travellers two and a half months to reach Constantinople. Unlike the accounts of previous travellers, Ignaty's was focused around places, rather than dates.
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Three decades later, In 1418-22, a monk of the Trinity-Sergiev Monastery near Moscow, Zosima, made the first comprehensive trip to all the sacred places: Constantinople, Mount Athos, Salonika, the Holy Land. By this tim e there already existed a well-developed genre of pilgrim s’ travel accounts in Europe; moreover, distinct parallels between Zosima's text and Daniil's dem onstrate that Zosima had read Daniil's account. The general convention of canonical literature had been for the author to stress his own "worthlessness,” remaining in the background as much as possible. Zosima makes a gesture at adhering to this tradition but at the same tim e points out his own courage in undertaking the journey. During his trip he was robbed by either Sicilian or Spanish pirates, who fired upon his ship, boarded it, and hacked the captain to pieces. He himself was robbed and was left, quite literally, with nothing but the kaftan on his back. Zosihia also took considerable pride in his presentation of Christendom's holy places: W ithout bragging I can say that no one has seen the sites o f Jerusalem as has this sinner. I spent an entire year in Jerusalem and visited the sacred places outside o f Jerusalem and I, a sinner, have received m any wounds to m y body from the Saracens and endured a ll this in the name o f God. I rem em bered a ll that the Apostles and Martyrs suffered and I counted a ll this as nothing, but rather anguished in gratitude. Two pilgrimages were made to the Holy Land in 1456 and 1461-62 by the monk Varsonofy, who may well have been the sam e Varsonofy who was a candidate for Archbishop of Novgorod in 1471. Both accounts are contained in a single manuscript. Varsonofy, whose journey led him through Kiev, Belgrade, Constantinople, Crete, Rhodes, Cyprus, Tripoli, Beirut, and Damascus to Jerusalem, composed what is basically an inventory of the sites which he visited during his first pilgrimage. The account of his journey is also quite brief. Both are told in the first person. Varsonofy was the first Russian pilgrim recorded as having visited Mount Sinai. Nearly two centuries later, in 1634-37, a merchant from Kazan', Vasily Gagara, travelled down the Volga to visit the Orient. When Gagara's ship, destined for Persia and loaded with goods, sank, he decided to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. Despite his professed religious devotion, however, he left Jerusalem after only three days and moved on to Cairo for 14 weeks, his true intentions evidently having been at least as strongly inspired by trade as by religion. Gagara marvelled at the numerous mosques, whose minarets stood like a "dark forest,” at the pyramids, a crocodile, the production of sugar from cane, the Red Sea, and Mount Sinai. He then backtracked to Palestine for two weeks. Forced to return home by a different route
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because of Turkish-Persian hostilities, he chose to travel via Turkey, Moldavia, and Poland. Even so he was imprisoned by the Poles for 14 weeks before getting to Kiev and then to Moscow. Gagara's account contains a short introduction, a description of the trip itself, and a brief afterword. The work differs from accounts of other pilgrims in that the description of holy sites comprises only about ten percent of the text, the rest being devoted to Gagara's experiences and a number of legends. The work is also unusual in that, while written in Church Slavic, it clearly im itates in places the rhythm of the Russian folk epic. During the 17th century the extravagant fantasies of early pilgrim age accounts gave way to more factual presentations. A more levelheaded work was that of the monk Iona Malen'kii (literally: Jonah the Small), who accompanied Patriarch Paisios of Jerusalem on his 1649 trip home from Moscow. Iona broke his narration into four wellbalanced parts: a foreword, the account of the trip itself, a description of the holy sites in Palestine, and the return home in 1652. Not only was Iona factual in his descriptions, but he provided considerable detail. In 1652, Arseny Sukhanov, the head of the Bogoyavlenskii Cloister in the Moscow Kremlin, having returned from a two-year diplom atic pilgrim age to Constantinople, Cairo, and Palestine, wrote what is the largest diplom atic report and pilgrimage account under the title Proskinetareon (Proskinetarii). Some 120 printed pages in length, it provided a detailed account of religious rites in the East. Sukhanov was the first Russian emissary to visit the Holy Land since the tim e of Ivan the Terrible, and he had brought with him 80 sable pelts to present to the Patriarch on behalf of the Tsar, but the ship bringing them to Constantinople was seized by pirates. One of the reasons for Sukhanov's mission was the problem of the legitimacy of the Russian translations of the liturgical texts. Moscow's claim to be the "Third Rome” (after the fall in 1453 of Constantinople to the Turks) could have been undermined by an admission of inaccuracies in the Russian texts. The issue was already a sensitive one but not yet fraught with the tragedy and violence that would later ensue. Sukhanov's account of his mission is factual, with numerous reference to sources, and the tone is relatively scholarly and neutral, much as one might expect from a diplom at. Sukhanov discussed politics, geography, the flora and fauna he observed, and, especially, church ritual. Curiously, the Greeks were alarmed when they perceived him taking down everything he saw in a notebook to report to the Tsar, and they even urged the Patriarch to confiscate his notes and burn them. In 1653 Sukhanov was sent to Mount Athos to collect Greek manuscripts to be used to check the authenticity of the Russian religious writings. He returned in 1655 with 500 texts. In the meantime Patriarch Nikon had gone ahead
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with a 1654-56 church council that led to the schism in the Russian church. From 1660 to 1664 Sukhanov headed the Moscow Pechatnyi dvor, the state printing house, which a century earlier had published the first Russian printed book for which there is a date. Under the influence of the Reformation and humanism the genre of the W estern European pilgrimage account evolved in the direction of a more personal narrative and away from form al catalogues of holy sites, relics, and legends. Much the same trend can be traced in the Russian tradition, albeit with a considerable tim e lag. One of the causes of these changes in Russia is to be found in the appearance of the secular tale. An instance of such a hybrid genre is the colorful 1676 account written by Vasily Polozov of Kostroma, who spent some 25 years outside of Russia. Polozov wrote a petition (chelobitnaya) to Tsar Fëdor Alekseevich requesting a job in recognition of the many trials he had endured. Captured by the Crimean Tartars, Polozov was sold into slavery to the Turkish sultan a year and a half later. After 12 years’ service, he was condemned to death for clinging to his faith, but the sentence was commuted to slavery on a galley, where he was a rower for nine years. When the ship capsized, Polozov managed to survive, chained to his wooden bench which had been tom free from the ship. W ishing to thank God for his preservation, he made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, crossing the Black Sea and travelling through Aleppo. He tells of miracles he supposedly witnessed and describes his eventual return to Russia via Astrakhan'. The Tsar was so impressed with Polozov's fortitude that he awarded him 1,000 rubles, plus a position as court investigator and surveyor. Very few later Russian travellers were to meet with such generosity from Moscow. In 1703, in the early Petrine period, the priest Ioann Luk'yanov returned from a two-year pilgrimage to Palestine and composed an extensive account of his journey: 100 printed pages. The work is far more modern and personal than previous such reports, describing how the owner of a menagerie in Constantinople tried to pretend a dead lion was only asleep, how Luk'yanov haggled over customs duties, fell ill with the plague, and warded off the threat of Arab raiders and sea pirates. In some places the actual descriptions of the Holy Land are modelled after earlier pilgrim s’ accounts and are generally more cursory in nature than the description of the journey itself. Just as the church schism in Russia began to place in doubt the legitim acy of the official church, it also began to undermine the inviolability of its written traditions. Luk'yanov was an Old Believer and he perceived great significance in the fact that the right hand of the Kiev relics of the folk hero li'ya Muromets was stretched out with two fingers, not three — a sticking point in the clash between the official Church and the
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schismatics. It is unlikely that the literary freedom he permitted him self in the very personal, even intim ate descriptions of his own experiences would have been as com plete had he not been a religious dissident. Not surprisingly, the manuscript was circulated widely by the Old Believers. Luk'yanov's lively, detailed account was more or less unique up until the end of the 18th century. In 1704, just a year after he returned, the W est Russian monks Makary and Sil'vestr made their own pilgrimage, travelling via Kiev, la§i, Constantinople, Alexandria, and Dam ietta to the Holy Land. The document briefly describes Constantinople, mentions "the Pharaoh's mountains" (the pyramids), and provides an inventory of the sites in Palestine. Part of the text is taken from the pseudo-Korobeinikov account (see below). A relatively unsophisticated pilgrimage account was created by Andrei Ignat'ev, who travelled to Palestine and Mount Sinai in 1707-08 and took vows as a monk. Thanks to the efforts of the Russian diplom at Pëtr Tolstoi, Ignat'ev and his brother received a safe conduct document, a firman, from the Sultan. Unlike Luk'yanov, who not only refrained from calling all Turks "dogs and rascals,” but even had some positive comments to make about them, Ignat'ev was a strong Hellenophile who had no use for the pagan defilers of the city. As for the G reek faith, he wrote that "a light shone in the darkness, and the darkness did not realize it.” The Ignat'ev brothers’ ship capsized on the way home, but they were fortunate: not even their belongings got wet. Another pilgrim to receive a firman through Tolstoi was the Chernigov monk Ippolit Vishensky, who made a pilgrimage to Mount Sinai, Palestine, and Mount Athos in 1707-09. The manuscript, which has been preserved in a single copy, is a diary of his trip. Vishensky naively gave credence to a number of myths, but at the same tim e he devoted a good deal of attention to the trip itself, and not just to the holy places. Among the cities which he visited were la§i, Bucharest, Byzantium, and Cyprus. In Cairo he was concerned with the radical drop in the city's population as a result of the plague and was indignant at the sight of "black arabs” walking around naked. Like Polozov and the Ignat'ev brothers, he also experienced shipwreck during his travels. Just a few years later, in 1712-14, a monk of the Crypt M onastery in Kiev, Varlaam Lenitsky, found himself in Constantinople as chaplain in the service of Field Marshal Boris Sheremet'ev after a truce with the Turks and decided to seize the opportunity to make a pilgrim age to Palestine. Lenitsky's account of his journey is reminiscent, both in manner and in content, of the popular tales (gishtorii) of the Petrine period. Twice his ship barely escaped attacks by pirates, and at one point was severely tested by a storm. No less danger was posed by Arab bandits. Despite all these hazards, Lenitsky
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reached Palestine, where he visited such sites as the Garden of Gethsemane, the Mount of Olives, Bethlehem, and the birthplace of John the Baptist. After spending six weeks in the Holy Land, however, he was unpleasantly surprised to leam that hostilities had again broken out between the Turks and the Russians and that the Russian diplom atic staff in Constantinople had been arrested. A t first he planned to flee with a French monk to Venice but was convinced by the Orthodox Greeks not to travel with a Roman Catholic. He ended up taking passage on a French cargo ship travelling to Accra and Cyprus and was advised by the captain of the vessel to pass him self off as a Bulgarian or Serb. All went well until he reached Cyprus, where he was betrayed by his servant and imprisoned by the Turks for 15 months. Hard as such a lot must have been, his treacherous attendant fared even worse: the man was beheaded by Maltese pirates. Released by the Turks, Lenitsky returned to Kiev via Constantinople and composed an account of his journey consisting of an introduction, his journey to Palestine, a description of the actual holy sites visited, and his eventful return. The account is structured more like a traditional pilgrim age account than a diary. The spirit of adventure came more and more to the forefront in works of the Petrine period. Matvei Nechaev of Yaroslavl' made his pilgrim age in 1721-22. Frightened by the plague in Constantinople, Nechaev delayed his arrival in that city, tarrying in Adrianople, northwest of Constantinople. When he finally arrived in the "new Rome” he spent 32 days sightseeing and created the most detailed description theretofore. Travelling on to Rhodes, he encountered captive Russians from Penza and was fearful of being sold to the Turks himself. When his ship left Cyprus, it was searched by Maltese pirates, among them two Russians, from whom Nechaev hid. Oddly, his account is rooted more in the sentim ental knightly novel of the period than in the tradition of the pilgrimage report. Tears, sighs, com plaints over "bitter fortune,” and rhetorical exclamations over virtuous ladies are a far cry from the accounts of earlier travellers to Palestine. Thus the pilgrimage account evolved away from being a static catalogue of religious sites and myths couched in Church Slavic to a more dynamic mode, and came to be devoted more and more to the personality and experiences of the author, whose language came closer and closer to the vernacular and whose attitude toward myth became ever more critical and objective. Nechaev's work represents a still more radical evolution of the tradition.3
•For more information on Russian pilgrims, see: Seem an, D ie altrussische Wallfahrtsliteratur, 1976.
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Travellers For m y part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel's sake. The real affair is to move. Robert Louis Stevenson The original motivation for Russians to travel abroad was often commercial as well as religious. Under the year 6903 from the Biblical creation of the world (1395 A.D.) the Novgorodian Fourth Chronicle contains an extremely short description of 21 sites in Constantinople, composed by the deacon Aleksandr, who made the trip partially to view the religious sites and partially to engage in trade, and whose narrative tells of an unsuccessful siege of the city by the Turks. Another traveller who combined business with religion was the merchant Vasily, who travelled to Bursa and Cairo to deal in silks, satins, and damask, then went on by way of Gaza, Hebron, and Bethlehem to Jerusalem in 1465-66, and later wrote a brief description of his visit to Cairo and Jerusalem and environs. W hile the account is relatively brief, the route was a new one for Russians wishing to visit the Holy Land. The merchant Afanasy Nikitin, who visited Persia, Africa, and India in a trip that lasted from 1466 to 1472, left a traveller's memoir based on first-hand observation and reminiscent of Zosima's account. Nikitin suffered shipwreck and was attacked by pirates. The work contains Nikitin's immediate impressions of these exotic lands and is replete with words taken from Turkic, Arabic, and Persian. W hile many of the early travel accounts can readily be seen to have been based on actual experience and provide a wealth of inform ation, others are sheer fantasy. The ancient city of Azov, captured first by the Golden Horde and then by the Turks, was under frequent attack by the Don Cossacks, one of whom, Mikhail Cherkashenin, was called the "Scourge of Azov” (groza Azova). His son, the starets Sergy, is evidently the person depicted in a manuscript as having been kidnapped by the Tartars and sold in Palestine. The often dubious reliability of the text is evident from the mention of camels crossing the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. The text is dated April 1,1640, but may have originated in the second half of the 17th century. The growing secularization of Russian society encouraged some Russians to travel for purposes other than religion and/or trade. One of the stronger inducements was the lure of education from the more advanced West. In the 18th century two fortunate young Russians were able to study abroad, and brought a number of W estern
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literary theories home with them. Vasily Trediakovsky (1703-68) travelled to Holland in 1726 and from there to Paris, where he studied mathematics, philosophy, and philology at the University of Paris and theology at the Sorbonne. Five years after returning to Moscow in 1730, he published a tract entitled A N ew and B rief W ay o f Composing Russian Verse with proposals for a German-derived syilabo-tonic system of versification to replace the form er syllabic system imported from Poland but also used in the Romance languages. Syllabo-tonic verse had already been composed in Russian in Moscow by Germans, but it was Trediaikovsky's W estern experience that paved the way for a revolution in Russian poetry. Upon returning from a 1736-41 sojourn in Germany and France Mikhailo Lomonosov (1711-1765) used his W estern training to further develop the ideas of Trediakovsky, proposing that both bisyllabic and trisyllabic meters be accepted. Equally important, he used his own verse to dem onstrate the potential of the iamb for Russian versification. Thus, modern Russian verse is constructed on an imported W estern foundation. Denis Fonvizin (1745-1792) made four trips abroad, and his francophobie letters home go a long way toward explaining his plays. After passing through a Poland "bought up by Jews and priests,” he arrived in Strasbourg, which he found filthy, smelly, and whose streets were so dark that "the sun never shines on these sinners.” From there he went on to Bourg-en-Bresse, where the people were "up to their ears in filth.” French singing reminded him of nothing so much as "goats bleating,” so that his wife was forced to carry ear plugs to avoid the cacophony. In Fonvizin's judgm ent the French were superficial, haughty, materialistic, and dishonest. They seemed to stay young for a long time, but then would abruptly be transformed into old men and women, so that there was no mature citizenry. French writers, he complained, were vain, boastful, envious, wily, and contem ptible in their unceasing efforts to slander each other. French scientists and scholars fared no better in his eyes, being filled with "lies, ambition, and the basest of flattery.” As for French education, Fonvizin described it as limited to rote learning and so compartmentalized as to make a broad education impossible. Dictatorial and exploitative, the governm ent robbed the people at every turn; the courts were corrupt, and the army lacked discipline. Fonvizin's fellow Russians in France came off no better in his eyes; he wrote that they had come alm ost exclusively on a sex tour, while all around the French were either torturing someone on the rack and then beheading the poor wretch or running a raucous carnival. Fonvizin's deepest contem pt was reserved for Paris, which he found "only slightly cleaner than a pigsty” — with widows and orphans begging in the streets and decent people forced
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to live in seventh-floor walkups.a Behind the magnificent facades he found such filth that he could not understand why foreigners would ever want to visit such a "Sodom and Gomorrah.” The chief lesson Fonvizin acquired from France was an appreciation of life in Russia. Only the French theater earned his praise, especially comedy, but tragic stage came off "mediocre.” He found French opera visually magnificent, especially the choreography and the stage decorations, but the singing struck him as nothing less than horrendous. Fonvizin also visited Germany and was favorably impressed by German neatness, but he found the country boring and the weather intolerable. In 1789 the w riter and historian Nikolai Karamzin travelled to W estern Europe and wrote Letters o f a Russian Traveller, in which he described the mixed feelings experienced by many a traveller before and after, albeit in a more sentimental fashion than most. Once on his way, however, he displayed a charming sense of humor: I m ust te ll you o f a m eeting which le ft me with the m ost pleasant memories.... I opened a door and saw a beautiful woman standing before a m irror; wiping the dust from her white face; her companion was seated next to he r in an arm chair yawning. "Excuse m e,” said I, "I le ft a book here.” H er hunchbacked cavalier nodded in the direction o f m y book, which was lying on a table. The beauty turned away from the m irror and peered a t me with such a quick, penetrating gaze that I surely would have blushed, had I anything naughty in m y thoughts. B ut I gazed a t her with calm naïveté, a t her exquisite blue eyes, her perfect Greek nose, her rose lips and cheeks, adm iring her charms the way a young sculptor adm ires a creation by Michelangelo o r a painter prizes a Raphael. The beauty sat down and I rem ained standing before her without picking up m y book. "It's a very hot day,” she said in a pleasant voice, glancing both a t her companion and a t me. He yawned, and I repeated her words: "A very hot day.” A silence ensued. Knowing that in life's decisive moments women never utter the first word, I finally asked: "Is it Dresden you're going to, M adam e?” "N o,” she responded, "we're going to visit our friend in the country. B ut I suppose you really are headed fo r Dresden?” " You're correct, Madame, I hope to be there early tom orrow morning. ” " You m ust be a foreigner, if I m ay make so bold as to ask?” " Quite right, M adam e.” "An Englishman, o f course? Because the English speak excellent G erm an.”
•P ëtr I (P eter the G reat) had m ade a similar observation, remarking that, while it would be worthwhile to copy French art and science, "Paris stinks."
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"Excuse me, Madame, I'm a Muscovite. ” "A Muscovite I M y God, I've never seen a M uscovite.” ” 1 have,” her hunchback gallant inserted and again commenced yawning. "Please tell me how it is you've come to our country.” "It's curiosity, M adam e.” "You m ust be very inquisitive. Surely you've le ft behind much that is dear to you?” "A great deal indeed, Madame, a great deal. I le ft fatherland and friends.” I d o n t know where our conversation would have led, but the postm aster came in with some water and told me that m y carriage was ready. I bowed low to the beauty and she wished me a pleasant journey. "And that was all?,” you ask, dear reader. W hat can I say, I d o n t want to tell a lie. Karamzin's impressions are fresh, insightful, and often tell as much about him as about the countries he visited. In Ba$el he found the women to be "exceptionally ugly” (otmenno dumye), but Switzerland was such a dream that he wanted to kiss the ground. Unfortunately, it was also expensive. Paris too he found exquisite, but attractive women were almost as rare there as in Switzerland. England's womenfolk, on the other hand, were of such beauty as to entrance even the most indifferent male. And Karamzin stressed that he observed them with the greatest attention I London was crowded, but the English never had anything to say; they simply sat around, thinking. As for British theater, it was pitiful compared to the grandeur of Parisian plays. And London was even more decadent than Paris. Karamzin found English descriptive poetry admirable, but "dram atic poetry” was represented by a single author — Shakespeare. The British, in his view, were bombastic and weak, and these frailties showed in their literature. As for contemporary English belles lettres, they were not worthy of attention. And the English language was not only unpleasant, its entire word stock was stolen from the French and the Latin, and it was clearly inferior to the majestically flowing Russian language. The clim ate of the country was cold and damp, like the stingy, calculating British personality. On the whole, the British to him were a gloomy lot, unlike the frivolous French or the wily Italians. But for all these negative assessments, Karamzin confessed that he found it difficult to leave England behind to return to Russia. His letters quickly found an avid reading public, and the epistolary genre became popular in Russia. By the late 18th century educated Russians considered themselves Europeans, and travel to Europe and expatriate living had become common. The simple joys of travel were a new experience for the Russians. In 1824 Nikolai Bestuzhev described his em otions in a letter to a friend:
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How can I explain the charm o f the new, hitherto unknown sensation o f seeing a special land, o f experiencing the inspiration o f an unknown fragrant air, a t seeing unknown grasses, unusual flowers and fruits, their colors unknown to our gaze, their taste inexpressible in words and com parisons? How m any new truths are opened, how m any observations supplem ent our knowledge o f man and nature when we encounter lands and peoples o f a new worldI How lo fty the calling o f the m ariner who brings together the links in the hum an chain! As the Russian navy expanded its operations, a number of its officers gained an opportunity to travel abroad and some took up the pen to describe their experiences. In their ranks was a son of the German novelist and playwright August-Friedrich-Ferdinand von Kotzebue, who had lived for considerable periods in the Russian Empire. W hile still a teenager, Otto Kotzebue (1788-1846) was taken on a world cruise in 1803 by a fam ily friend and upon returning home decided to try his own hand at writing and published his experiences in Vestnik Evropy (The European Herald) in the form of a letter to his father, describing, among other things, folk dram a in Nagasaki and acupuncture. So enchanted was the young Kotzebue by the sea that he became an officer in the Russian Navy and headed up a m ajor world cruise in 1815-18, keeping a diary as he visited such exotic spots as the Canary Islands. In 1823-26 he was off on another world cruise, which he described in Russian and German, providing a colorful description of the natives on the Sandwich Islands and Tahiti, and even Napoleon's grave on the Island of Saint Helena. The descriptions he left behind create the impression of a bold, enlightened explorer. But Russians were motivated to go abroad by any number of reasons and sometimes they stayed abroad for still others. Fêdor Dostoevsky's fear of debtor's prison transformed him into an economic exile from 1867 to 1871. He maintained that his indebtedness stemmed from having taken over his late brother's debts, while his brother's widow insisted that Fêdor was actually the cause of her fam ily's strained material situation. A second factor in Dostoevsky's lengthy stay abroad was his epilepsy and attendant need of medical care. In point of fact, his years abroad were marked by concern over money and homesickness for Russia — hardly a desirable state for an epileptic. Moreover, he was far from convinced of the superiority of W estern physicians. W hile travelling in Western Europe in 1862, 1863, and 1865, Dostoevsky had evidently tried his hand at the casinos of W estern Europe and become obsessed with the thought of quick riches. After only a few weeks in Dresden he left his young wife to travel to the
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gaming tables of Bad Homburg, where he proceeded to lose everything and was even forced to pawn his watch. His short work, The G am bler (Igrok), is testim ony to his passion for the casino, and the figure of Marmeladov in Crime and Punishm ent is probably drawn from Dostoevsky's anguish over his own lack of self control, except that Marmeladov's passion was liquor rather than gambling.3 O riginally intending to spend only the summer in Europe, Dostoevsky took steps not to lose his St. Petersburg apartment. Later he was to claim that he left Russia "with death in his soul,” but in point of fact he had evidently enjoyed his previous trips and was still unaware that actually living abroad without money would be a less pleasant experience than sim ply travelling. W hile in Western Europe, he had frequent occasion to meet with other Russian writers, among them Turgenev and Goncharov, both of whom loaned him money at the gambling tables, and Gertsen, who turned him down. Deeply devoted to Russian culture, Dostoevsky was dismayed to find only Russian liberals travelling in Europe. He saw them as slavishly aping everything European and arrogantly despising all things Russian. Turgenev, he claimed, actually agreed with the words of Potugin— a character in Turgenev's novel Sm oke— that if Russia were to disappear from the face of the earth, it would be no loss to humanity. Supposedly Turgenev told him that he considered him self a German, not a Russian, and was proud of it. For Dostoevsky, this was "crawling” on the part of a writer who had lost his talent while living abroad. The anti-establishm ent critic Vissarion Belinsky was for Dostoevsky a "foul insect” (smradnaya bukashka), not to mention other unprintable epithets. Other liberals fared no better in his correspondence. Dostoevsky was of two minds about Western Europeans, particularly the Germans and the Swiss, between whom he made few distinctions. W hile he was capable of admiring the Germans’ cheerful diligence, in his blacker moments they appeared to him as "base usurers, bastards, and cheaters” (that he wrote after having to pawn his watch), "bestial” in appearance, "stupid,” "self-satisfied,” "unbearable.” Even their theater was "boring.” They were, he wrote, "a dead people, without a future.” If anything, his perception of Switzerland was even less flattering. The Swiss, he wrote, were "foolish, stupid, worthless”; their "base republic” knew nothing but "political squabbling, pauperism, and mediocrity in everything”; and
■Lev Tolstoi was also no stranger to the gambling passion, but he w as so unlucky at the gaming tables in Baden-Baden in 1857 that he w as forced to shorten his stay and return home prematurely.
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they lived in filth and were on "a low stage of developm ent’ — a collection of drunkards, scoundrels, and thieves. In March 1868 he wrote to his friend and physician Stepan Yanovsky from Geneva: I ... w ill probably have to stay a few more m onths in boring, repulsive Geneva. Never in m y life have I seen anything more depressing, more gloomy, more absurd than this morose Protestant city. People d o n t live here, they serve a sentence a t hard labor. The republic (or, a t least, the city) has 50,000 inhabitants, and a ll o f them are divided into political factions. In the newspapers and magazines each tries to bite and chew upon his enemy. Besides that, things are very expensive. B ut you would probably give away everything you possess sim ply not to find yourself here on Sunday. The church bells ring sullenly in the m orning and by afternoon the drunkenness sets in. How depressing the local craftsmen are — glum, filthy, ignorantl A nd there are a lo t o f them. I swear to you that they earn a good salary; they could set p a rt o f it aside, even a lot. B ut a ll these people g e t drunk like swine and drink up their entire wage. A ll night I hear their horrible songs, wails, and shouting under m y windows. It's a real hell. But things were not much rosier elsewhere. Paris was expensive and dusty. From Florence (I) he wrote that living there was worse than his Siberian exile, for at least in Siberia "there were Russians and the homeland, without which I cannot live.” Again and again Dostoevsky's correspondence refers to his fear of debtor's prison; he even weighs in his mind whether imprisonment would not provide him with literary material, and whether his health could withstand the shock. W ithout Russia, he writes over and over, he is depressed, feels isolated, and cannot write. But it is in Western Europe that he conceives the plot of Crime and Punishm ent (after losing at the casino in W iesbaden), and also The Brothers Karamazov — a work which he believes will make all his previous writings seem worthless, but which can be written only in Russia. And it is in Western Europe that he writes The Idiot (1868) and most of The Possessed (1872). Dostoevsky was not the only Russian to live abroad for fear of debtor's prison. Nikita Vsevolozhsky (1799-1862), who founded the first Green Lamp Society in 1819, had done the same, but ended up in a foreign debtor's prison anyway. Another was Nikolai Sazonov (see below). Spanish culture had been a popular exotic topic for Russian writers in the late 1830s and early 1840s, but it was Vasily Botkin (1811-1869) who, after travelling to Spain in 1845, described that country in a vivid, realistic fashion in his Letters On Spain (Pis’ma ob Ispanii), published in the journal Sovrem ennik (The Contemporary). His
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descriptions of the graceful Spanish women and their hospitable, generous, and fiery men, the innate democracy of Spanish society (at least, as perceived by Botkin), the great variety of cultures co-existing in Spain of the day, bullfights, cockfights, and the charm of Andalusian music are all presented with a sense of history and understanding. Virtually the only aspect of Spanish life to find his disfavor was olive oil, the taste of which he carped about repeatedly. Botkin was a moderate liberal at the tim e he composed his sketches, but after the Polish rebellion of 1863, he became a political conservative. Since his views met with hostility from the radical generation of the 1860s, he was so com pletely forgotten that Pavel Annenkov even had to remind readers who Botkin was when writing his obituary.
Diplomats M ay the pens o f the diplom ats no t m in again what the people have attained with such exertions. Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher A fte r the Battle o f Waterloo (1815) Official government agents abroad form a group midway between "travellers” and "expatriates,” and Russian literature has been immeasurably enriched by their contributions. In filing reports (stateinye spiski) of their experiences and observations, Russian diplom ats were haughty and contemptuous of what they saw, and as individuals did not generally create a favorable impression. And their com patriots back in Moscow (the "Third Rome”) were little inclined to travel or even to send their own children abroad for fear of contamination and desertion to the sinful W est. After the fall of Constantinople, the Russian Church in its new role as the protector of Christendom began to assert itself in the Holy Land, among other things by making a donation to restore the Holy Sepulchre. Encouraged by this generosity, Patriarch Joachim of Alexandria and Archbishop Makarios of Sinai sent a mission to Ivan the Terrible which reached Moscow in January 1558. The emissaries told of a miracle experienced by Patriarch Joachim: to prove his faith the Patriarch had to drink a goblet of poison; he did so with no effect to his person except that his teeth and hair fell out. When, however, he filled the goblet with pure water and gave it to the Jews to drink, the sinful Hebrews disintegrated into small fragments. Hoping that they had properly impressed the Tsar with this story, the emissaries then w ent on to request that he make a donation to renovate the Sinai Monastery.
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Ivan responded by sending his own mission to the Holy Land; among the mission members was the Moscow merchant Vasily Poznyakov. The mission lasted from 1558 to 1561, and Poznyakov's report was not preserved. Nevertheless a stateinyi spisok has survived that was in all probability based on Poznyakov's narrative. The delegation was received by Joachim, who intimated to them that he hoped the Russians would liberate the Holy Land from the Turks, referring to a Greek prophecy that Constantinople would be conquered by "an Orthodox Eastern king.” He also told them that St. Nicholas had appeared to the Turkish Sultan in a dream and threatened him with death if he carried out his intention to convert the St. Nicholas Church in Cairo into a bathhouse. Much of the rest of the document is a traditional pilgrim age description, but with mention of Arabs lurking in ambush for the unwary Russian travellers. The Poznyakov-based text was later reworked and passed off as having been written by Deacon Trifon Korobeinikov after his first trip in 1582. This so-called "pseudo-Korobeinikov” text was to become very popular and is found in many manuscripts. During the 18th and 19th centuries it was published over and over. Korobeinikov was a real person who actually was sent by Ivan the Terrible in 1582 to hand out charitable contributions in the Holy Land on the occasion of the birth of Ivan's daughter. Not surprisingly, Joachim himself benefitted handsomely from the Tsar's generosity, which took the form of Hungarian guldens and furs. Mindful that the Tsar was a harsh taskmaster, Korobeinikov was careful to document rigorously the money and pelts that he handed out. Peter the Great's famous journey to the W est in 1697-98, encompassing the Baltic states (which were not yet a part of the Russian Empire), Germany, Holland, and England and was chiefly designed to absorb Western technology. It was a pivotal event for later Russian visits to the West. Fearing a coup d'état in his absence, Pêtr ordered persons of power in the government to make sure that they, too, were out of the country on foreign trips during his absence. One such traveller was that same Pêtr Tolstoi (1645-1729), mentioned above. A courtier with the rank of stol'nik, he understood that great changes were at hand. On the instructions of the Tsar, he visited Poland, Florence, Venice, Milan, Naples, the Vatican, Dubrovnik, Sicily, and Malta. Tolstoi’s notes, devoted largely to Italy, were probably intended to serve as a travel guide for the Tsar. Tolstoi learned Italian and was able to get along without an interpreter. The travel genre was well established by that time, and Tolstoi was personally acquainted with such pilgrim writers as Luk'yanov, Ignat'ev, Vishensky, and Lenitsky. Tolstoi's diary was intended as an objective description of his observations and demonstrates an initially grudging but ever increasing
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admiration for the West. The following passage, describing a scene in Venice, gives an impression of the colorful manner of the work: During the fair the squares contain m any wooden booths set up for trade; they had all m anner o f wonderful and rich goods. A t that time o f year honest people, their wives, and girls in splendid costumes stroll past the booths. A ll sorts o f travellers in fine clothing also wander about, purchasing whatever they need either a t the fa ir o r a t the carnival. On the seaward side o f the same square there are sheds and even great buildings where people dance on ropes — men and wom en! Girls too! It's amazing. I saw one woman so pregnant she was on the verge o f giving birth, and even she did an astonishing dance. In other buildings they p u t on plays with dolls that are ju s t like live people. A nd in still other buildings you see incredible things. I saw a man with two heads, one in its proper place. His name was Jacob. The other head, which was on the side and was called Matthew, had long hair, eyes, a nose, mouth, and teeth. It couldn't talk o r eat, but would ju s t look around from time to time, and they say it could even hiss. B ut he uses his real head to talk, eat, and drink. B ut if anyone truly wants to know about him, he has to see his person, o f which we have not a few in Russia, and take the trouble to visit Italy. There I saw a bull with five legs, a huge turtle, a twoheaded sheep that had six legs and two tails, and m any naturally occurring wonderful things. A nd whoever wants to see a ll that has to pay m oney — four soldi p e r person in Venetian money, which is three M oscow d en 'g a (V A kopeks). From 1702 to 1714 Tolstoi was the first perm anent Russian ambassador to the Ottoman empire. When Pêtr's son Aleksei fled abroad, supposedly in hopes of staging a coup against his father with the aid of foreign troops, it was Tolstoi whom the Tsar charged with returning him and, later, with carrying out the imperial order to torture the young man, who died before he could be executed. After Pêtr's death Tolstoi feared that Aleksei's son would assume the throne and take vengeance on the man whose name was ninth among those who signed Aleksei's death warrant. Together with Aleksandr Men'shikov, a collaborator in the Tsar's reforms, Tolstoi used the palace guards to put Pêtr's widow on the throne. In the subsequent struggle for power, Tolstoi lost out to Men'shikov and was imprisoned in the Solovki Monastery together with his son, where both died. Not surprisingly, Men'shikov himself fell victim to the same complex palace intrigues and was exiled to Siberia. He died the same year as Tolstoi. Even after Tolstoi’s death, however, the genes of this early Russian w riter
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lived on in his relatives, who include Pètr Chaadaev, Konstantin Leont'ev, Vladim ir Odoevsky, Aleksandr Pushkin, Aleksei Konstantinovich Tolstoi, Lev Tolstoi, Fëdor Tyutchev, and Dmitry Venevitinov, among others. The naval officer and diplom at Ivan Neplyuev (1693-1773) was sent to Venice to study sailing and navigation, where he took part in the 1717-18 naval campaigns against Turkey. The years 1721 -35 were spent in Constantinople as the Russian Resident. Suspected of com plicity in a coup, Neplyuev was sent into a sort of internal exile as adm inistrator of the huge Orenburg Territory, east of the Volga, from 1742 to 1758. His eyesight eventually failed, and he retired to write his memoirs. In 1731 the Empress Anna Ivanovna appointed the poet Antiokh Kantemir (1708-1744) ambassador to England. One of the founders of Russian Classicism and satirical poetry, Kantemir used his tim e to write satires influenced by Boileau, and to a lesser degree by Pope and Locke. He became such an Anglophile that, upon his death in France, a French diplom at wrote an epitaph claiming that he was "more English than those born in London." Aleksandr Griboedov (1790-1829) lived the merry life of a young aristocrat, enjoying ballerinas, cards, and liquor until 1817, when he participated as a second in a duel between Count A. P. Zavadovsky and a cavalry officer, V. V. Sheremet'ev, over the ballet dancer Avdot'ya Istomina. Istomina had been living with Sheremet'ev, but had left him following a quarrel. When Griboedov brought her to Zavadovsky's apartm ent after a performance, Sheremet'ev challenged Zavadovsky, while Sheremet'ev's friend, A. I. Yakubovich, challenged Griboedov. Sherem et'ev died from the wound he received, and the Griboedov-Yakubovich duel was postponed when Yakubovich was exiled to army service in the Caucasus. At the tim e Petersburg society was a small club where everyone knew everyone, and Griboedov was blamed for the tragic consequences. Supposedly at the insistence of his mother, Griboedov left for Tiflis (Tbilisi), and the second duel actually took place on October 23 ,18 18 . Yakubovich shot Griboedov in the hand and the affair of honor was considered over. In what may well have been a sort of exile ordered by the Tsar, Griboedov alm ost im m ediately accepted the position of secretary of the diplom atic mission in Persia (he was given the option of going to America). The fruits of his travels were his Travel Notes and the plan for Woe from Wit, a comedy satirizing society and written according to the "rules" of French classicism. Griboedov returned home in 1822 and in 1825 was fortunate to be sent to the Caucasus and thus to be absent during the doomed Decembrist coup. In 1828 Griboedov returned to Teheran as m inister plenipotentiary with his wife, a Georgian princess 17 years his
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junior. But here Griboedov's luck failed him. Somehow the embassy detained two women from the harem of the Shah's son-in-law, and one of the Shah's eunuchs, who had secretly converted to Christianity, asked the Russians for asylum. Relations between Russia and Persia had been strained, and a religious riot broke out, possibly instigated by British diplomats. With the exception of the prose w riter Ivan M al'tsov (1807-1880), who had been living in a separate apartment, the entire Russian mission in Teheran was wiped out, and Griboedov's mangled body could be recognized only by the hand injured in the duel with Yakubovich. His pregnant wife, whom he had left behind in Tabriz, gave birth prematurely, and the baby died. On a narrow mountain pass Pushkin described how he met a cart carrying Griboedov's body to Tbilisi to be buried there rather than in Persia, a country which he had come to despise. A Russian poet who spent some 22 years abroad was Fêdor Tyutchev (1803-1873). A member of the Russian diplom atic mission from 1822 to 1837 in Munich, Tyutchev was transferred to Turin after a scandalous affair with a married woman. After being fired in 1837 from the diplom atic service for leaving his post without permission (again because of a woman), he stayed on in Europe until 1844, but ran out of money. These years spent in Russian embassy circles, following a privileged, idyllic childhood, together with a professed religious mysticism strongly expressed in his verse, form ed political views quite different from those of his contemporaries back home who attem pted the Decembrist uprising of 1825. Having received the personal approval of police chief Aleksandr Benkendorf and Nikolai I for his Slavophile (actually, pro-Russian imperialist) articles, this pillar of the political establishment was reinstated in governm ent service and appointed censor in 1848. In 1858, under Aleksandr II, he was appointed Chairman of the Committee on Foreign Censorship — a post he retained until his death. Tyutchev explicitly rejected the glorification of the W est so popular among his contemporaries. In one unpublished poem he wrote: The more liberal, the more tawdry! Civilization is their fetish, B ut its very idea is beyond them. No m atter how you bow and scrape Before Europe, gentlemen, You'll find no recognition from her. In her eyes you remain not the servants o f enlightenment, B ut its lackeys. Tyutchev, who was acquainted with so many of the luminaries of contem porary Western civilization, was twice married to Bavarian
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noblewomen and wrote polished essays in French. He used Russian to recreate German nocturnal poetry, invoking an image of the chaotic reality of night which is masked over by the false serenity of day. He was later championed by the Symbolists, who used a line from one of his verse as a poetic slogan: "A thought expressed is a lie.” A refined pillar of monarchy and Orthodoxy, Konstantin Leont'ev (1831-1891) began his literary career by writing plays that were rejected by the censor but ultimately himself worked as a censor from 1880 to 1887.a Leont'ev had abandoned his career as a surgeon in 1860 to take up writing for journals and newspapers. In 1864 he went to work for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and was sent abroad to serve in Crete and the Balkans, then part of the Turkish empire. For nearly ten years he pursued that career in Greek and Slavic provinces of the Turkish empire, then worked as a foreign correspondent for Mikhail Katkov's Russkii Vestnik (The Russian Herald), taking out a year to spend on Mount Athos during a severe personal crisis. The literary fruits of his years abroad were a three-volume cycle of fiction entitled From the Life o f Christians in Turkey. Leont'ev was also active as a literary critic, anticipating some of the later writings of the Russian Formalists, and opposing the utilitarianism of contemporary critics. In his role of philosopher, he preached a cyclical theory of history that foreshadowed the views of Oswald Spengler, and predicted that the "idle games” (balovstvo) being engaged in by chemists and physicists would destroy the world and that any revolution would rapidly be transform ed into organized torture. Leont'ev was hostile to liberalism, democracy, and bourgeois-egalitarian progress, and saw Byzantinism as the only hope for Russia to ward off the coming Untergang of civilization. Leont'ev is also particularly known for his paradoxical style of thought. In 1891 he took monastic vows. Not all Russian diplomats abroad were enthusiastic supporters of the regime. Prince Pêtr Kozlovsky (1783-1840), who made his debut as a poet but later switched to such topics as steam machines and the
•Tyutchev and Leont'ev w ere not the only expatriate writers to serve as tsarist censors. Another form er ém igré poet to perform that function was Ivan Born (17781851). The poet and critic Prince Pêtr Vyazem sky (1792-1878), who lived almost exclusively abroad for the last fifteen years of his life, even headed up the office of the censor from 1856 to 1858. After returning from his interrupted round-theworld voyage with Admiral Putyatin, the novelist Ivan Goncharov (1812-1891) also worked in this profession. And there w as also Petr Kapnist (1830-1898), a poet and playwright who spent the last three decades of his life in W estern Europe.
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theory of probability, allowed himself to be openly contem ptuous of Russia, at least as quoted by the Marquis de Custine3: The auspicious influence o f the crusaders stopped in Poland, as did Catholicism..... Peter the G reat ... destroyed the patriarchy so as to unite on his head the m onk's hood and the crown.....The Papal m edieval chimera has been realized today in an empire o f 60 m illion persons, the m ajority o f whom are im perturbable Asians not a t a ll troubled by the fact that their Tsar is the G reat Lama. Strangely enough, Nikolai I permitted this convert to Catholicism to spend 36 of the last 37 years abroad as a diplom at. Kozlovsky also maintained a friendship with Fèdor Tyutchev — a circumstance which makes one question the sincerity of Tyutchev's pro-regime views. Kozlovsky was also friendly with Heine, to whom he confessed that he was less than enthusiastic about ever returning to Russia. Regrettably, only fragments of Kozlovsky's memoirs tia v e been preserved.
Expatriates Twas for the good o f m y country that I should be abroad — Anything fo r the good o f one's country — I'm a Roman for that. George Farquhar, 1706 The female woman is one o f the greatest institooshuns o f which this land can boste. Charles Farrar Browne (Artemus Ward) 1834-1867 Prior to the Soviet period many Russian writers travelled freely back and forth, publishing their artistic works in Russia, and any alienation from the Russian tradition experienced by 18th- and 19thcentury Russian expatriate writers was certainly of a far lesser magnitude than that experienced by the three "waves” of Soviet exiles. Now that the Soviet empire and "exile” itself no longer exist, Russia's
“Not only did the Russian censors ban Custine's four-volume description of his 1839 trip through Russia, which described the country as an Asiatic, barbaric, and profoundly vicious society, they made it illegal even to discuss the work. Gertsen, on the other hand, declared that it was the best description of Russia ever penned by a foreigner!
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expatriates find themselves in much the same situation as Turgenev or Gogol' in the 19th century. Curiously, however, the word '’expatriate” is only now being introduced into the Russian language. The number of Russian expatriates was greatly increased by the emancipation of the serfs in 1861. Estate owners abruptly lost their slaves, but then discovered themselves burdened with radically fewer oversight obligations. Compensated for the loss of their human property with government-issue five-percent bonds and totally fascinated by French culture (a feeling that appears to have been decidedly less than mutual on the part of the French), as many as 20,000 Russians converted the bonds to cash at ruinous discounts and set off for Paris, creating a lively Russian colony in that city, where they frequented cafés, restaurants, theaters, and balls. The women spent no small amounts of cash on Parisian fashions, while the men favored gam bling and French ladies. So many Russians arrived in Paris that the Russian embassy refused to have virtually anything to do with them. After a tim e their money would run out and these Slavic francophiles discovered they had no credit and could not afford even a ticket home; out of desperation or greed, Russian confidence artists became a veritable scourge of émigré society. This expatriate group was described as totally idle and vacuous in a book which appeared in St. Petersburg in 1881 entitled Russkaya tlya za granitsei, which can be translated as either "The Russian ‘Rot’ or 'Plant Louse’ Abroad.” But it was not only France that drew Russians. Born in Turin, Zinaida Volkonskaya (1789-1862) spent most of her life outside Russia. A member of high society, she wrote romantic tales and verse, and also composed musical plays in which she herself sang. Her romantic, sem i-autobiographical tale "Laura” is written in French, but she also wrote in Italian and Russian, although as an adult she had to work on her Russian, in which she was not entirely at home. Rumored to be Aleksandr I's mistress (with the silent consent of an indifferent husband intent on forging a diplom atic career as a close aide to the Tsar), she would undoubtedly have spent even less tim e in Russia than she eventually did, were it not for Aleksandr's letters to her virtually demanding that she return. Volkonskaya converted to Catholicism and established a literary salon in Rome. It was at her villa that Gogol' wrote much of his Dead Souls, and it was in Rome that she died, reputedly having caught pneumonia after giving her fur coat to a shivering fem ale beggar. One woman writer whose literary career definitely suffered as a result of emigration was the translator, poet, and novelist Karolina Pavlova (maiden name: Jänisch, 1807-1893). When she was only 20, she met the fam ous Polish poet Adam Mickiewicz in Volkonskaya's salon. Mickiewicz was asked to tutor Pavlova in Polish, and the
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lessons led to what was evidently a rather tepid proposal of marriage. Pavlova's rich uncle, however, who eventually left her his fortune, was opposed to the union, and the indifferent Mickiewicz departed from Russia, leaving his would-be fiancée behind. Pavlova first left Russia (but not the Russian Empire) in 1853, when her father died of cholera in St. Petersburg. She was so terrified that she left for Dorpat (Derpt) in Livonia without waiting for the burial. There, at the age of 46, she fell in love with a 21-year-old student and future writer, Nikolai Pavlov, and followed him when he returned to Russia. After her uncle's death, she married Pavlov, who later confessed he had agreed to the union only because of her money, which he then proceeded to squander on gambling. Once the doomed relationship fell apart, she left Russia in 1856 to live nearly another 40 years in Dresden, bereft of her inherited fortune. In Dresden she met the poet and playwright Aleksei Konstantinovich Tolstoi, who secured a pension for her from the Russian government. Pavlova's literary production abroad ïs relatively modest. Her only novel, A Double Life (Dvoinaya zhizn'), written while still in Russia, tells of a woman locked into a meaningless life and marriage. She also composed verse in German and French with mixed results. With the advent of fem inist studies her person has begun to attract the attention of several scholars.3
•Russian literature in Russia and even more so Russian literature abroad represent a largely m ale tradition. The overwhelming number of writers in the glossary to this volume are men. One thinks of Lev Tolstoi's w ife raising a large fam ily, managing a huge estate, and copying out W ar and P eace over and over again. There was precious little opportunity for writing in such a schedule. Moreover, Russia's talented wom en have displayed an incredible willingness to sacrifice for the sake of their husbands. W hen the Decembrists w ere packed off to Siberia, their wives followed them . For better or worse, many Russian wom en have seen them selves more as their husband's mates and helpers rather than as creative individuals in their own right. V era Bunina wrote in a letter to the ém igré critic Aleksandr Bakhrakh: ...it is now almost thirty-three years since I rejected the life I would have liked to lead and linked my life with that of Ivan Alekseevich [Bunin], who is a very original person. For twelve years [underlined by Bunina] I lived together with him in great spiritual nearness, attempting to fuse our desires and aspirations into one, but when I understood that this w as impossible I began to search out other paths. W hy is this impossible? If you have read Lika, you will find an answer there. O f course, I am not Lika, and he is not totally Arsen'ev, but if a wom an does not live through the ambition and other pleasant creative sides of the creative person, but wants a response to her own inner life, longs for attention to her own personality, she will not receive it from the creative person. For such a person is greedy, he never gets enough, he likes only to take from others, and gives of himself only in his art, and not in life.
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Vasily Zhukovsky (1783-1852), who began his writing career with a free rendering of Thomas Gray's "Elegy in a Country Churchyard,” was one of Russia's most distinguished translators. He did a number of im itations of the ballads of German poets, including Goethe and Schiller, and translated Byron's "The Prisoner of Chillon.” His m ajor effort, however, was his translation of The Odyssey, done in Germany, where he spent the last 13 years of his life. There he had earlier met with Goethe on more or less equal terms and was a friend and patron of the romantic painter C. D. Friedrich. Actually his German connection went back to earlier roots, in Dorpat, where the university was German. In Russia he was even criticized for being "too German.” W hile he played a major role in introducing Russia to Western literature and was, of course, a m ajor poet in his own right, he himself once stated: "Everything I have ever written is either taken from others or based on their work.” In the long run, Zhukovsky's greatest influence was outside the area of poetry — in the liberal upbringing of future Tsar Aleksandr II, to whom he was tutor. Nikolai Gogol' (1809-1852) was also an expatriate, but one who not only was not disgruntled with the tsarist regime, but even supported it enthusiastically. Gogol' left for Europe in 1836 and made only three trips home before finally returning in 1848. His immediate stim ulus for leaving Russia was the negative reception of his play The Inspector General. This comic play, which depicts a small town with a corrupt adm inistration, was pronounced a "stupid farce” by Prince Chernyshëv, the Minister of W ar; Count Fëdor Tolstoi declared the author to be an "enemy of Russia”; and the novelist Ivan Lazhechnikov (1790-1869) told Belinsky he would not give a kopeck to have written it. Equally unpleasant to the young author was the ecstatic praise heaped upon him by those attacking the government. GogoC’s response was to burn his bridges behind him: I am going abroad to slough o ff the anguish heaped upon me daily by m y contemporaries. A contem porary writer, a com ic writer, a w riter who wishes to describe the mores o f his society, m ust live as far as possible from his native land. From Hamburg he wrote to Zhukovsky: Providence, which has sent me everything from above for m y education, has rem oved me from m y fatherland. This is a great breaking point, an epochal event in m y life. I know that I will encounter much that is unpleasant, that I will suffer poverty and need, but nothing in the world can make me return soon. I shall rem ain on alien s o il— as long as possible. A nd although m y name, m y efforts will belong to Russia, I and m y m ortal flesh w ill rem ain rem oved from her.
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It was a promise he was to keep. Gogol' remained largely indifferent to the literary life of Western Europe and was often contem ptuous of W estern civilization. Still, he felt he could w rite best about Russia from a distance. W ithin a month he wrote another letter to Zhukovsky: God has taken me under his wing and worked a m iracle in giving me a warm, sunny apartm ent; I am in bliss. Dead Souls is m oving along much better than in Vevey, and I am overwhelm ed by the feeling o f still being in Russia. I see before me our landowners, our officials, our officers, ou r peasants, our huts — in a word, the whole o f Orthodox Russia. I c a n t help but laugh when I think I am writing Dead Souls in Paris. It was not long, however, before he became more than a little jaundiced about Paris. As for Germany, it was "nothing more than the foul-sm elling belch of the most revolting tobacco and the most disgusting beer." Italy, however, struck him quite differently. The longer he lived there, the more enchanted he became with the country and the more disenchanted with Russia; in a letter to the historian and journalist Nikolai Pogodin he wrote that there was "no life in Russia for gentle people. Only pigs live there.” Paradoxically, however, the same Gogol' who so often reviled Russia and was loath even to visit the country wrote entirely about that country, showing little evidence that his stay abroad essentially influenced his writing. When in September 1839 his mother and sisters found themselves in serious financial straits, Gogol' was depressed over being compelled to return home for even a few months to make arrangements for their future. He wrote to literary historian and poet Stepan Shevyrêv: Can it really be that I am going to Russia? I find it hard to believe. I fear fo r m y health. I've become unaccustom ed to the cold; w ill I be able to endure it? ... B ut much as I dislike it, I have to go. GogoC’s attitude did not change after spending a few months in Russia; he wrote once more to Pogodin: Oh, fo r the sake o f God and everything that is sacred, g e t me out o f here to Rome, that m y soul m ay be able to relax. I shall perish here. The popularity among liberals and radicals of Gogol' the expatriate immediately collapsed when his Selected Passages from a Correspondence with Friends appeared. In these letters, which he later
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regretted having published, he proposed a spiritual transformation of Russia through strict observance of morality, religion, and obedience to the State. Belinsky's famous rejoinder to Gogol' is actually an expatriate document, having been composed in Salzbrunn and sent to Gogol' in Frankfurt: Preacher o f the knut, apostle o f ignorance, champion o f obscurantism, a panegyrist o f barbarism, what are you doing? Look a t your feet. You are standing a t the edge o f an abyss. How could you, the author o f The Inspector General and Dead Souls, begin singing hymns to the glory o f the disgusting Russian clergy, setting it even higher than the Catholic priesthood? I rem em ber even now how you present the idea that education is not necessary for the people, is actually harm ful to it, as some great and unarguable truth. M ay your Byzantine God forgive you that Byzantine thoughtl ... The public looks to Russian authors as its sole guides, defenders, saviors from Russian Autocracy and Orthodoxy. That is why it is always ready to forgive an author for writing a bad book; but it w ill never forgive him for writing a pernicious one. If you love Russia, you ought to jo in me in rejoicing a t the failure o f your book.... It is not the truth o f Christian doctrine that can be found in your book, but rather a m orbid fear o f death, the devil, and hell.... One enthusiastic adm irer and close personal friend of Belinsky's was Ivan Turgenev (1818-1883), who adopted Belinsky's letter as his "religion.” Born into a wealthy land-owning family, Turgenev was accustomed to travel in Western Europe from early childhood. His life almost ended at the age of four in Berne, when he nearly fell into the fam ous bear pit but was saved by his father, who caught hold of him just in the nick of time. W hile still a student at Moscow University, he was nicknamed "the American" for his democratic, W estern sympathies and especially his enthusiasm for the United States of America. His other main student enthusiasm was for an idealism modelled on that of Schelling. Turgenev's political views were formed in large part as a reaction against the cruel manner in which his mother treated her serfs. On one occasion, for example, she had a gardener flogged for failing to prevent the plucking of a tulip. Turgenev wrote in the introduction to his reminiscences that not only was there nothing to keep him in Russia, but, on the contrary, almost everything he saw aroused in him a feeling of embarrassment, indignation, and disgust: I hated the very a ir I breathed, I could not live side by side with what I abom inated; I daresay I did not possess sufficient strength o f character for that. I had to p u t a certain distance
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between m yself and m y enem y so as to be able to attack him more effectively. In m y eyes this enem y had a clearly defined form and bore a fam iliar nam e: serfdom. In this nam e was concentrated everything I had made up m y m ind to fight — everything with which I swore never to become reconciled. That was m y Hannibal's oath; and I was not the only one to take it a t the time. I went to Western Europe so as to be able to carry it out. Turgenev was later to maintain that he never would have written Diary o f a Sportsman if he had remained in Russia, just as Gogol' said he never would have written Dead Souls if he had not left Russia. As soon as he learned of revolutionary disturbances in France in 1848, he immediately hurried from Brussels to Paris to observe the events. When his mother demanded that he return home, he refused and was cut off without funds for two years. Finally back in Russia in 1852, he was arrested for having circumvented censorship rules and, unofficially, for his friendship with the émigrés Gertsen and Bakunin. Ordered by Tsar Nikolai I to live on his estate, he was not perm itted to travel abroad again for four years. Turgenev purchased a house in Baden-Baden, and it was there that he wrote the novel Smoke (Dym) in 1867, having selected the title to symbolize the futility of human effort in Russia, which disappears w ithout a trace — like a puff of smoke. In it both Russian revolutionary students and conservatives were subjected to merciless satire. The novel was seen as so unpatriotic that the English Club in Petersburg even wanted to exclude Turgenev from membership. Turgenev maintained friendships with many of the luminaries of the W estern world, including Flaubert, George Sand, Zola, and Henry James, but his impression of the French literary scene was a gloom y one. He described French literary life as petty, prosaic, hollow, void of talent, impotent, lacking any conviction, artistic or otherwise, and in a state of moral decay. But even though he disliked Paris, he lived for long periods in the city. And while he romanticized his estate of Spasskoe, he ultim ately chose to lodge in a few small rooms in the house of his friends, Pauline Viardot and her husband, rather than in his ancestral home. On June 17, 1870, he wrote that "it is alm ost impossible to write Russian stories while living abroad — die Fühlung (the feeling) is lost.” But in January 1873 he wrote that he did not live in Russia because it was "the fatal thing (in the sense of fatum and not of fatality).” Another close friend of the Viardots was Elena Apreleva, who wrote under the pen name "Ardov.” She studied in Geneva in the early 1870s and later wrote one of her first stories while a guest in the Viardot home. A sort of George Sand of Russian literature, she wrote
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about passion and tragic love. Turgenev assisted her in getting one of her novels published — G uilty W ithout G uilt (Bez viny vinovatye). She died in Belgrade in 1923. In 1833 the 26-year-old idealist Vladim ir Pecherin (1807-1885) was sent to Europe to continue his education, chiefly at German universities, as a future professor of classical philology. W hat he saw in the W est only strengthened his form er rejection of his homeland, which he believed could be reborn only by first being destroyed. Mixed feelings of love and hate for Russia are nothing new, and for Pecherin this was a destruction which he found "sweet” to observe. In 1835 he went back to Russia, only to leave within a year, never to return. He had wanted to live in Paris, which he saw as the "new Jerusalem,” but the French authorities granted him only a transit visa. In Belgium Pecherin converted to Catholicism and in 1840 became a monk in the Redem ptorist Order, which is dedicated to serving the poorest of the poor. As a young man he had written verse, but later he was to tell Aleksandr Gertsen that he viewed his own poems the way a recovered patient would look upon his form er illness. Stationed in Rome in 1858, he was repelled by the luxury of the Vatican, and in 1861 left the monastery (although he remained a Catholic priest), feeling that he had wasted the best 20 years of his life. Pecherin considered returning to Russia after Aleksandr II assumed the throne in 1855, and the possibility of his return was even debated in the Russian press by the journalist Mikhail Katkov and the historian Mikhail Pogodin. Katkov, who later was to become a political conservative, favored Pecherin's coming home, while the nationalist Pogodin feared his proselytizing skills. Hoping to influence events in Russia, Pecherin wrote an autobiography: Notes from Beyond the Grave (Zamogil'nye zapiski). Russian censors refused to perm it its publication and it finally appeared only in 1932 in Moscow. The last 23 years of his life were spent as a Catholic priest in a Dublin hospital. Just before his death Pecherin wrote that he believed God's invisible hand had guided him throughout his life and asked that the words of Pope Gregory VII (Hildebrand) be inscribed on his tom bstone: "Dilexi justitiam et odivi iniquitatem et propter ea morior in exilio” (I have loved justice and abominated lawlessness, and thus I die in exile). Despite his request, Pecherin's tombstone is inscribed only with his name. Among the 35,000 persons discussed in the Soviet literary encyclopedia he is not mentioned. Another expatriate to become a Catholic priest was the diarist and theologian Ivan Gagarin (1814-1882), who had lived three years abroad with his fam ily as a child and spent most of 1833-1842 as a Russian diplom at. Having resigned from the Diplomatic Corps, he expatriated in 1843 and entered the Society of Jesus as a novice.
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Gagarin had gone through several ideological metamorphoses as a young man. Although he belonged to a wealthy fam ily that may have owned thousands of serfs, he was vehem ently opposed to that institution. For a tim e he espoused views strikingly sim ilar to those of Chaadaev and sympathized with revolutionary thinking, but he became frightened by the prospect of violence in Russia and concluded that the Eastern Church should be reunited with Rome under the leadership of the Pope so as to guarantee the Russian Church's independence and make revolution impossible. One of his books, all of which remained largely unnoticed in Russia, was entitled: La Russie sera-t-elle catholique? The tsarist governm ent took a decidedly dim view of his activities and in 1853 he was tried and convicted in absentia for having converted to Catholicism and for being abroad without permission. After his m other's death he applied for permission to visit his father, but the old man evidently presented his own counter-petition, asking that the son's request be denied. Gagarin was a good friend of Tyutchev, and he was the source of a selection of the latter's verse published in Sovrem ennik (The Contemporary). Russian criticism was well represented in W estern Europe. Pavel Annenkov (1812 or 1813-1887) lived abroad during much of the 1830s and 1840s, and settled there permanently in the mid-1860s. An early adm irer of GogoC's, he actually rented a room next to GogoC's in Rome in 1841 and served as his scribe for the first volum e of Dead Souls. Subsequently, he described his impressions in Letters from Abroad and Travel Notes. Still later, in his Parisian Letters, he was to recreate the atmosphere of French literary life as represented by Dumas, Sand, and Balzac. A close friend of Belinsky and a proW esternizer, Annenkov was nevertheless more sym pathetic to the artfor-art's sake position than to the Belinsky-ChernyshevskyDobrolyubov-Pisarev ''utilitarian” group. But he was at Belinsky's side when the latter wrote his fam ous denunciatory letter to Gogol'. Annenkov devoted his later years to literary and political memoirs of Belinsky, Stankevich, Bakunin, Gogol', and Turgenev, among others. He died in Dresden. One of the most productive, although later largely forgotten, Russian 19th-century expatriate authors was Pêtr Boborykin (18361921). Boborykin travelled in W estern Europe from 1865 to 1871 and after 1914 again lived chiefly abroad. He is the author of nearly two dozen novels and an enormous quantity of short stories, plays, memoirs, and literary criticism. Proficient in a number of languages, he was also active as a translator and scholar. Boborykin wrote chiefly about contem porary life, following the practice of his French model, Émile Zola (although he disagreed with Zola's biological determ inism ). This once well-known writer, who introduced the word "intelligentsia”
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in Russian, died in Lugano, Switzerland, and was not republished in Russia until the mid-1960s. His wife S ofya (1845-1925) abandoned her stage career for him and herself became a writer of prose and plays. Elena Blavatskaya (1831 -1891 ) was certainly an independent and fascinating woman. A t the age of 16 she married a 42-year old man (who she later claimed was 70 at the time) and then left him to travel about Africa, North and South America, Egypt, India, and China. During stays at home she founded an ink factory and opened an artificial flower store. In 1872 she unsuccessfully proffered her services to the tsarist police (the so-called Third Section [Trete Otdelenie]) as a polyglot international agent. In 1873 she travelled to the United States, where she obtained American citizenship and founded a theosophical society with the goal of discovering the lost forces of nature and developing a universal religion. In 1879 she established a theosophical society in Bombay and until 1884 stayed in India, which she viewed as the cradle of civilization. In the meantime her form er colleagues accused her of practicing fraud in her seances. Blavatskaya wrote verse and published in English a collection of stories entitled The Nightm are Tales. B lavatskaya influenced the o ccu lt no velist V era Kryzhanovskaya (1857-1924), who had been fascinated with ancient history and mysticism ever since childhood and as an adult participated in seances as a medium. Kryzhanovskaya lived in W estern Europe in the 1880s and 1890s, supposedly writing only in French in a coma-like state and later translating her creations into Russian. Her readers were chiefly women interested in spiritism and magic. The background of her novels was usually that of an exotic antiquity, with an adventureoriented plot intended to catch the attention of the mass reader. Politically a conservative, Kryzhanovskaya wanted to save the world from an atheism created by Masons, liberals, and humanists. The Jews, she wrote, had corrupted the people and achieved power by accum ulating money. The destruction of world civilization would commence when the Chinese destroyed them, triggering the end of everything living on the planet, and a resurrection would be achieved only through the efforts of a group of immortal magicians. Such books were hardly consistent with the ideology of Bol'shevism, and Kryzhanovskaya emigrated to Estonia after the October coup. Penniless, she died in Tallinn after working in a tim ber mill for two years.
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Another woman w riter fascinated by the occult was Aleksandra Moiseeva, who took the pseudonym Miré» (1874-1913). As a young woman Moiseeva had joined a troupe of wandering actors travelling the Volga River circuit. In frequent contact with revolutionaries, she was arrested several tim es and then placed under police surveillance. Finally perm itted to leave Russia in 1897, she left for Europe but suffered from alcoholism and was afflicted by hallucinations. In Paris she continued to lead the bohemian life, posing for artists, and at one point was even sold by a lover. Colorful as her life was, she created quite the opposite impression on contemporaries — that of a reticent, even shy person. Her two major works, Life (Zhizn') and The Black Panther (Chërnaya pantera), were published after her return to Russia. Part of Life may have been written in Paris.b One of the most popular Russian writers of the early 20th century, Leonid Andreev (1871-1919) was a devotee of melancholy sensationalism. His intense, surrealistic presentation of sex, insanity, death, and the sinister lurking in everyday life — all couched in hyperbole and the grotesque — partly fit the mood of a country on the verge of calamitous events, partly expressed a general trend in W estern literature at the time, and partly reflected the personal life of an alcoholic author known to have attempted suicide on at least three occasions. Lev Tolstoi quipped about Andreev: "he tries to frighten you, but I'm not afraid.” In 1905 Andreev was arrested for perm itting the Central Committee of the Russian Social Democrat W orkers’ Party to meet in his apartment, but was released after two weeks. In 1906, fearing that he m ight be attacked by right-wing organizations, he left for Finland. Since that country was still part of the Russian Empire, he ended up having to flee to Berlin that same year. Subsequently he moved to Capri, where he joined Gor'ky, who tried with mixed success to wean him away from his experiments in symbolism and the surreal, and also to provide him some emotional support after the death of his wife. Resisting Gor'ky's personal and artistic influence, Andreev returned to Finland in 1907, and in 1908 built him self a large gloom y house in Finland where he could spend his nights writing, surrounded by copies of paintings by Goya that he had created himself. In 1909 he protested the governm ent's use of violent methods in its struggle with the revolutionaries by publishing his famous Story o f the Seven Who Were Hanged (Rasskaz o semi poveshennykh), based on the
«Evidently from the French; prendre sa m ire means to take aim. bThe occult topic, which w as suppressed in the Soviet Union, w as later to be resurrected abroad in the collection OkkulVzm iio g a (Belgrade, 1933) and by two Riga publishing houses, Mir and N. Gudkov.
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execution of conspirators plotting the assassination of the tsarist M inister of Justice Ivan Shcheglovitov. In the chaotic war years Andreev was forced to abandon his "castle of death,” as the newspapers referred to his home, and became more and more conservative in his views. In 1916, offered the enormous salary of 50,000 rubles a year, he became the literary editor of the very conservative newspaper Russkaya volya (Russian Freedom or Volya), to which his form er ally Gor'ky refused to contribute. Having become fam ous for his anti-war story Red Laughter; which was inspired by the Russo-Japanese war, he ultim ately supported the tsarist governm ent's efforts to prosecute W orld W ar I and during the Civil W ar was even offered the post of Propaganda Minister in the governm ent of the W hite General Yudenich. He refused the offer, but that same year published an "S.O .S.” to the Allies — America, Britain, and France — calling on them to save Russia from Bolshevism . His literary production during his brief post-1917 émigré period is not significant — an inevitability considering his declining health, material circumstances, and the political turm oil of the period. His 1905-07 expatriate period, however, was a prolific one. In 1947 Andreev's son Daniil, also a writer, was arrested in Moscow and imprisoned for ten years, but in 1956 the Soviet governm ent more or less forgave the elder Andreev his views, when his body was moved from Finland to Leningrad for reburial. Maksim Gor'ky (pseudonym of Aleksei Peshkov, 1868-1936) was a triple émigré, having experienced both tsarist internal and foreign exile, and then having spent ten years abroad during the Soviet period (albeit partly for health reasons). Before taking up writing, Gor'ky had a jack-of-all-trades background — something like that of Jack London. Also like London, he became a champion of socialism. His 1901 sentence to internal exile was the result of his having penned a proclam ation calling for the end of autocracy. Briefly imprisoned in the Fortress of Peter and Paul for participating in the revolution of 1905, he left the country illegally in 1906 and visited America, where he became the target of attacks in the press for his common-law marriage and was even evicted from his hotel room. His negative impressions of the trip are recorded in M y Interviews and In America. It was in the United States that he also wrote the novel Mother, a naive and sentim ental work which was eventually proclaimed a model of Socialist Realism. The novel initially appeared in English in 1906, and in Russian only the following year. In 1906 the Russian government sought a loan to recover from the w ar with Japan, but Gor'ky opposed the extension of credit. When the French banks nevertheless acceded to the request, he responded angrily:
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Fair France ... Your best children no longer know you ... a woman kept by bankers.... You, the M other o f Liberty, you, Joan o f Arc, have allowed beasts to try to crush men once again. O great France, once the guide o f civilization, do you realize the vileness o f your act? Your m oney-grubbing hand has tried to stop a whole country from taking the road to freedom and culture.... O m y beloved, I spit blood and g a ll into your eyes. Gor'ky settled on the island of Capri, where he remained until a general amnesty in late 1913 permitted him to return home. It was on Capri that he wrote The Last Ones (Poslednie), Sum m er (Leto), and The Life o f M atvei Kozhemyakin (Zhizn' Matveya Kozhemyakina). It was in the name of this self-educated, sincere émigré that Russian literature was throttled for over a half century. Maksimilian Voloshin (1877-1932), who had first travelled abroad in 1899, fell so much in love with Paris he returned to that city for most of the years 1901 to 1917. The beauty of Paris, he wrote, left a "light aftertaste of decay, as in well-prepared wild fow l.” Poet and artist, the young man roamed through Italy and Spain, soaking up impressions "like a sponge.” His fascination with Catholicism, Buddhism, Freemasonry, the occult, and Rudolph Steiner's Anthroposophism was to be reflected in his debut as a Sym bolist poet and in his later mystical, prophetic verse, intense, palpable, in which he spoke to "Holy Russia”: The enem y whispered: yield Your treasure to the rich, your pow er To slaves, your m ight to foes, your honor To serfs, give traitors your keys ... You burned your cities and fields; Your ancient home was devastated, You le ft as a beggar, humiliated, Slave to the lowest slave. Dare I stone you o r condemn Your urgent flam e? Shall I not press m y face in the m ud Before you and bless the print o f your Bare foot, you homeless, drunk, impure Russia, Christ's holy foolI Voloshin had received a small inheritance in 1903, which he used to build a house in the Crimea. For him it was an anchor to
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Russia, and he periodically returned there before 1917. After the Bol'shevik coup that year he returned to that home, and was never again to see his beloved Paris. Instead, he opened his home to a bohemian crowd of artists and writers. During the civil war the revolutionaries Bela Kun and Rozaliya Zalkind were guests in his home, and Kun, who had taken a liking to Voloshin, permitted him to cross out one name in ten in the lists of those marked for death. The gentle poet thus was forced to become a party to mass murder, "praying for the murdered and the murderers.” His own life was miraculously spared. Had he lived longer, there is little doubt that he would have perished in the purges, as did Kun himself in 1937.
The Politicals Exile Within the Empire Russia's speciality ... internal exile, which gives the worst o f both worlds: emigration ... plus repression Leszek Kotakowski Praise everywhere as freedom Exile from your native land. Mikhail Lermontov Both the tsarist and the Soviet governments made liberal use of "internal exile,” in which the offender was relocated beyond the bounds of Russia proper but remained within the empire, under some form of custody. In the 17th century, exile to the Mongolian border or to the W hite Sea was true exile in every sense. Such was the lot of Archpriest A w akum (1620 or 1621 -1682), who was a leader of the Old Believer movement opposing the liturgical reforms of Patriarch Nikon. Church Slavic translations of the Bible and liturgy were found to contain errors and Nikon wanted to bring the rituals of the Russian church into conform ity with those of the Greek Orthodox church. The Old Believers refused to give up traditions which had been observed for centuries, and in 1653 Aw akum wrote a letter to Tsar Aleksei Mikhailovich protesting the Nikonian reforms. During this period, the association between Church and State was closer than ever before or since, and Nikon, like many a bureaucrat before and after him, did not hesitate to avail himself of the power he enjoyed through the State to have Aw akum exiled to Tobol'sk, in Siberia, and later still further — to the Mongolian frontier. Two of A w akum 's children died before he was brought back to Moscow in 1664. Unrepentant, Aw akum refused to support Nikon's
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reforms at the Church Council of 1666-67 and was defrocked and exiled to Pustozersk, not far from the Arctic Ocean. There he spent the last 15 years of his life, largely confined to the log hut in which he was eventually burned to death as a heretic. It was during this period that he produced the bulk of his writings: theological treatises, historical sketches, petitions to the Tsar, and his celebrated autobiography, describing his torm ents at the hands of Afanasy Pashkov, commander of the local army regiment: Pashkov drove me out into the m ountains to wander am ong the beasts, snakes, and birds. A nd I sent him a little message which began: "M anl Have a fear o f G od who sits am ong his cherubs and sees into the deepest abyss. A ll the powers o f heaven and a ll creatures, including man, trem ble before Him, but you alone deny Him and show your stubbornness. ” A nd so did I write this and m any other things to him. Then I saw about 50 men running tow ard'm e.... They brought me to him, and he was standing there with a sword and trem bling with rage. "Are you a priest o r have you been defrocked?” (Pop li ty Hi rospop?), he said. I answered: "I am Archpriest A w akum ; what do you want from m e?” He bellowed like a wild beast and struck me on one cheek, then on the other, and then on the head. He knocked me o ff m y feet and seized an axe with which he struck m y prone body three times. Then he had me stripped and given 72 blows o f the knut. But I said: "M y Lord Jesus Christ, Son o f God, help m e!” I kept saying this over and over, and he became angry that I did not say: "Spare m e!” I prayed with every blow, but in the middle o f the beating I cried: "Enoughl” A nd he gave the order to stop. A nd I said to him : "W hy do you beat m e? Do you know?” A nd again he had me beaten on the sides before stopping. I began to tremble and fell to the ground. He had me dragged and flung into a flat-bottom ed boat, where I was shackled hand and foot to a supporting brace. It was fall, and it rained heavily on me a ll night.... I wanted to call ou t to Pashkov: "Forgive m e!” but God's strength restrained me — it was m y lo t to endure. Previously, hagiographie works had been written exclusively in Old Church Slavonic, and Aw akum 's lively, vernacular style was a radical departure from the accepted Church canon for this genre. Ironically, Nikon himself was deposed in 1666 and likewise sent into internal exile. Aleksandr Radishchev (1749-1802) was one o fte n young men sent by the Russian governm ent to study law, literature, the natural
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sciences, medicine, and foreign languages at Leipzig University from 1767 to 1771, where his "democratic” convictions were only strengthened. In 1790 Radishchev, who by that tim e had become a civil servant, used his own printing press to publish an unflattering description of life in Russia entitled A Trip from Petersburg to Moscow (Puteshestvie iz Peterburga v Moskvu) in an edition of 650 copies. When Radishchev's authorship was revealed, he was arrested and was personally interrogated by Catherine the Great, who had him condemned to death but then commuted the sentence to ten years’ exile in Siberia. When Catherine died in 1796, her son Pavel, reversing as many of his mother's decisions as he could, permitted Radishchev to return from exile in 1797; Radishchev was even permitted to move to Moscow in 1801 under Aleksandr I. The following year he committed suicide in an extremely painful fashion: in the presence of his sons he drank a glass of sulfuric acid intended for cleaning his uniform. Radishchev's works could not be published again in Russia until after the revolution of 1905. Q uite a different situation was enjoyed by Aleksandr Pushkin (1799-1837), whose upbringing was, in many ways, nearly as French as Russian — his tutors, his father's library, even his fencing teacher were all French. Supposedly he still could not write good Russian upon entering the lycée. Even as an adult he wrote to his countryman Chaadaev: "I will speak with you in the language of Europe, with which I feel most com fortable.” All his life he longed to go abroad, but was not permitted to do so, first by the liberal Tsar Aleksandr I in 1817, and then by Nikolai I. O f the 20 members of the St. Petersburg literary circle to which he belonged, he alone never travelled beyond the bounds of the empire. One of his chief offenses was his "Ode to Liberty,” in which he referred to the assassination of Aleksandr's father Pavel I and seemed to repeat the rum or that Aleksandr had been implicated in the act. Pushkin's case provides convincing testim ony that "internal exile” under the Tsars was not always a hardship. His banishment from Petersburg to the south in 1820 was more like a vacation, and even though Aleksandr I had originally intended to send him to Siberia, his many friends, including Glinka, Zhukovsky, and Karamzin, successfully interceded with the Emperor to get him permission to leave for the Caucasus and Moldavia. In the south he lived the life of the sophisticate visiting the provinces, enjoying official dinners with the local officials, travel, and women friends, one of whom described a m eeting with him:
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I rem em ber how during this journey no t fa r from Taganrog I was driving in a carriage with m y sister Sophia, ou r English governess, our Russian nurse, and ou r lady companion. A t the sight o f the sea, we told our driver to stop and our whole crowd le ft the carnage and ran tow ard the sea.... N ot suspecting that the poet was walking behind us, I began to amuse m yself by running after the waves and then running away from them as soon as they were about to reach m e; in the end m y feet g o t wet but, o f course, I did not te ll anyone about that when I returned to our carriage. Pushkin found this scene so beautiful that he described it in his charm ing verses, poeticising m y childish prank. I was only 15 a t the tim e:
How I envy the waves — running in stormy succession To lie down lovingly at her feet! How much I wished then with the waves To touch her dear feet with my lips. So lacking was this life in serious moments that in 1822 Pushkin actually fought a duel over whether the band at the city park would play a mazurka or a French quadrille. All this was a far cry from A w akum 's experience. Nevertheless the bored Pushkin could not resist comparing his lot with that of the Roman poet Ovid, who had also been banished to the Black Sea by his emperor. After Pushkin was killed in a duel, Mikhail Lermontov (18141841), only 23 years old and still unknown as a poet, captured the attention of the reading public with his poem on Pushkin's death. He was placed under house arrest and sentenced only five days later. Retaining his rank of cornet, he was transferred to the Nizhegorodsky Dragoon Regiment in the Caucasus, and later portrayed him self as the bored and jaded officer Pechorin in the novel Hero o f O ur Times. W hile not quite as relaxed as Pushkin's exile (he was, after all, an army officer on active duty), Lermontov's sojourn in the southern reaches of the empire was hardly an arduous one. He made stopovers in Stavropol', Pyatigorsk, Kislovodsk, and Tiflis, was soon perm itted to transfer to Novgorod, and even spent a month in Petersburg, where he frequented the theater. In 1838 he was transferred back to his original regiment. In 1841 he was sent back to the Caucasus. Along the way he wrote a poem which contained the line: "Farewell, unwashed Russia, land of slaves, land of lords.” Upon arriving in Pyatigorsk, Lermontov called a fellow officer, N. S. Martynov, a ferocious "highlander with a big dagger” (montagnard au grand poignard) in the presence of a lady. It was common at the tim e for Russian officers to
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dress up as Circassian warriors, and Martynov, who considered himself offended by Lermontov's jibe, challenged him to a duel. Lermontov was shot through the heart, whereupon he collapsed and died on the spot, w ithout even clutching at the place where he was hit. Like the death of Pushkin, his was a tragedy couched in trivia. One of the landmarks of Russian history was the so-called "Decem brist” uprising of 1825. Some of the rebels were prose writers and poets, and their ideals were reflected in their literary works in the form of "civic poetry” and revolutionary songs. One of them was a co editor of Polyarnaya zvezda (Polar Star), Aleksandr BestuzhevMarlinsky (1797-1837), a romantic prose w riter influenced by Byron and Hugo and a translator of English and French literary criticism. Like many writers of his generation, Bestuzhev was engrossed with Russian/W estern literary relations: We have criticism, but no literature.... Raised by foreign tutors, we have im bibed with our m others’ m ilk cosmopolitanism and adm iration only for things foreign. When we measure our literary works against the brilliance o f other literatures, we deprecate our own m odest accom plishm ents still further.... To make things worse, we have been raised exclusively on French literature, which has little in common with the tem peram ent o f the Russian people and the spirit o f the Russian language. After the quashing of the Decembrist Rebellion, Bestuzhev turned him self in and confessed to have volunteered to murder the Tsar's fam ily. His original death sentence was reduced to im prisonment, and he was sent into internal exile in Yakutia. In 1829 he was transferred as a private to the Caucasus, where his interest in ethnography and languages led him to establish close contacts with the local tribesm en and to become fascinated with the exotic milieu of the area. His essays supported the transition from Neoclassicism to Romanticism, which was taking place at the tim e on the Russian literary scene. W ilhelm Küchelbecker (1797-1846) was a poet, playwright, and critic whose parents had emigrated from Germany to Russia in the 1770s. He acquired first-hand European experience during a year-long trip undertaken in 1820-21, when he met Novalis and Goethe. A critic, journalist, dram atist, prose writer, and poet, he came to the conclusion that Russia lacked an original national literature, which he saw as a necessary precondition for the formation of a true national character. During the Decembrist uprising Küchelbecker, armed with a pistol and broadsword, actually fired shots at Grand Prince Mikhail and General Voinov, but missed both. After the suppression of the uprising he attem pted to flee to W estern Europe but was arrested in W arsaw
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and brought back to Moscow in chains, where he was sentenced to be beheaded. Tsar Nikolai I commuted his sentence, but Küchelbecker remained in solitary confinem ent until 1835, when he was exiled to Eastern Siberia and married the young, illiterate daughter of the local postmaster. There he fell ill with tuberculosis and went blind. Nevertheless he wrote a good deal during those last nine years of his life — prose, poetry, translations, articles. Pushkin was able to assist him in getting a small portion published, but only anonymously. It was not an easy life for a man who had had money problems even before his arrest. In one of his poems he borrows a line from Dante: Hard and bitter the stale bread o f exile, Anguished the flow o f an alien country's river, Its shore morose, its water no t sweet. The exile's silence is g rie f unshared; His heart is le ft behind, in a different land, Where every flow er is alive and blossoms for him. B ut here his roo f is a shroud, and everything around him withers, dies. Hard and bitter the stale bread o f exile, Heavy the exile's yoke. The Polish police were able to recognize Kuchelbecker, having been provided a good description of him by the Pole Faddei Bulgarin (Tadeusz Butharyn, 1789-1859), a prose writer, critic, journalist, and publisher. Bulgarin had been close to Pushkin's liberal group before the Decembrist coup attempt, but afterwards judged it wisest to side with the governm ent — a circumstance which caused many to view him as an unprincipled opportunist. W arning of the dangers of "socialism, communism, and pantheism,” he proposed to Nikolai that censorship not be limited to passively cutting out objectionable passages, but should also involve actively coopting loyal writers. Bulgarin was a fascinating figure. Having received a dishonorable discharge from the Russian army in 1811, he had made his way to Paris, where he joined Polish units of the French Foreign Legion and fought in their ranks in Italy and Spain and later published Memoirs o f Spain. In the last stages of Napoleon's invasion of Russia, he actually fought against his form er comrades in arms. Pardoned as a Pole under the general amnesty, he went to Russia to establish a literary career as a proseiytizer of Polish culture, but after the uprising of 1830 actually came out strongly against his form er countrymen. Having switched to writing in Russian in 1820, he became a widely read novelist in that language, claiming that he had forgotten his Polish and playing down his form er journalistic career in that language in Poland. When he
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became known as the "Russian W alter Scott,” Pushkin quipped that only skot was apposite, alluding to the Russian word "skot,” meaning "livestock.” Bulgarin's newspaper Severnaya pchela (The Northern Bee) had the largest circulation of any Russian newspaper at the time — up to 10,000 copies. Vilified by Russian critics to this very day, Bulgarin was significant in that he transformed publishing into a commercial enterprise. Before his time, literature had been the pastime of the wealthy nobility. A secret agent of Benkendorfs Third Section, he was rumored to have been responsible for inciting Pushkin to participate in the fatal duel. Bulgarin the expatriate Pole writing in Russian and deeply involved in Russian culture and politics presents a stark contrast to Russian expatriates, who for the most part have been largely uninterested in assimilation. Like Küchelbecker, Pëtr Chaadaev (1794-1856) complained that Russia lacked a genuine national character. Chaadaev had fought in the Napoleonic war and had first seen Western Europe as an officer in the Russian army of occupation. From 1823 to 1826 he travelled throughout Europe and was fortunate to have been absent from Russia during the Decembrist revolt. Chaadaev was a Hegelian who assumed that humanity was one and that Western civilization was its vanguard. In this he differed from the Slavophiles, who took a more pluralistic view. From 1829 to 1831 this Catholic philosopher in an Orthodox land composed (in French) his "Philosophical Letters,” in which he took a harshly negative view of Russian history and claimed that Russia was "une nation bâtarde” and that Russians had made no contribution to world culture, having been cut off from Western civilization by the Tartar yoke (1240-1480): For us historical experience does not exist.... We have not been affected by the universal education o f mankind. A ll that we have received from the progress o f the human spirit we have disfigured.... We have come into the world like illegitim ate children, without a heritage.... We have given nothing to the world, taken nothing from the world, we have added not a single idea to the totality o f human ideas: we have contributed nothing to the human spirit.... We are one o f those nations which does not seem to form an integral part o f humanity, but which exists only to provide some great lesson fo r the world.... Situated between East and West, supporting ourselves with one elbow on China and another on Germany, we ought to have united within us imagination and reason.... [Instead], we live only in the m ost narrow kind o f present, without a past and without a future. Chaadaev often argued heatedly with Tyutchev, the two of them representing opposing world views. It must have been particularly
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onerous for Chaadaev to encounter in the almost totally Europeanized, sophisticated Tyutchev a staunch proponent of Russia's political establishment. W hile Chaadaev himself was not exiled, but merely declared insane and placed under house arrest, his publisher Nikolai Nadezhdin (1804-1856) was sent into Siberian exile. As happened later with Dostoevsky, imprisonment and exile turned Nadezhdin into a loyal servant of Church and State. In 1838, just before being allowed to return from exile, he wrote: The catastrophe which befell me has given m y life an entirely new direction. Now I live exclusively in the past.... I am studying the thought and faith o f form er years — especially faith! For me the highest point in human history is concentrated in the history o f religion, in the history o f the church. A ll ou r tragedies, personal and social, occur from a lack o f religious enthusiasm, from crawling over the earth ‘in crim inal forgetfulness o f the fact that our lives are a preparation fo r heaven. Mikhail Lunin (1787-1845) was also arrested after the failed Decembrist coup, and accusations came to light that he had conspired to assassinate the Tsar some ten years earlier, in 1816, when he had belonged to a secret society modelled on the German Tugendbund. Even though no seditious acts or conspiracies could be established after 1822, he was sentenced to hard labor and then exiled to Siberia for 20 years. His Letters from Siberia (1836-1840), in which he presented a political and philosophical analysis of Russia's history, role and prospects, demonstrated that he had become more, not less radical during his imprisonment and led to a new arrest in 1841, when he was moved from a village near Irkutsk to the even more remote Akatui, an area heavily polluted by the Nerchinsk silver mines. Lunin's Letters correspond to the date of Chaadaev's philosophical letter of 1836. The epistolary genre was popular in Russia at the time, having been imported from W estern Europe. The Letters were first published in Gertsen's Polar S tar in 1859 and 1861, but could not appear in Russia until the revolution of 1905 changed the political climate. Minutes of the interrogation of the Decembrists were taken by the prose writer, memoirist, and poet Andrei Ivanovsky, who was later to serve as the secretary of police chief Aleksandr Benkendorf, founder of the Third Section. Ivanovsky, who died in Belgium, seems to have been equally enamored of the political establishm ent on the one hand and of Russian literature on the other. It was to him that Benkendorf entrusted the task of explaining to Aleksandr Pushkin why Pushkin was denied his request to go to the Caucasus as part of the active army.
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As a young writer, Dostoevsky began to attend semi-secret m eetings of the Petrashevsky Circle in Petersburg in 1847. By today's standards, the group's interests and intentions appear to have been far from radical: improvement of ship building, emancipation of the serfs, governm ent reform. All these issues were discussed at gourm et Friday suppers at Petrashevsky's home. There were other members of the group, however, whose interests were far more radical and who wanted to establish an underground printing press and work for the overthrow of the government. The revolutionary events in France in 1848 alarmed the tsarist government, and the Petrashevsky group was infiltrated by a governm ent informer. In 1849 Dostoevsky was arrested together with the rest of the group and after an eight-month imprisonment was subjected to a mock execution before the eyes of a silent and watchful crowd of some 3,000 persons. Only four years later was he permitted to write his first letter, addressed to his brother, maintaining that a sentence at hard labor in military service was worse than a civilian sentence. Permitted to leave the prison only for work, he spent the entire four years behind prison walls. On one occasion he worked four hours overtim e when even the mercury in the thermom eter froze: We lived together in one large heap, in a single barracks. Im agine an old, dilapidated wooden building which should have been torn down long since. In the sum m er the heat was unbearable, and in the winter the cold was unendurable. A ll the floors were rotten and covered with an inch o f dirt, so that you could easily slip and fall. The tiny windows were covered with an inch o f ice, and it was impossible to read even during daylight. W ater dripped everywhere from the ceiling. We were kept like sardines in a barrel. Even with six logs in the stove there was no warmth (ice barely thawed in the room), and the fumes from the fire were intolerable. A nd it was like that a ll winter. Convicts would wash their clothes right in the barracks, so that the entire room was wet. There was not enough space even to turn around, and it was not possible to go outdoors to take care o f one's bodily functions, since the barracks were locked. A bucket was placed in the entrance hall, and the stench was unbearable. A ll the convicts stank like pigs and claim ed that they couldn't help acting like pigs since they were only “human, " so to speak. We slept on bare bunks and were allowed only one pillow. We covered ourselves with short pea jackets, and our feet were always bare, so we shivered a ll night. Fleas, lice, and roaches were everywhere. O ur coats, which were shabby in the extreme, retained alm ost no warmth, and ou r short boots were totally inadequate for the weather.
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The literary result of the experience was Notes from the House o f the Dead. After being released from prison, Dostoevsky had to spend four more years in the army. The basic political controversy between left and right has not changed essentially since those days, centering ultim ately on human nature. Dostoevsky, like Solzhenitsyn and Shalamov after him, came away from prison and exile deeply conservative and disillusioned in his fellow creatures and convinced that a better world would not achieve the beauty and harmony predicted by Rousseau and Marx. "It is the sim ple man,” he wrote, "whom I have come to fear.” But his despair was not total, and as soon as he was again perm itted to write, he wrote letters asking for books: a German dictionary, the Koran, Tacitus, Plutarch, etc. And soon the born w riter in him began seeing imprisonment and exile as a creative experience: / need to live, brother. A nd these years w ill\ not pass in vain [underlined by Dostoevsky].... How m any are the characters and types I have come to know! I have lived with them, and I think I know them well. How m any stories [I have heard] o f tram ps and bandits, and in general o f an entire m iserable way o f life ! It's enough to fill volumes. W hat an odd people. In general this time has not been lost for me. I have come to know — not Russia — but the Russian people as have only a few before m e *
Exiles Abroad Pre-Nineteenth Century A sort o f craving came over me to travel abroad. Apollon G rigor'ev One of Russia's first prom inent men of letters was Prince Andrei Kurbsky (1528-1583), who had been commandant in the city of Yur'ev (Tartu, Estonia) under Ivan the Terrible and had the misfortune to suffer a m ilitary defeat in 1564. Already disgruntled by Ivan's policies and probably worried that he would be treated in a less than kindly fashion by his sovereign lord, he defected to the camp of Sigismund,
‘ Curiously, this is almost the sam e remark m ade by the imprisoned Andrei Sinyavsky to his w ife M aria Rozanova and quoted in my interview with them (Conversations in Exile, 1990; Besedy vizgnanii, 1991.)
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King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania. Once out of Ivan's reach, he initiated an angry correspondence with him: I w ill order that this letter; soaked in tears, be p u t in m y grave with me fo r that m om ent when I shall appear together with you before the judgm ent o f m y Lord, Jesus Christ.... You are an enem y o f Christianity, conceived in lust, an Antichrist struggling against the Lord Himself. You have spilled Christian blood as if it were water and have doom ed the strong men o f Israel ... N either you nor your children for ten generations shall enter the Church o f God. Amen. Upon receiving the letter from Kurbsky's servant, Ivan had the man tortured and put to death before responding to his nemesis: On account o f a single angry word o f mine, you have lost not only your own soul, but the souls o f a ll your ancestors: for, by God's will, they had been given as servants to our grandfather, the great Tsar, and they gave their souls to him up to their death, and ordered you, their children, to serve the children and grandchildren o f our grandfather. B ut you have forgotten everything and traitorously, like a dog, have you transgressed the oath and gone over to the enemies o f Christianity. In your wrath you utter stupid words, hurling, as it were, stones a t the sky ...a Ivan's death in 1584 and that of his son Fêdor in 1598 created a crisis of authority in Russia known as the smutnoe vremya or smuta (the Time of Troubles), which lasted until the Romanov dynasty was installed on the throne in 1613. This period marked the appearance of the first "false Dmitry,” a pretender to the Russian throne who was, at least according to one version, a form er deacon from the Chudov M onastery in the Moscow Kremlin. Supported by the Polish-Lithuanian gentry and the Catholic clergy, Dmitry secretly converted to Catholicism and promised to hand over large territories to Poland and support Sigismund III in his struggle with Sweden, to convert Russia to Catholicism, and marry Marina Mniszech, the daughter of a Polish governor. When Tsar Boris Godunov died, his army switched loyalties to Dmitry, who occupied the throne in 1605. During the wedding ceremony, however, Dmitry was assassinated in a conspiracy organized by Prince Vasily Shuisky. Dmitry appears to have had a homosexual liaison with Ivan Khvorostinin (7-1625), who likewise flirted with the "Latin heresy” and was exiled by Shuisky, who had been
•The authenticity of this first correspondence between a Russian exile and the Russian head of state has been called into question (see: Edward L. Kennan, The Kurbskii-Groznyi Apocrypha, 1971).
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crowned Tsar, to the Volokolamsk Monastery. Marina was perm itted to return to Poland in 1608, where she recognized a second "false Dmitry” as her husband, who had been miraculously saved from death, but they both met the same fate as the first Dmitry. Khvorostinin, in the meantime, was forgiven his past errors and promoted to the rank of stol'nik. Nevertheless, he continued to read Latin books covertly, carouse, eat meat on fast days, and conspire to flee, "for in Moscow the people are stupid, and it is impossible to live with them ,” he complained. Searches of his home revealed "verses” ridiculing Moscow customs, and his attempted escape ended in confinem ent in the Saint Cyrill Monastery of Beloozero, where he "recanted” his heretical views. Under the monastic name "Joseph” this would-be émigré composed a number of anti-Catholic tracts and a chronicle of the Time of Troubles: Words o f Days and Tsars and M oscow Prelates. Like Awakum , Grigory Kotoshikhin (16307-1667) was a subject of Tsar Aleksei Mikhailovich. Kotoshikhin was a scribe who took part in negotiations with Sweden at the end of the Russian-Swedish war of 1656-58. He was unfortunate enough to have om itted the Tsar's title of "Lord” or "Sovereign” (Gosudar') in a document he sent home, for which offense Aleksei Mikhailovich ordered him beaten with rods. The incident did not interfere with Kotoshikhin's career but must have jaundiced him somewhat against his employer, for he began to sell confidential information to the Swedes. In 1664 he fled to Poland, and from there to Sweden the following year, by way of Silesia and Prussia. In Sweden he was promptly put on the governm ent payroll and wrote a sort of sociological treatise entitled About Russia in the Reign o f Aleksei Mikhailovich. Kotoshikhin's tenure in the Swedish service came to an early close when he became involved in a drunken brawl with his landlord, who was also his translator, over Kotoshikhin's apparently rom antic relationship with the man's wife and also over unpaid rent. He stabbed the landlord to death and even wounded the man's sister-in-law, who tried to intervene. Submitting to arrest, Kotoshikhin offered no resistance and stated he would have committed suicide otherwise. Under Swedish law he could have attempted to overturn the sentence by appealing to the wife, who seems to have had mixed feelings on the subject, but he did not. W hether it was his sense of guilt that restrained him or whether he was simply aware that a lifting of the sentence would lead to his being handed over to the Russian authorities, who were actively seeking his extradition, is a question which will never be resolved. Kotoshikhin was permitted to convert and was then executed. His body, dissected and made available for anatomical research, thus
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served as a testim ony of relations between Russian émigré writers and their translators, but his manuscript, written in the exquisite script of a professional scribe, was not discovered until nearly two centuries later, in 1837. The discovery of the manuscript was a major political event; it gave W esternizers a stick with which they could beat the Slavophiles and attack their claim that Russian culture was inherently humane and virtuous. In the early 19th century Kotoshikhin's skull disappeared — perhaps collected by some ardent fan of Russian literature in exile.
The Nineteenth Century The Moderates There is moderation even in excess. Benjamin Disraeli Although a rail link with Western Europe was established only in 1848 (via Warsaw), roads were sufficiently well developed that even in the 18th century the difficulties inherent in travel by carriage were not sufficient to put off Russians intent on travel. Even such Slavophiles as the Kireevsky brothers, Konstantin Aksakov, and Aleksei Khomyakov travelled to Western Europe, where German romanticism and idealist philosophy strongly influenced their own view of Russia's unique role in the world. One of the first Russian émigrés of the 19th century was Nikolai Turgenev (1789-1871), who was a member of two secret societies — The W elfare League and the Northern Society. He had also joined the Arzamas literary association, but left it after losing hope of inducing Russian writers to become interested in social reform. Fortunate in having gone abroad in April 1824, he escaped the vengeance of Nikolai I. Turgenev was no stranger to Europe, having studied at the University of Göttingen in 1808-11 and returned for another two years to work on the staff of Baron vom Stein in the allied forces pursuing Napoleon. The tsarist governm ent demanded that Turgenev return home to be tried, and when he refused, attempted — unsuccessfully — to extradite him. The court sentenced him to death in absentia, but Nikolai commuted the sentence to life at hard labor in Siberia. Turgenev wrote to the Tsar, and the poet Vasily Zhukovsky even interceded on his behalf, but to no avail. Fearful of arrest on the continent, Turgenev was unable to travel outside England until 1830. Turgenev's interests were more social and economic than literary, and he was what nowadays might be termed a liberal on the political spectrum — a circumstance that did not prevent him from
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selling his serfs to support himself abroad. A specialist in the area of taxation, he also authored a work in 1847 expressing his own view of Russia in a three-volume opus entitled La Russie e t les russes. Fearful of recriminations against his brother, he had waited for the latter's death to publish the manuscript. Aleksandr II restored his rank, and he made three trips to Russia before his death — in 1857,1859, and 1864. As the oppressive thirty-year reign of Nikolai I dragged on (1825-55) a number of Russians began to lose hope for reform and went abroad. To do so they needed to receive permission from their government. The two most acceptable reasons were medical treatm ent and/or business. Once in the W est they, like Nikolai Turgenev, used their newfound freedom to "tell the truth” about the Russia they had left behind. The group was largely aristocratic and not organized into anything like a coherent revolutionary movement. Nikolai Sazonov (1815-1862) left Russia in 1840, having already been abroad in 1835-36. Because of his extravagànt lifestyle, he found himself so deep in debt by 1845 that he would have been clapped in debtor's prison, had he returned to Russia. In 1854 he published a small book entitled La vérité sur l'em pereur Nicholas. It was a frontal attack on Nikolai personally, whom he described as an imperial Khlestakov — an impostor official from GogoF’s play The Inspector General. Sazonov wrote that, not only was the Tsar system atically destroying authentic literary culture by imprisoning and exiling such writers as Bestuzhev, Dostoevsky, Küchelbecker, Lermontov, and Pushkin, but he was even creating a surrogate literature to take its place, supported by a plethora of stultifying governm ent journals. When Nikolai died and was replaced by the more liberal Aleksandr II, Sazonov submitted a petition to the Grand Duke Konstantin during the latter's visit to Europe, "acknowledging his faults” and meekly asking permission to return to Russia. Aleksandr granted his request, but somehow Sazonov died in 1862 without making use of the imperial consent. Claiming he needed medical treatment, the prose w riter Ivan Golovin (1816-1890) left Russia in 1842, having already visited Sweden in 1838. Displeased by his writings, Nikolai ordered him to return home in 1844 and, when Golovin refused, confiscated his estate, stripped him of rights of inheritance, and sentenced him in absentia to hard labor. In response Golovin obtained a certificate of naturalized British citizenship in 1846 and in 1847 published Types et caractères russes, which appeared in English under the title A Russian Sketch-Book. Using fictionalized stories, Golovin told a depressing tale of the lot of Russians in their native land. In 1849 he followed up with Catechism o f the Russian People. Although printed in Paris (anonymously), the place of publication was shown as St. Petersburg.
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Created in the form of dialogues, the work is just as pessimistic as the Russian Sketch-Book. There was also La Russie sous Nicolas l-er, which must have pleased the Tsar even less. Poverty forced Golovin to regret his own audaciousness and, like Sazonov, he repeatedly petitioned the Russian government for a pardon. Nikolai would not hear of leniency, but when Aleksandr II took the throne in 1855 Golovin radically changed the tone of his writings and attem pted to assume the role of advisor to the Tsar. Secretly, in 1872, he even proposed to the Third Section that he become an inform er for them. The application for a staff position was rejected, but an offer was extended to pay for individual useful pieces of information. Among Golovin's works is a novel written in German, D er Flüchtling (The Refugee). In 1843 "Pierre Dolgoroukow” (Prince Pëtr Dolgorukov), who was living in Paris, published a four-volume study of Russian aristocratic genealogy under the pseudonym "Count d'Am agro.” Displeased over the unsavory details contained in the book, Nikolai im m ediately ordered Dologrukov to return home. When he arrived in Kronstadt on May 2, 1843, he was arrested and exiled to Vyatka. A year later his sentence was commuted, but without the right to live in St. Petersburg, where it was feared he might use his tim e to gather new material. He managed to leave Russia again only in 1859 and was horrified to read a book by C. Châtelet, a Frenchmen in Lyons, entitled La vérité sur la Russie (The Truth About Russia). France, Châtelet wrote, had the advantage of three more centuries of civilization than had Russia — a situation that he felt explained a great deal. In Russia, Châtelet maintained, commerce, communications and the arts were blossoming under the wise oversight of the government; serfdom entailed responsibility on the part of the serf owners, not just exploitation; the Russians preferred the knut to prison "and who is to say that they are wrong?”; lastly, Châtelet wrote, the Tsars should not abdicate a right granted them by Providence. And, if Russia was guilty of dismembering Poland and acting aggressively toward Turkey, one could point out equally reprehensible behavior on the part of England with regard to Ireland. Châtelet thus admonished his French readers to remember that France was "strong enough to respect her enemy and be fair to him.” Russian émigrés seem to have always been berating W esterners for their tolerance of Russian ways, and Dolgorukov was no exception. In 1860 (with a second edition in 1861) he composed his own La vérité sur la Russie, informing the reader that he had em igrated with the specific purpose of telling the Russian governm ent what he thought of it. Russia, in his view, was a land inhabited exclusively by slaves, some of whom were more privileged and others less. And the privileged slaves were busy junketing around
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W estern Europe with no concern for the condition of their native land. W hen his cousin Vasily Dolgorukov, the tsarist chief of police, demanded that "Pierre” withdraw the book from the book stores and return home immediately, Dolgorukov sent him his portrait instead, pointing out that it was an excellent likeness and could be exiled to Siberia in his place. As for the late Nikolai I, Dolgorukov wrote that Russia was fortunate to be rid of such a Tsar, but that it was a shame that the late monarch had not taken poison him self earlier. The Russian Senate responded by stripping Dolgorukov of all titles and rights of inheritance, and condemning him to eternal exile.a W hile still a boy, Aleksandr Gertsen (1812-1870) had become a staunch adm irer of Schiller. Together with his lifelong friend Nikolai Ogarêv, he swore a boyhood oath on Moscow's Sparrow Hills in 1827 to sacrifice his life for the liberation of the Russian people. Later the two friends enrolled in Moscow University and became involved in a circle for the study of the socialist ideas of Saint-Simon. M ost of the group's members were arrested, and Gertsen spent nearly a year in prison before being sent into internal exile in Vyatka from 1835 to 1837 and then in Vladim ir from 1838 to 1840. In 1839 he received a personal pardon from Nikolai I. But in 1840 the Tsar again lost patience with him when Gertsen wrote a letter to his father criticizing the local police. He was, however, able to plead his wife's ill health, so that he got permission merely to move to Novgorod. Gertsen took a keen interest in the ideas of Hegel, Leroux, Feuerbach, Fourier, and Proudhon, and eventually became deeply enamored of socialism. When his father died, leaving him a fortune of 500,000 rubles, he lost no tim e in applying for a passport and emigrated from Russia in 1847. Once abroad, he quickly became disenchanted with the Western world, particularly with Paris, where he witnessed the suppression of the June Days uprising in 1848. Curiously enough, it was as an expatriate that this W esternizer began to gravitate somewhat toward the Slavophile camp. The Russian
»Actually Dolgorukov's problems w ere not limited to the above. H e had been accused of being the author of a lampoon on Pushkin which caused Pushkin to challenge his wife's purported lover to a duel. Dolgorukov denied the allegation, but many granted it credence. Since Pushkin w as viewed with great piety as Russia's national poet, the accusation was very difficult to live with. Another ém igré suspected of being the author of this lampoon w as Prince Ivan Gagarin (1814-1882), who left Russia in 1843 and becam e a Jesuit priest. The unproven accusation was a burden on Gagarin for the rest of his life. In Paris Gagarin founded a Russian library called M usée Slave and published a theological journal.
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peasantry, he believed, was destined to play a unique role in history. In 1861 he wrote in Kolokol (The Bell): Listen, for darkness does not prevent listening: from all regions o f our vast, vast country, from the Don and the Urals, from the Volga and the Dnepr the sigh grows, the protest rises; it is the first roar o f the tidal wave which rises, big with storms, after an om inously long silence. Go to the people! To the people I — there is your place, exiles o f science, show that they w ill not make church servants out o f you, but fighters o f the Russian people, and not hirelings without a country! H ail to you ! You are starting a new epoch, you have understood that the tim e o f whispering, o f distant allusions, o f forbidden books is com ing to an end. You still write in secret a t home, but openly you protest. H ail to you, younger brothers, and our blessing for the future! Oh, if you only knew how our hearts beat, how the tears sprang into our eyes when we read o f the student disorders in St. Petersburg! Gertsen considered it his mission in life to acquaint Western Europe with Russia and to forward the revolutionary cause. To this end he moved to London, where he founded the Free Russian Press in 1853. There he was joined by Ogarëv, who helped him found the newspaper Kolokol and an almanac The Polar Star, both dedicated to the emancipation of the serfs, freedom from censorship, the abolition of corporal punishment, and the establishment of open courts. Banned in Russia, the two publications were regularly smuggled into the country. Gertsen's purely fictional work was created largely before he em igrated and was intended as a vehicle for his social and political views. His 1845-46 novel Who Is to Blam e? centers around a lovetriangle and deals with the topic of female emancipation and the role of the "superfluous man” in Russian society. "Doctor Krupov” (1847) is devoted to his hopes for the creation of a new, communal society, and "The Thieving Magpie” is an indictment of serfdom. Gertsen's major achievement, however, is his memoir M y Past and Thoughts, which he wrote between 1852 and 1868. His life story was also a history of the intellectual life of the period, and his sensitive reminiscences are remarkable documents. Here Gertsen summed up his life experience in a passage addressed to Ogarëv: When I think o f how we two men, who are now nearly 50 years old, now stand before the first free Russian press, it seem s to me that our childish enthusiasm on Sparrow Hills is not 30 years behind us, but no more than three. Peoples, revolutions, the m ost beloved minds appeared, were replaced by others and disappeared somewhere between Sparrow Hills and Primrose H ill [in
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London]. Their traces have been alm ost lost in the m erciless w hirlw ind o f events. E verything around us has changed: instead o f the M oscow River the Thames flows past me, and the speech o f a foreign people sounds in m y ears.... For us there remains no way back to the fields o f our native la n d ... and only the dream o f two boys — one 13 and the other 11 — still livesI Nikolai Ogarêv (1813-1877) was also arrested in 1834. A fter a nine-month period of imprisonment he was sent under police escort to Penza. His continuing interest in the ideas of Hegel and Feuerbach was rewarded by the government with a second arrest and imprisonment. After he emigrated and joined Gertsen in London he m anaged— unlike the la tte r— to lose the entire fortune he had inherited and depended on Gertsen for a stipend in his later years. The relationship of the two men has an unusual personal twist to it. True to the liberated world view of their circle, Gertsen and Ogàrêv's wife informed Ogarêv that they intended to have an affair. Ogarêv acquiesced and his wife became Gertsen's mistress, bearing him three children, all of whom were legitimized as Ogàrêv's. (Madame Gertsen in turn had an affair with the German poet Georg Herwegh.) Ogàrêv's literary vocation was to poetry — love lyrics and sociopolitical verse. After emigrating, he continued to write poetry, but more and more of his efforts were devoted to political activities. After the December 1825 uprising it became increasingly difficult to receive permission to travel abroad; often such authorization depended on the Tsar's personal approval. After Nikolai's death, however, Aleksandr II relaxed these limitations. In the late 1860s and early 1870s Russian émigré political activity was more intense in Switzerland than in England. A Russian colony of some 300 persons was grouped around the University of Zürich. Many of these émigrés were women, who — for the most part — were not perm itted to obtain university degrees in Russia. In May 1873 the tsarist governm ent became alarmed at the new "populists” (narodniki) and issued a decree declaring all degrees obtained in Zurich after January 1,1874, to be invalid in Russia. As a result the colony's popularity with the Russians fell drastically. Up until roughly 1861 the general inclination of Russian intellectuals had been to cooperate with the governm ent of Aleksandr II. Reform-minded Russians felt they could collaborate with the bureaucracy on a friendly basis, and the period has been called "the honeymoon of freedom .” Since there was no bourgeoisie of any magnitude in Russia to bear the banner of liberalism (as had been the case in the West), the hope was for reform from above.
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Early Radicals Tell a man whose house is on fire to give a moderate alarm ; tell him to m oderately rescue his wife from the hands o f the ravisher; tell the m other to gradually extricate her babe from the fire into which it has fallen; but urge me not to use moderation. William Lloyd Garrison, 1831 By and large, 19th-century Russian political émigrés were men of the pen. In the late 1850s and early 1860s a number of periodicals were published in England, but by the late 1860s the center of Russian ém igré publications had begun to shift to Switzerland. Ogarêv moved to Zürich in 1865, where he established ties with Bakunin and Nechaev and attem pted to help the latter revive Kolokol. A significant radicalization occurred in the period 1859 to 1861, producing the so-called "young em igration.” As this group of Russian ém igrés began to arrive in Europe, Gertsen came to be regarded by many as too conservative, and outright hostility became evident between him and such more radical thinkers as Aleksandr SernoSolov'evich, Nikolai Utin, Varfolomei Zaitsev, and Nikolai Zhukovsky.3 W hile there was also a sm aller Russian colony in Heidelberg, Switzerland was a safer abode for the émigrés than was Germany, which m aintained close diplom atic relations with Russia. By the mid1910s France came to be more and more important. Often the titles of such publications clearly illustrated their ideological thrust. For example, one 1904-05 publication was entitled Power and Law: The People's Self-Defense Arm Against the Benefactors and Parasites Who Have Stolen Its Education and Bread. The romantic poet Nikolai Vorms (1845-1870) felt increasingly uncom fortable under police scrutiny in Russia. After emigrating in 1866 he received financial assistance from Gertsen. Nevertheless, Vorms attacked Gertsen for not being sufficiently circumspect in conspiratorial matters, and Gertsen broke off relations with him in 1868. The affair contributed to Gertsen's worsening relations with the "younger generation."
•For a discussion of ém igré politics of the period see Martin Miller's The Russian Revolutionary Ém igrés: 1825-1870 (Baltimore/London, 1986).
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The mild-mannered Ogarëv made a strange pair with Sergei Nechaev (1847-1882). In his Catechism o f a Revolutionary (Katekhizis revolyutsionera) Nechaev proposed that the revolutionaries declare them selves to be above the law, emotion, and conventional morality. W hen his suspicions were aroused that a member of his organization might betray them to the authorities, he arranged the man's murder "to bind the organization together with blood.” In 1872 the Swiss authorities handed Nechaev over to the Russian government, and he died ten years later in the Peter and Paul Fortress. Nechaev mirrored the extreme shift in attitudes which had occurred between the generation of the forties and the generation of the sixties. The older generation, represented by such figures as Ivan Turgenev, Timofei Granovsky (1813-1855), and Vissarion Belinsky, had favored gradual change, while the generation of the sixties — Nikolai Chernyshevsky (1828-1889), Dmitry Pisarev (1840-1868), and others — were in favor of far more radical solutions. The revolutionary movement abroad, not needing to fear the long arm of the tsarist police, was far more open and radical in expressing such views. Mikhail Bakunin (1814-1876) was a revolutionary and one of the founders of the international anarchist movement. Like many of the radicals of both the 19th and the 20th century, he was the son of a well-to-do family. A member of the Stankevich Circle in Moscow in the 1830s, he acquainted Belinsky with the theories of Fichte and Hegel and thus exercised a considerable, albeit indirect, influence on the developm ent of Russian literary thought and practice. Bakunin left Russia in 1840 and lived in Germany, Switzerland, Belgium, and France. Declaring that "the urge for destruction is also a creative urge,” he became involved in uprisings in Paris, Prague, and Dresden. In 1844 the Russian authorities confiscated his funds and sentenced him in absentia to hard labor, but that did not hinder this tireless revolutionary from scheming to raise a Polish insurrection to invade Russia. In 1850 he was jailed in Saxony and Austria and handed over to the Russian authorities, who imprisoned him in the Peter and Paul Fortress for six years and then exiled him to Siberia in 1857 after he wrote a confession to the Tsar. In 1861 he reached London after escaping to San Francisco via Japan. There he feuded with Marx (although at one point he began to translate Das Kapital into Russian) and was expelled from the First International in 1869. He also collaborated with Nechaev, although he eventually broke with him. A major figure in the anarchist movement, he may well have served as a prototype for Stavrogin, the hero of Dostoevsky's novel The Possessed Bakunin and Ivan Turgenev became inseparable friends in Berlin and shared housing for a year. After Bakunin's escape from
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Siberia, Turgenev offered to contribute 1,500 francs a year to a fund which he hoped to raise for him. In an added twist to their close relationship, Turgenev even became infatuated with Bakunin's sister, Tat'yana. Nevertheless, Turgenev ultimately came to disagree with Bakunin, Gertsen, and Ogarêv over their idea for a pan-Slavic Federation of States with Russia at its head. Bakunin died in Berne. Pêtr Lavrov (1823-1900), philosopher and ideologue of the Populist movement, boasted some 56 pseudonyms. A member of the secret revolutionary society Zemlya i volya (Land and Freedom or Will, he was arrested and sent into internal exile in 1867, accused of "pernicious thinking.” In 1870 he fled Russia, joined the First International, and took part in the Paris Commune. In his influential "Historical Letters” (1870) he identified the intelligentsia as the key force in enlightening the masses, but was opposed to much of the violence and anarchy preached by some of his fellow revolutionaries. Lavrov was active as a literary critic and aesthetician, preaching a sort of revolutionary classicism. As he grew older his purely artistic view of literature weakened, and he came to stress more and more its ideological content and accurate reflection of reality. His best known poetic accomplishment was a song first published in 1875 which was sung as a Russian version of the Marseillaise (the so-called "W orkers’ Marseillaise”). Lavrov is now remembered as a moderate who served as a sort of bridge between Gertsen's generation and the more radical youth who came later. His disagreements with Plekhanov over populism versus Marxism in many ways proved so prophetic of future quarrels among the revolutionaries that the Soviets refused to republish any of his works from 1930 until the late 1950s. Lavrov's personal secretary from 1894 up till his death was the Russian and Yiddish prose writer and dram atist Shloime Rapoport (1863-1920). Rapoport, who did not learn Russian until he was 17, was a populist who had taught literacy to Russian peasant children almost as soon as he himself learned to read Russian. From 1891 to 1905 he lived in Switzerland and Paris, playing an active role in the AgrarianSocialist League and the Socialist-Revolutionary Party. Rapoport studied the life of Russia's Jews as an ethnographer and wrote several plays about them. He also translated Russian poetry into Yiddish. He died in Warsaw. Pêtr Tkachëv (1844-1885) left Russia in 1873 and collaborated with Lavrov in the latter's journal Vperëd (Forward) in Geneva. His earlier association with Nechaev had left its mark upon him so that he soon broke with Lavrov, whom he considered too moderate. In 1875 he and other like-minded radical revolutionaries began to publish Nabat (The Alarm). Tkachêv saw the Russian peasant commune as an institution which would perm it Russia to skip capitalism and move
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directly into socialism. This expectation did not stop him, however, from proposing the establishm ent of the "KOB” — the acronym of Kom itet O bshchestverwoi Bezopasnosti or "Committee for Public Security,” an absolutely uncanny anticipation of the Soviet KGB. In the last years of his life he suffered from severe mental disorder. Another prominent anarchist and émigré was Prince Pêtr Kropotkin (1842-1921), who as a 12-year-old first tried his hand at literary composition and as a 17-year-old cadet in the Imperial Corps of Pages attem pted to produce a revolutionary magazine. Kropotkin was a governm ent adm inistrator and explorer in Siberia who had undertaken major expeditions along the mighty Am ur and Lena Rivers and discovered several dorm ant volcanoes. After returning from a geological expedition to Finland and Sweden in 1871, he came more and more to favor his revolutionary activities over his scientific career. A confirmed anarchist by 1872, he was arrested in 1874 but escaped from the prison infirm ary two years later and made his way to London. In Europe he frequently moved back and forth between England, Switzerland, and France, sometimes deported and on other occasions fleeing from fear of arrest. After the assassination of Aleksandr II in 1881 he learned that back home a conservative organization called the "Sacred Fellowship” (Svyashchennaya druzhina) considered him to have been a major participant in the act and had condemned him to death. In 1883 he was arrested in France and sentenced to five years imprisonment. In prison he taught his fellow inmates astronomy, geometry, and physics, but fell ill with scurvy and malaria. Released thanks to public pressure after having served three years of his sentence, he lectured on anarchism in Europe and the United States, publishing his memoirs in the Atlantic Monthly. In 1908 he was one of three members of the revolutionary jury of honor which investigated Evno A zefs record and found him guilty of having been a double agent for both the tsarist secret police and the revolutionaries, and of betraying agents from both sides.3
•Rom an G uf's novel A ze f gives a fascinating account of the activities of this incredible terrorist. For an equally talented documentary presentation of the Azef case see Nikolaevsky's Story of a Traitor (Istoriya odnogo predatelya). Gor'ky at one tim e also gathered material for a book on Azef. Azef w as exposed by a man who w as his moral antipode — Vladim ir Burtsev (1862-1942), who w as imprisoned by Tsarist authorities, the British government (for inciting the murder of the Tsar), the Provisional Government, and the Soviet government. Burtsev died in abject poverty in Paris. Azef was not unique. Dmitry Bogrov, assassin of Pêtr Stolypin, Russian head of state, was also a double agent and evidently assassinated Stolypin to allay suspicions of the revolutionaries of his complicity in earlier arrests in their ranks.
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In 1897 Lev Tolstoi wrote to Kropotkin asking his advice on the resettlem ent of some 8,000 members of the Dukhobor religious sect to Canada, a cause Kropotkin was more than happy to take up. During his second lecture tour to North America in 1901 he visited the Dukhobors in their new home. Kropotkin had a number of personal ties with Russian writers and in 1905 he published his Ideals and Realities in Russian Literature, in which he claimed that Russian Populist writings and Russian realism were more profound than French naturalism, criticized tsarist censorship, and was generally so utilitarian in his approach to belles lettres that he included in that category even political writings and quasi-dem ographic studies. Kropotkin's Notes o f a Revolutionary, written partly in Russian and partly in English, was translated into some 15 languages, bringing him international fame and honor. He returned to Russia in 1917 and was invited by Kerensky to join the Provisional Government. Although he refused the offer, he supported the prosecution of the war by the Provisional Government. Kropotkin soon began to experience misgivings as to the course being taken by the Soviet government. On November 30,1920, the Soviet governm ent issued a statem ent claiming that W hite organizations were planning terrorist activities against "the leaders of the worker-peasant revolution” and that an "Institute of Hostages” was being established. In December Kropotkin wrote a letter of protest to Lenin, in which he described such a practice as a return to the worst period of the Middle Ages and religious wars, an act unworthy of the new com m unist state, and an indication that the new leaders were sim ply protecting themselves rather than the cause. That same month he also wrote an open letter to the Eighth All-Russian Congress of Soviets, defending the right of independent publishing houses to exist. A few weeks later he fell ill with angina and pneumonia and died in the small town of Dmitrov. Georgy Plekhanov (1856-1918), who had been a member of Zem lya i volya, left Russia in 1880 and spent the next 37 years abroad. Plekhanov did much to develop a Marxist aesthetics and establish the view of art as a superstructure dependent on an economic base. He viewed the fin de siècle art-for-art's-sake movem ent as a form of escapism, but also disagreed with the m echanistic utilitarian model which eventually became so influential during the Stalinist period. Plekhanov returned to Russia after the revolution, but died soon after, unloved by Soviet critics for his criticism of the proto-utilitarian critics Dobrolyubov, Chernyshevsky, and Pisarev, whom he faulted, among other reasons, for their ahistorical approach. Sergei Stepnyak-Kravchinsky (1851 -1895) was a co-worker of Plekhanov's and one of the most colorful figures among the Russian
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revolutionaries in Europe. As a 22-year old Populist, he abandoned his studies and travelled about the countryside, preaching socialism to the peasants, was arrested, and escaped. Shortly thereafter he began publishing utopian tales of a communal Russia; the stories were printed in London and Geneva and smuggled into Russia. In 1874 he fled abroad and took part in an unsuccessful uprising in Herzegovina against the Turks, and later illegally returned home. In 1877 he was arrested in Italy for taking part in an armed insurrection and held in prison for nine months. After being released under a general amnesty he went to Switzerland — on foot for lack of funds — and together with a group of other Russian émigrés founded a revolutionary magazine entitled Obshchina (Commune). Having returned home in 1878, he became a member of Zemlya i volya and that same year stabbed to death the Chief of Police in Petersburg. In 1879 he again fled abroad, never to return — this tim e with an ominous task: to kstudy the manufacture of dynamite. After the assassination of Aleksandr II in 1881, the tsarist governm ent requested his extradition from Switzerland, forcing him to flee to Italy, and in 1884 from Italy to London. In London Kravchinsky continued to compose political tracts, and in 1889 published in English a novel about the Russian populist m ovem ent— The Career o f a Nihilist, continuing that topic in Russian in 1894 in an unfinished novel, Pavel Rudenko, M em ber o f the Stunde. In 1889 he founded "The Society of Friends of Russian Freedom” in England, and the following year a monthly English-language magazine, A Free Russia. The London home of the untiring Kravchinsky became a gathering place for like-minded writers. W alking down the street two days before Christmas 1895, too busy to look up from the m aterials he was examining for the first issue of a newspaper he was preparing, Kravchinsky was struck by a train. In 1896 his novelette A Little House on the Volga (Domik na Volge) was published posthumously. Living together with Kravchinsky in his London home was the revolutionary poet and prose writer Feliks Volkhovsky (1846-1914). In 1869 Volkhovsky was arrested for purported participation in the Nechaev group and then released, in 1874 he was again arrested for revolutionary activities and, after an unsuccessful escape attem pt, imprisoned for four years in the Fortress of Peter and Paul. During his trial in 1877 he refused to testify and was sent into internal exile in the Tobol'sk guberniya. In 1899 he fled to Canada by way of Vladivostok. Boris Savinkov (1879-1925) was described by Zinaida Gippius as having an "interesting, asymmetrical face and light hair” and suffering from guilt over the people he had killed in the revolutionary cause. He had escaped to Geneva from tsarist internal exile in Vologda and joined the Socialist Revolutionary Battle Organization
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(Boevaya Organizatsiya) under A zefs leadership. In 1904 Savlnkov and two other terrorists, Ivan Kalyaev and Egor Sozonov, had travelled to Russia to assassinate Vyacheslav Pleve, Minister of Foreign Affairs. Sozonov, who threw the bomb, was seriously wounded. Sentenced to hard labor, he later took poison to protest the beatings of political prisoners. Savinkov and Kalyaev managed to flee abroad. The next year they returned to Russia and killed the Grand Duke Sergei Aleksandrovich, uncle of the Tsar, in the Kremlin. Kalyaev was unable to escape after this second attem pt and was hanged after refusing to plead for mercy. Savinkov again managed to flee and this tim e devoted him self to literature under the pseudonym "Ropshin,” composing two novels, Black Stallion (Kon' voronoi) and W hat Never Happened (To, chego ne bylo). We will hear more of Savinkov later on in this book.
Future Soviet Leaders 'Tis Apollo come leading His choir, the Nine. — The leader is fairest, But a ll are divine. Matthew Arnold The 1917 October coup probably would never have taken place if the ideology and strategy had not been worked out in Western Europe. Anyone who harbors any doubts in that regard need only peruse a list of the hundreds of revolutionary Russian-language periodicals published in Europe. The early Soviet government was literally a governm ent of émigrés come to power. Vladim ir Lenin (pseudonym of Vladim ir Ul'yanov, 1870-1924) had been sent into "internal exile” and been abroad twice — from 1900 until 1905 and from 1907 until 1917. His elder brother Aleksandr, who had participated in preparations to assassinate Aleksandr III and later refused to ask for clemency, had been hanged in 1887. The decision proved to be a fateful one for the Romanov dynasty; it was Vladim ir who gave the order to murder not only the Tsar, but his entire fam ily as well. From 1907 to 1917 Lenin, who was of a very practical, nonliterary bent, form ulated the official Party position for literature in what was to become the Soviet Union. Upon returning to St. Petersburg from his first stint abroad in 1905, Lenin published "Party Organization and Partisan Literature” (Partiinaya organizatsiya i partiinaya literatura) in Russia's first legal Bol'shevik newspaper Novaya zhizn' (The New Life): Literature m ust become Party-oriented ... a pa rt o f the proletarian cause, a "screw and gear” in the great social-
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dem ocratic cause p u t into m otion by the conscious avant-garde o f the entire working class. Literature m ust becom e a com ponent o f organized, planned, united social-dem ocratic Party work.... The newspapers m ust become arm s o f the various Party organizations. Writers m ust jo in Party organizations. Publishing houses and warehouses, bookstores and reading rooms, libraries, and the book trade m ust a ll become Party-oriented and be held responsible fo r this obligation. A nd a ll this work m ust be controlled b y an organized socialistic proletariat, without exceptions.... W hile at the tim e Lenin advocated this program only for Party organizations during the period of the revolutionary struggle, it was later forced upon all Soviet writers. Literature was to be treated as an instrum ent of political propaganda. The Formalist critic Viktor Shklovsky later compared the policy to using a samovar to drive nails; it could be done, but the sam ovar would inevitably be the worse for wear. After imprisonment and internal exile for revolutionary propaganda the critic Vatslav Vorovsky (Wactaw Worowski, 1871 -1923) emigrated to W estern Europe in 1902, and returned to Russia in 1905 after the general amnesty. As a Marxist critic, Vorovsky engaged in regular sallies against the decadents, who placed greater emphasis on their own experience of reality than reality itself. Vorovsky stressed that he was a m aterialist and a proponent of the view that literature reflected both the real world and the underlying cultural-political forces directing it. The crucial role played by Vorovsky in early Soviet literary policies and his own violent end are discussed later in this book. A member of the radical group "The People's Freedom,” Aleksandr Bogdanov (pseudonym of Aleksandr Malinovsky, 1873-1928) had been arrested in 1899 and sent into internal exile in Kaluga and then Vologda. When his sentence ended, he left for Switzerland to join Lenin. There he served on the editorial boards of Proletarii (The Proletarian), Vperëd (Forward), and Novaya zhizn' (The New Life). At the 1907 London Congress of the Russian Socialist Party Bogdanov and Anatoly Lunacharsky (1875-1933, married to Bogdanov's sister) found themselves opposed to Lenin over the question of whether to boycott the Duma and were expelled from the Bol'shevik faction. In 1909 Bogdanov and Lunacharsky joined Gor'ky on Capri and established a school to educate the proletariat. They were to follow up on this idea after 1917, when they established P ro le tku lt Following Plekhanov's lead, they held the view that literature necessarily reflects class prejudice and interests. But they believed that even though modernism and decadence were fundam entally flawed in a social sense, they nevertheless enlightened and uplifted the reader. When
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Bogdanov and Lunacharsky argued that literature should be independent of Party control, they were opposed by Lenin. By 1920 the Party had taken a firm stand against the Proletkul't movement. Nevertheless the core concepts of the movement eventually formed the basis of Socialist Realism, as expounded in officially approved Soviet textbooks. W hile still an émigré, Bogdanov wrote two science fiction novels: Red S tar (Krasnaya zvezda) and Engineer M anny (Inzhener Mènni). Red S tar evidently influenced Aèlita, the popular science fiction novel of Aleksei Tolstoi. In both these works the Russian revolutionary goes to Mars, has a love affair with a Martian woman, interacts with Martian society on several levels, and eventually returns to Earth. Engineer M anny is a utopian fiction tale about the building of the Martian canals. Bogdanov's attem pt in both novels to develop an adventure plot within a utopian fram ework served as a bridge between pre-Soviet and Soviet science fiction. As soon as Lunacharsky graduated from high school in Kiev he enrolled in the University of Zurich to study philosophy and the natural sciences under the philosopher Richard Avenarius. In 1897 he returned to Russia but emigrated in 1906 and did not return until 1917, when he was appointed "Commissar of Education” of the Russian Republic. In an attem pt to reconcile Marxism with religion, Lunacharsky launched the Bogostroitel'stvo (God-Building) movement. In 1904-06 he authored a three-volum e work entitled Empiriomonism, which was an adaptation of the epistemological ideas of Avenarius and Emst Mach. He followed it in 1908-11 with a two-volume Reiigion and Socialism. His "genuine, unvulgarized, un-Plekhanovized Marxism” was vigorously supported by Bogdanov despite the latter's rejection of Lunacharsky's religious term inology. The most ferocious opponent of Lunacharsky's religious ideas was Lenin, who attacked him in his 1908 Materialism and Em piriocriticism . Lunacharsky wrote a half dozen plays and 20 "dram alettes” (one-act plays) of a melodramatic nature. He favored active dram atis personae and was opposed to Meierkhol'd's passive creations. Lunacharsky was also active as a translator from the German. His chief activity, however, was in the area of criticism — nearly 2,000 articles, book reviews, and lectures. Lev Trotsky (assumed name of Lev Bronshtein, 1879-1940) was subjected to both foreign and internal exile under the Tsars, and repeated both experiences under Stalin. In 1898 he was exiled to Siberia, where he lived in a squalid village and "studied Marx while chasing the cockroaches from his pages.” In 1902 he fled to London, w ent straight to Lenin, and could hardly wait for him to get out of bed to discuss his revolutionary plans. In London, where he was so engrossed by his revolutionary work that he hardly noticed the city's
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architecture, Trotsky wrote for Iskra (The Spark) and eventually broke with the Men'sheviks. In 1905 he returned to Russia, where he was a leading participant in the Revolution of 1905. In 1907 he and 14 other members of the Petersburg Soviet were exiled to Siberia. Later that year he again left Russia, in London first meeting the man who was eventually to order his murder, Iosif Stalin, and settled in Vienna for seven years. In 1916 he spent six months in the United States, where he was editor of N ovyi m ir (The New W orld). In America, he wrote, the profession of revolutionary was considered no more crim inal than that of bootlegger. A member of the Moscow City Committee of the Bol'shevik Party, Nikolai Bukharin (1888-1938) was arrested in 1910, spent six months in Moscow jails, and was exiled to Onega in 1911. He escaped within a few months and fled to Europe, where he took part in socialist anti-war agitation. After the revolution, as we shall see below, Bukharin was to play an im portant role in the young Soviet state.
Religious Dissenters Zion, will you not ask after your captive sons? Political protestors were not the only writers to go abroad to pursue their goals in greater freedom; religious dissenters also chose this route. W hile Lev Tolstoi himself remained in Russia, his most loyal follower, Vladim ir Chertkov (1854-1936), was deported for his work in assisting the Dukhobor sect to em igrate to Canada. From 1897 to 1908 Chertkov remained abroad, publishing in English the newspaper The Free Word, which was devoted to the student movement and Russian sectarianism. In 1908 he returned to Russia, settled down on Tolstoi's estate Yasnaya Polyana, and led the "Tolstoians” in opposing the more traditional views of Tolstoi's wife, whose pressure on her husband had caused the w riter to undertake his final journey, leaving Yasnaya Polyana surreptitiously on foot and dying in a small railroad station. Another w riter who took an interest in the Dukhobors was Vladim ir Bonch-Bruevich (1873-1955), who had been an émigré from 1896 to 1905. In 1899 he even accompanied the Dukhobors in their resettlem ent to Canada.
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America: Economic and Religious Emigration Alaska The first Russians to appear in North America arrived on the W est rather than the East Coast — a circumstance that sets them off from other European immigrant groups. As might be expected, the Alaska chapter of Russian emigration to the United States has very little literary significance. On instructions received from the dying Peter the Great, Captain Vitus Bering, a Danish sea officer, led an expedition across the North Pacific in 1728 and discovered the straits that still bear his name. In 1741 he undertook a second expedition. Although Bering died during the expedition, his crew returned home with pelts worth $30,000 — a sum large enough in those days to give birth to a vigorous Russian trapping industry. In 1783 the Irkutsk merchant and explorer Grigory Shelikhov led a Russian expedition to Alaska and built a fort at Three Saints Harbor. Catherine the Great was reluctant to support Shelikhov's plans, but her son Pavel, who continued to take great joy in reversing his m other's decisions after her death, granted Shelikhov monopolistic rights to develop Alaska in 1799. In 1805 Nikolai Rezanov, head of the Russian-American company, built a school and library in Sitka. By 1833 over 600 Russians resided in Alaska, and by 1850 the territory boasted 9 churches and 37 chapels. The Russian population after that grew largely as a result of intermarriage of Russian men with Aleutian women, but in 1867 Russia sold Alaska to the United States for seven million dollars, thus converting Alaska's Russian citizens into American "citizens by purchase.” According to the census there were nearly 800 Russians in the territory, men outnumbering women by three to one. Many of the Russians moved on to California, but a considerable cultural-religious heritage was left behind among the native Alaskans, despite the often cruel treatm ent they sometimes received at the hands of the Russian settlers.
Demographics The collective m em ory is ultim ately the motherland. Leszek Kotakowski Combined American, Canadian, and Argentine immigration figures alone show 4,509,495 individuals as having arrived between 1828 and 1915 from the Russian Empire. The actual emigration from
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Russia was preceded by a shift of population within the empire. Beginning in the middle of the 19th century there was a considerable internal migration to Russia's southern and south-eastern territories. With the coming of the railroad there was also migration to the Far East, with over IV 2 million settlers looking for land there. The governm ent encouraged this resettlement, but by the last quarter of the 19th century agricultural laborers began travelling westward instead, to Prussia and Austria, and especially to America. Using "foreign statistics,” the Brokgauz and Efron encyclopedia, published in the late 19th century, indicates that the chief destination of the émigrés during the period 1886 to 1902 was the United States. Some also left for South America. Many of the em igrants were not Russian, but shtetl Jews, with a considerable contingent of Belorussian and Ukrainian peasants, who are described with revolutionary pathos in Korolenko's 1895 novella W ithout a Language (Bez yazyka). O f the 1.5 million immigrants registered by the U.S. Census Bureau as having arrived from the Russian Empire in 1910-30 the vast m ajority were Jews (58%), Poles (11%), or Germans (8%). "Russians” comprised only 15-17% of the group, and many of these were actually either Belorussian, Carpatho-Russian®, or Ukrainian. In general the tsarist governm ent attempted to discourage this out-m igration. W ork abroad was supposed to be limited to a period of five years, and persons who took foreign citizenship and later returned home could be sent into internal exile. For whatever reason, the percentage of ethnic Russians declined even further after the turn of the century. Most immigrants in the United States from the Russian Empire on the eve of W orld W ar I were farmers and working class people. Just as significant as the relatively small percentage of ethnic Russians in this group was the fact that many of the ethnic Russians were single males who had come to earn money and then return home. In 1909, for example, 42% went back to Russia, but by 1913 that figure had dropped to a little over 16%. Only 15% of ethnic Russian émigrés to Am erica were women, as opposed to 43.4% among the Jews, causing one American researcher to comment that "The paucity of Russian women results, to some extent, in a suppression of normal sex responses.” Children below the age of 14 comprised only 3.4% in the Russian group, and persons older than 44 constituted even less — 1.6%. Such figures are evidence of an emigration that was intended by most of the ethnic Russians to be temporary. A census of one of the districts in the
•400,000 Carpatho-Russians emigrated to the United States from 1880 to 1914, most of them settling in Pennsylvania mining districts.
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Chernigov guberniya showed that 62% of the peasants who had travelled to America remained there from one to two years, 35% stayed two to five years, and only 3% spent more than five years. In contrast, the overwhelming majority of Jews remained, with only 4.7% to 10% returning. It should be noted that Russian emigration also increased significantly in the period immediately preceding World W ar I. If, according to one tsarist source, only 21,000 ethnic Russians arrived in the U.S.A in the eight years preceding 1907, the figure for the next seven years was 144,000. By the end of the reign of Nikolai II the population outflow was so massive that the governm ent was forced to accept it as a reality; for a tim e the tsarist officials even nurtured a vague hope that Russians abroad would be so horrified by Western democracy that they would be cured of the disease. From 1820 to the 1917 October coup some three and a quarter million persons are recorded as having entered the United States from Russia. The figures for emigration to the United States provided by the Brokgauz and Efron and the official U.S. statistics differ considerably. For example, the Brokgauz and Efron figure for 1886 is 32,143, as opposed to only 17,800 according to U.S. statistics. For 1902, on the other hand, the Brokgauz and Efron provides only 55,368, as opposed to 107,347, according to U.S. statistics. For the period 1886-1902 the Brokgauz and Efron indicates a total of 703,088 as having emigrated to the United States, as opposed to 849,461, according to U.S. statistics. The official U.S. statistics are probably more accurate for the United States. Just how reliable the Brokgauz and Efron statistics are for other countries is difficult to surmise. In many cases, however, it seems obvious that the Brokgauz and Efron must be widely off the mark. In general pre-1917 Russian statistics could not be particularly reliable in view of the fact that many of the emigrants left Russia secretly and thus were not registered anywhere in tsarist records. In the United States the areas of settlem ent chosen by the new em igrants were widely scattered: Massachusetts — 41,669 (1915), Ohio — 48,756 (1915), New York — 60,000 (1917), Pennsylvania — 35,000 (1917), Illin o is— 50,000(1917), M ichigan— 30,000(1917), New Jersey — 25,000 (1917), Connecticut — 20,000 (1917). The breakdown by cities is estim ated as: New York — 40,000, Detroit — 17,000, Chicago — 16,000, San Francisco — 15,000, the greater Pittsburgh area— 14,000, Philadelphia— 12,000, Newark— 10,000, Jersey C ity— 8,000, Cleveland — 5,000, Saint Louis — 5,000. The massive exodus from Russia was brought to a halt by W orld W ar I, when steamship travel became dangerous, and then by Soviet "locked borders” after 1917.
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Poverty W hether ethnically Russian or Jewish, the new im migrants in Am erica were, for the most part, among the poorest of the poor. In the period 1899-1910 they arrived in the United States with savings averaging between 11 and 19 dollars. By 1910-14 the émigrés were still more impoverished, and only 5.3% had more than 50 dollars upon arrival. Salaries of W h cents an hour at the Pittsburgh steel mills were sufficient to attract a number of the new arrivals; low as such pay may have been even then, a significant portion of these wages was nevertheless sent home to Russia to fam ily members in still greater need. A letter published in the New York Russian-language paper Russkaya zemlya (The Russian Soil) in 1914 described their lives: Peer into the subterranean kingdom o f the mines, into those places where God's light does not penetrate and where there reign eternal darkness and the dankness o f the grave. W hat figures w ill you see there, often knee-deep in cold water, bent over o r prone, in narrow passages, covered with mud, choking from dust and harm ful gases, threatened every m inute by a thousand dangers? In the dim light o f the flickering lamps, people look more like ghosts than living, m oving human beings. M any o f them have worked for years in this hopeless kingdom o f darkness. Some o f them have becom e so accustom ed to their situation that they can no longer tolerate daylight, and take no pleasure in the jo ys o f the world.... Go to the factories that m anufacture pig iron. There you w ill see a sea o f smoke and flame.... The infernal heat is everywhere, and the bright gleam o f m olten m etal blinds the men who work there. Lumps o f m olten iron fly in a ll directions from the furnaces, and woe to him who is struck b y them. Alm ost naked, barely human, these people m ove about, sometimes in semidarkness, sometimes in the light o f red-hot blobs o f metal. To the observer they appear like m onsters from another planet.... If we were to list a ll the different types o f labor in America, we would see that the Russian worker's lo t was to be given the m ost difficult and exhausting work. Alm ost without exaggeration we can say that where there is d irt and where there is suffering, you will be sure to find a Russian worker. Another article in Russkaya zem lya (1916) described the ruinous effect of this poverty on the immigrants’ self-esteem: Recently a friend and I went into an enorm ous departm ent store on Broadway. M y companion had to buy some sm all thing, but we were unable to explain to the
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saleswoman precisely what it was that we needed. The woman wanted to be helpful and asked m y companion what his nationality was so as to find someone to interpret fo r us. M y friend responded without a second thought that he was French. They brought a salesman who could barely speak the language, and we m anaged to make the purchase, albeit with no sm all difficulty. When we le ft the store, I asked m y companion, who was from Moscow, what made him claim to be French when there were undoubtedly m any Russian Jews among the salesmen in the store. "I'm asham ed to adm it it, " he answered, "but I never say I'm Russian. Surely you can understand me. Russians abroad are viewed with either curiosity o r contempt, so I pass m yself o ff as French." From his point o f view, m y friend was undoubtedly right. We Russians really had not created a positive reputation fo r ourselves. One of the problems afflicting America's Russian communities was alcoholism. In 1915 the newspaper Russkoe slovo (Russian Word) conducted a mock trial of liquor in "The W orkers’ Cathedral” on 14th street. The "prosecutor” gave an impassioned speech, but was countered by the defense ... in verse. Nevertheless, the jury banished the defendant to Mars.
Journalism Anaxagoras, when asked if he did not care about his motherland, replied that he did care very much indeed and pointed a t the sky. Reported by Diogenes Laertius In the 1860s a modest number of Russian intellectuals came to the United States to promote the revolutionary cause, among them the priest Agapy Goncharenko, who had worked with Gertsen in London in his "Free Russian Press.” When, in 1867, Russia sold Alaska to the United States, Goncharenko was awarded a subsidy of $50 an issue from the U.S. State Department to publish a RussianAmerican newspaper for America's new citizens. For $1,700 he bought Russian type and established in 1868 (in San Francisco) the Alaska Herald, which contained eight pages and appeared twice monthly. Half the m aterials were in Russian and the other half in English. True to his form er ideals, Goncharenko used the paper to publish Russian revolutionary literature, which he sent to Siberia. Unhappy over
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Goncharenko's editorial policies, Russian diplomats in America, and evidently some émigrés as well, made their feelings known to the U.S. government, and Goncharenko eventually lost his subsidy. Despite the early appearance of the Alaska Herald, the Russian press in Am erica did not really get off the ground until the 1880s. The center of Russian publishing was New York. At first the new arrivals leaned toward a generally Russian orientation, but the preponderance of Russian Jews in this group was especially evident in the press, and Jewish materials became particularly common. From 1889 to 1892 the "workers’ newspaper" Znamya (Banner) appeared weekly in New York, publishing pieces by such revolutionary Populists as Pêtr Lavrov, Vera Zasulich, and Georgy Plekhanov. One of its contributors was the journalist Sergei Shevich, who in 1886 ran for mayor of New York; although Shevich was unsuccessful, his campaign attracted a good deal of attention in the press. Two weeklies that appeared in 1892 were Russkii listok (The Russian Page) and Russkie novosti (Russian News); the latter had a circulation of 2,000 copies. Both papers were aimed at the newly arrived audience of Russian Jews. Russkie novosti was edited by Yakov Gordin, who later became a popular author of m elodramatic plays. In 1893-94 the weekly Progress appeared, first in New York and then in Chicago. The weeklies Spravochnyi listok (Questions and Answers) and Russko-amerikanskii vestnik (The Russian-American Herald) provided useful information on the day-to-day activities of Russians in New York. Nevertheless, by 1894, the revolutionaries decided to concentrate their activities in Europe and for a while virtually stopped coming to America. By 1910 the U.S. Census showed 95,137 persons indicating their native language was Russian; of these 57,926 were foreign-born. By the turn of the century this population base was large enough to support a number of Russian publications.8
“Among the new periodicals w ere Velikii okean (The G reat O cean, Los Angeles, 1912-1917, appeared three tim es a w eek), Russkaya zhizn' (Russian Life, Detroit, 1915-1918, weekly), the Social-Revolutionaries' Volya (Freedom , N Y , 1915, w eekly), Trud (Labor, Pittsburgh, 1914-1916), and Am erikanskii pravoslavnyi vestnik (The American Orthodox Herald, NY, 1899-1915). Most of these proved to be quite ephem eral publications, but by 1918 Mark Vil'chur, a form er editor of Russkoe slovo, w as able to list som e 21 Russian periodicals appearing in the United States and Canada. They included Novyi m ir (The New W orld, NY, founded in 1911 by the M en’sheviks), the humorous Zhizn' ism ekh (Life and Laughter, N Y, founded in 1914, w eekly), the Carpatho-Russian Golos naroda (Voice of The People, 1917), and Russkii golos (The Russian Voice, NY, 1917). O ne of them still exists and even prospers, today: Russkoe slovo (The Russian W ord, N Y , 1910; later renamed Novoe russkoe slovo [The New Russian W ord]).
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One journalist was Vladim ir Geins, who arrived in America in 1868 and wrote articles about American life under the pseudonym W illiam Frey for magazines back home: Otechestvennye zapiski (Notes of the Fatherland), Delo (The Cause), Nedelya (The Week), and Vestnik Evropy (The Herald of Europe). In Am erica Geins established a Russian-Jewish commune in Oregon called The N ew Odessa, where he preached vegetarianism and religious positivism. Later Geins lectured in New York State and acquired a considerable number of adherents. Humanity, he taught, was a living organism in which individual people were only temporary atoms. Religion and science had to be unified to create a great human brotherhood without private property.
The Jews ... the m ost experienced exiles, exiles p a r excellence, the Jews. Leszek Kotakowski Russian estimates of pre-1917 emigration from the Russian Empire in the period 1899-1909 show only 4.4% of the émigrés as Russian, the rest being Jews (43.8%), Poles (27%), Lithuanians (9.6%), Finns (8.5%), and Germans (5.8%). According to another estimate, based on the native language indicated for the 1910 U.S. census, ethnic Russians comprised only 2.4% of arrivals from the Russian Empire. No understanding of the huge Jewish exodus from the Russian Empire is possible w ithout taking into consideration the historical circum stances that gave rise to it. At first excluded from Russian territories, the Jews found themselves incorporated on a massive scale into the Russian Empire after the first partition of Poland in 1772. Under the influence of liberal Western ideas, Catherine the Great originally called for their integration into the empire but changed her mind by 1791, when she first established the "Pale of Jewish Settlem ent” (Cherta osedlosti). The Pale extended from the Baltic to the Black Sea, expanding and shrinking alternately over the years, and eventually came to include 15 gubem iyas .a Fertility patterns were, of course, very different back then than now: from one and one-half
•The Bessarabia, Chernigov, Ekaterinoslav, Grodno, Kherson, Kiev (excepting Kiev itself), Kovno, Minsk, Mogilev, Podol'sk, Poltava, Tavriya, Vilno, Vitebsk, and Volyniya gubem iyas.
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million in 1825 the Jewish population grew to nearly five million by 1897. During the reign of Aleksandr II, Jews were perm itted to settle in other areas — "where they would comprise an insignificant minority and thus partially soften their national characteristics; but for the sake of caution and gradualism, and also with the goal of preventing a rapid influx of an alien elem ent into the inner guberniyas” These groups were limited to merchants of the First Guild, persons possessing a higher education, artisans, veterans, and Jews living in Turkestan or Siberia. According to the census data of 1897 only 0.9% (44,328) of the Jews considered their native language to be Russian, and 96.9% were Yiddish speakers; that figure reached 99% in rural areas of the Pale of Settlem ent. In cities outside the Pale, however, only 80.5% indicated Yiddish as their native tongue. In spite of these census results, however, a quarter of the Jewish population was literate in Russian; Jewish males had a one-third literacy rate, higher than that of Russians and lagging behind only that of the Russian Germans. Despite the lim itations placed upon the Jews, the Jewish bourgeoisie appears to have been remarkably sym pathetic to the monarchy and viewed russification of the shtetls as a positive influence. In 1920 the Paris-based Evreiskaya trib u n a {Jewish Tribune) editorialized that the Jews were linked intim ately with Russia: These bonds consist o f the deep influence o f Russian culture on the Jews. Russia is for [Jews in ] the western provinces their country and above a ll their spiritual home. Who are the readers o f the Russian newspapers o f Wilno, Minsk, Grodno and Warsaw? Nine-tenths o f them are Jews. The Grodno paper Nashe utro (O ur Morning) is printed ha lf in Russian and h a lf in Yiddish. When one o f these Russian papers passed into Polish hands and began to support the Polish point o f view in the question o f the kresses (The Russian-Polish borderlands), a ll the Jewish contributors abandoned the paper. The Jews represent the sole conquest made in the western provinces, not by Russian arms, but b y Russian culture. The assimilation of Jewish intellectuals into Russian culture was particularly evident. For example, Trotsky in his autobiography consistently speaks of himself as a Russian, not a Jew. Some Jews were even openly hostile to their own Jewish heritage. Sheer Èfron (1849-1926) was a Lithuanian Jew who composed prose works and plays in Russian under the penname Savely Litvin (meaning "Lithuanian”). Èfron-Litvin had studied in a cheder and then graduated from a rabbinical school in Vilnius, but nevertheless had no compunctions about expressing his disdain for Jewish life in his prose
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works and plays. In 1900 the St. Petersburg Malyi Theater put on a play written jointly with Viktor Kryiov under the title The Contrabandists, with one of the main roles performed by the Jewish actor Yakov Tinsky. The prem iere of the work, which described the Jewish population in a small border town as consisting of bandits and murderers ready to commit any crime for the sake of money, engendered such riots that the actors fled the stage and the alarmed censor forbade any mention of the play in the press and even shut down the newspaper Severnyi Kur'er (Northern Messenger), which organized a counter-campaign. Èfron himself was widely attacked as a turncoat and slanderer. After the 1917 October coup he escaped first to Feodosiya, in the Crimea, and then to Serbia, where he took vows as an Orthodox monk.3 The first pogroms occurred in 1859, and again in 1871. When Aleksandr II was assassinated in 1881, the fact that one of the conspirators was a Jewish woman received wide publicity. Over 100 pogroms occurred that year alone. They continued until 1884. A second onslaught took place in the wake of the October Manifesto of 1905, which was regarded as a humiliation of the Tsar, forced upon him by Jewish revolutionaries. 1915-21 were years of particularly violent pogroms, the Jews having been accused of aiding and abetting the enemy during the war. Altogether the historian S. M. Dubnov counted 887 m ajor pogroms and 349 minor ones; an estimated 60,000 persons lost their lives and 200,000 were injured. These events, together with the russification policies of Aleksandr III and the introduction of universal conscription into the army in 1874, which included Jews, engendered a massive exodus. Most of the émigrés left for North America. In the period 1881-1908,1,250,000 Jews emigrated from Russia to the United States, while Canada attracted 30,000 and Argentina 20,000. England drew 150,000, but France, Germany, and Belgium only 30,000, 20,000, and 5,000, respectively. South Africa accepted 15,000 and Egypt 10,000, while 20,000 (about 1.3%) relocated to Palestine.
•Èfron must have spent some tim e abroad in the 1880s, having criticized the ém igrés as immoral and satirized them in 1889 in Ta/es From the Life o f the G eneva Rebels (Rasskazy iz byta zhenevskikh buntarei).
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Writers An exile's life is no life. B ut the M uses love me. For m y suffering they gave me a honeyed g ift: M y name survives me. Leonidas of Tarentum (c. 290 - c. 220 B.C.)
Neither the background of the new arrivals to the United States nor their material situation was such as to be conducive to the composition of poetry and fiction. Indeed, 92% of them belonged to the peasant laboring class. These were uneducated people who had to earn a living by the sweat of their brow. Nevertheless, there was a modest amount of literary activity. In the late 1860s the Russian w riter A. S. Kurbsky settled in the United States, travelled all over the country, and published a series of essays back home in the Vestnik Evropy (The Herald of Europe). One writer, Grigory Machtet, arrived in the United States in 1871 and helped establish a Russian commune in Kansas which quickly folded. In San Francisco he met Goncharenko, who published some of his verse in Svoboda (Freedom — the Alaska Herald renamed). M achtet is the author of a collection Travelling Around the W orld with one story entitled The Pull of America. Vladim ir Stoleshnikov (7-1907) had been a close friend of Tkachêv and Nechaev and had helped publish Nabat in Switzerland from 1875 to 1876. He arrived in Am erica in the late 1870s. There he published his verse and political parodies in Znamya. A lawyer and architect, he helped design Carnegie Hall. Osip Dymov (pseudonym of Iosif Perel'man, 1878-1959) had been a professional prose writer and journalist since the turn of the century. He emigrated to the United States in 1913, having published half a dozen books in Russia. In the United States he continued to publish in Russian and Yiddish, particularly plays. An eclectic writer, he began his career as a sentim entalist, but wrote many humorous works and tried his hand at psychological prose.
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The Soviet Period The First W ave Statistics Unless statistics lie he was more brave than m e: more blond than you. E. E. Cummings If, in Pushkin's phrase, Peter the Great "hewed a window through to Europe” and later tsars attempted to board over that opening so as to keep unwelcome prodigal sons from returning home, it was the Soviets who went even further and applied what had been known in 17th-century Prague as "defenestration.” As it became increasingly evident that the W hites were losing the civil war, no active process of ejection was required on the authorities’ part. Educated society in particular was only too eager to flee the dictates of a leftwing group of intellectuals freshly arrived from Parisian "exile” to instruct the working class in what was referred to as "recognized necessity.” Although individual Russians made their way abroad as early as 1918, the mass exodus began only in 1920, when General Denikin's army was defeated and a massive evacuation was undertaken from the Black Sea port of Novorossiisk. Admiral Kolchak's forces were crushed in the Far East, and many Russians fled to Harbin and Shanghai, which already had large Russian populations to maintain the rail link to China. Also that year VrangeC’s army was evacuated to Istanbul from the Crimea, and later was dispersed throughout France, the Balkans, and Czechoslovakia. Historically, radical political upheaval has been accompanied by correspondingly massive emigration, and while the institution of M arxist governm ents proved no exception, Russia was the first in that series of events. On the whole, it is quite difficult to assess the accuracy of estimates of Russia's population losses in the period im m ediately following the civil war. The émigré historian Pêtr Kovalevsky estimated an expatriate population of somewhere between nine and ten million people: to the 1,160,000 who were estimated by the League of Nations to have left Russia after the 1917 October coup are added Russians residing in areas split off from the Russian empire:
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Poland— 5,250,000a; Bessarabia— 742,000; Slovakia-Eastern Ukraine (Carpatho-Ruthenia) — 550,000; Latvia — 231,000; Estonia — 91,000; Lithuania — 55,000; Finland — 15,000. But there were also those who returned to M other Russia — over 180,000 between 1921 and 1931. The enormous wave of Russian refugees outside of Russia was not a unique phenomenon; there were another 1.4 million Russian prisoners of war, of whom 1.2 million were still in Germany as late as October 1918. Large, additional numbers were interned in 70 camps, with 230,000 working in agriculture and another 650,000 in industry. When the war came to a close the majority of these men wanted to return to Russia and in their restlessness posed a real threat to German law and order — especially under the influence of the revolutionary events in Russia. The Germans exercised only nominal supervision over the camps, and on a number of occasions the prisoners were released by sym pathetic German "comrades” to make their way to Berlin in hopes of getting home from there. For their part, the Germans wanted to be rid of the Russians as quickly as possible — both because of the practical difficulties involved in maintaining them and also in view of the successful communist propaganda campaign being conducted in their ranks. Huge columns of ragged, hungry men began the trek eastward in the bitter cold. On January 16, 1919, however, Supreme Allied Commander Marshal Foch decided to stop the repatriations in the hope of recruiting these men to fight on the side of the W hite armies or, at the very least, of preventing them from filling the ranks of the Red army. Given until February 2 to stop the repatriations, German officials hurriedly sent 400,000 Russians home — by ship and train. Nevertheless, it soon became rapidly evident that the W hites had lost the civil war, and the repatriations continued. In December 1920, the Germany Ministry of Internal Affairs declared that the bulk of Russian prisoners of war had been repatriated. This may have been som ewhat premature, since only three months later there were still some 30,000 Russian prisoners of war registered in Germany and another 40,000 to 50,000 were "at large” (flüchtig). The Russians in the German POW camps lived under very difficult conditions. 50,000 actually died in captivity. There were attem pts to fight the prevailing boredom by organizing choirs and staging theatrical performances; the camp at Altengrabow even had two resident am ateur theater companies. Camp newspapers were published, among them Daite zh it' (Let Me Live), evidently published
“Ukrainians and Belorussians w ere probably included in the figure, classified as "Russians."
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in Altengrabow, and a Soviet publication — Izvestiya Russkogo Byuro Voennoplennykh (News of the Russian Prisoner of W ar Bureau). Some of the Russians, particularly the officers, resisted repatriation, and the German government eventually decided not to forcibly deport such persons. By February 1922 between 12,000 and 20,000 form er Russian prisoners of war were permitted to remain, and the prisoner-of-war camps in Altenau, Altengrabow, Celle, Quedlinburg, Lichtenhorst, W ildemann, and W ünsdorf began to close. Under these circum stances the distinction between a "refugee” and a "prisoner of war” or, for that matter, between an émigré and a Soviet citizen residing in Germany, became very vague indeed. The composition of the First Wave had a high percentage of m ilitary men. This was hardly surprising in view of the fact that an estim ated 71/2 million men were serving in the Russian armies on the Austro-German front in 1917, not to speak of veterans of the various W hite armies. But while this imparted a definite military bent to émigré culture, it would be a mistake to view the First Wave exclusively in this light. The first edition of the G reat Soviet Encyclopedia thus describes the inverted social pyramid of the W hite emigration: Although there are no precise data on the social com position o f the White emigration, the shattered remains o f the Russian bourgeoisie, the landed gentry and (tsarist) officials undoubtedly predom inate in it. Within the White émigré com m unity there are a t least 1,000,000 participants in the White arm ies — m ost o f them officers, volunteers, and cadets, drawn prim arily from the nobility o r products o f the upper o r middle bourgeoisie, and ... the kulak stratum.... The bulk o f the rem aining White em igration is made up o f form er members o f the landed gentry, capitalists, tsarist officials, priests, etc. Within the ranks o f the White em igration the intelligentsia is represented b y its upper la y e rs ... chiefly lawyers, journalists, professors, adm inistrativetechnical personnel, and so forth. How is it that an official Soviet government publication could so frankly adm it that the cream of society had fled the country en masse? Such admissions were still possible in the early Soviet period, when total censorship had not yet been imposed. Nevertheless, this "brain drain” was regarded by an egaiitarian world view as a temporary loss — not, in the words of the non-émigré writer Lidiya Chukovskaya, a genetic "bloodletting” of society. The relentless war waged against its own intellectuals was to become a topic of concern for a number of Russian scholars. The émigré writer and historian Nina Berberova wrote that the Russian tragedy resulted from a split between the intelligentsia and the people and worried that the consequences of the
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destruction of the intelligentsia would not be overcome even in two hundred years. A later emigrant, Aleksandr Zinov'ev, wrote: W hat will the Russian people contribute to the world com m unity once it has disappeared from the face o f the Earth as an ethnic unit? In point o f fact, Russia is disappearing as a nation. The revolution, civil war, collectivization, endless repressions, and the Second W orld W ar have a ll crushed Russia as a national entity. For a long time now Russia has ceased to exist. A nd she will never be again. O nly the Russian population remains — as m aterial for som ething else, perhaps, but not for a nation. The philosopher Georgy Fedotov in an article entitled "Tragedy of the Intelligentsia” described the massive murder and exile of Soviet Russia's intellectuals as a national "loss of memory” (poterya pamyati). This was indeed the case, although the magnitude of change was not really comparable to that brought about by the introduction of the East Slavs to Christianity. Communism lasted seven decades, not seven centuries— the amount of tim e that lapsed between the Christianization of Rus' and the Petrine reforms — and the cultural gap that lay between the tsarist exiles who pulled off the coup of 1917 and the intellectuals who took their seats in Parisian cafés was in no way comparable to that which existed between East Slavic pagan tribes and Byzantine monks in the tenth century. This realization may be poor consolation for the tragic course of the 20th century, but it does help to maintain a proper historical perspective. On the other hand, this is adm ittedly a comparison in magnitude between a positive historical phenomenon and a national disaster; Christianity was, after all, a civilizing influence, while Soviet communism introduced an era of devastating violence.
Politics Rage3 Assassination is the extreme form o f censorship. George Bernard Shaw On the whole, Russian literature had been highly politicized under the tsars, and the Soviet period only served to strengthen this
•I had already chosen the heading for this subchapter when I cam e across the identical expression — rage — used in connection with Germ an exile literature — "Literatur des Zornes" — in an article by the Germ an critic Hans M ayer.
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tendency. One must imagine Mark Vishnyak, editor of Sovremennye zapiski (Contemporary Annals), being introduced in Paris to Pêtr Shuvalov, whose father had been governor of Moscow and was assassinated by terrorists. Vishnyak took Shuvalov aside to assure him that he had not been a party to the assassination. Another instance (one of thousands) of the intensity of political passions occurred at the funeral of Cavalry General Vladim ir Sukhomlinov, who had been sentenced to life imprisonment by the Provisional Government for his failures in leadership during the war. When the Bol'sheviks took power, instead of shooting Sukhomlinov, as they did so many other highranking tsarist officers and officials, they handed him over to the Germans under what many regarded as suspicious circumstances. He ended up in Berlin in 1918, where he wrote two books: The Grand Duke N ikolai Nikolaevich the Younger and Memoirs. One of the gravediggers at Sukhomlinov's funeral was a form er W hite officer who muttered as he was digging: "All right, German spy, return to your German earth.” And there was W hite General Denikin, who had to be evacuated from Turkey to Malta for fear of assassination by his own men, who blamed him for the defeat. Even so, such precautions failed to save his second-in-command, General Ivan Romanovsky, who was shot by a man wearing the uniform of a Russian officer. Such emotions did not fade with the years. Aleksandr Kerensky, the unsuccessful head of the Provisional Government, played an active and prominent role in ém igré life. One day, while walking down a street in Paris, he passed a Russian woman with a little girl. The woman pointed at Kerensky and said loudly: "Look Tanya. That's the man who ruined Russia.” Kerensky fell into a deep depression that lasted for days. Even four decades later the émigré newspaper Rossiya (Russia) claimed that to compare him to Judas Iscariot was an insult to Judas, who had, at least, had the courage to kill himself when he realized the treason he had wrought. Passions ran so high that a spelling reform put into effect by the Soviets was rejected by the émigrés for decades, even though it had been conceived and planned during the tsarist period. When Ivan Bunin was asked to examine a copy of the Prague magazine Studencheskie gody (Student Years) he replied: "You can send me a copy of the magazine for examination, but only if it's in the old orthography. Otherwise don't bother.” In Belgrade Professor Evgeny Spektorsky declared that: "in the Russia of the future people will be hanged for [using] the new orthography.” At a meeting of the Parisian society "The Green Lamp,” Dmitry Merezhkovsky raised the question of a "disconvergence between the intelligentsia and the Russian spirit, the soul of Russia.” He concluded that the intelligentsia itself had produced the Bol'sheviks as "typical
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Russian intellectuals” who created a philosophy "unheard of in history, unique, an unbounded evil — Satanism.” This hard-line view was institutionalized in the establishment of a "Day of Implacability” (den' neprimirimosti), observed annually on November 7, the date the W inter Palace was taken. In the U.S.S.R. the date was celebrated as the "Day of the Great October Revolution.” Such heated emotions inevitably found expression in the violence which became a regular companion of Russian émigré life. One particular act that might well have had disastrous consequences for the Russian émigré community in Paris was the assassination of French President Paul Doumer by the Russian émigré Pavel Gorgulov on May 6 ,1 9 3 2 . Ironically, Doumer had been a true friend of Russian émigrés, having organized an aid society for Russian soldiers who found themselves in France after 1920. Lev Lyubimov, ‘a Russian émigré for almost 30 years who was deported to the Soviet Union in 1948, was a correspondent for the newspaper Vozrozhdenie (Renaissance) at the time. He described how he learned of the event and immediately rushed to the scene, still unaware that the assassin was Russian. A t the entrance I m et the editor o f a m ajor French newspaper. ”So a ll our presidents are to be m urdered now, ” he said as he greeted me. I stared a t him in incomprehension, but he said nothing m ore and rushed o ff to his car.... I followed the other reporters and entered a room packed full with people. As I pushed forward, I saw a face which im m ediately im pressed itself into m y m em ory fo re ve r— round, puffy, flushed. Something in the face seem ed both fam iliar and strange to me. I had never seen that particular face before, but I knew such faces. M y sensations were still unclear, but then I heard the m an's voice. As he groped for French words, I understood him immediately. And I shuddered a t the thought that I was probably the only one there to understand him so easily, in that mass o f French reporters and police he was m y only countryman — a Russian émigré ju s t like m eI The distorted face, the Russian accent.... His bloodshot eyes seem ed to flash with a dumb, insane pride. Gorgulov, who had been beaten during the arrest, screamed out the motive for his a c t— to protest France's relations with the Soviet Union. When attacking Doumer he screamed: "The violet will defeat the machine!” In his book The Secret o f the Lives o f the Scythians (Taina zhizni skifov) he explained that the violet symbolized a tender,
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sensitive Russia, as opposed to the intellectual West. A brochure was found with the political platform of his party, the "Greens”: Russia was to be ruled by a trium virate of dictators. Its senior member was the Green dictator, the peasant leader Pavel Gorgulov. Its second and third members had not yet been selected, but the trium virate's titles had already been established: "Citizen Dictator” for Gorgulov himself, and "Citizen Vice-Dictators” for the other two. The uniforms for the various ranks were precisely described — who would wear high boots with spurs, who would wear a boyar hat, who would have striped trousers, who would have shoulder braids, etc. A notebook was found with the inscription: "Doctor Pavel Gorgulov, Head of the Russian Fascists, M urderer of the President of the French Republic.” At his trial, Gorgulov declared, however, that he was not a fascist, but a loyal adherent o f ... Kerensky! Before he was guillotined publicly, Gorgulov screamed (to the dismay of the émigré community) that he had com m itted the murder in the name of Russia and out of hatred for the Bol'sheviks. Gorgulov, whose nom de plum e was "Pavel Bred” (In Russian, bred means "ravings” or "delirium ”) — was a prose w riter and a poet: Forests! Grow treesI BeastsI Be bestiall M enl Subm it! Georgy Fedotov, criticizing fellow émigrés for their insistence on violent overthrow of the Soviet government, coined the term gorgulovshchina to indicate such doomed efforts. The reaction in the Kremlin to all this rage and violence was one of unconcealed gloating. In a 1922 article in Pravda Aleksandr Voronsky, editor of the Moscow journal Krasnaya nov\ mocked the ém igrés as "impotents” who were already beginning to sense that they were at a dead end.a Pravda itself went even further, calling the émigrés "corpses brandishing cardboard swords.” Curiously, this was virtually the same phraseology to be used by Goebbels in mocking exiled German writers in 1933: "The thread of your lives is broken; you're cadavers on leave,” he jeered. But the defeated foes — both those actually slaughtered and those merely wished dead — remained a source of morbid fascination. Stalin, who had current issues of the Paris émigré newspaper Poslednie novosti (The Latest News)
ideologically neutral literature, he pronounced, would not be tolerated: "À la guerre, com m e à la guerre." By 1927 Voronsky himself was arrested as a "Trotskyite" and exiled to Siberia. Although this form er tsarist exile recanted his sins and w as permitted to return to Moscow, he was rearrested in 1935 and shot two years later as an "enemy of the people."
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delivered to his desk, attended Bulgakov's play about the fleeing W hites, Days o f the Turbins (Dni Turbinykh), fifteen times! Nor was he the only person in Moscow to be enthralled with the lives of the foe: from 1926 to 1941 the Moscow Art Theater presented 987 performances of this stage adaptation of the novel White Guard (Belaya gvardiya).
Political Fragmentation and Hopes for Intervention Liebchen, with whom should I quarrel except in the hiss o f love, that harsh, irregular flam e? Stanley Kunitz Once the original shock of defeat and exile had receded som ewhat and it gradually became evident that a victorious return home was not imminent, the émigrés had to decide how to get along with each other.3 Even though the number of émigrés was not sufficient to support the estimated 150 Russian political parties which had existed before the revolution, the number was, nevertheless, still quite large. Compared to the ideological views of tsarist exiles, the spectrum of émigré political credos had been broadened considerably; not only did the émigrés not form anything like a unified community, they seemed to live in different worlds, shaped by their divergent political views. On the right were the monarchists, the Mladoross (Young Russia) party, the "post-revolutionary" (porevolyutsionnye) movements, the Solidarists, and the Russian Fascists. In the center were the Constitutional Democrats (The Cadets), and on the left the Social Revolutionaries, the Men'sheviks, the Eurasians, and the "Changing Landmarks” (Smena vekh) group.6 Despite their manifold political disagreements, the émigrés recognized the need to unite in the struggle against the victorious Bol'sheviks. Lenin anguished over the fact that the émigrés were
■For a discussion of the topic see Mityukov's 1926 Com m unity a t a Crossroads (Èm igratsiya na pereput'e).
book
The Ém igré
bThis heterogeneity is not an unusual phenomenon in the world context of emigration. The Germ an émigré writer Lion Feuchtwanger in his 1940 novel Exile noted the infighting in the Germ an émigré community during the Nazi period, but with an ethnic self-centeredness typical of ém igré existence, saw such divisions as something uniquely Germ an.
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willing to pay any price to overthrow the revolution, and the émigré economist, historian, and politician Pêtr Struve (1870-1944) seemed to confirm the fears of the first head of the Soviet state when he commented that he didn't care who overthrew the Bol’sheviks — the liberal Kerensky or the arch-conservative Markov II. But how was this to be accomplished? Nikolai Astrov, the form er mayor of Moscow residing in Prague, advised Russians abroad to refrain from accepting citizenship in their new countries of residence so as to avoid denationalization. He was opposed by Struve, who believed that if they were to be effective in their struggle against the new government of Russia, the émigrés had to be financially secure and integrated into their new lives. The chief issue of émigré debates at the tim e was the nature of the "W hite Idea” — the unification of the various groups to achieve the overthrow of the Soviet government. Many hoped for foreign m ilitary intervention, a contingency which Markov II declared could be rejected only by fools hoping for a miracle. On the other hand, when Struve led a delegation of émigrés to visit the philosopher Nikolai Berdyaev, who had just been deported, Berdyaev went into near hysterics over any talk of intervention by the Western powers. The Prague newspaper Volya Rossii went even further, favoring international recognition of the Soviet state and condemning military intervention as hopeless. Faced with such a broad range of political views, many adopted the position that the achievement of a united front required renouncing any specific political platform for Russia until after the communists were overthrown. This view was referred to as nepredreshenchestvo (non-predeterm ination). As the interwar period progressed, rightist movements generally gained strength, but liberals and leftist organizations were financially better off and, according to the contem porary German historian Hans von Rimscha, controlled 80 percent of the émigré press. And the literary and journalistic establishm ent of the new host countries was even further to the left. Russian writers — both outside and within the Soviet Union — had expected their foreign colleagues to support them in their hour of need, but instead they found themselves running up against a wall of indifference. In 1927 Russian émigré papers published a letter, supposedly received from Moscow, attacking Western writers for their silence at a tim e when Russian literature was being strangled in its native country: W riters — ear, eye, and conscience o f the world — answ er u si It does not behoove you to maintain that na ll authority comes from G od.” You will not say to us the cruel words: "each people desen/es the governm ent which rules i t ”
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O ur only weapon— the p e n — has been snatched from our hands. We are deprived o f the a ir we need to breathe — literature.... We send you this letter as from an underground dungeon. We write it a t great risk, and those who forward it abroad will also be in m ortal danger. We do not know if it w ill reach the pages o f the free press. But if it does, if our voice from the grave sounds among you, we bid you — listen, read, think o f its message. The standard o f conduct o f our late great man — Lev Tolstoi — will then become your own standard: 1 cannot remain silent.” — A group of Russian writers* Despite its eloquence, the appeal was ignored by W estern writers; in 1928, however, Konstantin Bal'mont and Ivan Bunin did manage to publish an appeal protesting this lack of attention in L ’A venir. A few days later Romain Rolland asked Gor'ky, then still residing in the West, if all this was true. In the March issue of L'Europe Gor'ky responded that it was a lie.
The Church Let there be no violence in religion. Koran, Surah 2 It was only natural that in their new circumstances the refugees would cling with special tenacity to their traditional faith. Faced with open war declared in the Soviet Union upon religion and themselves refugees fleeing a "godless” government, Church figures them selves became intim ately involved with politics, thus complicating the situation even further. The Crimean evacuation brought with it a number of bishops, who on November 1, 1919, with the blessing of the Patriarchate of Constantinople, formed the Russian Church Administration Abroad. Patriarch Tikhon in Moscow, head of the Russian Orthodox Church, desiring to confirm the legitimacy of this decision, issued decree (ukaz) No. 362 on November 20,1920. This document, which is regarded as
•O f course, Russians w ere only one of many émigré groups to encounter disbelief from W estern writers over the horror stories they brought from home. In 1934 the Germ an League of Proletarian-Revolutionary W riters sent a strikingly sim ilar and equally anguished appeal for support from writers in other countries.
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the canonical foundation of what is known today as "The Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia,” states that if the Supreme Church Administration should for any reason cease its activity, then any diocesan bishop would immediately be authorized to enter into relations with the bishops of neighboring dioceses with the aim of organizing a body to serve as a supreme authority or even to take such authority upon himself. From November 21 to December 3,1921, the Supreme Church Administration Abroad convened a council (soboi) of 13 bishops, 23 priests, and 67 laymen in Sremski Karlovci, Serbia, which declared loyalty and submission to the Patriarch of Moscow but called for foreign m ilitary intervention to overthrow the Soviet government and restore the Romanov dynasty. Monarchist sympathies were so deeply ingrained in the Church Abroad that as late as the 1938 Episcopal Council, held in Yugoslavia, Archbishop Ioann (Maksimovich) accused the entire Russian nation of complicity in regicide. Patriarch Tikhon himself anathematized the Bol'sheviks in 1918, but in March of that same year he was placed under house arrest, and on May 5 he issued a new ukaz, suspending the Supreme Church Administration Abroad for engaging in politics and appointing Metropolitan Evlogy of Paris as the new head of the Church Abroad. Supposedly, Tikhon issued the declaration under threat of execution of the entire Moscow clergy. Evlogy himself originally refused to accept the order. O ut of obedience to the Patriarch, but aware of the pressure placed upon him, the Supreme Church Administration Abroad grudgingly accepted the latest decree but shortly thereafter created the Tem porary Holy Episcopal Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad as its own replacement. On March 25,1925, Tikhon died under suspicious circumstances, and most of his staff was arrested and exiled to Siberia. Meanwhile, Evlogy had reexamined his position with regard to Ukaz No. 362 and now maintained that he was head of the Russian Church abroad, having been appointed by Tikhon. In JuneJuly 1926 Evlogy left the Synod, creating the Russian Orthodox Church in W estern Europe and taking with him 10 bishops and 62 parishes. But 18 bishops declared themselves loyal to the Synod. Both groups appealed to the new Metropolitan in Moscow, Sergy, who at first declined to intervene on the grounds that he was poorly informed about the nature of their quarrel. In December 1926 Sergy was imprisoned for refusing to excommunicate all bishops in exile, but he was released in July 1927 after agreeing to issue a "declaration” demanding that the clergy abroad sign a written promise of com plete loyalty to the Soviet government, which had threatened to arrest the entire clergy if he refused to do so. Evlogy signed the oath
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so as not to endanger the Church in Russia, maintaining that he understood "loyalty” as abstention from political activities. The Synod, however, rejected the loyalty oath as "an unheard-of and unnatural union between the godless authorities and the Holy Orthodox Church,” forbade Evlogy to perform religious functions, and demanded that his fellow believers refuse to pray with him. Meanwhile, the Russian Orthodox Greek-Catholic Church in America, whose roots went back to the 1790s, when the first Russian clergy arrived via Alaska and which had 100,000 members in 169 parishes on the eve of the Russian revolution, had substantial differences with Evlogy but eventually supported him in denying the authority of the Synod. The American Church also appears to have supported the loyalty oath, at least somewhat. In 1930 Evlogy travelled to England, where he took part in a prayer service for the "suffering Russian Church,” but was reprimanded by Sergy and ogee again began to rely on Tikhon's 1920 ukaz rather than the 1921 appointm ent. Thus, separate Russian Orthodox churches abroad came into existence: a) the (Synodal) Russian Church Abroad (also known as The Russian Church Outside of Russia), b) Evlogy's Russian Orthodox Church in W estern Europe, which recognized the authority of the Moscow Patriarch, and c) the Russian Orthodox Church in America. The Church in America eventually sought to resolve its vague ecclesiastical status by seeking "autocephaly” (independence) from the Church in Moscow, while Evlogy preferred to enter the jurisdiction of the Patriarch of Constantinople. Since the Russian Orthodox Church had for centuries taught that Moscow was the "Third Rome” after the Greeks had been punished for their sinful ways, this recognition of the authority of the Constantinople Patriarchate definitely represented a radical change in policy. Inevitably, the Synod accused Evlogy of "selling out” to Constantinople. Synodal archbishop Serafim even declared that Evlogy had abandoned the Mother Church, and declared him to be, not a Russian, but a Greek bishop. In June 1928 the Moscow Patriarchate declared the Synod to be guilty of disobedience and schism, and form ally condemned and expelled the entire Church Abroad. The following year saw the passage of the Soviet Law on Religious Associations. Church buildings were converted into clubs and dance halls, and religious education was prohibited even more strictly than before. Priests and bishops continued to be arrested and to perish in Soviet forced-labor camps. W hen Metropolitan Sergy declared to foreign journalists that the Church in Russia was not being persecuted, Evlogy's ideological stance was subjected to devastating criticism within the exile community. That same year Sergy appealed to other local Patriarchs of the Orthodox Church to forbid activities of the Russian Church
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Abroad, but the appeal remained unheeded. In the confusing religious politics of the 1930s the American Church tem porarily reunited with the Church Abroad, and in 1934-35 Evlogy came to a provisional understanding with the Synod. By 1937 the Great Purges were in full swing throughout the Soviet Union, and in 1938 the Second Sobor of the Russian Church Abroad reconfirmed its unwillingness to rejoin the Moscow Patriarchate. The ém igrés’ conservative political outlook found expression in religious affairs, and a resolution of the 1926 Synod recommended that the Paris Theological Institute, a creation of the Evlogian church, reject "Judeo-Masonic” financial support. In 1936 Father Sergei Bulgakov, an em inent theologian and member of the Institute, was declared a heretic by both the Synod and the Moscow Patriarchate. Later, when the Nazis came to power in Germany, they supported the Synod over the Evlogian Church, which recognized Moscow's ecclesiastical authority. W hen an Orthodox cathedral was built in Germany in 1938, the German governm ent made a sizeable donation and Metropolitan Anastasy even wrote a letter to Hitler thanking him for the donation and calling him "a leader in the struggle for peace and truth ... for whom the Russian people should constantly send their prayers to God.” That same year the German government handed over all Evlogian parishes and property to the Synod.
The Constitutional Democrats (Cadets) The fly-blown phylacteries o f the Liberal Party Archibald Philip Primrose, Earl of Rosebery Established in 1905, the Constitutional Democratic Party called for a constitutional and parliamentary monarchy in the English mold which would strictly observe such fundamental human rights as freedom of speech and movement and the right of workers to form unions and strike. This was a liberal party which called for gradual reform rather than radical revolution. Upon coming to power, the Bol'sheviks immediately declared the Cadets to be "enemies of the people.” During the civil war a number of Cadets fought in the W hite armies, and when the new government had defeated its opponents on the battlefield, the Cadets were forced to flee the country. Once abroad, they split into the liberal Republican-Democratic group, headed by Pavel Milyukov, a centrist group led by Nikolai Astrov, and a conservative under Vladim ir Nabokov the elder and Anton Kartashev. The conservatives remained in Berlin, while the liberals moved on to
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Paris. Obshchee delo (Common Cause), edited by Vladim ir Burtsev, was a Cadet publication, as was the newspaper R ul' (The Helm), in Berlin. On December 21,1921, Milyukov issued a statem ent entitled "W hat to Do After the Crimean Catastrophe?", in which he proposed that the Cadets renounce their form er reliance on military defeat of the Bol'sheviks and, rather, attem pt to undermine them from within. Instead of achieving its stated cause, the "new tactic” served only to create intra- and inter-party factionalism. On December 14,1922, the leaders of the tiny Cadet faction in Berlin form ally voted to disband,3 and the effectiveness of other groups in Paris, Warsaw, Belgrade, Prague, Vyborg, Harbin, and Vladivostok was dissipated.
The Social Revolutionaries (SRs) 4
O but we dream ed to m end W hatever m ischief seem ed To afflict mankind, bu t now That winds o f winter blow Learn that we were crack-pated when we dreamed. W illiam Butler Yeats The political platforms of the the liberal Cadets, the conservative Social Revolutionaries, and even the Men’sheviks’s conservative wing were really quite close. The Social Revolutionaries, who saw themselves as continuing the traditions of 19th-century revolutionary populism, had existed illegally from 1902 until 1917. In contrast to the Social Democrats with their dedication to the proletariat, the SRs saw themselves as the defenders of the peasantry, the largest class in Russia at the tim e of the revolution. Their platform called for political freedoms, the socialization of land, and the establishm ent of a dem ocratic republic. Even before 1917 they were divided between the "m inim alists,” who favored participatory democracy, and the "m axim alists,” who advocated terror and assassination. A number of other individuals and groups claimed to represent or at least to defend the interests of the peasantry — Boris Savinkov, for example, or the National Socialists (the NSs) and Kresfyanskaya Rossiya (Peasant Russia), although it would be difficult to imagine a
•Among its more prominent members w ere Iosif Gessen, Avgust Kaminka, Aleksandr Izgoev (pseudonym of Aleksandr Lande), and Aleksandr Kizevetter.
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broader cultural gap than that which existed between this émigré cultural elite in Paris and the illiterate peasantry back in Russia.“ Aleksandr Kerensky, the head of the Provisional Government, was a prom inent member of the Social Revolutionary Party, but he — like Milyukov — was forced to live in constant fear for his life since many Russians blamed him for losing Russia to the Bol'sheviks. While still head of state, Kerensky had transferred funds abroad, which he used to publish the newspaper D ni (Days), distributing it free of charge to subscribers. The general editorial line was one of moderate socialism, favoring the type of reforms attempted during the February Revolution, not those of the October coup. One group of Social Revolutionaries in Prague published the magazine Revolyutsionnaya Rossiya (Revolutionary Russia). Later, when members of this group moved from Prague to Paris, some of them began publishing Sovremennye zapiski (Contemporary Annals). Although the Cadets received funding from the Czechoslovak Russian Iniative, popularly referred to as the Action russe (see below), they hoped to receive considerably more from Western states, but to do that they had to ally them selves with the Social Revolutionaries. In August 1922 a public trial was held in Moscow of 47 Revolutionaries. In Baku the terrifying public prosecutor Nikolai Krylenko called for the complete destruction of the party. On March 18, 1923, the Soviet authorities forced those party members who had not yet been arrested to hold an "All-Russian Conference,” at which they confessed the error of their ways and voted to disband. For some tim e after this, the SRs abroad tried to remain active, but it proved im possible to revive the party, divided as it was into four major factions, and lacking a sister organization in Russia.
The Men'sheviks Democracy is, by the nature o f it, a self-canceling business; and gives in the long run a net result o f zero. Thomas Carlyle The Social Democrats were known as the Men'sheviks, since they were the minority faction in the Social Democratic Party in 1903, when they split off to form their own party (Men'shevik means minority,
•K ie s f yanskaya Rossiya w as headed by the form er Socialist Revolutionaries A.
A. Artunov and Sergei Maslov.
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while Bol'shevik signifies majority). The crux of their disagreem ent with their previous allies was their insistence that a dem ocratic regime was necessary to prepare the Russians for the overthrow of capitalism . This led to an irreconcilable split with the Bol'sheviks. After the October 1917 coup, most members of this almost exclusively Jewish group emigrated to Germany, where they had established close ties before the W orld W ar.a Since they had brought considerable sums of money and valuables from Georgia with them, having been in power there nearly five years, they were able to stay in Germany until Hitler came to power, when they shifted their declining base of operations to Paris. The Men'sheviks had a leftist faction, led by Yuly Tsederbaum (pseudonym: Martov) and Fêdor Gurvich (pseudonym: Theodor Dan), and a conservative one, led by Aleksandr Potresov; the attitude of the party's left wing toward the U.S.S.R. was one of partial approbation in some aspects. For example, they viewed separatist tendencies in Georgia as a threat to the new Socialist state, and they were often happy to publish materials which threw a positive light on events in Moscow. The economic reforms of the NEP period only encouraged them in their belief that revolution in Russia could be restrained and channeled into something much more humane and even desirable. David Dalin, for example, believed that "our revolution is bloody and horrible, but it is our own Russian revolution and we should not damn it, but fix it.” Naturally, this party of Jewish socialists was extremely unpopular in the very conservative ranks of the émigré community, and even in its strongest émigré period it was, in the words of the rightist M en'shevik Pètr Garvi, "an emigration within an em igration.” So hostile were their fellow émigrés that the Men'sheviks voluntarily chose not to proselytize, and while this policy was ultim ately disastrous to their cause, it did save them from infiltration by agents of Moscow. Created in 1921 by Yuly Martov and Rafail Reinb, the Men'shevik journal, Sotsialisticheskii vestnik (Socialist Herald), specialized in publishing materials smuggled out of the Soviet Union. It was so well informed that there were 700 subscriptions from Soviet officials, which represented a major source of funding for the publication. The chief literary critic of the journal was Vera Aleksandrova, who favored a political and sociological approach to literary scholarship.
•M any party members used pseudonyms, among them: Rafail Abramovich (Rein), Pavel Aksel'rod (Paul’), David Levin (Dalin), Sem en Monoszon (Shvarts), Sem ën Portugais (Stepan Ivanovich), V era Shvarts (Aleksandrova), Yury Tsederbaum (M artov). bLater editors were: Theodor Dan, David Dalin, and Sem ên Shvarts.
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Most of the Men'sheviks had left Russia in the early 1920s with valid Soviet passports, which they regularly renewed, and at first they preserved warm relations with their form er colleagues in tsarist exile, now reincarnated as high-ranking Soviet officials. In 1923, for example, Aleksei Rykov attended Martov's funeral and Anatoly Lunacharsky composed a magnanimous obituary. The Bol'sheviks accused their form er allies of exploiting talk of democracy as a cynical political ploy to mask their real desire to reestablish capitalism. Lenin demanded that the party be totally wiped out, and Stalin followed up on that particular piece of advice in 1931, when leading Men'sheviks in Moscow were put on trial for sabotaging the economy. In 1932 the ém igré Men'sheviks, along with Trotsky, were stripped of Soviet citizenship. After the Nazis came to power, most of the party members in Germany fled to Paris, some of them abandoning even their personal possessions and archives. After the war what was left of the party relocated to New York, but by 1965 Sotsialisticheskii vestnik was finally forced to close.
Monarchism A m erry monarch, scandalous and poor John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester (1647-1680) The Supreme M onarchist Council, headed by Markov II, the form er leader of the right wing in the Russian Duma, was located in Berlin. The m onarchist idea remained strong in the émigré community. According to Pêtr Struve, 85 percent of all the émigrés were monarchists — an assessment confirmed by Milyukov. There was even talk of the spirit of Rasputin having reappeared to save Russia from the darkness which had descended upon her. Nevertheless, the very intensity of feeling split the movement into numerous factions. The first Assembly of monarchists was held in Bad Reichenhall, Bavaria, on June 2, 1921, attended by representatives of 75 monarchist groups. According to the Council's weekly bulletin, Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich, uncle of Tsar Nikolai II, was to be elected "émigré dictator” in order to overthrow the Soviet government with the assistance of foreign governments, whereupon he was to be elected "All-Russian Dictator.” Those monarchists who wished to proclaim an ém igré tsar, particularly the supporters of Grand Duke Kirill Vladim irovich, referred to themselves as "legitim ists.” There was even a movement to create a sort of Soviet monarchy, preserving the Tsar but m aintaining the structure of the Soviets. By November 1922, when the second Assembly was held in Paris, the number of m onarchist groups attending had risen to 120. In
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1922 Grand Duke Kirill Vladimirovich declared him self "Protector” (Blyustitel' ) of the Russian throne and in 1924, when little doubt remained as to the fate of the imperial family, he assumed the title of Tsar and named his son Vladim ir heir to the throne. Supporters of the two contending claim ants to the throne were referred to as Nikolaevtsy and Kirillovtsy. Kirill's rights to the throne aroused especially heated debate. According to Imperial law, if the tsar's future wife was not a member of the Orthdox Church, she had to convert before the wedding ceremony; Kirill's mother was a Mecklenburg princess who had converted to Orthodoxy only after he was born, and his wife and German cousin Viktoria was a staunch Lutheran and a divorcée to boot, thus form ally rendering Kirill ineligible to participate in the chain of Imperial generations. And there was a second, even more serious objection to Kirill as future tsar. The October coup which brought the Bol'sheviks to power had been preceded by the February revolution, which had installed the so-called Provisional Government and limited the Tsar's authority. During the February revolution, Kirill had appeared at the Duma in the uniform of a Russian sailor and wearing a red ribbon, bringing his entire regiment with him to swear loyalty to the Provisional Government. Markov II must have found this event particularly difficult to pass over. There were also ideological differences between the two claimants. Nikolai Nikolaevich called for the Soviet governm ent to be overthrown with the aid of foreign troops, after which the Russian people would themselves decide what sort of governm ent they preferred (nepredreshenchestvo), while Kirill Vladimirovich supported a reestablishment of the monarchy but opposed intervention.3 Nevertheless Nikolai Nikolaevich was already 70 years old, and the rivalry became a moot point when he died in January 1929. Kirill's official representative was the W hite General Vasily Biskupsky, who together with the Riga German Max Scheubner-Richter had organized the first Monarchist convention in Bad Reichenhall. Biskupsky claimed he had concealed Hitler in his apartm ent after the failed Munich putsch in November 1923 and that his w ife had sold her jewelry to finance Hitler's attempted escape. Supposedly Biskupsky even supported financially the Nazi Völkischer Beobachter. If this was true, Hitler was singularly ungrateful, perm itting him to be arrested in 1933 and personally ordering that no compensation be paid him upon his release. Biskupsky was said to have received money from W olfgang Kapp, who had attempted an unsuccessful coup in 1920. But
■When approached by Kirill Vladimirovich, supported Nikolai Nikolaevich.
Vrangel'
responded
that he
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all of this is in the realm of rumor and conjecture; we do know that Biskupsky him self was chronically short of funds and was particularly interested in transferring funds deposited in the name of Nikolai II to Kirill Vladimirovich, having been promised a 15% fee if the case proved successful (it did not, and what actually happened to this money is unknown). A t the same tim e he was an informant for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (das Außenpolitische Amt). When he died, there was even a rum or that he had been killed by the Gestapo. The monarchists enjoyed considerable financial backing, for example, from fem ale members of the royal family, who even auctioned off their jewels to support them, and supposedly from German industrialists such as Gustav Krupp, and even from Henry Ford. The monarchists maintained vigorous ties with the National Socialist Party in Germany, and are thought to have exercised no small influence in shaping Hitler's anti-Jewish views. Reportedly, they even helped to finance his ascent to power. They regarded the October 1917 coup as a Jewish conspiracy and looked to the new German governm ent as a source of support. The alliance ended, however, when it became obvious that the Nazis were not about to leave Ukraine under Russian domination. Popular as monarchism was among the émigrés, however, there were also many fervent anti-royalists in their ranks. Thus, when some of the audience stood up while the tsarist anthem was played during a scene in Bulgakov's play Days o f the Turbins, others dem onstratively remained seated or even walked out. Needless to say, relations between the monarchists and the left wing of the émigré political spectrum were hostile; Markov II, for example, referred to the left as "liberal trash” (liberaTnaya skvema). Russian Jewish emigrants especially were horrified at the thought of restoration of the monarchy. At the same time, insofar as the m ajority of world Jewry had resided for centuries within the Russian Empire, Jewish exiles very much wanted to see themselves as Russian citizens who would survive in a new and reformed Russia, and for them those reforms had to preclude any return to the old order. Among the monarchist publications were the newspapers Novoe vremya (New Time), Prizyv (Call to Battle), Vozrozhdenie (The Renaissance), and Gryadushchaya Rossiya (The Future Russia), and the magazines Derzhavnaya Rus' (Great-Power Russia), Dvuglavyi orël (Double-Headed Eagle), and Vysshii monarkhicheskii sovet (The Suprem e M onarchist Council). In 1926 a Russian monarchist youth league was created to engage in terrorist activities in Russia. However, the organization was soon infiltrated by Soviet intelligence, and most of the would-be terrorists were arrested and executed after crossing the Soviet border.
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The Changing Landmarks Movement (Smena vekh) When two people are under the influence o f the m ost violent, m ost insane, m ost delusive, and m ost transient o f passions, they are required to swear that they w ill rem ain in that excited, abnormal, and exhausting condition continuously until death do them part. George Bernard Shaw In effect from 1921 to 1928, Lenin's "New Economic Policy” (NEP) allowed a good deal of freedom in the area of trade and small commercial ventures. Soviet publishers even commissioned émigrés to write books for publication in the U.S.S.R. During the early years of the NEP Soviet writers travelled to the West, and émigrés served as correspondents for Soviet newspapers. Lenin openly conceded that this had been only a tactical move, but at the tim e many believed it represented a genuine return to a more conventional form of government. One of the movements that grew out of this wishful thinking was the Changing Landmarks Movement. The name came from a collection of essays with that title which was published in Prague in 1921. Contributors were Aleksandr Bobrishchev-Pushkin, Sergei Chakhotin, Yury Klyuchnikov, Sergei Luk'yanov, Yury Potekhin, and Nikolai Ustryalov. The movement's name was selected to dem onstrate a new set of values, distinct from those laid out in the 1909 collection Vekhi (Landmarks), authored by a group of thinkers — Nikolai Berdyaev, Sergei Bulgakov, Semên Frank, Mikhail Gershenzon, Aleksandr Lande (Izgoev), Bogdan Kistyakovsky, and Pètr Struve — most of whom were later to find themselves outside Russia's borders. The 1909 collection, which was a reaction to the revolution of 1905, had rejected utilitarianism and positivism, atheism, radicalism, and revolutionism in favor of a spiritual world view. The Changing Landmarks movement view of the 1917 October coup as a purgative storm that had mercifully separated Russia from the corrupting W est (an image of long standing in Russia) represented an early attem pt to find a modus vivendi with the new Soviet government. Chakhotin's essay "To Canossa!”, for example, called upon the émigrés to do penance before the Soviet governm ent and return home. Intellectuals were called upon to renounce their misconceived hostility to the regime:
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The civil war has been irretrievably lost. Russia is proceeding along its own path, notours.... Either recognize this Russia that you hate o r remain without her, but there w ill be no "third Russia, ” concocted according to your recipes. A prom inent figure in the movement, Professor Nikolai Ustryalov (1890-1937), steadfastly proclaimed the indigenous nature of the Russian revolution: No, neither we nor the "people” can totally deny our responsibility for today's crisis — neither for its dark, nor its bright visage. It is our [crisis], truly Russian, entirely embedded in our psychology, in our past, and nothing rem otely sim ilar could possibly occur in the West. A nd even if it is m athem atically proven, as is sometimes now unsuccessfully attempted, that 90 percent o f the Russian revolutionaries are foreigners, chiefly Jews, that in no way cancels out its purely Russian nature. For better o r worse, if "alien” hands have played a role, its soul, its "inner s e lf’ is authentically Russian, intellectual, bent by the prism o f the people's psyche. Curiously, another prominent member of the group, Yury Klyuchnikov, was a form er Cadet, but nationalist feelings overwhelmed his form er convictions, much as was to happen later with Pavel Milyukov during the Second W orld War. Berlin became a center of the Changing Landmarks movement in the early 1920s. Evidently with Soviet funding, the group founded the newspapers Novaya m ysl' (New Thought) and Nakanune (On the Eve), whose literary supplement was edited by the novelist Aleksei Tolstoi and counted among its contributors Mikhail Bulgakov as its Moscow correspondent. The magazine Russkaya kniga (Russian Book), later renamed Novaya russkaya kniga (The New Russian Book), edited by Aleksandr Yashchenko with the assistance of the young Roman Gul’a, promoted the theory that the Soviet government would inevitably be forced to return to a more traditional form of rule and that the émigré community should renounce the extreme animosity it had heretofore displayed.0 Most émigrés were openly hostile to the Changing Landmarks movement — especially after learning of Ustryalov's more extreme statements about "national Bol'shevism.” A
•Gul' w as later to reject the movement vehemently, as did Yashchenko. O th e r publications which supported the movement w ere Novaya Rossiya (The New Russia, Sofia), Novosti zhizni (Life's News, Harbin), Put' (The Path, Helsinki), and Novyi put' (The New Path, Riga).
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number of writers* withdrew from the literary society Vereteno (Spindle) to protest the sympathy shown by its leaders for the Changing Landmarks movement, and in 1922 the Union of Russian W riters and Journalists voted to expel all members of Nakanune (Berlin). Attacked vituperatively byZinov'ev and Bukharin, Ustryalov, the "bard of dictatorship” (a phrase coined by Sergei Mel'gunov), taught at Harbin University and managed a branch library of the trans-Siberian railroad before he finally returned to the Soviet Union, where he perished in the purges. Sergei Luk'yanov, one of Ustryalov's collaborators in the Changing Landmarks collection, was beaten to death during his interrogation in a Soviet forced-labor camp. Aleksandr Bobrishchev-Pushkin was first sentenced to ten years im prisonm ent for "terrorist expressions” (vyskazyvanie), but then ordered executed by a revolutionary panel of three judges, known as a "troika.” Yury Klyuchnikov was executed as a spy.
Eurasianism But, softI what light through yonder window breaks! It is the east, and Juliet is the sunl W illiam Shakespeare Another m ovem ent— with religious overtones— that professed to find positive elements in the Soviet state was Eurasianism. The movement was founded by Nikolai Trubetskoi, Georgy Florovsky, Pêtr Savitsky, and Pêtr Suvchinsky, who regarded Gogol', Dostoevsky, Khomyakov, and Leont'ev as their spiritual teachers. It was launched with a collection of essays entitled Exodus to the East (Iskhod k vostoku) in Sofia in 1921.b Believing in the need for an authoritarian social structure based on religion, the Eurasians combined Slavophile ideals with a belief in a new culture which would unify both Europe and Asia. Their view was a traditional Russian concept which w ent back centuries to the idea that Russia was the "Third Rome,” and that the selfish, individualist W est had much to learn from the ideal of Russian communality. Peter the Great with all his forced W esternization was
•Among them w ere Ivan Bunin, Ivan Lukash, Vladim ir Nabokov, and Aleksandr Otsup [Sergei Gorny]. bThey w ere supported by some very prominent thinkers, such as Pêtr Bitsilli, Dmitry Svyatopolk-Mirsky, Georgy Vernadsky, Lev Karsavin, and Anton Kartashev. They published Evraziiskii vremennik (Eurasian Herald) and Evraziiskaya khronika (Eurasian Chronicle), and a newspaper, Evraziya (Eurasia).
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viewed as having gotten Russia off her special, unique path.3 W hile the Eurasians did not reject W estern civilization altogether, they had little use for the "fetish of technical ‘progress.’” A relatively young group, the Eurasians were influenced by Nikolai Berdyaev, who, although he was later to view their movement as a form of cultural isolationism, felt that contemporary democracies were in such a degenerate state that they could not serve as a source of inspiration for anyone: Liberalism, parliamentarianism, constitutionalism, democracy, juridical formalism, hum anist morality, rationalistic and em pirical philosophy are a ll creatures o f the spirit o f individualism and hum anist self assertion. A ll o f these are now living out their lives and are losing their form er significance. This is the yesterday o f our history. S trictly speaking, this dying out o f dem ocracy should be a source o f joy, since dem ocracy leads to non-being and is based not on truth, but on the formal right to choose any truth o r lie whatsoever. Moreover, in Russian conditions, dem ocracy is utopia. Should we not recognize as utopian and senseless the dream s o f abruptly transform ing Russia into a legalistic dem ocratic state, o f forcing the Russian people through humane speeches to recognize the rights and freedoms o f man and citizen, o f using liberal methods to exterminate violent instincts both am ong rulers and the ruled? Prince Svyatopolk-Mirsky, who had left Russia in 1920, was remembered by Vladim ir Nabokov as an almost perfect physical double of Lenin. A literary scholar who wrote what is still used as a popular textbook on Russian literature in English-speaking countries, he was also a representative of the left wing of Eurasianism (indeed, he considered rightist Eurasianism to be a form of mental imbalance). Mirsky found him self "in total sympathy” with communist policy and
aThis Spenglerian view of cultures in decline w as soon to become quite fashionable. By 1925 the Germ an sociologist Alfred W eber spoke of a ”reasiatization" of Russia; the poet Aleksandr Blok in a famous 1918 poem "Scythians" described an alien, slant-eyed Russian tribe peering hostilely at W estern Europe; Herm ann Hesse’s popular novel D er Steppenwolf was based on the idea of a new Karam azov-like civilization engulfing the bourgeois W est; André G ide w as captivated by this idea; and in his notes to The W aste L a n d T . S. Eliot referred to a hostile army coming over the plain. The more immediate Russian roots of the movement reach back to an essay by Vladim ir Solov’ev — "Three Conversations on W ar, Progress and the End of World History" (1899-1900) — describing an invasion of Europe under the banner of "Pan-Mongolism."
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was openly contemptuous of the views of his fellow émigrés: "Like the Bourbons,” he wrote, "the Russian émigrés have shown them selves to be among those who forget nothing and learn nothing.... [Their] intellectual sterility has been com plete.” Like the Changing Landmarks group, the Eurasians encountered considerable hostility. One of their chief opponents was the liberal Pavel Milyukov, a form er member of the Duma and editor of the influential newspaper Poslednie novosti> The impractical Eurasians perceived a certain affinity between them selves and the Soviet state, where they naively hoped to seize power. Their émigré opponents faulted them for passivity and called them "[Religiously] Orthodox Bol'sheviks.” For their part, the Soviets attem pted to use the group for their own ends and claimed that Eurasian groups existed in the U.S.S.R., urging émigrés "to liberate Russia-Europe from the oppression of European culture.” One branch of Eurasianism eventually became more and more pro-Soviet, and in 1929 the movement split. The pro-Soviet‘ faction was headed by Mirsky and Marina Tsvetaeva's husband, Sergei Èfron, while Trubetskoi and Florovsky ultim ately disassociated them selves from the movement. Mirsky returned to Russia in 1932, only to find that his political beliefs offered little protection at that particular point in Soviet history; he was arrested and sent to a Siberian forced-labor camp, where he worked in a boiler room while writing a book on the theory of verse and giving lectures on the theory of Russian literature.0 Lev Karsavin was in Lithuania in 1940 when it was occupied by Soviet troops. He remained there even after the Germans were driven out, was arrested in 1948, and died in the hospital of a Soviet forced-labor camp. Èfron was executed in 1941 as a foreign spy after returning to Russia. Like the Changing Landmarks movement, Eurasianism proved too intellectual to have any mass appeal. More m ilitant movements were to take their place among the disaffected and impoverished "younger generation” of Russian émigrés.
•Milyukov
himself w as criticized from the right, which viewed him as a
twentieth-century Stepan Verkhovensky — the well-intentioned but bumbling old man in Dostoevsky's Devils. bUntil recently he was thought to have died in Kolyma in 1941, but he may actually have survived until 1951.
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The Mladoross (Young Russian) League Go tell the Spartans, thou who passest by, That here, obedient to their laws, we lie. Simonides (c. 556-468 B.C.) The "Young Russia” League was founded in Munich in 1923 and renamed the "Mladoross League”a in 1925 and published more than twenty publications, among them Mladoross (1928-1932), M ladorosskaya iskra (The Mladoross Spark, 1931-1940), and Bodrost' (Boldness, 1934-1939). Later it moved to Paris. The movement's goals as presented by its chairman Aleksandr Kazem-Bek were clearly influenced by the impending Zeitgeist of the Nazi period, albeit within the fram ework of a monarchy (a position that Soviet counterintelligence was quick to exploit, claiming that the Soviet people longed for a new tsar!): The Russian future lies in the new Russia, which we call the "young Russia“.... We do not amuse ourselves with the fiction o f a Russia abroad. We know that there is no Russia outside o f Russia. N or are there two Russias. There is one living Russia. That Russia, the only Russia, now being reborn in torturous spasms, is the young Russia. The so-called "Catastrophe,” that is, the October 1917 coup, was seen by the M ladorossy as the creation of a rootless intelligentsia, and in fact the sense of guilt among all intellectuals — regardless of political leanings — was real and palpable. W hat was supposedly needed was a return to the less effete ideals of the common man. The M ladoross League was the first major ideological and political movement created totally by the "younger generation” of émigrés. In 19th-century Russia intergenerational conflict had taken the form of a clash of views between conservative fathers and liberal sons. Now, in exile, the sons were the conservatives, and radical conservatives at that. These young people wanted to reach out to their own age group in Russia over the heads of the fathers and create a new Russia which would preserve some of the achievements of the revolution. To understand the impetus behind such a movement, one must be aware of the spirit in which émigré children were raised in those years. R. Termen, director of the Rodnoi Korpus school in Sofia, laid out the
aSoyuz molodoi Rossii; also Soyuz mladorossov.
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ideals set before émigré children as “Life for Faith, Tsar, and Fatherland”: Elections, the hollow ring o f pariiam entarianism and party spirit, along with their accompanying struggle, are considered by us to be incom patible with order and unity. The history o f our revolution and the fall o f Russia totally ju s tify ou r view.... Within the Russian intelligentsia we witnessed sharp criticism o f the measures taken by the authorities and the actions o f superiors, criticism which even included attacks upon the Tsar, condemnation o f everything Russian, lack o f faith, decline o f religiosity, smirks directed a t the clergy, a desire on the p a rt o f everyone (either personally o r through "delegates”) to interfere in the governing procedure and to control it, a broad wave o f wilfulness, a thirst fo r "liberties. ” In a programmatic article published in the Mladoross magazine Bodrost', Boris Kadomtsev set out the goal of the party as4a seizure of power from the communists while retaining governmental control over the economy. A "new totalitarian corporate state” was to be created for the "narod-bogonosets” (the God-bearing people). Bodrost' called for a "synthesis of the ontological internal searching of October with the national ideal of Russian Truth.” The group supported Kirill Vladim irovich's claim to the throne. There seems to have been little disagreem ent as to the fascist nature of the Mladoross party. Even its meetings emulated those of the Fascists, including shouts of "Glava! G laval” ("Führer” or "Duce”) when Kazem-Bek appeared on stage. Kazem-Bek was particularly taken with the Italian head of state, about whom he wrote: The spiritual life o f fascism hearkens back to Rome — Im perial Rom e— and is totally em bodied in the person o f Mussolini. His genius is the genius o f Rome. His sense o f measure is the heritage o f an ancient culture. As the years pass his very appearance becomes more and more that o f a Roman Caesar. Kazem-Bek's stressed "total unity” with Mussolini's views extended into the broadest philosophical realms: Russia is the first great white state on the path o f the rising yellow wave.... Solidarity o f the white people should be recreated, since a ll peoples o f the white race, whose growth has been stabilized, are threatened in the next century with being crushed by the colored races, who have m aintained their elem ental fertility and acquired the technology and m aterial civilization created by whites, but reject our spiritual culture. O nly white racism makes sense for peoples o f the white race. Despite all the above, when W orld W ar II broke out, the pro fascist leanings of the Mladorossy were swept away by a surge of
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Russian patriotism , and Kazem-Bek sent a telegram to the French governm ent placing all the resources of his party at its disposal. Kazem-Bek him self quietly left for the Soviet Union from the United States in 1958.
Solidarism Tous pour un, un pour tous. Alexandre Dumas In 1924 the secret society Duty to the Homeland (Dolg rodine) was created with the goal of overthrowing communism in Europe. In 1927 it was replaced by The Internal Line (Vnutrennyaya liniya). Membership was voluntary, but any attem pt to withdraw from the organization was punishable by death. The organization called itself an "order” — in the traditions of knighthood. Eventually, many émigrés reached the conclusion that the organization was a Soviet-sponsored plot to control the émigré community in general, and specifically both the Solidarist movement and The Russian All-W arrior League (ROVS), led by generals Pêtr Vrangel', Aleksandr Kutepov, and Evgeny Miller®. Formed in July 1930, The National League of Russian Youth (Natsional'nyi Soyuz Russkoi Molodêzhi) became the political party of the Solidarist movement. In 1931 it was renamed the National W orking People's League of the New Generation and in 1936 the National Labor League of the New Generation (the NTS). W hile quite sim ilar in orientation to the Mladoross movement, Solidarism was even more closely modelled on fascism, and favored the establishment of a transitional dictatorship. In the words of one natsmal'chik, it was more a social and economic doctrine than a world view. In 1940, when Marshal Pétain became head of the Vichy governm ent in France, the Solidarist K. Vergun claimed that dem ocracy and "prettified liberalism" were gradually fading from the scene of history. Members of the movement were called upon to endure any sacrifice in the name of the nation. Such slogans as "Forget yourself in serving Russia” and "Let our names perish as
•Russkii Obshche-Voinskii Soyuz (R O V S ). According to the captain of Vrangel”s ship, Vrangel' ordered his own vessel sunk in the Bosphorus in the sum m er of 1921 so that he could collect the insurance on his fam ily jewels after first removing the ship’s safe. If this is true, this act may have provided some of the financing for R O VS.
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Russia rises up in glory”3 demonstrated not only a strong idealism, but also a negation of the individual in favor of the collective. In this respect the movement was entirely in line with the spirit of the age. Russia's models for developm ent were Italy ("a first-class power of which every Italian could be justifiably proud”) and Germany ("young and powerful”). The Solidarist publication Za novuyu Rossiyu (For a New Russia) left no doubt as to where its sympathies lay: Within the process o f this world revolution a new social order w ill be born, not in Moscow, but in a ll those places where there are dedicated and noble reform ers who recognize the decay o f liberal capitalism and the lie o f inhuman communism. A t the head o f those struggling for a new social order and firm social peace are Hitler, Mussolini, and Salazar, but they w ill be followed by others inspired by those same ideas. The Solidarist M. Georgievsky was equally straightforward in identifying National-Socialism and fascism as models for the movement. In discussing the New Order being developed in Italy, Portugal, and Germany, he dismissed all criticism of party dictatorship and any mention of persecution of dissidents and even of terror and concentration camps: People forget first o f a ll that a difference in degree and quantity has a prim ary — not a secondary — m eaning in ou r days, that an intense heat destroys young shoots but that warmth is good for them. They forget the m illions o f victim s o f the Bol'shevik terror. They forget that the mockery, torture, and bleak horror o f the Soviet concentration camps cannot be in any way com pared to the exceptional m easures taken to presen/e order which are generally directed against those who [previously] dug a p it for dissidents and an execution wall to go along with it.... It is difficult to see a hidden reactionary in Mussolini, who barked a t the capitalists: *D o n t think we're going to serve as a lightning rod for you.” The same is true o f Hitler, who instructed his people: ” Honor work and the working m an.” The experience o f both o f them is only the beginning o f a strengthening in minds and social order o f a new doctrine — the doctrine o f Solidarist cooperation. To Georgievsky's chagrin, his admiration for Mussolini's Italy and Hitler's Germany was not reciprocated by either regime. Only later,
•Sluzhit' Rossii - zabyt' sebya; D a vosvelichitsya Rossiya, da gibnut nashi imena.
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when Germany found itself in desperate straits, was the decision made to use the émigrés. By March 1939 Georgievsky had begun to distance himself from his form er admiration for Hitler and Mussolini, describing the oncoming war as a struggle between two world views — that of "Jewry and ‘dem ocracy,’” on the one hand, and "fascism,” on the other. After the M olotov-Ribbentrop Pact was signed on August 23 of that year he became disenchanted with fascism and pronounced it to be a sort of "anti-Com intern,” now allied with the Comintern. The NTS actively pursued a program to infiltrate the U.S.S.R., but half these agents perished in attem pting to cross the Soviet border. Even when war broke out, it was still unclear what course of action the Solidarists would take. On March 1,1940, their newspaper Za Rodinu (For the Homeland), newly transferred from Sofia to Belgrade under its original title, Za Rossiyu (For Russia), came out with a special page showing previous titles of the publication and a prom inent article by Dmitry Zavzhalov, Chairman of the Bulgarian branch of the Solidarist movement, calling upon members to be ready to fight, but when Germany attacked the U.S.S.R., the Solidarists declared total neutrality.
The Russian Fascists Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend me your ears. Shakespeare, Julius Casear By the early 1930s the totalitarian spirit of the period led some converts in the Russian émigré community to create organizations which their organizers openly called "fascist.” One émigré group chose to celebrate the Day of Russian Culture on the birthday of St. Vladim ir (July 15) rather than on Pushkin's birthday because of Pushkin’s "nonAryan” descent. After Vladim ir Nabokov's father was assassinated, rumors circulated that he was a Jew and the Russian Church in Karlovac, Yugoslavia, refused to perm it a memorial service to be perform ed in his honor. His novel-writing son himself was married to a Jewish woman, and precisely for this reason some émigrés did not wish him to give a speech on the occasion of Bunin's receiving of the Nobel Prize. Once the Nazis actually came to power in Germany, some 23 Russian émigré associations sent their greetings to Hitler.
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One figure who was difficult to take seriously was "Count” Anastasy Vonsyatsky, a dancer married to a wealthy American heiress whose money opened many doors. During a visit to Paris Vonsyatsky visited a Russian m ilitary museum run by a form er tsarist general, who escorted Vonsyatsky to his car while encouraging him to make a donation to the museum. Suddenly the general abandoned Vonsyatsky and rushed up to the young man seated at the wheel; it was Grand Duke Fêdor Aleksandrovich, a nephew of the late Tsar ... and Vonsyatsky's chauffeur. From his wife's Connecticut estate Vonsyatsky played at soldiering and issued instructions to his (largely) fictitious minions, calling upon his purported supporters within the U.S.S.R. to assassinate governm ent officials, engage in all-out sabotage, and poison the country's foodstuffs. Although he explicitly rejected antiJewish views, Vonsyatsky employed the Swastika, titles such as "Death Storm Trooper” (Shturmovik smerti), and the Nazi salute, accompanied by the shout "Glory to Russia!” (Slava Rossiil). The fascist movement found considerable support among the Russian émigré community in Yugoslavia. One book published in 1937 in Belgrade by "Orthodox Russian fascists” defined the movement's ideals: 1) This is a traditional religious-national working m ovem ent o f the Russian people. It is both political and social in nature and has as its goal the establishm ent o f the type o f governm ental structure which has achieved brilliant results in Germany, Italy, and Portugal. The m ovem ent is called fascism, because this word is the accepted term used to define the spiritual structure o f the "new m an,” as distinguished from the "o ld" type, who was raised in the ideals o f liberalism, democracy, socialism, and communism. 2) The basic goals o f Orthodox Russian Fascism are: a) active arm ed struggle with communism and Godlessness, b) the installation o f Russian Orthodoxy in a ll its purity and sacredness, and c) the establishm ent on Russian soil o f the reign o f social justice — o f the Working Russian Empire. 3) O rthodox Russian Fascism considers that such goals can be accom plished only if an arm ed uprising o f the Red Arm y and the people can be organized out o f the reach o f the Soviet government, and under the slogan "God, Nation, L a b o r...” Konstantin Rodzaevsky, the pale, nervous Führer of the Manchurian-based Russian Fascist Party, did not confine him self to the type of fantasies indulged in by Vonsyatsky, but became actively involved in a number of very serious operations, including the
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infiltration of Soviet territory. Rodzaevsky evidently participated in several crim inal operations, one of which involved kidnapping the son of a wealthy Jewish businessman. When the father refused to pay, the son's ears were cut off; still later, the young man was murdered, but the Japanese court refused to convict the kidnappers. Arrested by the Soviets at the end of the war, Rodzaevsky wrote letters to Stalin, praising him as a leader of the Russian fascist movement. Nevertheless, after being flown to Moscow from Peking, Rodzaevsky was executed in the Lubyanka prison.3
Postrevolutionary {porevolyutsionnye) Movements The Philistines have invaded the land. Old Testam ent The term "postrevolutionary” (porevolyutsionnyi) was used to cover such groups as the Utverzhdentsy (literally, "those who affirm ”), the Novogradtsy,b and the National-Maximalists, all of whom denied the possibility of a restoration of the ancien régime and who called for a religious transform ation of the Soviet state from within. For example, Yu. Shirinsky-Shakhmatov, an ideologue of National-Maximalism, rejected calls for foreign intervention in Soviet Russia, believing this would lead to a "replacem ent of red internationalism with an international cabal of gold and stock markets ..., create a bourgeois Jewish-A/epman republic ... and at the price of thousands of victim s purchase a philistine governm ent with two chambers and ministerial crises.” In 1933 at his initiative "The Congress of United Postrevolutionary Movements” was convened, which called for a society based on nationalism and religion. Thus, there were a number of elem ents common to Postrevolutionary movements, the Changing Landmarks Movement, and the various Fascist groups.
•O ne of Rodzaevsky's followers was A. N. Pokrovsky, who was married to the poet Rim m a Pokrovskaya (pseudonym: M arianna Kolosova). She wrote poetry dedicated to Pokrovsky under the title "To a Russian Fascist" (Russkomu fashistu). After the Germ ans w ere defeated, Pokrovskaya-Kolosova took up Soviet citizenship but later renounced it following the attacks by Andrei Zhdanov on Anna Akhm atova. She and her husband ended up in Santiago, Chile, w here the Russian colony in the 1950s numbered no more than 300. bAfter the journal Novyi grad (The New City), founded by ll'ya BunakovFondaminsky, Fëdor Stepun, and Georgy Fedotov.
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The Trust
If a ll good people were clever, A nd a ll clever people were good, The world would be nicer than ever We thought that it possibly could. Elizabeth W ordsworth (1840-?) Faced with such intense political activity by an ém igré com m unity consisting to a large degree of form er m ilitary men, the Soviet governm ent launched a campaign of counterintelligence and subversion. In 1922, or possibly 1923, evidently on the initiative of Feliks Dzerzhinsky, head of the CHEKA, the so-called ."T ru s t’ was created — a fictitious monarchist organization which claimed a wide base of support in the Soviet Union. W hite general Pëtr Vrangel’ suspected that the "T rust’ was actually a Soviet front organization, but General Aleksandr Kutepov was more inclined to lend it credence. There was considerable hostility between Vrangel' and Kutepov, who held Vrangel' responsible for the failure of the W hite armies to defend Russia against the communists. In October 1923 the Poles recognized the "T rust’ as the only legitim ate governm ent of Russia and, in exchange for the promise of the supposed future m onarchist governm ent of Russia to recognize Poland's independence, agreed not to support either the Ukrainian nationalist Simon Petlyura or the Russian émigrés, nor to perm it any émigré infiltration back into Russia through Poland. The 1925 death in Russia of Sidney Reilly, a British agent and probably a Russian-Jewish émigré, raised a number of suspicions about the Trust, but Vasily Shul'gin, who together with Aleksandr Guchkov had persuaded Nikolai II to renounce the throne, travelled to Russia that same year and returned in February of 1926, claim ing that the Trust was a reliable ally. After five years of more or less successfully duping the émigrés, the Soviets announced that the Trust had been a sham all along, created to provide European intelligence services with false information. An enormous amount of hope and effort had been invested in cooperating with the Trust, and the news not only represented a vast setback for the émigrés, but also sowed even more distrust in their midst than had existed before.
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Émigré Terrorism in Russia There w ill be tim e to m urder and create. T. S. Eliot In the early 1920s a number of organizations existed which aimed at armed insurrection in Russia, among them Savinkov's Popular League for the Defense of the Homeland and Freedom (Narodnyi Soyuz Zashchity Rodiny i Svobody), Sergei Mel'gunov's and Mikhail Fëdorov's The Struggle for Russia (Bor1>a za Rossiyu), Peasant Russia (Krestyanskaya Rossiya), and The Brotherhood of Russian Truth (Bratstvo russkoi pravdy). Discouraged, Kutepov even considered abandoning the struggle and going to work as a carpenter's helper. In late 1929, however, rumors circulated in Paris that he had received 10 million francs that had been deposited in Japan in 1919 by the governm ent of Admiral Kolchak. Even before receiving this purported windfall, Kutepov resolved to respond to the exposure of the "T rust’ by appointing Mariya Zakharchenko-Shul'ts head of the League of National Terrorists. Zakharchenko called for open terrorism, utilizing explosives, contagious diseases (cholera, typhus, plague, etc.), and the poisoning of grain supplies. All agents were to be provided with cyanide capsules so they could forestall capture by committing suicide. In June 1927 Zakharchenko and Èduard Opperput, a form er OGPU agent who had defected to the Whites, blew up part of a dorm itory of Opperput's form er employers on Moscow's Malaya Lubyanka Street. The explosive device was not entirely successful, however, and Opperput and his accomplices were pursued and killed. According to one version, when Zakharchenko realized she could not escape, she shouted "For Russia!” and shot herself in the temple. Opperput supposedly shot him self through the mouth. This, at least, is one version. But there are also claims as to the existence of a certain Aleksandr Opperput, one of whose aliases included the name “Èduard.” This Opperput infiltrated Kutepov’s organization as a sort of “Soviet A z e f and was then sent by Kutepov to the USSR. This O pperput had the misfortune to be in Kiev when the Germans occupied the city and was executed. Which version is to be believed? The dilem m a is a typical one in emigre studies. In any case, another attack was carried out near the Moika Canal in Leningrad, when a bomb was hurled during a university lecture on "American Neorealism,” wounding 26 persons. In September of that same year a number of captured terrorists were put on trial. Kutepov refused to give up his tactics and in the summer of 1928 resumed smuggling agents into Russia. Two of the chief targets were the form er tsarist émigrés Nikolai Bukharin and Anatoly Lunacharsky.
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By 1930 Soviet counterintelligence resolved to pursue its émigré enemies even more directly. On January 26 Kutepov was dragged into a gray-green Alfa-Romeo which sped through Paris to the Pont de l'Alma. When the car was caught in a traffic jam, one of the kidnappers, posing as a gendarme, explained to a passerby that he was administering ether to the victim of a traffic accident whose legs had been crushed. On the coast near Coburg a "longish package rolled up in sacking” was transferred to the Soviet cargo ship Spartak, which after a stop in Antwerp continued on to Leningrad. Kutepov was executed. No specific information on this event was received from Russia until 1965, when the newspaper Krasnaya Zvezda noted that Sergei Puzitsky, a commissar in the secret police, had participated in both the arrest of Savinkov and the kidnapping of Kutepov.
Freemasonry and the Jews ... beyond the obvious facts that you are a bachelor, a solicitor, a Freemason, and an asthmatic, I know nothing about you. Sherlock Holmes, The Norwood Builder Freemasonry, a mystical, egalitarian movement of universal brotherhood, had arrived in Russia in the early 1730s, a tim e when the movement was achieving unheard-of success in its proselytizing efforts throughout the Western world. Due to the movement's anti-clerical nature, it was periodically suppressed by the Russian government, while its secretive rituals lent it a sort of catacomb status. After the civil war, masonry exercised considerable influence among Russian émigrés. Hitler's Germany outlawed the movement, but by then most of the Russians had moved on to France. A number of writers were masons.3 In the minds of its Russian critics, Freemasonry was part and parcel of a Jewish conspiracy, referred to as zhidomasonstvo (JudeoMasonry). A popular quip had it that the 1917 October coup had been created by "Jewish heads, Latvian sharpshooters, and Russian fools.” Valery Bryusov complained that not more than five percent of Lenin's governm ent consisted of Russians; Metropolitan Antony (1863-1936) published a book entitled Christ the Savior and the Jewish Revolution; and another émigré, V. Vladimirov, inveighed:
•M ark Aldanov, Georgy Adamovich, Aleksandr Amfiteatrov, Gaito G azdanov, Roman Gul', Vasily Nemirovich-Danchenko, Mikhail Osorgin, Nikolai Otsup, Andrei Sedykh, Mark Slonim, and Yury Terapiano, to nam e but a few .
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Now Russia is Judea, in the full and literal meaning o f the word. The socialist republic o f peasants and workers is only a screen to conceal Judaism, which has trium phed over the Russian people. Now generally assumed to be a forgery, The Protocols o f the Learned Elders o f Zion was first published in Russia in 1905, and reissued in 1919 by the Berlin magazine Luch sveta (Ray of Light), edited by Pëtr Shabel'sky-Bork, Sergei Taboritsky, and Fedor Vinberg. The basic thrust of the Protocols is that Jews, themselves few in number, were using the secretive Society of Freemasons to undermine Christianity in order to achieve world domination. Thus, the 1917 October coup and, hence, the exile of so many Russians were blamed on zhidomasonstvo. A 1923 Russian-language Berlin publication prophesied retribution upon the "Bol'shevik Jews” for their "sinful” participation in the oppression and destruction of Russia. One of the most active Judophobes was Grigory ShvartsBostunich, a journalist, playwright, and poet whose library had been confiscated by Red troops in Kiev at the end of the civil war. In his writings this so-called 'C hristian occultist” railed against "Jewish Soviet gorillas” who with the assistance of "mongoloids and other sem ihum ans” had drowned Russia in a 'S ea of Blood” (the title of one of his pamphlets). He was naturalized as a German citizen and even promoted to the rank of SS-StandartenfQhrer, but so extreme was his conduct that Himmler was forced to forbid him for a time to wear the SS uniform for fear that he would "compromise” the organization. Many prom inent representatives of the Orthodox Church were far from reticent in denouncing the Jews. In 1926 the Archbishop of Harbin Mefody warned ominously of zhidomasonstvo. At a 1932 council of the Russian Church Abroad, Metropolitan Antony was equally blunt: M asonry is a secret international world revolutionary organization for the struggle against God, against Christianity, against the Church, against the national state, and particularly against state Christianity. Within this international organization, influence and significance belongs first and foremost to the Jewish nation, which has been engaged in a struggle against God from the day that Christ the Savior was crucified. Historically, Judaism enjoys the m ost intim ate ties with M asonry in its fierce struggle against Christianity and in its messianic strivings for world dominance. The great secret of the revolution, according to the writergeneral Pëtr Krasnov in his popular novel From the Double-Headed Eagle to the Red Banner (Ot dvuglavogo orla k krasnomu znameni)
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was that "Zion was consuming the best of the goyim .” One sarcastic, and grossly exaggerated, definition of the Central Committee of the Communist Party in Moscow was "Lenin and 33 Jews.” But if strong Jewish participation in the workings of the young Soviet state is a fact of history, it is equally true that Jews made up an im portant part of the opposite camp and thus also found themselves exiled. An estim ated 20 percent of immigrants from Russia in Germany were Jews, and among the stateless the figure rose to nearly 40 percent. Jewish refugees such as Iosif Bikerman, G. Landau, and D. S. Pasmanik felt compelled to distance themselves from the events in Russia. In 1923 the National League of Russian Jews Abroad published a book in Berlin entitled Russia and the Jews: The transform ation o f legend into truth was partially prom oted by those Jews who loudly declared the genetic link between Bolshevism and Hebraism and who boasted q f the broad sym pathies o f the Jewish masses for rule by commissar. The psychological truth o f our responsibility compels us to accept a portion o f the responsibility for the overthrow o f Bolshevism .... O nly through this struggle can we save Jewry.
The Soviet Government and the Émigré Press After their trium phant return to Russia, the Bol'sheviks m aintained a keen interest in émigré affairs. Lenin ordered that all W hite Guard newspapers be collected for system atic examination, and in early 1922 Trotsky had the Politbyuro charge the Comintern with keeping an eye on the émigrés. Their literature, art, journalistic forays, and philosophy were the bailiwick of Kamenev and Zinov'ev. Soon a special Soviet commission consisting of Yakov Agranov, Andrei Bubnov, and Nikolai Meshcheryakov was established to m onitor ém igré publications. Agranov, who had been a Social Revolutionary before going over to the Bol'sheviks, became a prom inent member of the CHEKA and personally interrogated the historian and future émigré Sergei M el'gunov and the poet Nikolai Gumilêv, who was executed. It was Agranov who prepared the list of intellectuals deported in 1922 (much to the displeasure of the German Chancellor, who grumbled that "Germany is not Siberia”), but at the same tim e he m aintained close relations with members of such leftist literary groups as RAPP and LEF, not to mention Osip Mandel'shtam and Boris Pil'nyak. Thus, he became the chief resident literary henchman of the GPU, serving first as Yagoda's right-hand man and then as Ezhov's deputy. He oversaw the interrogations of Kamenev, Zinov'ev, Bukharin, and Rykov, among others, and conducted the fraudulent investigation of Kirov's m urder in
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1934. Obviously, Agranov knew more than Stalin would have liked, and he was shot in 1939. The form er Trotskyite Bubnov switched his allegiance to Stalin and headed Agitprop, the Central Committee's propaganda arm. Later, after first conducting a purge in the army, he replaced Lunacharsky as M inister of Education. Subsequently he was arrested, sent to the Gulag, and shot in 1940. Even his daughter was put in a labor camp. But Stalin's scythe could not mow down every blade of grass. Nikolai Meshcheryakov had been a writer and publisher before 1917 and had lived in Belgium, graduating from the University of Liège. During the Soviet period he headed Gosizdat (the state publishing house), was on the editorial board of Pravda, and was assistant editor of the first edition of the G reat Soviet Encyclopedia. He actually appears to have died under non-violent circumstances in 1942. The Bol'sheviks’ plans for literature included far more than sim ple oversight, however, and on May 29, 1922, on Dzerzhinsky’s initiative, a censorship body was created which just a few days later was christened G iavlit — Central Management of Literature and Publishing3. It was headed by the literary critic and editor Pavel Lebedev-Polyansky, who had lived abroad from 1908 to 1917, mainly in Geneva. Just three months later, on September 1, 1922, Iosif Unshlikht, acting chief of the GPU (executed in 1938), proposed to Stalin that G iavlit be put in charge of foreign publications, as well as dom estic. After that G iavlit was responsible for receiving and distributing émigré publications. In October 1922, G iavlit established its own special bulletin, which was intended to provide an objective overview of émigré activities and was sent to a very select group of high Soviet officials. Lenin wanted to remain a force in émigré publications, and the Soviet governm ent subsidized such publications as Novyi m ir (The New World, Berlin), P ut' (The Path, Helsinki), and Sovetskaya Rossiya (Soviet Russia, U.S.A.), but the expenses proved too high, and all these publications were shut down in spring 1922. The chaos of the civil war had wreaked havoc on Russian publishers, and the decision was made to import émigré editions selectively. This function fell largely to Gosizdat, which spent millions of rubles in 1922-23 to import books from abroad, many of them émigré publications. Readers found these books were expensive because of im port duties and licensing requirements, which doubled the cost, and Soviet censorship over them was fairly rigid, albeit often arbitrary.
•Glavnoe upravlenie po deiam literatury i izdatel'stv.
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Repatriation No foreign sky protected me, no stranger's wing shielded m y face. Anna Akhmatova
in the early years of exile the émigrés hoped to return home victorious, and W estern bankers were so confident of this prospect that they even granted discounted mortgages to people who owned property back in Russia. Home was, after all, so very close. The émigré editor Iosif Gessena stood on the Finnish shore, peering at St. Petersburg through binoculars, while the poet and popular singer Aleksandr Vertinsky hearkened to the peal of a church bell wafting across to him on the Romanian shore of the Dnestr River. Such prom inent émigrés as Pavel Milyukov, Pêtr Struve, and Pêtr Vrangel', among others, frequently proclaimed the Bol'shevik regime to be on the verge of collapse. With time, the theme of return was sounded more and more insistently, but the logic of that return came to be based on acceptance of the new regime. This mood was promoted by various Soviet front organizations, for example, "The Society for Cultural and Political Links with the U.S.S.R.,” which was created in 1925 and later replaced by the "League of Friends of the U.S.S.R.” The heated emotions surrounding the topic abate as the years passed. In 1934 Dmitry Filosofov wrote in the W arsaw-based Mech (The Sword) that Russians who consciously abandoned the ideological front were the same as dead to the émigré community. In the opposing camp was Aleksandr Peshekhonov, an impassioned proponent of return. Peshekhonov wrote that he had left Russia against his will and remained abroad only because the Soviet governm ent would not issue him a reentry permit. In a series of articles published in Volya Rossii (Russia’s W ill), he denied that the ém igré community had any cultural mission to perform and accused the émigrés of violating principles of honor, of being ignorant of the new Russia, and of exaggerating their own importance.
•Iosif Gessen, an brothers): Vladim ir (a Sergei's son Evgeny Vladimirovich Gessen,
editor of the Berlin newspaper Rul', had two sons (halfjournalist and prose writer) and Sergei (a philosopher). was a poet. There was also an ém igré poet, Aleksei possibly the son of Vladimir.
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Overwhelmed by the difficulties of émigré life, impoverished, hopeful of a "normalization" of the political situation in the Soviet Union, nostalgic for friends, family, and country, and afraid of being forgotten professionally, a number of writers returned to the Soviet Union in the 1920s. Among them were the Formalist critic Viktor Shklovsky, the future "father of Socialist Realism” Maksim Gor'ky, the prose w riter Aleksandr Drozdov, and the poet Aleksei Èisner. Vsevolod Nikanorovich Ivanov® did not return until 1945, Nikolai Fedorov (pseudonym: Nikolai Roshchin) in 1946, and Natal'ya il'ina in 1947. The poet Antonin Ladinsky went back only in 1955, while Irina Odoevtseva waited until 1987. One returnee was the talented but opportunistic novelist Aleksei Tolstoi, who managed to make a brilliant and remunerative literary career for himself in the U.S.S.R. Before returning to Russia, Tolstoi published an open letter, stating that he was "cutting himself off from the émigrés.” In 1923 he published the science fiction novel Aèlita, in which the protagonist emigrates in allegorical fashion, escaping from Earth (the dynamic Soviet Russia) to Mars (the decadent West) in an effort to at least give this degenerate world a chance to "perish calm ly and m ajestically.” W riting in the Berlin newspaper R ul' (The Helm) in 1921, the prose w riter and member of the Changing Landmarks movement Ivan Sokolov-M ikitov had accused the Soviets of poisoning Russian minds with hatred and then expecting the W est to come to their assistance. Nevertheless, he himself returned home only a year later. There he was fortunate to have preferred country life and thus escaped the purges. He took part in an expedition of the icebreaker Malygin and was even received by Stalin. The poet Mariya Vega, who likewise returned to the U.S.S.R., but only in 1975, gave eloquent expression to the longing to go home: Take m y talent, m y hands, ready to work, M y experience, memory, the honed sword o f m y anger, M y loyal heart, which has m atured in this long parting, M y stem lyre and soft feminine speech. Take the sta ff which tapped
•Not to be confused with the Soviet writer Vsevolod Vyacheslavovich Ivanov.
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the cold paving stones O f alien cities. Take the treasure which I have hoarded. Take the colors o f m y palette, faded with poverty, and the wanderer's shaggy sail, decorated with patches. Stack a ll this up in the square, in your snowy Leningrad. Kindle the bonfire, and le t the high flame leap upward. Let m y notebooks soar skywards In light flocks — Like yellow leaves, when granite freezes. O nly from flames is bom the word. If you believe m y living verse and ask: "Are you prepared to burn twice?” I w ill answer: " Yesl” A nd the Russian muse will stretch out her hands to me through the smoke. The talented poet, novelist, and critic Andrei Bely had arrived in the W est declaring that the émigrés were as alien to him as the Soviets and that he would be alone in Berlin. In the words of Fêdor Stepun, he returned to Russia in 1923 in a "fever.” Nina Berberova recalled a dinner she attended on September 8: Bely arrived in a state o f rage and spoke to virtually no one. Squeezing his enormous wrists between his knees ... he sat looking o ff into space. A t the end o f the dinner he stood up, glass in hand and staring with hatred a t the more than 20 people who were sitting a t the table, to announce that he wished to make a speech. It was a toast to himself. A t that m om ent the image o f Christ seem ed to come alive in this brilliant fool: he dem anded that they drink to him, because he was leaving to be crucified. For whom? For a ll o f us sitting there in the restaurant on Hentinerstraße — fo r Khodasevich, Muratov, Zaitsev, Remizov, Berdyaev, Vysheslavtsev.... He was going to Russia to spill his blood and be crucified for a ll o f Russian literature.
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"B ut not for m e,” Khodasevich said quietly without standing up. "Boris Nikolaevich, I d o n t want you to be crucified fo r me. There is no way I can give you that sort o f mission.* B ely p u t his glass down and, staring ahead, his eyes filled with hate, he declared that Khodasevich had always been filled with the poison o f his own skepticism and that he, Bely, was breaking a ll ties with him. Khodasevich grew pale. Even after such a speech, actually going home was no easy decision to take, and Bely asked Marina Tsvetaeva, who had moved from Berlin to Prague, to obtain a grant to allow him to continue his literary work there. Tsvetaeva, who was almost as impractical as Bely, som ehow managed to get him not only a grant but an apartm ent as well. In an irony of fate, however, her telegram arrived only hours after Bely had boarded the train for Moscow.3 Before returning to Russia herself much later, Tsvetaeva summed up her dilem ma in a letter to her friend, the Czech w riter Anna Teskovâ: Do you happen to know a good soothsayer in Prague, m y dear Anna Antonovna? I d o n t know what to do without a soothsayer. Everything revolves around the question: to go o r not to go. (And if I go, then forever.) To sum things up, S. Ya., and also Alya and M ur [Tsvetaeva's husband and childrenJ definitely want to go. A ll around us we see the danger o f war, revolutions, and generally catastrophic events. I c a n t stay here alone. The émigrés d o n t like me, Poslednie novosti has driven me out, and I c a n t get published. O f course, writers were not the only émigrés to go home. The painter Ivan Bilibin, rejected in the world of Parisian art, returned to Russia to find an audience. The composer Sergei Prokofev, evidently to his own regret, also went back and found himself living under enormous pressure for the rest of his life. (He died the same day as Stalin, and his funeral was ignored in the Soviet press.) Many others, including the writers Aleksei Remizov and Roman G ul\ toyed with the idea of returning to Russia but never went through with it. An amnesty was declared for soldiers of the W hite armies. Altogether, 181,432 persons returned to Russia during the decade 1921 -31 ; the majority of them — 120,000 — in 1921. And these figures do not include the period 1917-20. Returnees from the United States were commonly referred to as "Am ericans.” Repatriation was again to come to the fore against the
•According to one version, Bely was induced to return to Russia by his future w ife, Klavdiya Vasil'eva, who was supposedly sent to bring him home by fellow anthroposophists in Moscow, concerned about his well-being.
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background of Russian patriotism evoked by the oncoming Second W orld War. According to one Soviet source, by the end of the 1930s as many as 400 émigrés in Paris wished to be repatriated, and over 1,000 in the whole of France. W hile the Soviet government regarded expatriates as "renegades” and "enemies,” many writers who had either voluntarily or involuntarily remained in Russia were wracked by conflicting emotions. It was not a new situation for Russian writers, as Pushkin could have testified. The life of the poet Anna Akhmatova, who returned over and over again in her verse to the them e of emigration, is illustrative. Akhmatova was rom antically involved with the painter Boris Anrep, who had lived mainly in Western Europe since 1908 and evidently was not as keen on marriage with her as she was with him: Heretic, fo r an em erald island You have bartered away your native land, O ur songs, our icons, The quiet pine above the lake. Bold man o f Yaroslav, If insanity has not usurped your mind, Why does your eye fall upon red-headed beauties A nd their opulent villas? Blasphemer, wallow in your bluster, Doom your Orthodox soul, S it tight in the king’s capital Savor your precious freedom. In the difficult war year of 1940 she returned to a poem she had written in 1917: I heard a pleasing voice, It called to m e: " Come here, Leave your distant, sinful land, Abandon Russia, never to return. I will scrub the gore from your hands, Pluck the sliver o f black shame from your heart, A nd cover the anguish o f defeats and hum iliations With a new nam e.” B ut calmly, indifferently, I covered m y ears so as not to corrupt the m elancholy spirit With this impious speech.
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And there is, of course, the famous verse which was so often quoted by official Soviet critics to show that Akhmatova cursed and anathematized the émigrés: I am not with those who abandoned the land To be ravaged by its enemies. I give no ear to their flattery A nd lend no song to their impiety. To you, castaway, I grant eternal p ity — A s to a convict o r a man diseased. D ark is your path, wanderer, A nd your alien bread reeks o f wormwood. O f course, the number of writers who would have left Russia, given the opportunity, must have been very large, indeed. One of the most tragically eloquent instances was the suicide of the playwright, critic, and editor Anastas'ya Chebotarevskaya, wife of the "decadent" sym bolist w riter Fedor Sologub. Chebotarevskaya jumped off a bridge in Petrograd in 1921 when she and Sologub were denied permission to emigrate. Another prom inent non-émigré was Isaak Babel', who visited W estern Europe three times, living for a while with his wife and daughter in Paris, but who chose to remain in Russia even though his fam ily remained in the West. Life abroad was amusing, he maintained, but only in Russia could he write. Besides, like Aleksei Tolstoi, he lived a privileged life in Russia; a large dacha was built for him in the writers' settlem ent of Peredelkino, not far from Moscow, where he enjoyed such luxuries as servants and a new eight-cylinder Ford, imported from Am erica. In May 1939, however, he was arrested and all his m anuscripts were confiscated. Despite the imminent threat of war, Soviet prosecutors found tim e (20 minutes) in January 1940 to try him and have him shot. And there were many, many other writers who would have left Russia, had they been given the opportunity, for example, Aleksandr Blok, who died while waiting for permission to go to Finland for medical treatm ent, and Mikhail Bulgakov, for whom permission never came. This sad list could grow to be very long, but it is really the topic of a different book.
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Soviet-Émigré Relations Pontifical Death, that doth the crevasse bridge To the steep and trifid God. Francis Thompson (1859-1907) Until the advent of giasnost\ the official Soviet approach to émigré literature, not surprisingly, was to ignore it completely. For example, the index to the nine-volume B rief Soviet Literary Encyclopedia (1962-78) contains roughly 35,000 names; Solzhenitsyn's is not among them. Nevertheless, relations between émigré and Soviet Russian literature were relatively cordial in the liberal atm osphere of the early 1920s. This is not to say that Soviet-émigré relations were idyllic even then. To cite just one example of countless others, the émigré critic Yuly AlkhenvaPd (1872-1928) was convinced that Valery Bryusov had played a role in having him deported from the U.S.S.R. as revenge for a negative review he had written about Bryusov's poetry.® By the mid-1920s Soviet writers were largely forbidden to have any contact with émigré colleagues, and when the great purges were launched in the late 1930s, even ordinary working people in the Soviet Union stopped corresponding with their relatives abroad and on occasion went so far as to burn their pictures. On the whole, ém igré writers kept abreast of Soviet Russian literature rather well, but Soviet writers before the late 1980s — through no fault of their own — often remained largely ignorant of émigré literature. Soviet law forbade the importation of any Russian-language materials published abroad, and it was a crime to own, to conspire to acquire, or to import them. One émigré reaction to such draconian measures was to deny that anything of literary value was being produced in Russia and to claim that the center of Russian literature had moved from Moscow to Paris. Bunin wrote that Esenin's poems were sentim ental trash, that Babel’ was "nothing special,” and that Pasternak was "boring.”
‘ Trotsky, too, may well have had a hand in his deportation. Just six months earlier, on June 2, 1922, Trotsky had published an article, under the pseudonym "O ,” entitled "Literature, where is your whip?" (Literatura, gde tvoi khlyst?), in which he called Aikhenval'd a "snake-in-the-grass aesthete" (podkolodnyi èstet) and accused him of championing the sam e sort of "pure art as had been popular in the sewers of Generals Denikin and Vrangel'." Trotsky proposed that Aikhenval'd be driven out of the Soviet Union by the "whip of dictatorship" to that cam p to which he w as accustomed to "pander." All his life Aikhenval'd had suffered from a superstitious fear of trolley cars and he w as actually killed by a tram in Berlin in 1928. The literary circle which he had founded in Berlin continued functioning until 1934.
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Merezhkovsky and Gippius saw their salon as a refuge for the Russian literary tradition being destroyed in the Soviet Union. W riters who were unpublished at home took pride in the fact that they had never "collaborated” with the Soviet literary establishment. But this view was not universally shared. The argument that émigré literature would eventually reunite with Soviet literature was first advanced by figures who were politically left of center. In 1922 Aleksandr Yashchenko wrote that a "bridge” was needed between émigré and Soviet literature, while Ekaterina Kuskova spoke of filling in a trench between the refugees and Russia. Voicing the opposite view, Vadim Rudnev, the former mayor of Moscow and an editor of Sovremennye zapiski, sarcastically commented that such "illusions” as "bridge building” were like jumping from the fifth floor of Moscow’s Lubyanka prison. But the "bridge builders” were not about to be silenced, and the critic Mark Slonim m aintained that émigré books did not constitute a distinct literary tradition, thus supporting the need for émigré letters to make peace with Russian literature back home. The idea persisted throughout the Soviet period. In 1956 Gleb Struve wrote in his history of Russian émigré literature that it was a tem porarily diverted stream which would eventually flow back into the river of all-Russian literature. Later the émigré writer-scholar Nina Berberova even went so far as to claim that this reunification had already taken place in the period 1972-83. Of course, her statem ent was premature, but the very appearance of such a claim dem onstrates that Russian émigré literature no longer made a claim to an existence independent of Soviet literature. At a conference on ém igré literature held in Los Angeles in 1981 the primary topic of discussion was the eventual reunification of Soviet and émigré literature. But reunification was only the far end of the bridge, the beginning of which reached back to a cultural heritage so threatened in the U.S.S.R. that Osip Mandel'shtam in his poem Vek (The Age) wrote of using his own blood to paste together the snapped spine of his age. Thus, it was up to the émigrés to recognize the mission thrust upon them by fate. Berberova felt herself to be a seam holding together the new Soviet age with that of the past. Roman Gul' and Vladislav Khodasevich spoke for the émigré community in saying they had "carried their Russia away with them .” At a meeting of the Green Lamp Society, Zinaida Gippius asked if it was not tim e simply to forget about Russia? In response to the view that the capital of Russian literature was not Moscow, but Paris, and that Pushkin's best work had been on foreign topics, supposedly demonstrating the Russian language could be used to write on topics other than Russia, the critic and poet Georgy Adamovich responded that such views were almost as frivolous as they were affirm ative:
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We need a different tone, different words, a sense o f tragedy. It is said that we brought the Russian language with us, and our Russian streams and birch trees are supposed to stay back in Russia. Fine, gentlemen, but Russia is not a concept that can be exported piece by piece. A language is inseparable [from its country o f origin] and cannot be carried away. Language is a form o f the people's spiritual life; it exists only for its people, and not for anyone else. Otherwise you should be consistent and take up Esperanto. Language takes shape together with the life o f the people and corresponds to it. Russian literature can only be about Russian people. A nd despite some exceptions in certain literary masterpieces, it is absurd to elevate these exceptions to the status o f a rule.
Geography Gallipoli and Istanbul I would send them to the Turk, to make eunuchs of. Shakespeare, A ll's W ell That Ends W ell The original evacuation from Black Sea ports to Constantinople and the Caucasus was conducted by the French in April 1919, when Odessa first fell to the communists, but most of the evacuees returned after that city was retaken by the Whites. The second evacuation took place on January 20,1920, after the defeat of General Denikin's army, and was conducted by the British. The evacuation of Novorossiisk, ten days after the Bol'sheviks retook Odessa, was only partially successful. Both in Novorossiisk and Odessa conditions attending the evacuation were chaotic and desperate, with a number of people literally thrown overboard. The third and main evacuation — that of Vrangel”s army — proceeded in an orderly fashion from Novorossiisk, Yevpatoria, Yalta, Kerch, Odessa, and Sevastopol' in mid-November 1920.a Among those left behind was the son of the w riter and future émigré Ivan Shmelêv, who was taken prisoner and shot by soldiers commanded by the Hungarian Communist Béla Kun and his associate Rozaliya Zalkind (Zemlyachka). It was ironic that the same Russian armies that had threatened the Ottoman empire for centuries had arrived at those very shores in
•There w as also a northern evacuation from Arkhangelsk in February, 1920, and a Far-East evacuation from Vladivostok in October, 1922.
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search of refuge. The Atatürk government, which was asked to host these uninvited guests, was sympathetic to the new Soviet regime and hardly eager to harbor this potentially dangerous refugee army of an empire that as recently as 1915 had concluded a secret pact with the Allies to gain control of Istanbul and the Dardanelles. Nevertheless, Istanbul was occupied by the Allied armies and in a state of chaos, so the Turks had little choice in the matter. The last, and largest, group of evacuees numbered some 150,000, of whom 100,000 were soldiers and 50,000 were civilians, including 30,000 women and 7,000 children. A veritable armada of between 126 and 166 ships participated in the evacuation (accounts vary).3 The British government quickly adopted the position that a continuation of the Russian civil war was no longer feasible, but the French for a tim e supported the Russian troops in exchange for the Russian fleet which had delivered that army. Even so, the French governm ent itself began to exert pressure on the army to either return home or move on. Offers to take in the refugees were extended by Serbia, Bulgaria, Greece, Canada, and even Brazil. As of this moment the émigrés were transformed from assets to expensive liabilities in the eyes of W estern governments. Before this admission of the nonviability of the W hite movement, Russians easily received visas and could even exchange tsarist Russian currency at relatively favorable rates. The Soviet governm ent launched a campaign to get people to return; Soviet sources claimed that nearly one half the W hite officers took up service in the Red Army, and the food shortages and cholera in the m ilitary camps made such shifts of allegiance understandable. Inevitably, Soviet intelligence attempted to infiltrate émigrés’ ranks. Altogether more than 4,000 officers returned to the Crimea, together with approxim ately 5,000 women, children, and elderly people. One of the chief regrouping areas for the Russian army was G allipoli13, a bleak peninsula projecting into the Sea of Marmara and referred to by the Russians as "Golo-pole” (Naked Field). Living conditions for Russians, who constituted 50 percent of the population, were harsh; people found themselves sleeping in tents, caves, earthen dugouts, or under an open sky. In Istanbul itself the Russians found
•The ém igré historian Vertepov, for example, gives an overall figure of 135,000 evacuees, rather than 150,000. bThe First Corps of General Kutepov (25,000 men) was bivouacked in Gallipoli. The so-called Don Corps (20,000) was put up in the environs of Constantinople, and the Kuban' troops
(15,000) w ere on the island of Lemnos.
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them selves in difficult straits; 2,655 Russian women were registered as prostitutes in Constantinople, and generals became waiters. An intense effort was launched to maintain m ilitary discipline, but French reluctance to continue supporting the Russian army inevitably cut short the Turkish chapter in the history of the Russian em igration. Nevertheless, in the course of one and one half years some 80 cultural, educational, and professional organizations were form ed which were brought together on April 24, 1922, under the um brella organization The Russian Committee in Turkey (Russkii konntet v Turtsii). Publishing activities were surprisingly vigorous. Some of the magazines and newspapers leaned toward the pious: A Conversational Partner Useful to the Soul: A Spiritually Enlightening Magazine o f the Panteleim onov M onastery and O ther Russian M onasteries on M ount Athos. Others were early attem pts at preserving the Russian cultural tradition: the weekly Economic and Literary Newspaper, and The Path: A Social, Financial-Economic, and Literary-Cultural Journal. In this community of largely m ilitary men many of the publications carried tongue-in-cheek titles: Cheerful Bombs, Stray Thoughts, The Jackal, The Scaffold, The Canard, and Scatter Your Troubles in a Naked Field. One, at least, had a rather sad title: The Pariah. The Scaffold was prepared on a typewriter in an edition of 48 copies.a The illustrator, Colonel Murav'êv, had to repeat the drawing 48 times. During the Russians’ brief sojourn in Turkey, several more or less serious literary societies were created, among them the Chekhov Society*3, the Society of Russian Scientists, Scholars and W riters in Constantinople6, The League of Russian W riters and Journalists in
•Russian titles: Dushepoleznyi sobesednik: Dukhovno-prosvetitel'nyi ireligioznyi zhum al russkogo Panteleimonovskogo monastyrya iprochikh obitelei na Sv. Afone Constantinople, 1922; Èkonomicheskaya i literatum aya gazeta, Constantinople, 1922; P u t Z h u m a l obshchestvennyi, finansovo-èkonomicheskii i literatum okhudozhestvennyi, Constantinople, 1924; Vesèlye bomby, Gallipoli, 1921; Dum ki zalêtnye, Gallipoli, 1921; Shakal, Gallipoli, 1921; Utka, Lemnos, 1920-21; R azvei gore v chistom pole, Gallipoli, 1921; Izgoi, Gallipoli, 1921; Èshafot, Gallipoli, 1921). bObshchestvo imeni A. P. Chekhova, Kamensky, ll'ya Surguchêv, and A. Sokolov.
founded
by the writers
Anatoly
cÔbshchestvo russkikh uchênykh i pisatelei v Konstantinopole, chaired by Sergei Gogel', with N. Litvin as Secretary. In 1922 the society published Alien Distant Lands (Chuzhaya dal'), by Anatoly Bumakin.
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Constantinople®, and the Tsargrad Poets’ Guild5. A number of short lived publishing houses even sprang up in Istanbul.6 The number of Russians resident in Istanbul alone in November 1920 is estimated at 167,000, but by 1923 only about 8,000 were left. Nevertheless, many a refugee retained a firm belief in a successful renewal of hostilities and a return to Mother-Russia: In the Crimea we could be overwhelmed by numbers; in G allipoli we could be forcibly scattered; and on Lemnos we were literally starved. B ut now there is no force capable o f crushing the Russian ranks. Tomorrow, a t the first command, the men w ill gather beside their banners and come down from the mountains, out o f the forests, and up from the mines, leaving behind their huts and falling into graceful ranks. The trum pet w ill call, and like m agical spirits, regim ent w ill fa ll in behind regim ent as Russian warriors again make the sign o f the cross and advance, their banners flowing, to liberate Russia. Russia will be saved by self-sacrifice and the feats o f people in whose hearts the commandments o f old have not been extinguished: "Rem em ber that you belong to Russia. ” "O nly death can free you from fulfilling your obligations." The number of Russians still residing in Turkey in 1930 is estim ated at only 1,400.
•Soyuz russkikh pisatelei i zhurnalistov v Konstantinopole, founded in 1920. The League organized literary evenings and published Russian translations of Turkish writers in the newspaper Presse du soir, and some of their undertakings w ere even attended by Abd al-M ajid, who later was proclaimed Sultan. The founders of the League w ere Professors Sergei Gogel' and Nikolai Alekseev, and also S . I. Varshavsky. In 1923, after a majority of its members moved on to other countries, the League ceased to function. bTsaregradskii tsekh poètov. The group called for simplicity of style and an end to revolutionary "clowning"; they published the m agazine Teatr and at least one book, a collection of verse by Andrei Allin. cVerba, Z a rubezhom, Tovarishchestvo Zarya Rossii, Tovarishchestvo Ku'ltura, Novyi Satirikon, and M. Shul’man.
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Berlin
Mr. Zimmerman calls Berlin Sodom and Gomorrah, but Berlin has not collapsed and heaven's rage is not incinerating it Nikolai Karamzin, 1789 You d o n t have to love Berlin; a lo t o f people dont. B ut you c a n t help feeling a deep respect for the concentrated, alm ost tragic seriousness which constitutes the character o f this city. Nowhere does the pulse o f contem porary history beat with such m alignant precision. Lpv Trotsky Before W orld W ar I Germany had served as a strong m agnet for ethnic Russians, Russified German Balts, and Russian Jews, who complained almost as much about discrimination by German Jews as by Russians back home. No visas were required, and the Russian aristocracy was closely intermarried with German royalty, owned property in Germany, and liked to vacation there. Many young Russians, half of them Jews, visited what was for them a sort of cultural Mecca as early as the 1730s, studying in Berlin, Halle, Marburg, Göttingen, and Jena. In the 1890s Russian artists such as Vasily Kandinsky, Igor' Grabar’, and Dmitry Kardovsky came to study contem porary European art movements. Prior to 1917 the political left was well represented in that country among a number of émigré groups, and revolutionaries often used it as a base of operations. The journal of the Russian Social Democrat W orkers’ Party, Iskra, for example, was published in Munich from late 1900 to the spring of 1902. At the same tim e the current did not flow in one direction only; in the period 1828-1915, some 1,459,000 Germans had settled in Russia, and the interactions of Germans in Russia created a peculiar m irror image of the complex interactions of Russians in Germany. After the civil war, there was a significant stream of evacuees from the Crimean operation via Turkey, the Balkans, and Paris into Germany, despite the country's post-war impoverishment. Ever a magnet for Russian émigrés, Berlin continued to attract them, particularly following a sharp rise in prices in Paris in late 1921, and large numbers of Russians came over the "green border” between the
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two countries.3 The Soviet government made its own contribution to this influx, employing some 3,000 persons in its embassy and trade offices. A t first, the German government viewed its Russian guests as tem porary refugees who would eventually return to Russia and occupy influential positions. The Germans even welcomed the Russian refugees in the hope that they could be swayed in favor of Germany and against France. But this optimism soon faded. So prom inent were the Russians in the "stepm other of all Russian cities,” as Berlin was known, that one German newspaper published a cartoon showing all Berlin shop signs in Russian except for one that read: "German Spoken Here.” The Germans suspected (undoubtedly correctly) the Russian community of harboring a substantial contingent of Soviet spies — this despite the fact that the W eim ar governm ent had reached an accommodation with the Soviets with regard to the terms of the Versailles treaty and the creation of the new Polish state. There was also hostility to the Russians on the part of Germans who feared the newcomers would take their jobs, and also over worries about Russian Francophiles (Cadets and socialists), who tended to the left of the political spectrum, as opposed to the conservatives, who were more often Germanophiles (nationalists and communists). There was even a group of extreme conservatives who dream ed of using the Red Army to achieve a revanche over the French. The League of Nations stated that its goal was to return the Russians to Russia, and the German government attempted to deport at least some of the country's numerous guests. In 1925 one young Russian, about to be deported, committed suicide — an event that was covered extensively in the émigré press. Nor did the Germans’ desire to be rid of their Russian guests dissipate with the passage of tim e. In 1936 the Berlin chief of police even proposed that unemployed Russian im m igrants be placed in labor camps, but the government rejected his recommendation.
•Betw een 60,000 and 100,000 Russians are estimated to have been residing on Germ an territory by 1919. By 1920 the American Red Cross in Germ any was rendering assistance to 560,000 Russians in Germ any, but many w ere only passing through the country, so that the total number of immigrants is estimated by the G erm an historian Hans-Erich Volkmann to be approximately 300,000 for that year. The "Russian Archive" in Prague lists 230,000 to 250,000 emigrants from Russia in Germ any for 1921, and the League of Nations estimated 600,000 for 1922 and 1923. In 1923 alone, 360,000 emigrants applied for refugee status in Berlin. Reliable figures are hard to come by for later years, but by 1928 a League of Nations document listed only 150,000 emigrants from Russia in Germ any, as opposed to 400,000 for France. After the exodus of 1923-1925 the number of Russians in Germ any is estimated to have been in the 100,000 range.
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W hile Russians were scattered throughout Berlin, they were especially heavily concentrated in the southwest part of the city — W ilmersdorf, Schöneberg, Friedenau, and Charlottenburg, which was christened "Charlottengrad.” Aside from Berlin, there were com m unities of Russian émigrés in the so-called "Russian provinces” — Munich, Leipzig, Frankfurt am Main, Hamburg, and Danzig. Virtually every town had some Russians: Düsseldorf, Baden-Baden, Breslau, Stuttgart, Heidelberg, Göttingen, Königsberg, to name only some. A significant portion of these emigrants were Volksdeutsche.a Two associations were especially active in the late 1920s: the Organization for the Protection of the Interests of Russian Refugeesb and an office of the League of Nations that worked with Russian émigrés. In term s of social structure, 1920 witnessed the arrival of a large number of W hite Army officers, while 1921 brought in a massive influx of persons of less aristocratic origins, those fleeing^ the famine, and 1922 was the year of leftists and liberals. This was a very elite group — more so than Paris. On the whole, the émigrés were not covered by German labor laws, and living conditions were difficult (although, curiously enough, Russian memoirs of the period depict a much rosier picture than do German documents about the Russians). In 1929 stateless persons were equated with Germans for purposes of unemployment compensation, and the normalized legal status of Russians in Germany was a significant factor in maintaining their numbers at a high level. The sheer number of the immigrants, plus the fact that many of them were politically active, was a cause of concern for officials in the M inistry of the Interior, which viewed the newcomers as undesirable and even dangerous. Shady figures such as the Russian émigré painter and inveterate counterfeiter Ivan Myasoedov (pseudonym: Eugen Zotow) only confirmed these suspicions. The Soviet governm ent had established relations with the W eim ar Republic, and authors whose books were published sim ultaneously in Berlin and Petrograd were perm itted to retain copyright. Èrenburg commented that if France was the country of
•Among their organizations w ere: D er Verein der Wolgadeutschen, D er Verein der Deutschen aus Südrußland, D ie Deutsch-Sibirische Vereinigung, and Das Provinzialkom itee der Deutschen aus Rußland der Provinz Ostpreußen. ‘O rganizatsiya zashchity interesov russkikh bezhentsev, referred to as the Vertrauenstelle by the Germ ans and headed by the form er Russian am bassador to Italy, Sergei Botkin.
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painting, Germany was the country of books. A primary engine for this publishing activity was, strangely enough, inflation — at least in its early stages. Stripped bare by the victorious Allies after the Treaty of Versailles and forced to pay enormous reparations, calculated in marks, the beleaguered German governm ent ran the printing presses round the clock. The currency was so devalued (2.7 million marks for $1 by August 16, 1923) that books could be published in Berlin at prices far below those possible in other countries. The émigré editor Iosif Gessen recalled owing a debt of 75 million marks, which he paid off with 50 American cents. But if an issue of the newspaper R ul' cost 10,000 marks in August 1923, by early December the price had risen to 200 billion marks — an increase of twenty million tim es (I) in just three months. In the early 1920s Berlin boasted at least 47 Russian publishing housesa, of which eight maintained Russian libraries.6 Roman Gul’ quotes the Börsenblatt des deutschen Buchhändlers as listing more Russian books appearing in Germany one year than German books. Altogether, between 2,100 and 2,200 titles were published by 86 publishers. Petropolis0 alone issued more than 1,000 books between 1922 and 1935, when it was forced to move to Brussels, where it survived until W orld W ar II began. Some ninety percent of the books published by Petropolis were exported for sale outside of Germany. Paper was extremely hard to come by in Russia, and ém igré publishing houses thus received a unique, albeit tem porary opportunity to capture much of that market. The Soviet writers who published in Berlin included, among others, Boris Pil'nyak (Vogau),
•These included such publishing houses as Akadem iya, Alkonost, Bibliofil, Dvuglavyi orêl, O. D'yakova i Ko., S . Èfron, Èpokha, Èver, Gam ayun, Tovarishchestvo Gliksman, Gelikon, Glagol, Grani, Grzhebin, Gutonov, O . Kirkhiner, Ladyzhnikov, Literature, Logos, Moskva, Mysl', Nauka i zhizn', Neva, Ogon'ki, Petropolis, Povolotsky i Ko., Progress, Rossiya, Russkoe iskusstvo, Russkoe tvorchestvo, Russkoe universal'noe izdatel'stvo, Slovo, Skify, A. Syrkin, Siyal’sky i Kreishman (one reference refers to this publishing house as Siyal'sky i Krechm er), Szio-Verlag, Teatr i zhizn', Trud, Vek kul'tury, Volga, Vostok, Vozrozhdenie, Vrach, Zarya, Znanie. For the most com plete list of Russian publishing houses in Berlin see: Gottfried Kratz, "Russische Verlage in Berlin nach dem Ersten Weltkrieg." * 0 . D'yakova i Ko., Tovarishchestvo Gliksman, O. Kirkhner i Ko., Knizhnyi Salon, Moskva, Obrazovanie, Rus', Rodina. «Petropolis w as founded as a cooperative, chaired by M. A. Kuz'min, with an editorial com m ittee consisting of Yakov Blokh, Abram Kagan, and Grigory Lozinsky. Blokh w as evidently the committee's most active member.
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Konstantin Fedin (later head of the Soviet W riters’ Union), Vsevolod Ivanov, and Anatoly Mariengof. One of the major publishers, Zinovy Grzhebin, published prose and poetry by Maksim Gor'ky, Aleksei Remizov, Vladislav Khodasevich, Boris Pasternak, Fëdor Sologub, and others. Grzhebin, who was Gor'ky's protégé, for a tim e had an arrangem ent with the Soviet authorities to sell his books to them .a The other major publishers in Berlin were Gelikonb, Èpokhac, and Slovo (backed by Ullstein Publishers), and that of Ivan Ladyzhnikov.d Slovo published almost all the works of Mark Aldanov and som e of Nabokov's. One of the magazines published by Èpokha was Beseda (Conversation), which was conceived by Viktor Shklovsky. Gor'ky was so determ ined that Beseda survive that he would not allow any of his writings to be published in Soviet Russia unless issues of Beseda could be legally imported. Beseda was popular enough to enjoy a printrun of 1,200 to 1,500 copies abroad — very respectable by ém igré standards — but the hope was for greater sales in Russia itself. To propitiate Gor'ky, the Politbyuro in 1924 issued a special decree, perm itting the importation of Beseda, but then refused to order any copies. Besedäs life span was thus a short one — although not an unusually brief one by émigré standards — from June 1923 to March 1925. A number of newspapers were published in Berlin. Golos Rossii (The Voice of Russia) was a daily publication with a rather vague political orientation; it was eventually purchased by the Social Revolutionaries and renamed D ni (Days). A second daily newspaper was R ul' (The Helm), co-edited by Iosif Gessen and the senior Vladim ir
•The Soviets did not keep their end of the bargain, and Grzhebin's publishing venture w as bankrupted. Supposedly the Soviet publisher Sam uil Zaks (pseudonym: G ladnev) w as sent to Berlin in 1920 to undermine Grzhebin's activities. bGelikon, which existed from 1922 to 1924, w as founded by Abram Vishnyak, who w as to perish in a Germ an concentration camp. cÈpokha w as founded and managed by Solomon Kaplun (pseudonym: Sum sky), who managed to go bankrupt, like his fellow ém igré publishers, Zinovy Grzhebin and Ivan Ladyzhnikov. dLadyzhnikov had been in charge of Bol'shevik publishing abroad as early as 1905, first in G eneva and only later in Berlin. His publishing house Kniga (renam ed Mezhdunarodnaya kniga in 1923) w as the official Soviet book company abroad. Ladyzhnikov eventually returned to Russia and becam e literary executor for the estate of Maksim Gor'ky, whom he had known since the 1890s.
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Nabokov, father of the writer.® A weekly publication, Vremya (Time), was published by Grigory Breitman. There was even a communist Russian-language newspaper Novyi m ir (The New W orld), supposedly financed by the Soviet governm ent and intended to cover politics, literature, and economics. The Monarchists published Gryadushchaya Rossiya (Future Russia). Another weekly was the Changing Landmarks publication Nakanune (On the Eve).b And, of course, there were the Russian Nazis, who first published Prizyv (The Call) and then Zhidoved (Judenkenner). Dozens of Russian magazines were published in Berlin — on all sorts of topics. There were periodicals published by the Moderate Democrats, the Leftist Democrats, the Peasant Union, the AnarchoSyndicalists, the Social Democrats, the Social Revolutionaries, the Leftist Social Revolutionaries, the Monarchists, the Communists, and Russian Jewish organizations.® Zhar-ptitsa (Firebird) was a glossy illustrated literary-artistic monthly. Grzhebin's Putnik published both Soviet and émigré authors. N ovosti literatury (Literary News), edited by Mark Slonim, was a "critical-bibliographical journal.” Announced for publication was a satirical journal Plokhie shutki (Bad Jokes), to be edited by Nadezhda Tèffi. Golos èm igranta (The Émigré's Voice) appeared every two weeks and was devoted to the cultural, legal, and economic questions of interest to the émigré community. Aleksandr Yashchenko's Novaya russkaya kniga (New Russian Book), a non-political bibliographical and
•The paper appeared from Novem ber 16, 1920, until October 1 2 ,1 9 3 1 , with a circulation of som e 20,000 copies in the early 1920s, roughly half of which w ere sold in Germ any. Altogether R ul' w as sold in some 369 cities in 34 countries. Evidently the publication w as made possible thanks to an agreem ent between the G erm an publisher Ulstein and Gessen. bRodina (The Fatherland) w as published weekly in Russian and Germ an. Spolokhi (Northern Lights) was a literary and artistic monthly. CA partial list: Arkhiv russkoi revoliutsii, Byulleteni Dom a Iskusstv, Dvuglavyi orêl, Èpopeya, Ezhenedel'nik Vysshego Monarkhistkogo Soveta, Golos èmigranta, Istorik i sovremennik, Kresfyanskoe delo, Letopis' revolyutsii, Novosti literatury, Pechatnoe iskusstvo, Revolyutsionnaya Rossiya, Russkii Ökonomist (in German), Sotsialisticheskii vestnik, Spolokhi, Teatr i zhizn', Trudy russkikh uchënykh za granitsei, Veretênysh, Zarya. Vestnik samoobrazovaniya, Vostanovlenie. W hile many of these publications w ere in no way literary, the list does help to give a general picture of the scope of Russian publishing in Berlin.
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critical journal which kept track of Russian publishing activity all over the world, appeared m onthly.3 There were dozens of Russian cultural organizations in Berlin, among them the W riters’ Club, the House of the Arts, the Russian Institute of Science and Scholarship, the League of Russian Journalists and W riters, and the League of Russian Publishers.11 The Academy of Prose was launched in 1923 with a reading by Aleksei Tolstoi from his A M anuscript Found in the Garbage Under the Bed, while Vereteno (Spindle) proclaimed that it was going to "struggle against the decay of Russian literature” and debunk "pseudo-scientific” distinctions between "younger” and "older” writers.0 The local W riters’ Union was headed by Iosif Gessen. Needless to say, there was no shortage of clubs and restaurants in Russian Berlin: Strel'nya with Prince Golitsyn's gypsy chorus, Tikhii om ut (The Quiet Quagmire), M edved' (The Bear), Alaverdi, the Leon Café on Nollendorfplatz, and the café Landgraf, where a so-called "Russian Club” gathered on Sundays/1 There was also the Russian Literary and Artistic Circle6, which was actually a kind of club. The Chamber of Poets (Palata poètov) gathered in the café Chameleon and devoted a special evening to Charlie Chaplin on the occasion of one of his visits to Paris.1 Since the ruble was still convertible, many Soviet writers were able to visit Berlin, and the Berlin
‘The archives of Novaya russkaya kniga w ere taken by Boris Nikolaevsky to Paris and have been at least partially preserved in the Hoover Institute Library in California. bSom e members of these organizations: Yury Aikhenval’d, Andrei Bely, Nikolai Berdyaev, Boris Zaitsev, Georgy Ivanov, Pavel Muratov, Irina Odoevtseva, Nikolai Otsup, Sergei Rafalovich, and Vladim ir Khodasevich. Dorn iskusstv w as founded in 1921 and chaired first by Nikolai Minsky and then by Andrei Bely, with the active participation of Aleksei Rem izov, Viktor Shklovsky, Ivan Sokolov-Mikitov, and others. clts board members included: Gleb Alekseev, Vladim ir Am fiteatrov-Kadashev, Aleksandr Drozdov, Sergei Gorny, Vladim ir Korvin-Piotrovsky, and Yury Ofrosimov. dAmong the writers who gave readings there w ere ll'ya Èrenburg, Pavel Muratov, Vyacheslav Khodasevich, Viktor Shklovsky, Vladim ir Gom berg (Lidin), Aleksandr Yashchenko, Andrei Bely, Boris Vysheslavtsev, Boris Zaitsev, and Nina Berberova. •In 1926 its board included M. A. Anatra, Aleksandr Kulisher, V . Y a. Nazim ov, I. M. Troitsky, and Pêtr Zvezdich. »Some members: Aleksandr Ginger, Georgy Evangulov, Valentin Parnakh, Sergei Sharshun, Mikhail Struve, and Mark-Lyudovik-Mariya Talov.
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House of the Arts maintained close relations with the Petrograd House of the Arts. The W riters’ Club included Andrei Bely and Viktor Shklovsky, both of whom eventually returned to Russia, as well as Il'ya Èrenburg, whose relations with the émigré community were themselves an interesting elem ent of the cultural scene. The League of Poets was founded in February 1928. It met twice a month, and called for total seriousness and a cautious attitude toward form, while rejecting aestheticism (but not romanticism). The League published the verse collections Housewarming, The Grove, and The Net.* Russian Berlin could boast of a number of women poets: M arina Tsvetaeva, Nina Berberova, Raisa Blokh, and Èmiliya Chegrintseva all published collections of verse there. Naturally, Russian cultural activities in the German-speaking countries were not limited to Berlin. Ivan Nazhivin's publishing house Detinets (Citadel) listed its location as Berlin/Vienna, and he had another, Ikar (Icarus), in Reichenhall. And there were other publishing operations in Vienna: Laguna, Novaya Rossiya (New Russia), Persky Publishers (Izdatel'stvo Perskogo), and Rus'. Vostok was located in Dresden, Insel in Leipzig, and Milavida in Munich, where there lived some 500 to 600 Russians, most of them monarchists. The places of publication of Russian magazines are indicative of where the writers were clustered. Although a handful of Russian magazines and journals had been published in Germany before 1917, their number subsequently increased, and 1922 was destined to become the first peak in Russian serials publication in Germany. Despite all the cultural activities and institutions for which postW orld W ar I Germany is famous — the Bauhaus, Expressionism, the theater of Max Reinhardt, avant-garde music and film — the country was seething with resentment. In April 1922 the Soviet and German governm ents unexpectedly signed the Treaty of Rapallo, launching a period of collaboration between the two countries in producing weaponry forbidden in Germany under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles. Indeed, it was the very terms of the treaty that forced the W eim ar Republic into the arms of the Soviets. Rapallo put an end to the claim s of Russian émigrés to represent Russia at the negotiating table. W orst of all, once the Rapallo treaty had been concluded, Russian ém igrés could be tried in German courts in accordance with Soviet law. The German government, already troubled by the huge influx of Russian émigrés, took a dim view of the tum ult created by its Russian guests, and the rumor spread that Germany had concluded a secret agreem ent with the Soviets to put an end to émigré
“Novosel'e (1931), Roshcha (1932), Nevod (1933).
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counterrevolutionary activities. By the end of 1924 a massive exodus of Russian emigrants to Paris had commenced: inflation was replaced by deflation, and Germany had simply become too expensive for them. Iosif Gessen's diary reads: "Russian Berlin is dying.” In April 1924 the philosopher Nikolai Berdyaev asked his colleague Lev Shestov for assistance in moving to Paris. Later Berdyaev was to write that Russians in Berlin did not feel they were cut off from Russia, as was the case in Paris. W hile conceding that the mood in Germany was far from upbeat, Shestov had noted as late as August 1923 that people were working and he felt that talk of disaster was exaggerated. By the tim e Berdyaev's letter reached him, however, his guarded optimism had all but disappeared. Èrenburg commented that, if Berlin was a depressing place in 1923, by 1927 the chaos left over from the war had been swept away and replaced with expensive jewelry stores and orchids. A year later he wrote that Germany was unquestionably the most fascinating country in Europe. At the same tim e the Germans were becoming even more unhappy with the large Russian presence inside their borders. Early in 1930 the head of the M inistry of the Interior (das Auswärtige Amt, Ostabteilung) even wanted to give Moscow a free hand in putting a stop to anti-Soviet activities. Germany continued to be of compelling interest to both émigrés and Soviets when the National Socialist Party came to power in 1933, but for different reasons. The Russian Institute of Science and Scholarship (Russkii nauchnyi institut) was purged of "non-Aryan” members, and many books— German as well as fo re ig n — suffered the same fate. Roman Gul' witnessed the book burning on Opera Square: When m y wife and I arrived a t Friedrichstraße, the crowd was already enormous. Autom obile horns were sounding, tram s caught in the traffic jam were im patiently ringing their bells, and an all-consum ing nocturnal chaos reigned. The crowd was pressed up along the sidewalk. Brown Shirts with swastikas on their sleeves m arched in closed ranks down the pavement, red torches smoking in their hands. Their footsteps resounded as if their boots were cast o f pig iron. They sang in unison, with a chorus: "B lut m uß fließen! B lut m uß fließenl” (Blood m ust flowI) We m anaged to squeeze through the crowd and made our way along Unter den Linden to the bonfire, which was casting quivering orange shadows on the windows o f the old buildings; the flame in front o f the university m ore and more took on the color o f blood. Drums rolled, flutes squealed, and m ilitary marches resounded. Shafts o f light leapt into the night sky. Suddenly, raising their right hands to the fire-breathing
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sky, the crowd began to sing: Die Fahne hoch! A nd when this Horst Wessel song had died down in the darkness, an incredibly pow erful loudspeaker scream ed into the redness o f the night: "/ condemn to the flames Erich M aria R em arquer A roar o f approval rolled over the square, even though I doubt that m any there had actually read A ll Quiet on the Western Front. Hands red from the fire's reflection began flinging books into the flame, which suddenly leapt upward into the darkness, and book sheets spun through the a ir as if alive. Joy spread over the square.... Gul' him self remained in Germany until 1933, when he was arrested and spent several weeks in a Nazi concentration camp. As soon as he was released, he left for France. Iosif Gessen, editor of Rul', wrote of the Berlin apartm ent that had been home to him and his w ife for ten years: The furniture rem ained alien and som ehow not ours; I felt no attachm ent to these things, no associations. As if dead, they preserved a lifeless dull muteness, and I came to know them better only ju s t before the auction, when the appraisers were conducting an inventory and asked me to examine each item individually and state how much I thought it was worth. Despite numerous attempts by the émigrés to curry favor with the new government, the general attitude toward things Russian took a radical turn for the worse.The largely anti-Russian and naively proGerman Ukrainian emigration, which was very much sm aller than the Russian, was far more successful in this respect. Most Russians who had stuck it out in Germany through the inflation, arising every morning to wonder what that day's dollar exchange rate would be, decided it was tim e to move on. A second, sm aller "peak” of Russian arrivals in Germany came in 1948, and a third after the collapse of the U.S.S.R. — but more about those events later.
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Paris No m atter what anyone says, gentlemen, Paris is the only place in the perishing W est where you can perish in so ample and convenient a fashion. Aleksandr Gertsen, 1847 A t first I denied Paris and even attem pted to ignore it. Essentially this was the struggle o f a barbarian for survival. I sensed that if I wanted to approach Paris and truly encompass it I had to expend too m uch o f myself. Lev Trotsky Do you love Paris? So do I. It's sheer paradise, and when I was driven from that paradise, a ll I could do was smile shyly, like Adam. It's a rem arkable city! Remember the salesgirls beneath the chestnut trees, the girls playing hopscotch on the sidewalk, the used bookshops along the Seine, the blackbirds and the Sym bolist poets in the Luxembourg Gardens, the "terrible" anarchist Sebastien Faure, who taught babies to sing. Just rem em ber it all. Is it not a grandiose province, a transplanted village o f happy people? Il’ya Erenburg The Russian fascination with France goes back to the 18th century. The 19th-century memoirist Pavel Annenkov saw this obsession as an enthrallm ent with an idealized, even phantasized country. Gertsen, on the other hand, perceived the French capital as a gloom y city of death. Still, as Vladim ir Burtsev put it, France was "every Russian's second fatherland,” and Paris was the true émigré capital. Any number of Russian poets devoted verse to the city — Blok, Voloshin, Akhmatova, Gumilêv, Mandel’shtam, and Mayakovsky, to name but a few. Pavel Annenkov commented that when he arrived in Paris in the spring of 1846, he discovered an entire Russian colony led by Bakunin and Sazonov engaged in an interminable discussion of everyday, historical, and philosophical questions, such as were constantly being stirred up by social life in Paris under the liberal King Louis Philippe. At that tim e there was still no trace of any Russian political émigré community; that came into being only after the 1848 revolution. By 1875 so many Russians had relocated to Paris from Switzerland, where they had been studying, that Ivan Turgenev made
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a donation to create a Russian reading room, renamed the Turgenev Library after his death. Beginning with Russkii parizhanin (Russian Parisian) in 1892, Paris was home to several short-lived Russian newspapers.® Parizhskii vestnik (Parisian Herald, 1913) was actually quite successful, with printruns of 10,000 copies, but it closed down when World W ar I broke out. Ya. Povolotsky Publishers was founded in 1910 to bring Russia and France closer together; it was reactivated after W orld W ar I came to a close. The number of Russians in Paris had increased steadily toward the end of the 19th century, and it rose even more steeply after the 1905 revolution, making Paris the most im portant Western European city for Russians. There were actually three Russian colonies residing in different parts of the city. The largest concentration, consisting of intellectuals, artists, and students, was on the Left Bank. The wealthy Russian aristocracy preferred the Right bank — in the sixteenth arrondissem ent (Auteuil and Passy), and there was a Russian-Jewish colony in the fourth arrondissem ent — in the area of Saint Paul and the Bastille. Outside Paris the chief areas where Russians lived were Niceb, Lyon0, Cannes, and Marseilles. The acm eist poet Nikolai Gumilëv, a twenty-one-year-old student in Paris in 1907, published a literary journal entitled Sirius?, proclaim ing Paris ”a second Alexandria of elegance and enlightenm ent.” The general tone was typical of turn of the century ecstatic aestheticism :
aA partial list: Echo de Russie (1893, in French and Russian), Parizhskaya gazeta (Parisian Newspaper, 1900, intended for visitors to the World's Fair), Parizhskii listok (Parisian Flyer, 1910), Inostranets (Foreigner, 1912-1914), Novosti (New s, 1914-1915, published by Nikolai Avksent'ev, ll'ya Bunakov, and Boris Savinkov, with verse by Voloshin and Bal'mont), Golos (Voice, 1914-1915), Novaya èpokha (N ew Era, 1917), and Druz'ya russkogo soldata (Friends of the Russian Soldier, 1916, published by the Society of Friends of the Russian Soldier, organized by Paul Doumer for Russian soldiers in France). bAleksandra Fedorovna, mother of Tsar Aleksandr II, had fallen in love with Nice in 1856, when she w as negotiating for port rights for Russian ships with the Kingdom of Sardinia. Russian nobility followed the imperial fam ily to the Riviera, and by 1860 there w ere 214 Russian fam ilies resident in Nice. After the 1917 revolution the number of Russians in that city grew to 5,300. «Roughly 7,000 persons. »Together with Mstislav Farmakovsky and Aleksandr Bozheryanov.
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We will fall in love with everything that w ill im part an aesthetic fluttering to the soul, whether it is degenerate but luxurious Pom peii o r a New Egypt, where the tim es have intertw ined in madness and dance, the golden middle ages, o r our own severe, thoughtful time. The second issue of Sirius contained verse of Gum ilêv's future wife, Anna Gorenko, later to become famous as Anna Akhmatova. A second, and equally short-lived, literary journal appeared only six years later — Gelios — whose editors declared they wanted "to reflect the efforts of contemporaries to draw nearer to the sun.” Lunacharsky wrote an article on the theater, and the Soviet w riter Vera Inber, who lived in Europe as a journalist from 1924 to 1926, was represented with two poems in the second issue. When the 1917 October coup delivered a huge mass of Russians to France, the French saw no reason to lessen their traditional hostility to foreigners. Despite Dyagilev's popular 1909-11 "Russian Seasons,” little seemed to have changed for Russians in Paris after 1917. The émigré editor Mark Vishnyak com plained that foreigners frequently heard themselves referred to in the streets as "sale étranger” (dirty foreigner) and "métèque” (wop), and that even French intellectuals rarely sympathized with the plight of the Russian exiles. Nevertheless, even though opportunities for integration into French society were limited, France had suffered from a shortage of workers since the 1880s, and when W orld W ar I came to an end, the governm ent was eager to recruit foreign workers to rebuild the country — particularly in the face of agrow ing German population already nearly twice that of France. The heavy losses at the front had resulted in a dearth of French men, while the military evacuations had produced a male majority among the Russian émigrés. Since Russian women were relatively few in numbers, most Russo-French marriages were between Russian men and French women (a circumstance that contributed to the Russians’ rapid assimilation). Russians were treated quite hospitably in a number of ways. In 1923 the French Assembly voted a credit of 450,000 francs to create educational scholarships for some 200 Russian students, and the French attitude toward the émigrés was immeasurably better than toward the new Soviet government. Vasily Maklakov, a member of the last Duma, had been appointed Ambassador of the Russian Provisional Government, but when he presented him self at the Quai d'Orsay to deliver his credentials, he was informed that Kerensky's governm ent had been overthrown. Nevertheless, he was officially recognized as Russian Ambassador to France and actually resided in the Russian Embassy until October 1924, when France finally granted diplom atic recognition to the Soviet government. The following year the
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French governm ent extended its generosity to the Russian refugees and granted official status to the so-called "offices russes," and Maklakov continued to represent the civil affairs of Russian immigrants right up to his death in 1957, only by then as a French civil servant. French naturalization laws were sim ilar to those of most European countries, and between 1921 and 1934 17,033 Russians received French citizenship — most of them young men eligible for military service, agricultural laborers, and fam ilies with many children. Persons over 30, particularly if they were childless, generally suffered discrim ination. As of spring 1926, however, the Labor Ministry no longer perm itted foreigners to take the qualifying examination for naturalization. Thus, the majority of Russians in France never became French citizens; for many doing so would have meant to betray Russia. Estimates of the number of Russians living in Paris at the time range from 72,000 to 400,000. In the words of the émigré editor Mark Vishnyak, the city had been transformed into "both Babylon and Mecca, sim ultaneously a market and a tem ple.” Some 2,500 Russians worked as taxicab drivers in Paris, often emblazoning the doors of their cabs with the emblem of the Russian bear. The Russians, who had the lowest crim e rate of all foreign residents, maintained so many restaurants and manicure shops and had so many singers, balalaika players, and ballet dancers that one French observer noted in 1937 that the French themselves could totally immerse themselves in Russian life, should they wish to. There were 14 Russian bookstores, plus any number of Russian schools, shops, lotteries, orchestras, pharmacies, banks, hotels, butchers, mechanics, tailors, typesetters, and printers. One could even buy Russian Sappho cigarettes, and the magazine llyustrirovannaya Rossiya (Illustrated Russia) sponsored a Miss Russia to the Miss Europe and Miss Universe contests. As the German mark rose in value, the French franc fell, and any savings brought from Russia now went further in Paris than in Berlin.3 Aside from economic reasons for relocating to France from Germany, there were also obviously political factors at work after the Nazis came to power in Germany in 1933. Right-wing Russians were more likely to remain in Germany, while liberals and the political left moved on.
•By July 1926 the French franc had fallen from its 1921 exchange rate of 13.5 to the dollar to nearly 50. In Decem ber of that year a currency reform returned the franc to 26 to the dollar, w here it remained until 1934, when the exchange rate was established at 15.2. By the late 1930s the franc began falling again — to 21 to the dollar in 1936, 29 in Decem ber 1937, and 40 in January 1939.
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At that tim e Paris was the unquestioned world center of art, and such Russian émigré artists as Mark Shagal, Natal'ya Goncharova, Vasily Kandinsky, Aleksandr Benua, Mikhail Larionov, and Ivan Bilibin played a significant role in the artistic life of Montparnasse. Sergei Dyagilev had established a name for his Ballets russes even earlier, Fêdor Shalyapin performed to packed houses in the Russian Opera, and there was a Russian Repertoire Theater. Paris had more than 30 Orthodox churches and seven Russian institutions of higher learning. 1921 saw the founding of the Russian People's University. In 1924 the YMCA Press moved to Paris from Berlin. (It had been established in Prague before moving to Berlin.) The Russian Academy of Religious Philosophy was also transferred from Berlin. The flight of writers from Germany further confirmed Paris's status as the capital of Russian émigré culture. Among the leaders of the Paris émigré com m unity were Zinaida Gippius and Dmitry Merezhkovsky, who continued a popular fin-de-siècle tradition — the literary salon. It was called the Green Lamp Society, and its ideas were promulgated in the magazine N ovyi korabl' (The New Ship). The society's name was taken from the Green Lamp Circle which met in the St. Petersburg home of Nikita Vsevolozhsky in the first quarter of the 19th century. Before 1917, the Merezhkovskys had conducted regular soirées in their St. Petersburg apartment, where Merezhkovsky held forth on the new religious consciousness and Gippius discussed such topics as the metaphysics of sex and the Second Coming. Their guests, who included Aleksandr Blok, Andrei Bely, the philosopher Nikolai Berdyaev, Vasily Rozanov, and Fêdor Sologub, delivered talks and lectures on virtually every topic regarded as significant either for contemporary Russian culture or in the broader world context. The Society met regularly from 1927 until 1939. Among the first three papers delivered were "On Literary Criticism ” (M ark Tsetlin), "The Russian Intelligentsia as a Spiritual Order” (ll'ya Bunakov-Fondaminsky), and "Does Poetry Have a Purpose?” (Georgy Adamovich). The meetings, which were by invitation only, were attended by a wide spectrum of Russian intellectuals and writers, ranging from such established figures as Ivan Bunin, Boris Zaitsev, Mark Aldanov, Aleksei Remizov, Vladislav Khodasevich, Nadezhda Tèffi, Nikolai Berdyaev, Lev Shestov, Georgy Adamovich, Konstantin Mochul'sky, and Georgy Fedotov to members of the "younger generation” — Boris Poplavsky, Dovid Knut, Vladim ir Varshavsky, and Nikolai Bakhtin, among others. Meetings were chaired by Georgy Ivanov, with Gippius and Merezhkovsky seated at the speaker's table as "adm inistrators.” The discussions were conducted in a formal, albeit often heated fashion. Although a large number of speakers held forth over the years on a
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wide range of topics, the "metaphysical” implications of these topics appear to have been a frequent focus of discussion — a feature sharply attacked by the so-called "Formists” Anna Prismanova and Vladimir Korvin-Piotrovsky. The Merezhkovskys had a wide circle of friends among the "older” generation of writers, and Gippius, an accomplished society hostess, often did even more than was required to draw younger writers into the literary fold. Supposedly only platonically involved with her husband and Dmitry Zlobin, the poet who had accompanied her and Merezhkovsky in their escape to the West, Gippius evidently played the role of vamp with young men who attended the Green Lamp meetings. At the same time, she also had more than passing interest in androgyny, and the high-society mixture of mysticism and unusual sex lent an added twist to her role of mystic poet and salon hostess. Another literary "circle” was that of Il'ya Fondaminsky, which met in his apartm ent on the avenue de Versailles on alternating Mondays.3 The wealthy Mikhail and Mariya Tsetlin also held "teas” in their spacious apartment, dedicating the proceeds to the Committee to Assist Russian W riters. The Arzamas group was interested in literature, music, and ballet.6 The National League of Russian W riters and Journalists in France was created in 1937 with the goal of being a sort of mutual assistance society. The Perekrêstok (Intersection) group organized lectures on literary topics. Cherez (Through) brought poets and artists together. The magazine Chisla (Numbers) gave lectures and readings in a group with the same name. In 1937 even the Cossacks had their own literary group.0 A number of journals were produced in Paris, including Sovremennye zapiski (Contemporary Annals)d, the chief "thick” literarypolitical journal of the émigré community, founded with financial support from the Czechoslovak government. Paris was also home to the two chief émigré newspapers — the liberal Poslednie novosti, edited
“Most of the members w ere involved in the collection Krug (Circle), and the group even called itself by this name. •»Chaired by N. D. Yanchevsky. cKruzhok kazakov-IKeratorov, founded in 1937. The group published Kazachii al'm anakh (Cossack Alm anac) in 1939. «•Founded
by Nikoali Avksent’ev,
Il'ya Bunakov-Fondaminsky,
Gukovsky, Vadim Rudnev, and Mark Vishnyak.
Aleksandr
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by Pavel Milyukov,6 and its conservative opponent Vozrozhdenie, edited by Pêtr Struve with financial backing from the Gukasov brothers, who had been oil magnates in Armenia before emigrating. Milyukov believed in a gradual evolution of Soviet rule into a more dem ocratic form and opposed foreign military intervention in Russia, while Struve did everything in his power to encourage it. In December 1925 Vozrozhdenie even came out in "unambiguous and total” support of Italian fascism, because of the latter's clearcut anti-com m unist thrust. Many new publishing operations sprang up, and Vozrozhdenie and Sovremennye zapiski felt morally obliged to publish books.b Paris became the new home of such prose writers as Ivan Bunin, Aleksandr Kuprin, Boris Zaitsev, Ivan Shmelêv, Aleksei Remizov, Dmitry Merezhkovsky, Mikhail ll'in (pseudonym: Mikhail Osorgin), and Mark Landau (Mark Aldanov). Pavel Milyukov headed the local W riters' Union. The Russian poets living in Paris included Vladislav Khodasevich, Nina Berberova, Zinaida Gippius, Georgy Ivanov, Georgy Adamovich, Dovid Knut, Boris Poplavsky, and Marina Tsvetaeva (after 1925), to name but a few. Like so much of world literature at the time, Russian ém igré literature found its focal point in the cafés, and it was Paris that was destined to become the real center of the "café period” in Russian letters. Cafés were not just a place to have breakfast; they were a way of life. Russian Montparnasse had already been a real institution before 1917 and when the revolutionaries went home, their places were soon taken by the new Russian refugees. In 1919 and the early 1920s the Café de la Rotonde was an extremely popular spot — especially since the owner fancied himself a poet and served coffee and onion soup on credit. Later the Rotonde was expanded into a very much larger institution, and many of the writers moved on to sm aller cafés with a more intimate atmosphere. By 1928 the Selecte and the Napoli became the two most popular Russian cafés. Others were Le Dôme and Aux Deux Magots. In 1928, in memory of Charles Leconte de Lisle, Yann'is Papadiamandopulus (Moréas), and Nikolai Gumilêv,
aln 1938 Milyukov claimed a print run of 39,000 copies. A Glavlit document claims that the paper was partially financed by the form er tsarist ambassador Boris Bakhmet'ev. bSom e other Parisian publishers were: B. M. Dombrovsky, Franko-russkaya pechat' (Franco-Russian Press), D. Konovalov, I. Kutyrina, Mishen' (The Target), Molodaya Rossiya (Young Russia), Oven (Ram ), Orfei (Orpheus), Palata poètov (Cham ber of Poets), Ptitselov (Fowler), L. Z. Rodshtein, Russkaya pechat' (Russian Press), Russkaya zem lya (Russian Earth), Sever (North), Teatr i iskusstvo (Theater and Art), M. & M. Tsetlin, and I. S. Zon.
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a group of young Russian poets who called their group Perekrêstok (The Intersection) began to gather in La Closerie des Lilas, and then moved to Montparnasse, on the left bank of the Seine. It was during this period that Russian émigré culture achieved its greatest flowering — in music, art, ballet, dance, and literature. This achievement was the product of a close interaction between Russian and world culture, sometimes promoted by wealthy patrons. For example, Evgraf Kovalevsky (father of the émigré historian Pêtr Kovalevsky) owned an estate in Meudon, a suburb to the southwest of Paris, where some 2,000 émigrés lived, and Prince Grigory Trubetskoi presided over his own grand estate in Clam ait, where some 300 Russian aristocrats resided. The unemployment caused by the depression of the 1930s forced the French government to reexamine its attitude toward foreign workers. In 1932 a law was passed authorizing the Labor M inistry to impose quotas for foreign workers in certain areas — usually five or ten percent, and in 1935 an especially stringent law caused a number of Russian to lose their work permits. By the late 1930s unemployment among the Russians in Lyon, for example, had reached 45 percent. Aside from cases of true hardship, some odd situations arose; for example, a balalaika orchestra could hire only 15 percent Russian musicians, and a Russian choir could employ no more than 10 percent non-citizens. Even slight legal infractions such as late payment of the fee for identification papers could be viewed as sufficient cause for deportation. In 1934-35 the Nansen International Office for Refugees interceded on behalf of 1,596 Russians subject to deportation orders, and another 4,000 may have had such orders standing against them at the time. If no foreign country was willing to accept the deportees, they were imprisoned for six months, and if they still had nowhere to go when they were released, they would be imprisoned again. There was one individual who was incarcerated for ten years. The country which had presented the Statue of Liberty to the United States in com m itm ent of its support of the principle of asylum had become very hard-hearted indeed.
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Brussels A nd Belgium 's capital had gather'd then Her beauty and her chivalry, and bright The lamps shone o'er fa ir women and brave men. Byron, Childe Harolde Russia's relations with the southern Netherlands extend back to Peter the Great, who sent young men there to study and who him self served a brief imperial apprenticeship on Antwerp's wharfs in 1697, consuming — together with his entourage — hundreds of bottles of wine. Today’s visitors to Brussels' Parque Royale can read a bronze plaque commemorating his having been sick on that very spot after overim bibing. Soon Russians began to discover for themselves the homeland of brabant lace and gothic architecture. In 1842 Prince Aleksei Meshchersky wrote a 200-page description of the country, describing its cities, legends, architecture, and numerous political exiles, some of whom were Russian. Belgium was already becoming popular among Russians as an inexpensive tourist destination and a relatively safe haven for radicals (who nevertheless lived in constant anxiety that Russian governmental pressure might cause them to be deported). Among Belgium's many Russian admirers were Aleksandr Gertsen, who became close friends there with Victor Hugo, and Pavel Annenkov, the first Russian to meet Karl Marx, who had been deported there from Paris. In Lüttich (Liège) Annenkov's guide was an old man who had been a prisoner of war in Saratov after Napoleon's unsuccessful invasion of Russia. The man kept repeating the one Russian sentence he remembered from his captivity: "G et outside now, you dog of a Frenchman.” Many other Russian writers were taken with the country, among them Gogol', Zhukovsky, Bakunin, and Turgenev. Later Bryusov, Blok, Èrenburg, and Bely were to visit. Ostend was particularly popular as a spa with well-to-do Russians, who spent their days and evenings in an incessant round of strolls and form al dinners, having put up at either Cour impériale de Russie or Hôtel de Russie. The outbreak of the Crimean war in 1854 caused Nikolai I to sharply cut back the number of exit visas issued to would-be Russian travellers, but even so a Russian diplom atic post was opened in Brussels that same year. After Nikolai's death in 1855, the more liberal Aleksandr II removed most travel limitations for his Russian subjects, and many made their way to Belgium. Their political sym pathies ranged from conservative to liberal to radical, but they appear to have been united in a common com plaint that the locals were provincial,
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petty bourgeois, and stingy. W orst of all, at least according to the Russians, all the most beautiful Flemish women had moved to Paris. The Russian government was sufficiently concerned about leftist inclinations among the Russians in Belgium that from 1855 to 1892 it actually published for them a French-language newspaper, Le Nord. In 1862 Pêtr Dolgorukov founded a biweekly magazine entitled, simply, P ëtr Dolgorukov's Paper, and that same year he induced a liberal émigré, Leonid Blyummer, to move to Brussels from Berlin and bring with him his political magazine Svobodnoe slovo (The Free W ord). But the two men had a falling-out and when Dolgorukov spread the rumor that Blyummer was Russian spy, both publications closed. The number of Russians in Belgium continued to grow, although for many Brussels was only a stopover on the way to Paris. By 1898-99 there were 450 students from the Russian empire, many of them Russian Jews who had difficulty enrolling in universities back home. By the turn of the century there were 2,350 citizens of the Russian empire residing in Belgium, and 7,490 by 1910. Being so close geographically and culturally to France, Belgium inevitably was involved with Russian cultural activities in that country (Gertsen had complained that the locals "aped” the French). Brussels boasted both a literature and arts "society” and a literary and arts "circle,” the latter created by the "society” to inculcate in young Russians a love for Russian culture. In addition there was a Russian w riters’ club and publishing house, Edinorog (The Unicorn). One of the more colorful figures in Edinorog was the novelist and editor Ivan Nazhivin (1874-1940), an ardent Tolstoian who blamed the loss of W orld W ar I on drunken generals and speculators indifferent to young Russian men dying nobly at the front. The émigré com m unity was for him a "suffocating swamp whose deadness was astounding.” When he could not get his angry views published in the émigré press, he applied for Soviet citizenship but then failed to follow up on the undertaking. In 1933 he founded his own "independent’ press, but in a brochure published that same year he was disrespectful to the memory of Nikolai II. As a result, he was drummed out of émigré society. The local Russian newspaper even referred to him as a "mad dog,” and he renewed his attempts to return to Russia. In 1934 he wrote a personal letter to Stalin requesting amnesty and even included the text in his novel N ot Deeply Respected (Neglubokouvazhaemye, 1935). The request was denied — fortunately for Nazhivin, since he would surely have perished in the purges. Many members of the Russian nobility chose to live in Belgium, and the League of Russian Noblemen (Soyuz russkikh dvoryan) was active until the beginning of World W ar II. There was also a Russian library in Brussels, but it closed when World W ar I began.
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Prague G old! G old! G old! G old! Bright and yellow, hard and cold, Molten, graven, hammer'd, and roll'd. Thomas Hood (1799-1845) TornaS Masaryk, Czechoslovakia's head of state from 1918 to 1935 and also an expert on Russian history, was resolutely hostile to the Soviet government. When Czechoslovak troops who had fought in Russia during World W ar I and the Russian civil war brought back with them to their own country some of the Imperial Russian gold reserves, the interest on these funds was rumored to have been used by the Czechoslovak governm ent to support Russian writers in exile. This was the so-called "Russian Initiative”3 that provided support for Russian émigré writers and students, thus attracting a sizeable group of Russian cultural figures to Prague. The city even came to be known as the "Russian Oxford." In the mid-1920s some 25,000 Russians were registered in Czechoslovakia, but the registration requirements were so lax that the actual number must have been considerably higher. The Russians arrived in Czechoslovakia in staggered groups. The majority were ex-soldiers, but there were also scholars and political figures who had been deported in the 1922 group. The Czechoslovak government's support was originally provided through Zerngor*, which awarded 4,663 scholarships to Russian and Ukrainian students in 1924 alone. A number of Russian libraries were also founded with the money, although the bulk of the funds appear actually to have been expended for clandestine political purposes. Like their com patriots in other European countries, Russians in Czechoslovakia felt isolated from the intellectual life of the country which had received them. Czechoslovak politics were usually to the left of those of the Russian émigrés, and the general orientation was W estern, not Russian. In the early years especially, expectations were for a quick and victorious return home. When the liberal Pavel Milyukov arrived from Paris to announce to his compatriots that they m ight
•The Ruskâ akce was managed by the Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Supposedly, the financial support was arranged by Kerensky, who had good personal relations with Masaryk and Edward BeneS. bReestablished in 1924, the Ob'edinenie rossiskikh igorodskikh deyatelei, also referred to as Vserossiiskii soyuz zem stv i gorodov, was created on April 3 0 ,1 9 2 1 . O ver tim e its activities gradually becam e focused almost exclusively on providing relief for refugee children.
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indeed eventually return, but certainly not on a white steed, he was furiously hooted down. Many regarded him as a turncoat, even a traitor. Prague was a vibrant center of Russian émigré publishing activities. The publishing house and bookstore Plamya (The Flame) was founded in 1923 and played a significant role for all of Europe, not just Czechoslovakia.3 Other publishing houses were the Slavic Press, Peasant Russia, the Russian School Abroad6, and that of the journal Volya Rossii.c 1923 also saw the founding of the Russian Book Committee6 in Prague. Given the high cultural profile of the city, it seemed only natural that it become the center of an effort to bring together the multifarious cultural activities of the Russian émigré community. In 1924 the Committee published a volume of essays on cultural activities of the émigrés and an accompanying bibliography com piled by Sergei Postnikov. From 1920 to 1928 some 80 Russian magazines and 45 newspapers were published in Czechoslovakia. Among them was Pêtr Struve's monthly "literary-political” Russkaya m ysr (Russian Thought). With the collapse of the German mark and the total loss of the Soviet market, however, it became impractical to publish in Prague and most such ventures came to an end. The Russian émigré community in Prague boasted a number of cultural organizations which were devoted wholly or in part to belles lettres: 1. "The Czech-Russian Union (Ôesko-russkâ jednota),” established in 1919 to serve as a link between Czech and Russian culture.6 2. "The Russian Hearth” (Russkii ochag), created in 1925. Like the Jednota, the Russian Hearth had its own
8Plam ya took over from Nasha rech' (Our Language), which had been founded in 1919. bSlavyanskoe izdatel’stvo, Krest'yanskaya Rossiya, and Russkaya shkola za rubezhom. cUp until October 9, 1921, Volya Rossil had been a daily newspaper; the journal began to appear as of January 1, 1922. Financing w as provided through the Russian Initiative. dKomitet russkoi knigi. •The organization had its own library and branches in BFno, Kladno, Boleslav, Bratislava, and Budéjovice.
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3.
4. 5.
6.
library and organized regular cultural events, including literary "evenings.”3 "The Day of Russian Culture,” founded in 1927, celebrated in Prague and other European cities on June 6-8 to mark Pushkin's birthday. "The Russian Popular Library,”15 established in 1921, boasted a collection of 35,000 volumes as of 1928. "The Hermitage of Poets” (Skit poètov), established in 1922, which included prose writers as well as poets. The group conducted weekly meetings and was directed by the literary scholar Al'fred Bern, who was troubled by what he saw as an inability on the part of traditional, realist émigré writers to find appropriate themes. Although the Hermitage did not adhere to any literary "platform ," one faction was attracted to Acmeism, while the other favored Mayakovsky as a model. Bern tended to deprecate the so-called "Parisian Note” propagated by Georgy Adamovich (discussed below). When W orld W ar II broke out the group fell apart.6 Named after the coffee house where the members originally gathered, the literary circle "Daliborka,” took a particular interest in young writers. Its support was sufficient to allow a beginner to break into print. It held a number of guest lectures.d
•In the first two years of its existence, the Russian Hearth conducted 367 meetings with 111,500 attendees. This figure could have been much higher, since not all events and guests w ere registered. bRusskaya Narodnaya Biblioteka — Chital'nya Zem gora. «Among the members w ere Nikolai Dzevanovsky (Bolestsis), Sem en Dolinsky, Aleksey Èisner, Aleksey Fotinsky, Alla Golovina, Lev Gomolitsky, Kristina Krotkova (Irm antseva), Mikhail Ivannikov, Dmitry Kobyakov, Vyacheslav Lebedev, Vladim ir Mansvetov, Sergei Rafal'sky, Tat'yana Ratgauz, Boris Sem enov, 1.1. Tidem an, Aleksandr Turintsev, A. Vurm, and Elena Yakubovskaya. Skit poètov w as preceded by Masterskaya slova (Workshop of the W ord), founded in 1922 by Sergei Rafal'sky and Aleksandr Turintsev, among others. dFounded in 1924 by Vladim ir Amfiteatrov-Kadyshev, Pëtr Kozhevnikov, Dmitry Nikolaevich Krachkovsky (not to be confused with Dmitry Ivanovich Krachkovsky [Dmitry Klenovsky]), and Sergei Makovsky, all of whom lived in Prague at the tim e.
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9. 10. 11.
12.
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Literary Tuesdays of the journal Volya Rossii, held in the same building where Mozart once lived.3 "The Union of Russian W riters and Journalists in the Czechoslovak Republic,” founded in 1922. The Union regularly conducted literary evenings.15 The Russian People's University. The Russian Historical Society. The Artistic-Literary-M usical-Arts Federation. Founded in mid-1922, the group had 175 members, including 26 writers.0 The Russian Historical Archive Abroad was established in Prague in 1923, financed by a grant from the first Czechoslovak government, and functioned there until 1945.d The Archive was contained within the Slavonic Library3, which was founded as a research library of the M inistry of Foreign Affairs and limited at first to the collection of materials dealing with Russia and the Soviet Union.
•M arkS lonim .N . V . M el’nikova-Papoushkova, Vyacheslav Lebedev, and Sergei Postnikov w ere the chief organizers. Among those who regularly attended w ere S. Dzevanovsky, Aleksei Èisner, Aleksei Fotinsky, V. G . Fêdorov, N. Krotkova, M. Myslinskaya, S. Nailanych, Aleksandr Voevodin, and Nikolai Eienev. Most m em bers of "Daliborka" and the "Skit" generally attended, at least occasionally. bHeaded by Vasily Nem irovich-Danchenko, prose writer and brother of Vladim ir Nem irovich-Danchenko, the famous theater director. cArtistichesko-literaturno-muzykarno-khudozhestvennaya federatsiya, chaired by the writer Evgeny Chirikov, with the actor V . Kh. Vladimirov as Secretary. Som e of the speakers were: M. Bozheryanov, Dorofei Bokhan, Konstantin Olenin, I. Petrov, A. Rumyantsev, T. Sokolova, and Georgy Sorgonin. «Originally called Arkhiv russkoi èmigratsii, renamed Russkii zagranichnyi istoricheskii arkhiv in 1925. In the process its management w as shifted from Zem gor to the Czechoslovak Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which also administered the Russian Initiative. By the 1930s the Archive had 50,000 volumes, a newspaper collection with over 3,000 titles, and ajournai collection with over 1,500 titles. In 1936 the Archive had 30 representatives in 20 countries in Europe, North and South America, and the N ear and Far East. One of them w as Gleb Struve. After World W ar II ended the collection w as closed to the general public for 45 years on the grounds that it subverted Soviet interests. •Slovanskâ knihovna. By 1900 the Library had 700,000 volumes, most of which w ere in Russian.
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Literary activities were not totally confined to Prague. There were also groups in Zbraslav®, ÖernoSice, ftevnice, VSenory, and Mokropsy which featured literary evenings among their activities. Czechoslovakia was tem porarily the home of Marina Tsvetaeva and also Roman Yakobson (Jakobson), the famous Russian linguist and literary scholar, who arrived with a Soviet passport as a representative of the Russian Red Cross. In general, the interaction of the Russian "Formalists” and the Czech "Structuralists,” as well as the Prague linguistic school, played a major role in the developm ent of modern literary theory. The literary scholars Dmitry Chizhevsky and M ark Slonim, the theologians Sergei Bulgakov and Georgy Florovsky, the historian Georgy Vernadsky, and the philosopher Nikolai Lossky were all residents of the Czechoslovak Republic at one tim e or another. There was also the Circle for the Study of Modem Russian Literature, founded at the so-called Russian Free University*3. When the Russian émigré specialist on Byzantine and Russian icons Nikodim Kondakov died in 1925, a number of his colleagues came together to found the Kondakov Seminar. Masaryk approached an American, Charles R. Crane, for financial support, and the Seminar was able to publish eleven impressive collections under the title Seminarium Kondakovianum, plus the final volume of Kondakov's great study of Russian icons.c
•"Zbraslav Fridays" (Zbraslavskie pyatnitsy) w ere held from 1923 to 1925 in that city, which is located only 13 kilometers from Prague. The local castle even housed a Russian historical and cultural museum with 14 rooms. Up to 100 guests would arrive from Prague to attend the literary and musical "teas." Som e of the members w ere: Al'fred Bern, Valentin Bulgakov, M. V . Vasnetsov, N. N. Ipat'ev, Nikolai Lossky, K. N. Nibur, V . F. Nibur, Pêtr Potêmkin, M ariya Stoyunina (honorary Chair), E. P. Sveshnikov, V . V . Stratonov, N. S. Tim ashev. Among the speakers w ere: Professor Evgeny Anichkov, Evgeny Chirikov, Professor Anatoly Florovsky, Professor D. V . Ivantsov, Professor Aleksandr Kizevetter, Professor Ivan Lapshin, Dalm at Lutokhin, Professor Nikolai Mogilyansky, Professor N. L. Okunev, Professor M. V . Shakhmatov, Professor Georgy Vernadsky, Professor S. V. Zavadsky. bKruzhok po izucheniyu sovremennoi russkoi literatury, chaired first by Leonty Kopetsky, then by Konstantin Chkheidze, and finally by Valentin Bulgakov. Som e of those who gave either readings or lectures were: Nikolai Andreev, Èm iliya Chegrintseva, V . G. Fëdorov, E. N. Kotsiubinskaya, Sofiya Taube, N. N. Terletsky, and Aleksandr Voevodin. cThe Sem inar was able to w eather the economic depression of the early 1930s reasonably well, thanks to various sources of financial support and income from the sale of art reproductions; but academic life being what it is, this prosperity engendered allegations of corruption and considerable ill will on the part of less affluent ém igré associations. Nikolai Rerikh (Roerich), the well-known Russian
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Russian cultural activities in Czechoslovakia peaked in the 1920s, declined during the depression of the 1930s, and, as might be expected, were reduced to a minimum during World W ar II. With the close of the war, the Soviet occupation authorities arrested hundreds of Russian emigrants and shipped them off to the U.S.S.R. A number of Russians managed to move on before the communist takeover of 1948. The Russian Prague of old was eloquently mourned by Yury lofe: The Russian cem etery is too shabby for dawdlers; In sm oky Prague nightingales don't sing In the old orthography To Orthodox archpriests and yesterday's colonels. The fires o f a confused and anguished Empire Have been crushed between the m ilky glass o f those years, A nd in the émigré Cathedral o f the Assumption A local deacon sobs for an unknown Moscow. The wounded Empire died under the knife, Its grave heaped with dusty thorns instead o f live flowers. There's nothing le ft but dead colonels A nd broken markers in an alien town.
painter and writer, had offered to raise funds to transfer the sem inar into an institute under the charter of New York University, but on Septem ber 2 0 ,1 9 3 0 , the Director of the Sem inar w as jailed on charges of improprieties. There he supposedly suffered a total nervous breakdown, although some claimed he w as feigning illness to avoid being sentenced to a lengthy jail term . Rerikh withdrew his support. But this incident w as only part of the difficulties experienced by the Sem inar. As tensions with Germ any grew, the Czechoslovakian government found itself hard pressed by the Soviets to close down what Moscow viewed as a suspicious ém igré organization. Since the Czechoslovaks regarded the U .S .S .R . as an important ally, the threat had to be taken seriously, especially after it becam e evident that publishing the works of Russian scholars resident in the U .S .S .R . threatened their physical safety. By 1937, fearing that Czechoslovakian governmental support would be term inated, the Sem inar directors resolved to transfer som e of the more important library holdings to Belgrade. This had to be done clandestinely, however, since the Czechoslovakian Slavonic Institute, a rival organization, would have used this violation of Czechoslovakian law to take over the Sem inar. The Belgrade office, believing that the new Director was intentionally refusing to send more books to Belgrade, wrote a letter to the Rector of the Charles University denouncing him for allegedly spending government funds improperly.
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Stem colonels, where are they today? Perhaps in the netherworld they're recalling the free Don A nd a t a Divine ball they kiss the fingers O f rosy-cheeked ghosts, dead prim a donnas.... The Russian deacon sobs softly, trustingly In the cathedral's quiet. W hat can I do with this old m an? Outside, the Sun laughs over Averchenko's grave As if it were reading his Satyricon.
Belgrade It would puzzle a convocation o f casuists to resolve their degrees o f consanguinity. Cervantes, Don Quixote To appreciate the situation of the Russian émigrés in Yugoslavia, one needs some understanding of the historical developm ent of relations between the East and South Slavs. As late as 500 A.D., the Slavs still spoke a more or less common tongue. In the tenth century Russia adopted the Byzantine version of Christianity through the medium of liturgical texts translated into South Slavic, and the late philologist Boris Unbegaun even made the case that modern Russian has more of the South Slavic in it than of the East Slavic. Although Russia's ties with the W est were interrupted by the Mongol invasion and the subsequent dominance of the Golden Horde in the 13th and 14th centuries, medieval Russian culture was later to be deeply affected by the so-called "second South-Slavic influence,” when South-Slavic exiled writers and scholars found refuge in Ukraine and Russia from the Turks before and after the taking of Constantinople in 1453. By the end of the 17th century, the spiritual and cultural ties binding Serbia and Russia had acquired a deepened political dimension as Russia attempted to play the role of defender of the South Slavs against the Ottomans and Austro-Hungary. W hen W orld W ar I first broke out, a hard-pressed Russia managed to send considerable assistance to the Serbs. On March 24, 1917, the future exile Pavel Milyukov (then Foreign Minister) gave an interview proclaiming Russia's passionate desire to liberate the South Slavs from "German imperialism.” All this made for a strong Russophile mood among the Serbs. Serbian King Aleksandr I was related to the Russian imperial fam ily and had been enrolled in the Imperial Corps of Pages in St. Petersburg before World W ar I, and there was even an émigré
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faction which envisaged him as the future heir to the Russian throne. In this favorable political clim ate the new arrivals were issued a monthly stipend, and the tsarist embassy was allowed to retain its status. It is alleged to have received a subsidy until Yugoslavia recognized the Soviet government.® In June 1920 the assets of the St. Petersburg Loan Association were delivered to the refugees. A State Commission was appointed to assist the Russians in their cultural and everyday affairs.6 There were Russians residing in Yugoslavia even before World W ar I, and a Russian Club had been founded in Zagreb as early as 1906. The Russians who arrived in Yugoslavia after the war came in three consecutive groups: a) those who were evacuated by the French from Odessa in April 1919, b) the evacuees from Novorossiisk and Odessa in January 1920, and c) a large contingent from the major evacuation from the Crimea in November 11-16,1920. As can readily be imagined, a significant percentage of the new arrivals were military men. Altogether, 73,431 refugees reached Yugoslavia, of whom 33,231 were civilians and 40,200 were soldiers and officers of VrangeF’s army. In the 1930s their numbers dwindled to between 25,000 and 35,000, and by 1939 only some 8,000 were still residing in Belgrade itself. Yugoslavia played an im portant role for the Russian Orthodox Church. The First Constitutional Assembly (Sobor) of the Russian Church Abroad was held in Sremski Karlovci in 1921, and the second in 1938. The two basic organizations rendering humanitarian assistance to the émigrés were the Russian Red Cross, regarded by many as a front for Soviet espionage, and Zemgor. A number of Russian schools were recreated in Yugoslavia and preserved Russian as the language of instruction. These included three "Cadet Corps,” which existed until September 1944. Government support of Russian schools was generous, allowing them to survive for several decades. The Russians created a number of formal and semi-formal institutions: the Literary-Artistic Society; the Lermontov Book Circle;
•The ém igré historian Nikolai Chukhnov claimed the subsidy w as 1,000,000 dinars a month, but another historian, Yury M eier, denied that it even existed. bDespite the traditional ties between the Serbs and the Russians, however, there w as a low-key resentment among some Serbs who felt Russia favored Bulgaria over Serbia. Bishop Evlogy, for example, recalled that when he sang the Bulgarian hymn in Serbia in a small group, expressions of gloom appeared on som e Serbian faces, and the comment was heard that Bulgaria was like a daughter to the Russians while Serbia was only a stepdaughter.
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the Russian-Serbian Club; the New Arzamas, founded in 1928 by a group of "lonely” young writers; and the League of Devotees of the Russian Language in Yugoslavia, which numbered 110 members. The League of Russian W riters and Journalists, which was established in 1925 but dissolved before the War, had 200 members. Three-quarters of all Yugoslavs were engaged in agriculture and half were illiterate, so that Russian professionals were highly welcome immigrants. Sixty-two percent of them had com pleted a secondary education, and thirteen percent had degrees from institutions of higher learning, all of which were form ally recognized as valid. The tim e in service in Russia of Russian professors was counted toward a Yugoslav pension. As a result, Yugoslavia became a significant intellectual center for the émigrés. The Academic Group was active in scholarship, science, and teaching. The Russian Scientific and Scholarly Institute had 472 members and conducted 23 conferences and 670 lectures and seminars in the first ten years of its existence alone. Belgrade was also the home of the Society of Russian Scientists and Scholars and the Russian Press. In 1928 and 1929 the Committee on Russian Culture was created with the goal of supporting Russian culture in exile. The Committee received a monthly subsidy of 50,000 dinars from the State Commission on Russian Refugees. From 1928 to 1934 the Publications Commission issued 61 titles and the Russian Library published 63. Altogether, it is estimated that 900,000 copies of Russian books were published. Virtually all books were printed in the old orthography, and those few books that were printed with the new spelling were mostly devoted to politics and were either to the extreme right or left of the political spectrum. In October 1934 Il'ya Golenishchev-Kutuzov, who had returned from his doctoral studies in Paris, founded the most im portant literary group, the so-called Literary Wednesdays. Although books by Soviet authors were prohibited, there were a number of Russian libraries in Yugoslavia, among them that of the Union of Russian W riters and Journalists, and the Zem gor Library, which numbered some 20,000 volumes. The Russian Public Library was established, and eventually it built up a collection of some 120,000 volumes. On April 9, 1933, King Aleksandr dedicated the Nikolai II Russian House, newly erected for the support of Russian culture, and the Russian Public Library was moved there. In 1920 the All-Slavic Mutual Society purchased the library of Ivan Sytin with some 70,000 volum es and immediately established a public library. The Renaissance Library housed some 60,000 volumes. A conference of Russian émigré writers was held in Belgrade under the patronage of King Aleksandr in 1928 and attended by 111 participants, guests, and observers. It was chaired by Vasily
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Nemirovich-Danchenko. Among the topics discussed were copyright problems for émigré authors, the legal status of writers residing abroad, the situation of the émigré and Soviet press, the Russian Archive in Prague, and the creation of a W riters’ Center. Most of the writers who attended came from countries other than Yugoslavia, including 39 from Paris, 16 from Prague, 10 from Berlin, and 5 from W arsaw. Their expenses were covered by the Yugoslav government. Only eight participants were from Belgrade. Inevitably, there was friction between the political "conservatives” and the "liberals” in the organization. Nonetheless, the conference resulted in a series of volum es published by the Serbian Academy of Sciences under the title The Russian Library. A second series, entitled A Child's Library, was devoted to Russian fairy tales and poems, including some works by ém igré authors. When King Aleksandr was assassinated in Marseilles in October 1934 by Croatian and Macedonian terrorists, the Union of Russian W riters and Journalists in Belgrade issued a one-day newspaper Rossiya (Russia), honoring his memory. A number of conservative political groups were active among the Russians, including the National Union of the New G eneration and the Mladorossy, represented by ll'ya Tolstoi, a grandson of Lev Tolstoi. He saw no contradiction in preaching that international communism would save Russia, and returned to the U.S.S.R. in 1945. Belgrade was the new home of the daily "literary-political” newspaper Russkoe delo (The Russian Cause), after it was closed in Sofia. Novoe vremya (New Times) had been a prominent Petersburg newspaper, and when the son of its editor-in-chief, Mikhail Suvorin, arrived in Belgrade with a number of his father's form er colleagues, Novoe vremya arose from the ashes, only to eventually close once more for financial reasons. Meanwhile, Suvorin published books as well as the newspaper. One of Suvorin's contributors was Prince Fêdor Kasatkin-Rostovsky, a prose writer, poet, and playwright who had joined the W hites after learning of the execution of his mother and sister. Altogether there were more than twenty publishing houses in Belgrade in the interwar period, while S. F. Filonov issued 142 titles in Novi Sad. The magazine Meduza was founded in 1923, edited by Dmitry Kobyakov. Stupeni (Steps) was the focal point of a group of eighteen writers. And, of course, Russkii Arkhiv (Russian Archive) was an im portant journal. There was a de facto preliminary censorship of newspapers, carried out by the Press Bureau in the Council of Ministers. After 1933
•Created in Yugoslavia in 1930 by Mikhail Georgievsky and Viktor Baidalakov.
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censorship became more rigid, when the governm ent became concerned that the anti-communist Russian immigrants m ight spoil relations with the Soviet state. Many Russian writers spent significant periods of tim e in Belgrade. In general, the poets were most prominent: Yury Bek-Sofiev, Aleksei Durakov, Ekaterina Tauber, and ll'ya Golenishchev-Kutuzov, who held up Vyacheslav Ivanov as a model. Sergei Mintslov (1870-1933), a historical novelist, was especially popular among the émigrés; in 1933 the Turgenev Library reviewed its borrowings and discovered that Mintslov was the author most in demand by its readers. His books had been checked out 255 times, with Turgenev only in second place (92 checkouts), and Shmelêv running third (43 requests). Yugoslavia was also home to the future literary scholars Kirill Taranovsky (1911-1993), who also composed some verse as a young man and later became an expert on the verse of Osip Mandel'shtam, and Rostislav Pletnêv (1903-1985), who wrote a 65-page chapter on Russian exile literature in his History o f Russian Literature o f the Twentieth Century. Yugoslavia in general and Belgrade specifically proved to be a sort of way station for Russian writers, who tended to move on to other countries. By the mid-1920s the number of Russian émigrés in Yugoslavia began to dwindle, partly because they were hired by factories in France and partly because of the cultural draw of Paris. But other countries also attracted Russian émigrés, many of them writers. Sergei Mintslov moved to Riga and Aleksei Durakov to Bulgaria, ll'ya Golenishchev-Kutuzov and Nikolai Agnivtsev even returned to Russia. During the war years Russian cultural activities declined radically. In their early stages, Russian-Yugoslav relations were very warm, particularly on the part of the Serbs, but the Yugoslavs gradually became more oriented toward the W est (and wished to study French and German rather than Russian), and Yugoslav intellectuals began to look down on their impoverished and politically more conservative Russian neighbors, despite the large number of intellectuals among the émigrés. This downward slide was eventually to be transform ed into a free fall as a result of massive Russian émigré participation on the side of the Germans during the Second World War.
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Warsaw M ay no soul cross that border a n d ... no raven fly from Krakow. Aleksandr Pushkin, Boris Godunov The whole question of what is Poland and what is Russia has been fiercely fought over for centuries. W hereas Poland once controlled a large portion of the Baltic states and of what is now Belorussia and Ukraine (Kiev itself was in Polish hands until 1655), the country was forced to endure three partitions: that of 1772, which ceded the three northeastern provinces to Russia; the 1793 partition, which reduced Poland to one-third of its form er territory; and the 1795 partition, which com pletely abolished Poland as a state. The three copartitioners — Austria, Prussia, and Russia — even vowed never to use the word "Poland” again. Under Tsar Nikolai I, the Russian language was imposed in schools, courts, and administration, and after the insurrection of 1863-64 Polish provinces were downgraded to ordinary adm inistrative units of the Empire. This situation prevailed until the Germans and Austrians occupied the country in 1915 and on Nov. 5,1916, declared an independent Poland on territory form erly occupied by Russia. More important, of course, the victorious allies — France, Britain, and the U.S.A. — all recognized Polish independence and statehood. By the beginning of 1920 the war with Russia resulted in Polish occupation of territory roughly equal to that occupied up to the second partition. The Russians briefly advanced even into "ethnic” Poland near Warsaw, but were routed by Poland's future president, Josef Pksudki, who had the advice of a French military mission, including a young French officer by the name of Charles de Gaulle. W hen Poland annexed the eastern territories, the Russianspeaking population of Poland numbered 5,250,000, out of a total population of 27,177,000.a A centuries-long history of co-existence of two national groups, as in Poland, the Baltic countries, or Bessarabia, for example, is quite a different situation from that which obtains when an entire com m unity appears abruptly on another nation's borders
•The above figure is from the census of Septem ber 30, 1921. A 1927 Polish encyclopedia quoted by the ém igré historian Pêtr Kovalevsky provides quite a different figure. Out of a total Polish population of 27,192,674, of which "Ruthenians" comprised 14.3% , Russians supposedly made up only 0.7% of the total population, which would mean a total Russian population of slightly over 190,000. The enormous discrepancy here lies partially in how one classifies a Ukrainian or "Ruthenian" whose chief language is Russian, and also perhaps in the sym pathies of the researcher in treating such a politically sensitive topic.
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petitioning for admission as refugees, as happened in the Balkans at the end of the Russian civil war. Thus, Russians in Poland did not consider themselves émigrés. After the Russian civil war, an additional 50,000 Russians spilled over the border into that country as refugees. In some of the Eastern provinces Russians comprised the overwhelming majority of the population, and the Polish authorities were intent on polonizing these groups (as well as converting them to Catholicism). Many Russian schools were closed and the slogan "There are no Russians in Poland” was proclaimed. The wheel had come full circle. in January 1919 the Russian Committee was founded, with quasi-diplom atic status. A year later Boris Savinkov, who had served in the governm ent of Admiral Kolchak until its collapse, and Nikolai Chaikovsky, a veteran of the pre-Soviet anti-tsarist opposition, arrived in W arsaw to negotiate with PHsudski. PHsudski, who distrusted the Russians’ willingness to accept Polish, Ukrainian, and Baltic independence, had resolved to recover by m ilitary means Polish territories ceded to the Russians. Thus, he found the visit of Savinkov and Chaikovsky opportune. But the Russian exiles were less enthusiastic than Savinkov about concessions to W arsaw. In the spring of 1920, when Polish and Ukrainian armies seemed on the verge of capturing Kiev and establishing an independent Ukraine, Russian émigrés were indignant over the conduct of the "base, ungrateful” Poles and regarded Poland's persistent struggle for independence as insulting. It was a view that did little to ingratiate them with their hosts. PHsudski appointed Savinkov head of a secret m ilitary unit composed of Russian soldiers. Savinkov, who had his visiting card printed Ancien M inistre de la guerre de Russie, appointed Dmitry Merezhkovsky his second-in-command, for non-m ilitary affairs, of course, and Zinaida Gippius headed the propaganda branch, publishing the newspaper Svoboda (Freedom). In addition to Savinkov's Russian Committee, there existed a number of other ém igré political organizations, including the Agrarian Party, the Party of Socialists and Revolutionaries, and the Russian National Party. On March 18, 1921, the Riga Accord was signed, granting Volynia, Polesye, and parts of Belorussia to Poland. The Russian émigrés in W arsaw were horrified, comparing it to the Brest-Litovsk Treaty. In October 1921, an agreement was signed between the U.S.S.R. and Poland, promising W arsaw 20 million gold rubles and the return of seized Polish property, in exchange for which the Poles were to deport the Russian and Ukrainian armies. A number of Russians left for Czechoslovakia, which had agreed to accept them, and the first payment of 10 million rubles was made. Savinkov was afraid Lenin would demand his extradition, and the question was even debated in
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the Sejm after PHsudski denied Savinkov asylum. Nevertheless, PHsudski did manage to obtain a Czechoslovakian visa for Savinkov, even though he yielded to Soviet pressure to deport him. Savinkov felt betrayed, especially by his fellow Russian exiles in London, Paris, and New York, whom he accused of having abandoned the cause. In 1924, the same year his last novel, Black Horse (Kon' voronoi) appeared, Savinkov declared to Vladim ir Burtsev, the man who exposed the notorious double agent Evno Azef: I'll show a ll these Chernovs, Lebedevs, Zenzinovs and others how you die fo r Russial Under tsarism they preached terror, bu t now they've rejected not only terror, but even the revolutionary struggle with the Bol'sheviks. With m y judgm ent and m y death I w ill protest against the Bol'sheviks, and that protest w ill be heard by everyone! Savinkov was arrested crossing the Soviet border and sentenced to death, but the sentence was commuted to ten years. On Septem ber 13,1924, Izvestiya published an article supposedly penned by him and entitled "W hy I Accepted Soviet Rule.” The following year he supposedly committed suicide by throwing himself from the fifth floor of Moscow's Lubyanka prison, but may have been executed. Dmitry Merezhkovsky and Zinaida Gippius spent some ten months in Minsk and Warsaw, attempting to form a government in exile. In August 1920 Merezhkovsky was received by PHsudski, who responded in Russian when Merezhkovsky addressed him in French. Merezhkovsky was ecstatic over PHsudski, proclaiming him a hero "selected by God ... an unshakable revelation of the Godhead, a Theophany” sent to save Poland and the world: "The barbarian hordes,” he declared to PHsudki, "march against you, against all of Europe, like the Antichrist.” PHsudki, who had long believed that Poland's only hope for freedom lay in Russia's military defeat, did not need much convincing. Merezhkovsky also gave lectures on Mickiewicz and communism. The Poles, who not only remembered Russia's im perial past but could also easily see that the Russian ém igrés were still keenly interested in preserving "a united and inviolable Russia,” were only partly receptive; one Polish writer, Stefan Zeromski, called Merezhkovsky "a mystic (or perhaps a m ystifier).” But Merezhkovsky was not about to let his political activities erase his literary interests. Most of his prose works were translated into Polish, and his play Pavel I, which had premiered on Oct. 15, 1915, ran for 52 performances. His verse, however, was generally ignored. The local Russians, for their part, condemned the Merezhkovskys as pro-Polish, and the Russian Jewish community boycotted them over a controversial Mickiewicz lecture. Attacked by the newspaper Varshavskoe slovo (The W arsaw Word), whose editor was later tried
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as a paid Soviet agent, the Merezhkovskys became disenchanted with what they perceived as the Poles’ insufficient support for anticommunism. After a falling-out with Savinkov they eventually left for Paris, where, curiously, they had an apartm ent in the same building in which the Polish poet Adam Mickiewicz had once lived. W hile many of the Russians remaining in Poland began to lose hope of ever returning home, others were less inclined to accept the status quo. On June 7,1927, the Soviet ambassador to Poland, Pavel Voikov, was assassinated by a 19-year old Russian émigré, Boris Koverda. The Russian émigrés were accused of abusing Polish hospitality, and Koverda's deed clearly jeopardized the position of the Russians in Poland. The issue of the newspaper Za svobodu! (For Freedom I) which reported the act was confiscated, and a dozen or so monarchists were arrested. Nevertheless, the sense of satisfaction over the assassination among Poland's Russians was palpable. But the violence continued. Osip Traikovich was a Russian em igrant from Vilnius whose brothers had died fighting in Denikin's army and the rest of whose fam ily had perished during the civil war. Traikovich had vowed to take vengeance on the Soviets. Shortly after the assassination of Voikov, he and his brother were shot dead in the Soviet Mission in Warsaw. And there was more. A year later, on May 22, 1928, another Russian émigré, Yury Voitsekhovsky, attem pted to assassinate the head of the Soviet Trade Mission.3 Angry over the exiles’ demand that Russia be reestablished in its pre-1917 borders and exasperated that their acts of violence were endangering the country, the editors of the newspaper Express Poranny exclaimed that Poland was not Mexico and would not tolerate such conduct. The Russian Committee — the senior association of the exiles — was shut down until 1931, and its chairman was deported. By then the situation had calmed down, and some of the Russians had returned home, while others were following the events unfolding in Hitler's Germany. But literature continued to be created. The League of Russian W riters and Journalists, which In 1929 had created the Literary Commonwealth6, had a branch in W arsaw and in 1937 published A n
■Koverda was imprisoned for ten years, but Voitsekhovsky w as simply deported to Belgium. bLiteraturnoe sodruzhestvo; it ceased functioning in 1935. Som e of the members: Vsevolod Baikin, A. S. Dombrovsky, Dmitry Filosofov (chair), Lev Gomolitsky, Sergei Kapel'man (pseudonym: Bart), Aleksandr Khir'yakov, S o fy a Kindyakova, S. Kontsevich, Lev Lyshchinsky-Troekurov, Andrei Luganov, V . F. Martsinkovsky, V . K. Mikhailov, Sergei Shovgenov (Nal'yanch), and E. S . Veber.
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Anthology o f Russian Poetry in Poland, in which 37 poets were represented. Dmitry Filosofov, who in 1898 had helped found M ir iskusstva (W orld of Art), the first journal in Russia devoted to the fine arts, had lived with the Merezhkovskys since 1900 and had fled Russia together with them and Vladim ir Zlobin in 1919.a But now, when the Merezhkovskys moved on to Paris, Filosofov remained in Poland. W hile Filosofov was impoverished and not very influential in Polish circles, he was co-editor of the weekly Mech (Sword), wrote for Za svobodul, and held regular literary meetings and discussions in his tiny apartment, which could accommodate no more than 15 persons. The group called itself Domik v Kolomne (A Little House in Kolomna), after a work by Aleksandr Pushkin, and proclaimed universality (vsemimost') as the basic tradition of Russian national culture, echoing Dostoevsky's fam ous Pushkin speech. Arrangements for the meetings were made together by the poet Lev Gomolitsky and Polish friends. The older Poles spoke Russian and were fam iliar with Russian literature, and younger writers were also interested. Topics ranged from émigré literature to aesthetic criteria to the state of contemporary Russian literature. Translations from the Russian were also read. Filosofov, who impressed the Poles with his elegant, old-regime manners, died in 1940 in Otwock, near Warsaw. Russian-language W arsaw newspapers included the daily Varshavskoe slovo and the weeklies Svoboda (Freedom)0, Rus', Varshavskie otkliki (Warsaw Resonances), and Golos kazachestva (Cossack Voice). Varshavskoe èkho (Warsaw Echo) was a Russianlanguage newspaper intended for "national minorities.”0
«Gippius called Filosofov her "Adonis" (he was evidently a handsome man), maintaining that there w as a mystical significance in the number three and that sex w as the divine m eans of attaining the Godhead. W hether Filosofov agreed with her metaphysical views and whether he w as even interested in women remains open to question, but it would appear that Merezhkovsky and Gippius never consummated their m arriage. »»Renamed Z a svobodul only later. It was founded by the Merezhkovskys, Savinkov, and Filosofov, and appeared until Septem ber 1939. cThe two most important Russian publishing houses w ere Dobro and Russpress, both located in W arsaw, along with Rossica, E. Sakovich, Svyashchennaya lira (Sacred Lyre, directed by Lev Gomolitsky), and Vek kul'tury (Age of Culture). Lvov (Lwow, Lviv) was home to the publishing houses Zaikin and Rusalka (M erm aid), as well as Chëtki (Rosary), an association of Russian writers (directed by Panteleimon Yur'ev [Sem ën Vityazevsky]), and M uza (M use, founded in 1922).
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The Russian Academic Group had a branch in W arsaw which was considered to be more sympathetic to the Prague school of verse than to the "Parisian Note,” in no small measure due to the influence of the scholar Al'fred Bern. Among that city's poets were Lev Gom olitsky and Sergei Kapei'man, who wrote under the pseudonym S. Bart. One small group, which existed from 1921 to 1925, called itself The Poets' Tavern a. Prior to W orld W ar I, Russian writers interested in modernism had found Poland to be an intriguing country, and this preoccupation had grown in the first year of the war. The new Russian arrivals created a sort of club for émigrés, Russkii dom (Russian House), with branches in Warsaw, Wilnius, and Rovno. There was also the League of Russian Minority Organizations (Soyuz russkikh men'shinstvennykh organizatsii) and a Russian branch of Matica srbska, a Serbian cultural um brella association. The Union of Russian Students published its own newspaper, Svetoch. After W orld W ar I a definite shabbiness set in in W arsaw (Gippius later wrote that it created the impression of an "alien and unpleasant Paris”), and many Russians decided to move on. Among those who passed through W arsaw were Arkady Averchenko and Vladim ir Chaikin. The playwright and prose w riter Mikhail Artsybashev, who had come to W arsaw in 1923, published the book A W riter's Notes (Zapiski pisatelya) in 1925 and died in Poland in 1927. Artsybashev criticized the Russian émigré community for being fixated on its own problems. In Septem ber 1939, as a result of the Ribbentrop-M olotov secret agreement, Poland was divided between Germany and the Soviet Union. In effect, it was the fourth partition of this essentially W estern country. During the German occupation, Russian books continued to be published, especially the 19th-century classics.
“Taverna poètov. Som e of the participants w ere Vsevolod Baikin, Al’fred Bern (group’s last Chairm an), Vladim ir Brand, Boris Evreinov, R. Gutuev, Oleg Kolody, M. Konstantinovich, A. Topol'sky, and Oleg Voinov. The Tavern maintained close relations with the Skam andrites, a celebrated group of young Polish poets.
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Sofia
When the m ilitary man approaches, the world locks up its spoons and packs o ff its womankind. George Bernard Shaw C'est magnifique, m ais ce n'est pas la guerre. General Pierre Bosquet, 1854
W hen Russia drove Turkey out of the Balkans In 1877-78 as part of her plan to capture Constantinople and the Bosphorus, Bulgaria was initially very grateful to Russia, even after the Great Powers abolished the Russian protectorate over Bulgaria. But when Russia refused to support plans for expansion of a "greater Bulgaria,” diplom atic relations were com pletely broken off between the two countries from 1886 to 1896. Despite Moscow's reluctance in the question, Bulgaria's Russian émigré community of populists (>narodniki) and marxists supported the local struggle for independence. The Russians who arrived in Bulgaria after the defeat of the W hite armies, on the other hand, constituted an organized army supporting Russian nationalism . The refugees came in several groups. A small group of aristocrats passed through the country in late 1919, and a second group in the afterm ath of the defeat of Denikin's army in 1920. In July of that year the Russian Red Cross registered 4,000 Russian refugees, but since not all refugees were registered, the total number may well have been closer to 6,000. The third and largest group came via Turkey — some 18,000 to 19,000 were soldiers from Vrangel”s army. Still another 2,600 arrived via Cyprus and Egypt. All in all, the Russian colony in Bulgaria has been estimated at 34,000. Since this was a largely m ilitary group (only a quarter were civilians), all but about 6,000 of them were men. The Russians were housed in military barracks left empty as a result of the requirements of the Versailles Treaty. Inevitably, the predom inantly military nature of the immigrant com m unity determ ined the nature of the cultural activities and organizations which they were later to form. The main areas of settlem ent for the Russians were Sofia, Varna, Burgas, Pernik, Veliko-Tyrnovo, Sliven, Rusçuk (Ruse), and Plovdiv. As in Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia, those who wished to continue their education received a stipend from a government that
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was still grateful for Russian help in the 1875-78 war of liberation from the Turks. The Slavic Society (Slavyanskoto Druzhestvo), a local charitable institution with a special interest in cultural matters, provided many of the newcomers with food, clothing, train tickets, and cash. By November 1, 1920, it had spent 400,000 levs on Russian arrivals in Bulgaria, dispensed largely through the Russian Refugees Fund and the Russian-Bulgarian Committee,3 which had been created in 1921 by Bulgarian "Russophile intellectuals” and prom inent Russian immigrants. The Committee founded a Russian House, a Russian dormitory, and a Russian high school, in addition to conducting literary readings and lectures. On March 2, 1922, the Stambolisky governm ent passed a resolution perm itting governmental bodies to hire Russian immigrants. The com m unist movement was strong in Bulgaria, and the advent of a Russian émigré army fresh from the struggle against communism engendered considerable hostility and even physical threats from both sides. Vrangel' declared a policy of nonintervention in Bulgarian affairs, but on May 16,1922, he told representatives of the governm ent that Russian troops, when confronted by hatred and slander, might be forced to take action. The governm ent interpreted this statem ent as a threat, and the Russians were accused of trying to set up a state within a state. Several senior officers in V rangel’s arm y were taken into custody, and the W hites' official ambassador was asked to leave the country. Even earlier, on May 11, the Bulgarian cabinet had resolved to deport a number of senior Russian officers, to break up the Russian units into work brigades which were to be scattered throughout the countryside, and to facilitate the repatriation of Russians willing to return to Russia. Finally, the Bulgarian governm ent refused to allow the Russian refugees to refound the Cadet Corps, as was done in Yugoslavia. Meanwhile, Soviet sympathizers were active among the immigrants. Aleksandr Ageev edited the newspaper Na rodinu (Returning Home), later renamed Novaya Rossiya (The New Russia). The very first issue of the paper called upon the émigrés to come together in a general act of repentance for the sin of having resisted the new regime in Moscow. According to one Soviet source, there existed some 65 local branches of Sovnarod — the "League to Return to the Homeland,” with 4,000 members. Supposedly, 9,750 persons eventually went back to Russia, 65 percent of them Cossacks. Many of them actually returned to Russia from Yugoslavia, Romania, Greece,
•Russian names: Fond russkikh bezhentsev and Russko-Bolgarskii komitet. The Com m ittee also received support from the Bulgarian Red Cross, the W om en's Refugee Com m ittee, and the Bulgarian Sacred Synod.
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Turkey, and Italy via Bulgaria. Furthermore, the Soviet government exerted pressure on the Bulgarian authorities to close down the Solidarist newspaper Za Rossiyu (For Russia); beginning with issue 34, no place of publication was indicated. The response of the Whites, who were still intent on defeating the Red enemy, was one of unbridled rage. In November of 1922 a form er W hite officer, Nikolai Boicharov, assassinated Ageev in Sofia. There were also attacks on members of the Russian Red Cross, which was organizing the repatriation operation. The Bulgarian authorities prom ptly closed Rus\ Svobodnaya rech' (Free Speech), and Russkoe delo (Russian Cause). Two editors of Russkoe delo were deported. The situation was worsened by the difficult economic straits in which the country found itself. The Bulgarians were forced to pay war repatriations and to disarm, while the population was being impoverished by devastatingly high prices. On June 9,1923, however, the governm ent of Aleksandr Stamboiisky was overthrown and Stam bolisky and some of his closest aides were killed. Much to the delight of the Russian arrivals, the Communist Party was outlawed, and some of the Russians who had been deported were allowed to return. Still, Bulgaria was a poor country with relatively rare professional opportunities. Many of the Russian officers were com pelled to work in the coal mines in Pernik. When the Russians arrived in Bulgaria, Sofia could boast only one university, founded in 1888.100 full room-and-board government scholarships were awarded to Russian arrivals. A number of Russian scholars received positions at the university and made a major contribution to the scholarly and scientific work being carried on there. Among them was the brilliant Russian literary historian Pëtr Bitsilli (1879-1953). The critic Konstantin M ochul'sky (1892-1948) also resided there for a time. Lyubov' Stolitsa stood out by virtue of her talent as a poet and novelist, although much of her work still remains unpublished. Other writers were the prose w riter and poet Aleksandr Dekhterev, who took vows as a monk, the professor of literature and poet Aleksandr Gindenburg (Fëdorov), the poet and playwright Tat'yana Kondratenko, the prose writer and poet Nikolai Mazurkevich, the memoirist Vera Pushkarëva, the novelist and priest Mikhail Shishkin, and the poet Aleksandr Stoyanov. Between 1920 and 1941, 87 Russian and 4 Ukrainian newspapers and magazines were founded in Bulgaria.3 The Cossacks
•Among them w ere: Balkanskii zhum al (Balkan Journal, 1921-1923), G obs truda (The Voice of Labor, a publication of the League of Christian laborers [Soyuz trudyashchikbsya khristian]), Golos Rossii (Russia's Voice, edited by Ivan Solonevich), Izgnannik (The Exile, 1922), Knut, a m agazine of satire and humor
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constituted a large contingent among the immigrants, and published their own newspaper in Sofia: Kazach'i dum y (Cossack Thoughts). Russkaya m ysl' (Russian Thought), which devoted considerable space to contem porary literature, was actually a transplanted publication founded in Russia in 1880. Later it moved to Prague (1922), then to Berlin (1923-25), and lastly to Paris (1927). Easily half of the Russians were professionals, and in the early 1930s there existed 47 political, professional, charitable, and cultural institutions within the Russian community. The monarchists and pro fascist groups were especially active. Some of these groups insisted adamantly on the restoration of the Russian empire, but many Cossacks were more inclined to call for the creation of a separate Cossack state. Sofia boasted five Russian libraries, and a theatrical society was founded in Varna in 1928. Much of the Russians’ 4cultural life revolved around the Russian clubs, which arranged theatrical performances and literary readings. Sofia had several Russian publishing houses: Zlatolira (Golden Lyre), Pechatnoe delo (Printer's Trade), Russian-Bulgarian Publishers, and the Russian-Bulgarian Friendship Society. Since Bulgarian is closely related to Russian, the immigrants were able to achieve a certain command of the language quite easily and thus be absorbed into Bulgarian life. Of no little importance was the fact that this was a group of relatively young soldiers who began marrying Bulgarian women and raising families. And, of course, many Russians moved on to Western Europe. By 1934 the Russian community had shrunk to only 18,000. Nevertheless, in 1936 the Russians in Bulgaria founded two military organizations: the National Organization of Knights and the National Organization of Russian Scouts, which proclaimed discipline, hierarchy, and monarchism to be their ideals.3
(1921), Nedelya (The W eek, 1924), Rossiya (Russia, 1920-21), R us' (1922-28), Russkaya gazeta (A Russian Newspaper, Varna, 1921), Russkaya m ysl' (Russian Thought, 1921), Russkaya pravda (Russian Truth, 1920), Russkaya sofiiskaya gazeta (The Russian Newspaper in Sofia, 1920), Russkaya zhizn' (Russian Life, 1924-26), Russkie sbomiki (Russian Collections, 1921-22), Russkoe delo (The Russian Cause, 1921-22), Russkoe èkho (Russian Echo, 1923), Vam enskoe èkho (The Varna Echo, 1920), and Z a Rossiyu (For Russia, a publication of the N TS ).
“Natsional'naya organizatsiya vityazei (N O V ) and Natsional'naya organizatsiya russkikh razvedchikov (N O R R ). Their slogan w as Z a Rus', z a Veru! (For Russia! For the Faith!).
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Riga A bad neighbor is as great a plague as a good one is a blessing. Hesiod (c. 735 B.C.) An estimated 231,000 Russians resided in Latvia before 1914; as a result of the Russian civil war this historic population of Baltic Russians was augmented by 20,000 Russian refugees. On August 1, 1920, Soviet Russia signed a peace treaty with Latvia, and Russian cultural life in that country developed with considerable vigor. By 1930 12 percent (233,366) of the population consisted of ethnic Russians and 4.8 percent (93,479) were Jews, most of whom spoke Russian as their first language; the rest were German Jews, largely from Courland, but they were in the minority. In some districts in Eastern Latvia Russians made up an absolute majority of the population. The census of 1935 indicated that 226,758 Russians had adopted Latvian citizenship. Of Riga's 1935 population of 385,000, 33,000 were ethnic Russians and 43,000 were Jews. Many of the Russians were illiterate peasants whose interest in literature was minimal, at best. Some of the ethnic Russians were merchants whose fam ilies had established them selves in Latvia in the 19th century, and there was some tension between the Russians long resident in the country and the newer arrivals. Russian and German were widely spoken, along with Latvian, and Russian professors regularly lectured at Latvian universities in Russian. Russian was especially widely spoken in Riga, and many Latvians and local Germans were fluent in it. A significant percentage of the older generation of Baltic Germans had even been educated in Russian schools before 1917. One of the largest émigré newspapers of the period, Segodnya (Today), was founded in Riga in 1919, with two literary supplements, plus morning and evening editions. The readership included a number of Latvians who spoke Russian.® Like the other émigré newspapers with their relatively modest circulations, Segodnya calculated that roughly half of its expenses went for typesetting and used the galleys from the newspaper to publish some 75 books that had been serialized in it. Since the paper’s staff was largely Jewish, as were many of its readers, coverage of Jewish topics was especially thorough, a situation which alienated some of the ethnic Russians. A form er Petersburg
•The editors, however, w ere refugees from Russia: Maksim Ganfm an, Boris Khariton, Mikhail Mil'rud, and Pêtr Pil'sky.
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journalist, Leonard Korol'-Purashevich, founded Rizhskii kur'er (The Riga Courier, 1921-24), evidently with Polish funding, and then Vechernee vremya (Evening), using these publications to attack Segodnya as "non-Russian.” In 1933, he created Zavtra (Tomorrow) to counter Segodnya (Today). Korol'-Purashevich left for Germany in 1939, but Yury Rzhevsky published the weekly Gazeta dlya vsekh (A Newspaper for Everyone, 1936-40), also stressing that it was a truly "Russian,” not a Jewish publication.3 The Soviets published N ovyi p u t' (The New Path).b Riga was home to a number of Russian publishing houses, the largest of which was Salamandre.0The Latvian publisher GramatuDreugs also produced a number of Russian books.d International copyright laws were generally ignored, and many pirated editions were published with cheap bindings and low-quality paper. Altogether, over the course of two decades some 1,200 titles appeared. Among Riga's Russian social and educational institutions and organizations were the National-Democratic League of Russian Citizens, the Russian Society in Latvia, the Society for Enlightenment, the League of Russian Teachers, the Grebenshchikov Commune, and the Library Circle.. There were also 13 Russian elementary schools and a selection of Russian secondary schools. The Riga Russian Dramatic Troupe was considered to be one of the strongest émigré theaters. Latvia's Russian prose writers included Yury Galich; the popular and prolific prose writer Sergei Mintslov, who had lived abroad
O th e r papers w ere Slovo (The W ord, edited by Nikolai Berezhansky), Novyi put' (The New Path), Nasha gazeta (Our Newspaper), M ayak (Lighthouse), D en' (D ay), and the short-lived Povorot (The Turn). Russian newspaper publishers had to be careful about what they printed; when the Social Democrats' paper Svobodnaya m ysl' (Free Thought) offended the government's sensibilities, it w as closed for two w eeks as a warning. Among the journals published in Riga w ere Perezvony (Chim es), 1925-28; Yunyi chitatel' (The Young Reader) 1925-26; Novaya niva (The New Reid) 192627; the critical and biographical monthly Literatura i zhizn' (Literature and Life), 1928; Rodnaya starina (Ancient Haunts), 1928-30; the w eekly Iks (X ), 1923; Iskiy (Sparks), Mansarda (The Attic), 1930; and the humorous w eekly Plyazh (The Beach), 1923-25. bNot to be confused with the pre-revolutionary publication with the sam e title. °Salam andra, along with Perezvony and Belotsvetov brothers, well-to-do businessmen.
Slovo, w as supported
by the
“O ther publishing houses were: Vostok, Gliksman, Dzintars, Didkovsky, The Latvian Publishing House of Russian W riters, Orient, The Siberian Publishing House, Stremniny, O . D. Strok, and D. Tsymlov.
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since 1916; the humorous w riter Mikhail Mironov (pseudonym: Mikhail Tsvik); Pëtr Pil'sky, who was also active as a critic; Irina Saburova (who also composed verse); Leonid Zurov, who left Riga for Paris in 1929 and was elected Chairman of the League of Young W riters and Poets in Paris after the war; and Vasily Vasil'ev (Gadalin). Among Latvia's poets were Nikolai Belotsvetov, Igor' Chinnov, Nikolai Istomin (who returned to the Soviet Union), Aleksandr Perfil'ev (husband of Irina Saburova, he also wrote prose), Tamara Shmeling (wife of Yury Ivask), and Viktor Tret'yakov. In 1929 Georgy Matveev and Istomin founded the literary-scholarship society Na struge slov (In the Boat of W ords), which in turn established Stremniny Publishers, publishers of M ansards* The governm ent formed in 1920 with Karlis Ulmanis (a form er Latvian émigré who had studied agronomy in Nebraska) as Prime M inister had guaranteed limited rights for all minorities residing in Latvia. Nevertheless, although the prevailing attitude to Russians appears to have been more or less positive in the early years of the independent Latvian state, and Latvia's older Russians looked back on the inter-war era as an idyllic time, the relationship between the two national com m unities was marred by increasing tensions. As early as 1921 the newspaper Latvijas Sargs had editorialized that Latvia needed to cut itself free from "Asian Russian culture.” In tim e antiRussian attitudes gained strength. One Latvian journalist advised copying the Finns, who engraved on their knives: "Against the devil and the Russians.” Given their long-standing German heritage, the Baltic states could not remain uninfluenced by contemporary events in Germany, and Latvian nationalism became the order of the day. In 1933 a wave of nationalism swept over the country under the slogan "Latvia for Latvians.” In 1934 Ulmanis carried out a coup d'état and appointed him self President, or "Leader.” Alfreds BerzigS, a Minister in the new government, issued a speech in which he proclaimed: In this country our fate is determ ined by Karlis Ulmanis, the Leader o f our people.... Never ask why. A loyal person will always im m ediately answer, like a warrior: "/ obey, I shall carry out the order.” As early as 1932 the government had decreed that Latvian would be the only official state language, and the teaching of Russian was elim inated in several Latvian schools. In 1934 the Minister of Education L. Adamoviö declared that Latvia had to free itself of the
•The society w as chaired first by Leonid Kavetsky, then by Mikhail Klochkov. Among its m em bers w ere P. Budynsky, Nikolai Belotsvetov, Lev Zander, Aleksandr Magil'nitsky, Sergei Mintslov, Pêtr Pil'sky, and Igor' Chinnov.
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influence of alien cultures that "threatened Latvianism.” In fam ilies where the father was Latvian and the mother Russian, the children could no longer be sent to a Russian school. The readership of Segodnya began to decline when its readers started switching to Latvian. A number of Russian periodicals were closed and censorship was introduced for others. In 1940 Soviet troops occupied Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania, and numerous prominent nationals and Russian em igrants were arrested in all these countries; many of them perished. Russian libraries and bookstores were closed, and Russian books were confiscated and pulped. The offices of Segodnya were closed, but the staff was not immediately arrested. Its publishers, Yakov Brams and Boris Polyak, managed to leave the country, but other journalists were arrested by the Soviets in the early morning hours of June 14 ,1941, and disappeared3. Georgy Goncharenko, a form er cavalry general who wrote under the pseudonym Yury Galich, had committed suicide upon receiving a summons from the NKVD in 1940, and Pêtr Pil'sky avoided arrest only because he suffered a heart attack when the NKVD agents came to arrest him. He died a few months later at his home. Subsequent Soviet arrests were prevented by the German occupation, but that event turned out to be a crown of thorns, too. The book publisher Sergei Karachevtsev, for example, was arrested and shot in 1942. O f the 34,000 persons arrested by the Germans in Latvia, 22 percent are estimated to have been Russian, Belorussian, Ukrainian, or Jewish.b Among Riga's several libraries, the most im portant was the Ivanov Library, which was completely destroyed.
•R . Celm s (Tsel'm s), Boris Khariton, Gerasim Levin (G . Lugin), Leonid Meirson, A. Perov, and Sergei Tsivinsky. bAmong those arrested w ere Maksim Aas (Lev Maksim ), Izrail' Kobylyansky, Mikhail Mironov (Mikhail Tsvik), R. G. Rubinshtein (Evgeny Shklyar), and Mark Vaintrob.
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Tallinn Empire is on us bestow'd, Shame and ruin wait for you. William Cowper (1731-1800) Estonia had been part of the Russian Empire for two centuries, and some 73,000 Russians were permanent residents in the country. Russians tended to live in the eastern territories, in Tallinn (Revel), Narva, where they constituted one third of the city's residents, and Tartu. The majority of the Russians were peasants, but many were well-to-do people who had summer homes and even estates there. The Germans occupied the country during World W ar I, but the Estonian Republic was established as an independent state in 1918. In November of the following year the W hite army under General Nikolai Yudenich was defeated, and thousands of soldiers were disarmed and interned by the Estonians. Many, very many, perished from hunger and typhus in the camps. In November and December of 1919 between 50,000 and 60,000 Russian soldiers and refugees left the country, and on February 2, 1920, the Soviet government signed an armistice with Estonia, recognizing the country's independence. Although new refugees continued to arrive, equal numbers moved on, so that the number of Russians in the country did not essentially change. By 1923 Russians in Estonia numbered 91,109, comprising 8.2% of the total population, of whom an estimated 16,422 were refugees. Some of the writers — Ivan Belyaev (Inno Vask), Vadim Belov, and Grigory Sosunov — returned to Russia. Before the Russian civil war, Russian social and cultural activities in Estonia were limited, since most Russians were peasants, with whom the small educated class had little in common. When independence was achieved, the status of local Russians abruptly changed from that of dom inant nationality group in the empire to that of minority, so that when the writer Ivan Belyaev created a journal, he called it Na Chuzhbine, meaning Tn an Alien Country.” Alarmed, local Russians initially resisted Estonian claims to autonomy, and a Provisional Russian Council was created on November 28, 1918, which prom ptly called for a "single and indivisible” Russia. The following year, however, it was forced to abandon this position. Russian religious activities in Estonia were extensive. The Uspensky Orthodox Monastery and the Pukhtitsy Cloister were but part of Russian religious life in Estonia; Tallinn, for example, had four of Estonia's 37 Russian parishes as late as 1940 (plus 14 EstonianRussian churches). There was also a colony of Russian Old Believers.
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The Day of Russian Culture was celebrated in Tallinn with great ceremony on an annual basis, and a collection of prose and verse was published annually from 1928 to 1935 under the title N ov' (Virgin Soil) in connection with the holiday. Two active Russian theaters were created by the new arrivals — one in Tallinn and another in Narva — and the local actor's union took up arms, demanding that the governm ent forbid Russian actors from performing. The Revel newspaper Tallina Teataja supported their request: Revel swarms with Russian perform ers working daily in the restaurants and cabarets, ju s t as if we continued as before to live in nm ighty" Russia. In a ll these cabarets you hear only Russian songs, see Russian clowning. Even The Estonia [the Estonian State Theater] invites Russian perform ers to act in Russian. O ur arm y officers seem to consider it a m atter o f honor to speak Russian. The m anagem ent office o f The Estonia is decorated with full-length portraits o f Lev Trotsky and Maksim Gor'ky. The theater halls are em pty during Estonian perform ances.... Would anything like this be tolerated in Finland o r Germany? There were about twenty Russian newspapers and periodical publications in Estonia. The "democratic national” newspaper Svobodnoe slovo (Free Word) appeared daily, competing with the conservative Poslednie izvestiya (The Latest News, 1920-27). S taryi Narvskii Listok (The Old Narva Newsletter) was the oldest Russian newspaper in Estonia, having been founded in 1889. Vesti dnya (The Day's News, 1926-1940) presented the Estonian point of view, as opposed to Russkii golos (Russian Voice), which was more Russian oriented. Two other papers were Zavtra (Tomorrow) and Russkii golos (Russian Voice). Papers generally were short-lived, going out of business only to be either replaced or refounded under a new name: Novaya Rossiya (New Russia), for example, was replaced by Vernyi p u t' (True Path), which in turn was succeeded by Zhizn' (Life). In February of 1923 Aleksei Janson united the various Russian cultural and social institutions under the umbrella of a single society, which existed until mid-1940, when the country was occupied by the Soviets, who executed Janson. An im portant role was also played by Svyatogor, a cultural society which promoted cultural, literary, and social events. Led by Ivan Lagovsky, the Russian Student Christian Movement had a m ajor center in Estonia, and the im portant journal of this organization was published there. Among the literary societies were the Literary Circle and Vityaz' (Knight) in Tallinn, Raki na sushe (Crayfish on Dry Land) in Tartu, and Skit poètov (Hermitage of Poets) in Revel. Tartu had a Russian "Literary Guild” (Tsekh poètov), run by Boris Pravdin, and a short-lived organization of young poets,
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Chugunnoe kol'tso (Castiron Ring) was founded in 1930. But educated Russians tended to move on to other Western European countries, and by the mid-1930s only Vityaz' still functioned. Publishing was cheaper in Estonia than in many other European countries, and Russian writers often had their works brought out by Bibliofil, founded by Albert Org, the Estonian Counsel in Petrograd; Kol'tso (Ring) was another publishing house founded in Tallinn, while Al'fa was located in Tartu. Literary journals included Gamayun, Veche, Via Sacra, Knut, and Otkliki. There were also a number of Russian publishers.3 The League of Russian Societies for the Promotion of Enlightenm ent and Charity in Estonia published a monthly literary magazine. And there were Russian libraries in Tallinn, Narva, and Tartu. Although many Russians felt slighted by their Estonian hosts, some 100 Russian schools were subsidized by the governm ent. The best known Russian w riter in Estonia was Igor' Severyanin, but Vera Kryzhanovskaya (pseudonym: Rochester) also resided in Estonia after 1917, as did Aleksei Baiov (pseudonym: G otvill'), and Vladim ir Gushchik, among others.b The writers generally preferred traditional realism, and Ivan Belyaev's modernistic Na chuzhbine met with a certain amount of hostility from other writers and readers who disapproved of his lack of social engagement. Although the Estonian government partly subsidized Russian publications, the actual amounts of such assistance were quite small, and writers and cultural activists generally acted out of sheer enthusiasm. Many of them were arrested and perished in Soviet prisons and forced-labor camps in 1940-41.
•In Tallinn: Bibliofil, Kol'tso, Novaya zem lya, and Russkaya kniga. In Tartu: A lfa , Anori, V . Bergman, O dam ees, and Postimees. bEstonia w as richer in Russian poets than in prose writers. Among the poets who had least spent som e tim e there were: Vladim ir Aleksandrovsky-Adams; Irina Bashkirova; Ivan Bazilevsky; Ivan Belyaev (Inno Vask), who returned to the Soviet Union in 1926 and died in a forced-labor camp; Karl Gershel'man (also a prose w riter and painter); Irina Borman; Boris Dikoi (Vil’dej; Yuliya Ivanova; Yury Ivask; Irina Kaigorodova; M ariya Karam zina (arrested by the Soviets in 1940, she allegedly died in a forced-labor camp in 1942); Boris Nartsissov, who later em igrated to the United States, and his sister Ol'ga; Mariya Ryabushkina; Boris Sem enov, who w as arrested by the Soviets in 1940 and disappeared in the camps; Igor' Sheffer; Boris Pravdin; M eta Roos (wife of Mikhail Irtel', she also wrote prose); Elizaveta Ross-Bazilevskaya (sister of M eta Ross); Yury Shumakov, the editor of N ov) Boris Taggo (Boris Novosadov); Natal’ya Tranze; and Yaroslav Voinov. Vasily Nikiforov-Volgin, a prose writer, was arrested in 1940 and apparently died in a forced-labor camp.
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Finland and Scandinavia But in the North long since m y nest is made. O tell her, brief is life but love is long ... Tennyson Finland had been annexed by the Russian Empire after the Swedish-Russian W ar of 1808-09 and granted constitutional status in the Empire. However, inasmuch as the civil service was entirely composed of native Finns (the official languages were Finnish and Swedish), the Russian population in Finland never grew to be very large. The Russian governm ent made persistent but generally unsuccessful attempts to reconcile the Finns to their place in the empire and also established Russian schools and churches to serve the Russian community. In 1840 or 1841 Yakov Grot was appointed professor of Russian language and literature at the Aleksandr University in Helsinki — much to the displeasure of a number of his Finnish colleagues. In 1842 he published an almanac of essays dedicated to the Tsar, and by 1848 the Russian book collection in the Aleksandr University library had increased to 10,000 volumes. W hen the Finns persisted in their hostility to the Russians, however, G rot lost all hope of achieving a reconciliation and returned to Russia in 1853. In the 1890s the tsarist governm ent applied new pressure on the Finns, making the study of the Russian language mandatory in the higher adm inistrative centers in the country. In 1899 a "Grand Petition” was signed by half a million Finns and presented to Nikolai II, protesting efforts to keep Finland in the Russian fold. By 1910 there were only approxim ately 12,000 Russians resident in the country. Among them was Elena Guro (1877-1913), an artist and w riter who was a member of a Cubo-Futurist group. Once the Finns had declared their independence in December 1917, the Russians were declared to be personae non grata, Russian schools were closed, and deportations lowered the Russian population to about four or five thousand. The Finns’ deep-seated suspicions of the Russians were heightened during the Finnish civil war, when Finnish communists received weapons from Moscow while the other side was supported by German troops under General von der Goltz. When the Finnish W hite army marched trium phant into Vyborg (Viipuri), hundreds of Russians — Reds and W hites alike — were shot. The journalist and historical novelist Sergei Mintslov was among those who fled, complaining that "the concept of the ‘Russian’ has now become identical with that of the plague.” The Russian-language Finlyandskaya gazeta (Finland’s Newspaper), which had existed since 1900, folded.
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Nevertheless, the situation in Russia was so desperate that Russians continued to arrive, even though the Finns erected all sorts of barriers, including visa requirements. By the beginning of 1919 there were approxim ately 15,400 Russians who had permission to remain in the country, of whom roughly 11,000 were in Karelia, where Russians had lived since the early 18th century. Many moved on to other W estern Europèan countries, but a considerable number stayed. Finnish authorities attempted to lim it the number of Russians settling in Karelia and the three largest cities — Helsinki, Âbo (Turku), and Vyborg. Since Russians who had formerly owned estates and country houses in Finland were no longer able to visit them, their properties were auctioned off, with the proceeds placed in escrow for possible heirs. A t this point the Soviet consulate suddenly displayed a keen interest in these abandoned homes. In Vyborg, just 70 miles northwest of St. Petersburg, the victorious Finns found themselves with so many Russian residents that 26 associations had to be founded to distribute American humanitarian assistance to them. The Special Committee for Russian Affairs in Finland,3 made up of Russian exiles, raised two million Finnish marks to finance its anti-Bol'shevik plans, and in return agreed to recognize Finland's independence, but the W hite Russian generals persisted in their desire to restore Russia's pre-1917 borders. By the end of 1918 the W hite Russian general Nikolai Yudenich was forced to retreat from Petrograd to Helsinki, together with his troops. The Finnish head of state, General Carl Gustav Mannerheim, hoped to seize Petrograd, ideally using only Finnish forces. Mannerheim, who had spent 30 years as an officer in the old Russian army, demanded that Yudenich recognize Finland's independence, but the W hite Russian Admiral Aleksandr Kolchak was opposed to any such reciprocity. Meanwhile, Yudenich had almost reached Petrograd when he was forced to retreat. Lenin himself believed that if the Finns had supported Yudenich, the city would have been taken. The exiles also pointed an accusing finger at Estonia and Britain. The W hite Russian armies suffered a series of defeats, and A rkhangelsk had to be evacuated, triggering the flight of between
•Osobyi komitet po delam russkikh v Finlyandii. The committee was created by the form er Tsarist official Aleksandr Trepov, who later had to be replaced by Anton Kartashêv because of Trepov's known "germanophile" sympathies. O ther Russian ém igré organizations in Finland w ere the Russian Colony in Finland (Russkaya koloniya v Finlyandii), the Russian Merchants' Club (Russkii kupecheskii klub), and several organizations of form er Tsarist military men. There w as also a Russian school for boys and another for girls.
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1.000 and 1,500 Russians across the Finnish border. In March of 1921 the Soviets suppressed the Kronstadt rebellion, and from 6,000 to 8.000 Russian sailors and civilians fled to Finland. The Soviets quickly established a committee in Vyborg to repatriate the refugees and sent so many spies to the country that the Finnish police estimated that every third Russian immigrant was a Soviet agent. The Finnish border was less than 20 miles from Petrograd, and Russian émigré spies and such W estern agents as Sidney Reilly were so successful in exploiting this "window” to Russia that the Soviets demanded that all Russian exile organizations in the country be disbanded. In 1921-22 the number of Russian immigrants reached its highest level: some 19,000, of whom four or five thousand had resided in the country for generations. Roughly a quarter of them lived in Helsinki. Many of the more prominent Russian émigrés were actually of German descent. From that tim e on their numbers gradually sank, but since naturalized Finns were not distinguished from native Finns in official statistics, the exact Russian population is difficult to determ ine. Given the long and checkered history of diplom atic relations between Russia and Finland, it is not surprising that a good deal of hostility toward Russians was in evidence. When Finland's sm all Orthodox Church attempted to coopt Russian parishioners, the latter felt themselves out of place and established their own community, which joined the Evlogian church. There were several Russian libraries and reading rooms in Finland, and Biblion Publishers put out a number of titles for the Russians until cheaper Russian publishing houses on the continent drove it out of business. In Vyborg the group Sodruzhestvo poètov (Commonwealth of Poets) was active, and there was also a literary-philosophical society, Svetlitsa (The Parlor), active in Vyborg during the latter half of the 1930s. There were also three amateur acting troupes.4 The Day of Russian Culture was actively celebrated every year in Helsinki. The most im portant Russian writers to settle in Finland were Leonid Andreev and, for a time, Aleksandr Kuprin. Ekaterina Dykhova (1849-1936) had studied medicine in the United States and returned to Europe with her American husband. W hile a student at New York University, she had met Harriet BeecherStowe, the author of Uncle Tom's Cabin, and written a didactic "progressive” novel of her own, published in 1871. In 1918 she left St. Petersburg to live on her estate in Vammelsuu.
•The Russian Dram atic Circle (Russkii dramaticheskii kruzhok), founded in 1920; the Vedrinsky Dramatic Circle; and the Zveno (Link) Dram atic Circle.
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When the Solonevich brothers fled Russia in the early 1930s, they both remained in Finland for about one year and lectured frequently on the evils of communism. The popular writer and literary scholar Komei Chukovsky (1882-1969) had written his first book for children — The Crocodile— in Kuokkala, where he lived from 1912 to 1917, but he chose to shutter up his home and return to Russia. Others who opted not to remain in Finland were Aleksandr Am fiteatrov (1862-1938), Anton Kartashëv (1875-1960), Aleksandr Kuprin (1870-1938), and Igor1 Voinov (18981970). Among those Russian writers who remained in Finland were the poet Vera Bulich (1898-1954), the memoirist of the Imperial fam ily Anna Taneeva-Vyrubova (1884-1964), the poet Juhani Savolainen (pseudonym: Ivan Savin, 1899-1927), and Vadim Gardner (1880-1956), who wrote verse in both English and Russian.3 Given the very small Russian population in Finland, the newspapers proved very short-lived.b Zhum al sodruzhestva (Journal of Concord) was the chief literary publication. Even in the 1930s there was still a modest amount of Russian cultural activity in Helsinki. Helsinki had long been a repository of tsarist governmental duplicate archives, which later were to serve many scholars who could not obtain access to such documents during the Soviet period. When the Finnish-Soviet war broke out in 1939, many Russian organizations were shut down by the Finnish authorities. Russians evidently felt even less welcome in Sweden than in Finland, and thus the Russian community there was far smaller. The Russians who did settle in Sweden were people who had owned real estate in the country before 1917, the wives of Swedes who had worked in Russia, and a handful of military men and diplomats. The other Russians who came to Sweden passed through to France,
•O ther Russian writers and scholars who temporarily resided in the country or at least passed through w ere Evgeny Lyatsky (1868-1942), the painter Nikolai Rerikh (1874-1947), Boris Sove, Vladim ir Sukhomlinov (1848-1926), and Ivan Tkhorzhevsky (1878-1951). Three critics who remained in Finland w ere Konstantin Arabazhin (1865-1929), Yury Grigorkov (1885-1961), and Sergei Rittenberg (18991975). bSevem aya zhizn' (Northern Life, 1918-1919, daily), Rassvet (Dawn, 19191920, daily, published both poetry and fiction), Russkaya zhizn' (Russian life, daily, 1919), Novaya russkaya zhizn' (The New Russian Life, daily, 1919), Put' (The Path, 1921-1922), Russkie vesti (Russian News, daily, 1923), Dni nashei zhizni (Days of O ur Life, 1923), and Ustok russkoi kolonii (Bulletin of the Russian Colony, 1927). O ne newspaper that lasted for twenty years was Probuzhdenie (The Awakening), but it w as chiefly religious in nature.
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Germany, and Czechoslovakia. Russian life centered around a modest church in Stockholm, which possessed a library. The prominent émigré publisher Zinovy Grzhebin placed a large order with Progress Printers in Stockholm which established Novaya Rus' (New Russia) Publishers. Severnye O gni (Northern Lights) was run by I. A. Lundel' and Evgeny Lyatsky. Although Norway and the U.S.S.R. shared a common border, the small Russian émigré contingent came by boat because of a lack of roads. Most of the Russians arrived on February 25, 1920, on two ships: the Kuz'ma Minin and the Lomonosov. Only about 500 Russians — 442 men and 121 women — remained in the country, where they found sympathy among the conservatives and hostility in left-wing circles. The Russians in Norway created three chief societies: the Russian Commonwealth (Russkoe sodruzhestvo), the Russian Émigré Circle in Norway (Russkii èmigrantskii kruzhok v Norvegii), and the Russian National League (Russkoe natsional'noe ob'edinenie). Russian church services were held as early as 1921. The Danish royal fam ily provided refuge to the Dowager Empress (Vdovstvuyushchaya imperatritsa) Mariya Fêdorovna, who in turn provided financial support to m onarchist groups. Although she became som ewhat senile toward the end of her life, she ran a sort of m iniature royal court and received selected visitors. She also financed the "League of the Loyal” (Soyuz vernykh), whose members had vowed to reestablish the monarchy. The European representative of the League was Markov II, who had his office in Munich.
Kovno (Kaunas) He comes too near, that comes to be denied. Sir Thomas Overbury (1581-1613) The incestuous relations of Russia and Lithuania (and we must include here Ukraine and Poland, as well) have their own rich history. In the 15th/16th centuries Lithuania served as a haven for Russians fleeing the anger of the Grand Duke of Moscow, such as Kurbsky. Even earlier Lithuania was the refuge of Prince Vasily Mikhailovich the Bold (Udalyi), who had made the mistake of allowing his wife to accept an expensive necklace as a wedding present from her aunt, who was the w ife of Grand Duke Ivan III. Not suspecting that the fam ily heirloom had changed hands, Ivan decided to make a present of it to his daughter-in-law when she gave birth to his grandson in 1483. Upon learning that Vasily's wife was in possession of the necklace, Ivan flew into a rage and ordered the arrest of both Vasily and his wife, but the two had managed to flee to Lithuania. Only ten years later did Ivan's
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w ife manage to prevail upon him to pardon the two fugitives. While Ivan III was no Ivan the Terrible (IV), neither was he a meek, forgiving type, and Vasily evidently judged it prudent not to accept the invitation to return home. The following year Ivan concluded a treaty with Lithuania, not forgetting Vasily in his spite, who evidently still had the necklace. Peevishly, Ivan stipulated in the document that Vasily "was not to be perm itted to go anywhere, and if he take absence, he was not to be accepted back.” The third partition of the Lithuanian-Polish Commonwealth in 1795 divided Lithuania between the Prussians and the Russians, but St. Petersburg experienced the usual difficulties in quelling local nationalism, and in 1840 the Russians outlawed the very word "Lithuania.” in 1861-63 the Poles and Lithuanians rose in an unsuccessful rebellion against the Tsar, to which the Russians responded by proscribing even the use of the Latin alphabet, hoping to force the Cyrillic alphabet upon this rebellious province. For a time there was also a ban on the local press, lifted only in 1904. In 1915 the Germans occupied the country briefly, but the Red Army took Vilnius (Vilno) in 1919. Exploiting the constant conflict between Russians and Poles over Lithuania, the Lithuanians were able to achieve independence in 1923 and kept the Polish border closed until 1938. Russians comprised 2.7 percent of the Lithuanian population (some 55,000) at the end of W orld W ar I, and their numbers were soon augmented by an additional 10,000 refugees. Given the small number of Russians, their cultural activities appear to have been relatively modest. However, there were four Russian newspapers: Èkho Litvy (Lithuanian Echo), a "literary-political daily”; Vol'naya Litva (A Free Lithuania), "a daily organ of independent democratic thought”; Ponedel'nik, which appeared on Mondays, as its name indicates; and Vilenskaya rech' (The Talk of Vilnius). Zerkalo (The Mirror) was a m agazine devoted to literature, art, and "social life.” And Kaunas was home to Baltic Publishers. The literary group Barka poètov (Barque of Poets) existed in Vilno from late 1926 to mid-1928. And the city was home to the poet Roman Ryabinin, and — for a brief tim e — to the prose w riter Sergei Mintslov. Some 34,600 persons, many of the Russian, are estimated to have been arrested in Lithuania after the Soviet occupation in 1940.
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Zürich-Geneva M eet the m alady on Its way. Persius (34-62 A.D.) Russians had been coming to Switzerland since the middle of the 19th century either as students or political refugees, or both. Medicine was an especially popular field of study for women, who were long denied the right to m atriculate at Russian universities. W ith over 400 of them studying at the medical school in Beme, critics began to refer to the institution sarcastically as a "Slavic girls’ school.” In the early 1870s the Tsarist governm ent ordered all Russian women students to return home. By 1910, 147 of every 1,000 residents of Switzerland were foreigners. According to the census taken that year, 4,607 persons listed their native language as Russian, most of whom resided either in Zurich or Geneva, with sm aller populations in Lausanne, Beme, and Basel. About a third of them were students, many of whom were so well-to-do that in 1906 the registration fees which they paid constituted about 57 percent of all fees collected. The money brought in by wellheeled Russians was regularly supplemented by fund-raising drives conducted by various political organizations throughout Europe. Editions Internationales Populaires (EDIP) published books for the Russians in their language. The Bibliothèque Leon Tolstoi was established in 1875 and was subsequently converted by Russian students into a circulating library. The largest library was founded by Nikolai Rubakin, who had fled tsarist Russia in 1907. He eventually built the collection up to 100,000 volumes. The tsarist government attempted to put pressure on the Swiss because of the high-profile political activities of the Russians (and Poles) in Switzerland, but with very limited success. When the first W orld W ar began, the émigrés were sharply divided as to whether to resist the war (Lenin's position) or support it (as advocated by Kropotkin and Plekhanov). In the initial stages of the conflict there was a brief rapprochement between the émigrés and the tsarist government, which evacuated a number of them to Russia. In 1915, however, the Russian mission ordered all those subject to the draft to return home — a demand that was widely resisted. On the whole, the activities of the Swiss Russian contingent appear to have been largely political and educational, not literary. By 1930, 2,266 Russians are estimated to have been living in Switzerland.
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Kishinev (Chisinau) Gypsies in boisterous crowds M eander through Bessarabia ... Aleksandr Pushkin What a wind in the Moldavian ste p p e ... Aleksandr Vertinsky Russian-Romanian relations have a very long history. After five Russian invasions of Bessarabia, the first of which occurred in 1711, Russia annexed this frontier territory in 1812 under the Treaty of Bucharest. Apart from the Romanians themselves and a large Jewish population, the population consisted of Germans, Bulgarians, Swiss, Gypsies, Greeks, Armenians, and, of course, a very large number of Russians. Filipp Vigel', a friend of Pushkin, described his first impression of Kishinêv upon being sent there as the first vice-governor of Bessarabia: I have never seen a larger, uglier, and more chaotic village.... When you enter it, your gaze and nose are equally under assault: the place consists entirely o f twisted lanes strung with hovels pressed up tight against each other. The filth and slops flow into the town from the surrounding areas and from there end up in the Byk [River]. In the sum m er the a ir is so infectious that fever is everywhere. Serfdom was never introduced into this relatively autonomous province, and Russian schismatics, runaway serfs, and outlaws found haven there. From 1856 (the Treaty of Paris concluding the Crimean War) to 1878 (The Treaty of Berlin) southern Bessarabia reverted to Moldavia, but was then reincorporated into the Russian Empire. Beginning in the 1880s, Rumania was the most important center of revolutionary activities on the part of Russian émigrés.3 By 1913 the Russian M inister of Education Lev Kasso claimed that a great wave of patriotic feeling had swept over the Russians in Bessarabia in the face of "the common enemy” and that the Bessarabian guberniya (province) was blending more and more with other parts of the Empire. In 1918 Rumania took back Bessarabia and held it until 1940. According to the 1920 census, of a total population of 2,686,000, some three quarters of a million were Russians and Ukrainians. After the Russian civil war, 7,000 additional Russians
■Most of these Russians w ere populists (narodnik).
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arrived as refugees. Aleksandr Vertinsky in his memoirs tells of an "alm ost Russian” landscape with Russian store signs and Russian speech heard everywhere — among cab drivers, salesmen, and even beggars. Nevertheless, conditions for literature do not appear to have been propitious, since 82 percent of the men and 96 percent of the women were illiterate as late as 1900.a Bessarabia was within the Pale of Settlement, and there was a large Jewish population in the area, creating, in the words of the émigré poet Dovid Knut, "a peculiar Jewish-Russian air.” The first Russian newspaper appeared in 1854— Bessarabskie oblastnye vedom osti (Bessarabian Oblast' Ledgers), a governm ent publication. A governm ent decree dated July 2, 1870, forbade the publication of articles containing polemical topics, and even jokes or poems. The year 1889 marked the appearance of the first private periodical — Bessarabskii vestnik (The Bessarabian Herald). By 1899 some 28 periodicals had appeared, among them nine newspapers and two magazines, most of them inconsequential.6 Bessarabia presented one of the numerous territorial questions confronting both Soviets and émigrés drawing plans for the future Russian state. Markov II favored giving Bessarabia to the Rumanians in exchange for their support in the struggle against the Soviet government.
Uzhgorod "A Russian A ustria" Adol'f Dobryansky (1871) Although most "Ruthenians” (Rusiny), or "Carpatho-Russians,” in Galicia, Bukovina, and the Transcarpathian region (what is now western Ukraine and eastern Slovakia) spoke dialects of Ukrainian,
aln this rural setting, even the Bessarabian industrial working class w as very weakly represented, comprising only some 30,000. bln the period 1900-16 254 periodicals appeared, of which 136 w ere newspapers and 78 w ere m agazine-type alm anacs with literary supplements. Prior to 1900, only one publication had been in Romanian, w hile sixteen w ere in Russian. 185 of the 254 periodicals w ere published in Kishinêv, and sixteen appeared in Bendery. Among the Russian periodicals w ere the daily newspapers Bessarabia (1919-12), Bessarabskoe siovo (The Bessarabian Word, 1922-35), Kishinêvskii listok (The Kishinêv Bulletin, 1929-30), and the weekly Bukharestskie novosd (Bucharest News, 1922). There w ere also two Russian knigoizdatel'stvo and Novaya kniga.
publishing
houses:
Bessarabskoe
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there were an estimated 550,000 ethnic Russians in the area. During periods of strain between Hungary and Austria, Vienna promoted Ukrainian nationalism as a counterweight to pro-Hungarian sentiment. The suppression of the Hungarian uprising of 1848-49 by Russian troops gave a strong impetus to pro-Russian sentim ent in the region. The poet Aleksandr Dukhnovich transferred such political sentiments to literature and wrote odes to Nikolai I, much like those Derzhavin used to w rite to Catherine the Great. Dukhnovich went on to write The True H istory o f the Carpathian Russians, or the “Ugric Ruthenians, who had been transform ed into dunces by the envious Magyars.” The Russians had their own newspapers in Lviv and even in Vienna. The Hungarians, for their part, took the view that the local residents were neither Ukrainians nor Russians, but "Hungarians of the Greco-Roman faith.” In view of the "Russian threat,” however, the Hungarians prom oted Ukrainian nationalism, and there were complaints that ethnic Russians were being transformed into Ukrainians. A t the same tim e a portion of the more educated citizenry began to favor the Hungarian language. After the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian empire in 1918 pro-Hungarian elements attempted to establish a "Russian border area” (Rus'kaya kraina), and in 1919 part of the Carpathian region was occupied by Romanian and Czech troops. On February 20,1920, the area was declared an "autonomous region of the Czecho-Slovak Republic.” This situation, which was as confusing linguistically as it was politically, lasted until 1938.a From 1928 to 1933 the Dukhnovich Society published Karpatskii svet (Carpathian Light), under the editorship of A. V. Popov. A pro-Russian history of the prose and poetry of the "CarpathoRussians” was published by Evgeny Nedzel'sky in Uzhgorod in 1932. In 1939 the Society of Russian W riters in Carpathian Rus' was founded in Mukachevo. Literary evenings were conducted, and writers read their works over the radio.b Immediately thereafter the war broke out and the society became inactive. The historian Evgeny Nedzel'sky
•W hen World W ar II cam e to a close, part of W estern Galicia, the so-called Lemkovshchina, was given to Poland, and local Russians w ere forcibly repatriated to the Soviet Union. Another part went to Czechoslovakia, without forced repatriations, and the remainder was declared to be part of W estern Ukraine. The G reat Soviet Encyclopedia (third edition) called the Ruthenians "Western Ukrainians... with a specific language and culture." bObshchestvo russkikh pisatelei v podkarpatskoi Rusi. The organizers w ere Nikolai Terletsky, I. Zhupan, and Andrei Karabelesh. Som e members w ere the monk Aleksei (Dekhterev), Em el’yan Baletsky, Vasily Dobosh, Aleksei Farinich, and A. Patrus.
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viewed the literature which they created as fitting into a CarpathoRussian tradition. Before World W ar II there was a Carpathian Literary League in Prague.3 After the war Carpatho-Ruthenia was incorporated into Ukraine and Slovakia.
London Dear; damn'd, distracting town. Alexander Pope D on't send a poet to London. Heinrich Heine Russian contacts with England date back to the child m arriage of Vladim ir Monomakh with the daughter of the English King Harold II in the 1060s. In 1524, Tsar Vasily III sent an embassy to Spain, which appears to have arrived via England. Relations were established between the two states, and Ivan the Terrible even conducted a correspondence with Elizabeth I. In 1602 Tsar Boris Godunov sent 15 young men to Europe to study, only one of whom returned. Nearly another century passed before Peter the Great paid his colorful visit to England in early 1698. Britain had a long tradition of granting refuge to political exiles, and during the second half of the 19th century London became popular among Russian dissenters. Virtually all the im portant revolutionary figures had lived and worked in the city. Trotsky in his memoirs mentioned Nikolai Chaikovsky as the "patriarch” of the émigré com m unity in London. Iskra (Spark) appeared there for a time, edited by the older generation— Plekhanov, Zasulich, and A ksel'rod— and the younger revolutionaries — Lenin, Martov, and Potresov. With time, however, the center of revolutionary activity had shifted to the continent. Statistical records do not distinguish between the nationalities of arrivals from the Russian empire — Polish, Jewish, Russian, or any other ethnic group. In 1871 there were 9,569 such persons residing in England, but after the assassination of Aleksandr II in 1881, their numbers increased dram atically — to 94,204 in 1911. Prior to the passing of the Aliens Act in 1905, no visitor to England could be prevented from landing. Many, if not most, of the new arrivals were Jews, who settled largely in London's Stepney area, and in Leeds and Manchester. One Briton, upon returning from a trip to the Pale of
•Literaturnoe ob'edinenie studentov-karpatorossov, chaired by Dmitry Vergun.
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Settlem ent, remarked It was just like being in London's East End. The revolutionary activities and terrorism which the visitors engaged in aroused violent disapproval from many of the British, and in 1894 the Foreign Secretary, Lord Salisbury, even referred to them as "enemies of the human race.” Even so, the general British attitude was remarkably tolerant. In 1914 the Aliens Restriction Act was passed, but the commencement of hostilities cut off immigration even without it. After 1917, the number of Russians who gravitated to England was considerably sm aller than to other European capitals. Even earlier most Russian students abroad chose Paris or Switzerland. Kovalevsky quotes "official statistics” estimating the number of Russians in England "and her colonies” at 4,000 as of 1930. Members of Russian high society attempted to maintain the form er social pecking order — an effort that was more easily sustained by virtue of the fact that London's Russians enjoyed better financial circum stances than their colleagues in continental Europe. There were few er financial restrictions placed on employment than in Paris, for example, but it was harder to obtain visas and residence permits. Some im portant Russian businessmen settled in London, and some Russian Jews who had settled in London before 1917 became prosperous. Grand Duchess Kseniya Aleksandrovna (sister of the Tsar) was recognized as the titular head of the local Russian community, which numbered such famous Russian names as Golitsyn, Meshchersky, Belosersky, Trubetskoi, Volkov, Kutaisov, and Shipov, among others. Prince Feliks Yusupov, one of Rasputin's assassins, managed to bring out of Russia with him a good supply of valuables and held elegant receptions. Nevertheless, many Russian nobles found them selves engaged in what for them were rather unexpected occupations: Kolchak's Chief of Staff Admiral Smirnov made women's hats, Admiral Volkov (who in 1940 was accused of spying for the Germans) kept a restaurant, the Golitsyns went into the antique trade, and Grand Duchess Mariya knitted dresses for sale. Religion was as politicized among London's Russians as in other places. The faithful were split between the two Russian Churches abroad. One accepted the authority of the Patriarch in Moscow, while the other viewed him as a Soviet collaborator. The scant support which the English provided for the W hite Arm ies aroused a certain degree of resentment among the Russians. Before launching the Crimean evacuation, Vrangel' even accused all the Allies of treachery (although, admittedly, his words were intended largely for France). The First-Wave historian V. Maevsky wrote that England was a "selfish country” that showed no interest in Russian émigrés.
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Among the 200,000-strong Allied interventionist force fighting on the side of the W hite armies were some 14,000 British troops in Murmansk and another 14,000 in Arkhangelsk. When the British left Arkhangelsk, they took with them a number of Russian businessmen who would have found themselves in dangerous straits under the Soviets. In London the new arrivals formed the "Nordic League” for the support of local cultural activities, including literary evenings, plays, and a Russian school. I. I. Bilibin opened a branch of the nationalist Mladoross League. The most active figure in arranging Russian cultural activities was Princess Ekaterina Georg'evna Golitsyna. For a time, the Russian Academic Group was active in London. The Nordic League arranged literary readings, and Evgeny Sablin, form er chargé d'affaires of the tsarist embassy, named his home Russia House and made it available for cultural events. One émigré described the general atmosphere: Enormous portraits o f our Emperors, covering a whole wall, gazed m ajestically down on the visitors, and Empresses greeted them with kindly smiles. Prints showing regim ental uniforms, buildings in Petersburg and Moscow, and old maps were hung on the walls. On the table old Court silverware was to be seen. "Here is Im perial Russia, here we breathe its a ir.” It was a far cry from the circumstances facing most of the exiles scattered throughout the rest of Europe. Even the stock market crash of 1929-30 and the ensuing depression, which exercised a great levelling effect on the émigrés’ economic circumstances, left intact much of the extreme form ality of London's Russian community. A number of prominent scholars tem porarily made their home in England, among them Prince Dmitry Svyatopolk-Mirsky and also Gleb Struve, who later wrote a history of Russian literature of the First W ave. And Vozrozhdenie (Renaissance) Publishers was located in London. On the whole, the Russians in England found a sym pathetic environm ent there. The words of Alexander Kennaway, a secondgeneration member of the Russian community, could probably have been accepted by many: If som ebody says to me, " What are you?” I would say that I'm Russian. I've g o t a British passport, but it would be foolish to say that I'm English because I'm not. You can't be.... I think that, like a lo t o f Russians, England represents to me a country in which it is nowadays easy to live because the English leave you alone to be yourself.
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Rome If you only knew the jo y I experienced in leaving Switzerland and flew o ff to m y beautiful Italy. She is m ine! A nd no one in the world shall take her from m eI I was born here; Russia, Petersburg, snow, scoundrels, the office, m y University post, the theater— a ll this was a dream. I have awakened in m y homeland. Nikolai Gogol', 1837 ’T o Italy, to Ita lyl”... I wanted rest, I wanted the sea, the sea, warm air, luxurious greenery, and people who were not so cynical and heartless [as in Paris].... Aleksandr Gertsen, 1847 To poeticize Italy and life there a t the expense o f Russia, as did the late G ogol’, you have to have a selfish soul, and a Ukrainian one (khokhlatskuyu) a t that. Apollon Grigor'ev, 1858 Russia's contacts with Italy were first developed in the second half of the 17th century, and by the late 18th century a number of Russians had even settled there. Despite the grumpy tone of G rigor'ev's epigraph above, even he could not resist the country's charm: There is nothing official o r prescribed in m y love for Italy. I have fallen in love with her sublimity, her nature, her art, her people, and their striking garments, ringing voices, and erupting volcanoes. Italy has given me much — a revelation o f what I lacked, a revelation o f the "plastic.” I thank her constantly for so precious a gift. Gertsen wrote that the first tim e he came to the Forum his breath was taken away and he simply stood there, bashful and excited. Denis Fonvizin, however, was the inevitable exception. In his eyes Italy came off only slightly better than France. Its operas were inferior to those in St. Petersburg, and its universities were a joke. If his wife had not restrained him, he would have shot the postman (an offense which, he wrote, was no more serious than shooting a dog). Magnificent as it m ight seem, even Venice reminded him of nothing so much as a funeral.
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The number of Russians resident in the Eternal City continued to increase with the years, and in 1858 Vladim ir Pecherin was sent to preach in Rome, partially in Russian, dem onstrating that there must have been enough Russian émigrés in the city to make such an undertaking worthwhile. Princess Zinaida Volkonskaya had her fam ous salon in Italy, and a fair number of prom inent artists, among them Aleksandr Ivanov and Karl Bryullov, simply emigrated there. Strong as the draw of Italy may have been to Russians during the tsarist period, Russian émigrés did not flock to its shores after 1917, although, of course, the em inent poet Vyacheslav Ivanov made his home there. As of 1930, Kovalevsky estimates the number of Russians in Italy at only 2,500. There was a Russian academic group in Italy. Among the Russians who found the charms of Italy absolutely irresistible were the writer and art historian Pavel Muratov, who lavishly praised the country to his Russian readers, and the w riter Boris Zaitsev, who wrote that Italy had literally become a part of him.
Harbin We do not ride on the railroad; it rides upon us. Thoreau As part of its general proselytizing efforts, the Russian Orthodox Church sent the translator Aleksei Agafonov (1746-92) to Peking soon after he graduated from the seminary. Agafonov spent over a decade in China (1771-82) as a member of the Russian Church mission. It is interesting to note that he took an active part in the interrogations of Russian defectors in the capacity of interpreter. Agafonov's translations often deal with religious and philosophical topics, as well as political. Sheer distance was long a limiting factor in contacts between Russians and Chinese, but in 1896 the Chinese governm ent signed a treaty with the tsarist governm ent perm itting the Russians to com plete the rail link to Vladivostok, and many Russians arrived in Northern Manchuria to adm inister this grandiose undertaking, which took from 1898 to 1903 to complete and actually cost more to build than did the Trans-Siberian line. Despite the turm oil caused by the Boxer rebellion in 1900, the new arrivals transformed Harbin into a virtually Russian city. When the Russian civil war ended, the strip of land along both sides of the tracks, which was considered Russian territory, contained 62,000 Russian subjects, of whom about 41,000 lived in Harbin. Between the spring of 1918 and the end of 1922 the railroad colony
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was joined by a contingent of refugees estimated at 200,000 people, most of whom settled in Harbin. By that tim e the number of Russian speakers in the city itself may have been as high as 155,000. This was an interregnum for the Russians, who considered themselves citizens of tsarist Russia, although the tsarist governm ent no longer existed. As of Septem ber 23,1920, the Chinese government no longer recognized the Russians’ diplom atic status, but on May 31, 1924, the railroad began to be operated jointly by the Soviets and the Chinese, and most Russian employees accepted Soviet passports in order to keep their jobs; others accepted Chinese citizenship, while still others remained stateless. Despite the fact that so many Russians accepted Soviet citizenship, the community as a whole was so anti-Soviet that there was even a joking proposal to rename the city Belogvardeisk (W hiteguardsville). During the period from 1923 to 1927 the Soviets exercised broad influence over their Chinese neighbors. In 1923 Chiang Kai-shek was sent to Moscow to study the U.S.S.R. economic and political system, but he returned hostile and distrustful of Soviet intents. By 1924, following instructions from Moscow, Chinese communists began to infiltrate the Kuomintang. In 1926 Chiang became head of the party and proposed the idea of a northern campaign to unify China. Pursuing their own plans for the area, the Soviets attempted to frustrate such efforts. On April 6,1927, Chinese police occupied the Soviet embassy in Peking — with the advance consent of the ambassadors of the U.S.A., G reat Britain, Japan, France, Holland, Spain, and Portugal. Soviet officials were unable to burn hundreds of folders containing an abundance of documents on underground communist activities in China. On December 15, 1927, the Nationalist government broke relations with Moscow, and on May 27,1929, the Chinese conducted a sim ilar raid on the Soviet consulate in Harbin, after which a number of Russians who had accepted Soviet citizenship were arrested. In 1929 bad relations between the U.S.S.R. and China led to a m ilitary conflict in which the Soviets easily came out on top, leaving the largely anti-Soviet émigrés with decidedly mixed feelings. When Japanese troops occupied Harbin on February 5,1932, as part of their general occupation of Manchuria, local Russians celebrated on the streets, anticipating a liberation from both Chinese and Soviet rulers, but those hopes were to prove ephemeral. On December 29,1934, the Japanese created the Bureau of Russian Émigré Affairs in the Manchurian Empire with the intent of controlling the chaotic and often conflicting activities of the Russian community. A number of Russians decided to go "hom e,” and one witness described a banner hanging in the local train station reading "M other Russia, Accept Your Children!”
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Evidently, most of the returnees were arrested. Despite these returns, by 1939 some 45,000 Russian speakers had supposedly been registered in Harbin and other cities in Manchukuo, the name of the puppet state created by the Japanese, and the true figure may have been even higher. There was very little assimilation of the Russians in China. Mixed Russian-Chinese marriages were extremely rare, and the Russian community existed as one of the foreign colonies. Residents had no need to assimilate into the local culture or learn a new language, as was later true in Western Europe or the Americas, and even the street signs in the Russian part of the city were in Russian. The life of the Russian colony before 1917 was quite com fortable in a material sense, but the life of the refugees, who arrived later, was one of relative poverty. Harbin's Russians undertook an impressive amount and variety of cultural activities. The Society for the Study of M anchuria published some 87 books, gathered a library of 9,000 volumes, and created a museum with 62,000 exhibits. There were 70 Russian schools when the Japanese occupation began, and between 1918 and August 1945 110 newspapers and 220 journals were founded. Russian Harbin's periodicals reflected a wide spectrum of political views — the Democrats, the Changing Landmarks group, the Progressives, the Russian Nationalists, the Fascists, the Social Revolutionaries and the Anti-Socialists, the Communists and the Anti-Bol'sheviks, and the nonaligned. O f Harbin's newspapers, the most im portant were the proJapanese Vremya (Time, 25,000 copies), the anti-Soviet Kharbinskii vestnik (Harbin Herald), later renamed Vestnik M anchzhurii (The M anchuria Herald), Nash p u t' (Our Path — a fascist publication, 4,000 copies), the pro-Soviet Molva (Rumor), and the daily Zarya (Dawn, 10,000 copies).3 Between 1918 and 1945 150 one-day newspapers
"Others w ere the communist Kharbinskii den' (Kharbin Day), later renam ed Tribuna (Tribune), the daily anti-Bol'shevik Russkii golos (Russian Voice), the daily Novosti zhizni (Life's News), which published articles by the Change of Landmarks leader Nikolai Ustryalov, the monarchist daily S vet (Light), Gun-Bao, which w as published in Russian, the daily socialist paper Rossiya (Russia), Druzhba narodov (Friendship of Peoples), Kharbinskoe vremya (Harbin Tim es), Luch A zii (R ay of Asia), Segodnya (Today), Vozhd' (Leader), Rupor (Megaphone) — an evening paper with a literary and artistic supplement, and Russkoe sbvo (The Russian W ord). Man'chzhurskii den' (Manchuria Day) was devoted to Chinese-Russian relations, and Novaya èra (New Era) was intended to "defend the interests of the Chinese railroad." Among the m agazines w ere Prozhektor (Projector), Kitezh, and V al (Breaker); the last two devoted considerable space to literature, art and politics.
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were created to raise money for specific causes or to commemorate specific events. In the period 1898-1960 2,300 Russian books were published, 73% of which appeared in 1918-45. From 1922 to 1938 the number of Russian Orthodox churches increased from 28 to 67. Perhaps the main literary group was the "Young Churaevka,” which was organized in 1926 under the auspices of the YMCA and put on regular readings, concerts, plays, and even radio programs. It also issued its own literary newspaper.3 In 1931 the group published a collection of its verse, entitled Semero (The Seven). Other groups were Akmèb, a Far Eastern group of Futurists0, a literary-scholarly group entitled Klin (W edge)d, and the W riters’ and Journalists’ Society®. Despite ail these cultural activities, however, there was a sense of isolation from W estern Europe. Aleksei Achair and "Arseny Nesmelov” (real name: Arseny M itropol'sky) were two of the most popular poets. Mitropol'sky, who
The publishing house of M. V . Zaitsev produced nearly 200 book titles. Gong, Val, and Sinii zhum al (Blue M agazine) w ere devoted to art and literature. There w ere also several publishing houses: I. N. Burkin; A. Z. Belyshev; N. A. G am m er; Katèi-Press; E. S. Kaufman; A. Kryukov, Martenson and Co.; Russkoe delo (Russian Cause); Russko-Man'chzhurskaya knigotorgovlya, Student, and Taiga. ■Originally called Mofodaya Churaevka, the paper was later renamed simply Churaevka. The meetings of the literary group w ere chaired by Aleksei Achair, with Valery Pereleshin as head of the literary section. Som e participants were: Vsevolod Ivanov, M arianna Kolosova, Vasily Loginov, Arseny Mitropol'sky (Nesm elov), Aleksandra Parkau, Sergei Petrov (Sergin), Natal'ya Reznikova, Nikolai Shchegolev, Mikhail Shm eisser, Nikolai Svetlov, and Professor M. A. Talyzin. bParticipants: N. Alyab'ev, Tam ara Andreeva, G. Kopytova, Vasily Obukhov, N atal'ya Reznikova, and Nikolai Svetlov, all of whom participated in a collection of verse published by the group under the title A Ladder Into the Clouds (Lestnitsa v oblaka). cSom e members: Sergei Alymov, Nikolai Aseev (returned to Russia in 1922), Fêdor Kamyshnyuk, Sergei Tret'yakov, V . Sillov. «The group w as founded in early 1932 and in February of the following year published a journal under the sam e title. ■The group functioned from late 1921 until early 1923. Its first chair was the w riter E. I. Shirovskaya, and its writer-m em bers included Sergei Alymov, Lev Amol'dov, Taisiya Bazhenova, Fêdor Kamyshnyuk, Sergei Gusev-Orenburgsky, Venedikt M atveev (M art), Nikolai Dvorzhitsky (All), Stepan Petrov (Skitalets), and Nikolai Ustryalov. A number of professors w ere also members, including Georgy Gins, E. Kh. Nilus, and L. K. Zander.
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wrote a sort of hymn to the Russian fascists in China, using the pseudonym TM. Dozorov," was forcibly repatriated to the Soviet Union at the end of the war and died in 1945 in a transit prison cam p.a Stepan Petrov (Skitalets, meaning 'W anderer”) and Sergei GusevOrenburgsky had been known as prose writers in Russia before they arrived in Harbin in 1921 from the 'F a r Eastern Republic,” which existed from April 1920 until November 1922. Gusev-Orenburgsky soon left by way of Japan and died in New York in 1963. PetrovSkitalets returned to Russia in 1934, where he died in 1941 .b In 1935 the U.S.S.R. sold its interest in the Chinese Eastern Railroad to the Manchurian government (although it received only 23 million yen of the agreed price of 140 million), and from 10,000 to 25,000 Russians returned to Russia, not suspecting that the great purges were only two years away. The infatuation that at first characterized the exiles’ attitude toward the new conquerors was soon dissipated. The Japanese proved stricter in their oversight of the émigrés than the Chinese had been. Inevitably, the Japanese supported the fascists, who created a number of social organizations, including even a children's club entitled Fascist Tots (Fashistskie kroshki). Over tim e the Japanese grew distrustful of the Russian fascists, executed 24 of them in 1940, and on July 1,1943, disbanded their organizations altogether. By the end of that year Japanese war fortunes were obviously so dismal that the Japanese instructed Archbishop Milety to have parishioners in his diocese pray to an image of the goddess Amaterasu placed upon the altar (Milety refused). Although more and more Russians began leaving for Shanghai, enough young Russians still remained in Harbin in 1938 that the YMCA and the monarchists were able to organize two literary and art circles that year. But by 1941 the number of Russians in Harbin was reduced to somewhere between 30 and 40 thousand.
•Others who returned to the U .S .S .R ., some possibly deported, w ere Andersen, Faina Dmitrieva, Nina ll'nek, Vasily Loginov, Elena Nedel'skaya, Obukhov, Nikolai Peterets, Vladim ir Pomerantsev, Natal'ya Reznikova, Sergin, Vladim ir Slobodchikov, Nikolai Svetlov, Lidiya Khaindrova, Shchëgolev, Mikhail Shmeisser, Viktor Vetlugin, and M ariya Vizi.
Larisa Vasily Sergei Nikolai
bLidiya Khaindrova, Georgy Saprykin (Granin), Nikolai Shchëgolev, Nikolai Shm eisser, and Arkady Upshinsky wrote prose as well as poetry.
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Shanghai Coral island in a dark blue sea A nd a new Miklukho-Maklai. Half-century's passed since that far-off day When he abandoned Shanghai. (anonymous poem of a Russian émigré on the Island of Tubabao,* Miklukho-Maklai was a 19th-century explorer of south-east Asia.) Shanghai's first contacts with Russians began with the shipm ent of tea to Russia. In 1865 a consulate opened in the city, operated by the British on behalf of the Russians until 1880. With time Shanghai developed a small Russian population, consisting of tsarist governm ent officials, businessmen, and employees of the RussianChinese bank. When the Chinese closed the tsarist consulate in 1920, several thousand Russians in Shanghai, like Russians throughout China, found themselves in a sort of legal limbo. The year 1923 marked the arrival of a ragtag fleet of Russian ships carrying refugees from the Russian civil war. The Soviet-Chinese conflict of 1929 delivered another sizeable contingent of Russians to Shanghai, and by the end of the year Shanghai's Russian colony numbered 13,000 persons. And then the Japanese bought the railroad, acquiring 20,000 Russians for the "Yellow Babylon.” By the mid-1930s there were between 40,000 and 50,000 Russians in the city, many of them Jewish. Shanghai's Russian Em igrants’ Committee combined 52 cultural and charitable organizations and competed with the Council of United Russian Social Organizations (SORO). Shanghai was considerably larger and more cosm opolitan than Harbin, and the Russian community was thus more "diluted” in the new environment. In general, the 1930s were a period of vigorous cultural activity for Shanghai's Russians.® The new arrivals
•There w ere two widely read Russian daily newspapers: Shangkhaiskaya zarya (The Shanghai Dawn), owned by Lembich, and Slovo (The W ord), edited by Pavel Zaitsev. Others w ere Shangkhaiskaya zhizn' (Shanghai Life); Shangkhaiskaya gazeta (The Shanghai G azette), which w as reissued as an evening newspaper with the title Shangkhaiskoe novoe vremya (Shanghai New Tim es) and was specifically devoted to the émigré community; Russkoe èkho (The Russian Echo); Vechem ee vremya (Evening), later renamed Vechem yaya zarya (Evening Dawn); Kopeika (The Kopeck); Kur'er (The Courier); Novosti dnya (New s of the Day); and Russkaya m ysl' (Russian Thought). There was also an English-language weekly entitled Russian Free Thought
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had to com pete with Chinese on the labor market and found themselves in such difficult straits that 75 percent of their children were malnourished,* the Shanghai Municipal Council published a report on Russian prostitutes. All too often, the resident Russians looked upon the new refugees as poor relatives. Shanghai was home to the popular magazine Rubezh (Border), which put out 865 issues between 1927 and 1945, and the city's writers created a literary organization modeled after Harbin's Molodaya Churaevka and bearing the same name.3 Literary meetings supposedly gathered audiences of several hundred. Another literary group was Ponedel'nik (Monday).6 In 1933 a popular light-hearted organization was created under the name KHLAM (JUNK), with a membership of writers, artists, actors, and musicians, including the poet Valentin Prisyazhnikov (Valya Val') and the prose w riter Viktor Petrov. That same year witnessed the founding of Vostok (The East), which brought together intellectuals with a wide range of interests.3 Other Shanghai writers to arrive from Harbin were the poets Aleksandr Vertinsky, Larisa Andersen, and Mariya Vizi.
Russian newspapers w ere not limited to Harbin and Shanghai. Tientsin had two dailies — the communist Luch (The Ray) and the liberal Russkoe s lo w (The Russian W ord). Luch w as later shut down by the Chinese police. Among the m agazines published outside Harbin and Shanghai w ere Z a rubezhom (Abroad), devoted to art, literature, and politics, and N iva (The Sown Field), devoted to literature and art. Shanghai boasted a number of publishing houses: Dal', Dukel'sky Publishers, Kryukov and Martens, The Literature and Arts Co-op (Izdatel'stvo Literaturnokhudozhestvennogo ob'edineniya), A. P. Maliks and V . P. Kamkin, B. Y a. Semichov, Slovo, Èmigrantskaya biblioteka (Ém igré Library), Vostok (East), and Zhëltyi lik (Yellow Face). •Among its members w ere Larisa Andersen, Viktor Petrov, O l'ga Skopichenko, Nikolai Svetlov, and Vladim ir Pomerantsev. blts members included, among others, the prose writers Apollinary Nentsinsky and Pavel von Olbrich (Pavel Severny), and the poets I. V . Fryuaf and Mikhail Spurgot. Reports or readings w ere given by Vsevolod Ivanov, A. D. Lavrent'ev, Arseny Mitropol'sky, Valentin Prisyazhnikov, Mikhail Shcherbakov, among others. cChair: D. A. Petrukhin; Secretary: N. N. Yanovskaya; two writers, Kirill Baturin and Mikhail Shcherbakov, w ere board members.
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Buenos Aires Don't cry for me, Argentina. Evita, Tim Rice Estimates of Russians in Argentina — the Latin American country with the largest Russian population — range from 50,000 to 300,000, most of them having arrived before 1917. Some of the earliest were 800 Russian Jews who arrived in the port of Buenos Aires in 1899. In the early 1920s there were two weekly newspapers in Buenos Aires — the "progressive” Novyi m ir (The New World) and Nasha gazeta (Our Newspaper). There were also the magazines Zarya (Dawn) and the 1932-33 Seyatei' (The Sower), devoted to "culture and enlightenm ent.” An interesting figure in Buenos Aires was Ivan Solonevich (1891-1953 or 1954), who had escaped from forced labor on the Belomorkanal in 1934 and fled to Finland. Shortly thereafter he made his way to Bulgaria, where he founded the newspaper Golos Rossii (Voice of Russia) and wrote Russia in a Concentration Camp (Rossiya v kontslagere), but the W est at that tim e was not particularly interested in reading criticism of its future ally against the Germans. (Later, when that fram e of mind had changed, Solzhenitsyn's exposees were proclaim ed as "relevations.”) When World W ar II began, Solonevich went to Finland to plunge into anti-Soviet war propaganda. Later he hoped to do the same thing in Germany, but was sent instead to a small German village, where he sat out the conflict. Some doubted Solonevich's claim to have escaped from the Soviet Union. Rather, they suspected he had agreed to work for the Soviet governm ent as an agent and later broke that promise. In 1938 a package containing a bomb arrived by mail, killing Solonevich’s wife and secretary. In 1947 or 1948 Solonevich left Bulgaria for Argentina, where he refounded his newspaper as Nasha strana (Our Country), but was deported in the early 1950s for opposing rule by generals. His monarchist paper, however, is still appearing.
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Sao Paolo " You'll end your days somewhere in B razil.” I laughed then ... but now I'm alm ost sure that precisely that w ill happen. From a story by Sergei Dovlatov No one hates his jo b so heartily as a farmer. H. L. Mencken The first Russians arrived in Brazil after the Russian revolution of 1905. This small group was followed by evacuees from the Crimea, who began arriving in 1921.3,000 Russians left for Brazil in 1921 to become farmers, but 1,200 refused to remain and were brought back to Europe by a French ship, evidently ending up in Corsica. Most eventually returned to France. Some 2,000 Russians arrived from China, and by 1934 a Russian church was erected in Rio de Janeiro. The early arrivals had at least two newspapers: Russkaya gazeta (The Russian Gazette) and the Mladorosskaya partiya (The Mladoross Party), both published in Sao Paulo. In 1926-27 another 500 Russians left for Brazil, Bolivia, and Peru. One group of 160 Cossacks returned to Europe from Peru and held a thanksgiving service to celebrate not having perished after months of battling snakes, vam pire bats, and mosquitos. There was also an attem pt to settle Russians in an agricultural colony in Paraguay, where a certain General Belyaev played a prom inent political role for a time.
Jerusalem It has been prophesied to me m any years I should not die but in Jerusalem. Shakespeare, Henry IV The pogroms of the early 1880s triggered the exodus of the first significant group of Russian Jews to Palestine. A second group, consisting of dedicated Zionists, began coming in 1903-06, bringing so much leftist thinking in its luggage that it was even called the "socialist aliyah.” This second aliyah lasted until approxim ately 1910 and numbered some 40,000 persons, mostly from Russia. Immigration to Palestine was hindered by regulations issued by the territory's Turkish adm inistrators requiring that incoming Jews stay no longer than three months and acquire no real estate. At this time, however, Zionism was still gaining strength. In the spring of 1917 the movement suddenly
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became very popular among Russian Jews, who were to play a prom inent role in future Israeli culture. But 1917 reshuffled the entire deck of cards, and at first it was unclear whether Russian Jews would attem pt to build their lives in the new Soviet world or would now be even more eager to relocate to their "historic homeland” of Israel. The Jews who had played so prominent a role in the overthrow of the tsarist governm ent were not about to tolerate any mass exodus of their brethren. Even study of the Hebrew language was declared "counterrevolutionary” in a decree issued in July 1919 (as opposed to Yiddish, which was accepted as the language of instruction for Jewish schools). The third aliyah covered the period 1919-1923; altogether this last group amounted to between 20,000 and 30,000 people. For example, one ship, the Ruslan, delivered 637 Jews to Palestine from Odessa in November 1919. Another group, consisting of 15 Hebrew writers and headed by the Hebrew and Yiddish poet Khaim Byalik, arrived in 1921 by way of Constantinople. By 1927, however, new Russian arrivals in Palestine were down to only several hundred per year. Curiously, not all the arrivals of the third aliyah were Zionists, and many of them — particularly those with Russian spouses — chose to move on to other countries. Russian-Jewish influence dominated the Jewish cultural scene in Palestine, and Russian actively competed with Hebrew and Yiddish. Some writers were even trilingual — Solomon Rabinovich (Sholom Aleikhem), for example. Many writers who lived in Palestine published their works in the United States and Europe. Among these were Abram Vysotsky and Yuly Margolin. Others, among them Elisheva (pseudonym of E. Lisheva-Zhirkova) and Aleksandr Pen, an im itator of Mayakovsky, who preferred to switch to Hebrew. The famous Zionist Vladim ir Zhabotinsky (1880-1940) spent only a few years in Palestine, since he was deported by the British in 1920. Zhabotinsky eventually wrote two novels in Russian: Samson the Nazarene (Samson Nazorei) and The Five (Pyatero). The hero of Samson the Nazarene is an autobiographical figure who devotes himself to his people, but is not understood by them. The Five describes the difficult life of a Jewish fam ily in Odessa on the eve of the 1905 revolution. Zhabotinsky also tried his hand at poetic translation and rendered Poe's "The Raven” into Russian. When he died Mikhail Osorgin wrote of him that for all his Zionism he was nonetheless a Russian writer to his dying day and that his fellow writers were even a little offended that he had abandoned them for politics. It had been a conscious decision on the part of Zhabotinsky, who as tim e passed published fewer and fewer articles in the Russian-language press. In 1930 he had autographed a copy of one of his Russian-language books to a friend with the inscription
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"from a late author” (o t pokoinogo avtora). When asked w hat this meant, he responded that he was now deceased for Russian literature. Evidently there was no Russian-language newspaper in Palestine — not at first, anyway — and the few periodicals tended to be of a religious bent, intended for Christian pilgrims to the Holy Land.
British Columbia Naked came I out o f m y m other’s womb, and naked shall I return thither. Old Testament, Job A number of Russian religious groups settled in the North American Pacific Rim at the turn of the century. The first of these were the Dukhobors, who originally arrived in Alberta but soon moved to British Columbia. The sect was limited to Ukraine until the early 18th century, when its members were gradually pushed out to more distant areas, including Siberia, by a Russian governm ent that feared they could "infect” Russian Orthodox believers. Kovalevsky estimated the 1917 Russian population of Canada at 119,000. In the period 1898-1900 some 8,000 Dukhobors em igrated to Canada, financed in part by the royalties from Lev Tolstoi's novel Resurrection (Voskresenie), and in part by a $200,000 grant from the English Society of Friends (Quakers). The Canadian governm ent granted them land, and probably not much would have been heard of them if it had not been for one particularly unconstrained group which marched naked in protest against compulsory school attendance, the purchase and sale of land, the oath of allegiance, and alm ost any other form s of governm ent regulation. The Canadian governm ent finally passed a law against public nudity in 1932, and over 300 "Freedom ite” men and women were sentenced to three years’ imprisonment.
San Francisco-Los Angeles California — a state so blessed, he said, in climate, none had ever died there a natural death. Robert Frost Russian settlem ent of California dates back to 1812, with the founding of Fort Ross in the vicinity of San Francisco. In one of history's most spectacularly disastrous deals, the Russians sold the settlem ent with all its gold to Johann Sutter in 1841. Between 1901
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and 1912 the Molokans began to arrive, settling in Los Angeles and San Francisco. A considerable number of Russian Baptists and Pentecostals also settled in the state. Even today the city has an area entitled "Russian Hill.” By 1917 nearly 50,000 Russians had resettled in California, Oregon, W ashington, and British Columbia. They were soon joined by refugees from the Crimean evacuation of 1920. It is estimated that some 10,000 to 15,000 Russian émigrés settled in the environs of San Francisco in the 1920s. San Francisco boasted a "Russian Literary Art Society,” founded in 1923. As late as 1957 it issued an anthology entitled A t the Golden Gates (U zolotykh vorot). There was a literary circle, first entitled Laborers of the Pen (Truzheniki pera) and later the Pushkin Society, which was chaired by V. P. Anichkov. The city was home to the newspapers Novaya Zarya (New Dawn) and Russkaya zhizn' (Russian Life), and in 1934 The California Alm anac was published there (although printed in Harbin).3 According to the editors, the goal of the publications was both to support local writers and to recognize the contribution of the overall Russian émigré community. Fourteen established writers, most of them non-Californians, contributed brief autobiographies.11 One California writer, Nina Fëdorova, received a $10,000 prize from the Atlantic M onthly for her novel Fam ily (originally written in English and only later translated in Russian), which was part of a trilogy detailing the saga of an émigré fam ily in Harbin. After the Second W orld War, the largest group to arrive was from the Russian com m unity in China, which arrived via Tubabao.
“It included prose works by Pêtr Balakshin, Taisiya Bazhenova, Yury Bratov, Kam illa Daniels, A. Lifant'ev, Aleksandra Mazurova, and V . Peshekhonov-Kamsky, as w ell as verse by Boris Volkov, Natal'ya Dudorova, and Nina Divish. bEkaterina Bakunina, Sergei Gorny, Georgy Grebenshchikov, Vladim ir Iretsky, Veniam in Korsak, Vladim ir Krymov, G alina Kuznetsova, Aleksandra Mazurova, Iosif Matusevich, Mikhail Osorgin-ll'in, Nikolai Otsup, Georgy Peskov, Pavel Tutkovsky, and Yury Fel'zen.
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New York I am in New York, in the fantastically prosaic city o f capitalist automatism, where the aesthetic theory o f Cubism rules in the streets and in the hearts the philosophy o f the dollar. New York impresses me as the m ost perfect expression o f the spirit o f the current age. Lev Trotsky Boris Bakhmetev had been sent by the Russian governm ent to obtain American support in prosecuting W orld W ar I and in 1917 was Russian Ambassador to the United States. He remained in that position until June 1922 and was able to dispense $77,000,000 in U.S. governm ent credits, much of which went to VrangeP’s army.8 Most Russians in America, however, belonged to the industrial proletariat and thus were sympathetic to the "workers’ revolution” in Russia. Russian Jewish arrivals were particularly inclined to hold leftist views. The Justice Department warned the country of the "red menace” and even supplied newspapers with printing plates for headlines reading "W arns Nation of the Red Peril — U.S. Department of Justice Urges Americans to Guard Against Bolshevism Menace.” In 1919 and 1920 the Lusk Committee instituted a search for communists, and the Justice Department conducted raids in which over 5,000 people were arrested. The Justice Department also established a card catalogue of 200,000 radical individuals and organizations. Of those considered most dangerous, 90 percent were aliens. Records show that 249 persons who had arrived from the Russian Empire were deported. Taken by the Army transport ship Buford (christened the "Red Arc”) from Ellis Island to Finland, they crossed the Soviet border on January 19, 1920. In 1921 nativist political groups were able to push the Immigration Quota Act through Congress, severely restricting any spillover of Russians from Western Europe to the United States. Nevertheless, unlike the Russians in France, Russians in Am erica generally preferred to be naturalized. Novyi m ir (The New World) had been founded in 1911. Nikolai Bukharin was an editor in 1916, and another staff member in early 1917 was Lev Trotsky, who spent two months in New York before returning to Russia, possibly thanks to German money. In 1916 the
•Som e 65 form er tsarist ambassadors formed a council that had at its disposal funds deposited by the tsarist government, which w ere estimated at half a billion French francs.
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Socialist Publishing Association, which had founded the paper, refused to accept w ar bond advertisements, and in October 1917 Novyi m il's second-class mailing privileges were withdrawn by the Post Office. In 1918 postal authorities seized a number of copies of the paper and declared still others unmailable under the Espionage Act. On August 15 a disloyalty act was issued forbidding the publication even to receive mail. In 1920 the Lusk Committee had the paper raided and its printing presses were damaged, forcing it out of business. A number of companies refused to hire "Russian Bol'sheviks.” W hile some Russians decided the tim e had come to bring relatives to the United States, others were discouraged by the U.S. political situation and chose to return to Russia. Between 1922 and 1925 over 5.000 Tsarist émigrés made the journey home, either in groups or individually. An American scholar, Jerome Davis, commented on the situation in 1922: The thousands o f disappointed and em bittered Russians who have already le ft our shores are doubtless now acting in m any cases as agents o f hatred, as they go through city, town, and village; they serve to spread the gospel o f enm ity toward Am erica and prejudice large numbers o f the people against our nation. From the m erely selfish standpoint o f international trade, this will prove costly; from the standpoint o f international peace and m utual understanding it is deplorable. On the whole, pre-1917 Russian emigrants were a poorly educated group, and in this respect the eastern seaboard contingent was several rungs lower on the social ladder than Russians resident in San Francisco. O f the estimated half million (a very rough appraisal) Russians living in North America, the majority were supposedly miners. New York City was home to about 60,000, characterized by the New York Times as "true Russians, not Jews or Lithuanians.” They were joined by another 6,000 after the conclusion of the Russian civil war, many of whom settled in East Harlem. In 1917 the United Russian Organizations in Am erica attempted to bring together the 30 different émigré associations. By 1918 their number had increased to 40, with 15.000 members. The émigré historian Ivan Okuntsov commented that one could meet Russians from the post-war emigration in the New York Public Library, but not from the pre-war "peasant” emigration, which did not read much and evidently included a large number of alcoholics. One American scholar commented that the prohibition am endm ent had "brought a change in the recreational life of many Russians.” There was considerably less political divisiveness than in the Paris émigré community, and the literature written and read by Russians in New York tended to be fairly naive and moralistic. Nevertheless, it is remarkable that between 1923 and 1930 more than
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2,000 émigré publications appeared in North America. Newspapers were estimated to have a combined print run of 25,000 copies. But many of these publications were created by post-1917 exiles whose cultural level was vastly higher than that of their pre-1917 fellowcountrymen. In 1918 the Literary Fund (Literaturnyi fond) was founded, a cultural organization which still exists to arrange cultural events and raise money to help needy Russian writers. The Circle of Proletarian W riters in North America operated out of New York and in 1924 published an almanac whose title — Captive to Skyscrapers (V plenu neboskrêbov) — graphically illustrated the mood of a Russian peasantry abruptly transform ed into the industrial working class. An almanac issued by the same group, undated but evidently published in 1922, stated that all proceeds from the sale of the 35$ publication would be donated to feed the hungry in the Soviet Union. The lead1story tells of a Russian peasant who had lost the money he had saved to buy a cow, but had been given back his money by a sim ple peasant woman who herself was in need. The only thread linking the story to the United States is the fact that the author, Sergei Manenkov, wrote it in New York. A second story, by Aleksandr Sokolovsky, involves an accidental meeting between a Russian man and woman in New York. The woman, who realizes she made a terrible mistake in joining V rangel's army, learns from the man that her fiancé, who had been in the Red Army, committed suicide after he was told she had married another man.a By the mid-1920s Russian New York had grown considerably, but cultural activities were not on the level of many European cities. In 1936 the Society of Admirers of Russian Belles-Lettres sponsored a lecture by the literary scholar Boris Brazol’ on the deep meaning for Russians of a long poem by Georgy Golokhvastov, entitled The Doom o f Atlantis. Golokhvastov himself founded the Arts and Literary Society in New York. Evidently the largest cultural organization in New York (300 members), the Russian Literary and Artistic Society in Am erica was chaired by the poet Lev Kamyshnikov. The form er priest turned Church critic Sergei Gusev (pseudonym: Gusev-Orenburgsky, 1867-1963) arrived in New York by way of China and then Japan. In New York he founded the magazine
•Although the Russian language of the alm anac is correct, the dedication contains a serious grammatical error: Rossie, svetonositse i stradalitse, posvyashchaem ètu knigu. O ther contributors to the alm anac w ere: A. Sanderov, Vladim ir ll'in, V . Karpuk, and David Yuzhanin.
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Z hizn' (Life), of which nine issues appeared in 1924-25, and in 1928 he published a novel entitled Country o f Children. New York was home to the poet, artist, and "father of Futurism” David Burlyuk (1882-1967), who arrived in 1922 after a two-year stay in Japan and hosted Mayakovsky during the latter's 1925 visit. Active in publishing even before emigrating, Burlyuk founded the journal Color and Rhyme, of which 60 issues appeared between 1930 and 1966. Burlyuk served as a bridge between Russian art and Russian literature. In the second half of the 1920s Il'ya Tolstoi, together with Georgy Grebenshchikov, founded a Russian village in Connecticut, not far from New Haven. The village, with its "Tolstoy Lane” and "Russian Village Road,” was named "Churaevka” in honor of Grebenshchikov's novel The Churaevs (Churaevy), which was a best seller among the émigrés and went through eight printings. As many as 4,000 Russians lived in Churaevka, the chief building of which was Grebenshchikov's home. Grebenshchikov established a printing press in his house, which supposedly put out more books during the Second World W ar than any other Russian émigré undertaking. By the mid-1960s the village had ceased to exist as a Russian community. Among the Russian newspapers published in New York in the early 1920s were the daily Novoe russkoe slovo (New Russian Word), the daily Russkii golos (Russian Voice), a union weekly Am erikanskie izvestiya (American News), the "political-economic and literary weekly” Utro (Morning), the religious weekly Nedelya (Week), the CarpathoRussian Golos Rusi (Voice of Rus') and Prikarpatskaya Rus' (Carpathian Russia), and the "democratic” weekly Syn otechestva (Son of the Fatherland).3 Thus it is not surprising that whereas only one or two Russian periodicals appeared in the United States in the early 1860s, by 1917 their number had increased to 24.
•Publishing houses w ere concentrated in New York: Carpatho-Russian Publishers, M. Gurevich, L. M. Kamyshnikov, M aizel', Narodopravstvo, Rabochee knigoizdatel'stvo, Russkoe literaturnoe izdatel’stvo, and Zarnitsa. Working-class Detroit w as home to a publishing house which claimed to represent virtually all the progressive Russian ém igré organizations of the United States and Canada, and there w as also the Chicago Russian Center. Of course, Russian newspapers appeared in other American cities as w ell. For exam ple, Pravda (The Truth) w as published twice weekly in Laska, Pennsylvania. The union paper Golos truzhenika (Voice of the Working Man) and the daily Svobodnaya Rossiya (Free Russia) appeared in Chicago. Chicago had its own cultural society, entitled Prosveshchenie (Enlightenment), which in turn established a literary-dram a group in 1929.
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By 1940, 571,100 U.S. residents indicated their native language was Russian, up from 95,137 in 1910; of these 356,940 were foreign bom. At the same time, the pressure to assim ilate into American life and the total cessation of emigration from Russia was radically undermining the vitality of the émigré community, and the number of newspapers and magazines began to decline after about 1923. Unlike in France, citizenship was accepted without a sense of guilt over betraying Russia.
Athens To happy convents, bosom 'd deep in vines, Where slum ber abbots purple as their wines. Alexander Pope 4
The Christianization of the East Slavs in the tenth century from Byzantium led to a long-standing Russian presence in Greece. The Russian Monastery on Mount Athos was founded sometime before 1016 and still contains some 10,000 manuscripts in its library. It was only natural, even inevitable, that the Russian Church would w ant to remain in contact with its source. In the 19th century the monk Semên Vesnin (1814-53) made a five-year pilgrimage to Mount Athos (1843-47) and then returned for another visit in 1851. Vesnin began by writing humorous verse, and later switched to religious poetry, and also composed a history of Russian monks on Mount Athos and travel memoirs. Gogol' was so taken with Vesnin that he wanted to travel to Mount Athos with him. Perhaps 3,000 Russians found themselves in Greece after the Crimean evacuations. Kovalevsky estimates their number at 1,659 as of 1930. The Soviet political scientist Vadim Belov indicated 4,000, citing unnamed "official sources.” At one point, the historian Georgy Vernadsky wrote a letter to the First-W ave editor Aleksandr Yashchenko, in which he asked for assistance for the tiny Athens Russian Student Union.
Tokyo A nd the epitaph drear: "A fool lies here Who tried to hustle the E ast.” Rudyard Kipling Despite the proxim ity of Japan to the Russian border, the number of Russians in the island empire has never been large. Three years before Russians reached the Pacific in 1638, the Tokugawa
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Shogunate Issued an edict prohibiting its citizens from travelling abroad, or from returning to Japan if they chose to violate the edict. Japan's isolation was so extreme that even foreign ships were driven away — a policy which was slightly relaxed in 1842, and especially after the application of gunboat diplomacy by American Commodore Matthew C. Perry in 1853. Although Japan had form erly outlawed Christianity and even executed a number of Christian missionaries, it did agree to perm it a revival of such activities out of fear of Western intervention. In 1860 The Russian Orthodox church made use of this opportunity to send a 24-year old priest — Father Nikolai Kasatkin — to convert the Japanese. By the tim e of his death in 1912, Kasatkin left behind a heritage of 35,000 believers, over 200 churches, and 35 Japanese priests. His activities were chiefly those of a missionary, and any claim that he was there to serve the diplomatic community was a pure fabrication. The few Russian businessmen residing in Japan in 1917 were only briefly joined by Russians fleeing the events back home and in transit to other countries. Nevertheless, there were enough Russians in Japan to create a literature and arts circle in the 1930s, which published an irregularly appearing collection devoted to the culture of the peoples of the Orient. The group was ostensibly established to build a bridge between Russian and Japanese culture, but it had to be very circum spect in political matters. It even had a clause in its bylaws to the effect that anyone engaging in political discussions would be expelled from membership. Russian books were published in Tokyo by Akkord (later renamed Sputnik, meaning "Fellow Traveller”) and Mir (Peace), and there was a Russian bookstore in Taisiudoo. The Russian émigré philosopher Lev Shestov became a minor cult figure among Japanese intellectuals. The painter and artist David Burlyuk, who lived briefly in Japan, founded "Marusya's Press,” named in honor of his w ife Mariya, and in 1921 published his own book Climbing FujiSan in Yokohoma.
Sydney/Melbourne Russia's pre-1917 emigration included a contingent in Australia, and the initial reaction in that country to the 1917 October coup was one of elation. These were working-class people who were organized in the "Russian W orkers' Association.” Russian emigrants in Brisbane prom ptly christened their organization the "Australian Soviet.” Artêm Sergeev, a political activist who had been exiled to Siberia and escaped to Australia, established a circulating library of proletarian literature and conducted classes on marxist ideas before returning to Russia. Sergeev founded the newspaper The Australian Echo, which
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was shut down by the government, reissued it as The Worker's Life, also banned, and then brought it out again under still another title. The paper's general line was clearly stated: "Follow the Russian example and emancipate yourself in Australia.” The Australian governm ent's response was to refuse to accept the credentials of the first Soviet council and to deport the more politically activist Russian immigrants back to the Soviet Russia which they supported so enthusiastically.
Other Locations He that travels far from his own fam ily has far to travel. Petronius, Satyricon In addition to the countries mentioned above, therç were small communities of Russian émigrés in Austria, the free city of Danzig, Denmark, Egypt (1920-22), Holland, Hungary, Spain, and Syria, as well as a scattering of Russians in India and Africa (Russian sailors in VrangeC’s evacuation fleet ended up in Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia, and a number of them joined the French Foreign Legion). The Soviet scholar Vadim Belov gives a figure of 7,000 in all, citing unnamed "official sources.”
The Nansen Certificate He which hath no stomach to this fight, Let him depart; his passport shall be made, A nd crowns for convoy p u t into his purse ... Shakespeare, King Henry V The number of stateless Russian emigrants scattered over Europe after the conclusion of the Russian civil war presented an enormous adm inistrative problem to the countries involved. The German government, for example, refused to recognize the Soviet governm ent until the treaty of Rapallo was signed on April 16, 1922. Sim ilar policies were pursued by virtually all other European countries. Thus, the émigrés had no government to represent them. On December 15, 1921, the "All-Russian Central Executive Committee” declared stateless all persons who had spent longer than five years abroad and who had no Soviet identification papers issued by June 1, 1922.
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A t an August 22,1921, international conference in Geneva® the Norwegian Polar explorer Fridtjof Nansen was appointed High Com missioner for Affairs of Russian Refugees, who were then issued the so-called "Nansen Certificate” (commonly called the "Nansen Passport”), recognized by 50 governments within the next six years. The Certificate granted political refugee status to émigrés from the Soviet Union and served as an international travel document. It did not, however, resolve the question of citizenship or even the right to work. Still, it did provide a legal basis for residency and travel and saved many refugees from forced repatriation to the Soviet Union. In France, 60,000 Russians held Nansen Certificates, but in Germany the docum ent was never really widely used because of the availability of Soviet and non-Soviet Russian passports.
The Publishing Marketplace O f making books there is no end. Old Testament, Ecclesiastes " W hat is the use o f a book, * thought Alice, " without pictures o r conversation?” Lewis Carroll The sheer number of Russian-language publications appearing abroad was in itself eloquent testimony to a vibrant culture. Lyudmila Foster's Bibliography o f Russian Émigré Literature, 1918-1968 fills 1,389 pages and contains some 17,000 items.6 The major émigré newspapers were Poslednie novosti (The Latest News) — with daily sales of up to 40,000 copies, and Vozrozhdenie (The Renaissance), both published in Paris. In political
•The following countries w ere represented: Bulgaria, China, Finland, France, G reece, Poland, Romania, Serbia-Croatia-Slovenia (East), Switzerland, and Czechoslovakia. b575 literary m agazines and anthologies, 37 almanacs, and collections of poetry, 1,080 novels, 636 collections of short stories, 1,024 verse collections of individual authors, 202 plays, 87 separately published volumes of literary memoirs, plus 260 other memoirs published in magazines and almanacs. Under the heading Historical Mem oirs there are listed 15 collections, 119 separate editions, and 160 articles. One of the collections, Archive of the Russian Revolution, contains 23 volumes. In 1929 V . A. Rozenberg compiled a partial list of Russian émigré periodicals according to the year in which they w ere founded; the peak years w ere 1920-22.
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terms, Poslednie novosti, edited by Pavel Milyukov, was the "liberal” newspaper which supported the Cadets, while Abram Gukasov's Vozrozhdenie was more to the right.® Two sm aller Parisian papers were the weekly D ni (Days), created by the form er head of the Provisional Government, Aleksandr Kerensky, in 1928, when the Berlin daily with the same name folded, and Obshchee delo (Common Cause), edited by Vladim ir Burtsev. The chief newspapers outside Paris were R ul' (The Helm, published by the Cadets in Berlin) and Segodnya (Today, published in Riga). Each of these publications had its own particular political sympathies and corresponding "editorial line.” For example, both Poslednie novosti and Vozrozhdenie, while agreeing that the Bol'shevik coup had been a tragedy for Russia, held to quite different views as to the cause of the revolution. Poslednie novostfs line was that the "obstinate conservatives" were to blame; readers of Vozrozhdenie, on the other hand, were presented with a quite different villain — the "indecisive liberals.” So many newspapers were put out by the Russian émigrés in those years that the then émigré Viktor Shklovsky joked that no one had thought to bring out a newspaper for the monkey in the Berlin Zoo. A time-honored type of publication in Russia is the so-called "thick” journal, which combines politics, history, and culture — particularly literature. The tradition goes back to the 19th century, when educated people lived on their country estates, separated from each other by great distances. Reading became then and remained one of the most popular Russian pastimes (even though the significance of the printed word is rapidly declining in post-Soviet Russia). The most im portant "thick journal” in the émigré world was Sovremennye zapiski (Contemporary Annals), which was founded in 1920 by Social Revolutionary politicians with money from the Czechoslovak governm ent under an agreem ent negotiated by Aleksandr Kerensky with the Czech Minister of Foreign Affairs, Eduard BeneS. Later, after being moved to Paris, it was sponsored in large measure by the wealthy Russian émigré ll'ya Fondaminsky, and also by Mikhail Tsetlin (pseudonym: Amari), who edited the poetry section. The editorship of Sovremennye zapiski was collective, consisting of the Social Revolutionaries Nikolai Avksent'ev, Fondaminsky himself, Vadim Rudnev, and Mark Vishnyak. Later, they were joined by Aleksandr Gukovsky. It is remarkable that a journal edited by public activists and politicians became the chief émigré
•Num erous writers w ere published in Vozrozhdenie, among them Vladim ir Amfiteatrov, Sergei Makovsky, Pavel Muratov, Ivan Shm elêv, ll'ya Surguchêv, Tèffi, Boris Zaitsev, and Vladislav Khodasevich.
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publication in the area of belles lettres and literary criticism and history. Sovremennye zapiski was open to virtually all groups, although "younger” writers often experienced difficulty getting published in it in the early years. A list of all the writers who contributed to Sovremennye zapiski would take up pages. Vladislav Khodasevich calculated that in the first 12 years of its existence it produced 25,000 pages of printed material. Although the journal can be faulted for fielding essentially the same names during the two decades of its existence, Milyukov was correct when he wrote that Sovremennye zapiski was the living history of the Russian emigration. Russkie zapiski (Russian Annals) appeared as a second "thick journal” in 1937 under the editorship of Pavel Milyukov. An earlier journal, Russkaya m ysl' (Russian Thought), appeared somewhat irregularly from 1921 to 1924. At various times its editorial offices were located in Sofia, Prague, and Berlin. Volya Rossii (Russia's Will), which started out as a daily newspaper in Prague was shut down in 1921, reopened in 1922 and survived until 1932.a Like Sovremennye zapiski, it was financed by the Czechoslovak government. In time, these subsidies began to shrink, and in 1927 the editorial offices were moved to Paris, but the publication closed in 1932, partly because many felt it to be "leftist” and not sufficiently anti-Soviet, but mainly due to financial difficulties. The bulkiest émigré magazine, and the one with the largest circulation, was lllyustrirovannaya Rossiya (Illustrated Russia), which appeared first bi-weekly and then weekly and celebrated its 500th issue in 1935, creating an im portant milestone in émigré publishing.1» On the whole, Berlin was the chief center for book publishing in the early 1920s, while Paris was more important for periodicals. On the eve of W orld W ar I book publishing in Russia had been very well developed, but that conflict, combined with the Russian civil war, dealt a disastrous blow to the trade. The Moscow book store Knizhnaya lavka pisatelya (W riters’ Bookshop) began selling manuscripts in October 1920, and by April of the following year was offering an accumulated 220 items for sale! NEP (1921-28) led to the creation of numerous publishing houses. By the spring of 1922 there were 337
•Editors: Vyacheslav Lebedev, Mark Slonim, Vasily Sukhomlin, and — later — Evsei Stalinsky. bSom e other publications w ere Gryadushchaya Rossiya (Russia of the Future, founding editors: M ark Aldanov, V . A. Anri, Nikolai Chaikovsky, and Aleksei Tolstoi) — Paris; Vêrsty (Miles) — Paris; Spotokhi (Northern Lights) — Berlin; Zhar-pHtsa (The Fire Bird) — Paris-Berlin; Zveno (The Link) — Paris; and Chasovoi (Sentinel) — Brussels.
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publishing houses in Moscow and 83 in Petrograd, many of which printed the works of émigré authors. Nevertheless, skepticism about the Bol’sheviks’ ultimate intentions combined with free-wheeling commercial conditions in Berlin led many of the new publishers to hedge their bets by keeping one foot in the East and another in the W est. When Germany initiated true currency reform in 1924, publishers in Berlin found themselves losing money, and they began either to move away or to go bankrupt. In addition to the books published by the émigrés for themselves and for circulation in the U.S.S.R., a great many of their publications were translated into foreign languages. In 1921 alone, 246 émigré works were translated into English, 168 into German, and 103 into French. This was particularly crucial since the émigré market was so limited that it was virtually impossible to live on royalties w ithout the income from translations. Jewish participation in book publishing was exceptionally high. The editor Iosif Gessen claimed that the budget of the League of Russian Jews was several times larger than those of all the other Russian social organizations taken together. According to another contemporary, Isaak Levitan, most of the book publishers and booksellers were Jewish.8 The prominence of Jews in both the late tsarist and the Soviet press was particularly resented among the Russian émigrés. Vasily Shul'gin, for example, who produced a book entitled W hat We D o n t Like About Them (Chto nam v nikh ne nravitsya) and openly called himself an anti-Semite, laid the heaviest blame on Jewish journalists for destroying the old Russia. Zinovy Grzhebin (1877-1929) had studied art in Munich and Paris from 1899 to 1905. He came back to Russia with the idea of creating an art magazine entitled M ir iskusstva (World of Art). He became a successful publisher, but chose to leave Russia again in 1921, moving his publishing operations first to Stockholm and then to Berlin, and later to Paris. Meanwhile Gor'ky had conceived a grandiose plan for a governm ent publishing house, Vsemirnaya literatura (World Literature), but book publishing in Russia had fallen upon desperate times. There was no paper, printing press equipment was not to be had, and skilled employees had been lost during the world war and the following civil
•In Berlin alone Levitan lists such publishing houses as Z. I. Grzhebin, S. E. Èfron, A. È. Kogan, Zal'tsm an, Slovo (W ord), Logos, Petropolis and Obelisk (Yakov Blokh and Abram Kagan), Gelikon, Èpokha, Obrazovanie (Education), Ogon'ki (Lights), Mysl' (Thought), Grani (Facets), and Rossika; he adds that the list is only a partial one, compiled from memory.
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war. It was at this point that Grzhebin proposed to publish books in the W est on order from the Soviet government. The contract was for cost plus 5 percent. Gor'ky enthusiastically supported the proposal, but the very idea of subsidizing a capitalist publisher to service the young com m unist state met with furious opposition, especially since some of the books were not to the authorities’ liking. To make matters worse, Gor'ky again went abroad in 1921 and came to be regarded by many in the governm ent as an émigré and thus an enemy. Pravda published an article, signed by "A Communist W orker,” accusing Grzhebin of being a counterrevolutionary. Grzhebin attempted to sue the author, but Pravda refused to reveal his identity, and Lenin's personal papers them selves carried a reminder that "Grzhebin's counterrevolutionary publishing house should be destroyed.” Grzhebin, whom the Soviet authorities had permitted to take what must have been a fairly large amount of money out of Russia with him, signed a sizeable contract in June 1922 to publish a number of titles with the promise of firm orders from the Soviet government for resale in Russia. He invested his own funds and those of his brother and was planning a general investment of several million marks, but in February 1924 the Soviet government abruptly blacklisted émigré publishers, and their books could not be imported to Russia. Even G or'ky’s and Khodasevich's literary and scholarly journal Beseda (Conversation) was eventually outlawed. To add to Grzhebin's misery, the monarchist newspaper Russkaya gazeta (Russian Newspaper) published an anonymous article accusing him of being a communist agent. Some writers stood up for Grzhebin, but the validity of the accusation remained an open question in many people's minds. When Moscow reneged on the book contract, Grzhebin sued the Soviet Trade Offices in Berlin in arbitration court and won $15,000 plus expenses, but collecting the money proved harder than winning a judgm ent. Unable to pay his bills, the form erly wealthy Grzhebin was evicted from his apartm ent and threatened with deportation from France if he did not pay his taxes. Frantic, Grzhebin wrote to Gor'ky in Sorrento: I had counted on Gosizdat so much and was so confident that this now makes me despair. What do they want from m e? Why are they attacking me on ali sides? What have I done to them? I am totally dismayed. But time is passing, I have less and less strength, and there is no ray o f hope. I haven't the faintest idea what I am to do now. I've invested a ll m y m oney in the firm, gotten into debt, and the books are not selling. Some consider me to be a counterrevolutionary and others a Bol'shevik mercenary. I'd love to send them all to the devil. If only they would le t me ge t on with m y beloved book publishing ...
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Grzhebin had been a firm friend of Gor'ky's for years, and in 1919 Gor'ky had made a form al present to him of the exclusive rights to 20 selected works, but in 1928 the Soviet publishing house Gosizdat announced these particular works for publication as part of Gor'ky's collected works — without Grzhebin's permission. Desperate, Grzhebin wrote to Gor'ky asking to be paid his share of the royalties. He and Gor'ky had had a falling out in 1934, and Gor'ky claimed that he had granted Grzhebin only temporary rights. Nevertheless, he paid Grzhebin the $4,000 which his form er friend said he would settle for, but the strain proved too much for the exhausted publisher. He died in Paris of a heart attack before receiving all the money.
Philosophers and Essayists B ut a ll be that he was a philosopher, Yet had he but little g o ld 'in coffer. Geoffrey Chaucer Some of the lasting contributions made by the ém igré community can be found in the areas of philosophy, essay-writing, and literary criticism — areas which suffered even greater constraints under the burgeoning Soviet censorship than did belles-lettres. It was only beyond Stalin's reach that Russians could debate the "Russian idea,” the Christian unity of Europe and Russia, Russia's purported innate inclination toward despotism, the notion of a state based on law, the crisis of the Russian national character, and literature as a means of self-knowledge. And only outside Russia’s borders could they castigate the utilitarianism inherited from 19th-century thinkers. Despite the liberalization of the NEP period, launched in 1921, the Soviet governm ent deported a large group of scholars and intellectuals in 1922. Expecting to be met by a group of Russian émigrés, they appointed the philosopher Nikolai Berdyaev to give a speech to the welcoming committee. On disembarking in Stettin, they lined up, but no one appeared to meet them. The following day the Riga newspaper R ul’ commented on the arrival of the "deported Bol'shevik professors.” Evidently it was Trotsky who made the decision to deport them, in part because he feared their activities in the AllRussian Committee To Aid the Hungry, formed in 1921, would develop into a real political force.a In an interview granted to John Reed's wife,
•Vserossiiskii komitet pomoshchi golodayushchim (P O M G O L). According to Osorgin, all members of the committee w ere to have been shot, but Nansen intervened on their behalf.
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he characterized the persons selected for deportation as "worthless,” but also claimed that he wanted to prevent them from being shot in the event of a m ilitary crisis — a fate which would undoubtedly have befallen them even without any such emergency. According to one Soviet scholar, however, the deportation plan was worked out personally by Lenin. The group included a number of thinkers whose views could be characterized as philosophical idealism and who had spent considerable tim e in Western Europe before 1917. Among them were Semên Frank (1877-1938), Ivan ll'in (1882-1954), who called for the resistance to evil by force in his Russkii kolokol (The Russian Bell), and Boris Vysheslavtsev (1877-1954). Im portant philosophical studies were also undertaken by Nikolai Lossky (1870-1965), Lev Karsavin (1882-1952), Fêdor Stepun (1884-1965), and Vasily Zen’kovsky (1881-1962). The best known of the group was Nikolai Berdyaev (1874-1948), whose views underwent a number of transform ations. As a young man, he became enamored of Marxism, and was imprisoned and sent into internal exile by the old regime. Before being deported, he was personally interrogated by the fearsom e Feliks Dzerzhinsky and was forced to sign a statem ent recognizing that he would be shot if he attempted to reenter the country.3 His dismay at finding himself cast out of his native country was one shared by other Russians abroad: I brought with me an eschatological sense o f the fates o f history ... thoughts born in the catastrophe o f the Russian revolution, in the finiteness and fearful lim itlessness (zapredel'nosf) o f Russian communism, which posed a problem to which Christianity found no answer.... I brought a consciousness o f the conflict between the personality and world harmony, between individual and communal [values], a conflict unresolved within the confines o f history. As an exile Berdyaev revived his Free Academy of Spiritual Culture, and was the editor of both the Slavophile religious journal P ut' (Path) and the YMCA Press and tem porarily moved in the direction of Kantian idealism. About 1908 these newer views were supplanted by Russian Orthodoxy. Still another metamorphosis ensued after the German invasion of the Soviet Union, when he perceived the Stalinist
•The interrogation took place across a polar-bear rug in Dzerzhinsky’s office, after which Berdyaev was released by his oddly gracious host. Dzerzhinsky expressed concern that there w ere a lot of thieves about and had Berdyaev driven home on a motorcycle.
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system as representing the salvation of Russia. Despite these changes, Berdyaev remained a consistent exponent of Christian personalism, existential freedom, and creativity. He was engrossed by the role of the Russian intelligentsia, which he perceived as a deeply Russian phenomenon, in contrast to Georgy Florovsky, who believed that the very rootlessness of the intelligentsia had brought down the old order. When the war was over, Berdyaev once more turned against the Soviet regime. Throughout his life he published prolifically (some 30 books and a large number of articles) and eventually died at his desk. Like Berdyaev, Sergei Bulgakov (1871-1944) moved from Marxism to idealism, to Russian Orthodoxy, to strong anti-German feelings during W orld W ar II. He had studied in Berlin, Paris, and London in 1898-1900, was anointed into the priesthood in 1918, and was one of those deported in 1922. In Prague he helped organize the "Brotherhood of Saint Sofia,” and as of 1925 he was Professor and Dean of the Theological Seminary in Paris. In 1935 the Synod of Bishops of the Russian Church Outside Russia found him guilty of heresy — an opinion with which Metropolitan Sergy in Moscow agreed. Since, however, Bulgakov had broken with the Russian Church and subordinated himself to the Patriarch of Constantinople, the judgm ent had no practical consequences for him. Bulgakov wrote extensively about Dostoevsky and was opposed to "positivist self-reliance.” "Lev Shestov” was the penname of leguda Leib Shvartsman (1866-1938), the son of a wealthy dry goods wholesaler in Kiev. Shestov's father was an early participant in the Zionist movement, but Shestov him self was a true citizen of the world. He was close not only to fellow émigré philosophers such as Berdyaev and Bulgakov, but also to Kierkegaard, Buber, and Husserl. Shestov had studied in Berlin for one sem ester and lived mostly abroad from 1896 to 1914. In 1898 he published Shakespeare and His Critic Brandes, a work which did not attract much attention. However, his second book, G ood in the Teachings o f Tolstoi and Nietzsche (1900), in which he sided more with Nietszche than Tolstoi, was widely debated. Although Shestov never failed to protest against the frequent accusations of cynicism and skepticism directed against him, he definitely liked to shock readers with his unorthodox evaluations and analysis. His Apotheosis o f Groundlessness (1905) was a collection of aphorisms that clearly showed the antipositivistic, antirationalistic, and antim aterialistic position he was to champion in later life. Another intentional shocker was his 1905 essay on Chekhov entitled "Creation from the Void,” in which he attacked the traditional view of Chekhov as a humanist. Chekhov, he maintained, was a bard of the irrational, a sadist who relished destroying the last vestiges of hope.
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In 1914 Shestov returned home, and later witnessed the burning of the fam ily's warehouse during the Civil War. It was an especially difficult tim e for Jews, who were accused of having destroyed Russia by organizing sedition, and there were vicious pogroms in Kiev before the Reds took over the city. In January 1920 Shestov managed to obtain a number of falsified documents which perm itted him to leave the country, along with 12 fam ily members, on a French ship travelling from Sevastopol' to Istanbul. Fortunately, the fam ily possessed property outside Russia. Upon arriving abroad, Shestov estimated that there were sufficient funds to perm it the 17 members of the fam ily who eventually managed to escape "to exist modestly for 8 to 10 years” and was thus able to allow himself the luxury of continuing to engage in philosophy and criticism. In W estern Europe Shestov expanded his intellectual horizon still further, publishing Potestas Clavium (Berlin, 1923) and In Job's Balances (Berlin, 1929). One brochure written by him, W hat Is Russian Bolshevism ?, was printed, but never read, because the entire edition was burned by a fellow émigré writer, Evgeny Lundberg, who returned to Russia in 1924. Several of Shestov's books appeared posthumously, among them : Kierkegaard and Existential Philosophy (Paris, 1939) and Athens and Jerusalem (Paris, 1951). One of these posthumous publications was devoted to another Russian expatriate — Ivan Turgenev. Not surprisingly, Shestov fell out with Gippius and Merezhkovsky over the latter's pro-fascist views. Dmitry Filosofov (1872-1940) was an interesting, albeit far less prominent, thinker who had begun his career as an art critic, but then shifted to religious and philosophical topics. Even before 1917, he had collaborated with Merezhkovsky and Gippius and in 1904 became editor of N ovyi p u t' (The New Path). A proponent of "religious-social values,” he was hostile to the new Soviet government and settled in W arsaw in 1920, contributing articles to Za svobodul and Mech. Georgy Fedotov (1886-1951) was an eloquent historian, essayist, and religious thinker, whose major work was the two-volume The Russian Religious Mind. In 1935 Fedotov published an im portant article on the fate and mission of the Russian emigration, rejecting the notion that Russians had committed some original sin that doomed them to live out their lives in idleness abroad, although he conceded that the émigrés found it difficult to "comprehend the truth of exile.” Exile, he wrote, was a "feat,” a "creative act,” in which the electrician still saw him self as a corporal, the cab driver as a colonel, but herein lay the moral danger of placing one's hopes in a general war in which the form er Gallipoleans would end up fighting each other. The émigrés, he agonized, had been alienated from the old intelligentsia by the jealous cult of their own sufferings, while back in Russia they were
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regarded, not as exiles, but as deserters who had declined to drink from the common cup of the people's grief. Ultimately, it was culture that supplied moral justification: Perhaps no emigration in history has received such a pow erful mandate from the nation — to be the bearer o f culture.... We are here, abroad, to serve as the voice o f all those who rem ain silent there, to reestablish the polyphonic wholeness o f the Russian spirit. While not pretending to drown out the revolutionary roar o f building and destruction, we can preserve that which is deepest and m ost precious in the experience o f the revolutionary generation, and will im part this experience to the future. We can become the living link between yesterday's and today's Russia. Another of the scholar-deportees was Semên Frank (18771950), who had become interested in Marxism in the 1890s. After participating in student disturbances, he was denied permission to live in Moscow for two years and went abroad from 1899 to 1901, where he rather quickly adopted a conservative religious position, which he maintained for the rest of his life. In Berlin he gave lectures at the Russian Institute of Science and Scholarship, and after it was moved to Paris in 1924, was appointed dean in the last year of its existence (1931). In Germany he was influenced by the thinking of Martin Buber and came to advocate a Platonic, pantheistic mysticism, consistently maintaining the unknowability of the universe. He viewed the 1917 October coup as a crisis of Russian spirituality. The Nazis were not impressed by the fact that Frank, a Jew, had been baptized an Orthodox Christian and had even written negatively about Judaism. He was denied the right to lecture in Berlin, and in 1937 he finally moved to the south of France, where he was forced to conceal his Jewish ancestry. After the war he moved once more, this tim e to England.
Self-Evaluation: A Mission? Keepers of Culture G reatly unfortunate, he fights the cause O f honor, virtue, liberty and Rome. Joseph Addison The large number of First-Wave émigrés and the prom inent place they had occupied in pre-Soviet Russian society made it inevitable that they could not view themselves as simply an accidental crowd of refugees. Having left Russia behind within a relatively short space of time, often as organized armies, Russians began to search for a meaning in the experience which had overwhelmed them and their country. They had left a Russia basking in its "Silver Age” (a
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coinage of émigré cultural historians), and their sense of loss was greater than the sum of their own personal tragedies. The Russian language itself became a rallying point. The social and economic structures of communist Russia were different than those of tsarist times, and these differences inevitably ushered in linguistic changes. New words appeared, the semantics and stylistics of the language evolved at a dizzying rate, and many verbal items became loaded emotionally and politically. In addition, Russia's new political and economic leaders often were poorly educated or had failed to acquire the distinctive pronunciation of the form er upper classes. Indeed, such mannerisms could even be mortally dangerous in the new "proletarian" culture. The language of the "Sovdepiya” — a derogatory phrase used by many of the émigrés for the Soviet Union — struck the exiles as degraded, as the language of their form er servants. W ithin the exile community itself changes were everywhere. Coming to term s with the realities of life in foreign countries and surrounded by other languages, the émigrés engaged in wholesale foreign borrowing while forging their own linguistic creations and discarding old words and turns of speech — even as the language purists called for strict preservationism. W riters were left confused and at a loss as to how to write. The humorous writer Nadezhda Buchinskaya, who wrote under the pseudonym Tèffi, complained that the literary language was "ugly, because it is dead.” As the original hope of a speedy return home began to fade, it was replaced by the conviction that the very existence of Russian culture was threatened. The exiles came to see themselves as bearing high a torch, as transcending their tim e and surveying Russian culture in broad historical terms. How were they to relate to Russian culture in general and literature in particular? It is a problem faced by virtually any w riter who has left his or her native land, and few possess the self-confidence of a Thomas Mann, who declared "Wo ich bin, ist die deutsche Kultur” (W herever I a m — that is where German culture is), or Karl W olfskehl, who maintained that the German "spirit" (Geist) was with him always. In the words of Alfred Polgar, "Die Fremde is nicht Heimat geworden. Aber die Heimat Fremde” (“A foreign country has not been transform ed into homeland, but the homeland has become alien”). Echoing a phrase of Vladislav Khodasevich, Roman Gul' stressed the portability of culture in the title of his trilogy / Took Russia With Me. The idea was especially popular among the émigrés: One o f the m ajor Jacobins (Danton, it seems), while still in power, said o f the French émigrés: "you can't take your hom eland aw ay with you on the soles o f your shoes.” This is true — but only o f those who possess nothing but the soles o f their shoes. M any French émigrés such as Châteaubriand, the
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Duc d'Enghien, Richelieu, and others presen/ed the m emories o f their hearts and souls and m anaged to bear France aw ay with them. And if the outcast took his homeland with him, it was his sacred obligation to serve it in exile. On February 16,1924, Ivan Bunin gave a speech on the mission of the Russian exile community. Bunin wrote that the overwhelming majority of the émigrés had left Russia involuntarily, and thus were not émigrés, but exiles, and that the tim e had come to recognize the "mission” of the émigrés — to remain faithful to an oppressed Mother Russia, crushed by a satanic Lenin: This abomination, the congenital m oral idiot Lenin, revealed to the world som ething m onstrous and frightening in his activities: he im poverished the greatest country in the world and m urdered several m illion people. Even so, the world has become so insane that people now argue whether o r no t he was a benefactor o f mankind. He crouched on a ll fours on his red throne; when British photographers were taking his picture, he kept sticking out his tongue: and people argue that this m eans nothing! Semashko [a prom inent Soviet official] him self blurted out for everyone to hear that in the skull o f the new Nebuchadnezzar they found nothing but green slime instead o f a brain; the newspapers write that he lay in his red coffin with the m ost terrible grim ace on his yellow-gray face: that m eans nothing, they argue! A nd his coworkers have no reluctance to write: "A new god has died, the creator o f a N ew World, the D em iurgeF ... W ithout doubt, God's anger will strike a ll this down; it has always been this way. "/ shall arise against you, Tyre and Sidon, and cast you into the depths o f the sea...." Fire and brim stone will fall on Sodom, Gomorrah, and a ll these Leningrads, while Zion, God's city o f Peace, w ill stand through the ages. B ut what is a Russian em igrant to do now, on this day, and in this hour? The mission o f the Russian émigré com m u nity... is to dem onstrate that in conscience it will not be frightened into accepting these commandments o f Lenin. O ur mission demands that we persevere in this non-acceptance*
‘ Despite Bunin's unquestionably unambiguous attitude, the Soviet writer Konstantin Simonov was sent to Paris in 1946 to attem pt to convince Bunin to return to Russia! Curiously, Bunin's hatred for the Soviet Union did not prevent him from maintaining a close friendship with Boris Panteleimonov, an ém igré writer who
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Markov II was even more blunt: In going into battle, do not be dism ayed by the thought that you will be killing other Russians. There is no Russia there, no Russians ... The exiles looked around and saw so many of their acquaintances that they had the impression no one was left back home. Baron Boris Nol'de, an economist and historian, declared in Poslednie novosti: We exist as Russia.... It is not a tiny band o f people grouped around a dead principle overthrown by life, but the flow er o f the nation, a ll those who possessed pow er in life, no m atter how we related to that life. This is not an emigration o f Russians, but an emigration of Russia [emphasis mine: JG]. Nol'de’s view was shared not only by Russian émigrés; French prem ier Clemanceau, for example, declared that "Russia no longer exists.” W ithin the context of this demonization of the Soviet government, the literature of exile was seen by many as the only legitim ate heir to the grand tradition of Russian literature. "We are not exiles,” came the call, "but ambassadors” (My ne v izgnanii, a v poslanii). The remark has been attributed to a number of writers, including Zinaida Gippius. In 1924 she wrote that after early 1918 there were no "writers in Russia, no literature, nothing: just a dark abyss”: The cup o f Russian literature has been flung into Europe, spattering a ll o f Europe. It is here [in Europe] that it should be sought.... No m atter what name comes to m ind — we are a ll here. In keeping with her heady evaluation of the accomplishments of Russian writers in exile, Gippius envisaged a suitably grandiose role for her fellow émigré writers: the preservation of Russian culture, which she perceived as being physically and spiritually destroyed by the Soviet governm ent before the eyes of a naive and indifferent West. The charge was stock and trade for the Russian émigrés throughout the Soviet period. In 1976, to cite but one example, Vladim ir Maksimov voiced the same, virtually permanent complaint of the émigré com m unity — that the Soviet government had been warring with intellectuals ever since the 1917 October coup and that the W est's response has been to "rejoice” that Soviet citizens then had "more sausage and brighter textiles.”
wrote in 1945 that "the dawn of a free life was blazing over the ocean of Russian peasantry." Panteleim onov accepted Soviet citizenship in 1945, but despite this act Bunin when dying went so far as to write that he was joining him in death.
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Russian émigrés were not unique in perceiving a special role for themselves. Polish literature, for example, was largely a literature in exile for a whole century, and many German writers in exile during the Nazi period began to feel that they were the true keepers of the flame. Leopold Schwarzschild maintained that the entire body of German literature had been "transferred” abroad. His words were echoed by Ernst Ottwalt, who stated categorically that the true German literature had emigrated and that the literature of emigration was the German literature. But disagreem ent is the lot of any émigré community, and inevitably another German writer, Eduard Korrodi, assaulted such statem ents as "nonsense.” At a 1927 meeting of the Green Lamp Society the journalist Semên Portugeis (1881-1944, writing under the pseudonym "Stepan Ivanovich”) questioned this sense of mission and meaning of ém igré culture. He felt that the émigrés were being strangled by the lack of contact with Russia proper, that even major writers could4"dry up” in exile, and that memories alone were not enough to sustain a m eaningful tradition. Dovid Knut reacted forcefully to Portugeis's views: W hat difference does it make that the supply o f birchtrees and cuckoo birds is being exhausted? W hat is im portant is that Russian writers have brought out o f Russia som ething quite different, som ething which is no t being squandered but, on the contrary, is gaining strength, growing, enriching itself. Russian people took their souls with them out o f Russia carefully and in good time. ... The time is near when it w ill become clear to everyone that the capital o f Russian literature is not Moscow, bu t Paris. Portugeis was equally categorical in rebutting Knut: I d o n t understand how people can fail to see that m ajor talents have wasted away [after emigrating]. We are told that Paris, and not Moscow, is the capital o f Russian literature. To that I say that literature over there m ay be twenty tim es worse than Parisian literature, but even so the capital o f Russian literature is Moscow. Paris with its m agnificent talents is nevertheless a place o f exile, a cursed place. O nly those who sense with pain the degree to which creative efforts have been narrowed here can be uplifted and only he can struggle for a reconquest o f our homeland. There can be no Russia for those who maintain that their affairs are proceeding nicely and that Paris is the capital o f literature. That w ill be literature written in Russian, but not Russian literature. The Gippius-Knut evaluation of the achievements and role of literature in exile was rejected by Mark Slonim, who wrote that Anna
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Akhmatova, Andrei Bely, Maksmilian Voloshin, Valery Bryusov, Boris Pasternak, Vladim ir Mayakovsky, Sergei Esenin, Osip Mandel’shtam, Isaak Babel', Boris PiPnyak and many other writers had remained in the Soviet Union, and that Russian literature would continue there despite governm ent censorship. Ironically, with the exception of Bryusov, none of these writers was to escape suicide, execution, or enforced silence, and even Bryusov would probably have perished in the purges, had he lived longer. The crisis in émigré letters was clearly coming to a head, noted by the novelist Mark Aldanov, who conceded that emigration did indeed deprive the writer of his "native soil,” but that "slavery was worse.” There were plenty of topics, Aldanov wrote, but recent Soviet life was not one of them. On the other hand, Aidanov's perspective could be viewed as one-sided in that he became a writer of stature only after emigrating. A third view, echoes of which could be heard frequently right up until the collapse of the U.S.S.R., was summed up by ll'ya Bunakov-Fondaminsky, who had been strongly influenced by Eurasians — that the emigration and Russia were connecting vessels united in a religious consciousness which would bring forth a blossoming of creativity among the émigrés and a new holistic world view.
Literature "Older” and "Younger” Generations You are young, m y son, and, as the years go by, time will change and even reverse m any o f your present opinions. Refrain therefore awhile from setting yourself up as a judge o f the highest matters. Plato I know thee not, old m an: fall to thy prayers; How ill white hairs become a fool and je ste r! W illiam Shakespeare W riters who had already established their reputations prior to 1917 came to be referred to as the "older generation” — even though some of them were still relatively young. Among these authors who were already well known back in Russia were Arkady Averchenko, Konstantin Bal'mont, Ivan Bunin, Zinaida Gippius, Vyacheslav Ivanov, Aleksandr Kuprin, Sergei Makovsky, Dmitry Merezhkovsky, Aleksei Remizov, Igor' Severyanin, Ivan Shmelèv, Aleksei Tolstoi, Nadezhda
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Buchinskaya (pseudonym: Tèffi), and Sasha Chëmy. Some of them were among the 161 writers, journalists, and prom inent cultural figures deported in 1922. W riters who established themselves as writers only after em igrating were lumped together as the "younger” generation — again regardless of age.a A few did not belong definitively to either of these categories. For example, Mark Aldanov began his career as an ém igré writer, but he was nevertheless felt to be closer to the “older generation.” The two Georgy's — Ivanov and Adamovich — and the prose w riter Ivan Lukash also did not conform com pletely to this artificial division, but fit more into the older group in the eyes of their contemporaries. Until the late 1920s the older group dom inated the literary scene, with the same names appearing again and again in the magazines and newspapers. Although the appearance abroad o f so many prom inent writers in the early post-revolutionary years created an exhilarating new environment, in tim e stagnation began to replace excitement. In 1929 the critic Mark Slonim agonized that w hile the French revolutionary exiles had laid the groundwork for the literary
•This group w as by far the largest. The following incomplete list gives som e idea of the size of this group and the magnitude of Russia's loss: M ark Levi (M . Ageev), G leb Alekseev, Vadim Andreev, Ekaterina Bakunina, Elena Bazilevskaya, Yury Bek-Sofiev (Yury Sofiev), Nikolai Belotsvetov, Nina Berberova, Raisa Blokh, Ivan Boldyrev, Boris Bozhnev, A. Brailovsky, V era Bulich, Aleksandr Braslavsky (A. Bulkin), Èm iliya Chegrintseva, Mikhail Chekhonin, Lidiya Chervinskaya, Igor' Chinnov, Vladim ir Dikson, Valerian Dryakhlov, Aleksandr Drozdov, Georgy Evangulov, Nikolai Freidenshtein (Yury Fel’zen), Leonid Gansky, Gaito Gazdanov, Karl Gershel'm an, Aleksei Gessen, Aleksandr Ginger, Alla Golovina, Lev Gomolitsky, Mikhail Gorlin, Antonina Grivtsova (A. Gorskaya), Aleksei Gryzov (Aleksei Achair), Nikolai Gronsky, Roman Gul', Yury Ivask, G alina izdebskaya, Lazar' Kel'berin, Aleksei Kholchev, Mikhail Klochkov, Irina Knorring, Dovid Knut, Dmitry Kobyakov, Vladim ir Korvin-Piotrovsky, G alina Kuznetsova, Anatonin Ladinsky, Vyacheslav Lebedev, Veniam in Levin, Ivan Lukash, V era Lur'e, Viktor Mamchenko, Yury Mandel'shtam , Vladim ir Mansvetov, Georgy Matveev, "Mother Mariya" (Elizaveta Kuz'm ina-Karavaeva, née Pilenko), Vadim Morkovin, O. Mozhaiskaya, Vladim ir Nabokov, Arseny Nesmelov, Yury Odarchenko, Yury Ofrosimov (G . Rosimov), Georgy Otsup (Georgy Raevsky), Nikolai Otsup, Georgy Peskov, Boris Poplavsky, Sofiya Pregel', Anna Prismanova, Elena Rubisova, Juhani Savolainen (Ivan Savin), Sergei Sharshun, Zinaida Shakhovskaya, Aglaida Shim anskaya, Sergei Shishmarëv, Vladim ir Sm olensky, Perikl Stavrov, Anatoly Shteiger, Gleb Struve, Boris Taggo (Boris Novosadov), Ekaterina Tauber, Yury Terapiano, Tat'yana Tim asheva, M ariya Tolstaya, M arina Tsvetaeva, Aleksandr Turintsev, Nikolai Turoverov, Vladim ir Varshavsky, Tam ara Velichkovskaya, Anatoly Velichkovsky, Boris Vil'de, Boris Volkov, Irina Yassen, Boris Zakovich, Vladim ir Zlobin, Leonid Zurov, Yakov Tsvibak (Andrei Sedykh).
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movement which was destined to renew French literature and prevail at home, Russia's exiles had failed to produce either theories or works which could serve as such a program. Slonim went on to use the word dozhivanie — living out one's last years — in regard to the established writers, whom he saw as sim ply repeating what they had written before emigrating. He m entioned a contest of younger writers conducted "not so far back” by the journal Volya Rossii (Russia's Will), to which a total of 94 subm issions had been received. Slonim found them "backward,” and said they gave the impression of having been written 25 years earlier, from the standpoint of both subject m atter and style. Nevertheless, he felt that the future of Russian émigré literature was with the younger generation, and he went on in the article to name several of them. Slonim 's article was incisive in many ways, and it was at precisely this point that the "younger generation” began to come to the fore. In 1936 the young novelist Gaito Gazdanov picked up Slonim's argum ent in an article in Sovremennye zapiski. Gazdanov denied that the younger generation of émigré writers (with the exception of Nabokov) had produced anything of lasting value.3 Gazdanov saw this supposed crisis in émigré letters as resulting from a shortage of readers and the absence of a world view or moral structure, and not as the effect of location. Émigré culture in general and literature in particular were sim ply copying past traditions, because they had no "topic.”b With the perspective of tim e we can see that this critical selfevaluation was almost inevitable. The "embarrassment of riches” of the older generation was obvious to all, and it was natural for the younger writers to im itate such recognized literary masters. And when the hope of return began to fade and the younger writers began to perceive them selves as the last doomed bearers of the torch of Russian culture, this striving toward emulation rather than innovation became even
“G azdanov's comments w ere basically to be repeated, only much later, by a representative of a different emigration. W hen Milan Kundera decided not to return to Prague, he wrote a lengthy article for Le Monde, claiming that Czechoslovakia had becom e a cultural desert where everything was stifled. There was an enraged response from his colleagues back home, who felt Kundera was implying that because he had left Czechoslovakia, it meant that now everything else was dead. “»Gazdanov at one point actually requested permission to return to the Soviet Union (a wish he never carried out), stating in a letter to Gor'ky that Russian literary endeavors in the W est w ere useless and unnecessary. Elsewhere, G azdanov w as to claim the real reason for his request was concern for his mother.
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more deeply entrenched. Vladim ir Veidle, for example, wrote of the "poison of modernism” and the "death of art.” The material and literary circumstances of the younger generation were extraordinarily difficult, and their fate was tragic. They arrived in Europe (some in China) without having established a literary reputation in Russia, usually penniless, their education often incomplete, only to learn that the literary magazines gave preference to more established authors. The magazine Chisla (Dates), which was published from 1930 to 1934 and edited by Nikolai Otsup3, was a prom inent exception in this regard. The magazine was welcomed as an outlet for the "younger” generation of writers, but its apolitical content impressed many people unfavorably in the clim ate of the time. Before the founding of Chisla, Volya Rossii (Russia's W ill), which many older writers considered too friendly to the Soviets, was one of the first to allot significant space to younger authors. O ther magazines that devoted special attention to younger writers were Novyi dom (New Home), Vstrechi (Meetings) and Novyi korabl' (New Ship) in Paris, and N ov' (Virgin Soil) in Tallinn. Mikhail Osorgin founded the publishing house Novye pisateli (New W riters) in the early 1930s to help younger writers break into print, while the critic and scholar Al'fred Bern in Prague went out of his way to be helpful to budding writers. In 1925 the League of Young W riters and Poets was founded in Paris to hold readings and even published several collections of verse by its members.6 Three years later Mark Slonim, who was only 34 at the time, helped a group of young writers establish Kochev'e (Nomad's Camp), a literary society whose very name, testified to the younger w riters’ perception of their situation. These young writers soon found themselves in the middle of runaway inflation in Germany, followed in a few years by a worldwide depression. Then came W orld W ar II, and they eagerly joined the fight against communism, only to forfeit their lives. The sense of alienation from their fathers’ generation was still further heightened by a sense of betrayal on the part of many, a conviction that the older generation had "gambled away” Russia while the younger men had been forced to spill their blood futilely on the field of battle. The young exiles studying at the Russian Law School in Prague were particularly
•Otsup, who had originally emigrated to Berlin in 1922 and later moved to Paris, w as an Acmeist poet and one of the most loyal followers of Nikolai Gum ilev, whom he had unsuccessfully attempted to save from execution. bSoyuz molodykh poètov i pisatelei (v Parizhe). Som e members w ere: ll'ya Golenishchev-Kutuzov, Lazar' Kel'berin, Yury Mandel'shtam , (Raevsky), Boris Poplavsky, Yury Sofiev, and Boris Zakovich.
Georgy
Otsup
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em bittered when they realized that they had wasted four years learning a legal system which, contrary to the assurances of their elders, would not be resurrected. From the viewpoint of the exile, Russia could be a very faraway place. In the words of their contemporary Vladim ir Varshavsky, Adamovich's musings on the fate of man, couched in terms of the eternal Russian quarrel between the Slavophiles and the Westernizers, "seemed as distant and incomprehensible as the Wars of the Roses. The im mediate reality was that of loneliness, homelessness, rootlessness.” The sense of futility, perhaps common to the intelligentsia in all countries and all periods, was particularly overwhelm ing for the Russians. In his memoirs Berdyaev speaks of feeling "caught up by primordial, fatal forces,” of feeling "alienated, unneeded, lonely.” It was this sense of remoteness that the newspaper M olodaya Rossiya (Young Russia) was attempting to oppose and dispel when it first appeared in Paris in 1923 under the slogan A ll for RussiaI (Vsê dlya Rossii). A "Eurasian" view of the situation was provided by Semên Portugeis, who commiserated with the young people, pointing out that the image they had of Russia was cloudy, since they never knew her: It is possible to create an ideology that will allow young writers to become Europeans, but they will cease to be Russians. Russian literature is not Russian because it describes birch trees, samovars, and sarafans [peasant sundresses]. It is Russian literature because it expresses specific peculiarities o f the Russian m oral and artistic consciousness. The tragedy is not that young Russians have never seen a sarafan, but that they have not absorbed the basic elements o f Russian life and Russian culture. An unfinished novel by Boris Poplavsky gives a sense of the atm osphere of alienation and self-loathing in which many representatives of the younger generation lived: I had arrived recently and had ju s t now been separated from m y family. I was stoop-shouldered, and m y entire appearance gave o ff the impression o f a sort o f transcendental hum iliation, which clung to me like a skin infection. I wandered around the town, from one acquaintance to another. Im m ediately regretting that I had come but nevertheless staying on, I would keep up m y end o f the émigré conversation with degrading politeness. From time to time the boring half hearted talk would be interrupted by sighs and tea, drunk from badly washed china....
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Dragging m y feet, I le ft m y fam ily; dragging m y thoughts, I le ft God, dignity, and freedom; dragging m y days, I reached the age o f 24. In those years m y clothing was wrinkled and lost its shape a ll by itself, sprinkled with ashes and shreds o f tobacco. I washed rarely and liked to sleep without undressing. I lived in twilight, and in tw ilight I would wake up on a strange, unmade bed. I drank water from a glass that sm elled o f soap and would stare out o f the window for a long time, inhaling the smoke o f a butt discarded by the apartm ent's owner.... But, if you think about it, what had actually happened, other than the fact that a m illion people lost some tasteless Viennese couches, paintings b y unknown artists o f the Dutch school (undoubtedly forged), and featherbeds and m eatpies that lu ll a person hopelessly into a heavy, degrading afterdinner sleep sim ilar to d e a th ? ... Proudly I would step out into the street, the shirt unbuttoned on m y narrow hairless chest, and I would stare a t passers-by with a patronizing, absent, and sleepy gaze. W riters with established reputations supposedly disdained the ragtag crowd which frequented the Café de la Rotonde (which, incidentally, Ivan Turgenev had patronized for his morning cup of coffee). Bunin, for example, looked down his nose at the new magazine Svoim i putyam i (By Our Own Paths): I happened to glance through an issue o f the Prague m agazine Svoimi putyami. These are bad paths, and the level is deplorablel With the exception o f Remizov, the nam es are hardly prom inent: Bolestsis, Krotkov, Rafal'sky, Spinadel', Turintsev, Ginger, Knut, Lutsky, Terapiano, Gazdanov, Dolinsky, Elenev, Tideman, Èfron, etc. True, a ll o f them are people finding their own paths in the new Russian culture; no wonder they use the Bol'shevik orthography. B ut are there really people who have no need for a minimum o f taste, common sense, and a knowledge o f Russian? The older émigrés were still attem pting to hold onto the Russia they had known, and the literature of that Russia was usually understood to be in the realist tradition. Readers generally favored General Pêtr Krasnov and his historical epic From Double-Headed Eagle to Red Banner (OX dvuglavogo orla k krasnomu znameni), which was translated into twelve languages, over experimentation. Krasnov was a political conservative who wrote that ”to be a Russian means to be a Black Hundreds man, a participant in pogroms and surely a monarchist, a restorationist, and an extreme reactionary.”
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Toward the end of the 1920s, Vladislav Khodasevich announced that In the future he intended to devote more of his tim e to "poets of his own generation and stature.” In a classic "fathers and sons” conflict of views, the younger writers often failed to see any relevance for themselves in that tradition. Theirs was a world of dreams and hallucinations, of mirages and feelings, of mysticism and decadence. It was this lonely, alienated condition which gave birth to Nabokov's Invitation to a Beheading, in which the hero's erotic fantasies, fears and hopes, allies and enemies all turn out to be figm ents of his own imagination. But it was precisely in this form that the younger generation found expression. In the 40th issue of Sovremennye zapiski Nina Berberova wrote about Nabokov: A tremendous, mature, sophisticated modem w riter was before m e; a great Russian writer, like a phoenix, was born from the fire and ashes o f revolution and exile. O ur existence from now on acquired a meaning. A ll m y generation was justified. We were saved. Boris Pasternak was a focus of controversy. His early manner, often intentionally complex and highly stylized, was the model for a number of younger poets, but was vehemently rejected by the "neoclassicists.” (After 1940 Pasternak himself steadily moved away from the modernism of his younger days to a more traditionalist mode.) In prose, the influential Georgy Adamovich not only lambasted Nabokov regularly, but himself led a movement heading in the opposite direction, searching for the "eternal themes” of human existence. This was the so-called "Parisian Note.” Often the younger writers did not know or even want to know the Russian tradition from which they them selves sprang. Berberova complained that those who left Russia at an early age had brought virtually nothing with them: Knut had neither studied nor fought; he had helped his father in his produce shop in Kishinëv. Ladinsky had been a White officer. Poplavsky lived with his family. Nabokov le ft with his parents, having published in 1 9 1 7 a collection o f adolescent verse. Sm olensky was evacuated from the south o f Russia. Zlobin, who lived with the Merezhkovskys through the entire revolution, arrived with them in Paris. I m yself appeared as "Khodasevich's w ife,” having published one poem in the Petersburg collection Ushkuiniki (Pirates) in February o f 1 9 2 2 . I did not know if any o f them, aside from myself, had ever been to Moscow. B ut I know that neither Knut nor Sm olensky had ever been to Petersburg. W hether Ladinsky had ever visited the city I d o n t know. Had Knut ever read Lom onosov o r Vyacheslav Ivanov, Veselovsky, o r the Form alists? I doubt it. Certainly Sm olensky had never read them, although he was
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vaguely acquainted with their names. Ladinsky had thrown him self into reading and studying French in the 1930s, when he switched from house painting to being a messenger. A t that tim e Knut read whatever he could lay hands on — usually random books. Sm olensky read alm ost nothing, believing that to do so would only undermine his own uniqueness (even though he was less unique than the others). Once he and I spoke o f Tyutchev, but he did not even want to know about him fo r fear that Tyutchev could impinge upon the totality o f his work and that he would not be strong enough to resist. Poplavsky probably read more than the others — the Dadaists, Verlaine, Apollinaire, Gide. Zlobin m erely ingested the atm osphere o f the M erezhkovsky household. This was a question not only of knowledge, but of relevance. After interviewing Andrei Sedykh in 1982, I asked him if he had any desire to visit Moscow. Sedykh, already an old man but in his youth a member of the so-called "younger generation” of writers, had lived his entire life in the very center of Russian cultural life abroad. He had been Bunin's personal secretary when Bunin received the Nobel Prize. The author of a number of books, he was also the editor of a m ajor publication of Russian émigré culture, the New York daily newspaper Novoe russkoe slovo (New Russian W ord). Sedykh appeared puzzled by the question, but then responded: "I don't know. W hat would I do there? I never travelled outside the Crimea before I em igrated. Going to Moscow would be like going to Peking."
Symbolism ... I behold upon the night's start'd face, Huge cloudy symbols o f a high romance. John Keats Émigré poets in this period can be divided into four basic groups: a) late Symbolists; b) followers of the "Parisian Note”; c) Tsvetaeva and poets who tried to emulate not only her, but also Mayakovsky, the pre-1940 Pasternak, Dadaism, Surrealism, and Apollinaire; d) those who followed Khodasevich's dictum sim ply to write good poetry and not try to fit into any specific model. Symbolism had been the dom inant poetic school in Russia from the 1890s to 1910. As in W estern Europe, it was at first fundam entally an art-for-art's sake movement, but later Symbolists saw them selves more as prophets than as players of aesthetic games. Underlying the philosophy of Symbolism was the Neoplatonic idea of a "higher reality” and Schopenhauer's concept of an ideal inaccessible
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to the rational faculty. Creativity was viewed as a spiritual act which did not so much communicate as suggest. A line of Tyutchev's — "A thought expressed is a lie” — became an im portant slogan for the Russian Symbolists. The mysterious and the exotic became almost prescriptive elements in poetry, and social-mindedness was generally rejected in favor of a highly personal, individualistic view. Synaesthesia in art caught the imagination of many, and there were numerous attem pts to duplicate the effects of music in poetry. The Russian version of Symbolism was linked to a general eschatological mood and to a sense of art as a mystic experience leading to a spiritual rebirth. Decadence played a strong role in the early developm ent of Russian Symbolism, while mystic and prophetic notes were characteristic of later developments in the movement. The chief émigré holdovers from Symbolism were Konstantin Bal'mont, Lev Èllis, Vyacheslav Ivanov, and Andrei Bely. A lesser figure was Nikolai Minsky, who loved to shock listeners at poetry readings by including such lines as "Proletarians of all lands, unite!”. And of course there were Zinaida Gippius and Dmitry Merezhkovsky, who had first come to Paris in 1906 to pursue their interest in religion and mysticism in general, and Catholicism specifically. Before settling in Switzerland in 1913, Lev Kobylinsky (pseudonym: Èllis, 1874-1947) had played an active role as a religious thinker, sym bolist poet, and active opponent of traditional realism, a trend which was prom inent not only in Russia, but among those writers who were ultim ately destined to emigrate — Evgeny Chirikov, Maksim Gor'ky, Aleksandr Kuprin, and Ivan Shmelev, to name only a few. After em igrating, Èllis devoted himself chiefly to scholarship and translation. Konstantin Bal'mont (1867-1942) was a man of broad culture who had traveled all over the world. A poet, critic, and essayist, he was also a translator from Norwegian, English, Spanish, and Polish, as well as a number of other languages. In Paris he was sometimes referred to as "the Russian Verlaine.” At the same tim e he had such a strong love of English literature that Aleksis Rannit called him "an English poet writing in Russian.” Before the 1917 October coup Bal'mont frequently had difficulties with the tsarist government for his rebellious if vague political leanings. As a twenty-year-old student he was tem porarily expelled from Moscow University and placed under police observation. Several of his books were confiscated by the police, and in 1904 he was denied permission to live in Moscow or any university town for two years. Fearing arrest, he fled to France in 1905 and remained in Paris until 1913, when a general amnesty was announced for political émigrés. A representative of the older, "decadent” branch of Russian symbolism, with all its flamboyance, rebelliousness, subjectivism , extreme aestheticism, and fascination with the exotic and
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the sensual, Bal'mont was in close contact with other sym bolists who were eventually to find their way to the W est — the Russian-Lithuanian poet Jurgis BaltruSaitis (1873-1944) and Dmitry Merezhkovsky. He combined these views with a Pan-Slavist world view and steadfast devotion to abstract beauty. In April 1920 the "Commissar for E nlightenm enf (meaning "Education”) and form er émigré Anatoly Lunacharsky sent Bal'm ont abroad on a literary assignment. When he was filling out the exit-visa application, Bal'mont was asked which political party he belonged to and responded: "I'm a poet.” Although he had originally supported the Bol'shevik cause, he defected, settling once again in France, where he worked for Poslednie novosti and Sovremennye zapiski, and suffered from repeated bouts of mental illness: he had first attem pted suicide in 1890. In his early verse he dwelt on death and the transitory nature of being, but later attem pted to create a positive, "free,” "sun-lit” image of the whole man. During the last years of his life he had to be institutionalized. Impoverished and abandoned by his readers as a holdover from the turn of the century, he died a sad and lonely death. Vyacheslav Ivanov (1866-1949), a poet, critic, and literary theoretician, spent most of the period from 1886 to 1905 abroad, and then returned to Petersburg, where he maintained a literary salon called The Tower (Bashnya). Ivanov's poetry was strongly inspired by his second wife, with whom he professed to be maintaining contact even after her death. When he married her daughter, he again went abroad under pressure from colleagues who were personally offended by the marriage. Upon returning to Russia he found it wiser to settle in Moscow, not St. Petersburg. In 1920, after his wife/stepdaughter died from hunger and deprivation, he made an unsuccessful attem pt to leave the Soviet Union, after which he moved to the northern Caucasus region and from there to Baku, where he was appointed professor of classical philology and became engrossed in the cult of Dionysos. He left Russia in 1924 with the permission of the Soviet authorities, having promised Lunacharsky not to participate in any acts hostile to the Soviet government. Two years later he converted to Catholicism, but he continued to receive a Soviet salary until 1930, and kept his Soviet citizenship until at least 1936 and may have retained it until his death. Thus, his departure from Russia was less a political act than it was for the majority of his contemporaries. Living out his life in Rome, Ivanov seemed divorced from contem porary politics and devoted his energies to the aesthetics of the Silver Age. His personal contacts with other members of the ém igré community were fewer than was typical of many of his fellow exiles, although he did correspond with a number of them.
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Ivanov laid heavy stress on the literary symbol, which he viewed as the core of religious myth rather than just an aesthetic device. Literature itself was for him a form of mythmaking, and he saw the work of art as a striving for the Divine and a means of going beyond the barriers of the individual personality: Roving Magus, fierce thief, gray wolf, I compose these winter verses to your glory. A nd hear your hungry how l! The earth has W elcomed me and human speech is kind. B ut not for you, despised. What the host's dog knows Is a slavish debt and the seers o f Polyhymnia w ill know You, m ore m agical and kindred than the Delphic Beast, as one o f their own until their voices fail. N ear the place where the dugout o f the soul is moored, Where I was given over to the Fates, igor', leader o f the wolves, stands his watch. You pack o f shamans, howl. From m y childhood I've known it as a summons, this drawn-out wailing O f hom eless fire on the frozen steppe* Zinaida Gippius (1869-1945) wrote a memoir describing her life with Dmitry Merezhkovsky, which was published posthumously. Unfortunately, she tells virtually nothing about herself and there are only a few pages devoted to the inter-war period, since she died before the m anuscript was finished. She was certainly an extravagant woman given to theatrical effects, having, for example, casually commented to the international revolutionary and terrorist Boris Savinkov that he was a "weakling.” Gippius debuted as a poet in the late 1880s, composing "decadent’ verse, railing against the tedium of life, and searching for a higher, exotic beauty. Often she would begin a poem with a nature description and then shift into a parallel presentation of her own feelings. She also composed prose works in which she linked religious m otifs with revolutionary ideas, and then backed up these concepts with theoretical tracts.
•Translation by Mary Jane W hite,
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The Parisian Note ... then worms shall try That long preserved virginity: A nd your quaint honor turned to dust; A nd into ashes a ll m y lust. The grave's a fine and private place, B ut none I think there do embrace. Andrew Marvell (1621-1678) Acmeism established itself in Russia with the poetry of Nikolai Gumilêv, Osip Mandel'shtam, and Anna Akhmatova as a reaction against the vagueness and other-worldliness of Symbolism, which enjoyed its heyday in Russia at the turn of the century. It was Acmeism, and to a degree the poetry of Innokenty Annensky, which form ed the basis for the Parisian Note — a movement that first found expression in 1914 in the Russian émigré poetry journal Vechera (Evenings). The phrase was probably inspired by the "Parisian School” of painters resident in the city since the 1910s. The Parisian Note came into its own in the second half of the 1920s and exercised a considerable influence throughout the interwar period. Among its adherents were Georgy Adamovich, Lidiya Chervinskaya, Georgy Ivanov, Antonin Ladinsky, Irina Odoevtseva, Nikolai Otsup, and Anatoly Shteiger. Symbolism, the poetic background against which both Soviet and émigré poetry developed, had taken on an eschatological tone even before 1917. And when the tsarist governm ent finally collapsed and so many refugees from the "Russian Pompeii” (a phrase coined by Sasha Chêrny) found themselves scattered abroad, there was a feeling that their mission in exile was to preserve the memory of a doomed heritage. The basic thrust of the movement thus had its roots more in a philosophy of life than in an interest in poetic form (a feature which led to a rift between its chief prophet, Georgy Adamovich, and Khodasevich, who laid greater emphasis on style). The belief was that the poet should avoid radical experimentation and aspire to sim plicity by working with such so-called "eternal” themes as life, God, love, and death. Behind all these concepts loomed a consciousness of irrevocable catastrophe, of the collapse of culture. Boris Zaitsev saw the striving toward the "eternal and the spiritual” as a consequence of the loss of the native soil in which Russian culture had been rooted, while Yury Terapiano wrote that the vicissitudes of émigré existence had brought about a disenchantm ent with the "irresponsible word games” of past poetic traditions:
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Contem porary man is im poverished and naked because he has a conscience. If he so desired, he could still drape him self in a ll m anner o f verbal garments, ju s t as well as people did before, selecting colors and shades according to his own tastes; but he has no such desire. It seems to me that the exercise o f w ill amounts to the denial o f external glitter; this impoverishment, this will to survive loneliness is the m ost significant acquisition o f the new generation, and we m ust hope that the best o f the young poets and prose writers w ill not be tem pted b y the cheap success achieved by pandering to the crowd.... Through poverty and hunger, through isolation and loneliness, in a culture which is alien and strange to us (despite any ”continuities o f culture,” Louvres, and Dresden Museums) a few young people hoped to bring home an unextinguished sm all flam e: two o r three lines, a few words in which they hoped would be reflected that which is m ost im portant in life, in which would be expressed the inexpressible, in which would be revealed a new, unique m usic which had never before been heard. Adamovich (1892-1972) came to exert considerable influence over the younger poets who had not yet published much while they were still in Russian He believed that if the artist was to achieve anything of lasting value, he had to search out those themes which had concerned all men in all times. W hile Adamovich did not believe that literature should serve as a vehicle for social change, as advocated by Marxist critics, he laid heavy stress on the affective power of the written word to deepen the individual's sensitivity. The writer, he maintained, must first of all express his own inner self. The principle of freedom of personality had to take precedence over the accidental circumstances of history. A t the
■Adamovich’s collaboration with various ém igré magazines reads like a catalogue of periodicals of the period. H e began to write for the new literary review Zveno (Link) as its chief literary critic, and then switched to Poslednie novosti in 1928, when Zveno ceased publication. Other periodicals to which he contributed included: Blagonamerennyi (The W ell-Intentioned), Chisla (Num bers), Novyi korabl' (The New Ship), lllyustrirovannaya Rossiya (Illustrated Russia), Novaya gazeta (The New G azette), Vstrechi (Encounters), Russkie zapiski (Russian Annals), Novosel'e (Housewarm ing), Sovrem ennye zapiski (Contemporary Annals), Opyty (Experim ents), Vozdushnye puti (Aerial W ays), Novoe russkoe slovo (The New Russian W ord), Novyi zhum al (The New Review), and Mosty (Bridges). He also contributed to Russkie novosti (Russian News), a pro-Soviet publication that appeared after the end of World W ar II.
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same time, he promoted the moral message of art, believing that even in Soviet literature all the truly valuable works had posed one and the same question to the reader: "How shall we live?” The artist, in Adamovich's view, should view sincerity, truthfulness, and high seriousness as essential features of art, which should not be a verbal, form alistic game but a sincere statem ent of the author to the reader. Literature was of value only if the author had som ething to say. Adamovich opposed the exaggerated use of metaphor, eloquence for its own sake, picturesque or ornam ental imagery, and "modernism" in general. He preferred blank to rhymed verse, because he considered it less artificial and because it created fewer artificial barriers between artist and reader and thus promoted the general com m unicative function of art. In his view, Lev Tolstoi, Aleksandr Blok, and Innokenty Annensky were models of absolute sincerity, and he was frequently critical of what he considered an excessive preoccupation with literary frills in the works of such figures as Bely, Pilnyak, Babel', Severyanin, Tsvetaeva, Mayakovsky, Nabokov, and the early Pasternak. Adamovich's basically negative attitude toward Nabokov is illustrative of his position. He praised Nabokov as an "exceptional w riter,” "an unusual phenomenon,” but in the same breath questioned whether "this constant, insistent striving to amaze” was meaningful. And he was critical of Nabokov for failing to concern him self with moral issues: [W e see here] a feature o f Nabokov’s a rt which is very un-Russian: a lack o f concern with "sim plicity and truth” in the Tolstoian sense o f those words, o r at the very least an elem ent o f bravado, a slippery quality, an absence o f pauses and inner movements, the rubbery, soundless litheness o f style, the coldly castrated, childishly im pudent taste, the infantile selfconfident and im perturbable coloring o f his writings. Nabokov, he wrote, had created an empty world in an essentially amoral fashion and approached the eternal them e of death with the "indifference ... of a fish.”3 Ultimately, it is sad to realize that the most influential émigré critic spent so much of his tim e attacking the most talented émigré prose w riter and the most talented émigré p o e t— Marina Tsvetaeva. Adamovich never did realize a goal which he had set for him self for years — the creation of a collection of émigré writings, a so-called Golden Book.
•The animosity between Adamovich and Nabokov w as mutual. In his The G ift (D ar) Nabokov satirized Adamovich in the figure of "Christopher Mortus."
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Anatoly Shtelger (1907-1944), who was of Swiss descent and settled in that country as a Swiss citizen, created some exquisite m iniatures in the style of the "Parisian Note.” He is unusual (but not alone) in the generally puritanical context of Russian literature in that he wrote homosexual verse3: H ow can I shout, to be heard in that prison, Beyond those ramparts, through those walls, That not everyone has betrayed him, That he is not abandoned, alone in the world? I dream ed that I broke in to see you, S at on your bed and held you in m y arms. (Though he's long lost the habit, surely, O f tenderness and soft, fam iliar words.) Yet friendship exists, it really exists, A nd tenderness o f male for male as w e ll... It is not obligation, but particular nobility To say so, with unwavering eyes. From Prague, Al'fred Bern summed up his own critical attitude toward the Parisian Note: M uted intonations, perplexed-questioning phraseology, the unexpected aphorism which fits precisely into the last line o r two o f the poem, a perpetually parenthetical mode o f expression, the forced sim plicity o f language, and fragmented syntax — such is the repertoire o f this "diary" poetry. Having developed a literary manner, the poetry o f intim acy and sim plicity inevitably self-destructs, for its entire meaning lay in breaking free o f literary posing; more than that, it strove not to be literature a t all. The struggle with "prettiness” and literary convention led "diary" poetry down the very worst path — that o f artificiality, mannerism, and pose. Georgy Ivanov (1894-1958) escaped the constrictions of the Parisian Note through irony, that is, by actually mocking the form er "eternal” themes. One of the most popular poets in exile, he began his literary career with a brief flirtation with "Ego-Futurism” and then as a m ember of the Acm eist group in Petersburg. His style continued to evolve, and in the last decade of his life he was able to slough off all
■Marina Tsvetaeva fell in love with Shteiger, but she herself wrote som e lesbian verse, as also did Sofiya Parnok (1885-1993).
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the aestheticism and refinem ent of his Petersburg period while retaining the technical mastery he had acquired so early in his career. O f all the émigré poets, the sardonic Ivanov was one of the more successful in transcending the "exquisite clarity” of Acmeism: Now our daily bread is potassium cyanide, M ercuric chloride our drink. No matter. We g o t used to it, we grew accustomed, A nd did not go out o f our minds. Quite the contrary even — we resist evil In this senselessly wicked world. In a sepulchral waltz, tender couples W hirl a t the émigré ball. In 1938 Ivanov published The Decay o f the Atom (Raspad atoma), a slender volume reflecting his isolation and loneliness in the pre-war period and his longing for love and intimacy. Many of the reflections are intended to shock the reader, such as a phantasized act of necrophilia, which symbolized his sense of life and art. Ivanov wrote that he wanted to speak to his soul in simple words — the language of the acmeists, from whom he had learned his art — but that life had taken him too far from that form er ideal. Truth was only in the present — this day, this hour, this fleeting moment. Life as such was meaningless: ... Its spiral is flung deep into eternity, carrying everything with it: cigarette butts, sunsets, toenail clippings and the d irt under those nails, world-shaking ideas, the blood spilled for those ideas, hem orrhoidal blood, blood from festering sores, birdcherry blossoms, stars, innocence, sew er pipes, cancer tumors, the commandments o f bliss, irony, Alpine snow, a M inister who signed the Treaty o f Versailles flies while singing " Germany m ust pay.” The pus has congealed on his sharp teeth, and the rat poison glim m ers through the walls o f his stomach. In many ways Ivanov was a controversial, even som ewhat scandalous figure. His memoirs, Petersburg W inters (Peterburgskie zimy), bordered on the fictional, and during W orld W ar II he declared he would "prefer to be the chief of police in [German-occupied) Smolensk to editing a literary magazine in a Soviet Smolensk.” O ther younger writers, regardless of their attitude toward the Parisian Note, ultim ately became dissatisfied with their own work and began to seek out new forms. Nina Berberova saw the search for manner giving birth to a new ideology:
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The new a rt o f the period brought me jo y precisely in its renewal. O ur tragedy, the tragedy o f a ll the younger émigré writers, was rooted in the absence o f a style, in the im possibility o f any stylistic renewal. N either I nor m y contem poraries could have a style. Nabokov alone in his genius brought with him a renewal o f style. It was not the question o f topics o r language which proved to be decisive for émigré literature; rather it was the question o f style. The "older” writers frankly adm itted that they had no need for a renewal o f style; they had ready-made forms which they continued to use and whose obsolescence they attem pted to ignore. "There can be no renewal o f ideas without a renewal o f style,” said Châteaubriand. We brought nothing new to literature, either in sentence structure o r in lexicon. In fact, the predominance of the Parisian Note as a movement has been exaggerated; poets of the period were far from unified in their creative method. Such figures as the Symbolist Konstantin Bal'mont, the classicist Vladislav Khodasevich, the phantasmagorical Boris Poplavsky, M arina Tsvetaeva with her startling verbal experimen tations, and Dovid Knut with his exotic but nostalgic longings for Jewish life often had little in common with the sim plicity of an Adamovich or a Shteiger. The conservativism of the Parisian Note was not limited to Paris, or even Europe. The 1925 verse collection From Am erica (Iz Ameriki) by Vladim ir ll'yashenko, Georgy Golokhvastov, Dmitry Magula, and Evgeniya Khristiani was quite lyrical in nature and would have fit quite well into that tradition. The author of the brief preface, A. I. Nazarov, w ent out of his way to denounce Futurism, so popular in Russia at the tim e. The émigrés clung tenaciously to the grand tradition of 19th-century Russian literature, and so their political ideology and aesthetic theory dovetailed almost perfectly.
Experimenters Is there any thing whereof it m ay be said, See, this is new? it hath been already o f old time, which was before us. Old Testament: Ecclesiastes, i, 10 M arina Tsvetaeva (1892-1941) emigrated to Berlin in 1922 and then moved on to Prague that same year, where she and her husband spent three relatively bucolic years while receiving a stipend from the Czech governm ent. In 1925 the fam ily left for Paris. Although she had
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already written im portant poetry before emigrating, the greater part of her writing was accomplished in exile. Tsvetaeva's ecstatic identification with the forces of life, the powerful driving rhythm of her lines, her ability to dip into the reservoir of folk poetry, and the comprehensiveness and intensity of her themes and manner made her an absolutely unique, even startling talent; there was no way she could fit into the "Parisian Note." Adamovich conceded that some of Tsvetaeva's highly idiosyncratic verse was "incom parable,” but he saw no way that other poets could profit from her example. In the U.S.S.R. Gor'ky went even further, claim ing she was "hysterical” and "controlled by the word rather than controlling it.” He even faulted her for a weak command of Russian. In the émigré world Tsvetaeva felt herself not only unappreciated, but generally "hated.” Part of this perception was som ewhat exaggerated — at least at first. She was, for example, published in almost every other issue of the leading émigré journal of the day, Sovremennye zapiski, but it is true that she received far less critical attention from émigré critics than she deserved. Her estrangem ent was deepened when the first issue of the Eurasian journal Vërsty (Versts) appeared under the tutelage of Dmitry Svyatopolk-Mirsky, who later was to return to the Soviet Union, and many of her fellow émigrés began to look upon her as pro-Soviet. The actions of Tsvetaeva's husband Sergei Èfron compromised her totally. It was discovered that Èfron, an active member of the movement to repatriate émigrés to the Soviet Union, had been an agent of the GPU and had helped track down the Soviet agent Ignaty Reiss (who had actually defected and whose real name was Poretsky), as well as Trotsky's son Andrei Sedov, and had directed the assassination of both men. He is also rumored to have participated in the kidnappings of Generals M iller and Kutepov. The portrait of this idealistic actor, poet, editor, secret agent, would-be monk and real-life henchman remains a mystery to this day. The w riter Vladim ir Varshavsky left us a description of him: I became a Eurasian. I was converted by a form er White officer who was later a student. Tall, with huge Byzantine eyes, this uncommon m an was o f half-Jewish origin. His whole life was one o f selfless service to the cause o f Russia and Truth. I did not quite understand the Eurasian teachings, but when he told me that the Eurasians wanted to build everything on Christianity, I believed him a t once. I believed that Eurasianism stood for that highest Truth to which Russia had always aspired. Later on, this man was converted to Bolshevism . When someone asked him what had happened to his Christianity, he replied that communism was also a religion.
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Having adopted this faith, he stopped reasoning and in the name o f the one true teaching was ready to sacrifice his own life and the lives o f others. When Èfron fled to Spain to escape arrest, Tsvetaeva found herself ostracized by the émigrés, who refused to believe that she had been ignorant of her husband's activities. Tsvetaeva's political circumstances were interwoven with the classic émigré disease — poverty. The responsibilities involved in raising a fam ily were overwhelming in her circumstances. Even after Èfron's subsequent flight to Moscow, Tsvetaeva continued to accept money from the Soviet Consulate. As her daughter Alya grew up, she came to share her father's political views and worked for a French com m unist newspaper. As early as 1931 Tsvetaeva wrote to her Czech friend Anna Teskova that everything was pushing her back to Russia, but she could not imagine herself going there. In the W est she was superfluous; in Russia — impossible. Five years later her situation had become even more desperate: M y dear Anna Antonovna, do you happen to know a good soothsayer in Prague? If I don't find one, I w o n t know what to do. Everything revolves around the question: to go o r not to go? (And if we do go, then forever.) To sum things up, Sergei Yakovlevich, Alya, and M ur [ Tsvetaeva's husband and two children] definitely want to go. A ll around us we see the danger o f war, revolutions, and general catastrophic events. I c a n t stay here alone. The émigrés d o n t like m e; I've been driven out o f Poslednie novosti; no one will publish me a t all. The Parisian patronesses hate me because o f m y independent character. Tsvetaeva became infatuated with the critic Mark Slonim, but he rejected her. On November 19,1924, the day of Slonim's marriage to a young Czech woman, she poured out her fury in verse: Yesterday he lay a t m y feet, Swore he w ouldnt give me up For a ll o f China. B ut then his hands unclenched, A nd life fell from them like a rusty kopeck. Unloved, frightened, a m urderer o f children, I stand accused. B ut even in Hell I will say to you: nM y love, how have I wronged you?”
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I'll ask the table, the chair: " Why; for what reason do I suffer?” He's through kissing ... me. Now others respond. He taught me to live in fire ... A nd threw me on an icy steppe. Tell me ju s t one thing, m y love: "How have I wronged you?” There's no need to shake a tree; A ripe apple picks its own time ... Forgive me — fo r everything. ”M y love, how have I wronged you?” 4
Despite numerous vows never to return, she did in fact go back to Russia for good in 1939, following her husband just as she had followed him out of Russia in 1922, even though she did not know if he was alive or dead. In 1941 she was evacuated to the small town of Elabuga when the Germans were already approaching Moscow. W hile on her way there she wrote to the W riters’ Union requesting employment as a literary translator, since she had no other profession. She never received an answer, but the letter was later found with the words written across it: "Attach to file.” Ten days after arriving in Elabuga she committed suicide by hanging herself, and her poetry was not published in the Soviet Union for many years thereafter. Two weeks later Èfron was executed as a foreign spy. The First Secretary of the Soviet W riters' Union, Konstantin Fedin, and the poet Nikolai Aseev, another émigré who had returned home, had been in nearby Chistopol' when Tsvetaeva committed suicide, and she had visited Aseev a few days before her death — evidently in hopes of receiving some assistance. A quarter of a century later the critic Viktoriya Shveitser wrote an essay for the chief Soviet literary journal N ovyi m ir (New W orld) about a pilgrimage she had undertaken to Elabuga and about Tsvetaeva's death. The essay had already been set in type when Fedin wrote to Novyi mir, demanding that publication be stopped: "How long,” he wrote, "must we bear the burden of this guilt?” In the words of the poet and literary critic Yury Terapiano, Boris Poplavsky (1903-1935) was "the first and last Russian Surrealist.” He was a member of the so-called "younger generation,” and against the stark and decorous background of the "Parisian Note,” his hyperboles, fantastic images, and impressionism show the indisputable im print of Rimbaud and Apollinaire:
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Below; m ilky land glistens. A train belching sparks is clearly visible. A pattern o f rivers ornam ents the fields, and over there is the sea, its waters waist-deep. Raising their tails like aeroplanes, our pilots are gaining altitude, and we fly o ff to Venus — but not the one that wrecks the charts o f our life. A m otionless blue mountain, like a nose. Glassy lakes in the shadow o f mountains. Joy, like a tray, shakes us. We head for a landing, our lights fading out. W hy are these fires burning on the bright sun's surface? No, already they cry and whisper — They are dragonfly people, they are butterflies as light as tears and no stronger than a flower. Toads like fa t mushrooms come galloping, carrots buck and rear and quiver, and along with them toothed plants that cast no shadow are reaching for u s * Poplavsky was only 32 when he died. An acquaintance had invited him to experiment with drugs. Poplavsky turned up at the agreed tim e and place, and the two were found dead the following morning. A few days later a woman who knew the acquaintance published a letter the man had written to her on the very day he and Poplavsky died. The man wrote that he wanted to commit suicide, but being afraid to die alone, had decided to take someone with him. Igor' Severyanin (pseudonym of Igor' Lotarëv, 1887-1941) was a poet who liked nothing better than to shock his readers. In 1915, while so many other young men were being sent to their deaths at the front, he published a collection entitled Pineapples in Champagne (Ananasy v shampanskom). Like his fellow Futurists, he rejected the classic Russian writers and decked his own verse with outlandish neologisms and elaborate verbal and rhythmic experimentation. In 1918 Severyanin emigrated to Estonia, which had been recognized as a separate nation, and adopted Estonian citizenship. Lionized before
■Translation by Emmett Jarrett and Dick Lourie.
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1917, he fell upon hard tim es as an émigré but even so refused to heed a 1922 missive from the fem ininist author and Soviet official Aleksandra Kollontai to return home. He remained in Estonia until the country was occupied by Soviet troops and in 1940 published some poems in the Soviet journals Krasnaya nov' (Red Virgin Soil) and Ogonëk (Flame), welcoming the annexation of his second homeland by his first — an act of betrayal which did him no good since he died the next year. His grave stone reads: How lovely, how fresh will be the roses Tossed by m y country into m y coffin! (Kak khoroshi, kak svezhi budut rozy m oei strany mne broshennye v grob!) 4
Ironically, it was only outside Russia that Severyanin developed his talents to the full.
Independents Plunge your heart into this apple tree, O ur days float to the ground — like leaves. Aleksandr Vertinsky Competing with Adamovich was the influential critic and poet Vladislav Khodasevich (1886-1939). Khodasevich em igrated in 1922 and lived in Berlin, Prague, and Rome before settling in Paris in 1925. For a tim e he was married to Nina Berberova and lived with her in Gor'ky's house in Sorrento. A more or less established poet before emigrating, Khodasevich began his career as an epigone of Symbolism with four published collections of verse to his credit before leaving Russia; as an émigré he reaped numerous accolades, the most exaggerated of which was Nabokov's claim that he was "the greatest Russian poet that the 20th century has yet produced.” By the late 1920s Khodasevich had largely ceased to compose verse and had devoted himself to criticism and biography (his book on Derzhavin is recognized as a classic study). He disapproved of Adamovich's prescriptions for replacing art with "human docum ents,” however sincere they might be. His poetic practices were consistent with this approach, devoted as they were to the ideal of culture and displaying relatively little concern with his own personal experiences. Dovid Knut (pseudonym of David Fiksman, 1900-1955) was a poet who not only felt his Jewish roots strongly, but possessed a gift
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for introducing a truly biblical, exotic grandeur into Russian verse; his poetry has a poignant charm in its nostalgia for Jewish Odessa: W hat can I tell you o f Palestine? I rem em ber deserted Sedzhera, The orange cloud o f the Khamsin, The dignified voice o f an Astrakhan Ger, The narrow insulted back o f a m urdered Shom er boy. A haughty cam el a t the watering trough, The peyas o f mute Zaddiks from Tsfat, The dry sky o f a hungry eternity Hovering over the world's doom ed childhood, The sm ooth endless tombstones O f the Josephate's insane dead, A nd a g irl nam ed Judith Who waited for a long time, Waving a tanned hand after me. Knut was married to Ariadna Skryabina (Scriabin), daughter of the composer. When the war broke out, Knut helped to organize the Jewish resistance. Supposedly, Ariadna was captured while accompanying a group of Jewish children and shot on the spot by French collaborationists. Knut, who had been close to Zhabotinsky in the 1930s, emigrated to Palestine in 1949, where he began to write in Hebrew. Aleksandr Vertinsky (1889-1957) had already become popular as a singer and actor before being evacuated from the Crimea in 1919 and evidently opened a restaurant in Constantinople called La Rose noire. Abroad he was beloved as a cabaret singer, often using his own verse as lyrics. For a quarter of a century he toured Europe, China, and the United States, singing poignantly of a lost homeland and in no hurry to hand him self over to Stalin's Spartan utopia, which was so out of keeping with all his sensibilities and even his exaggerated ancien régim e speech with its French “r’s” and nasal vowels: I rem em ber the night, you r eyes, blue from eyeliner, the diam ond o f your tear as it slid into the wine glass.
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I rem em ber a past moment, your blouses — white on the armchairs, the day — gray and em pty after you left, and your parrot grieving in the corner. It kept shrieking "jam ais” and crying in French. Drawn by the exotic surroundings of Shanghai and its Russian community, Vertinsky settled there and attempted, unsuccessfully, to open a nightclub, The Gardenia, and saw him self lost in an indifferent and even hostile world. During W orld W ar II he left the "neon city” to return to the Soviet Union and published a surprisingly hostile memoir of his émigré years. It is hard not to believe that parts of the book were inserted by a government-imposed ghost writer. A t one point Vertinsky tells of meeting the ballet dancers Tam ara Karsavina and Pêtr Vladim irov in W arsaw: Karsavina was silent. The tears stream ed down her cheeks. "W hat do you think, Sasha,” she asked me, "w ill we ever return to our Hom eland?” Having been twice denied perm ission to return, I no longer believed it was possible. Still, I didn't want to hurt her. "If we earn the right,” I answered in a serious tone. "B ut how can we earn it? ” "W e m ust prove our love fo r the Hom eland.” "Prove it? B ut how?” "W e m ust think only o f h e rl We m ust wake up and fall asleep with her name on our lips. Do you understand? A nd even in these conditions, surrounded by strangers, glorify and exalt her nam e!” We fell silent. "If I could only go back to the theater!” she said, “Even as a costume g irl o r cashier in the ticket booth.” "I'd be willing to go as an usher,” Vladimirov attem pted to joke. No one smiled. The candles were being extinguished. The m usicians were putting away their instruments. The piano was being covered with som ething black, as if it were a corpse. It was inexpressibly sad.... I kissed her hand and we parted.
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The Realists Real are the dreams o f the Gods, and sm oothly pass Their pleasures in a long im m ortal dream. John Keats Even as Vertinsky, Karsavina, and Vladimirov were supposed to have craved so piously to return home, the Soviet authorities in both theory and practice were busy demolishing the favorite theory of the Formalist critics — that art was an aesthetic system independent from life: Pilnyak and Gumilëv were shot, Mayakovsky and Esenin com m itted suicide, and the truly massive terror of the late 1930s was close at hand. Socialist Realism was being hailed as the only perm issible literary tradition, and literary dissent, which was now equated with political dissent, had become a mortally dangerous enterprise. Although Socialist Realism in the U.S.S.R. was prim arily a product of political coercion, the prominent role of realism in Russian émigré literature — from Bunin and Kuprin to Solzhenitsyn and Maksimov — derived partly from a desire to hold on to tradition in a hostile new world and partly from nostalgia for a Russia of the past. The prom inent role of memoirs in émigré literature has at least some of its roots in this fram e of mind. The older generation of émigré writers brought with them the grand tradition of Russian realism — even though realism was already in decline in Russia itself by 1917. Ivan Bunin (1870-1953) had travelled extensively abroad before 1917. In 1918 he left Moscow for Odessa, where he edited the newspaper Nashe slovo (Our W ord). When the Red Army occupied the Crimea in 1920 he was evacuated to Istanbul by ship, and from there left for France. It was a typical émigré "itinerary.” On November 9, 1933, Bunin became the first Russian to receive the Nobel Prize for literature. The fact that he was an émigré and not a Soviet writer was viewed not only as a recognition of his own writing, but as a legitimation of Russian émigré literature in general. The award marked a high-water mark for Russian émigré letters, marred only by the indignity of a strip search by German customs officers when he travelled to Sweden to collect the prize. Bunin was not a kind judge of his contemporaries. He represented the grand tradition of Russian literature, and he had no use for either the Futurism of Mayakovsky or the fantasies of Remizov. Such feelings were often mutual; Marina Tsvetaeva in a letter dated November 24,1933, wrote that she would sit on the stage, since to not attend would be the equivalent of protest; she was not protesting, but she did disagree. Both Merezhkovsky and Gor'ky, she felt, deserved
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the prize much more than Bunin, whose influence was negligible compared to theirs. Uncomfortable as the Soviet government was over the fact that the only Russian Nobel laureate in literature was an émigré, it nevertheless attempted to find some common ground with him after the end of W orld W ar II; after Bunin's death Konstantin Fedin, the head of the Soviet W riters’ Union, even spread the rumor that Bunin had secretly received a Soviet passport. Bunin did visit the Soviet embassy after the close of W orld W ar II, and it is not impossible that he toyed with the idea of accepting citizenship, but in fact this never occurred. In 1966 Konstantin Simonov admitted that the rumor was an invention: In the fall o f 1946 Bunin had already come out against us in a rather hostile fashion. It seems to me that certain prefaces and articles leave out this fact. Bunin's last book o f memoirs, published in Paris in 1950, is very bad, in m y opinioh ... and is full o f cheap, vicious anti-Soviet statem ents.... This was his last blow against us, delivered in his feeble old age. It is sim ply not perm issible to pretend that he returned to us in his later years. During the so-called ‘Thaw ” following the death of Stalin, the Soviets actually began to publish many of Bunin's works, albeit with considerable cuts by the censor, and these editions were sold in the hundreds of thousands of copies in the U.S.S.R. In the West, however, even the Nobel Prize was not enough to gain any appreciable popularity for Bunin. Western bookstores carry Dostoevsky, Pasternak, and Solzhenitsyn, but Bunin's books are rarely in evidence. A man of a different age, Bunin now receives only lip service as a w riter (unlike Lev Tolstoi, who was a sort of cult figure for Bunin). Bunin's art is a sort of minimalism, and the subtle understatement he practiced was swept aside by an action-oriented age. W hile Bunin's prodigious memory enabled him to write about Russia for decades after he had left his native land, Aleksandr Kuprin (1870-1938) seemed to wither away as a writer in exile. He had fled Soviet Russia in 1919 and lived abroad, chiefly in Paris. "Russian m ilitant communism,” he wrote, "was the most negative, most infinitely evil phenomenon of world history.” In 1937, however, on the eve of the great purges, his daughter took him home to Russia, seriously ill and drinking heavily. Soviet disclaimers to the contrary, he was evidently either senile or a stroke had rendered him incapable of understanding what was happening around him. He died the following year. In the difficult post-1917 years Maksim Gor'ky (pseudonym of Aleksei Peshkov, 1868-1936) enjoyed a great deal of influence with the authorities and helped many writers, either in a material sense or by literally saving their lives. In 1921 he emigrated again and settled in Sorrento, Italy in 1924, clearly tormented by the necessity of taking a
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position vis-à-vis the Soviet regime. When he learned in 1923 that the works of Plato, Kant, Schopenhauer, Ruskin, Nietzsche, Taine, Vladim ir Solov'êv, and Lev Tolstoi were to be withdrawn from Soviet public libraries, he wrote to Khodasevich: I w o n t believe it till I've seen the "index” with m y own eyes. B ut m y first reaction was so strong that I began writing a letter to M oscow saying that I was renouncing m y Soviet citizenship. W hat can I do if that bestiality proves to be true? If you only knew how painful m y m oral situation is l It was during this émigré period that Gor'ky wrote the novel The Artam onov Business (Delo Artamonovykh) and began the epic novel which he viewed as the culmination of his life's work: The Life o f Klim Samgin (Zhizn' Klima Samgina), which was an attack on liberal intellectuals who opposed the revolution. His relations with other émigré writers, many of whom regarded him as an opportunist and others as only a "semi-emigrant,” were less than cordial. In a letter to Fedin he wrote: I am am azed and alm ost horrified to see how men who only yesterday were "cultured” are now rotting away. Zaitsev writes m ediocre books on the lives o f the saints, Shm elëv is so hysterical as to be unbearable, Kuprin drinks instead o f writing, and Bunin rewrites The Kreutzer Sonata under the title o f Mitya's Love. Aldanov also apes Tolstoi. I will not even speak o f M erezhkovsky and Gippius. You cannot imagine how hard it is to have to note a ll this. W hen Feliks Dzerzhinsky, the murderous head of the CHEKA, died in 1926, Gor'ky wrote an official letter bemoaning his loss. In 1928 and 1929 he was persuaded to visit the Soviet Union, and he finally returned to Russia in 1931, evidently concerned that he might actually be forgotten in his native land. "Émigré intellectuals,” he wrote on June 12, 1931, "spread slander about Soviet Russia, fom ent plots, and in general, behave basely; most of these intellectuals are Samgins.” His form er friend Bunin fell out with him, and Tat'yana Aleksinskaya published a devastating attack upon him in Le Journal des Débats. W hat post did he take among the Bol'sheviks? That o f supreme corrupter o f the intellectuals. He was appointed "D irector o f the Literary Section o f State Publications.” He had exclusive control o f literary publishing and he became the distributor o f subsidies to starving writers. Those who were willing to work with him could live, the others could only die o f starvation. But, unfortunately, that was not all. Gor'ky proclaim ed his sym pathy with the Bol'sheviks in cases where an elem entary feeling o f self-respect should have made him keep silent. When a young revolutionary, revolted by Bol'shevik
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tyranny, tried to kill Lenin, G or’k y prostrated him self before the dictator with a message o f servile congratulations. When, in Petrograd, a young socialist student killed the bloodthirsty Uritsky, the Bol'sheviks took vengeance that same night by slaughtering 900 hostages and political prisoners in Petrograd prisons.* A fte r that m onstrous crime, G or'ky attended a m eeting o f the Petrograd Soviet am ong the m embers o f its presidium, including the professional m urderer Zinov'ev, the Red murderer, Zorin, and other drinkers o f Russian blood.... To us Russians, G or'ky is one o f those who are m orally and politically responsible for the great calam ities that the Bol'shevik regim e has brought upon our country. Years w ill pass, but he will never be forgotten. In the show trials of 1938 two doctors "confessed” to having murdered Gor'ky through improper treatm ent. One of them, a Dr. Pletnêv, later told a fellow prisoner that Stalin had sent Gor'ky a box of poisoned chocolates, and that Gor'ky and two of his nurses had died from eating them. It was a finale that Gor'ky never imagined when he originally uttered his famous: "He who is not with us is against us.” Stalin had attacked Gor'ky in 1917 in what now, in retrospect, seems an altogether sinister tone: The Russian Revolution has overthrown m any authorities. Its pow er is evident in its unwillingness to bow down before "big nam es." Either it took them into its service o r cast them out into non-being when they did not wish to learn from it. There exists an entire roster o f "big nam es” later rejected by the revolution: Plekhanov, Kropotkin, Breshkovskaya, Zasulich, and generally a ll those old revolutionaries who were rem arkable only in that they were "o ld.” We fear that the laurels o f those "pillars” disturb Gor'ky's sleep. We are afraid that G or'ky is drawn in a "d e a th !/' fashion [quotation m arks b y Stalin] to jo in them in the archives. To each his ow n! The revolution is incapable o f either pitying o r burying its dead. The "father of Socialist Realism” must ultim ately be judged as a w riter of very mixed achievement. His best writings were his perceptive literary memoirs of fellow writers and a sensitive
aMoisei Uritsky, who as head of the Petrograd Cheka had conducted a policy of massive terror in the city, w as assassinated by Leonid Kannegiser, student and poet, on August 30, 1918, in revenge for the execution of a friend. Kannegiser's act reflected the conviction of earlier revolutionaries that state leaders responsible for crimes should be held personally responsible for their acts.
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autobiographical trilogy — Childhood, In the World, and M y Universities, of which volumes 1 and 3 were produced in emigration. The prose and plays of Semën Yushkevich (1868-1927), a melodramatic chronicler of the difficult life of the Jewish working class, were very much in harmony with Gor'ky's approach to literature. Thus, it was only natural that Gor'ky's publishing house Znanie (Knowledge) was the chief outlet for his work before the revolution of 1905. By the end of the 1910's, however, Yushkevich had become disenchanted with Gor'ky's revolutionary ideals and when in 1920 he was reduced to selling his personal possessions to pay for daily essentials, he decided he had finally had enough and fled across the Romanian border to Paris, where he had studied medicine from 1893 to 1902. Having brought with him some pictures of the artist Isaak Levitan, he was able to sell them and so avoid the financial misery experienced by so many of his émigré colleagues. In 1921 Yushkevich decided to try his luck in America, and upon getting off the boat in New York, the first thing he saw was a poster advertising an unauthorized performance of his own play, Taie o f Mr. Sonkin (Povest' o gospodine Son'kine). New York fascinated him, and in the story Am erichka he described it through one of his characters as a place where you could find anything — cholera and communism, scoundrels and happiness. After three years, however, he decided to return to Europe, but did later make a last visit to the New W orld. In Europe he led a somewhat peripatetic life, moving to Berlin at the height of the inflation, and attempted unsuccessfully to found a theater in Paris. He continued to publish in Paris and Berlin, but at the same tim e began to look into the possibility of returning to the Soviet Union. W hen in 1922 the Soviet publishing house Moskva reissued his three-volum e 1911 novel Leon Drei, the editors of the YMCA Press, whose galleys had been used for the edition, were so outraged that they bought up the entire print run and had it burned — an event that caused some consternation among his fellow writers, who were concerned with the issue of artistic freedom. When Yushkevich died in 1927, Pravda published a laudatory obituary. A realist and adm irer of Gor'ky, Mikhail Artsybashev (18781927) eventually went on to devote his prose and plays to the themes of sex and violence and became an im portant figure in the neonaturalist movement in the first decade of the 20th century. As tim e passed, his innate pessimism and penchant for shock effects became even more pronounced, and he wrote increasingly of death. Artsybashev's most popular work was the 1907 novel Sanin, in which the protagonist displays a supreme disregard for the rights of others and devotes him self to a violent hedonism. Bishop Germogen threatened Artsybashev with excommunication, and the Church Synod
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instituted court proceedings against him for pornography and blasphemy. His lawyer refused to defend him, and prom inent writers such as Bunin and Leonid Andreev refused to be published by any m agazine w hich also accepted his w orks. The term artsybashevshchina even appeared, indicating a literary preference for sexual topics combined with social indifference. In 1923 Artsybashev emigrated to Warsaw, where together with Dmitry Filosofov he edited Za svobodu! (For Freedom!). His émigré works include: The W ild Ones (Dikie) and a play, The Devil (D'yavol). Artsybashev adopted Soviet citizenship and died in Warsaw. Mikhail Osorgin (pseudonym of Mikhail ll'in, 1878-1942) had been active in the Social Revolutionary Party before 1917 and later frankly described how he had helped conceal an im portant terrorist in the organization. He was arrested and sentenced to death in 1905, but the sentence was rescinded in 1906, and he was soon able to flee to Helsinki and thence to Italy. There he lived in a sort of commune near Genoa and became a journalist. He returned to Russia in 1916 and contributed regularly to left-wing publications. He was critical of the Soviet governm ent and became a member of the All-Russian Famine Relief Committee. Lenin felt that the Committee was hostile to the governm ent and ordered its members arrested. Held in the basem ent of Moscow's Lubyanka Prison (the notorious "Ship of Death”), Osorgin was sentenced to be shot, but when American President Hoover and Fridtjof Nansen protested, his sentence was commuted. Osorgin was one of the large group of intellectuals deported to the W est in September 1922. There he continued his journalistic activities, but at first worked for Aleksander Kerensky, the form er head of the Provisional Government, who employed him as an editor in his newspaper D ni (Days). Kerensky's political views were further to the right than those of Milyukov’s more liberal Poslednie novosti, and Osorgin's leftist views (he even kept his Soviet citizenship), combined with his increasing collaboration with Poslednie novosti, induced Kerensky to challenge him to declare which side of the barriers he stood on: was Osorgin prepared to continue the struggle against the Soviet regime, or did he wish to be reconciled with it? Osorgin responded that October 1917 was a logical consequence of the February Revolution; that a government run by Kerensky m ight be a lesser evil than the Soviet government, but nevertheless an evil; that the émigré press reflected chiefly the émigré community's hatred and so distorted the real Russia that the appearance of such publications could arouse only amazement, pity, and boredom; and that Kerensky's m indset was alien and irrelevant to Russia. At that point Kerensky accused Osorgin, not inaccurately, of being an anarchist and, having published his response together with Osorgin's statement, announced
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that he would never again repeat the error of permitting Osorgin to publish in Dni. Passions ran high, but in 1927 Kerensky rehired Osorgin as editor of the literary page of Dni. Named for a street in Moscow, Osorgin's 1928 novel Sivtsev vrazhek (English title: Quiet Street) is a kaleidoscopic replication of the early Soviet period. The work is a multi-generational chronicle of a fam ily representing the intelligentsia: there is the figure of the old professor engrossed in his ornithology, his granddaughter, with whom all the young men fall in love, and the epic alternation of eternal nature with the frantic cares and anxieties of a society undergoing major upheaval. The granddaughter falls in love with a man who was an émigré before 1917. Disgusted with the new society, this former revolutionary finds himself sharing an apartment with a government executioner. The latter, who is perpetually drunk, takes solace in treating his neighbor to the special rations and liquor paid him for plying his trade. Eventually the revolutionary is brought to him to be executed and tells him impatiently to get it over with. Later, when asked by his wife to slaughter a pig, the executioner hysterically pumps the animal full of bullets. Eventually, the executioner himself dies after an operation. This short novel is a mosaic of 86 mini-chapters, the last of which are set in the house on Sivtsev Vrazhek, where the girl and her grandfather talk of the swallows returning in the spring.
Exaggerated Prose N or can one word be chang’d but fo r a worse. Homer Some émigré writers had already chosen an experimental, ornam ental manner very different from that of their more traditional colleagues — what Andrei Sinyavsky called "exaggerated” (u triro v a n n a y a ) prose in my 1983 interview with him. A poet, prose writer, and literary theoretician, Andrei Bely (pseudonym of Boris Bugaev, 1880-1934) was a brilliant but unstable representative of the second-generation Symbolist movement. In both chronology and spirit, Bely was a member of the younger generation of Symbolists who saw them selves as prophets rather than decadents. Influenced by Nietzsche's tragic unity of Apollonian beauty and Dionysian chaos, a belief in the coexistence of the nominal and the phenomenal, and Vladim ir Solov'êv's predictions of a crisis in Western civilization, Bely eagerly awaited the coming of a new "theurgic” ideal, to be accomplished through intuition and art — especially music. He attem pted to combine mysticism, the occult, and alogicality with mathem atical analysis of prosody, relying on irony to mediate between
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the two ideals. On a political level he could not decide whether to be ecstatic or horrified at his own eschatological prem onitions of a changing world. In 1912 Bely went abroad to study under Rudolph Steiner and adopted Steiner's anthroposophie ideal of self-perfection and knowledge of the godhead. It was abroad that he began work on his fantasized childhood autobiography, Kotik Letaev. Although he broke with Steiner, he remained abroad until 1916, when he was called up for m ilitary service, but ended up not being drafted, after all. The figure of Sophia, embodying the Eternal Feminine and Divine Wisdom, which loomed large in Bely's hopes, was hardly consonant with the realities of Soviet life, and he re-emigrated to Berlin in 1921 (where, incidentally, he became enamored of the foxtrot), but returned to Russia just two years later — a fact which makes him more of an onagain-off-again expatriate than an émigré. Bely's influence was stylistic, rather than ideological, and he is frequently referred to in the same breath as James Joyce, particularly on the strength of his most famous novel, Petersburg, which he completed in 1913 in W estern Europe. Evgeny Zamyatin (1884-1937) was very much a Bol'shevik sym pathizer at one time, but is best known for his anti-utopian novel We, which appeared in English in 1924 (before the 1927 Prague Russian-language edition) and may have served as a prototype for Huxley's Brave New World and Orwell's 1984. Zamyatin, a naval architect, had worked in England in 1916-17, but made the mistake of returning to Russia. After the appearance of We, Zamyatin came under severe pressure from orthodox Party critics, and in 1931 — after writing a personal letter to Stalin — he was permitted to leave the Soviet Union for one year, and then opted not to return home. Like many Russian émigrés, Zamyatin was in dire financial straits, which he hoped to improve by writing film scenarios (he even met with Cecile deMille), but nothing came of these efforts or of the plays he wrote. The unfinished novel he was working on when he died — The Scourge o f God (Bich bozhii) — compared the Soviet threat to Europe with that posed by Attila to Rome. In general, Zam yatin's émigré period was an artistic disappointm ent; things m ight have worked out differently, had he lived longer. One of the most brilliant and best known of all the émigré prose writers was Vladim ir Nabokov (1899-1977), an author who eventually switched not only countries, but even languages. Nabokov liked to cast him self in the role of the nonchalant intellectual — playing chess with his father on the deck of the ship evacuating the fam ily from Russia; but for him, as for so many other émigré writers, exile was a financial
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disaster, although in his case not a permanent one. Born into a wealthy family, he found himself giving private lessons in Berlin. Unsuited to work in an organization, he lasted only three hours as a clerk in a German bank. After moving to the United States in 1940 he was so reduced in circumstances that he interviewed for a job as a bicycle delivery boy for Scribner's Bookstore. It must have been quite a jo lt for a man whose fam ily had been so wealthy that a chauffeured Rolls-Royce limousine took the future w riter to school. (When the 1917 revolution broke out, Russia's head of state, Aleksandr Kerensky, wanted to use it to flee abroad.) Nabokov's father, who had been a prominent member of the Constitutional Democrat Party (the Cadets), emigrated with his fam ily from Russia in 1919. In 1922 he fell victim to an assassination attem pt whose intended target was the historian Pavel Milyukov, who had outraged the monarchists by proclaiming a "new tactic" of attempting to find positive aspects in the October revolution. Milyukov, who as early as November 1921 had declared reestablishment of the monarchy to be a hopeless undertaking, had just given a talk in a rented hall at the Berlin Philharmonic when the assassination took place. Shouting "Vengeance for the Empress Aleksandra Fêdorovnal”, a man began firing shots in the sumptuous hall. The elder Nabokov attem pted to restrain him and was shot in the back by a second assassin. The two assailants were both Russian émigrés — Pètr Shabel'sky-Bork, who had previously attempted to free the Tsar and his fam ily from captivity in Ekaterinburg, and Sergei Taboritsky, who had earlier attem pted to assassinate Aleksandr Guchkov, the man who had persuaded Nikolai to abdicate in favor of his brother Mikhail. According to one witness, Taboritsky fired the final shot as Shabel'skyBork grappled with Nabokov. Avgust Kaminka, co-editor with Nabokov senior, and Gessen of R ul' (The Helm) were wounded along with some other people. On the day following the assassination their cell was inundated with bouquets of flowers from Russian monarchists who hated the liberal Milyukov. The defense was led by a Balt by the name of Foelkersham, who was a leading supporter of Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich. Both men were sentenced to 20 years' imprisonment, but were pardoned by Hindenburg and were politically active during the Hitler period.®
•Shabel'sky eventually emigrated to Argentina, where he died of tuberculosis in August 1952. In a note to a book he wrote glorifying Tsar Paul I he wrote of himself: "Pëtr Nikolaevich burned with a sacred hatred for those who betrayed and enslaved our land. As many know, he was not inactive in this sphere and paid dearly for the attem pt to remove the contemptible Milyukov from Life’s arena." (The
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From 1922 to 1937 Nabokov lived in Berlin, where he wrote the bulk of his Russian works, including M ary (Mèri, 1926), King, Queen, Knave (Korol', dama, valet, 1928), The Eye (Soglyadatai, 1930), The Defense (Zashchita Luzhina, 1930), Laughter in the Dark (Kamera obskura, 1932), G lory (Podvig, 1933), Despair (Otchayanie, 1936), The G ift (Dar, 1937-38, 1952), and Invitation to a Beheading (Priglashenie na kazn', 1938). That a writer whose w ife was Jewish and who had him self been fluent in both English and French since childhood but whose German was rudimentary (or, at least, so he claimed) would choose Berlin was indicative of the continuing significance of the city for Russian cultural life during this period. As late as 1934 he wrote to Khodasevich that he found the city "very attractive,” although he was later to claim that he had remained as long as he did because of his wife's salary as a secretary and was generally negative in his attitude to Germany. In January 1937 Nabokov was finally persuaded that the tim e had come to move on and he left for France, having spent 141/2 years in Germany. Fortunately for Nabokov and his family, he was able to come to the United States on a ship that left France in 1940, just before the Nazis overwhelmed that country. Russian literature had traditionally had a strong ideological bent to it, and Nabokov's writings struck many of the émigrés, who in a literary sense were often quite conservative, as vacuous trickery. Bunin, for example, in a moment of malice once prophesied to him that he would "die in dreadful pain and com plete isolation.” Only with the passage of tim e was the genius of his stories about Russians abroad (his chief topic) properly recognized by the majority of his fellow exiles. Nabokov began writing in English even before crossing the Atlantic, having used the language earlier as the vehicle for some poems and The Real Life o f Sebastian Knight (1941).a At first he had little hope of being able to support himself with the royalties from works published in Russian, but he had always supposed that the income from translations would suffice. This supposition proved to be unfounded. The choice of a new language eventually enabled him to break free of the poverty syndrome of the émigré writer, but it was not an easy decision to make. It took him over two decades to resolve to abandon his native tongue. Although the attraction of English was
book w as entitled A Pavtovian Tapestry [Pavlovskii gobelen] and penned under the pseudonym "Staryi Kiribei"). •Having spoken English as a child, Nabokov liked to claim that English w as actually his first language. On other occasions he phantasized that he could have becom e a great French writer.
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undeniable in his case, his motivation appears to have been largely financial. W hile on a lecture tour in 1942 he wrote to his wife: Yesterday after a tour o f the area around the city, I was wildly bored, and so I went to the cinema and came back on foot. I walked for more than an hour and went to bed a t about eight. On m y walk I was pleasantly pierced b y a lightning bolt o f inspiration, I had a passionate desire to write, and write in Russian, but I m ust not. I d o n t think that anyone who has not experienced this feeling can really understand its tortuousness, its tragic aspect. The English language in this light is illusion and Ersatz. I am in m y usual state o f affairs, i.e., occupied with butterflies and translations o r academic writing, and so I am not fully caught up in the sadness and bittem ess o f m y situation. Not only linguistically, but also socially, Nabokov appears to have withdrawn to a considerable extent from his previous contacts with the world of Russian émigrés, whom he had so often and so ruthlessly satirized in his early novels. The B rief Soviet Literary Encyclopedia referred to him as a "Russian-American writer” who had been become "denationalized.” In the United States Nabokov wrote Bend S inister (1947), Lolita (1955), Pnin (1957), and a memoir, Conclusive Evidence (1951). In 1958 the success of Lolita enabled him to move to Switzerland, where he wrote Pale Fire (1962), Ada (1969), Transparent Things (1972), and Look a t the Harlequinsl (1974). Lolita was the turning point in Nabokov's financial fortunes, but it was also a m anuscript which he at one point wanted to destroy. The book's sexual content was such that it could not originally find an American publisher, was banned in New Zealand, and put on mock trial by Nabokov's fellow émigrés. Ultimately Nabokov was to claim a sort of curious high ground, maintaining that the novel was of lofty moral content. His decision to translate the book into Russian himself was in part an attem pt to reestablish his identity as a Russian writer. In the preface to the Russian edition he agonized that the strings of his Russian lyre had grown rusty. Even after abandoning America for Switzerland, Nabokov continued to make much of being an American writer, but he spent nearly two decades in Europe before his death with only two brief visits back to Am erica. He was also active as a memoirist, lepidopterist, and translator, producing a very scholarly but singularly unpoetic rendering of Pushkin's Eugene Onegin. Himself a literary scholar of considerable talent, Nabokov had little patience with critics who tried to interpret his work in any sociopolitical context. He stubbornly maintained that Invitation to a Beheading had not been influenced by Kafka, although that novel seems to have the most direct relationship to the Nazi
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regime and the fate of the artist in that country — a circumstance which must be borne in mind when discussing the supposedly "apolitical” nature of his writing. But Nabokov was forever covering his tracks. When one biographer, Andrew Field, proved difficult to control, Nabokov launched a four-year struggle with him through his attorneys, although he never actually sued him. Field's response was to call Nabokov the "great Russian-American Narcissus.” Nabokov was a great and subtle stylist — in both English and Russian, and it is incomprehensible that neither he (nor the Argentine, Borges, with whom he had much in common) ever received the Nobel Prize for literature — perhaps in part because of the topic of Lolita, and also because the Awards Committee seemed to prefer works marked by social commitment.
Historical Novelists Another w riter of Nobel Prize quality was Mark Aldanov (pseudonym of Mark Landau, 1886-1957), whose talents developed alm ost entirely in emigration. Surprisingly, he was able to combine a prolific career as a writer with that of prom inent chem ist — a career which saved him from the penury that beset most of his fellow émigré writers. This brilliant man was also active as a historian, literary scholar, and publisher-editor. The historical novel has a rich tradition in Russian letters, and Aldanov was an ardent adm irer of Pushkin and, especially, Tolstoi, whose W ar and Peace dealt with a period that interested him keenly but which he himself avoided treating, possibly because he did not want to compete with his idol. A particularly fine novel is his Ninth o f Therm idor (Devyatoe Termidora), which is part of a tetralogy describing the French revolution. Aldanov was fascinated with the revolutionary process and felt that only persons who had lived through such upheavals could have a true understanding of their nature. Many parallels are drawn in the novel between the French revolution and the Russian coup of October 1917: the poverty of prominent exiles, the "new policy” of recognizing the achievements of the revolution, the royalists' hopes for the restoration of the Bourbons, the call for foreign intervention, the calls for a return home and the eagerness of some to "repent,” the replacing of fanatical idealists with sheer scoundrels, and the violent suppression of the popular will. At the same time, Aldanov was quick to point out that the Soviets had generally borrowed only the more hideous aspects of the French revolution. The Ninth o f Therm idor is written in elegant Russian, displaying Aldanov's fascination with the speech of earlier ages. The overall tone is one of deep European
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culture and refined irony. Altogether, Aldanov wrote thirteen novels, all of which have been translated into English, as well 23 other languages. Dmitry Merezhkovsky (1865-1941) was an amazingly prolific w riter who had established a major reputation before 1917. His 1914 edition of collected works, which was far from complete, ran to 24 volumes. Primarily known for his novels and critical essays, he began his career as a poet and was also active as a translator. The last decade of the 19th century and the first of the 20th century had been marked by the growing popularity of Symbolism, imported from France. In 1893 Merezhkovsky published a landmark Sym bolist essay, On the Reasons for the Decline and on the New Trends in Contem porary Russian Literature, decrying the utilitarian, didactic trend in literature which had been popular since mid-century. Merezhkovsky's best-known pre-1917 prose work was the trilogy of historical novels: Death o f the Gods: Julian the Apostate (Smert' bogov: Yulian otstupnik, 1896), Resurrected Gods: Leonardo da Vinci (1901), and Antichrist: Peter and Alexis (Antikhrist: Pêtr i Aleksei, 1905). In general, they lack the psychologism of Aldanov's novels, and are centered around Merezhkovsky's religiousphilosophical conceptions. Like a number of other writers, Merezhkovsky ran into difficulties with the tsarist censors. In 1912, when his novel, Paul I, appeared, the public prosecutor immediately charged him with "impudent disrespect of the Supreme Authority.” The charge carried a minimum penalty of one year imprisonment, and he judged it wisest to flee Russia for Paris, informing the prosecutor that he would return later for trial (he kept that promise, and both he and his publisher were acquitted). The Merezhkovskys fled to Poland in 1919. In 1920, after PHsudski made peace with the Soviets, they moved on to France, where Merezhkovsky continued to publish as prolifically as he had prior to 1917. Among his writings were the philosophical works Birth o f the Gods: Tutankhamon on Crete (Rozhdenie bogov: Tuntankamon na Krite), The Messiah, Napoleon (two volumes), Dante (also two volumes), and Jesus the Unknown (lisus Neizvestnyi). Nearly all of Merezhkovsky's works seek to explore the past while predicting the future, and to search for the sources of Christianity and a higher, religious reality. Merezhkovsky evidently saw himself as a sort of eschatological prophet castigating the Russian intelligentsia for having brought about the revolution. Many of his works were translated into various foreign languages, and for a tim e he may well have been more popular with non-Russian readers (particularly in Germany) than among the émigrés themselves. Merezhkovsky became enamored of Mussolini, whom he met in 1934 and who helped him get an advance from the Italian publisher
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Mondadori. He also met with Mussolini's son-in-law, who told him Italy would be proud to give such a man the chance to live and work in Italy. Il Duce inspired in Merezhkovsky a feeling which was "not fear, but a vague disquietude, an inexplicable heaviness, a terror which people feel when they approach and peer into a forbidden place.... It was something like what Faust felt when the Spirit of the Earth appeared to him.” After the meeting with Mussolini, Gippius com plained that Bunin was spreading the rumor that she and Merezhkovsky were leaving France to be supported by Mussolini, and an alm ost conspiratorial flavor creeps into her letters, in which Mussolini is referred to as "the bear,” "the Duke,” "Caesar,” or just by his initials, but even so it is clear that the flirtation was broken off sim ply by M ussolini's busy schedule. Despite Gippius's contemptuous remarks about the "idiot” Hitler, when W orld W ar II broke out, Merezhkovsky saw the Germans as representing salvation from communism. In the summer of 1941, a few months before his death, Merezhkovsky gave a speech over the radio, possibly authored by Vladim ir Zlobin, in which he spoke of the "enorm ity of the heroic feat” accomplished by the Germans in declaring a "crusade” on the Soviet Union.3 After that, the Merezhkovskys were largely boycotted by the same émigré com m unity which they had received so regularly at The Green Lamp. W hen Merezhkovsky died in 1941, Bunin refused to attend his funeral. Gippius survived him by four years and wrote his biography, which was published in 1952.
Whimsical Writers A nd more true jo y M arcellus exiled feels Than Caesar with a Senate a t his heels. Alexander Pope The Formalist literary scholar and novelist Viktor Shklovsky (1893-1984) spent 1922-23 in Berlin, where he fell in love ... and was rejected. The experience led to the creation of a charming collection of musings set in the epistolary genre — Zoo: O r Letters not about Love (Zoo: Hi pis'm a ne o lyubvi), written in Berlin but published in Moscow
aTem ira Pachmuss, the most productive scholar of Zinaida Gippius, writes that in an August 7, 1967, interview granted to her by Yury Terapiano, Terapiano claimed that Zlobin had forced Merezhkovsky to deliver the speech. Supposedly, Zlobin's goal had been to improve the difficult material circumstances of the Merezhkovskys.
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— plus a plea to Gor'ky and Mayakovsky to intercede for the author to get permission to return home. Gaito Gazdanov (1903-1971) was a member of the "younger generation” of émigrés, having left Russia with the Crimean evacuation when he was only sixteen. He finally made his way to Paris in 1923. Although he already spoke French as a boy in Russia, he continued to be devoted to the Russian language and never made any attem pt to switch to French as a writer. (Gazdanov was of Ossetian origin.) In 1930 he published his best known work, An Evening a t C laire’s (Vecher u Kler). Like Shklovsky's Zoo ..., the novel was uncharacteristic of the intense tradition of Russian letters, so often dom inated by plot and philosophy. Properly likened by contemporary critics to Proust's musingsa, the novel is filled with a romantic languor, delicate memories of childhood, and an enviable contentm ent with life. Gazdanov's chief biographer, Laszlo Dienes, however, supports Gazdanov's denial of a Proustian influence on An Evening With Claire. W hile still a boy, the protagonist falls in love with Claire, a French girl in Russia, but she marries someone else, and he does not see her for ten years. The meeting with her at the beginning of the book is followed by a reminiscence of childhood and then of the Russian civil war. Finally, the narrator finds himself on a ship which is evacuating refugees from the Crimea to Istanbul. His only thought is of finding Claire in Paris. To use Gazdanov's own phrase, this was a "journey in sound to the unknown.” Nevertheless, the book's rambling nature and lack of structure have an ideological underpinning — that convictions inevitably prove false, that logic is an exercise in self-deception, and that the only realities in life are our impressions of it. For a tim e Gazdanov enjoyed considerable popularity; Gor'ky praised his work, and some of his works were published in English. In 1953 he became an editor at Radio Liberation (later renamed Radio Liberty), a circum stance which permitted him to give up his 20-year job as a cab driver in Paris. As is often the case in émigré letters, the new, more professional occupation evidently took up too much of his creative energies, and he produced less — not more — literary works after his financial fortunes improved. Sadly, the recordings he did as a radio journalist were evidently destroyed. Arkady Averchenko (1881-1925) was a prose w riter who was also active in the theatrical world as a playwright and even founded his own theater before emigrating. In 1907 he was hired to write for the St. Petersburg satirical magazine Strekoza (The Dragonfly), which was
•Another writer compared to Proust was Yury Fel'zen, whose 1930 novel The Deception (Obm an) lacks virtually any plot and is closest in manner to a diary.
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refounded as Satirikon the following year.a Shortly thereafter he published a series of humorous books, including Cheerful Oysters (Vesëlye ustritsy, republished more than 20 times) and Humorous Stories (Rasskazy yumoristicheskie), which earned him the title "King of Laughter.” On November 15, 1920, he arrived in Istanbul and from there moved on to Sofia, but the Stambolisky governm ent was unsympathetic to Russian émigrés, and he left for Belgrade in May 1922. In June he moved to Prague, which was to become his last perm anent abode. It proved impossible for him to earn a living as a writer, and while still in Istanbul he founded a cabaret entitled "The Nest of M igratory Birds,” which toured Germany, the Baltic states, Romania, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Yugoslavia. W hen asked where he was headed next, he responded: I d o n t care. I used to be a Russian citizen and fo r me a trip from Petersburg to [nearby] Trete Pargoiovo was a feat. B ut now I ’m a citizen o f the world, and the countries flash by me like road posts. The planet has become so sm all that in the last three years it's become a ll dried up and wrinkled, like an old lemon. The tot of a satirical w riter was not an easy one. In Istanbul Averchenko was supposedly challenged to a duel by an "unknown officer” who felt that he had been slandered in one of Averchenko's light-hearted pieces, and in Romania he was nearly deported, supposedly for having said that Romania was not a nation but a profession — that of gypsy fiddler. In 1921 Averchenko published a collection of stories entitled A Dozen Knives in the Back o f the Revolution (Dyuzhina nozhei v spinu revolyutsii). The book was reviewed in Pravda by none other than Lenin himself, who while adm itting it showed considerable talent assailed Averchenko as a "W hite Guard bitter to the point of madness.”6 Many of the later stories
*Strekoza had been founded in 1875 by Germ an Komfel'd and w as renam ed by his son Mikhail in 1907, who modeled the publication after the Germ an humorous m agazine Simplizisimus. W hen this rem ake of the m agazine proved to be a success, Averchenko demanded that he and several fellow contributors receive a more generous share of the profits, but w ere turned down. The dissidents then founded their own N ew Satirikon and managed to drive the old Satirikon out of business within a year, but the events of 1917 rendered their victory meaningless. The younger Komfel'd, who emigrated in 1919, refounded Satirikon in Paris in 1931. But the world depression soured people on humor and, although many of the most prominent émigrés published in the m agazine, it folded just six months later. bLenin maintained a keen interest in those countrymen who had taken his place in exile. His personal library contained 267 ém igré books.
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of this "M ark Twain of Russian literature” are ironic depictions of émigré life. When he died in Prague in 1925, his body was buried in a metal vault in the hope that it would eventually be reburied in Russia. W hen Averchenko left Russia for Kiev late in 1918, he was accompanied by another contributor to the pre-1917 Satirikon, Nadezhda Tèffi (1872-1952)a, a humorous writer who had been extrem ely popular before 1917 and who renewed her Soviet passport as late as 1922. Tèffi was known as a children's author, often writing about animals, but she was popular among her fellow exiles for her light irony about émigré life. In time, however, her tone became more and more heavyhearted. Aleksandr Glikberg (Sasha Chêmy, 18801932) was another w riter known for his humorous and sometimes bitter satirical sketches of émigré life. Mikhail Èizenstadt (pen name: "Argus”) arrived in the United States in 1924, where he wrote both prose and verse in the manner of Tèffi. Totally rejecting ideology, Èizenstadt created brief miniatures intended as newspaper space fillers. One story tells of Russian ém igrés arriving on the moon and discovering another group of Russians already there, publishing competing newspapers. To the question "W here is the Russian emigration heading?” Argus responds — to the cinema, home, to meet their wives, or perhaps staying home tonight. He mercilessly satirized émigré literary-musical "evenings” and jokingly described Prince Kurbsky as a defector making his living as a specialist on Russia. Il'ya Èrenburg (1891-1967) was a prose writer, journalist, and poet who lived abroad for nearly three decades — from 1908 until 1917 and again from 1921 to 1941. During his first sojourn he was at first active politically and came to know Lenin, Kamenev, Zinov'ev, and Trotsky fairly intimately, but then decided to devote himself to writing. He had originally fled Russia out of fear of imprisonment, and upon returning to Russia he was again arrested, but released thanks to the intervention of an old friend, Nikolai Bukharin. For a tim e he lived in the home of Maksimilian Voloshin in Koktebel', together with Vikenty Veresaev and Osip Mandel'shtam, but then once more chose to em igrate. Abroad, he used his political contacts with the Bol'sheviks to maintain his Soviet citizenship and in the early 1930s was hired as the Paris correspondent for Izvestiya. Soon after this appointment, his friends in Moscow began to fall victim to the purges, but this was also the tim e of confrontation with Hitler. Èrenburg, who was an intelligent, cultured, and well-traveled intellectual, was horrified over the purges,
•Born Lokhvitskaya, she later becam e Buchinskaya by marriage; the name "Tèffi” w as evidently taken from the English word "taffy.”
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but keenly aware of his Jewish roots, continued to be a paid agent of the Soviet system and in 1941 returned to Russia. In the Soviet Union he managed to survive the late 1940s and Stalin's campaign against precisely such Jewish "cosmopolites” as himself, and published his fam ous memoir People, Years, Life (Lyudi, gody, zhizn') in the early 1960s. Yury Annenkov (1889-1974), who wrote under the pseudonym "Boris Temiryazev,” was a talented artist, critic, and memoirist who in 1934 attracted a good deal of attention with his sem i-autobiographical Tale o f Trifles (Povest' o pustyakakh), about a young painter who flees Russia out of frustration. Now, however, Annenkov is best known for his two-volum e Diary o f M y M eetings: A Cycle o f Tragedies (Dnevnik moikh vstrech: Tsikl tragedii), a classical work with remarkable illustrations by the author himself. A prose writer, journalist, editor, and critic,* Aleksandr Am fiteatrov (1862-1938) lived abroad for at least 12 years before 1917, and spent the last 17 years of his life in exile, beginning in 1921. As a young man, he had published satirical verse and epigrams in the humorous magazine Oskolki (Fragments), to which Chekhov had also contributed. After penning a lampoon on the Romanovs, he was sent briefly into internal exile and later forbidden to engage in any literary activities. In 1904 he emigrated to Paris, where he edited w hat was intended to be a nonpartisan magazine entitled Krasnoe znam ya (Red Banner, 1906-07). Having been a correspondent for a Russian newspaper in Milan in 1886-87, he moved back to Italy when Krasnoe znam ya proved unsuccessful (a failure which Lenin noted with satisfaction). There he published both fiction and non-fiction, and founded a second such journal, entitled Sovrem ennik (The Contemporary), which was printed in St. Petersburg. Am fiteatrov returned to Russia in 1916 and contributed to a number of periodicals. Horrified by the new Soviet state, however, he fled in a small boat with his fam ily to Finland in 1921. He considered himself a realist; in his case this meant fictionalizing current journalistic themes, often in a sensationalists manner. His popularity with the reading public is evident in the announced scope of his pre-1917 collected works (37 volumes, 34 of which appeared), brought out in St. Petersburg from 1911 to 1916. Cut off from his readers after emigrating, he was largely forgotten in his native country, b u t— like so many of the émigrés — is now being republished.
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Theater To have degenerated into the theatrical arts ... Tacitus The play’s the thing. Hamlet Drama — what literature does a t night. George Jean Nathan The origins of the Russian folk theatrical tradition are lost in tim e. As early as 1068 there is a mention of minstrels (skomorokhi) in the Prim ary Chronicle and there still exists a 1037 fresco depicting a perform ance in Kiev's St. Sophia Cathedral, so it is obvious that the stage tradition actually preceded the arrival of Christianity in Russia in 988. The puppeteering, music, acrobatics, and impious w it of the skom orokhi were actually encouraged by Ivan the Terrible, who was not loath to don a mask and dance along with them; but the Church took an increasingly dim view of their "pagan” activities. In 1648 Tsar Aleksei Mikhailovich outlawed their performances, and even had skom orokhi whipped and exiled to Siberia. In 1657 the Church declared them anathem a as part of a systematic and efficient effort to suppress the indigenous culture of the Eastern Slavs and supplant it with an imported, Byzantine tradition. People were encouraged to attend Church services, listen to sermons, saints' lives, and homilies, and sing hymns instead of drinking home-made beer and laughing at the antics of clowns and trained bears. The roots of the modern secular Russian theatrical tradition go back to a quite different heritage, one imported from the W est by such 18th-century neo-classic playwrights as Aleksandr Sumarokov and Denis Fonvizin. Over the course of the 19th century an authentic Russian tradition developed, thanks in no small measure to the major Russian playwright Aleksandr Ostrovsky. This passive, contemplative, often illogical tradition, which was eventually to achieve its full developm ent in the plays of Anton Chekhov (and also his im itator Maksim Gor'ky), exerted a major influence on Western theater and even such distant offspring as Samuel Beckett. W hile there were earlier individual performances of Russian plays abroad by Western troupes, the history of the Russian theater abroad belongs chiefly to the 20th century. It is a complex topic, and
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one little researched* In 1902 the actress Lidiya Yavorskaya took a troupe to Paris, and in 1912 performed at the Little Theatre in London, where she played Arkadina in the first English-language production of Chekhov's The Seagull. In 1905 the Moscow Art Theater toured Europe; by the tim e it reached Berlin, it had nearly run out of money and was saved only by an investment of two of its actors. That same year Pavel Orlenev's tiny St. Petersburg Dramatic Company performed in Berlin, London, and New York. Orlenev and Alla Leventon (Nazimova) were the stars of the program. In New York the major feature of the repertory was a play by the émigré Evgeny Chirikov, entitled Evrei (Jews) in Russian, but renamed The Chosen People in English. The play, which had been proscribed by the Russian censor for its depiction of the plight of Russian Jews, was a big hit with New York’s community of Russian Jewish émigrés. The troupe also put on Aleksei Tolstoi's historical chronicle,4 Tsar Fëdor Ioannovich. So successful was the tour that the Chirikov Circle (with anarchist Èmma G oldm an serving as press agent, fundraiser, and moving force behind the group) donated $2,500 and promised another $3,500. An additional $9,000 was donated by American friends. The following year Orlenev rented the East Third St. Theater, renaming it the "O rleneff Lyceum.” Curiously, the radical support of G oldm an did not put off Andrew Carnegie and J. P. Morgan, who raised an additional $16,000. Ecstatic over such generous support, Orlenev hinted he would like to find a perm anent home in San Francisco, but the earthquake and fire that ravaged the city in 1906 made such an undertaking impossible. Despite the support Orlenev received from an American audience which viewed his troupe as victim s of a despotic regime, the undertaking proved to be a financial disaster. Orlenev returned to Russia, narrowly avoiding arrest for debt, while his mistress and pupil Nazimova remained in the New W orld to become an exotic star of the silent screen. Somehow Orlenev's financial debacle resonated back in Russia as a financial Eldorado. The famous actress Vera Komissarzhevskaya, intent on repeating what she believed to have been Orlenev's success, herself came to New York, where she performed in Daly's Theatre and the Thalia Theatre, but succeeded only in losing some 20,000 rubles. Confident that his old debts had been forgotten, if not forgiven, Orlenev returned in 1912 with his new wife and partner, Lina Korolêva, but was again unsuccessful.
O n e notable exception is Lawrence Senelick's W andering Stars: Russian Ém igré Theatre, 1992.
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With the arrival of the First Wave, numerous attempts were made to establish Russian theaters abroad and not simply invite touring companies from Russia. Some of these enterprises were cabarets, but others were attem pts to establish legitimate theaters — especially in Berlin, where the distinction between "Soviets” and "ém igrés” was so nebulous. O f course, Berlin had its own resident dance troupe, The Russian Romantic Ballet, as well as two resident theaters— The Blue Bird, which toured the United States, and the Jackin-the-Box Theater. The magazine T e a triz h iz n ' (Theater and Life) was devoted specifically to Russian émigré theater and appeared from 1921 to 1923. There was a Russian Dramatic Theater in Riga and a Russian Chamber Theater. Russian performers were so ubiquitous that the city of Revel, Estonia, passed a law requiring that Russian theatrical and cabaret performances could not comprise more than 50 percent of the total. Nikita Baliev (1877-1936), who was actually Armenian and whose real name was Mkritich Balyan, had organized the Letuchaya mysh' (Bat) as a sort of private cabaret of the Moscow Art Theater in 1908. Baliev emigrated in 1920 and reconstituted the Bat as the Chauve-Souris, and it opened a successful six-month season in Manhattan on February 3, 1922. On April 9 the company staged a perform ance for the benefit of starving Russian actors and raised $10,000. Baliev's Russian vaudeville, rechristened "vodkaville,” made its creator, who had been born into a wealthy family, an affluent man again — at least until the stock market crash of 1929, when he again lost everything. By 1931 the Chauve-Souris had fallen upon hard times, and Baliev died indigent. W hen civil war broke out in Russia, a portion of the Moscow A rt Theater found itself in Kharkov, which was occupied by the W hite army of General Denikin. The troupe toured Europe until 1922, at which point some of its members, including Vasily Kachalov (real name: Shverubovich) and Ol'ga Knipper-Chekhova (the widow of Anton Chekhov), returned to Moscow to rejoin the parent theater. Under the leadership of Mariya Germanova, the actors remaining abroad established themselves as the Prague Group of the Moscow Art Theater. In 1923 they received financial support from the Czechoslovak governm ent. In April-M ay 1928 the Prague Group, directed by Germanova, performed in London's Garrick Theater, relying heavily on a repertoire largely fam iliar to Germanova from her days in Moscow.3
aA stage adaptation of The Brothers Karamazov, Chekhov's Cherry Orchard and Uncle Vanya, Gor'ky's Lower Depths, Gogol”s The Marriage, Tolstoi's Pow er o f Darkness and The Living Corpse, and Ostrovsky's Poverty Is No Vice.
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After the tour Germanova left the troupe. In 1931 the Prague Group returned to London, drawing upon a repertoire of Gogol', Dostoevsky, Chekhov, Gor'ky, Valentin Kataev, and Bulgakov. Another prom inent Russian actor abroad was Fêdor Komissarzhevsky (1882-1954), who became fam ous for his performances of Chekhov. Komissarzhevsky had the good fortune to leave for the United States just before W orld W ar II broke out and spent the rest of his life there. In 1923 the parent troupe of the Moscow Art Theater w ent on tour to New York, Boston, Chicago, and Philadelphia. Despite the obviously considerable doubts of Soviet authorities as to the appropriateness of Russia's theater leaving the country at such a moment, the decision was taken to dem onstrate to a skeptical W est the viability of Russian culture under Soviet rule. A second tour lasted from November 23, 1923, until May 24, 1924. It was then that the Moscow Art Theater became known chiefly for its perform ances of Chekhov, whose plays were actually a lament for the Russia of old, now ravaged by the Soviet state. The tours were a great success, and the American press made much of Konstantin Stanislavsky, who was described as resembling a southern plantation owner. Throughout the tour Stanislavsky found him self lionized by the Russian émigrés, but at the same tim e he sought to play down any such contacts — a task that proved well-nigh impossible. A t one point a snapshot circulated in Moscow of Stanislavsky, O l'ga KnipperChekhova, and Vasily Luzhsky standing next to Prince Yusupov at a charity bazaar in support of needy Russian performers in Am erica. This association with Yusupov, who had been one of the wealthiest men in tsarist Russia, radically compromised the actors in the eyes of the Soviet authorities. To make matters worse, the rumor spread that the troupe was helping to sell valuables smuggled out of Russia by the émigrés. Vladim ir Nemirovich-Danchenko sent a telegram to the authorities attem pting to calm the storm, and Stanislavsky engaged in hasty excuses. But when Stanislavsky refused to take Mariya Germanova back into the troupe3, he was attacked from the other side of the political spectrum. In Am erica Stanislavsky found him self accused of glorifying Bol'shevik Russia. Nevertheless, the tour was a success and there were a number of offers to remain permanently in the U.S.A. W hile some of the actors were obviously less than eager to return to Russia,
•Germ anova’s ostracism did not end there. W hen the troupe w as on tour in Paris in 1937, Nem irovich-Danchenko refused even to m eet with her.
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Stanislavsky never appears to have contemplated defecting. A telegram was sent from Moscow to be read to the entire troupe requiring them to return by a specific date and disallowing even certificates of illness. Those who failed to return would be regarded as political defectors. Finally, Vladim ir Nemirovich-Danchenko sent Stanislavsky a letter listing a number of the actors who were to be dismissed from the theater upon return to Moscow. Thus it was virtually inevitable that some of the troupe's members would remain behind, as in fact happened. Richard Boleslavsky (real name: Strzeznicki) was a Pole who had come to Russia in his teens and joined the Moscow Art Theater. He fled the Soviet Union in 1920 and joined the Prague Group the following year. When Stanislavsky's troupe arrived in New York in 1923 he was among those waiting to greet Stanislavsky at the pier. Only eight days after the first performance he had already delivered the first of ten lectures on the "Stanislavsky system.” One member of the audience described these lectures as being "like the coming of a new religion which could liberate and awaken American culture.” Boleslavsky thus established himself as Stanislavsky's chief disciple and advocate in the United States. In 1928 he became a U.S. citizen. Decimated by defections, the group eventually arrived home under fire from the Soviet press and did not go on tour again until its trip to Paris in 1937. Evidently, it was sent there as a sort of cam ouflage for the Great Purges. Actors emigrated for largely the same reasons as writers. In 1930 Mikhail Chekhov, the nephew of Anton Chekhov, who had left Russia after a distinguished career in the Moscow Art Theater, explained to Czechoslovakian President TornaS Masaryk that he had chosen to leave Russia because censorship, propaganda, and a general lack of artistic freedom were ruining the Russian theater back home and that he wanted to save it abroad.8
•Ém igré theatrical groups existed in all the major centers of the Russian émigré world. Inevitably, Paris boasted a particularly rich theatrical life. From 1924 to 1925, Baliev directed the Russian Theater; the Theater of Miniatures was founded in 1926 by Fëdor Komissarzhevsky; the Intimate Theater w as established in 1928 by D. Kirova; other theaters w ere the Albert I (1928), the Cham ber Theater Abroad (1930), the Yuzhakov Theater (1923), the W andering Comedians Theater (1934); and yet another Russian Theater (1936). Paris was also home to the playwrightdirector Nikolai Evreinov, who later wrote two books on the history of the Russian theater (Le théâtre en Russie avant 1946 [1946] and Histoire du théâtre russe [1947]). Berlin had its Bluebird Theater and the Van'ka-Vstan'ka (Jack-in-the-Box). Belgrade had two Russian theaters: The Russian Dram a Theater and the Russian Dram atic Theater for Everyone (Russkii obshchedostupnyi dramaticheskii teatr),
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These hopes were not to be realized, if only because foreign audiences obviously could not follow performances in Russian. Large as it was, the émigré community was too scattered to achieve the critical mass necessary to support a theatrical tradition. And there was also the problem of different realities and different traditions. As one Berlin newspaper reviewer put it, Berlin of 1921 was not Tver* or Yaroslavl' of 1908. In contrast, because ballet was not linguistically bound, it proved a fortunate exception to this history of enthusiastic but failed endeavors, but that story would take us beyond the scope of this book.
Poverty and Isolation To a solitary and an exile his friends are everything. W illa Sibert Cather W hile exile is asylum, it can also be a torm ent. One of the glaring realities of Russian émigré literature has been indigence. In his 1933 book on the émigrés W. Chapin Huntington described a regally attired Russian countess whose sole interest in form er tim es had been Court society but who was forced to support herself by giving manicures and selling silk stockings. One of the favored male professions was that of cab driver. A t the same time, aristocratic customs were adhered to tenaciously. For example, on three separate occasions Vladim ir Nabokov was on the verge of dueling. Among the writers, even Dmitry Merezhkovsky and Zinaida Gippius, who were fortunate to have had their old apartm ent kept for them in Paris, constantly fretted about money. The engineer, doctor, or musician who found him self abroad could take up the tools of his trade. After emigrating, the unskilled laborer sim ply w ent on doing w hat he did at home. W riters, on the other hand, dealt only in words and there was no corner of the globe open to them where Russian was not
which put on performances right up until the Germ ans bombed Belgrade on April 6, 1941. For some 20 years Riga enjoyed daily performances put on by the Russian Dram a Theater, while the producer of the Latvian Art Theater w as none other than Mikhail Chekhov, who later w as to become Marilyn Monroe's dram a coach. Tallinn had its own Russian theater, directed by Aleksandr Pronikov. Russians in China also enjoyed an active theatrical life. Prominent Soviet theatrical groups cam e regularly on tour to the Harbin Russian Theater (Russkii teatr) and the Russian O pera (Russkaya operetta). Harbin even had a newspaper devoted to local theatrical events — Kharbinskoe obozrenie teatrov (The Harbin Theatrical Review). And, of course, the role of Russian Jews in Hollywood itself could be the subject of an entire separate book.
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a foreign tongue. Thus, their situation was radically different from that of Spanish, English, German, or Chinese writers, who could go abroad, see their books published at home or in other countries where their language was spoken, and have their royalties deposited in the local bank. Throughout the Soviet period the Russian émigré writer found it well-nigh impossible even to return home for a visit. Not only could his books not be sold in Russia, but it was a crime to possess or conspire to possess them, to circulate, import, or even make a longhand copy of them. The only acknowledgement the writer could expect if he returned home was a prison sentence ... or worse. Georgy Adamovich named his collection of essays on émigré literature Loneliness and Freedom (Odinochestvo i svoboda). He was right about the loneliness, but in the modern world money is freedom. The penniless w riter is not a free human being. Western literary scholars often discount such talk as "whining,” perhaps because their university salaries have allowed them to fare far better than creative writers. The reality is, however, one of the creative writer working as a night watchman, while the professor assigning the book written by this same w riter to his (largely indifferent) students is com fortably ensconced in his home in the suburbs. Nina Berberova complained bitterly how different life was for Hemingway, who in his memoirs on living in Paris wrote that he was habitually short of cash but how two people could live modestly, but tolerably and even travel to Senlis, Fontainebleu, and the Loire: In our best years, we had 40 francs a day fo r the two o f us; before that we never had more than 30. A new filling in a tooth, a warm coat, two tickets to The Rites o f Spring tore a hole in our dom estic arithmetic, and there was no way to cover it up except b y using our feet as transportation around town for weeks. L a te r... when Khodasevich was dying, he was taken, not to a private clinic, but to a m unicipal hospital— a m onstrous d iffe re n c e !... The people we knew best were the landlords who rented us room s; the man who sold us coal and firewood; the baker; the butcher; the salespeople a t "Dam ois,” where we bought sugar, coffee, tea, and salt; and, the concierges who watched us, our guests, and our m ail with a sharp eye.... We never m et Valery, who published his books in luxurious lim ited editions, o r Katherine Mansfield, a great fan o f Chekhov who wrote about English old maids chatting around elegantly served tea tables. In those years James Joyce dined in a restaurant on the Rue Jacob and conversed with his wife and children in Italian, but we never met. A few tim es we did see the still
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unknown Henry M iller and his wife June; in a way they were a little like us. Poverty was the norm for the First Wave. Those of the Second W ave who were not forcibly repatriated to the Soviet Union lived in the tedious but relatively secure limbo of the Displaced Persons Camps as "DPs”, and at least a few of the Third-W ave writers secured positions teaching Russian language and literature in W estern Universities. The First W ave knew no such advantages. Ultimately, of course, the writers came to terms with life and found employment, but only for a few did literature become a source of income. And those who did eke out a living from literature in the rich émigré culture of the inter-W ar period were often stifled by a sense of alienation. Boris Poplavsky: Oh, loneliness, you are always with me, like a disease o f the heart, an illness which you neither recall no r sense. B ut suddenly you feel choked, as if you were in an isolation cell which you always carry around with you. Deaf, mute, unconscious, illiterate, I am alone in the street, ignorant o f m y own name. I stop, blinded by m y own wealth.... I am free, totally free to go right o r left, remain standing on the spot, light up a cigarette, go home and take an afternoon nap. O r I can go to the cinema for a matinée, instantly exchanging day fo r night, delving into the underground kingdom o f sounding shadows. Zinaida Gippius: Here in Paris there is absolutely nothing to do.... The only thing le ft is to depart into one's own inner world and personal work. That's what people do, as much as they can. That was what D. S. [M erezhkovsky] did, and it is what I attem pt to do, even though it is hard to g e t used to writing only for yourself.... Alm ost im perceptibly D. S. and I seem to be m oving toward French circles.... D. S. sometimes writes in French to make money, and even I have sunk to this level o f debauchery, absurd as it m ay seem. Under such circumstances the drive to create literature has to be strong indeed. For example, although Nabokov eventually became very well off as a writer, part of the price he paid was his inability to support his impoverished mother during the lean years.
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Former Tsarist Exiles in Positions of Power It is a strange desire, to seek power, and to lose liberty. Sir Francis Bacon You shall have joy, o r you shall have power, said God; you shall not have both. Ralph Waldo Emerson Ironically, many of the government officials responsible for driving so many people from Russia were themselves form er émigrés (and are discussed earlier in this book). Vatslav Vorovsky (Wactew Worowski) was appointed head of Gosizdat at its creation in 1919, and as such was the Soviet Union’s chief censor. He continued to reside chiefly in Western Europe as a Soviet diplom at and was assassinated by a W hite émigré, M. Konradi, in Lausanne in 1923.a Trained as a physician, the tsarist émigré and science-fiction novelist Aleksandr Bogdanov conducted a campaign in the 1920s to establish a network of bloodbanks throughout the U.S.S.R. In 1928 he carried out an experiment on himself, exchanging blood with a student who was ill with malaria and tuberculosis. The experiment proved fatal for Bogdanov, but he kept exact records on his own condition right up to his death in 1928. As an émigré Anatoly Lunacharsky had advocated the creation of a proletarian literature, but his position was less radical than that advocated by later Soviet critics in the Stalin period, and he appears even to have moderated his beliefs somewhat toward the end of his life. Lunacharsky was a true intellectual and a sincere man who did much to preserve Russian culture in his capacity as Minister of Education. He is still viewed by many as a symbol of the sort of partial freedom which was still possible in art in the 1920s. In the long run,
•The daughter of Aleksandr Guchkov claimed that her father had financed the assassination. Guchkov, who persuaded Nikolai to renounce the throne, w as himself a fascinating figure, having studied in Germany, travelled to Turkey during strained Russian-Turkish relations, been an officer in the Russian railroad running through China, crossed into Tibet, served as a volunteer in the Boer army in South Africa during the w ar with England, travelled to Macedonia during its rebellion against the Turks, and fought in the Russian-Japanese w ar in 1904-05. Evidently possessed of a fiery personality, he fought six duels before being sent by the governm ent of W hite General Anton Denikin in 1919 to France, where he remained after the W hites lost the Russian civil war.
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however, the cause which he championed as an exile and tried to realize upon returning home proved to be ruinous for Russian culture in general and Russian literature in particular. He died in France in 1933, en route to assume his responsibilities as Soviet Am bassador to Spain. Trotsky returned to Russia in 1917 from the United States via Canada and was arrested on charges of spying for Germany. After a brief stay in prison, however, he was appointed People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs. More importantly, he organized the new Soviet army. After Lenin's death in 1924, Zinov'ev and Kamenev united with Stalin to force him out of the Politbyuro. He was exiled to Alm a-Ata in 1928 and in 1929 deported to Turkey. From Turkey he left for Norway and then for Mexico in 1937. Throughout his life Trotsky was devoted to books, a passion he was able to pursue thanks in part to his ability to read very rapidly. His m ajor achievement in the field of literature is his lively book entitled Literature and Revolution, in which he rejects as inherently unfeasible the attem pt to create a proletarian culture overnight. He began writing the study in 1922, at a moment when Lenin had just offered him the position of Deputy Chairman of the Council of People's Deputies. It is an early indication of the importance to be later attached by the Soviet authorities to literature that in this very hectic period of his life he rejected this offer and ensconced himself in a dacha outside Moscow to write a book about belles lettres. Inevitably, Trotsky's relationship to Lenin had its ups and downs, both during the émigré and Soviet periods. Contrary to the claim s of the Soviet press, it was the working association of two intensely dedicated people pursuing a common cause. Lenin's wife, Nadezhda Krupskaya, wrote to Trotsky after Lenin's death, assuring him of Lenin's warm feelings for him right up until his death. In 1918 Stalin himself wrote in Pravda: The entire practical organization o f the uprising [the O ctober coup o f 1917] was directly supervised b y the Chairman o f the Petrograd Soviet, Trotsky. It can be said without any hesitation that the rapid shift o f the garrison to the side o f the Soviet and the skilled organization o f the work o f the M ilitary Revolutionary Committee was prim arily the accom plishm ent o f Comrade Trotsky. An intelligent, well-read, and witty man, Trotsky showed him self capable of making hard, even cruel judgm ents. On August 4 ,1 9 1 8 , he issued a decree as People's Commissar of M ilitary Affairs, demanding that counterrevolutionaries be rooted out mercilessly, that concentration camps be established for suspicious persons, and that opportunists be
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shot, regardless of their past services. In his 1935 diary he wrote approvingly of the murder of the Tsar and his fam ily: The severity o f the action showed that we would fight m ercilessly and without wavering. The execution o f the im perial fam ily was essential not only to frighten and horrify the enemy, and deprive him o f a ll hope, but also to shake up our own ranks and show them that there was no retreat, that ahead lay total victory o r total doom. In intellectual Party circles there were probably those who harbored doubts and shook their heads, but the masses o f workers and soldiers experienced not a m om ent o f doubt.... While abroad, I re a d ... a description o f the execution, the burning o f the bodies, etc. I haven't the faintest idea how much o f this was accurate and how much invented, since I never took the slightest interest in the m anner in which the execution was carried out. I have to adm it not even understanding such an interest. Stalin shared Trotsky's view of such matters and on May 23, 1940, sent an untrained squad of local communists to kill him in his Mexico home. A total of 73 bullets were pumped into his bedroom just a few feet from Trotsky's bed, and the assassins left incendiary bombs behind as well, but the intended victim and his wife were miraculously uninjured. On August 20 the second attem pt proved successful. Jaime Ramon Mercader del Rio Hernandez, a Spanish Moscow-trained agent of Stalin's GPU, had come to Trotsky’s fortified house, having convinced the fam ily that he was the fiancé of a woman working in the house. M ercader himself later described the act: I p u t m y raincoat on the table on purpose so that I could take out the ice-axe which I had in the pocket. I decided not to lose the brilliant opportunity which was offered me and a t the exact m om ent when Trotsky started to read m y article, which served as m y pretext, I rem oved the piolet from m y raincoat, took it in m y fist and, closing m y eyes, I gave him a trem endous blow on the head.... The man scream ed in such a way that I will never forget it as long as I live. His scream was "A a a a "... very long, infinitely long and it still seems to me as if that scream were piercing m y brain. But then I saw Trotsky g e t up like a madman. He threw him self a t me and bit m y hand ... Look, you can still see the marks o f his teeth ... Then I pushed him, so that he fell to the floor. He lifted him self as best he could and then, running o r stumbling, I don't know how, he go t out o f the room. Trotsky died the next day, but was conscious long enough to adm it to having thought earlier: "This man could kill me.” Four years
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earlier, while still en route to Mexico, he him self had written about Stalin: "He seeks to strike not at the ideas of his opponent, but at his skull.” Mercader had a letter in his pocket in which he claimed to be a form er follower of Trotsky's but had been horrified when Trotsky ordered him to go to Moscow to kill Stalin. Four days after the assassination Pravda gloated: When in 1929 the Soviet governm ent expelled from its territory the counterrevolutionary and traitor Trotsky, he was em braced b y the capitalist circles o f Europe and America. This was no accident. It was logical, for Trotsky had long since entered the service o f those who exploit the working class. Trotsky reached the depths o f human depravity and became entangled in his own machinations. He was killed by his own supporters — the same terrorists he had taught the treachery o f murder, treason, and villainy againsVthe working class and the land o f the Soviets. In organizing the atrocious m urders o f Kirov, Kuibyshev, and Gor'ky, Trotsky became the victim o f his own intrigues, betrayals, acts o f treason, evil deeds. Thus did this contem ptible person ingloriously descend into his grave with the seal o f an international spy and m urderer on his brow. Stalin approved an unsuccessful plan to end Mercader's imprisonment. The young man's communist mother was given jewels worth either $50,000 or $60,000 to finance the operation. Mercader was to be injected with the virus of an infectious disease which would necessitate moving him from the prison to a hospital, where his escape could be arranged. The injection, arranged by his own devoted mother, may actually have been intended to be fatal; at one point Mercader was sent a box of poisoned chocolates, and there were attem pts on the life of his mother, who knew too much. But Mercader served out his twenty-year sentence, consoled only by sexual visits from a girl friend — permitted in Mexican jails — and operating a small but profitable electrical business. Upon release, he left for the U.S.S.R., where he was awarded the title "Hero of the Soviet Union.” By then Stalin was dead, but his appointees and successors, the Class of '37, still had decades left to remain in power. As Trotsky him self once noted, "terror can be very effective against a ... class which does not wish to depart from the scene.” Trotsky's house in a suburb of Mexico City has been converted into a museum, with the gaping scars from the bullets of the first assassination attem pt left unrepaired in the walls. His wife, Natal’ya Sedova, lived on in the dwelling for another two decades, and the issues of Novyi zhurnal, to which she subscribed from New York, still stand on its bookshelves.
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Stalin's vengeance on Trotsky extended beyond Trotsky him self to many of his relatives. Trotsky was to write that Yagoda had driven one of his daughters into the grave and forced the other to com m it suicide. One of his sons, forced to renounce his father, suffered the same fate as his father anyway, and another died under suspicious circumstances. Even after Trotsky's death Stalin continued to persecute his family, executing his younger sister, Ol'ga, who was also guilty of being married to the revolutionary Lev Kamenev (pseudonym of Lev Rozenfel'd, 1883-1936). Kamenev had joined the Bol'sheviks abroad in 1903 and was one of Lenin's chief deputies. Stalin executed not only Kamenev himself, but his wife and children, too. There were other tales of fam ily vengeance. Yuly Aikhenval'd's son Aleksandr, a fam ous economist whose books were regarded as classical marxist studies, had visited his father, attempting to convince him — unsuccessfully — to return to Russia. The son was arrested in the beginning of W orld W ar II, and when the Germans were about to take Orlov, where he was held prisoner in 1941, he was executed along with other potential enemies of the Soviet system. It was common practice for the NKVD at the time. The grandson, Yury, a writer, was arrested in 1949 and declared mentally ill for his anti-Soviet views and imprisoned in a psychiatric hospital from 1951 to 1955. Nikolai Bukharin (1888-1938) was active in the new field of sociology (which was later to find itself in constant conflict with official Soviet M arxist doctrine). He was also a supporter of the New Economic Policy (NEP). W hereas Trotsky had backed a program of rapid industrialization and collectivization of agriculture, Bukharin advocated a more moderate approach and was supported by Stalin. In 1928, however, Stalin reversed himself and adopted Trotsky's position on this issue. Bukharin was removed from the Politbyuro but appointed editor of Izvestiya. In the sphere of literature Bukharin the form er émigré played a considerable role as an arbiter of public policy. He was probably the author of "Party Policy in the Field of Imaginative Literature.” This resolution, published in Pravda and Izvestiya on July 1, 1925, called for a gradual transition to a proletarian literature (as opposed to any immediate, dram atic leap). At the first conference of the Union of Soviet W riters, held in Moscow in 1934, Bukharin spoke out against the "bureaucratization” of literature and criticized Stalin's literary policy. Bukharin's efforts to save himself from the purges by praising the executions of Zinov'ev and Kamenev were fruitless; in 1937 he was arrested and became a defendant in the show trials of 1938. The prosecutor, Andrei Vyshinsky, accused the group of espionage,
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"wrecking,” terror, and plotting to seize power. Like the others, Bukharin made no protest: I confess m y gu ilt o f having com m itted the crim es which now weigh heavily upon me. I have previously stated to the court and now unreservedly confirm that I recognize m yself as guilty o f the crimes com m itted by "the block o f Rightists and Trotskyites.” I deserve the severest punishment, and I agree with Citizen Prosecutor, who has repeatedly stated that I am staring death in the face. The extrem ely offensive nature o f the crim e is obvious and the political responsibility boundless. The legal responsibility is such that it justifies even the m ost severe sentence. I deserve to be shot ten tim es over. Bukharin's request was honored, albeit only once. Just before his execution he wrote a last, half-crazed letter to Stalin, promising never to retract any of his confessions and swearing his total allegiance. He begged that his life be spared and offered in exchange to go to Am erica as a "sort of anti-Trotsky.” If necessary, he was even willing to leave his wife behind as a hostage. Others of the form er exiles who perished in the purges were Georgy Pyatakov (1890-1937), who had fled tsarist internal exile in Siberia to Europe via Japan and in 1930 became the real overlord of heavy industry, and Aleksandr Shlyapnikov (1885-1937), who had emigrated in 1908 and in Soviet Russia led a workers’ opposition. Shlyapnikov refused to incriminate himself in the show trials but died in prison anyway. Another friend of Lenin's since 1903 was the form er émigré Grigory Zinov'ev (pseudonym of Grigory Radomysl'sky, 18831936), who became head of the Comintern, carried out terrorist actions in 1918, and helped Stalin to defeat Trotsky in 1923-24. "Bol'shevization,” he had written, was the "flaming hatred of the bourgeoisie and of the counterrevolutionary leaders of Social Democracy.” Despite Stalin's promise of special consideration for both him and Kamenev at sentencing, Zinov'ev too was executed. Karl Radek, Zinov'ev and Kamenev had been attacked personally by Dmitry Svyatopolk-Mirsky, himself already doomed, as traitors and agents of Germany and Japan: They were able to soberly take into account how the people hated them but, deprived o f any hum an feelings and creeping about the depths to which they had descended, they were unable to fathom how the people loved their homeland, loved S ta lin ... and how the people had become a type, a mass phenomenon. A nd the purer, the better, the more heroic, the more noble the people o f our country are, the more m ercilessly we
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shall expunge these poisonous beasts — Trotskyites and Zinov’evites — the agents o f fascism. The country is purging itself o f alien trash. The venomous serpents have been captured and shall be exterminated. O ur solidly built Stalinist home w ill be free o f them. How was it that those accused of being "W hite Guard pygmies” and "worthless fascist lackeys” signed confessions and even pleaded to be executed? Varlam Shalamov, who himself spent 17 years as a prisoner in the camps, wrote that there were two schools of investigation, known as "physics” and "chemistry,” i.e. beatings and pharm acological methods. Equally effective was the threat of harm and even death to fam ily members. In 1988 the Soviet governm ent officially, albeit posthumously, "rehabilitated” Bukharin, Rykov, Zinov'ev, and 18 other Party functionaries; i. e., admitted that their confessions had been obtained "by unlawful means.” Emigration had turned out to be a round trip, but the fulfillm ent of their wishes in exile — a trium phant return home — proved to be their doom.
The Approaching War O ft expectation fails, and m ost o ft there Where m ost it prom ises; and o ft it hits, Where hope is coldest and despair m ost fits. Shakespeare, A ll's Well that Ends W ell As tensions began to increase in Europe in the 1930s, the Russian émigrés in countries which did not enjoy particularly good relations with Germany began to be regarded with suspicion because of the pro-German sympathies of many of their comrades in exile. In general, the entire period was one of intense political involvement and stress for the émigrés. In theory, the remnants of the W hite armies were still attem pting to maintain military discipline, although in practice, of course, they had long since been virtually disbanded. After Hitler came to power in Germany in 1933, some 50,000 Russians remained in the country, roughly 10,000 of them in Berlin. That year the Russian Popular Liberation Organization (ROND) was created and had 200 "storm troopers” organized according to a German model. ROND published the newspaper Probuzhdenie Rossii (Russia's Awakening) in Russian and German and graced with both the Russian double-headed eagle and the swastika. One of its leaders, Andrei Svetozarov, was shown in it wearing a swastika decorated in the Russian national colors and wearing a Hitler-style mustache.
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Svetozarov liked to be called Führer.8 Closed by the German authorities, who were at that tim e still supporting good relations with the Soviet Union, ROND was replaced by The Russian National and Social Movement. Its representative in Berlin, the form er tsarist general A. V. Meller-Zakomel'sky, paid homage to Hitler and Mussolini as the "spiritual leaders of the world forces of light, which are saving humanity from the pitch blackness of Bolshevism .” Inevitably, after France and Czechoslovakia signed mutual-cooperation treaties with the Soviet Union in 1935, the counterintelligence services of the two countries took a heightened interest in the activities of their Russian émigré guests. The Berlin Cadet newspaper R ul' folded in 1931 after a series of attacks on its editorial offices, evidently by communists, and was replaced by Nash vek (Our Age). The paper was staffed largely by Russian Jews but saw itself as a publication of the Russian‘emigration in its totality, rather than as a Jewish or even Russian-Jewish publication. The editors obviously hoped to find some accommodation with Germany's new rulers, avoided criticizing even Nazi anti-Jewish language and acts, and published letters to the editor welcoming the new government. On April 2,1933, the newspaper published an open letter addressed to Hitler by 28 Russian émigré organizations, congratulating Germany's "chosen and courageous leader of an awakened national Germany”6 on his assumption of office. The letter, which was carried on page one in Russian and German, went on: For years the martyrdom o f our people, who have been deceived and exploited by the Bol'sheviks, has been crying out to the heavens. For years we have watched the red flood approaching Germany and have sought to warn the public. We know well the enem y whom you, H err Reichskanzler, are attacking in selfless love for the Fatherland and from whom you wish to liberate the German people.... M ay a histone new era ensue in Europe together with yo u l M ay Germany be led to the same spiritual renewal which we desire for our people. On April 23, 1933, Nash vek ceased publication, supposedly because of its high printing costs. Its chief editorial w riter on foreign
•R O N D also published the newspapers Golos R O N D a, (The Voice of R O N D ), and Devyatyi val (The Ninth Breaker). b"den berufenen und mutigen Führer des erwachten nationalen Deutschland."
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affairs, Grigory Landau3, was deported that year, and Vladim ir Gessen, who wrote that he had been "impressed” by the torchlight marches, left for France. The Spanish civil war was closely followed by the Russian émigrés. At least 72 of them actually fought on the Nationalist side, while the Soviet Union assisted the Loyalists. In 1936 the W hite general Andrei Turkul created the Russian National League of W ar Participants,5 a military organization of younger people with a strong religious commitment. From 1937 until 1940 it published its own newspaper, Signal, where the platform of the party was laid out quite explicitly: " ... To pursue the goal of overthrowing the Judeo-communist authorities in Russia and reestablish the legitimate, national inherited authority ... that is, the confirmation of the legitim ate heir of the House of the Romanovs — under a scheme of broadly understood legitimism.” Turkul him self summed up his political ideals as "fascist monarchy.” The intent was to create a transitional dictatorship: We conceive the ascent to the throne by the Russian Monarch as a culm ination o f a com plex and, perhaps, lengthy process, whereby the Russian land will be purified o f the international pestilence, revolutionary intoxication, and Bol'shevik de bauchery.... But it is not for the Tsar to bum out the ulcers o f Russian life with searing iron. The hands o f the Russian Tsar should not be stained with blood. If that is necessary, better it be done by the dictator. The determined efforts of W hite General Vasily Biskupsky to establish a position within the German government were finally rewarded in May of 1936, when the informal Russian émigré mission ( Vertrauenstelle), which had been established in 1922, was dissolved by the Nazi governm ent and refounded under his direction. The street name of the new offices must have struck this dedicated monarchist as a favorable omen: "Bleibtreustraße” — literally, "Keep the Faith Street.” He prom ptly appointed as his deputies the same Pêtr Shabel'sky-Bork and Sergei Taboritsky who had murdered the father of the writer, Vladim ir Nabokov. Taboritsky "went German,” refusing to speak Russian and wearing an SS uniform. Basically, the Nazi authorities now intended to use the Vertrauenstelle to keep an eye on the Russian immigrants and serve as a registration bureau, evidently
•Landau moved to Riga, where he worked for the newspaper Segodnya (Today), but in 1940, when the country was annexed by the Soviet Union, he was arrested and executed. bBy 1937 the organization had branches in France, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, G reece, Albania, Argentina, and Uruguay.
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run by Taboritsky, but the attem pt was a failure. W hether or not Biskupsky ever handed over the names of Russian Jews, as instructed, has not been established. Throughout this period the impending violence of the war already hung in the air. In 1937 the form er Soviet agent Evgeny Poretsky (Ignaty Reiss) was murdered; Tsvetaeva's husband Sergei Èfron was implicated and was forced to flee to the U.S.S.R. That same year the W hite Army General Evgeny Miller, head of the all-Russian M ilitary League, was kidnapped in Paris by Soviet agents, taken to the Soviet Union, and shot. The W hite Army General Nikolai Skoblin and his wife, the singer Nadezhda Plevitskaya were accomplices in this act. Skoblin managed to flee, but Plevitskaya was sentenced to 15 years at hard labor. Plevitskaya, who was tremendously popular among the Russian émigrés, always wore a Russian national costume when performing and ended each performance with the song: "You've been covered over with snow, Russia” (Zaneslo tebya snegom, Rossiya). In prison Plevitskaya kept a diary, now owned by Columbia University's Bakhmetev Archive, in which she protested her innocence, but before dying she confessed to her lawyer that she had not only known about her husband's plan to kidnap Miller, but had even actively participated in the conspiracy. She and Skoblin, who had gone through six automobiles, were living far beyond their means. In her diary she wrote of seeing "Kolechka” (Skoblin) in a dream: "I threw myself on his chest and exclaimed: ‘W here have you been?’ He answered: 'There!' And suddenly his head disappeared. I shouted: ‘W here is your head?' ‘in the other world,' he answered. A bird was shrieking, an owl. And for a long tim e after that shriek my heart ached.” In Russia both Kutepov and Skoblin were interrogated (supposedly without any transcript being made) and sho t— on Beriya's personal instructions. The French centrist newspaper Le Matin commented on Miller's disappearance with a remarkable lack of foresight: France is not a no m an's land. She belongs to the French. If there are foreigners who have scores to settle between them o r quarrels to fight out, le t them do it in their own countries, not in ours. We are as little interested in the shade o f their opinions as we are in the shade o f their emblems. W hat does interest us is our tranquility. And in 1937, too, the League in France for the Return to the M otherland was renamed the League of Friends of the Soviet Motherland. In 1938, the same year that a mail bomb killed Ivan Solonevich's wife in Bulgaria, Trotsky's son, Lev Sedov, was murdered in France by Stalin's agents. And that same year Boris Pryanishnikov was sent to Berlin from France to set up a secret printing press, financed by the Japanese government, to publish materials of the
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National Labor League of the New Generation for distribution in the Soviet Union.3 In Germany the various Russian émigré organizations were amalgamated into Biskupsky's registration bureau, while in 1939 the French governm ent unexpectedly required registration of all foreign organizations but did not provide specific instructions as to how this was to be implemented. Russian cultural organizations found them selves in a sem i-legal situation. "Undesirable foreigners” were rounded up for deportation. These included Russians who had collaborated with the Nazis in Germany and also members of the proSoviet Union for Return to the Homeland. Earlier deportations had taken place in 1938. Now the Russian anti-communist emigration and the German anti-Nazi emigration found themselves in opposing ideological camps. After the French surrender in 1940 a number of the internees were handed over to the Germans and executed. The Vichy French governm ent also regarded Freemason organizations with suspicion, and on June 22, 1941, the very day Germany invaded the Soviet Union, 120 persons were arrested, among them ll'ya Fondaminsky, Vladim ir Zeeler, Il'ya Gal'perin, and Vasily Maklakov. All were released, with the exception of Fondaminsky, who was handed over to the Germans and perished in Auschwitz. Many of the so-called "conservatives” in the émigré camp openly favored a German attack on the Soviet Union, which they saw as the only way to overthrow the Soviet government. According to the magazine Signal, the W hite General N. N. Golovin viewed a possible German occupation as the price Russia had to pay for having allowed the Bol'sheviks to take power; all the German doctors, engineers, architects, and agronomists who would arrive to adm inister the new territories would, so Golovin claimed, simply be repeating history and would ultim ately be assimilated as Russians into Russia. A considerable number of Russians in France applied for permission to resettle in Germany after Hitler came to power, but the Germans distrusted them and largely disregarded their petitions. Conflicting German and Great Russian imperial ambitions were obviously a sticking point. Nevertheless, the general mood among the émigrés, who hoped to overthrow the communists with German support, was optim istic. In Belgrade a form er tsarist governor was asked what he would do upon returning home. He responded that the
•In general the role of the Japanese in Russian émigré affairs during those years is poorly understood. According to Pryanishnikov, General Turkul probably had connections with the Japanese, as well.
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last decree he had signed on the eve of the October coup was No. 16. W hen he got back he would sign No. 17. No matter how pro-German individual émigré groups may have been, they were regarded with distrust by the Nazi government. The Russian National-Socialist Movement (RNSD)a was intended to coopt the various émigrés and their organizations. A number of lectures were delivered on behalf of the group by Ivan Solonevich in 1938, and there was discussion of a possible translation of Mein Kam pf into Russian, om itting or diluting Hitler's demands for Lebensraum at the expense of Russia. In August 1939 the Molotov-Ribbentropp pact was concluded between the Soviet Union and Germany, leaving the pro-German segm ent of the émigré committee, which had placed all its hopes in Hitler, totally aghast and frightened.6 Russian émigré organizations were perm itted to remain in existence, but were ordered lo severely
“(Russkoe natsional-sotsialisticheskoe dvizhenie). The acronym RNSD has also been interpreted as meaning "Russian National and Social Movement" (Rossiiskoe Natsional'noe i Sotsial'noe Dvizhenie), but this was evidently a camouflage. bThe fate of Germ an writers in Soviet exile is itself a fascinating story which in many w ays runs parallel to and interlocks with that of Russians in Germ any at the tim e. A small group of Germ ans had been living in Moscow since the late 1920s, and in 1933 a large number of Germ an communists and writers sought asylum in the U .S .S .R . (guaranteed under Article 129 of the Soviet Constitution). At that tim e the Soviet government was eager to maintain good relations with the Germ an government, and People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs Maksim Litvinov is even rumored to have said that the Soviets did not care if the Germ ans shot their communists. Despite this state of affairs, the Germ an Communist Party instructed a number of writers to flee to Russia, including Willi Bredel and the Hungarian scholar Georg Lukâcs. After the Kirov assassination in Decem ber 1934, it becam e exceedingly difficult to obtain a Soviet entry visa, and in August 1936 the show trials began. In Septem ber 1936 Yagoda w as replaced by Nikolai Ezhov as head of the NK VD , whereupon som e of the Germ ans in the Soviet Union w ere executed. Almost all w ere murdered surreptitiously, Georg Born having been the only Germ an w riter to be publicly denounced as a "Japanese-Germ an spy.” Still others w ere simply handed over to the Germ an authorities during the period beginning with the 1939 Hitler-Stalin pact until the Germ an invasion. Lukâcs and Becher w ere given to understand that they would not be handed over, but would be liquidated internally. Germ an writers had previously been required to apply for Soviet citizenship, and those whose applications w ere not approved could at least hope to be deported. In the meantime Heinrich Mann wrote in N eue W eltbühne of the execution of 16 old revolutionaries that "they had to be done away with for the good of the revolution, quickly and thoroughly." His article w as appraised as "excellent" by the Moscow exile Johannes R. Becher.
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curtail any activities and refrain from criticizing the Soviet Union in any way.a That same year the Paris-based newspaper Vozrozhdenie abruptly shifted from a pro-Hitler position to one loyal to the French government. In China the Soviets attempted to win the sympathy of the right-wing émigrés by presenting themselves as supporters of the form er imperial way. In the window of a shop in Harbin, for example, the uniform of a Soviet general was exhibited, decorated with tsarist stripes on the trousers and epaulets in the style of the old regime. In Manchuria the Japanese began closing Russian schools.
•According to the ém igré historian Mikhail Nazarov, Alfred Rosenberg ordered that the so-called National Front (R N S U V , R N SD , RFS and others) be disbanded in early 1939. However, this information appears to be incorrect.
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The Second Wave World War II Die and be dam ned Thomas Mortimer (1785-1824) The fruits so inevitably born of the greedy and vengeful Versailles treaty represented a great hiatus marking the end of the exiles’ long wait. For many the hour appeared to have arrived for a return home, trium phant even if clinging precariously to the saddle of a foreign conqueror, while others could not see themselves fighting on any side other than Russia's, even Soviet Russia's. But for the older First-W ave émigrés, the W ar signalled the last years of their lives and careers; many died either during or quite soon after thé war. The younger exiles, hopeful of finally succeeding where their elders had so ignominiously failed, found themselves caught up in a bloody maelstrom in which many of them were killed in battle, imprisoned in Soviet forced-labor camps as traitors, and even executed by that same holy Russia they had so fervently hoped to save. As for RussianJewish exiles, there was only despair — from vainglorious beginning to calam itous end. For the Second W ave the war was despair and rage, but probably even more of the form er than the latter. In the early stages of the war some of the Russian émigrés in Europe preferred to remain neutral in a struggle which had not yet reached Russia. But even before the German invasion of the Soviet Union, the exiles had begun to choose sides. Once the conflict was finally forced upon the Soviet Union, émigré indecision and neutrality were almost totally abandoned. The editors of Novyi zhum al (The New Review), declared in their first issue that any overthrow of the Soviet governm ent under wartime conditions was impossible. Milyukov was even more blunt: "You're not for Stalin? That means you're for Hitler.” Milyukov's transformation became evident at the end of the RussianFinnish war, when he declared that he felt sorry for the Finns, but nevertheless wanted Vyborg Province for Russia. Now he went even further, justifying all of Soviet history: "When one sees the end, one understands better the means to that end.” Thus, this respected and cultured idealist, who had early on called for "Soviet rule w ithout the Bol'sheviks,” hoping for reform of the Soviet system from within, had come a long way indeed, but he was far from alone. Berdyaev wrote that he felt "merged” with the Red Army’s success and that he divided people into those who longed for Russia's victory and those who wanted Germany to win the war. Sources differ on how many Russians fought in the French army. Aside from Russians recruited into the
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Foreign Legion in Turkey and the Balkans, between 3,700 and 10,000 Russians fought in the regular French army, most as volunteers, and at least 450 of them died. Others perished in the Résistance. On the other hand, many Russian émigrés viewed the German invasion of the U.S.S.R. as a long-awaited opportunity to rid Russia of com m unist rule, and the French branch of ROVS registered more than 1,500 volunteers to be used in the fight against Bolshevism . On May 22, 1941, a month before the invasion of Russia by Germany, White General Aleksei von Lampe sent a telegram to German military headquarters asking permission for Russian émigrés to take part in the upcoming war with the Soviet Union, but his request was denied. From Serbia, just one day after the invasion, the W hite General Mikhail Skorodumov requested German permission to form a Russian émigré division to fight on the Eastern front. The request was originally rejected, but permission was finally granted in early fall to form a Russian m ilitary "corps” which was used against Tito's partisans. More than 80 percent of the young Russians in Bulgaria rushed to join m ilitary units that might send them to fight in Russia. Most of them ended up in the Russian Corps or the Russian Liberation Army (ROA). The National Organization of Russian Scouts (NORR) in Bulgaria contributed more than 250 men, many of whom perished. A third camp consisted of persons such as Kerensky and Denikin who desired a Soviet victory over Germany in the hope that the Red Army would then overthrow its own government (even though Kerensky had declared in December 1941 that totalitarian Bol’shevik governm ent was a thing of the past). This hope for a military coup was cherished in both leftist and rightist circles of the émigré community, and was shared by the more conservative Men'sheviks and many SRs. Once the Soviet Union had occupied the Baltic republics and eastern Poland, a series of arrests were carried out in those countries. In Estonia, for example, some 60,000 persons are estimated to have been arrested. Pêtr Bogdanov, a journalist who had been a member of the governm ent of W hite General Nikolai Yudenich, was shot. Some of the other victim s were the prose writers and poets Boris Semënov and Vladim ir Gushchik, and V. A. Peil, a supporter of the Eurasianist movement. The stocks of Russian libraries and book stores were destroyed or confiscated, but charitable and professional associations were allowed to continue to exist. A fter the Germans occupied Paris, a number of Russian émigrés found themselves in somewhat privileged positions. Since the Soviet Union was not yet involved in the war, the Germans used the Russians as interpreters, superintendents of confiscated buildings, and chauffeurs. The privileges they accrued from these jobs stirred up no little ill will on the part of the French, but Russian collaboration was not
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limited to such relatively innocent activities. Yury Zherebkov, the son of a tsarist general and a naturalized German, was appointed Leiter [leader] of the Russian émigré community. Just 36 hours after the German invasion of Russia he issued a communique rejoicing that the "satanic sword of Judeo-Marxism" had been deflected from Europe and celebrating the German invasion as a "resurrection” of the Russian people: In an unprecedented bloody struggle the German arm y is forced to take over the Soviet Union — which now turns out not to be Russia, as we a ll expected. Every Russian nationalist, once he has given the m atter his m ature thought and has killed in him self a ll cloying sentim ental feelings, m ust come to one conclusion: fo r the sake o f Russia it is essential that the Germans lead the Russian people for a num ber o f years — either directly o r through a Russian governm ent guided by them. A fte r a quarter century o f experiments conducted on Russians by the Yid Comintern, only the Germans can lead the Russians ou t o f their nearly bestial state. The Russians in Russia, according to Zherebkov, were anarchic and contam inated by the "Bol'shevik infection.” They needed a firm guiding hand, but definitely not that of the Russian émigrés, who had convincingly demonstrated that they were incapable of achieving a consensus. Any experimenting with democracy would only lead to a civil war that would destroy Russia: A dolf Hitler, the Savior o f Europe and its culture from the Yiddish-Marxist occupiers, and the savior o f the Russian people, will go down in Russian history as one o f its greatest heroes, and the blood spilled on the endless fields o f Russia will sense as the last purifying sacrifice and pledge o f the future springtim e o f the friendship o f two great peoples— the German and the Russian.... This is a terrible battle to the death o f two principles, two world views. On the one hand we have the principle o f destruction and enslavem ent: the remnants o f dem ocracy and plutocracy exploiting the masses, and what fo r m any was an unexpected a lly — blood-drenched communism. A nd behind a ll this is the im pudent Yid. On the other hand we see the creative, liberating principle: National-Socialism and Fascism, which build life on totally different principles and bring happiness and true freedom to the peoples. Zherebkov called upon the Russian émigré com m unity and each individual within that community to decide firm ly and irrevocably where his place was in that struggle and who his true friends were:
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If no coalitions in the world, even the strongest, have proven capable o f resisting the decision made by the German people, can it be that the vicious hissing o f a pitifu l handful o f émigré politicians, slanderers, and petty foreign agents can stop the decisive victory o f German arm s? We now live in a time when any neutral procrastination is a crim e! The Russian émigré com m unity m ust decide whose path it wishes to tread, what is more attractive: the snout o f the Yid with the bloody, five-pointed star on his forehead, o r the German soldier with the inscription on his belt buckle: "God is with u s ln Your decision w ill determine whether you w ill remain apatrides with no rights, o r whether you will regain your Hom eland and be able to take p a rt in the gigantic task o f recreating and resurrecting the Russian people. The tim e has come to decide, for the eleventh hour has struck! Zherebkov announced a mandatory registration of Russians residing in France and nearly half of them complied. Pro-German sym pathies were shared by many Russians, both within the émigré com m unity and in the Soviet Union. Ioann Shakhovskoi, future Archbishop of San Francisco and Russian émigré poet, minced no words in stating his position, proclaiming that "the bloody operation of overthrowing the Third International has been entrusted to a skilled, seasoned surgeon.” By the tim e Germany launched its offensive, the peoples of the Soviet Union had already undergone the horrors of collectivization and starvation, a massive assault on religion, and enormous political purges. As a result, the advancing German armies originally encountered an amazing degree of hospitality from the local population. Imm ediately after the war broke out between Germany and the Soviet Union, the National Cossack Movement was created in Prague with a newspaper, Kazachii Vestnik (Cossack Herald), which appeared twice weekly, beginning on October 1,1941. Alfred Rosenberg, a Baltic German and prom inent Nazi ideologue in charge of the occupied eastern territories, was particularly keen on supporting the Cossacks in their efforts to create their own state, independent of both Russia and Ukraine. On October 22, 1941, he persuaded Hitler to sign a decree creating special military units manned by Cossack prisoners of w ar and led by First-W ave Russian officers. The novelist and form er W hite general Pëtr Krasnov eventually was put in charge of all Cossack units.
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By the fall of 1941 a large number of Russian émigrés had assembled in Berlin to join in the fight against the Bol'sheviks. Among them was the novelist Nikolai Breshko-Breshkovsky, who died during a bombing raid on Berlin in 1943. The w riter Sergei Sokolov-Krechetov, a close friend of Bunin's, spoke at a literary evening devoted to him and used the opportunity to praise the Nazi regime. (Curiously, Sokolov-Krechetov was later accused of being a Mason and had to flee Germany.) Another writer whom the Germans attempted to recruit was Aleksandr Vertinsky. When the Nazis wanted to set up a "Russian Desk” in their new government, he was offered the position of Director, which he refused. Despite all these political flirtations, however, the Germans continued to distrust the Russians; in 1942 the European office of Rodzaevsky's fascist group was shut down by the Gestapo for suspicion of espionage for the Soviets. In December of 1934 the Japanese opened an office of Russian émigré affairs, headed by A. P. Baksheev and evidently controlled by Rodzaevsky, who based his activities on the slogan "To live and die with Japan.” Evidently, the Japanese closed that office in 1942.a Among the émigrés a favorite slogan was "Better a horrible end than a horror without end.” Other slogans were: "A crusade against Bolshevism ,” "W e are not fighting against the Russian People, but against the Soviet governm ent,” and "We wish to see as our neighbor a free and friendly Russia.” The Germans were initially so successful in their Blitzkrieg that by March 1, 1942, they had taken 3,600,000 prisoners of war and controlled millions of civilians in the occupied territories. These mass surrenders were hardly evidence of a "G reat Patriotic W ar” — the term used by the Soviets to describe the conflict. Stalin announced that these millions of prisoners-of-war (including his own son, Yakov Dzhugashvili), as well as all Soviet citizens working for the Germans on either a voluntary or involuntary basis, were to be viewed as traitors. The form er Soviet general Andrei Vlasov had played an im portant role in the defense of Moscow and Kiev. His fam ily background was not unlike that of many other Soviet citizens: one of his brothers had been executed by the Soviet authorities, his father had somehow lost his house, and his wife's parents had been "dekulakized,” that is, at the very least their property had been confiscated during the collectivization of agriculture. One account has it that he learned in 1942 that the NKVD had searched his Moscow apartment, and he suspected that the authorities had learned of his
A ccording to one Soviet source, a sim ilar fascist organization w as created in Tokyo under the leadership of a W hite émigré, Balikov.
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membership in a secret organization of Soviet military officers; this meant alm ost autom atic execution. W hile trying to break through to the besieged Leningrad, Vlasov's troops were encircled, and he himself surrendered to the Germans on July 11-12, 1942. Early in 1943 petitions of the so-called "Smolensk Committee,” signed by both him and form er Soviet general Vasily Malyshkin, were being dropped by the German planes on the front and in the Soviet rear, calling for the creation of a Russian Liberation Army. Stalin refused to recognize the Geneva Convention for prisoners of war, and many men who found themselves in such an intolerable situation were willing, even eager, to do anything to survive the horrendous condition of the camps. Before the war ended, exSoviet citizens serving in the W ehrmacht numbered between 500,000 and 1,000,000. There were also large contingents of param ilitary units, known as Hiwis (for Hilfswilllige, meaning volunteers) who performed armed guard duty. W ithin the German government, Borman, Himmler, and Rosenberg were opposed to the creation of a Russian army, and the Japanese were also actively hostile to the plan. By late March 1943 it had become evident that Germany was losing the war, and the decision was taken to perm it Vlasov to address the ém igrés and the following year to create an army. Vlasov's real views are still a hotly debated topic. After the war the supporters of this "Russian de Gaulle” claimed that he had sided with Hitler only because he had no other alternative in the struggle against Stalin's Russia. His opponents maintained that the Vlasov movement was inherently anti dem ocratic and anti-Jewish. The socialist Grigory Aronson, for example, p o le m iz in g with such pro-Vlasov figures as Boris Nikolaevsky, claimed to be quoting Vlasov, evidently relying on statem ents in 1943 issues of Parizhskii vestnik (Parisian Herald): The future Russia w ill have an authoritarian government. Parliam entarism and a ll sorts o f democratism such as that existing in the Soviet Union is a fraud practiced upon the people, and one which we do not wish to renew. *
An unbreakable and lasting friendship between the Russian and Germanic peoples [is the basis o f our platform on foreign policy] ... O ur enem y no. 1 is England, whose economic and political interests run contrary to the interests o f the Russian people. *
In the new accordance Jews there Bolshevism
Russia a ll her peoples w ill be able to live in with their desires. But there will be no place for the ... The liberation o f Russia from Stalin and w ill purify her o f the Jews.
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W hether these words can actually be attributed to Vlasov or were inserted by others is in dispute. Boris Nikolaevsky, the only nonJew among the Men'sheviks and a person whose credentials were absolutely irreproachable in this regard, quotes Vlasov speaking to an unnamed Kiev "professor" in the winter of 1944-45, uttering sentim ents quite the opposite of those cited above: For me, o f course, it is irrelevant who cooperates with me, whether he is m onarchist o r republican. W hat is im portant is that he be Russian, not, o f course, in the racial, but in the state meaning.... I need more Jews ... but that is not m y fault. I can say frankly that I do not share anti-Sem itic notions. That's a German, not a Russian position.... O f course, I do not attem pt to control the press, but in conversations with a num ber o f journalists I have categorically spoken out against any speeches smacking o f anti-Semitism. That's not the Russian way. Can it be decent to speak out against the Jews after the Hitlerites have been physically destroying them and the Soviet governm ent treated them so treacherously during the war? Throughout Europe Russian émigrés had to come to term s with the events in Germany. After the Russian émigrés had created "The Russian National Socialist Party” in late 1939, the directors of the Kondakov Seminar in Prague found themselves faced with the seem ingly impossible task of convincing the German occupying authorities that the Seminar was not a Russian émigré association and as such subject to the control of the émigré fascist Stützpunkt de r russischen Emigration. In April 1941, when the Germans occupied Belgrade, the Seminar's Belgrade office was destroyed in the shelling, and its director and his wife perished. To save the Seminar’s icon collection, the new Director, Nikolai Andreev, put it on perm anent exhibit and received extensive praise from German adm irers of Russian art. Inevitably, German support led to accusations that Andreev, who had been appointed Institutsleiter, was a Nazi. The Czechoslovak Resistance did not believe these rumors, but in May 1945 Andreev was arrested by agents of SMERSH®, a vicious Soviet counterespionage organization which was responsible for the murder of an untold number of innocent people, and jailed for two years. After the Ribbentrop-Molotov treaty, the Germans had pressured Yugoslavia into recognizing the Soviet governm ent — a rapprochement which confounded the anti-Soviet Russian ém igrés in Yugoslavia no less than their countrymen in Germany. The Russians
•S M E R S H is an acronym for S m art' shpionam, meaning "Death to Spies."
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in Yugoslavia tried to maintain a semblance of normal life and in the course of 1939 sponsored 39 scholarly talks at the Belgrade Institute for the Study of Russia. On July 28, 1940, the anti-Soviet Russian émigré newspaper Tsarskii vestnik (Tsarist Herald) was forced to close, although it was replaced on September 15 — minus the Russian Imperial Two-Headed Eagle — by Russkii narodnyi vestnik (The Russian People's Herald). Later that year the Solidarist newspaper Za Rossiyu was also shut down, although it, too, was replaced by a magazine entitled O gni (Flames). By March 1941, however, political alliances had shifted radically and the Yugoslav government allied itself with the Germans, but was itself overthrown a few days later. The new government was intent on placating the Soviets, and oversight of Russian émigré publications was handed over to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which warned the Russian-language Belgrade newspaper Russkii golos (Russian Voice) not to dwell on German successes in the war. On April 5 the Yugoslav governm ent signed a nonaggression pact with the Soviets, whereupon Germany declared war on Yugoslavia and occupied the country in just 12 days (although the various partisan factions put up resistance all through the war, while at the same time viciously attacking each other). During the occupation the State Commission, which had rendered so much assistance to Russian immigrants, and the form er Russian Embassy were replaced by the Bureau of Russian Refugee Affairs, which was headed by General Skorodumov. As in other European countries occupied by the Germans, Russian émigré publications were term inated. On July 13 the first issue of Russkii byulleten' (The Russian Bulletin) appeared. Its second issue, dated July 20, contained the following announcement: A ll traitors claim ing that "Skorodum ov will soon be rem oved and replaced by someone else" are to be considered provocateurs, because this is not sim ply a m atter o f Skorodumov, but o f our common association. A ll such provocations shall be reported to the [Russian] Bureau. A ll fools claim ing that Skorodumov "is a German official defending exclusively German interests" are to be handed over for study to Professor Krainsky [a psychiatrist]. The Bureau should be advised o f a ll traitors claim ing that our paths diverge from those o f the Germans. A ll traitors who argue for neutrality o r that we should be on the side o f the Soviets "to defend Russian territory” are to be considered Bol'shevik agents, and the Bureau shall be inform ed o f such incidents. Skorodumov returned the two-headed eagle to the form er Russian Embassy and on July 21 arranged a public book burning on the territory of the embassy. Among those authors whose works were
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condemned to the flames were Amfiteatrov, Kerensky, NemirovichDanchenko, Gippius, and even Merezhkovsky. Skorodumov issued an appeal to his fellow Russians: "Give me heroes, give me martyrs, give me patriote!” Russian émigré journalists announced: "On June 22 (the day of the German invasion of the U.S.S.R.) the New O rder commenced a last decisive battle against Bolshevism , which has enslaved Great Russia. As we predicted long ago, a new crusade has been launched against the communist Soviet governm ent.” The facade of the form er Russian embassy was decorated with a poster declaring that the victory of Germany meant the liberation of Russia. Many members of the Solidarist party relocated to Berlin to participate in the forthcom ing invasion of Russia. Some took positions in the newspaper Novoe slovo (New Word), while younger émigrés, who had been brought up in the Cadet Corps, were formed into a battalion of SSHilfspolizei (SS Auxiliary Police) and later into the SS-Sonderregim ent "W aräger” (SS Special Regiment "Varangian”). On Septem ber 12, 1941, Skorodumov finally received permission to form a separate Russian Corps (Russkii korpus), also called the Defense Corps (Okhrannyi korpus or Schutzkorps). He immediately posted a decree on the wall of the Russian House in Belgrade, announcing a draft of all men aged 18 to 55: Today; on the name day o f Blessed and Loyal Aleksandr Nevsky, Protector o f the suffering Russian Land, the cherished desires o f Russian people to begin service to their Hom eland in the Russian Arm y have been fulfilled.... Although Skorodumov was arrested and tem porarily detained3 two days later by the Gestapo for calling the unit the “Russian Corps,” another émigré, General Boris von Steifon, was perm itted to continue the task. By October 1 there were 893 men in uniform, and by November 1st their numbers had grown to 2,383. Originally outfitted in tsarist-style uniforms, the Corps was later reclothed in German uniforms and placed under German command. In 1943, supplem ented by volunteers from the contingent of Soviet prisoners of war, it supposedly numbered 16,000 men. One source shows 12,000 men in the summer of 1944. Some of the volunteers were so young that an entire unit was once caught playing In d ia n s” in their barracks; other members of the Corps were over 70 years old. Some 60 percent had seen service in the Russian civil war. The eager
•After arresting Skorodumov, the Germ ans closed Russkii byulleten'. On February 8, 1942, its place w as taken by Novyi put1 (The New Path), also published by the Russian Bureau. Novyi put' w as edited by B. K. Ganusovsky, a young man who had formerly edited a satirical m agazine entitled Bukh (Plop!).
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participation of the young was surprising in view of the fact that until then the older generation had been complaining of "denationalization,” i.e., cultural assim ilation. By then, two decades had elapsed since the Crimean evacuation. The overall mood was patriotic, enthusiastic, anxious. The poet Nataliya Korovaeva wrote a poem to "knights” of the W hite Army in 1941: G ray-haired warriors tried in battle S till young in heart but m ature in years, You have gathered a soldier's fam ily While native m elodies sing your glory. A thorny path stretches out behind you, Uncertainty lies ahead. The dear distances o f your native land Are swam ped in blood and tears.... 0 . A. Sidorov composed a poem entitled "On the Drina”: In silent nights A t distant anxious sentry posts For you, Russia, in tem pered hearts, We guard a White cross. W hen the various ethnic groups comprising Yugoslavia began to com m it atrocities against each other, the Russians at first performed what were basically police functions. They considered that they were helping the Yugoslavs to defend themselves against communism — a view that many Yugoslavs refused to accept. When two junior Russian officers were assassinated, an opulent military funeral was held in Belgrade, but representatives of the local government refused to attend. In August 1941 a Serbian sixth-grader killed a member of the Defense Corps and was promptly hanged by the Germans, who declared that any act directed against a Russian émigré soldier fighting on the German side would be punished mercilessly. In general, the Yugoslavs’ attitude toward the Russian émigrés worsened rapidly, and a number of Russians were killed by the partisans. On March 4,1942, the ém igré newspaper Vedomosti okhrannoi gruppy (Bulletin of the Defense Group) presented the Russians’ view of worsening relations: O ur adm ission to Yugoslavia was not only an affair o f the heart on the pa rt o f the late King Alexander, but a m atter o f governm ental calculation. We were loved as [Slavic] brothers, but we were also necessary as intellectuals. Serbia, whose
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intelligentsia had been destroyed during the wars, could not possibly have coped with the jo b o f renewing Yugoslavia; Serbia would have been forced to call upon the Croats, and the king chose to Russify Belgrade rather than C roatify it. A nd he was not mistaken.... We are now rebuked for having "eaten Serbian bread" for over 20 years. That is not the case.... The country underpaid us by a t least two m illion dinars a m onth fo r our labors by establishing a pay scale inferior to that observed for native-born citizens o f Yugoslavia. Such views were regarded by the Serbs as black ingratitude, and on July 1,1942, Russians were fired en masse from most Serbian ministries. Many Russians living in the countryside fled to Belgrade to avoid being killed by their form erly hospitable hosts. Others left the country or took up service in the Defense Corps. Meanwhile, the Nicholas II Russian House was the scene of night-long drinking bouts. At dawn the orchestra would parade out into the street to play as drunken Russian and German officers were helped into waiting cars to be taken home. The antagonizing effect on the local population during the difficult war years can easily be imagined. Those Russians who did not support the Germans were totally intimidated. Russian Church figures also threw themselves enthusiastically into the political maelstrom. Metropolitan Anastasy in the Holy Trinity Russian Church in Belgrade attacked the Archbishop of Canterbury for having called for a victory of the Soviet army. The Soviet government, Anastasy maintained, was the embodiment of the Antichrist. In July 1942 Archbishop Germogen accepted the proposal of the Croatian governm ent to form a "Croatian Autocephalic Orthodox Church.” The Germans closed most émigré cultural societies and provided support mainly for those organizations which could be expected to actively support the invasion of the Soviet Union. In France, the Germans funded Russian émigré publications, including the newspaper Parizhskii vestnik (Parisian Herald),3 and in 1943 three Russian theaters opened in Paris.b The Berlin newspaper Novoe slovo (The New Word) had been founded in 1933, when it inherited the
8Parizhskii vestnik appeared from 1942 to 1944 and w as edited by Pavel Bogdanovich. bO ne w as headed by Kseniya Pitoeva in the Salle Chopin, the second w as T e a t bez zanavesa (Theater Without a Curtain), headed by ll'ya Surguchêv, and the third was Sergei Lifar”s T e a t Russkoi dram y (The Russian Dram atic Theater), which opened on October 23. Lifar' was received in Berlin by Hitler three tim es and w as put on trial after the end of the war. Although he was found not guilty, his career never really recovered.
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readership of Rul', which was unable to compete with Parisian newspapers. Until the beginning of the war Novoe slovo had operated on a shoestring, but with German support it built up a circulation of 50,000 by the summer of 1943. The poet Vladim ir Despotuli3 was editor in chief. Nikolai Fevr, a staff correspondent, saw the paper as destined to play the historic role of being the first Russian émigré periodical to reach Russian soil. It was "to serve as a bridge between the émigré com m unity and form er Soviet citizens, and bring up on its pages an entire pleiad of fine anti-Bol'shevik journalists from the ranks of form er Soviet-enslaved people.” By November 2,1941, Novoe slovo proudly announced "the first work of a Soviet journalist to offer his pen” to the newspaper — a short story by Nikolai Terletsky. In 1942 the war still seemed to be heading toward a rapid victory for the Germans, and Evgeny Ryshkov, writing under the pseudonym E. Tarussky, wrote an editorial for the Christmas issue entitled "Hope, Faith, and W ork”: ... Now, for the first time since the founding o f the Christian world, the great holiday is celebrated in such an intense and titanic struggle, among the thunder o f world cataclysms, in the clash o f two principles — justice based on the finest covenants o f Christianity and exploitation o f man by his neighbor. This is an exploitation bom from the complex, age-old system o f Judeo-capitalism and false democracy. It is possible that such passionate hopes have never before burned in the hearts o f man as on this nineteen hundred and forty-second holiday o f Christ’s Birth. During the last quarter century, world-wide evil has revealed itself with an unprecedented and blatant cynicism in the horrible grim ace o f communism and in the goals o f world wide Yiddism — now obvious to all. For the first time since the birth o f Christ evil has m oved so insistently and decisively in its effort to take by storm the souls o f mankind, seeking to deprive them o f a ll that is light, o f all God's commandments and to transform people into two-legged livestock for whom the light would no longer exist and who would replace the greatest com m andm ent "Thou shall not kill" with the com m unist order: "K ill and destroy." This gigantic struggle between light and darkness is now proceeding before the eyes o f our contemporaries. In the hearts o f people there burns a flam ing hope for a victory o f man over beast, o f the Cross over the Jewish star.
•Despotuli had form erly been on the staff of R ul' (The Helm ), Nash vek (Our Age), and Vozrozhdenie (Renaissance).
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B ut mere hope o f victory is no longer sufficient.... We need total and unhesitating participation in the struggle. We m ust place ourselves in the ranks o f those actually carrying on the struggle, and not m erely in the ranks o f those praying fo r victory and hoping for it; we m ust be in the ranks o f those carrying out the last and decisive struggle with the enem ies o f a ll countries and peoples — with communism, Judaism, and plutocracy. The last days are now approaching, and each o f us m ust com prehend the meaning o f the struggle and determ ine his place in it. For he who does not move against communism is its conscious o r unconscious collaborator and ally. The anti-Jewish sentiments expressed regularly in Novoe slovo found their way into the fiction published by the paper. Typical is a short story entitled "Snouts, Snouts All Around” (Rozhi, rdzhi krugom) by Sergei Bel'deninov. The protagonist, who well may have been modelled on Hitler, is a young Russian artist in the Soviet Union whose works are system atically rejected, because the sources from which Russia drinks are poisoned by "Yido-Masonic ‘progressive’ society, through the lying press and the entire leadership, which consists exclusively of Jews.” The young man witnesses a number of street scenes in which people corrupted by Soviet society treat each other rudely. When he gives his seat to a priest on the bus, he is arrested and sentenced to ten years’ imprisonment in solitary confinem ent. The lawyer appointed to defend him is a Jew, because "the Soviet state entrusted the defense only to Jews.” When the man's w ife tries to learn her husband's sentence from the lawyer, the lawyer demands her wedding ring in exchange for the information. Verse was totally absent from Novoe slovo during the w ar — obviously because it was felt to be nonessential. Fiction was intended to serve the cause; stories that were not anti-Sem itic were anti-Soviet. Non-fiction often was intended to be both. One essay, entitled The Jews and Russian Literature and sent in from occupied Sm olensk by I. Gorsky, claimed that Russian literature in Russia had been replaced by "Jewish-Soviet” literature and was in danger of becoming "purely Jewish.” According to Gorsky, almost all the editors as well as many writers in the Soviet Union were Jewish. Russian writers were generally unfairly treated by Jewish critics, and Jewish characters predominated in works of fiction. Against such a depressing background, the rich diversity of Russian émigré publications came to an abrupt end. Poslednie novosti, the only daily paper left in Paris, dropped its weekly "literary page” immediately after the outbreak of war and went out of business com pletely as soon as the Germans occupied Paris in 1940. That year
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also marked the end of Sovremennye zapiski, the leading "thick" journal of the Russian emigration. The Turgenev Library in Paris with some 100,000 volumes disappeared — taken to Germany and later possibly ending up in Minsk. The Kondakov Library likewise met with a sad fate. Moved from Prague to Belgrade in 1938, it suffered heavily during the German bombing of Belgrade in 1941. The Russian Public Library in the form er Russian Embassy was plundered by Soviet troops. In his capacity of Czech President, Eduard BeneS, who had been instrum ental in establishing the Russian Historical Archive Abroad in Prague, supposedly presented the collection to the Soviet governm ent in gratitude for the city’s liberation. Officially, the archive was handed over to the Academy of Sciences, but actually it was "m anaged” by the NKVD, which mined it for information identifying people to be arrested — some 18,000 persons, among them were the literary scholar Al'fred Bern.3 There are a number of rumors on how Bern died, from being executed in a Prague prison to committing suicide. Some writers were fortunate enough to have left for America before the Germans occupied France, among them Mark Aldanov, and Mikhail Tsetlin. Gaito Gazdanov, Ivan Shmelêv, and Aleksei Remizov found them selves in the German-occupied zone, while others — Nina Berberova, Nikolai Berdyaev, Zinaida Gippius, Dmitry Merezhkovsky, and Nadezhda Tèffi — later returned to the German zone even before the Germans occupied all of France. Shmelêv published four essays and stories about tsarist Russia in the German sponsored Parizhskii vestnik and was accused of "collaborationism .” A number of writers died at the hands of the Germans: Yury Fel'zen was arrested in 1943 and deported to Germany, where he died in a concentration camp. On March 10,1942, Yury Mandel'shtam (not to be confused with the poet Osip Mandel'shtam) was visiting Igor* Voinov, also a poet, who lived in the same building. Having violated the curfew on Jews, Mandel'shtam spent 17 months in concentration camps and was shipped off to Germany. The nun and poet Mother M ariya (religious name of Elena Skobtsova, a form er revolutionary) died in the gas cham ber in Ravensbruck in 1945. The poet ll'ya KorvinPiotrovsky was arrested in 1944 and condemned to death, but the sentence was annulled five minutes before being carried out, when
•Som e of the materials ended up in the Central State Archive of the October Revolution (TsG A O R ), and at least part is stored in the Russian Governmental Archive for Art and Literature (RG ALI, formerly TsG ALI), and also in TsG IA M , TsG ASA , and TsG A VM F S S S R . Until 1988 access to these materials was extrem ely limited.
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Piotrovsky was included in an exchange for a group of captured SS officers. The couple Mikhail Gorlin and Raisa Blokh, both poète, evidently perished in German death camps. Both had moved to France from Germany after the Nazis came to power. Gorlin was warned by the local police that he would be arrested but could not believe that anything terrible could happen to him and made no effort to escape. He was arrested on May 14,1941, but Blokh remained at liberty until November 1943, when she was handed over to the Germans by Swiss border guards. She managed to throw a letter from the train saying that she did not know where she was being taken. In November 1932 she had written a letter saying that perhaps she was being unfair to the Germans, but she had lived ten years amongst them and they were alien to her. In 1959 friends of Gorlin and Blokh published a joint collection of their verse to honor their memory. In a poem later set to music by Aleksandr Vertinsky she had written that the cities of W estern Europe and even the water in their rivers and lakes was alien. Another Nazi victim was ll'y a Fondaminsky, who supposedly had organized a conspiratorial group in his apartment. Among the members were the writers Boris Vil'de and Anatoly Levitsky, who had begun putting out an underground newspaper, La Résistance (Soprotivlenie). Levitsky was arrested on February 14,1941, and Vil'de in March. Both were executed by firing squad on February 23, 1942, on M ont-Valérien. Before being executed, Vil'de was perm itted to write a letter to his French wife: Forgive me fo r having deceived you. When I came to kiss you once more, I already knew that it would happen today. To te ll the truth, I'm proud o f m y life. You could see that I was not trembling, but sm iling as usual.... M y belovedl I take the m em ory o f your smile with me. Try to smile when you receive this le tte r— ju s t as I am sm iling as I write it. (Just now I looked in the m irror and saw m y face was unchanged.) That seems to be a ll that I have to say to you. I have seen some o f m y friends. They are in good spirits. That gladdens m e.... The eternal sun o f love arises from the abyss o f m y death.... I am ready; I'm going. Meanwhile, the war was grinding to its furious conclusion all over Europe. By spring 1944 the Russian Corps was openly engaged in fighting with Tito's partisans (who themselves included a small number of Russian émigrés), and by September 1944 the Russian émigrés, including Russians from Hungarian-occupied territories and from Bulgaria, found themselves fighting against their own countrymen in the Red Army and Bulgarian communists. In June 1944 the Germans formed a Russian division, which was then reorganized into a "Russian National Army” in February-
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March, 1945a, but by then the war was nearly over. This collaboration with the Germans was regarded as treason by Tito's victorious partisans — a developm ent foreseen by many of the Russians who chose to leave the country as early as 1944. Their lives were mourned by K. Grudzinsky: Distant Leénica, Cossacks in alien uniforms, Dreams o f native Kuban', Shots across the river, Flares, Serbian oaths, The m orning sun's m ilky light, Snow soaked in blood, A corpse, a pistol, G rief frozen On barely twisted lips. On November 14, 1944, from Prague, Vlasov proclaimed the creation of the Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia (KONR). On January 28, 1945, the army, which informally was still called the Russian Liberation Army (ROA), was amalgamated into the German army. The Russians wore German uniforms with Russian chevrons and ROA's cocarde. Zherebkov, who was one of 49 signers of the Prague declaration, was appointed M inister of Foreign Affairs. It may seem incredible that the émigrés chose to join the so obviously defeated Germans at this particular point, but they feared, quite realistically as things turned out, that they would be handed over to a merciless Soviet governm ent after the war. German apprehension that these units could get out of hand proved well founded; it was this army that defended Prague — from the Germans — just a few months later, on May 6-7, 1945. Even before KONR was form ally established, Vlasov's staff published two newspapers: Dobrovolets (The Volunteer), with a circulation of between 40,000 and 60,000 copies, and Zarya (The Dawn), which was intended for prisoners of war and had a circulation of up to 120,000 copies. Despotuli's Novoe slovo in Berlin was suspended by the Germans toward the end of the war and its presses were used to print new KONR newspapers: Volya naroda (The
•There w ere also several other Russian émigré military units, among them the Russian Liberating People's Army (Russkaya osvoboditel'naya narodnaya arm iya — R O N A ) and the Druzhina Brigade.
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People's W ill), Za rodinu (For the Homeland, with a circulation o f 250,000 copies), and Nashi kryl'ya (Our Wings, a Luftwaffe publication). KONR also had its own radio station. When the Russian émigrés in Yugoslavia found them selves on the losing side, many deemed it wise to be evacuated together with the Germans. Bishop Germogen attem pted to flee when Soviet troops were approaching Zagreb, but was stopped by the partisans and executed. The émigré poet Yury Pskovityanin was one who praised the émigrés’ fight as failed heroism: The Drina knows, the Sava recalls The cooled lava flow O f dead warriors’ bodies M arked by no cross. Let Tito's partisans Remember Russian troops A nd m ay the Balkan winds sing their glory through the ages. From Belgrade to the Drava, Across m ountains and bridges, nam eless crosses trace paths o f thorny honor. The war virtually obliterated literature. It was a tim e for survival, not aesthetics. And when the violence was over, literary culture lacked that "critical mass” which had made the interwar period so vibrant. Among the many writers who succumbed to old age or sickness during the w ar were the Sym bolist poet Konstantin Bal'mont, the theater critic Aleksandr Pleshcheev, and the poet Anatoly Shteiger.
The Early Postwar Period Like one that on a lonesome road Doth walk in fear and dread, A nd having once turned round walks on, A nd turns no m ore his head; Because he knows, a frightful fiend doth close behind him tread. Samuel Taylor Coleridge As the war came to a close, many of the Russian refugees judged it wise to continue their exodus westward. A large number had fled together with retreating German troops, concealing their Russian nationality. British Ambassador Archibald Clark Kerr wrote a naive
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letter to Molotov asking that Russians pressed into German service be given "am nesty or considerate treatm ent’ upon conclusion of the war. M olotov rejected the request out of hand, claiming that the number of such persons was insignificant and adding that Stalin saw no reason to make such a concession. The British decided not to follow up on the matter, and one British advisor, Patrick Dean, was of the view that even if such persons were shot, it was no concern of "His Majesty's Governm ent.” On July 17, 1944, despite a protest by Lord Selborne, then M inister for Economic W arfare, the British W ar Cabinet accepted the principle that the prisoners would have to be handed over. Churchill was sympathetic, but Eden wrote that these were men who had served in German m ilitary or param ilitary formations, "the behavior of which in France has often been revolting ... we cannot afford to be sentim ental about this.” Lastly, Eden pointed out that the Soviets were holding large numbers of Allied prisoners and any refusal to return Russians to the U.S.S.R. would arouse Stalin's suspicions. The Secretary of State for War, P. J. Grigg, demanded a cabinet decision, since the Russian prisoners of war would be sent to their death on his instructions, and on September 4 the Cabinet approved Eden's decision "after a short discussion.” In the meantime many of the prisoners who were in danger of being returned were threatening to com m it suicide. On October 4, 1944, the Soviet of People's Commissars resolved that Soviet citizens should be returned to the Soviet Union upon the conclusion of the War, and at the end of that month 10,000 prisoners were shipped out. This first group consisted largely of persons who believed Soviet assurances that there would be no unjust retaliation, and only 12 men resisted and had to be taken on board by force. Ominously, when they arrived in Murmansk they were marched off under armed guard. The Americans, who had collected 28,000 such prisoners, while seeming to accept the British approach, actually agreed to repatriate only "claimants to Soviet nationality.” Thus, any Russian in a German war uniform who claimed to be German was not to be handed over, but the Soviets — as feared — threatened to retaliate against British and American nationals whom they had liberated from German prisoner-of-war camps. Prisoners were interviewed in the presence of a Soviet stenographer who wrote down every word for later use in prosecuting their cases. One man screamed that his fam ily had been wiped out by the Soviets and asked to be shot rather than repatriated, while a woman with a nursing baby (born in Britain and thus a British citizen) threw herself at the feet of a British official, begging for refuge for herself and her family.
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On February 11, 1945, Roosevelt and Churchill signed the Yalta accords, providing for repatriation of persons found outside the borders of their countries. Edward Bridges, Secretary to the British Cabinet, wrote enthusiastically of the "outstanding friendliness o f our Russian allies and of the obvious sincerity of their desire to do us well and their wish to be on good terms with us and to co-operate with us after the war.” De Gaulle concluded his own agreement with Stalin on June 29. Threats by the refugees to commit suicide proved to be more than just words. Upon learning that they were to be forcibly repatriated, men slit their throats or hanged themselves rather than go on board ship. Others literally threw themselves into the sea. Many were executed immediately after arriving in Soviet ports. One Second-W ave writer, Lev Dudin, who wrote under the pseudonym Gradoboev, recalled: For us, people o f the "Second W ave,” the second h a lf o f 1945 and a ll o f 1946 were a nightm arish dream, but this was no dream ; instead, it was a nightm arish reality. A ll our hopes — illusory and im possible as they m ay have been — were crushed, and we had bet everything on them. The future boded nothing good for us.... It is frightening even to recall those times. M ortal danger threatened us from a ll sides, lurked around every comer. Each b it o f news that reached us was more frightening and terrible than the previous item : the Western Allies were handing over Vlasov and other generals o f the Russian A rm y o f Liberation, and there were massive forced repatriations o f Vlasovites and Cossacks in Plattling, Dachau, Lienz, and other places. We learned o f these tragedies only later, but their significance was already clear to us then: the Stalinist regim e had caught up with those who had risen up against it with arms, and soon it would catch up with a ll the others as well. Dragnets were carried out for Russian émigrés in Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, France, Italy, Denmark, Norway, and even North Africa. Only Liechtenstein refused to hand over Russians. Among those taken away to the Soviet Union was Sergei Postnikov, the author of a book on Russian émigrés in Prague. The Cossacks, who were especially enraged over Soviet collectivization of agriculture and the suppression of the Church, had been fighting in modified German uniforms even before the Vlasov units were created, and in November 1943 the Nazi governm ent promised to return them their land after the Soviet regime was defeated. Toward the end of the war Alfred Rosenberg's Ostministerium granted them an area around Tolmezzo in the Italian
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Alps, a few miles from the Austrian border, to establish a new Kazakiya (Cossakia). By the spring of 1945 it was home to 35,000 Cossacks. Ernest Bevin, then Foreign Secretary of Britain, maintained that it was difficult to draw a line between traitors and political refugees and that, in any case, the Cossacks were "acknowledged traitors.” From May 28 to June 7,1 94 5, this group was forcibly handed over to Soviet troops by the British army in the area of Judenberg and Lienz, Austria. First the officers were taken away under the pretext that a meeting would be held with the allies to discuss their situation. Although the soldiers had surrendered their weapons, they resisted fiercely, only to be subdued by sticks, rifles, and bayonets. One woman interpreter described the scene: People were rushing past m y legs, scared out o f their wits. Everything was m ixed up: the singing, the prayers, the groans and screams, the cries o f the wretched people the soldiers m anaged to grab, the weeping children, and the foul language o f the soldiers. Everyone was beaten, even the priests, who raised their crosses above their heads and continued to pray. M etropolitan Anastasy wrote a letter to General Eisenhower, protesting the American army's collaboration with the Soviets in Kempten, in the foothills of the Bavarian Alps: They found a ll the émigrés in the church, fervently praying to G od that He m ight save them from deportation.... They were driven out o f the church by force. Women and children were dragged b y the hair and beaten.... The priests did everything in their pow er to protect their flock, but it was all in vain. One o f them, an elderly and respected priest, was dragged b y the beard. A nother priest had blood running from his mouth after a soldier, who attem pted to take the cross from his hand, struck him in the face. In pursuing the people, the soldiers broke into the altar area, and the iconostasis, which separates the alta r from the rest o f the church, was broken in two places, the altar table was overturned and several icons were flung to the ground.... Two persons attem pted to take poison. One woman, attem pting to save her infant, threw the baby out the window, but the man who caught the baby was him self wounded in the stomach. A number of people died in this action, from suffocation, beatings, and gunshot wounds. There were suicides — men hanging themselves, slitting their own throats and wrists, jum ping over bridges and from cliffs. One young woman with two small children ran to a cliff overlooking the river Drau, embraced the first child and flung him into the abyss. The other child, clinging to her skirt, cried out "Mama, don't. Mama, I'm frightened.” But she answered: "Don't be afraid. I'll soon be
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with you.” Then she threw this child, too, into the rushing waters, raised her hands as if to make the sign of the cross, cried out "Lord, receive my sinful soul,” and leapt into the raging whirlpool after her children. One Cossack used his revolver to shoot his w ife and three children before dispatching himself. Many others managed to escape, but over the course of the next two weeks an additional 13,350 Soviet citizens were handed over to the Red Army at Judenberg, bringing the total to 50,000. Forced repatriation also took place across the ocean. On June 29, 1945, 154 Russians in a prisoner-of-war camp at Fort Dix, New Jersey, rioted upon being told that they were to be returned to the Soviet Union. Three men committed suicide. On August 31, however, the Fort Dix contingent was put on a ship and handed over to Soviet representatives in Europe. They offered no resistance, having supposedly been drugged. The Allies were of two minds on forced repatriation. On the one hand, they wanted to observe the Yalta accords in hopes of achieving a new clim ate of cooperation with Stalin. On the other hand, the notion of dispatching large numbers of people to imprisonment or death was obviously incompatible with the Western concept of human rights. On October 4,1945, Eisenhower suspended forcible repatriation of Soviet citizens, and in November a committee representing the U.S. Army, Navy, and State Department prepared a paper rejecting forced repatriation with the exception of Soviet citizens captured in German uniform, deserters from the Soviet armed forces, and persons who had "voluntarily rendered aid and com fort to the enemy.” But the practice had acquired a momentum of its own and continued to produce horrifying scenes. On January 19,1946, Russian prisoners at Dachau rioted in an attem pt to avoid being returned to Russia. One group barricaded itself in a room, and when tear gas was used, two prisoners attem pted to disembowel themselves with broken glass, others stood side by side, slashing at each other's throats with pieces of glass, and still another man struck his head through a pane of glass, then shook it from side to side pressing his neck down against the jagged edges. The floor was literally flowing with blood. Altogether, ten men died immediately, and an unknown number of the remaining 21 who were seriously injured must have died on the way back to Russia. Sadly, The Stars and Stripes entitled its article on the scene: "Red Traitors’ Dachau Suicide Described as Inhuman Orgy.” O f the 271 prisoners, approxim ately 135 were handed over to the Soviets, the rem ainder having been judged to be First-W ave émigrés. But international resistance was growing. On February 20, 1946, Pope Pius XII published an allocution protesting "the repatriation of men against their will and the refusal of the right of asylum ,” but only
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four days later 1,590 Russians at Plattling were handed over to the Soviets. Five men committed suicide, and a number of others were prevented in their attem pts from doing the same. The Western allies were growing rapidly disenchanted with their Soviet partners, but even after Churchill's famous "Iron Curtain” speech at Fulton, Missouri on March 5,1 94 6, the forced repatriations continued. Just eight days later 222 more Russians at Plattling were forcibly handed over to the Soviets, with one suicide recorded. On June 6, the British Cabinet agreed to comply with the American decision to lim it forced repatriations, but on August 11-14 nearly 1,000 Russians in camps in Italy were moved to an American camp near Pisa and a British camp at Riccione, just south of Rimini, under the code names "Operation Keelhaul” and "Operation Eastwind.” The W estern Allies continued to acquiesce to Soviet demands in 1947, despite the prisoners' threats to commit suicide rather than return to Russia. On March 31 of that year the Soviet liaison officer in Rome confirm ed to British Headquarters that Russians under forced repatriation were expected to continue to commit suicide en route. On May 8, when Russians from the British camp in Riccione realized their train was taking them east, they staged a violent riot but were subdued. Afterwards, the men began giving their personal belongings to the British guards, saying the Soviet soldiers would only steal them anyway. Ultimately 255 were given over to the Soviet authorities. The next day they were delivered at St. Valentin, and Soviet receiving officers were informed that the men's wives had refused to accompany them. As can readily be imagined, the conditions for repatriation did not include much "maternal mercy” from the Soviet government for those who had fought against it. Many of the men were shot im m ediately upon being handed over. The form er W hite general and popular novelist Pêtr Krasnov had been active in rightist circles and had helped to form Russian units to fight against the Soviets during the war. Arrested and returned to Moscow, Krasnov was hanged in 1947. There were unconfirmed rumors that both he and Vlasov were suspended on meathooks. According to official Soviet accounts, Vlasov was hanged, and his severed head was reportedly seen exhibited in Red Square. Those who were not executed were taken in freight cars with barely any food or water to the Kemerovo area, just south of Tom sk and 2,000 miles east of Moscow. Upon arrival they were assigned tents and given planks to fashion bunks, but no bedding. Starvation rations, insects, lack of clothing, bitter cold, and illness caused the deaths of an estimated 7,000 the first year. Their im prisonm ent ended only in 1955, after Stalin's death. Later, a small
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number of the form er prisoners were permitted to rem igrate to the W est. As early as December 1946 Andrei Gromyko com plained at the United Nations that the resettlem ent of refugees and displaced persons was being conducted in such a fashion that "war criminals, quislings, and traitors” were escaping punishment. He was not entirely wrong. The same poet-playwright Grigory Shvarts-Bostunich who had maintained that Jewish rituals required the blood of the "host nation” (Wirtsvolk) disappeared after being taken prisoner by American troops.a Despite Gromyko’s complaint, however, the situation of the DP's was desperate: Where could we turn to for protection? In Paris, the Soviet m ilitary mission was directed by high-ranking mem bers o f the secret police (hiding behind the usual m asks o f "diplom ats”) and sew ed as headquarters fo r a grandiose hunt for Soviet citizens in a ll the Western European countries. The Soviets’ bloodhounds stalked through a ll the large and sm all cities. Representatives o f the Western Allies either refused to listen to us and understand us, o r they handed us over to "S talin’s m erdes.... ” The émigrés were left with no recourse except to either hide in the woods or produce some evidence that they had resided outside the borders of the Soviet Union before the war. The most effective ploy was to obtain a Nansen Certificate, issued to First-W ave em igrants and their children born abroad. Viktoria Babenko, a Second-W ave poet from Ukraine who spoke Polish as well as Russian and Ukrainian, passed herself off as a Pole during her escape. Many seized upon any "proof’ that they were not from the Soviet Union — even if it was only an old tram ticket from Prague or Belgrade. People learned Czech, Polish, Serbian, or Bulgarian words, the names of streets, squares, theaters, etc. in Warsaw, Prague, Sofia, or Belgrade. In every sense of the phrase, they were literally clutching at straws. The dem ographer Jacques Vernant quoted the Chief of the Soviet Repatriation Mission as having claimed in about Septem ber 1945, that 5,000,000 Soviet citizens — both prisoners of war and civilians — had been repatriated to the Soviet Union. O f the 2,000,000 Soviet citizens in W estern Germany, 1,393,902 were repatriated within the first two months following the end of the war. Many of them had been conscripted by the Germans for forced labor under conditions summed up by Heinrich Himmler: "If 10,000 Russian fem ales collapse
•By 1942 Shvarts-Bostunich had gathered a new library of 11,000 volumes on the occult, but it evidently fell into Soviet hands, as had his first in Kiev.
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from exhaustion while digging an antitank ditch, this is of interest to me only insofar as the antitank ditch for Germany is finished.” But the narcotic effect of the pro-Soviet propaganda conducted by the Allies during the war was so great that no heed was paid to the plight of such persons. On October 5,1 94 5, The New York Times wrote of "Russian traitors who are being held as prisoners-of-war and presumably will ultim ately face Soviet justice.” Evidently funded by the Soviet authorities, the Parisian newspaper Russkii patriot (Russian Patriot), edited by Dmitry Odinets, was published at the end of the war and during the early post-war period in an attem pt to win the sympathies of the Russian émigré community. Characteristic of its editorial line was the editorial "The Road ‘Home’”, published on page one of the October 1944 issue. The author, N. Borisov (possibly Odinets writing under a pseudonym), dem anded that the émigrés prepare themselves to subm it to the "collective”; the Soviets had no need of the émigrés, and they could only hope for the "maternal mercy of the homeland”: We m ust prepare ourselves to return to our father’s home, to study and accept with every fibre o f our being its custom s and norms. In m any ways we will have to reconstruct ourselves to m atch the type o f new man created b y the revolution. Otherwise we will m erely trade the title o f stateless em igrant for the fate [emphasis mine: JG] o f an "inner em igrant...." The message to the 40,000 Russians in China was largely the same. One 1942 article published in Shanghai proclaimed that the émigrés had no future without Russia. When the Soviet Union announced an "amnesty” for the ém igrés in 1946, a number of Russians in Manchuria and China chose to return home voluntarily. Thousands of others were arrested by the NKVD and taken to Soviet forced-labor camps; a number of persons who had collaborated with the Japanese were executed. In 1947 the Russian Em igrants’ Committee was dissolved. Threats were not eschewed even before the war came to an end. In 1944 Russkii patriot threatened that the "degree of responsibility of Russian journalists and writers who compromised them selves by working for Hitler's anti-Soviet propaganda should be exam ined.” The list provided included ll'ya Surguchêv, ll'in (there are several ll'ins, which one was intended was not specified), Georgy (Yury) Meier, Valentin Ivanov (Valentin Goryansky), Vladim ir Unkovsky, Ivan Shmelêv, Lolly L’vov, Evgeny Ryshkov (pseudonym: E.Tarussky), Nikolai Pyatnitsky, "and others.” Tarussky and Pyatnitsky committed suicide.
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The response of many of the émigrés was essentially the same as that of Kurbsky in responding to Ivan's demand that he return home. The following is an excerpt from a speech given by Nikolai Chukhnov at a displaced-persons camp in Germany on November 7, 1947. The occasion was the annual "Day of Im placability.” The entire stage was backed up with a picture of the Kremlin, wrapped in a fog that dissipated to the hymn "God Save the Tsar.” A curse upon you, Bol'sheviksl Do you think that in occupying the gold-crowned Kremlin you have taken possession o f Rus’? Do you think that, having spilled oceans o f blood, you have now become the m asters o f the Russian people? Do you think that you have obliterated the Russian soul with your collective farms, Stakhanovism, and concentration camps? Do you think that your hordes o f obedient soldiers have given you a reliable basis fo r further brigandage? No, no, and no a g a in !... Fateful tim es are approaching, and the hour o f vengeance will come. A new Nürnberg trial is already being staged on the gray backdrop o f history, and your end will be as inglorious as its beginnings were sham eful.... We, a handful o f Russian people, have escaped your spite, thanks to the W ill o f God and our own efforts, and we proudly raise our heads to laugh a t your bestial sneer. We believe, we know, that the hour o f vengeance approaches. For now, you can revel in the holocaust o f corpses and drown your consciences with foolish marches, herding into parades the hungry people, even as they curse you. B ut in their forced, hoarse shouts can you not hear the voices o f your victims, calling to you from the grave? Can you not hear the curses o f m others and the wail o f orphaned children? ... A curse upon you, Bol'sheviks, fo r the blood o f the m urdered Im perial Family, o f the bishops and priests, the scholars and the writers, the officers, the soldiers and sailors, the workers and the peasantsl A curse upon you for the young girls whom you have violated and the youths whom you have crippled.... We believe, we know, that you w ill not escape the judgm ent o f man, ju s t as you w ill not escape the judgm ent o f God. Chukhnov's damnation of the Soviet governm ent was not shared by all the émigrés. On February 12,1945, a group of prom inent émigré figures, among them the last tsarist Russian ambassador to France, Vasily Maklakov, went to the Soviet embassy in Paris to
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declare that they now recognized the Soviet government as the legitim ate representative of the Russian people and that they were willing to work with, rather than against that regime. The tsarist admiral A. E. Kedrov addressed the Soviet ambassador Aleksandr Bogomolov: Mr. Am bassador; / speak as an officer who com m anded others in the fight against you. Yes, it is true that we were enemies, but the years have thinned our ranks; some have died while others le ft us because they lost faith in that struggle. Those o f us who fought have rem ained behind as m ere husks o f men. As early as 1936 and 1937 others began to realize that a new generation had been born in Russia — a generation that was on your side rather than ours. There was a realization that a new state and a new arm y had been created, a realization that a destructive process had taken a constructive turn. There ensued a great war. A t first the Soviet Union came to an agreem ent with Germany. We Russians living abroad greeted this developm ent in the belief that Russia would not be harm ed and would grow strong if le ft out o f the war. B ut in her pride Germany attacked the Soviet Union, and we shed bloody tears when we learned o f the first defeats; in the depths o f our souls, however, we continued to believe that the Soviet Union would be victorious since it represented the Russian people. One can imagine Bogomolov's reaction: had the Soviets’ form er enem ies-to-the-death really come to surrender or was this a trick? They would have to prove themselves ... Sergei Mel'gunov, editor of the conservative Vozrozhdenie,was outraged by the visit and compared it to the humiliating bare-footed penance performed by the Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV before the windows of Pope Gregory VII at Canossa in the eleventh century: We are asked to forget about the hundreds o f thousands o f Russian lives destroyed, not on the field o f battle with a foreign enemy, but in the cellars o f the GPU and in concentration camps, where a ll those end up who disagree with the policies o f the ruling despot. O nly people with an extrem ely short m em ory can so easily spread the foam o f forgetfulness over such recent victims o f the forced collectivization o f the villages, carried out not because o f the country's national interests, but in the name o f party dogma. O nly those who are deaf to their own political conscience can seek out fictional justifications for the crim es com m itted by the com m unist dictatorship against the people and dem and "sincere reconciliation” with that dictatorship. The voices o f the dead do not cease to call to our
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conscience and honor. There can be no forgiveness fo r the exercise o f violence over man. On March 16,1946, a meeting was convoked of members of the W riters’ and Journalists’ Union in Paris. By that tim e the émigré press had been largely taken over by pro-Soviet figures, while the antiSoviet faction had not yet reorganized. More than one hundred people were present — a rare turn-out in Paris at the tim e — and the meeting was opened and chaired by the Union's long-standing General Secretary, Vladim ir Zeeler, form erly a lawyer in Rostov. The leader of the pro-Soviet faction was one Nikolai Fëdorov (pseudonym: Roshchin), a writer and friend of Ivan Bunin. Roshchin had worked for the conservative newspaper Vozrozhdenie (The Renaissance), but was a member of the French Communist Party — a fact which now came to light. His speech was both smooth and surprising; he began by saying that the émigré community was coming to an end and that people "were returning to their homeland.” For this reason he proposed that the association adopt a resolution addressed to the Union of Soviet W riters in Moscow, requesting acceptance as a branch of that organization. His speech was met with faint applause. After Roshchin spoke, the podium was taken by the artist and writer Yury Annenkov, the w riter Gaito Gazdanov, and the editor Sergei Mel'gunov, all of whom delivered passionate speeches in defense of freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and human rights. Their presentations were followed by wild applause. Arseny Stupnitsky, editor of Russkie novosti (Russian News) delivered a strong pro-Soviet statement, as did Dmitry Odinets, editor of Sovetskii p a trio ta. When the tim e came to elect members of the association's governing board, the pro-Soviet faction was defeated, 45 to 64.b Despite the defeat, this was a serious new alignm ent of views in the émigré community, or at least among writers and journalists. On June 14,1946, the League voted by a majority of two to one to expel members who had accepted Soviet citizenship. Evidently, Fëdorov-Roshchin, who returned to Russia that same year, was one of those expelled. But the decision engendered enormous dissent, and 25 of the League's 128 members resigned in protest, among them Georgy Adamovich, Vera Bunina, Gaito Gazdanov, Perikl Stavrov, Vladim ir Varshavsky, and Leonid Zurov. Bunin, hardly one to harbor pro-Soviet emotions, himself later withdrew from the
•The new nam e of Russkii patriot as of March 24, 1945. bElected w ere Boris Zaitsev (Chairm an), Sergei M el’gunov and Roman Gul' (Assistant Chairm en), Nikolai Vol'sky (Valentinov), and Professor Sergei Zhaba. Zeeler, who had served uninterruptedly since the twenties, w as reelected as Treasurer and General Secretary.
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association, and his stature as a Nobel laureate lent enormous sym bolic importance to his act. Nina Berberova wrote that it was a "knife in the back.” The important novelist and critic Boris Zaitsev, a long-time friend of Bunin, declared that Bunin was "dead” to him after such an act, and the secretary of Novyi zhurnal, Mariya Tsetlina, broke off her friendship of 30 years with Bunin.3 In examining the split in the émigré community, one must bear in mind the general intellectual background and mood of the period. The French Communist Party was part of the government and French intellectuals were generally pro-Soviet (one lonely exception being André Gide, who had travelled to the Soviet Union before the war and radically altered his pro-Soviet views). In addition, the émigrés, like everyone else, were exhausted by the war. This was, after all, the second tim e in a quarter of a century that their lives had been devastated. In Prague the jubilation over the liberation of the city was overwhelming, and when the Minister of Education, Dr. Zdenek Nejedly, an elderly communist widely known as the "The Red Professor,” proposed in June 1945 that the Russian Archive be presented to the Russian Academy of Sciences as a gift from the grateful Czechoslovak government and people, the idea appears to have enjoyed popular support.11People who had lived for the overthrow of the Soviet governm ent now had to choose whether to rejoice over a Russian victory (which was also a Soviet victory) or remain true to their form er oath of implacability. Social schizophrenia was virtually preprogrammed.
■This chain of resentments led to further repercussions: Mark Aldanov, one of the founders of Novyi zhum al, severed all ties with the publication out of solidarity with Bunin (Tsetlina was the journal's Secretary). Nor did the chain of resentment stop there. In 1951 Tsetlina was not reelected to the board of directors of the Literary Fund, causing Vladim ir Zenzinov to resign from the Board. These w ere only two instances of many, and people took their resentment with them to the grave. bThe Czechoslovak Cabinet, however, voted to hand over only the Documents Section.
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Cynicism ... a man who knew the price o f everything and the value o f nothing. Oscar W ilde In 1947 Adamovich published a book in French entitled L'autre patrie (The Other Homeland), with memoirs of his experiences in France. It is a revealing document of its time. The following are quotes from that book; the first describes the comments of a French officer in 1939 to foreigners in the French army: "And you as well, you Tartars, Poles, Hottentots, who asked you to g e t involved? You would have done better to stay a t home in your own countries! A nd France? France loßthes youI She is only waiting for the m om ent when she can throw you all out. It's Blum, the Jew, your prophet who ...” [Later] we were advised b y the colonel's sta ff that the ardent lieutenant had expressed a "strictly personal point o f view.” *
The Russians o f Nice celebrate — the very same ones who two years ago saw in H itler their liberator and who now feverishly discuss the importance o f the positions which w ill be created for them in their rediscovered country. For such a long time they have felt themselves to be pitifu l and hum iliated! Look a t them now — perked up again, proud to belong to a nation which dom inates the present political and m ilitary scene, willingly com paring Stalin to Peter the Great, and speaking o f nothing but "our” army. A ll the same, I love it... *
A nd me, would I be horrified by the success o f communism? ... Personally, I would like to escape all this; as long as it is applied only to future generations, it does not frighten me in the least. It's cowardly, I kn o w — "A fter me the deluge....” N ot only do I accept communism as som ething inescapable, bu t I salute it and welcome it. I am resigned to welcoming it. There does not exist any other solution to the social problem, and justice cannot be realized in any other way. Everyone senses this, everyone knows this ... *
Well, gentlemen, o r if you prefer, comrades, I am like everyone else. A signature a t the bottom o f a letter o f greetings to Stalin? Very willingly, and without the least afterthought; really, with a ll m y heart.
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Further Dispersion
Thus this brook hath conveyed his ashes into Avon; Avon into Severn; Severn into the narrow seas; they, into the main ocean. A nd thus the ashes o f W ickliff are the emblem o f his doctrine, which now, is dispersed a ll the world over. The Church History (1655)
In June 1946 the Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R. issued a decree granting Soviet citizenship to form er Soviet citizens and even to émigrés who had been citizens of the Russian Empire. A number of the émigrés rushed to exchange their French passports for Soviet ones, and there were incidents when individuals who were displeased with the treatm ent they had received in France even demonstratively burned their French passports. Soviet sources claim 6,000 émigrés in Yugoslavia and 11,000 in France accepted the offer of citizenship, and that 2,000 actually left France to return to Russia. The popular singer and poet Aleksandr Vertinsky had returned to Russia from Shanghai in 1943. Dismissing a quarter century of em igration as a "misunderstanding,” he married, had two daughters, and found a vast audience of listeners who still adored him. Like Aleksei Tolstoi, he enjoyed a very com fortable life there, in the material sense. Another returnee was the poet Antonin Ladinsky. Some writers preferred to remain in Europe but accepted Soviet citizenship; these included Aleksandr Ginger and his wife Anna Prismanova, Aleksei Remizov, and Nadezhda Tèffi. The poet Vyacheslav Ivanov apparently never form ally renounced Soviet citizenship. On August 15, 1947, the charter meeting of the League of Soviet Citizens was held (to replace the League of Soviet Patriots). The meeting was chaired by Igor' Krivoshein, who had already received a Soviet passport by that tim e and was to return to the Soviet Union, only to be imprisoned once he arrived there.3 A prominent member of the presidium was the Soviet Ambassador Aleksandr Bogomolov. The villa on Rue Gallière which had previously been
•Krivoshein's case w as not reexamined until 1954, and he was permitted to return to France only in 1974.
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appropriated by the Germans for Zherebkov's organization was handed over to the League, which — according to one Soviet source — had a total membership of 11,000. W ary of the anti-Soviet mood of some of the emigrants, the French governm ent delayed granting them permission to relaunch their publications. At the end of the war, the Soviets had established Camp Beauregard just outside Paris for Russian émigrés, and by November 1947 rumors began to circulate that Camp Beauregard was being used as a prison to hold Russian émigrés before forcibly repatriating them to the Soviet Union. The French government became suspicious and sent 2,000 police and six tanks to surround the camp, but by that tim e forced repatriations had ceased altogether. On November 25, 1947, leaders of the League of Soviet Citizens were rounded up by French police for deportation to the Soviet Union.® Others voluntarily accepted Soviet citizenship, acnong them Metropolitan Evlogy. The newspaper Sovetskii patriot was closed by the police. It was replaced by Russkie novosti (Russian News, 194552), edited by Arseny Stupnitsky. Russian émigrés in Yugoslavia had generally supported the Germans, and many deemed it wise to flee along with their allies. By the end of the war, only an estimated 8,000 to 12,000 of some form er 35,000 Russian émigrés were left in the country. The new Yugoslav authorities regarded those who remained as a sort of fifth column, and they arrested some of them as German collaborators. In 1948 and 1949, after the break between Tito and Stalin, Russian em igrants were accused of pro-Soviet espionage, and most emigrated westward via Trieste. Only a handful of persons holding Soviet passports actually returned to the Soviet Union. By 1953 only some 2,000 Russians were left in Yugoslavia, many of whom were old and sick. In China the Nationalist governm ent closed Russian émigré organizations in Shanghai that had collaborated with the Japanese authorities and the Nazis. Several new newspapers were founded: Kitaisko-russkaya gazeta (The Russian-Chinese Newspaper), Russkoe slovo (The Russian Word), Novaya zhizn' (The New Life), and Novosti dnya (News of the Day). At the same tim e the victory of Russian arms stirred up a wave of patriotic pride among the émigrés. Pro-Soviet feelings were so strong that at a Shanghai writers’ meeting a number of writers publicly supported Andrei Zhdanov's attacks on the poet
•Among them w ere: D. Belousov, N. Belyaev, A. Genik, A. Gushchin, N. Kachva, V . Kovalev, Lev Lyubimov, A. Marchenko, A. Paleolog, V . Plikhta, V . Postovsky, A. Prokotilov, T. Rozenkopf, M. Rygalov, S. Sirin, V . Tolli, I. Tserebzhi, and A. Ugrimov.
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Anna Akhmatova. All this failed to Impress the Soviets who, upon occupying Manchuria in 1945, arranged a "literary evening" in Harbin, with personal invitations sent to local writers and journalists. Those who appeared, including Aleksei Gryzov (Aleksei Achair), Arseny M itropol'sky (Arseny Nesmelov), and Mikhail Shmeisser, were arrested and disappeared. Many journalists suffered the same fate. Valery Pereleshin wrote that his mother counted 120 of her friends who had vanished and mentioned two libraries, the books of which were burned publicly in "huge bonfires.” In the meantime an estimated 85,000 to 90.000 files of the Japanese-created Bureau of Russian Emigrant Affairs were taken to the Soviet Union and placed in KGB archives in Moscow and Vladivostok. A number of writers left voluntarily for the Soviet Union.» Some died in Soviet prisons0, while still others® managed to publish their works in the Soviet Union. Altogether, some 15.000 persons returned to Russia. Between August and November 30, 1947, 2,500 Russian émigré families made the one-way journey, their expenses paid by the Soviet government. Many of Shanghai's Russians were hauled off to Siberia in 1947 and resettled in the socalled "virgin lands.” When the news of this practice spread, other émigrés who had retained Soviet citizenship handed in their passports. Others made their way to Californiad, while Larisa Andersen went to France, and Valery Pereleshin ended up in Brazil. On the political front, Rodzaevsky was returned to the Soviet Union and executed (in America, his fellow fascist Anastasy Vonsyatsky was imprisoned in a mental institution, just as was Ezra Pound). In the fall and early winter of 1948, Russian émigrés fled from other cities to Shanghai after it became apparent that the Nationalist governm ent could not win the civil war with the communists. Nevertheless, it was obvious that Shanghai itself would not hold out for long, and further flight became inevitable. On February 26, 1949, the editors of Kitaisko-russkaya gazeta (The Chinese-Russian Newspaper) issued a statem ent rejecting the suggestion of the Chinese National Governm ent that the émigrés be moved south from Shanghai and supporting the general evacuation from Shanghai, which had actually
•Varvara
Ievleva,
Lidiya
Khaindrova,
Vladim ir
Pomerantsev,
Nikolai
Shchegolev, Vladim ir Slobodchikov, and Nikolai Svetlov. bLev Grosse, for one. cLidiya Khaindrova, Pavel von Olbrich (Pavel Severny), and Natal'ya ll'ina. dYustiniya Kruzenshtern-Peterets,
O l'ga Skopichenko, M ariya Vizi, Viktoria
Yanovskaya, and Nikolai Yazykov, among others.
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begun on January 13,1949, and was completed by the end of March, although some remaining Russians emigrated in the 1950s and 1960s. Approxim ately 5,500 Russians were evacuated to the inhabited Island of Tubabao in the Philippine Archipelago, where with virtually bare hands they built a tent city, with streets bearing such grandiose names as Nevskii Prospekt, Admiral'skii Prospekt, and Tverskaya. The refugees were fed by the IRO (International Refugee Organization) and UNRRA (United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration). From Tubabao the refugees were dispersed to Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Paraguay, the Dominican Republic, and the United States. On July 1, 1950, the Conciliatory Commission of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives voted to accept 341,000 displaced persons by the end of July, 1951, including most of the remaining refugees on Tubabao. Finally, in the spring of 1953, the last refugees left the Philippines. It was the end of the Far Eastern chapter in the history of the Russian emigration. Many of the Russians already in Argentina were uneducated Russian Orthodox people from western Belorussia and Ukraine (Volhynia) who had fled Polish rule. They were joined by a sm all contingent of Russian engineers from Czechoslovakia in the early 1930s. When W orld W ar II came to a close, Peron made an effort to attract educated people to bolster the economy and began to perm it immigration — two years before the United States did so, albeit with lim itations. Only men younger than 45 and women under 30 were accepted. Some 5,000 Russians, a surprisingly large number of whom had been journalists, settled in Buenos Aires. Because of the large educational gap between the pre- and post-war immigrants, and the older group's more positive attitude toward the Soviet government, the two communities had very little contact with each other. Alm ost all literary activity was carried out by the newer arrivals. For a tim e Buenos Aires could boast several Russian-language newspapers: Nasha strana (Our country, founded by Ivan Solonevich), Russkoe slovo (The Russian Word, edited by Dmitry Konstantinov and Nikolai Fevr), Suvorovets, and Za Pravdu (In the Name of Truth), which was funded by the Vatican. The émigrés had a sort of cultural society named "The House of Russian W hite Émigrés,” with a library of 8,000 volumes. The Society arranged literary readings and concerts.3 In 1951 Russian writers and journalists in Argentina
•Among its members w ere the novelists Nikolai Tam artsev (Boris Bashilov), Mikhail Boikov, and Nikolai Churilov (Nikolai Kusakov).
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published The Southern Cross (Yuzhnyi krest) — an anthology of prose and poetry, edited by N. I. Fëdorov.b In 1947 Inflation began to pose a serious problem in Argentina, and in 1949 the United States opened the gates for immigration. Over the course of several decades approximately half the post-war group of 5,000 refugees emigrated to the United States, Canada, and Venezuela. After Stalin's death somewhere between several hundred and several thousand Russians— largely from the pre-1917 elem ent— left for the Soviet Union, which they evidently found little to their liking. Those who had been born in Argentina were permitted to leave the Soviet Union, and after that there were no further repatriations from Argentina. In Brazil the largest group of émigrés consisted of form er residents of displaced-persons camps in Germany and Austria after W orld W ar II. A t about the same time, part of the China diaspora also found its way to Brazilian shores. In 1952 the monarchist newspaper Vladim irskii vestnik (The Vladim ir Herald) was founded in Sao Paolo. The total Russian population in that city was sufficiently large that in 1979 there were five Russian churches and several clubs and social organizations. The attention attracted by purported Russian royalty provided a curious footnote to the Brazilian chapter of the Russian émigré com m unity. They included a certain Runge, who arrived in the late 1920s from Argentina claiming to be the illegitim ate son of Nicholas II; Nicholas's supposed niece Anastasiya-lngrid Romanova de Saratov, who visited Brazil either in the late 1960s or early 1970s; a semi literate car mechanic who came to Sao Paulo in the 1970s and claimed to be Nicholas’s son, miraculously escaped from the execution of the imperial fam ily; and an ephemeral "Prince Igor1 Dolgoruky,” who died in the mid-1970s.
•It included poems by M ariya Shelekhova-Benke, Izida Orlova, Valentina Krasnova, M ariya S ., Boris Knyazev, and Viktor Monkevich. The poetry is nostalgic, dealing with the burden of exile and hope of return to the homeland and vengeance. The prose section was contributed by Boris Tam artsev (Bashilov), O . Duretskaya, Georgy Tomin, and Mikhail Boikov; dram a was by Pëtr Potemkin (posthumously), and criticism by M. N. Lebedev and Nikolai Fedorov.
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The Late 1940s and 1950s Twelve years complete he suffer'd in exile A nd kept his father's asses a ll the while. Andrew Marvell (1621-1678) Many, perhaps most, of the displaced persons found themselves in the "DP” camps, run first by UNRRA and then by IRO of the United Nations. These organizations were financed largely by the United States. W hile the camps provided food, shelter, and limited clothing, and some of their residents even managed to "publish” their works with the aid of office duplicating machines, there was always a risk that the camps could be used by the Soviet governm ent to entrap and forcibly repatriate them. For this reason (and because there was money to be made on the outside) many avoided the camps, but this was not an easy task even for those who had ration cards. It was in just such a DP camp that the publishing operation Posev (Possev) was founded in 1945, headed by Boris Pryanishnikov. A t first, the Soviet governm ent was able to exert considerable pressure on UNRRA to censor any materials critical of the Soviet Union, and from November 1946 until mid-1947 all DP publications were suppressed — including Posev. When permission was again granted to the émigrés to publish, they usually did so using only prim itive equipment, reissuing Russian classics and works by the latest e xile s— Ol'ga Anstei's D oor in the W all (Dver' vsten e, Munich, 1949); Ivan Elagin’s You, M y Century (Ty, moê stoletie, Munich, 1948); Evgeny Tverskoi's Sketches (Ètyudy, Regensburg, 1947); and A fte r Plattling (Posle Platlinga, Bavaria, 1946), a panegyric, even dirge-like verse collection, parts of which were written in the style of the Russian folk epos. A surprising num ber of periodicals appeared, some with such — hardly exciting — titles as The News (Novosti, Munich, 1947-48), while others were more colorful in their appellations: The Sniper (Snaiper, 1949); Footsteps o f the Antichrist (Shagi Antikhrista, Hamburg, 1951); and Listen: An AntiBol'shevik M agazine (Slushai: Antibol'shevistskii zhurnal, 1947-48). After the war Russian émigrés in Eastern Europe could hardly look forward to a bright future in the communist order. For example, in 1948 the literary historian Pëtr Bitsilli, who was nearly 70 years old at the time, was fired from his professorship at the University of Sofia and denied any pension. Thus, the late 1940s and early 1950s were a period of remigration from Central and W estern Europe — to a large extent from fear of Soviet expansion. In all, 234,000 First-W ave émigrés found themselves behind the "Iron Curtain” (154,000 in Europe and 80,000 in the Far East), not counting several million ethnic Russians in territories annexed by the U.S.S.R. in 1939-40. If before
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the w ar 80 percent of the émigrés had resided in Europe, by 1952 this figure was reduced to 30 percent. The Cold W ar was at its peak, and on May 7,1 95 2, the same Anthony Eden who had ordered the earlier forced repatriations, stated in the House of Commons that the United Nations Command had no alternative but to resist the forcible repatriation of communist prisoners of w a r— any other decision would be "repugnant.” Later, in 1973, when asked about the earlier forced repatriations, Eden replied that he had no recollection of the details and declined to comment on the matter or provide relevant documentation. Stalin died in 1953 and was denounced by Khrushchêv in 1956. Even before Khrushchêv's famous speech, ll'ya Èrenburg wrote a short novel entitled The Thaw (O ttepel'j, giving hope to the entire world that reform had finally arrived in Russia. The Russian émigrés were no exception; even the implacable NTS was captivated by the possibility. These hopes were to prove premature.
Composition of the Émigré Community For I m ust to the greenwood go, Alone, a banished man. The Nut-Brown M aid Fifteenth century, anonymous The Second W ave consisted of persons who a) found them selves overtaken early in the war by the rapidly advancing German lines, b) were forcibly deported by the Germans to work in the Reich, c) volunteered for such work or chose to escape with the retreating German armies, or d) had defected from the Soviet army or been taken prisoner. Most of the territories which the Germans occupied— the Baltic states, Belarus, Ukraine, M oldova— were not part of Russia proper; as a result, only 7 percent of the Second-Wave refugees from territories that later comprised the Soviet Union are estim ated to have been ethnically Russian, although the percentage of russophones among them was, of course, higher. Moreover, there was a good deal of hostility between Russian supporters of empire and Ukrainian separatists, some of whom regarded even Gogol' as a traitor for having written in Russian instead of Ukrainian. W hile the Second Wave included a number of intellectuals, this group did not possess the "critical mass” essential to maintain a cultural tradition abroad on the scale of either its predecessors or its successors in exile. In the words of the Second-Wave writer Tat'yana Fesenko, it was an "emigration of individuals.” In publications of the 1950s and the early 1960s, First-Wave figures still tended to
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predominate. For example, in the poetry collection Sodruzhestvo (Commonwealth), compiled by Tat’yana Fesenko and published in 1966, two-thirds of the poets are from the First Wave. Gennady Khomyakov (G. Andreev) wrote that a general lethargy had made literary activities seem purposeless. Literary evenings were attended by five or six people, and there was nothing even vaguely sim ilar to a literary circle. Khomyakov saw not only Russians, but Europeans as well, as "half-asleep, half-awake, amorphous, undirected.” The Second W ave had relatively few intellectuals and showed major social and intellectual differences from its predecessor. It had no fam ous names; as a rule, the writers, scholars, and publicists of the Second W ave had yet to show their strengths and find a place for themselves, and they were clearly incapable of achieving the goal set for itself by the First W ave — the salvation of Russian culture from the Bol'shevik pogrom. In the words of Andreev-Khomyakov, Russian culture had "gone home, to new generations, and the war played an enormous role in dem onstrating the indestructibility of the Russian spiritual and cultural tradition and in reviving national self-awareness.”
Political Groupings The shattered lobsterpot, the broken oa r and the gear o f foreign dead men. The sea has m any voices. T. S. Eliot A number of old and new groups sprang up in the latter half of the 1940s and the early 1950s, an especially tense period during the Cold War, when W estern counterintelligence funding was generous. The various factions broke down into three basic groups: on the far right were the monarchists, who demanded a total restoration of the ancien régim e; in the center was the nepredreshenchestvo (nonpredeterm inationist) position, which advocated an overthrow of the Soviet government, with the form and nature of the new governm ent to be determined later; and on the left were those who recognized the February 1917 revolution and who were willing to accept some of the changes introduced after 1917. Alm ost without exception, all the various factions believed in continuing Russia's imperial tradition. In general, the émigré political breakdown was significantly different after the war than before. The m onarchist organizations, ROVS, the Men'sheviks, and the Social Revolutionaries lost much of their influence. Among the surviving political groups were:
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the Monarchists, who confirmed Grand Duke Kirill Vladimirovich as pretender to the throne; the short-lived Anti-Bol'shevik Center of the Liberation Movement of the Peoples of Russia (Antibol'shevistskii Tsentr Osvoboditel'nogo Dvizheniya Narodov Rossii — ATsONDR). Created in 1948, it represented an attem pt to revive KONR on a broad platform ; the Committee of United Vlasovites (Komitet ob'edinënnykh vlasovtsev — KOV), created in 1950 under General Turku!; the nationalist-minded Andreev Flag League (Soyuz Andreevskogo Flaga — SAF), funded at least in part by W est German counterintelligence; the League to Struggle for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia (Soyuz bor'by za osvobozhdenie narodov Rossii — SBONR) and the League of Warriors of the Liberation Movement (Soyuz voinov osvoboditel'nogo dvizheniya — SVOD ). SBONR was a political organization and SVOD was its m ilitary arm. This group opposed the restoration of monarchy. Created in 1949, it operated prim arily in Germany but had offices in a number of countries. Its membership consisted predominantly of new arrivals; SBONR, which published Bor'ba (Struggle) and, later, Golos naroda (Voice of the People), which was attacked by the right as "anti-Bol'shevik communists”; created in 1948, the Russian All-National Popular-State Movement (Rossiiskoe obshenatsional'noe NarodnoDerzhavnoe Dvizhenie — RONDD) published Derzhavnyi klich (Imperial Call), Volya naroda (The People's W ill) and Nabat (Alarm), attacked other émigré organizations, and complained about the threat of Judeo-Communism. Supposedly, it was partially funded by W est German intelligence services; created by American counterintelligence in 1952 for defectors, the Central Alliance of Post-W ar (in 1957 changed to "Political”) Émigrés (Tsentral'noe Ob'edinenie Poslevoennykh [Politicheskikh] Èmigrantov — TsOPÈ) published the almanac M osty (Bridges) but lost funding in the early 1960s. Nevertheless, the journal managed to keep going until 1970;
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h)
the National Labor League*, actually the form er NTSNP (Solidarists), headed by Viktor Baidalakov, Vladim ir Poremsky, Evgeny Ostrovsky (Romanov), and others, operating mainly in France and Germany. The largest of all the émigré organizations, it was heavily involved in counterintelligence operations, but also published the journals G rani (Facets) and Posev (The Sowing). To a considerable extent, the organization was created out of a sense of frustration with the older generation; I) Formed in March 1949 to unite the various factions, the League to Struggle for the People's Freedom (Liga bor'by za narodnuyu svobodu), headed by Aleksandr Kerensky and Boris Nikolaevsky, had its headquarters in the U.S.A., with branches in France and Germany; j) the Russian People's Movement (Russkoe narodnoe dvizhenie), founded in 1948 in Paris and4headed by Kerensky as of 1951, when he left the League to Struggle for the People's Freedom; k) the Anti-Bol'shevik Block of Peoples (Antibol'shevistskii blok narodov). The Orthodox Church continued to be involved in politics. As soon as the war was over, four Karlovcian bishops in Soviet-occupied China and Manchuria had applied for readmission to the Moscow Patriarchate. In Septem ber 1945, a year before his death, Evlogy actually rejoined the Moscow Church. Many of the Second-W ave émigrés, some of whom relocated to the United States, were unwilling to tolerate what they perceived as too accepting an attitude on the part of the Russian Orthodox Church in America, and they generally tended to join the Synodal Church, which itself had moved from Munich to the United States in 1950. In 1970 the Russian Church in Am erica accepted autocephaly (autonomy) from the Moscow Patriarchate, only to be roundly condemned by the Synodal Church for having any dealings with Moscow.
■At its founding in 1930, the official title w as the National League of Russian Youth (Natsional'nyi soyuz russkoi molodëzhi). A year later it w as renamed National League of the New Generation (Natsional'nyi soyuz Novogo Pokoleniya), and still later it becam e the National Labor league (Natsional'no-Trudovoi Soyuz), but that, too, w as altered — to the Popular Labor league (Narodno-Trudovoi Soyuz). The acronym NTS has been retained since 1935.
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Relations Between "First” and "Second” Waves 0 blithe newcom erl I have heard, 1 hear thee and rejoice. O cuckoo! Shall I call thee bird O r but a wandering voice. William Wordsworth A quarter of a century had passed between the arrivals of the First and Second Waves, and the encounter of the two groups was not an altogether congenial one. In the flush of postwar pro-Soviet patriotism , there were First W avers who regarded the newcomers as "Vlasovite traitors to the Homeland.” Even without such political confrontations, it was obvious that the two groups came from two quite different environments. The First-Wave philosopher Fëdor Stepun wrote in his memoirs that the Soviet Union was an unknown "blackness” and that the new arrivals needed to overcome their "trench-like” psychology so that they might help to comprehend "the frightening face of the Russia that had given birth to them and raised them .” The tone of such a statem ent was more than condescending, and decades later Second-W ave figures complained both about the purported "elitism ” of the First Wave and also the willingness of ThirdW ave writers to glorify the First W ave at the expense of the Second. In hindsight, however, it is difficult to see how things could have been different, given the material deprivation that the new arrivals had known in Russia. When the writer Ivan Solonevich escaped across the Finnish border, he was treated to a meal by a hospitable Russianspeaking lady who urged him not to hold back, because she knew he must not have enjoyed rolls and coffee for some time. He responded with just two words: "14 years.” And this was in 1934, a decade before the arrival of the first Second Wavers. But the Second W ave struggled vigorously to establish itself as a cultural entity. The Second-Wave w riter and literary scholar Leonid Rzhevsky wrote of the work done in 1958 to put together the collection Literature Abroad (Literaturnoe zarubezh'e): The anthology was the first attem pt a t presenting the literary creations o f the so-called "new” writers, and it encountered a num ber o f objections: was it really necessary— indeed, was it not even artificial — to draw a line o f demarcation between the "new ” and the "o ld”? To me such a distinction, a t least as regards writers, did not seem artificial — so different was the creative reality o f Blok's Russia, brought aw ay by writers o f the first em igrant
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flow, from Stalin's feudal principality with its "enslavem ent o f camps and internal exile." Roman Qui', a First-W ave writer, expressed essentially the same view in my 1982 interview with him: People are people ... B ut psychologically, o f course, there are differences between the first and second emigrations, and particularly between the First and the Third Waves there is a big difference. That's only natural. The third em igration grew up in the Soviet Union; we grew up under His M ajesty the Tsar. Those are two entirely different things. Naturally, there existed not only a difference in age, but also a social-class gap between the First and Second Waves. On the one hand, after nearly three decades of being cut off from Russia, the older émigrés wanted to reach out to newly arrived fellow Russians, but, on the other hand, they identified their new comrades in m isfortune with those who had exiled them from home and country. One woman, a member of the Second Wave, told me how she had despaired of arranging her life and visited a Russian church in Paris in the late 1940s and surprised even herself by bursting into sobs and praying aloud before the altar. When she had calmed down she heard someone hiss: "sovetskaya svoloch’” (Soviet bitch). It was an older woman sitting behind her who could tell by her way of speaking Russian that she was a recent arrival in the West. It would have been naive to assume that the new refugees would immediately flow sm oothly into the pool of older émigrés w ithout any friction, but when all is said and done, the hostility between First and Second W avers was trivial compared to the hostility between tsarist revolutionary émigrés and the First Wave, when the one group had hastened home to cast out the other. And the gap was less than that which would later be felt between a belatedly and im perfectly unified group of First and Second Wavers, who were ethnically Russian (or at least Slavic), and the largely Jewish Third W ave.a Thus, for a long tim e N ovyi zhurnal remained a mainly First-W ave publication which brought a number of Second-W ave writers into its fold, while Third-W ave authors were only gradually accepted as regular contributors. Money was a source of friction between the various W aves. W hereas the First Wave had been sufficiently large in numbers and
•The Third-W ave historian Mikhail Nazarov, whose sympathies are explicitly with the First and Second W aves, has even expressed the view that the appearance of the Third W ave led to a rapprochement of the Rrst and Second W ave in the face of the Third W ave's "cosmopolitanism."
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literary Inclinations to perm it its writers and thinkers to eke out an existence with the pen, the arrival of the Second and Third Waves coincided with the period of the Cold War. Money was spent not only on tanks and planes, but on ideology and propaganda. Literature came to be subsidized and was not so much sold as "distributed.” It is no exaggeration to say that most Second- and Third-Wave literature would never have come into existence without these subsidies, but it is also true that access to these funds could just as easily serve as a bone of contention.
Geography His time is forever, everywhere his place. Abraham Cowley (1618-67) It would be a mistake to view the dispersal of Russians in general and Russian writers in particular solely within the context of massive political upheavals. Global war is, after all, but one aspect of globalization in the larger scheme of things. If there had never been a world war, we might well be witnessing an even greater number of Russians abroad strictly as a result of normal social and commercial intercourse. In the second half of the nineteenth century Russians were routinely and efficiently travelling by train to Europe and communicating with the folks back home by telegraph. In 1867 Dostoevsky left St. Petersburg by train on April 14 at 5:00 pm and arrived in Vilnius the next day at 2:00 pm. He opted to stay overnight in Vilnius and left the next morning for Berlin. A modern traveller would feel quite comfortable under such conditions. Zinaida Gippius, writing about life in Paris from 1906 to 1914, wrote that she and Merezhkovsky had no feeling of separation from Russia; articles and books appeared promptly back home, and they had the feeling they could get on the Nord-Express and be back in Petersburg the next day: "No one lost contact with Russia.” Soviet "locked” borders, on the other hand, cut off such travel alm ost com pletely for over a half century, with the exception of the short-lived exodus of the Second Wave. Thus, communism in Russia both promoted and hindered emigration. The chief centers of the First-Wave Russian émigré community had been in relatively close proximity to Russian borders — Western and Central Europe and the much smaller community in HarbinShanghai. The exiles had long-standing ties to those places and originally settled there in hope of a speedy return home after the anticipated collapse of the Soviet government, but the Second W orld W ar uprooted Russians in Western Europe, and the establishment of
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a com m unist government in China brought about an even more radical displacement from that country. According to official U.S. figures, emigration to the United States by Soviet refugees was modest in the post-war period, the largest totals being reached during the years 1950 to 1952. Nevertheless, in the chaos of the immediate postwar years the center of Russian cultural life in exile shifted from Paris to New York. But an American address was regarded as a mixed blessing by many. There was a feeling, shared by emigrants from a number of countries, not ju st by Russian exiles, that the trip across the ocean was somehow qualitatively different from moving from one European country to another. And this was not simply a matter of distance. In the words of the German critic Hans-Albert W alter, what hope was there "in a continent that did not know Heinrich Mann and had no use for Döblin or Brecht?” On the cultural front, New York was home to the Pushkin Literary Society, the Society of Russian Artists, and the Russian Center.8 The city even boasted its own Russian theaters. Not far from New York, in Lakewood, New Jersey, the Rodina Society and ROOVA Farm arranged concerts and lectures. O ther major U.S. cities where Russians concentrated were San Francisco,b Los Angeles,0 Chicago,0 Boston,® Detroit,* Philadelphia,a W ashington, D.C., and Seattle. The chief Canadian cities where Russians lived were Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver, London, and W innipeg.
•Som e other organizations in New York w ere R O VS, K O N R , RO A, S B O N R , the League of Russian Military Invalids, the Association of Russian Lawyers, Sokol, the League of National Russian W om en, the League of Pages, the Alliance of Lycée Students, the League of Russian Nobility in Am erica, the Alliance of Officers of the Imperial Guard, the Radio Liberty Com m ittee, the Aleksandr Nevsky Fund, and the St. George's Association. bA branch of the Literary Fund, the Russian Youth Circle, the League of Russian-American W om en. «The V . Ordynsky Musical Society, the Accessible Theater, the Art Society. «The Russian University Youth Society, the religious and cultural Vladim ir Center, and a Russian radio program "Zarya" (Daw n). •The Society of Russian Emigrants. T h e Gallipoli Society. T h e Beseda Society.
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As of 1970,334,615 persons indicated in the U.S. Census that their native language was Russian. With tim e the Russian community was able to establish some 23 cultural organizations.3 In South Am erica the chief Russian centers were Caracas,6 Buenos Aires,c and Sao Paulo, which had seen vigorous Russian émigré activities even before World W ar II and which received a number of Russians from Yugoslavia and China after the war. W hile Paris still had hundreds of Russian émigré organizations on paper, the greater part of them became inactive after the war.d O ther European cities with Russian populations included Liège, Brussels, Antwerp, Luxembourg, and— especially — Rome. Finland, of course, had a Russian population, but permitted no anti-Soviet activities whatsoever. Occupied by the allies, W est Germany retained a number of Russians who had fought in the Vlasov army and who now offered their services to American counterintelligence and propaganda organizations. NTS and SBONR, for example, were both active in W est Germany. Thanks to American funding, 1950 saw the establishm ent of the Institute for the Study of the Soviet Union, and Radio Liberation
•Among them w ere: the All-Russian Monarchist Front (N Y ), the American Russian Aid Association (N Y ), the American Russian Slavonic Democratic Club (N Y ), the Association of Russian Imperial Naval Officers in Am erica (N Y ), the Federated Russian Orthodox Clubs (W ilkes Barre, Pennsylvania), the Fund for the Relief of Russian W riters and Scientists in Exile (N Y ), the Russian American Congress (N Y; later moved to Washington, D .C .), the Russian Brotherhood Organization of the U .S .A . (Philadelphia), the Russian Children's W elfare Society (N Y ), the Russian Independent Mutual Aid Society (Chicago), the Russian Nobility Association in Am erica (N Y ), the Russian Orthodox Catholic Mutual Aid Society of the U .S .A . (W ilkes Barre, Pennsylvania), the Russian Orthodox Church in the U .S .A . (N Y ), the Russian Orthodox Church of Am erica (N Y ), the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia (N Y ), the Russian Orthodox Fraternity Liubov (Jermyn, Pennsylvania), the Russian People's Center (N Y ), the Russian Student Fund (N Y ), the Society of the Russian Veterans of the World W ars (San Francisco), the Tolstoy Foundation (N Y ), and the United Russian Brotherhood of Am erica (Pittsburgh). bThe A. S. Pushkin House and the Russian Cultural Center. cThe Russian W hite Émigré House and a theatrical group. “Among those that managed to keep going w ere the Russian branch of the Y M C A , The Rakhmaninov Conservatory, The Academic Group, The Scholarly and Philosophical Society, The League of Russian W riters and Journalists in France, The Society for the Preservation of Russian Cultural Values, and the Com m ittee for the Assistance of Russian Emigrants in France.
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(renamed Radio Liberty in 1959) was founded in 1953. Franco's Spain provided refuge to an avid group of Russian monarchists, and Spanish National Radio ran a regular Russian program. Since the United States and the Soviet Union were allies during the war, the pro-Soviet tone of American newspapers and magazines of that period was unavoidable. As soon as the conflict came to an end, however, a worsening of relations between the two countries was equally inescapable. The new émigré community was as strongly antiSoviet as the First Wave, and various émigré organizations and publications received financial support from the Americans, albeit not as fast or in such generous amounts as the émigrés would have liked. In 1952 "Lieutenant-Colonel" M. Kolosov wrote: ...w hy d o n t the Am ericans take us refugees to Am erica instead o f leaving us in Germany? The U.S. Supreme Com m ander in Germ any M cCioy has declared that defectors from the Soviet arm y w ill be granted asylum, but why only in Germany, which is already filled to overflowing with refugees? W hy do the Am ericans themselves not wish to resolve the fates o f the people whom they themselves inspired to flee? B itterly disappointed by our m eeting with the West, we m ust say that we do not perceive friendship and sincerity on the p a rt o f the West. O ur efforts to develop anticom m unist activity are not supported. In a m aterial sense, our existence is shabby, and we do not enjoy the full spectrum o f human rights. We are oppressed morally, our hopes are crushed, and we are depressed by uncertainty and disenchantment. The above article appeared in a magazine entitled Kolokol (Bell), the very appearance of which seemed to illustrate Kolosov's mood — typed on cheap sheets of paper stapled together to form an issue. Australia, which received a considerable share of China's Russian community, had Russian populations in Sidney, Melbourne, Adelaide, Stratford, and Brisbane. In Africa, Bizerta had some Russians, but when Tunisia was declared a republic in 1956, most of them left for Paris, Marseilles, and the French Riviera. The Crimean evacuation had even brought a group of Russians to Addis Ababa, who were still in evidence after the war and who built a Russian cathedral there with the blessing of Haile Selassie.
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Periodicals and Radio 01 m any a shaft a t random sent Finds m ark the archer little m eant! A nd m any a word, a t random spoken, M ay soothe o r wound a heart that's brokenl Sir W alter Scott In France, the country which had constituted the center for cultural activity before the War, Russian cultural life was devastated. There was an extremely modest "comeback” in the late 1940s and 1950s, and then a depressing slide downwards until the arrival of the Third W ave in the 1970s. Since so many of the new émigrés found them selves — either voluntarily or involuntarily — in Germany, that country became a chief center for émigré publications in the immediate postwar years. The journal Posev was founded in late 1945 and G rani (Facets) in 1946. Both were conceived by Russian Second-Wave em igrants living in barracks for displaced persons under threat of forced repatriation to the Soviet Union. G rani soon established ties with the First Wave, but ultim ately became a forum for the publication of Soviet underground publications, as did Posev. Curiously, some of the original support for the journals came in the form of American cigarettes and coffee. Before the German currency reform of 1948, these two commodities actually served as money, and the journals’ subscribers — residents of the displaced-persons camps — received generous allotm ents of both and thus were relatively well off in a material sense. Later, in the 1950s, when the subscribers had moved on, largely to the United States, the dollar was very strong relative to the mark, and foreign subscriptions were especially profitable. The growing significance of New York was evident in the various political publications which appeared there. Founded in 1910, the newspaper Novoe russkoe slovo (The New Russian Word) developed into the most widely-read publication of the Russian émigré com m unity worldwide. W hile the monarchist movement was still viable, New York was home to its newspaper Rossiya (Russia, edited by
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Rybakov) and the journal Znamya Rossii (Russia's Banner, edited by Nikolai Chukhnov).a Nasha strana (Our country), a weekly newspaper founded in 1948 by Ivan Solonevich in Buenos Aires as an "organ of Russian m onarchist thought,” still appears. The paper summed up its position at the very top of page one in the words: "After the fall of Bolshevism only the Tsar will save Russia from a new Party slavery.” It adopted as Hs slogan "For Fakh, the Tsar, and the Fatherland,” and sought "to expose the dirty tricks, intrigues, and lies of past, present, and future enemies of Russia and the Orthodox Church.” For a flavor of the publication's spirit, the following passage from an article by Nikolai Nefedov about Mihajlo Mihajlov is revealing. M ihajlov is the son of First-Wave Russian émigrés who settled in Yugoslavia. The article is entitled: "A Soviet Man: A M arxist of 'Russian Descent’”: V. Zarubin in Nasha strana (O ur Country) provid inform ation on the appearance in Munich o f Forum, a Russianlanguage journal, that is a Jewish journal published in Russian. In the article Zarubin notes in passing that the dissident M ihajlo M ih a jlo v is o f R ussian descen t. V. Z a ru b in is m istaken: M. M ihajlov is not o f Russian descent. It is true that his parents came to Yugoslavia from Russia, were citizens o f the Russian empire, and knew Russian, but they were not Russian. Therefore, M ihajlo M ihajlov cannot him self be considered to be o f " Russian descent.” A nd neither is he a Serb o r a Croat. Having arrived in the W est with a Yugoslav passport, M ihajlo M ihajlov did not attach him self to the Russian ém igré community, which is totally alien to him, but jo in e d a group which was near to him — the com pany o f Soviet, leftist
•The S R bi-monthly m agazine Novyi p u f (The New Path), Rossiya (Russia), Russkii golos (The Russian Voice), S o fya Pregel"s Novosel'e (The Housewarming), Novyi zhum al (The New Review), the monthly m agazine Russkii vestnik (The Russian Herald), Sotsialisticheskii vestnik (The Socialist Herald), and the monthly Z a svobodu (For Freedom) w ere also published in New York. Pennsylvania was home to Pravda (The Truth, Philadelphia) and V em osf (Loyalty, Philadelphia), Lyubov1 (Love, Mayfield), S vet (The Light, W ilkes-Barre), the w eekly newspapers Russkii vestnik (The Russian Herald, Pittsburgh) and Amerikansko-russkii vestnik (The Russian-American Herald, Hom estead). The w eekly Russkoe obozrenie (The Russian Review) was founded in Chicago. The m agazine Solntse (The Sun) cam e out in Los Angeles, w hile Novaya zarya (New Dawn) and Russkaya z h iz ri (Russian Life, edited by Pëtr Balakshin) w ere published in San Francisco.
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dissidents, thus declaring a cold war on the Russian émigré community. His goal is to prevent, no m atter what the cost, a Russian national renaissance. He is an agitator working to replace Soviet communism with democracy — a "people's dem ocracy,” o f course, that is "socialism with a human face....” As for the Jewish question, which ought to be o f particular interest to the dissident Mihajlo M ihajlov ... the fact should be noted that, whatever lim itations there m ay have been [under the Tsars], the Jews were far better o ff than the rest o f the population, since they controlled trade* Thanks in part to support from the Ford Foundation, the Chekhov Publishing House published a number of fine volumes, beginning in 1952. The operation was headed by Vera Shvarts (Aleksandrova), who had been the chief literary critic of Sotsialisticheskii vestnik (The Socialist Herald) in the interwar period. N ovyi zhurnal (The New Review) was founded in 1942 by Mark Tsetlin, M ark Aldanov, and Mikhail Karpovich5 — all First-Wave figures who had recently moved from Europe to the New World. It was intended to be a "thick journal” in the Russian tradition and was conceived as a continuation of Sovremennye zapiski. Tsetlin had edited the poetry section of Sovremennye zapiski, and his wife, Mariya Tsetlina, who helped fund Sovremennye zapiski, was one of the supporters of Novyi zhurnal, at least up to the 1950s. To the editors’ surprise, the journal proved to be a viable undertaking with over 1,000 copies of its first issue sold. Although political materials tended to predom inate during the war and the poetry section was weak, the editors published works by a number of prominent prose writers of the First Wave, including Bunin, Gazdanov, Nabokov, Osorgin, Yanovsky, and Zaitsev. Roman Gul' became a full-tim e member of the editorial board in 1952 and, after the death of the historian Mikhail Karpovich, took over as editor-in-chief — at first on a de facto basis, and later form ally. W hen the W orld W ar II made it impossible for Russian writers to publish in Europe, Novyi zhurnal became the major political and literary "thick” journal of the émigré community, uniting the First and Second W aves. 1945 saw the reappearance of Vestnik russkogo [studencheskogo] khristianskogo dvizheniya (Herald of the Russian
•M ihajlov is a rare phenomenon in Russian émigré culture in that he represents the "second-generation," having been born in Yugoslavia. Contrary to Nefedov's assertions, he is not Jewish. bBunin actually considered moving to the United States to help establish and run the journal.
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[Student] Christian Movement), which listed New York, Munich, and Paris as its places of publication. It originally began as a strictly religious YMCA publication and then assumed the title Vestnik tserkovnoi zhizni (Herald of Church Life). Nikita Struve has been the official editor since 1955, althoughly he actually began fulfilling that function several years earlier. With tim e the journal began to publish more and more articles of a secular and literary nature, and by 1971 it was able to celebrate the appearance of its 100th issue. As one m ight expect from its title, it is a conservative publication, and Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn began supporting it as of 1974. In 1992 Moscow was added as one of the places of publication. In 1953 the journal Opyty (Experiments, New York) began to appear in New York, edited by Roman Qrinberg and Vsevelod Pastukhov under the banner of anti-Bol'shevism and artistic freedom. Editorship of the publication was later taken over by Yury Ivask until it ceased appearing in 1958. O pyty was intended strictly for verse and fiction. Grinberg went on to found the almanac Vozdushnye p u ti (Aerial Ways) in 1960; only five numbers appeared, and it, too, folded, in 1967. Both these publications were literary undertakings and thus lacked the political orientation necessary to attract U.S. governm ent support. But even the almanac M osty (Bridges, Munich), established by the Central Alliance of Political emigrants, eventually folded (19581970) after its publishing costs proved to be unmanageable. The editors of M osty actually saw it as a bridge between émigré and Soviet life, although far from all of its contributes were eager to embrace such a view. Vozrozhdenie (Renaissance, Paris) was a literary and political journal which appeared from 1949 to 1974 in Paris and was printed in the old orthography and financed by the same oil magnate Abram Gukasov who had earlier financed the newspaper with the same name. Over the years it published a large number of literary, philosophical, and critical studies, not to mention a wealth of memoirs. Novosel'e (House Warming) appeared from 1942 to 1948 in New York and then continued on for two more years in Paris. It was edited by the Fist-W ave poet Sofiya Pregel' in cooperation with the critic and literary historian Mark Slonim. Probably it was a mistake to relocate to Paris, since American Cold-W ar assistance m ight have been available, had the publication remained in its original place of publication. Radio was a natural propaganda response to Soviet censoship of the printed word. The Russian Section of the Voice of Am erica was founded in 1947. In 1953, Radio Liberation was founded by the American Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia, Inc. (Amcomlib), a C.I.A. front organization, to produce broadcasts beamed
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at the peoples of the Soviet Union. Each day the ticking of a clock was to be broadcast, followed by a solemn voice intoning: "Today, Iosif Vissarionovich Stalin is 74 years, 2 months, and 9 days old" (pause and more ticking).... "The tim e of Stalin is drawing to a close." After the first rehearsal, however, it was decided that Stalin might actually live for quite a while and such a feature would soon become boring. Ironically, Stalin suffered his fatal stroke that very day. A number of other foreign radio stations directed broadcasts to Soviet audiences; Deutsche Welle, the BBC, Radio Vatican, the Voice of the Andes, even Radio Albania. Thus, twentieth-century technology brought literature back full circle to oral transmission, as if it were folklore. For decades, these radio-wave publishing programs may well have been Russia's chief means of access to its own exiled literature. Indeed, literature was one of the main weapons employed in the Cold War. For example, Radio Liberty broadcast Solzhenitsyn's entire 260,000-word Gulag Archipelago over the air in 1974! Often funding was provided on a clandestine basis. I myself can recall seeing posters in the New York subway in 1966 or 1967 depicting people behind barbed wire and calling on Americans to support Radio Liberty, which was supposedly financed exclusively by their donations. Of course, as was later admitted, this was a total hoax. The late 1940s and early 1950s marked the height of the Cold War, and an undetermined amount of money (evidently all of it American) went into an effort to create a coordinating center for the struggle against communism. It was to have been centered largely around the NTS and the Institute for the Study of the Soviet Union, with headquarters in Munich. The Institute existed for more than 20 years, but the effort to create a coordinating center did not succeed — partly because it was undertaken during a period when Soviet émigrés were being rapidly dispersed to non-European countries. A major effort was launched to smuggle political propaganda into the Soviet Union, including 97 million leaflets and 8.6 million newspapers and brochures dropped by balloon. In response, the Soviets launched a major espionage campaign against such émigré organizations and even instituted The Committee for Return to the Homeland In East Berlin in 1955 with its own radio broadcasts and newspaper, Za vozvrashchenie na rodinu (For a Return to the Homeland).
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Shul'gin's Open Letter N ot o f the letter, but o f the spirit, for the letter killeth ... Paul's Second Epistle to the Corinthians Them that asks no questions isn't told a lie ... Laces for a lady, letters for a spy. Rudyard Kipling On September 18, I96 0, an open letter by Vasily Shul'gin was printed in the New York pro-Soviet newspaper Russkii g o b s (The Russian Voice). A form er member of all four Dumas, Shul'gin had emigrated after the civil war and played an active role in émigré politics. In 1925-26 he made a clandestine trip to the Soviet Union — either as a double agent of the Soviet authorities or sim ply duped by them. When the Soviet army occupied Yugoslavia, he was arrested and sent to the Soviet Union, where he was imprisoned until 1957. In his letter Shul'gin drew an idyllic picture of life in the Soviet Union and called upon the émigré community to renounce its hostility to the Soviet government. The Second World War, he wrote, had been a great trial, in which the Russian people chose to support the Soviet regime: If the émigré com m unity has not drawn any conclusion from the tragic vote which took place in 1941-45 and continues its activities directed a t the overthrow o f the Soviet government, this is a mistake. The very people who are supposed to be helped do not wish this. Leave them in peace. Let them arrange their lives as they choose. They did not support you, the Whites, during the civil war o f 1918-20, and they rejected and destroyed the émigré battalions which tought on Hitler's side.... Isn't that enough? Can it really be that we, who were not uninvited, will attem pt to "liberate” the Russian people fo r a third tim e? A nd under whose banners? Adenauer's? His successors'? The 1961 book from which this letter is taken also contains a second letter entitled "The Return of Odysseus,” in which Shul'gin takes note of the "cult of personality” and writes that he, Shul'gin, is "captivated” by the figure of Khrushchêv. Shul'gin was later interviewed on film telling how he and Aleksandr Guchkov had persuaded Nikolai to abdicate. Shul'gin's exquisitely aristocratic pronunciation, his elegant beard, and his obvious reverence for the Tsar make such feelings of "captivation” difficult to fathom.
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Prose Writers I am thinking o f aurochs and angels, the secret o f durable pigments, prophetic sonnets, the refuge o f art. A nd this is the only im m ortality you and I m ay share, m y Lolita. Vladim ir Nabokov Fundamentally, the 1940s were a period of disruption, but Second-W ave writers began to publish their works even before moving to the United States. Like the "younger generation” of writers from the First Wave, most Second W avers established themselves as writers only after leaving Russia. In 1948 Anatoly Darov (1920-1997) used a duplicating machine to bring out his Blockade (Blokada) — about the siege of Leningrad. In 1949 Sergei Maksimov (1917-1967) published the most popular novel of the Wave — Denis Bushuev. The bulk of the novel is im itative in nature, stylized after Sholokhov's Q uiet Don. Like Sholokhov's Grigory Melekhov, the protagonist is a noble peasant in love with a married woman, who is a romantic, violent, even Satanic figure. The action evolves against the background of the purges, but the political elem ent is secondary to the main plot line. The novel's conclusion is com pletely Dostoevskian, replete with murder, suicide, confessions, and passionate love. Linguistically, the work is fairly sophisticated and intended to create a deeply Russian atmosphere — an effect which must have tugged at the heartstrings of the émigré readers. Maksimov followed up with a second novel, Denis Bushuev’s Rebellion (Bunt Denisa Bushueva) in 1956, but his career as a writer was tragically ruined by alcoholism, as indeed was his entire life. Perhaps one of the major achievements of the Second Wave was in the genre of memoirs and the historical novel. The tragedy of the age had not been objectively reflected in Soviet literature, and it had been extremely difficult to smuggle manuscripts out of the Soviet Union before the War. Deserving of mention in this genre are Gennady Andreev's Solovets Islands (Solovetskie ostrova, 1950), Boris Shiryaev's The Inextinguishable Lamp (Neugasimaya lampada, 1954), the novel Enem y o f the People (Vrag Naroda, 1952, later republished in 1972 under the title Parallaks) by Vladim ir Yurasov (pseudonym of Vladim ir Zhabinsky), and Leonid Rzhevsky's Between Two Stars (Mezhdu dvukh zvêzd, 1953). Yury Elagin wrote a book of recollections entitled The Taming o f the Arts (Ukroshchenie iskusstv, 1952) and a book on M eierkhol'd: Dark Genius (Têmnyi genii, 1955). In her 1963 memoir, The Tale o f Ragged Years (Povest' krivykh let), Tat'yana Fesenko described her youth in Kiev, the German occupation, the tim e spent in Germany as an Ostarbeiterin, her resolve
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to com m it suicide if forced to return to the Soviet Union, the German landlord who threatened to hand her and her husband over to the Soviet authorities after the war, Ivan Elagin composing verse in a displaced-persons camp, the rescue by American soldiers of a Soviet repatriation officer from an enraged group of DP's, and her own preparations to leave for the United States. It is an intense, deeply personal tale of one woman, but it is, at the same time, a revealing docum ent of the period and helps us to understand Fesenko's own verse, with its reflections on the transitory nature of life. A novel about the purges of 1937 was published by Nikolai Narokov (pseudonym of Nikolai Marchenko, 1887-1969) in New York in 1952 with the title Im aginary Magnitudes (Mnimye velichiny). W ritten in imitation of Dostoevsky's novels, it was intended to convey a moral message within a sensationalistic plot. A young typist is befriended by a mysterious man who reveals to her that her father is a paid inform er for the NKVD and is responsible for the death of several neighbors and the arrest of her own husband. The typist forgives her father, whom the influential stranger orders released just before the father is about to be executed. When the man is directed to continue slandering his neighbors in order to generate still more arrests and executions, he throws him self under a train. A parallel plot unfolds within the ranks of the NKVD. The mysterious stranger turns out to be a high official in that organization. Intelligent and, above all, strong, he combines his murderous activities with a sincere admiration for the typist, whom he perceives as a "real” human being, unlike the thugs who work for him. In a surprise denouement, he murders his mistress, reveals his true identity to the typist, and lays plans to defect while abroad after realizing that his own days are numbered. Born and raised in Riga, Irina Saburova (1907-1979) did not considered herself to be a member of the Second Wave, since she never actually emigrated from Russia proper. Having fled the approaching Soviet troops in 1943 and settled in Munich, she produced two books — The DP Alphabet (Dipiologicheskaya azbuka) and Queen o f Clubs (Dama tref) — in 1946. Given the conditions at the time, "publication” meant setting the type and binding the books herself and selling each copy for a pack of cigarettes. She published A bout Us (0 nas) in Munich in 1972, a melodramatic novel with a very loose plot line about the immediate post-war years in Germany. The characters are overwhelmed by the struggle to survive — to eat, clothe themselves, and avoid forced repatriation to the Soviet Union. They gradually rebuild their lives and even arrange poetry readings in those difficult tim es. At one point mention is made of Gone With the Wind, and Saburova obviously felt a commonality of experience with M argaret
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M itchell's evocations of chaos, hope, and despair in the American South after the Civil War. Both Im aginary Magnitudes and About Us are traditional realistic novels displaying little artistic innovation, but dealing with the events that so wrenched the lives of the Second Wave and, as such, proved to be particularly meaningful to their readers. However, it would be incorrect to remember Saburova strictly in this key, for she also wrote a number of fairy tales, which she believed would outlast such ephemeral cultural artifacts as political-historical writing.
Poets I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each. I do not think that they will sing to me. T. S. Eliot In 1958 an anthology entitled Literature A broad* was published in Munich by a group of Second-Wave émigré writers and poets. The volum e was intended to demonstrate that the Second Wave constituted a literary entity separate from the First Wave. "Modem” Russian literature, as defined by Yury Bol'shukhin in the afterword to the volume, consisted of Second-Wave émigré literature and Soviet literature and was basically "moral” in thrust. Bol'shukhin felt that the division between émigré literature and Soviet literature was artificial: Second-W ave writers saw themselves fundamentally as Soviet writers (or, rather, anti-Soviet writers) who had been dispersed abroad by historical chance. Most First-Wave writers would have concurred in this evaluation of the Second Wave. Bol'shukhin wrote that imaginative writers like Nabokov had been rare among First-Wave writers, who for the most part were inclined toward old-fashioned realism. W hile conceding that the accomplishments of the Second Wave were still modest, Bol'shukhin pointed out that the group was small in number. The verse in the volume is often lofty in manner, with very traditional them es. Basically, the poets sought to transm it their impressions and musings in rhyme and meter. Bol'shukhin's perception of a new modernism (although he did not use that word) now seems very difficult to justify. W hen the First-Wave critic Yury Terapiano in late 1959 summed up the tradition of Russian émigré poetry since 1920, he
•Literaturnoe zarubezh'e. Contributors were: O l'ga Anstei, Ivan Elagin, Sergei Maksimov, Dmitry Klenovsky, Nikolai Morshen, Leonid Rzhevsky, and Aleksandr Kashin.
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sensed an essential commonality of approach and world view between the "two generations” — the First and Second Waves. W hile the form er deliberate sparseness of the "Parisian Note” was gone now, Terapiano felt that an essential unity of manner had been achieved by the early 1950s, evidenced by: 1. a rejection of so-called "leftist” and "chaotic” tendencies; 2. a repudiation of Symbolist vagaries; 3. an adherence to the traditions of the Acmeists (Gumilêv, Akhmatova, early Mandel'shtam, Georgy Ivanov); 4. the influence of Blok and (partially) Tsvetaeva; 5. the influence of nineteenth-century Russian poets (Pushkin, Lermontov, Tyutchev, Baratynsky); and 6. a less than expected influence of Pasternak, Khlebnikov, Mayakovsky, Esenin, Zabolotsky, Kirsanov, and Bagritsky. Clearly, Terapiano's perceptions were influenced by his own personal tastes (he shakes his head over the way recent arrivals ignored the verse of Innokenty Annensky, for example), but these were the perceptions of a sensitive contemporary critic, and cannot be ignored. Igor' Chinnov (1909-1996) is difficult to fit into either the First or Second Waves. Like Saburova, he grew up in Riga and thus was not really an émigré at all before leaving Latvia, but a Russian w riter born abroad. Chronologically, he would fit into the "Second W ave,” but he began writing verse as an im itator of the First W ave's "Parisian Note.” His verse is characterized by an economy of means (what is now referred to as "m inimalism”), a sense of restraint, and a strong underlying aestheticism: A black bird on a black and snowy branch — A hieroglyph o f sorrow. A black burdock in the snow — An ideogram o f winter. Shadows, mine and yours, on the white snowdrift — G raffiti o f silence. The quivering o f black branches and trees. How restless The Chinese calligraphy o f the winter garden, How fleshless These abstractions o f light and snow. Chinnov's later work, while using the same system of form al devices, is more ironical, with elements of surrealism and the
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grotesque. His literary roots were actually quite cosmopolitan, but his general mood reflected the exile’s underlying pessimism. W hile Chinnov was aesthetically an appendage to the "First W ave,” Ivan Elagin (1918-1987) as a poet was truly a product of the new society. Instead of the idyllic landscapes so often encountered in the verse of poets, Elagin adopted a rhetorical, declamatory manner, preferring hyperbole and political verse, as in the following poem dedicated to the memory of his father, the poet Venedikt Mart (Matveev): The man is still alive Who shot m y father In Kiev in the sum m er o f '38. Probably, he's pensioned now, Lives quietly A nd has given up his old job. A nd if he has died, Probably the man is still alive Who ju s t before the shooting Bound his arms Behind his back With a stout wire. Probably, he too is pensioned off. A nd if he is dead, Then probably The one who questioned him still lives. A nd he, no doubt, Enjoys a particularly generous pension. Perhaps the guard Who took m y father to be shot Is still alive. If I should want now, I could return to m y native land. For I have been told That a ll these people have actually forgiven me.
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Another example of the politicized verse of the Second W ave is a poem by the half-Estonian Boris Nartsissov (1906-1982): A M arated Bastilled age Trumpets the lilies’ doom A nd raises a defiant standard Through the red poppies o f banners and caps. The ages sweep past the naive flotsam o f your dream : The same striking men, the same mouths Crying fo r bread. The writhing streets m irror your crimson sheen, While — two hundred m illion strong — You brandish a pentagram over Moscow. 4
B ut your beloved children are impotent. Like you, they dw ell in, are sim plicity: " One step forw a rd — two back.” Throughout the ages Your labor bears the same fruit: Lavoisier on a scaffold, Gum ilëv in a cell. Nikolai Morshen (pseudonym of Nikolai Marchenko, b. 1917) is a Russian speaker from Ukraine, a group which contributed disproportionately to the Second Wave. Fraught with a sense of time, his philosophical verse reflects the life and movement of an age in which the individual is swept along by events: In superstitious panic I stared a t walls surrounding m e: W hat space encloses me — Four-dimensional o r four-walled? I opened the door. It was twilight. Objects gradually disappeared behind each other A nd the a ir rustled lightly like foam — Palpable, ye t elusive.
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The tide o f dark a ir rose to m y knees, to m y chest A nd I had only to cross the threshold To swim and swim, choking on stars. Nikolai Klenovsky (pseudonym of Nikolai Krachkovsky, 18931976) was a poet whose lyrical and philosophical meditations and "eternal them es” would easily have fit into the Parisian Note. His first collection Palette (Palitra) appeared in 1917, but he did not begin writing verse again until he found himself in a displaced-persons camp in Germany in 1947. His verse remained fundam entally conservative, even classical in manner, and is generally somber and preoccupied with death: A ll evil and a ll good W ill fuse within your soul Into a burden o f song — a partner in conversation o f late days. Oleg ll'insky (b. 1932) is unusual among Second-Wave versifiers in that, although he was taken out of Russia by his parents while still a teenager, he did not assimilate, but remained totally within the current of Russian culture. He is a very visual poet, and his verse is often a verbal still life, with what the Russian call veshchestvennost’ or predm etnost'. He has "fragm ents” reminiscent of haiku: Summ er clim axed in a waterfall and the window's view was ageless: a m aple le a f on a police car's license plate, a grape cluster and a bright wine bottle. *
Lilies floated in cranberry punch while aspens trem bled in the forest, reflections o f brigandish Corsicas played over m y sleeping face. *
Broken chalk by the blackboard, a petrified chunk o f childhood. Like Chinnov, Yury Ivask (1907-1986) had his roots in the Baltic region; his fam ily had left Russia for Estonia in 1920 and in 1944 he fled to Germany. Ivask began writing poetry in a rather conservative fashion — som ewhat in the manner of the "Parisian Note.” Later, he
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abandoned this Acmeistic sim plicity and clarity in favor of a more intimate, personal, associative verse and phonic experimentation. As a young man, he conducted an interesting correspondence with Marina Tsvetaeva, and in his later years he took a strong interest in ThirdW ave poets. Aesthetically closest to the First Wave, he matured as a poet quite late — after the arrival of the Second and even the Third W ave. In 1949 he moved to the United States and taught Russian literature at the University of Massachusetts, where he became enamored of the image of a neighbor in spirit and space, if not in tim e — Emily Dickinson: The m ad old m aid o f Am herst — a face like the moon, eyes on fire, her quill pen scraping. On the le ft a window. Another on the right. A nd from beyond the wild roses, the hawthorn and the maple (the glistening garden) — flowers for Thee, bright Absentee ... To Him ! Staccato down the road roaring with a thousand wheels — the mysterious, generous spendthrift o f a galloping soul. With axle squeaking ... into the churchyard — an open grave. But death is smashed. N ot she — trium phant maiden spinning off, away. Oh, Bliss. Em ily's July! The jo y o f the garden. On Globe Roses: the bee. Psalteries o f summer. Chirruping. A nd she needs nothing else, her honeyed horizon outside o f time. Let's fill the em pty heavens. It is already doneI A nd she, she has become his Noon: and dying flows with summer's paradise....9
•Translation by W illiam Tjalsm a.
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The 2Vi Wave For that fine madness still he did retain Which rightly should possess a poet's brain. Michael Drayton (1563-1631) In the 1950s and 1960s only a handful of Russian writers — the so-called 2Vz Wave — managed to make their way to the West. One of the first to leave was Viktoriya Kochurova (pseudonym: Alla Ktorova) (b. 1926), who married an American tourist and was able to leave the U.S.S.R. with him after Khrushchëv personally intervened in her case. It was a remarkable reversal of policy, since under Stalin such an act would have been classified as treason. The case of Valery Tarsis (1906-1983) is notable in that the Soviet authorities used him to experiment once more with psychiatric im prisonm ent and exile. In the U.S.S.R. Tarsis had been an editor, novelist, and poet. He had also translated 34 books from a variety of languages, including Ukrainian and Greek. In 1961 he smuggled out the manuscript of The Blue Bottle Fly (Skazanie o sinei mukhe), a political allegory of a philosopher who kills a fly and then asks himself why he cannot likewise murder people who get in his way. The book was published in 1962, and that same year Tarsis was imprisoned in the Kashchenko Psychiatric Hospital with a diagnosis of "expansive paranoia,” but was released five months later, after the case received wide publicity in the West. He described his experience in W ard 7 (Palata No. 7), the title of which he modeled after Chekhov's W ard 6. On February 21, 1966, he was stripped of Soviet citizenship "for actions discreditable to a Soviet citizen” and permitted to leave the U.S.S.R. a few weeks later. This was the first permission granted since the case of Zamyatin in 1932. He persistently declared the U.S.S.R. to be a fascist state, and the official Soviet reaction was to accuse him of a "delirium of anti-Sovietism .” In 1968 he published an autobiographical tale, Gray Youth (Sedaya yunost'), followed by a multi-volum e epos of life in the Soviet Union amalgamated under the title The Risky Life o f Valentin Alm azov (Riskovannaya zhizn' Valentina Almazova). The next case to receive wide publicity in the W est was that of Arkady Belinkov (1921-1970), a major critic whose relatively early death was a serious blow to Russian letters abroad. Belinkov had been arrested in 1944 for having contacts with foreigners and for having written an unpublished novel in which he asserted that the 1939 M olotov-Ribbentrop pact had led to World W ar II. During his im prisonm ent he was tortured and permanently crippled. Aleksei Tolstoi and Viktor Shklovsky interceded with Stalin on his behalf, and
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his sentence was about to be commuted to ten years when it was learned that he had written other anti-Soviet works before his imprisonment, and he was sentenced to an additional 25 years. He was eventually amnestied in 1956, under Khrushchëv, and awarded a lectureship at the Gor'ky Literary Institute, but was dismissed after being denounced by a student. During his Soviet period Belinkov had been a master of Aesopian language designed to circumvent the censors. Perhaps as a result of a bureaucratic blunder, the Soviets perm itted him to go abroad. Predictably, he defected and received political asylum in the United States in 1968. His public denunciation of the Union of Soviet W riters and of the Soviet government expresses the despair felt by many intellectuals when Khrushchêv's admissions of the "cult of personality” were stifled in the Brezhnev years: The appearance o f a literary empire with its enormous apparatus o f legislators, managers, judges, and henchmen was inevitable, and took place a t the same time and for the same reasons as the mass m urders o f the 1930s. The chronicle o f Soviet self-destruction begins with the creation o f the Union o f Soviet W riters in 1934 and the m urder o f Kirov. Everything that betrayed any gleam o f talent had to be destroyed, fo r talent does not tolerate evil. The m ost vicious corruption was forced upon the country: the rule o f the dull-witted. The W riters’ Union was created to control literature (which ultim ately became "p a rt o f the general-proletarian cause”); that is, it was created to produce everything essential for intolerant, ignorant, allconsum ing power. The authorities needed to raise vicious, devoted beasts ready to unleash wars, seize lands, m urder those who thought differently, o r in the same way, and blow the trum pets in honor o f that extraordinary man who succeeded in destroying more human beings than anyone else has done. I never wrote so much as a line o f the sort dem anded o f a pious Soviet writer and never considered m yself a loyal citizen o f that kingdom o f liars, tyrants, criminals, and stranglers o f freedom. The W riters’ Union is an institution o f a police state, ju s t like a ll its other institutions, and is no better and no worse than the m ilitia o r the fire department.... I write little about the pow erful W riters’ Union o f the U.S.S.R. and consumptive Soviet literature. Why write about a secondary evil? The chief evil is the bestial, fascist Soviet sociological ideology.
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Belinkov's two major works were a 1960 study of the writer Yury Olesha and a 1961 book on the critic and novelist Yury Tynyanov. The general thrust of his studies was more political than literary. I recall vividly a lecture he delivered at New York University shortly before his death, his voice barely audible as a result of his illness and the anger branded indelibly across his features. In 1966 — a relatively liberal period in Soviet history — Anatoly Kuznetsov (1929-1979), had managed to publish Babii Yar, about the destruction of the Jews by the Germans during the Second World War. He defected shortly after Belinkov, while visiting London in 1969, having received permission to go abroad by working as a KGB informer, and immediately republished the work, highlighting the passages which had been expunged by the censor of the Soviet edition. The story of the tremendously difficult conditions during the war, which included even cannibalism, received wide attention in W estern publications. Back in Moscow the Soviet authorities had not forgotten about the exiles. As part of a general campaign to discourage Russians abroad from defecting, the Soviet writer Anatoly Sofronov wrote the play The Ém igrés (Èmigranty) in 1967, in which a Soviet seaman is hospitalized in Australia for appendicitis. Sinister Vlasovites attem pt to bribe and intim idate him into defecting but, thanks in part to the efforts of other Russian émigrés who long to return home, their diabolic efforts are thwarted. Even without Stalin's open physical terror, the heavy-handed adm inistrative rule of his heirs seemed to strip away all hope that the regime could be overthrown, or at least reformed. For the émigrés there was no going home. Russian borders were effectively sealed off, and the Soviet state presented such a massive military threat that W estern countries were fearful of being overwhelmed by a Soviet Blitzkrieg. Boris Zaitsev summed up the general pessimistic mood of the dwindling émigré community: The W ar threw a ll the cards in the air. And then time carried o ff m any o f the laborers o f our craft. There was a handful o f people, and after the war there rem ained ha lf a handful. Now only a quarter is left, and soon we will a ll be ju s t a memory. But a ll this is meaningless. " Once upon a tim e” is the common lot. Each carries out the task allotted to him by fate. Each o f us did what he could, and m ost are now forever a t peace. Those who remain can only sigh, waiting for their hour to strike and clutching— to the very end o f their lives — the reins entrusted to them.
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The Third Wave Leaving Russian Jews or Jewish Russians? A Crisis of Identity With lime in the blood for an alien tribe, To gather the grasses o f the n ig h t... Osip Mandel'shtam The history of the Russian emigration is inseparable from that of Russia's Jews. Jews comprised the majority in the economic and religious emigration of late tsarist times and also were a significant contingent within the camp of the political émigrés of the era. They were very active both in the workings of the early Soviet state, and in First-W ave politics. As writers and publishers they played à m ajor role in literature of the period. Although the Second Wave numbered very few Jews, who obviously were not about to flee westward to Germany, the Third W ave was, of course, largely Jewish. And as age took its toll on the older community, the Russian émigré community became increasingly a community of Russian Jews. In May 1947 Gromyko made a statem ent (not published in the Soviet media) supporting the right of the Jews in Palestine to a homeland and neglecting to mention Stalin's Jewish Autonomous Republic, created in 1934 in Siberia along the Chinese border, although a small number of Jews actually did move there in 1946-48. In late November, 1947, the United Nations, with the support of the Soviet Union, issued a resolution calling for the creation of a separate Jewish state, but by October 1948 the Soviet press was attacking Zionism, and Jews who displayed an interest in moving to Israel were being arrested. Alm ost all contact between Soviet Jews and Jews in other countries was cut off. In January 1953 the so-called "doctors’ plot” was "uncovered,” in which Jewish physicians were alleged to have conspired to murder Soviet leaders. It appeared that Stalin was planning to launch a new major purge, this tim e specifically targeting the Jews. Prominent Soviet Jews (ll'ya Èrenburg, for one) were pressured to sign statements condemning the doctors, and Jews were attacked in the press as "rootless cosm opolites.” Only Stalin's death forestalled what appears to have been very ominous events in the making. Thus, the period from October 1948 until mid-1953 is regarded as "the black years” for Soviet Jewry. For fear of retaliation against Soviet Jews, Jewish leaders were at first reluctant to make any public accusations, but in May 1950 BenGurion demanded freedom of emigration. Once the "doctors’ plot” was
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announced, the Israelis decided to push for exodus from the Soviet Union, rather than for reforms, and a small committee was formed under Shaul Avigur to clandestinely orchestrate international outrage and exert massive foreign pressure on Soviet authorities. The emigration movement imitated the American civil rights movement, and the slogan "Let my people go” was adopted. In the immediate post-Stalin period Soviet leaders were dismayed to see that millions of Soviet citizens, most of whom had been totally assimilated into Russian culture, were clamoring to flee the country. A powerful factor in the mindset of the would-be expatriates had been the experience of prisoners in the forced-labor camps, where alm ost all the Jews became Zionists. In July 1953 Moscow resumed relations with Israel, and the Israelis cautiously accepted the proffered olive branch, tem porarily setting aside their demands for freedom of em igration. In late 1956 and early 1957, however, a permanent Israeli office was established to choreograph foreign pressure for the right to em igrate. By the early 1960s international conferences were being held in such m ajor world capitals as New York, London, and Rio de Janiero, and Soviet "refuseniks” were being compared to the victim s of Auschwitz. International leftist and communist organizations refused to support the locked-border policy of their form er ally. The Soviet reaction was one of deliberate delays and obfuscation; during all of 1958 and 1959 only 19 persons were perm itted to emigrate to Israel, and the government evidently considered cranking up the traditional anti-Sem itic campaign. Nevertheless, Soviet resistance began to weaken, and in December 1966 Soviet Premier Aleksei Kosygin declared he would not prevent "fam ily reunification.” The six-day war in June 1967 instilled a new confidence and pride in Soviet Jewry, and a petition of one million signatures was gathered abroad in support of their right to emigrate. The year 1970 witnessed the attempted highjacking of a plane from Leningrad, and then came the Jackson-Vanik trade bill. But the total em igration from 1948 to 1967 remained minute. Soviet Jews received limited permission to emigrate in 1970, along with ethnic Germans and Armenians.® Jewish emigration figures reached a peak of 213,042 in 1990, of whom 181,759 went to Israel.
•This w as not the first ethnic "leakage” in the Soviet dike during the post-war period. In 1950-51 roughly 3,000 Germ ans w ere transferred from East Prussia and M em el; from 1956 to 1959 some quarter million Poles w ere permitted to leave for Poland (14,000 are estimated to have been Jewish); in 1956-60 there w ere 5,500 Spanish repatriates (persons who had fled to the Soviet Union after the Spanish civil w ar); in the late 1950s, 5,500 ethnic Greeks moved to Greece; and 3,500 Koreans repatriated to Korea between 1963 and 1979.
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These figures included a number of non-Jews, since roughly half the Soviet Jews were married to non-Jews, and Soviet authorities actively encouraged non-Jews who wanted to emigrate to request permission to go to Israel as Jews. According to the 1979 Soviet census, 94.5 percent of Russian Jews spoke Russian either as their native language or as a second language. As they themselves testify, the result was cultural assim ilation:
Garry Tabachnik, journalist: The fact is that m ost o f us who em igrated felt ourselves to be Jewish only when we were rem inded o f it. Having lived all m y life in Moscow, I can testify that for the m ajority o f Jews who lived there fo r m any years, their only and m ost firm link to Jew ry was the anti-Sem itism that rem inded them o f their origins. 4
Èfraim Sevela, writer: Physically, I have Jewish roots, but spiritually, culturally, I am a Russian. I cannot tell you now that I am a Jew, because m ost o f m y best qualities, the qualities o f which I'm really proud, are Russian. I have two faces, a Russian and a Jewish, and this will be true a ll m y life.
Efim Ètkind, literary scholar: To divide people into Jews and non-Jews is absurd.... The author o f these lines is a Jew "by blood, ” but he is not separated from the Russia o f Pushkin and Tolstoi, Blok and M andel'shtam by his language, culture, o r his way o f thinking. We who have been brought up on the advanced ideas o f our age will not allow ourselves to be degraded to the zoological consciousness which — alas! — has stained m any o f our contem poraries ... Naturally, such views do not enjoy universal acceptance, and the question of Russian-Jewish identity has always been a subject of vigorous debate within the émigré community. When Semên Yushkevich died in 1924, Pavel Milyukov spoke at his funeral, declaring him to be a truly Russian writer, but the Jewish author Sholom Ash also delivered a speech, pronouncing him to be a Jewish w riter by virtue of his Jewish soul and heart. Despite the friendly tone of this kindly rivalry, the confusion of identity can be painful, as can be seen from a statem ent the Third-W ave w riter ll'ya Suslov made to me during an interview: O f course, I know very little about Jewish language, culture o r religion. I know about it to the extent that I have an interest in it, and I do have a great deal o f interest [siel]. I was assigned
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m y Judaism by the Soviets when they stam ped ■Jew ” on line 5 o f m y passport. That decision is made on the basis o f blood, and not religion. Its a ll blood.... If you read m y books, you'll see that the humor, the intonation, the accent, if you will, is Jewish. I have that accent, inside me, o f course. I feel it. This split identity can lead to outright hostility toward everything Russian. The following quote is from an early-1970s émigré whom I interviewed in 1996. M y fam ily's Jewish roots are really quite distinguished: when Zhabotinsky emigrated, m y aunt m oved into his apartment, and the Jewish Encyclopedia devotes an entire page to m y grandfather. A fte r emigrating, I spoke no Russian whatsoever fo r two decades, so that the Russian language was nothing m ore than an episode in our fam ily history. Now I use the language o f the enem y only as part o f m y jo b as a translator, and if I had any children, they would not know Russian. How can I regard m yself as a Russian when I rem em ber being taunted as a Tid and being beaten by Russian children! When I grew older, I knew I would have to overcome fa r greater obstacles in enrolling in a university and getting a jo b than would a Russian. In Russia I felt m yself to be pa rt o f an outcast underclass. If I had not m anaged to evade the draft, I would have had to be afraid that m y fellow soldiers would m urder me. I was im prisoned in a m ental institution for wanting to m eet Nixon during his visit, and I le ft— in fear and loathing — under threat o f being arrested again. I definitely am not a Russian, and I dislike Russian culture. Their so-called "spirituality” is ju s t hypocritical concealm ent o f their inability to com pete with people who are more talented than they. A nd I'm not the only one who thinks that way: I have friends who agree with me totally. I am here in Russia for the first time in a quarter century — for strictly business reasons — and I'm not one b it m oved by the experience. On the contrary, there is still the same fear and the same resentment. The Soviet governm ent published numerous anti-Zionist and anti-Israeli books (at least 22 between 1967 and 1969), but these publications were perceived by many Russian Jews (and Russian antiSemites) as sim ply anti-Jewish. As late as 1982 the Soviets published a book entitled The Class Essence o f Zionism (Klassovaya sut’ sionizma), written by Lev Korneev. Evidently not intended for sale to the general public, it was distributed to "scientific workers, lecturers, teachers, students, propagandists, and all who are interested in questions of ideological struggle.” Thus, it represented the Russian governm ent's views at the time.
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To say that Korneev's complaints about the Jews are extensive is an understatement. He writes that in ancient tim es wealthy Jewry "was transform ed into a cosmopolitan group of traders and usurers"; that the prim ary cause of anti-Semitism is "the exploitation by the Jewish bourgeoisie of the native population of the region of residence”; that the Jewish bourgeoisie and the Zionist leadership share responsibility for the Holocaust; that Zionism encourages a "gangster-like Russophobia” in Israel; that the Jews in all countries display a "primary loyalty” to Israel which transform s Jews into a "fifth colum n”; and that even the Old Testament is filled with instances of "cruelty and treachery on the part of Jews.” When a small percentage of the emigrants wanted to return to the Soviet Union, Korneev responded: O ur society is humane and magnanimous. B ut it does not forgive treason. A ll those who decided to go to Israel and fo r that reason lost Soviet citizenship were warned in a serious and tim ely fashion that they could find themselves in a difficult situation and thus be deprived o f norm al living conditions. And, o f course, it is im possible to feel anything but indignation a t attem pts to blame our country for refusing to restore citizenship ... to those who do not treasure their motherland. Finally, Korneev argued that Soviet anti-Semitism was a myth and that the small minority of working Jews had always supported the Soviet government. Korneev's book received strong praise from Sovetskaya kultura (Soviet Culture), Izvestiya (News), and Sovetskaya prom yshlennost' (Soviet Industry). In 1978 he published a sim ilar pam phlet entitled The Sword o f David (Mech Davida), changing his name to Leo Korn to give it a Jewish sound. It was distributed in English by the Novosti Press Agency. Inevitably, relations between ethnic Russians and Russian Jews remained a problem in the émigré community. A. Grishin in the Munich nationalist journal Veche (Town Meeting) complained in 1985 that the foreign Russian-language press basically reflected a Jewish point of view, that Jews had played a prom inent role in the overthrow of the tsarist government, that lim itations on Jewish enrollm ent in tsarist institutions of higher learning and on land-holding by Jews had been essential, and that the tsarist Pale of Settlem ent had been merely "a peculiar trade barrier separating eastern Russia from an excessively vigorous onslaught of 'capital relations,' of which she still had little inkling.” At the same tim e Grishin took pains to note that Jews had also taken part in the resistance to Bol'shevik rule and that Russian Jews had made enormous contributions to Russian literature.
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Naturally, such broadsides did not go unanswered. In a series of two articles published in 1986 in the Los Angeles newspaper Panorama, the émigré radio journalist Vadim Belotserkovsky expressed dism ay at what he saw as the growth of anti-Jewish feeling — not just in Soviet governm ent circles, but also among intellectuals. Belotserkovsky quoted statistics demonstrating that the Jewish role in the October 1917 coup had been exaggerated. He then went on to attack Solzhenitsyn, who had criticized Sakharov for the latter's alleged willingness to sacrifice reform in order to achieve freedom of Jewish em igration. Zinaida Shakhovskaya, a First-Wave figure who once referred to the Third W ave as "the second Soviet emigration (with a Jewish m ajority),” in 1984 published an article in Vestnik russkogo khristianskogo dvizheniya (Herald of the Russian Christian Movement), stating that many Jews in the Third Wave are hostile to Russians p e r se and quoting a fantasy of the Israeli writer Amos Oz: The Russian earth groans and trembles. Churches crumble. Kiev, Kharkov, the Dnepr Region, and Rostov are a ll wiped from the face o f the earth. VengeanceI Vengeance! Kishinëv! See our form er oppressors — so tall and strong — raise their hands in surrender. A ll the church bells ring.... No one w ill escape without answering, not the Lithuanians, nor the Poles, nor the Ukrainians. A ll o f Russia is reduced to dust. In the languages o f m y ancestors I whisper "Amen, Am enI" Shakhovskaya went on to quote a poem attributed to David Markish, who left the U.S.S.R. in 1972 and settled in Israel: We ate their bread, but paid in blood. We've kept the bills, but not balanced the books. A t the bedside o f that northern land O ur vengeance w ill be flowers a t its bedstead. Markish's brother Shimon wrote a response to Shakhovskaya's article, which Vestnik russkogo khristianskogo dvizheniya refused to publish but which appeared in the Israeli Russian-language magazine 22. Shimon Markish pointed out that Oz was born in Israel and speaks no Russian, and that the passage quoted consists of the words of a character in the story, not the feelings of the author himself. According to the brother, the poem had been radically rewritten by persons unknown, possibly agents of the KGB, in an effort to stir up hostility to Jews. The original version supposedly reads: We ate their bread, but paid in blood. The evil m em ory won't le t us sleep.... On our forty-year journey we'll take with us The anguished cries o f orphans, widows' tears.
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One of the better known documents in this Russian-Jewish quarrel was Russophobia, published in the late 1980s and written by the well known mathematician and dissident Igor* Shafarevich (b. 1923), who together with Solzhenitysn had contributed to the collection From Under the Rubble (lz-pod glyb). In it Shafarevich attacked "cosm opolitan” intellectuals, whose ranks he saw as consisting largely of Jews consumed with resentment toward Russia. Shafarevich was deeply offended by the negative image of Russia presented by this "elitist group,” which, so he claimed, depicted Russians as having an intolerant mentality that provided fruitful ground for a communism as vicious as it was messianic. Shafarevich argued that the reverse was true: Marxism was alien to the Russian tradition as a form of cultural "occupation” imported from the W est by "THEM,” as opposed to "US” (both words capitalized in the original). The purpose of this purported war was to annihilate Russia's spiritual foundations. W hat Russia needed now was to recognize the harm that W estern thinking had brought and create a strong national governm ent which would provide a unique Russian alternative to democracy. For the Jews, Shafarevich claimed, Russia was merely their "original country of residence.” "Less rooted in life” while still residing in Russia, they became even more isolated abroad and developed an "ém igré attitude” toward life in Russia, viewing it as som ething unrelated to them, insidiously altering their works and even their language to convey this distorted picture. Consciously or subconsciously, in Shafarevich's view, Jewish émigrés became oriented toward other, non-Russian readers and critics. And, although they acquired a sense of freedom, it was the freedom of rootlessness, freedom from responsibility for the fate of their country and from fear of inflicting harm on it. Shafarevich claimed the Jews actually took delight in Russia's failures and were demoralized by her successes. Divorced from the nation's life, they had become more and more fixated upon "intruding” into it and had mutated into a uniquely efficacious kind of disease that created disruption and upheaval. Unlike the First and Second Waves, according to Shafarevich, Third-W ave émigrés left voluntarily, unable to withstand the pressure put on them, and thus betrayed their colleagues. In his opinion, such persons lacked personal values and were incapable of making a contribution to culture, but instead strove to capitalize on their newfound celebrity and transform emigration into career. Even more destructive, in Shafarevich's opinion, was the way in which this "narrow social stratum ” had betrayed the people by maintaining that the chief human right was the right to emigrate. By thus abandoning the people, the émigrés supposedly not only became isolated even among the
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intelligentsia, but by choosing to leave rather than remain behind and fight may well have delayed the advent of perestroika for 20 years. Shafarevich went on to claim that the émigré "pluraliste,” not all of whom were Jewish, had begun to slander Russia, claiming to perceive a toadying national character (Aleksandr Zinov'ev), hostility to Jews (Andrei Sinyavsky), fascism (Aleksandr Yanov), and a lack of historical perspective (Boris Shragin). Rather than fight, they chose the cowardly option of flight. And once having fled, they then proceeded to create a literature depicting a hopelessly flawed, slavish Russian personality. W riters such as H'f and Petrov, Joseph Brodsky, and Aleksandr Galich, said Shafarevich, were creating calumnious images of Russians in a form of hidden psychological warfare. W orst of all, disgusted with the incessant stream of official Soviet propaganda, young Russians were so pleased by the émigrés’ anti-Stalinism that they accepted unquestioningly the émigrés’ chief, albeit hidden message — mockery of Russia and Russian history. Shafarevich then went on to attack Sinyavsky's Strolls With Pushkin (Progulki s Pushkinym), which he presented as a Russian equivalent of Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses. Both books, in Shafarevich's view, were filthy, giggling insults levelled at entire civilizations. Shafarefich went on to condemn anti-Semitism, but the tone of his text grew increasingly strident and alarming as he expounded his arguments. He concluded by stating that he could not die peacefully without disclosing this "suppressed truth.” A t a lecture delivered on January 9, 1990, in the Kennan Institute for Advanced Russian Studies in W ashington, D.C., Andrei Sinyavsky responded bitterly. Behind the figure of Shafarevich, Sinyavsky argued, loomed the prestige of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. According to Sinyavsky, Solzhenitsyn had evolved considerably since em igrating — in a negative direction. Sinyavsky expressed dismay that "liberals” in Moscow were attem pting to conduct a dialogue with Shafarevich, who was "playing with matches in an airplane hangar filled with explosive fum es.” Sinyavsky went on to describe conversations he had held with people hostile to Jews while serving his sentence in a forced-labor camp. If necessary, they were prepared to destroy the Jews as though they were "rats.” Thus, the mutual accusations of Shafarevich and Sinyavsky had reached such a feverish pitch that any "dialogue” was out of the question. But the Shafarevich-Sinyavsky clash pales before some of the vituperative anti-Jewish publications in the émigré press, a fact which should not be surprising, since greater freedom of speech by its very definition means that this freedom can be misused. Russkii klich (The
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Russian Battle Cry), run by Nikolai Tetênov in New York State, was devoted to promoting hostility to Jews by republishing the Russian editions of such foreign works as Mein Kampf, speeches of Hitler and Goebbels, The Protocols o f Zion, Henry Ford's The International Jew, etc. Tetënov's 1984 announcement of titles included some 90 items. Tetênov also founded what he called a sam izdat journal entitled Russkoe samosoznanie (Russian Consciousness) in which, to give but one example, he republished a 1921 article calling for the annihilation of the Jews. For the emigrant, national origins determ ine identity to a considerable extent. People hear a foreign accent and ask: "W here are you from ?” When that question is asked of a Soviet em igrant in America, Europe, and even Israel the answer is usually "Russian.” But Jews whose native language is Russian and who have been brought up on the classical works of Russian literature experience an on-going identity crisis: there are always some fellow countrymen who are ready, even eager, to deny them membership in the national community. But Russian Jews know little about Jewish culture, and may not even be interested in learning more. I recall a conversation I had in 1980 with Aleksandr Donat, Director of Holocaust Library Publishers in New York City, for whom I was translating a collection of horrifying Holocaust tales from areas of the Soviet Union occupied by Nazi Germany during W orld W ar II. I pointed out the considerable extent to which Russia's Jews had been assimilated into Russian culture, and Donat agreed. "But their children will be Jews,” he claimed. Third W avers responded to their identity crisis by assim ilating more rapidly into foreign cultures than had previous emigrants, but as can be seen from the opening quotations in this section, there are many other Russian Jews who consider themselves Russians and tenaciously cling to that language and culture. As the reader will recall, the definition of "Russian” in this book is linguistic, not ethnic. Thus, even though there are many ethnic Russians and Russian Jews who would dispute this approach, in this book, Russian Jews are Russians. After all is said and done, anti-Semitism in Russia was and is a grass-roots movement. On the other hand, a majority of Jews married to non-Jews also testifies to quite a different aspect of the relationship: hundreds of years of living together have created love as well as resentment. The cultural scene reflects this situation. In 1990 members of the literary group A pril heard themselves challenged as falsely claiming to be Russian writers and were called upon to leave for Israel. Familiar as such attitudes may have been, nevertheless they came as a shock. These were people who lived for and in Russian
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literature, and if they were not Russian writers, then Mandel'shtam and Pasternak, too, were just "Jews writing in Russian.” I recall talking to a young woman in Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan, in the early 1990s. She was half-Korean and half-Tadjik, and was no more accepted as an Uzbek in Uzbekistan than she would have been as a Korean in Korea. She was raising a child alone in the very difficult conditions of the post-Soviet world, and was anxious about her own future and that of her child. Although this slender young m other had no Russian blood and had never even visited Russia, she had attended only Russian schools and spoke only Russian as her native language. She, too, is Russian by the standards of this book, and if she ever begins writing verse or prose, she will be an appropriate topic for that unknown researcher in the future who will w rite the history of Russian writers abroad in the post-Soviet period.
Background I'm ... not a Jew, after a ll you know I'm a Buddhist Aleksandr Ginger The Jewish exodus which commenced in the early 1970s does not testify to an unflagging historical desire of the Jews to leave Russia. Under the Tsars, Jewish intellectuals knew quite well the nature of exile and were eager to finally find a home by assimilating into Russian society. Thus, their hopes were for reform rather than revolution. As discussed earlier, massive emigration began in the 1880s, reaching a crescendo on the eve of World W ar I. When the war drew to a close, however, the prominent role played by Jews in the young Soviet state led to a rebirth of Jewish hope for a life in Russia. W hen W orld W ar II broke out, the memory of the purges was suppressed by Russian Jews who looked upon the Soviet state as virtually their sole defender against Nazism (people generally accepted Soviet propaganda belittling the role of the Western allies). And Stalin did, after all, energetically support the establishment of the state of Israel. But the "anti-cosm opolite” campaign, the "doctors’ plot,” and the rupture of diplom atic relations between Tel Aviv and Moscow in 1952 represented for many Russian Jews such a major breaking point that the post-W orld W ar II generation grew up associating Soviet rule with anti-Sem itism . And there were many for whom this association simply m eant Russia. It was this despair that recharged the movement for em igration, even though only a minority of Russian Jews were dedicated Zionists.
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Early in December 1951 the Israeli governm ent informed the Soviet M inistry of Foreign Affairs that Israel's cardinal aim was "the return of Jews to their historic homeland,” and on March 3, 1953, fearing that Stalin was preparing a new bloodbath, an alarmed U.S. House of Representatives urged the Soviet governm ent to perm it the Jews simply to leave. But Stalin died two days later (and only six weeks after the "discovery" of the "doctors’ plot”) w ithout having implemented his plans for the Jews, whatever they may have been. At that point Soviet foreign policy did an about-face, and by July the Soviet Union and Israel resumed diplom atic relations, initiating a tiny flow of emigration to Israel. Just two years later, in 1955, the Israeli Prime Minister, Moshe Sharett, advised Ben-Gurion that the tim e was ripe to press the issue, but 1956 was the year that Soviet tanks crushed the first stirrings of Hungarian independence, and in October of that year the Soviets halted emigration, although in 1957 persons born on Polish territory were perm itted to relocate to Poland. During the period 1954-64, only a modest number of Jews were perm itted to emigrate. Essentially, Khrushchêv equivocated on the question of Jewish emigration, denying that Soviet Jews had any interest in leaving, but in 1957 he did tell Eleanor Roosevelt during her visit to the U.S.S.R. that all Jews who wanted to em igrate would "eventually” receive permission. By the late 1950s the international Jewish community had begun to put pressure on the Soviet government, and the Israeli radio station Kol Zion Lagola increased broadcasts in Russian to the U.S.S.R. to a daily basis. B'nai B'rith was comparing the Soviet treatm ent of the Jews to that of the Nazis, and U.S. congressman Alvin M. Bentley claimed that Soviet Jews were being "liquidated.” When pressed by Israeli journalists in Vienna in 1960, Khrushchêv, however, claimed that more Jews wished to return to Russia than emigrate. On April 5 -6 ,1 9 6 4 ,5 0 0 representatives of 24 Jewish organizations met in W ashington D.C., to discuss strategy for forcing the Soviet Union to allow Jewish emigration. Six months later, on October 14, 1964, Khrushchêv was abruptly removed from all positions, and the new Soviet leadership proved eager to calm international tensions and was now far more willing to perm it emigration than Khrushchêv had been. In December 1966 Soviet Premier Aleksei Kosygin told an American journalist he could see no barriers to a certain amount of emigration, and the number of departures actually increased, stim ulated in part by a surge of Jewish pride after the Israeli victory in the six-day war of July 1967. The 1968 occupation of Czechoslovakia also served to encourage emigration as more and more intellectuals began to lose hope that the political "thaw” would continue and that crude political propaganda would be moderated.
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Now thoughts of exodus won out over hopes of reform. Even as the Soviet authorities resolved to adopt a less restrictive emigration policy for Soviet Jews, however, they also decided to pursue a more repressive policy toward dissidents. Zionists in Russia were aware of the tradeoff and stressed that they were more interested in departure than in reform, thus creating resentment in dissident circles. Meanwhile, the Soviet Union was experiencing difficulty controlling the international communist movement with its powerful Jewish constituency. In 1966 a number of national communist parties — including the American Communist Party — protested the Soviet refusal to perm it Jewish emigration, and the following year one million signatures were gathered urging the Soviet Union to reverse its position. Finally, in the fall of 1969, the Israeli government launched a widely publicized campaign calling for the free emigration of Jews to Israel, and the number of requests for exit visas quadrupled. By 1970, more than 30,000 Soviet Jews had received affidavits inviting them to Israel, but only a tiny fraction of those were actually permitted to em igrate. That same year a small group of Jews attempted, unsuccessfully, to hijack a plane in Leningrad. In 1971, 24 men and women, including the w riter Èfraim Sevela, occupied the offices of the Suprem e Soviet to protest the plight of the so-called refuseniks, and by early spring the Soviet authorities decided to perm it large-scale em igration, but introduced an education exit tax to discourage em igration. In what may well have been a quid pro quo, the United States denied the Institute for the Study of the U.S.S.R. in Munich further American funding in 1972, forcing it to close, together with its 80,000-volum e library (no German support was ever provided), and the NTS radio station was shut down by W est German authorities. Evidently appeased by these gestures, the Soviets permitted Jewish em igration rates to escalate in 1972. Some of those departing were gentiles whom the Soviet authorities had encouraged to apply for exit visas as Jews. The chief legal vehicle for Soviet Jews wishing to enter the United States was the award of political refugee status, granted to them in October 1972. In 1974 the U.S. Congress approved the Jackson-Vanik amendment, making Soviet receipt of "most-favored nation” trade status dependent on Jewish emigration. Synagogues everywhere put up signs reading "Free Soviet Jewry.” There were ethical problem s with the legislation, since freedom of movement did not apply to other ethnic groups in the Soviet Union, with the exception of the Germans and the Armenians. When questioned as to how a group could expect support for freedom of emigration from other groups which were being denied that same right, one Chicago rabbi responded that such objections amounted to "absurd universalism.”
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And despite its rhetoric to the contrary, the U.S. governm ent would have actually been horrified at totally open borders in a number o f countries. China alone could have let tens of millions of real political refugees go, and even little Cuba caused enormous problems for the United States with its Mariel boatlift. But the Soviets dug in their heels, and emigration to Israel dropped to the 7,000-8,000 range. Nevertheless, the U.S. State Department wanted to play down the issue for fear that Moscow would retaliate by inciting racial discontent among American blacks. Alarmed by the state of American-Soviet relations, U.S. President Gerald Ford refused in 1975 to receive Solzhenitsyn in the W hite House. In September 1976, 44 Russian Jews wearing the yellow Star of David marched through downtown Moscow to the offices of the Central Committee of the Communist Party, demanding the right to emigrate. Soviet authorities gave in and in 1979 emigration to Israel increased sharply, but then declined again after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The Americans boycotted the Moscow Olympic games and refused to perm it the export of technological equipm ent (particularly oil-drilling equipment), and Andropov, who had succeeded Brezhnev, resolved to punish the United States by radically restricting Jewish emigration. If the 1970s were a period of relatively free emigration, the early 1980s represented a U.S.-Soviet standoff: Ronald Reagan christened the Soviet Union the "Evil Empire” and insisted on the Strategic Defense Initiative. During the early 1980s only a handful of Soviet Jews were permitted to depart. When Andropov died in 1984, he was replaced by Chernenko, who continued the Soviet hard line, if only through inertia. By 1985 the confrontation had acquired a special intensity. That year the Soviet magazine Novoe vremya (New Times) accused the émigré Vladim ir Bukovsky, the CIA, and Rabbi Meier Kahane of having murdered the American television journalist, Jessica Savich, for participating in the PBS film The Russians Are Here. The magazine also accused Israel of murdering émigrés from the U.S.S.R. who wished to return home. As late as fall of that year the poet, novelist, and soon-to-be émigré David Shraer-Petrov received a summons from the Moscow prosecutor's office and went underground in such anxiety that he suffered a heart attack. But 1985 was also the year that Chernenko died and Gorbachêv took over the helm of state with his subsequent policies of glasnost' and perestroika. That same year he and Reagan held their first summit, in Malta, and international tensions abruptly relaxed. On January 1, 1987, a new law was adopted, form ally establishing the legal grounds on which a Soviet citizen might em igrate or be refused that right. Under normal circumstances an invitation from
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abroad (yyzov) was to be judged sufficient. Gorbachëv's new doctrine of perestroika led many in the W est and the Soviet Union to hope for an even broader relaxation of emigration restrictions, and in late March 1987 Morris Abram, Chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, and Edgar Bronfman, Chairman of the W orld Jewish Congress, travelled to Moscow to lobby for "reunification of fam ilies.” The Soviets were accommodating, albeit not immediately, and U.S. President George Bush not only approved suspension of the Jackson-Vanik amendment, but even issued a billion-dollar credit for the purchase of wheat. But the situation was fraught with paradox. The same governm ent that had stirred up hatred against the Jews could not, at the same time, bear to part with them. Equally ironic was the large number of Jews in a governm ent which was bent on preventing Jewish em igration. As late as 1976, 294,744 Jews were members of the Com m unist Party — 13.7 percent of the entire declared Jewish population (and, of course, a considerably larger percentage of the adult Jewish population) at the time. In point of fact, however, Jews obviously represented a much larger contingent in Party ranks. If in 1959 1.1 percent of the Soviet population was supposedly Jewish, the figures decreased to 0.9 percent in 1970, 0.7 percent in 1979, and 0.5 percent in 1989. By itself, emigration was not nearly a large enough factor to account for this loss of half the population of Soviet Jewry over this 20-year period. Clearly, many Soviet Jews were declaring that they belonged to other nationalities; moreover, the practice of concealing one's Jewish identity obviously did not begin only in 1959. Members of the Communist Party obviously were especially highly m otivated to conceal their background in the clim ate of the time. One of the chief causes given by Jewish émigrés for leaving was their concern that their children would not have sufficient educational opportunities in the Soviet Union. This may well have been true; however, four tim es as many Jews had completed a post secondary education than the population as a whole. The official though covert response was the introduction of a numerus clausus by university admissions committees. If Jews comprised 2.6 percent of the student population in 1967-68, by 1976-77 the figure had fallen to 1.4 percent. Even at that, however, this ratio was still double what one would expect solely on the basis of the number of Jews among the total population. Jews were also fearful of discrimination on the job market, even though they enjoyed relatively high professional status. One governm ent lecturer claimed that 30 percent of all professionals were Jews, as were more than 50 percent of members of the Moscow and Leningrad chapters of the W riters’ Union. How much truth was actually
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contained in such claims is impossible to judge, but any pro-Russian affirm ative action program would have radically undermined the professional situation of the country's Jews. O f course, it was more than simply being Jewish that m otivated people to emigrate. People wanted greater freedom and higher incomes. And they wanted to be reunited with their fam ilies — grounds that conceivably would have been equally im portant to ethnic Russians — but Russians abroad were neither sufficiently influential nor sufficiently active in helping their relatives and countrymen.
Self-Image They don’t leave Russia, for it’s im possible to g e t aw ay from her. They flee the state whose enormous carcass covers the sky; they flee from pow er which recognizes nothing as sacred; they flee from apartm ent managers, district committees, regional committees, and radio broadcasts, from informers, from queues and forced-labor camps, from sham eless lies and cold cruelty, from inhuman crudeness and trium phant surliness — they flee to save their m ortal bodies and im m ortal souls from the m onster; they flee, cursing and sobbing. A. Nezhny, journalist The Third Wave went through a legal procedure of form ally applying for permission to emigrate, and even though departure was incomparably easier for them than it had been for earlier groups, people were traumatized by the intentional arbitrariness and uncertainties of a process that followed hard on the heels of a life experience that so em bittered people as to drive them to abandon their homes, their friends and families, their possessions and pensions. This harassment affected anyone who wished to emigrate, not ju st the Jews. The history of Ivan Kopysov, a journalist whose letters to Solzhenitsyn had been intercepted by the KGB in 1968, illustrates the situation. In 1972 Kopysov had been dismissed from his job and arrested. The authorities confiscated a novel and some essays he had written, his home was repeatedly searched, and he eventually moved to a different city. Once more his mail was intercepted, and he was placed under close surveillance by the KGB, his co-workers, and neighbors. In 1973 he was fired a second time. In 1974 he was fired from a third job in a third city. When he then obtained a tem porary position on the staff of Literaturnaya gazeta (Literary Gazette), he was
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again detained and interrogated during a trip to the Urals. In the offices of a local newspaper his nose was broken by a form er colleague who had been coached by the KGB, and the windows in his apartment were broken in the middle of the night. When Kopysov went to the Suprem e Soviet to complain, he was placed in a mental institution, where the psychiatrists did not bother to conceal the fact that they were acting under direct instructions from the KGB. Declared mentally ill, he was not perm itted to work even as a night watchman. In 1978 Kopysov wrote an open letter to the Supreme Soviet, demanding he either be allowed to emigrate or jailed: I harbor no illusions that justice w ill triumph. In our conditions only vengeance can ensue, ju s t as the regime which you control has done aw ay with m illions o f people. I w ill not be surprised even by the death penalty, no m atter how monstrous that m ight appear. A nd I will not petition for mercy, for I prefer death to miserable half-life in this terrible socialism o f the kingdom o f the dead, where people are no longer shot, but neither are they perm itted to live, so that they slowly choke to death. If even the m ost ephemeral grounds are lacking for a trial, I ask that I be perm itted to emigrate. I am willing to go to any country in which neither socialism nor communism is being built.... I flee from captivity, from the vicious prison guards who have made fear and violence the banner o f their red ideology. I never considered m yself a citizen o f this tem porary occupational regime, which is foundering in the blood o f m illions o f innocent persons. I was its prisoner and I never swore allegiance to it, so that I now consider m yself free from a ll its shackles and artificialities. The composition of such a letter required not only considerable courage, but a state of total despair in its writer. At the same tim e it was a request — for permission to emigrate. The resulting self-im age the émigrés took with them was a contradictory one: were they engaging in craven flight or were they boldly defying the authorities? The w riter Zinovy Zinik described emigration as "personal revolution” and "a massive attem pt at non-acceptance of the regime”— a view which was even more vehem ently expounded by Aleksandr Zinov’ev, who in an open letter to the émigré community wrote of the "noble cause” of rebellion. The Zinik/Zinov'ev view stood in crass opposition to that of another émigré, Yury Miloslavsky, then residing in Israel, who described the exiles as wretched, vain creatures: A nd that's the m ildest thing that could be said o f us, unless we m ention the inevitable kicks in the ass — usually delivered with weary scorn: "G et out o f here" o r (sometimes
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with the vexed nervousness o f a man trying to rid him self o f a hated wife who doesn't want him to go to a bachelor's party): "Fuck off, you goddam ned bitch!" Less frequent is the resounding, well-aim ed kick: "G et lost, you scum, o r you'll g e t what's com ing to you...." Having flitted o ff to a respectable distance, we snap back: "Just wait, you'll wish you hadn't been so short-sighted, but b y then it'll be too late; I'll be back — in spirit, if no t in the flesh." It's clear, however, that no one w ill regret your loss, nor will there be anything, o r anybody, to come back to, fo r the gap le ft by your departure soon begins to be filled with healing balm from within. To blame the cruelty o f the adm inistration o r threaten to reveal the whole truth and thereby show up the state in its true colors is ridiculous. Even if anyone other than the narrator (him self a great champion o f truth) shows interest in the exile's pitifu l inside information, his intrinsic untrustwor thiness and refusal to acknowledge defeat (and exile is ju s t that — defeat, not victory!) w ill soon alienate even the sym pathetic listener— assuming, naturally, that polling exiles is not p a rt o f his job. In their heart of hearts most Third-W ave émigrés probably agreed with Miloslavsky, for they could not help suffering from a group inferiority complex. Unlike the First Wave, these were people who had been born in governm ent hospitals, parented by governm ent employees, fed government-supplied food, educated in governm ent schools, healed by governm ent doctors, and entertained by governm ent media. And when they became adults, they them selves were employed by that same governm ent and expected to be buried in governm ent cemeteries. Even the angriest dissidents were convinced of their helplessness in the face of the leviathan state. When in the 1970s and early 1980s I pointed out that no empire lasted forever, my émigré friends were astonished at my "naïveté.” The Soviet state, they all assured me, was an indestructible behemoth. Proceeding from such a mindset, Russian authors often projected an image of themselves reminiscent of Dostoevsky's underground man. In the Soviet Union, Bulat Okudzhava proclaimed him self to be a "Moscow ant.” Cast out of his father's home (a phrase used in a song by Aleksandr Galich), the exile found him self dismissed as an "otrezannyi lom ot',” that is, a fragm ent cut off from the whole to which it belongs. Andrei Sinyavsky adopted the intentionally anti-heroic petty-thief alter-ego of Abram Terts, Vladim ir Voinovich became fam ous for his Schweik-like Chonkin, "Èdichka” Limonov crawled through the debris of New York, engaging in degrading sexual acts, Boris Khazanov and Sergei Dovlatov struck the pose of the perceptive
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fly on the wall, and Viktor Nekrasov — the very image of a Russian officer — seemed lost in the helpless poverty of émigré life. The Zinik/Zinov'ev view of literature as rebellion was simply wrong; it was, as Yury Miloslavsky put it, a rout — sheer and simple. And all exile studies are, in a way, exercises in victimology. The identity crisis of people who were only partially Jewish was particularly cruel. As one Soviet émigré whose mother was Russian but father Jewish put it, "W hat do you do when all the anti-Semites regard you as a Jew, but for the Jewish community you're Russian?” Thus, it was not surprising that in a 1989 longitudinal study, of the estimated one-half of urban Jews who were married to non-Jews, only five percent wanted their children to claim Jewish nationality in their passports.
The Soviet Position on Emigration Then w ilt thou not be loath to leave this paradise ... John Milton So effectively had the borders of the U.S.S.R. been sealed that only a few Soviet citizens on official business in the W est managed to leave Russia behind by defecting. One exception was the artist and poet Oleg Sokhanevich, who, together with a friend, leapt from a passenger ship travelling along the Soviet coast of the Black Sea in 1967, inflated a rubber life raft in the water, and then rowed to Turkey. The incredibly dangerous undertaking succeeded a week later when the two men, weak and exhausted, reached the Turkish coast, having been forced to drink sea water along the way. The poet and singer Aleksei Khvostenko later composed a song which in a sem i-ironic key captured the heroism of the feat. Pressured by the West, Soviet authorities were forced to work out an official position on emigration. One 1985 publication denied that there was any reason for people to want to emigrate. Supposedly, Soviet society lacked any social basis for emigration, intergroup hostility was a thing of the past, unemployment was nonexistent, and religious freedoms were guaranteed. Thus, the only conceivable reason people m ight want to leave was to unite their families. This last caveat was actually a concession relative to earlier Soviet positions. At the sam e time, the fam ily-reunification logic, which was recognized by Soviet Premier Aleksei Kosygin as early as 1966, contained the core of an earlier, om inous doctrine. On August 19, 1938, the Soviet governm ent had introduced a statute on citizenship decreeing that Soviet citizenship could be lost only as the result of an act of state, and not by an individual's decision, that the children of Soviet citizens
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were also considered to be Soviet citizens, and that any disloyalty by such persons abroad would be regarded as treason to the Soviet state. The 1985 legislation seemed to hark back to the 1938 law, and evidently indicated a compromise between hardliners and reform ers within the Soviet government. The new statute read: O ur specialists on problem s o f em igration are not ye t unanimous even with regard to the term which is m ost precise and universal with regard to such a person — an "em igrant, " a "person with origins in tsarist Russia o r the U.S.S.R.,” o r a "com patriot abroad." We can only note here that, according to established practice in the developm ent o f cultural relations with these m illions o f people residing in foreign lands, the term "com patriot abroad" encompasses both their children and grandchildren ... The grounds for perm itting or denying an individual the right to em igrate were established by law on January 1,1987. Previously, the governm ent's basic tactic for discouraging emigration had amounted to erecting arbitrary barriers after receipt of an exit visa application. Many would-be emigrants lost their jobs and gave up their apartments, but even then had no way of knowing when they would be perm itted to leave or even if they would ever get permission. The new legislation listed causes entitling a Soviet citizen to visit a foreign country: aside from reunification of families, Soviet citizens could apply to go abroad to meet close relatives, to get married, to see seriously ill relatives, to visit fam ily graves of near relatives, or to receive an inheritance. Other, unspecified "serious reasons” supposedly could also be taken into account. As earlier, permission to emigrate could be denied to people who had enjoyed access to classified governmental inform ation (and the definition of classified information was interpreted in the broadest fashion), and to anyone who had a legal obligation to another individual or state institution, had been accused of a crime, or had previously been involved in currency speculation. Lastly, there was a particularly vague form ulation to the effect than an exit visa could be denied on the grounds that emigration was injurious to national interests. Nevertheless, though even these criteria could be grossly violated, the publication of any justified cause at all was a landm ark within the Soviet context. When the U.S.S.R. finally began to perm it emigration, a form al justification had to be provided for granting permission only to Jews, Germans, and Armenians, while denying that privilege to the many other ethnic groups that made up the Soviet empire. The solution was a bald-faced proclamation that only those ethnic groups could em igrate who possessed an independent state entity in the capitalist world.
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Deprivation of Citizenship For if it be but h a lf denied, 1 is ha lf as good as justified. Samuel Butler (1612-1680) Given the anxiety caused by emigration and the uncertain financial and cultural surroundings in which the émigrés found themselves, many of them did not wish to reject totally the possibility of a reconciliation with the Soviet government. Such feelings were naturally strongest just after a person emigrated — precisely the time when he or she was of greatest interest to the Western press. Joseph Brodsky, for example, was very circumspect in his comments to the press when he first left the Soviet Union, claiming that he did not wish to "sm ear the gates of his homeland with tar,” and even the fearless Solzhenitsyn at first maintained he was above politics. Eventually, however, even the more tim id émigrés realized that such reticence would not bring them permission to later visit the U.S.S.R., and they all ended up vehem ently denouncing their form er rulers. Thus, Soviet intransigence left the authorities with very few means of influencing the ém igrés’ conduct. The form er citizens could be verbally attacked in the Soviet press (an approach which was not only ineffective but even counterproductive) or physically assaulted — as in the 1978 arson in the offices of Novoe russkoe slovo, or the bombing of the Munich offices of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty in 1981. The critic Arkady Belinkov maintained that the KGB had actually attempted to kill him in a purported autom obile accident, and there were rumors that that organization had been involved in the deaths of Andrei Am al'rik and Aleksandr Galich. When it became evident, however, that even the suspicion of such tactics served only to compromise the reputation of the U.S.S.R. abroad, a new tactic was applied — Soviet émigrés were stripped of citizenship. It was a repeat of a measure previously applied in 1932 to 37 troublesom e émigrés, one of whom was Lev Trotsky. The first victim of this revived tactic was the writer Valery Tarsis, who was deported and stripped of Soviet citizenship in 1966; others soon followed: 1969: Stalin's daughter, Svetlana Allilueva; 1972: physicist and dissident Valery Chalidze; 1973: biologist and social commentator Zhores Medvedev; 1974: Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn; 1975: novelist Vladim ir Maksimov; 1976: Solzhenitsyn's wife, Natal'ya, and dissident Viktor Sokolov; 1977: poet Tomas Venclova;
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1978:
novelist Aleksandr Zinov'ev; chess champion Viktor Korchnoi; General Pêtr Grigorenko; musician and orchestra director Mstislav Rostropovich and his wife, the singer Galina Vishnevskaya; artist Oskar Rabin; 1979: w riter and dissident Èduard Kuznetsov (who attem pted to hijack a Soviet plane to get out of the U.S.S.R. in 1970); novelist Viktor Nekrasov; the dissidents Aleksandr Ginzburg Valentin Moroz, Mark Dymshits, and the Baptist church leader Georgy Vins (all five had been sim ultaneously exchanged to the W est for two imprisoned Soviets); 1980: novelist Vasily Aksênov; dissident and plane hijacker Vasily Sosnovsky; form er Latvian political prisoner Gunars Rode; dissidents Yury Yarym-Agaev, Tat'yana Goricheva, Natal'ya Malakhovskaya, Ada Plyushch, Evgeniya Lebedeva, and Tat'yana Manova; 1981 : literary scholar Lev Kopelev and his wife, critic, memoirist, and translator Raisa Orlova; dissidents Viktor Kovalenko and Serafim a Strubbe; 1983: critic Mikhail Geller; novelist Georgy Vladimov; and 1984: theater director Yury Lyubimov. Some of the émigrés, including Vasily Aksênov, Lev Kopelev, and Raisa Orlova, had been specifically promised that they would not be stripped of Soviet citizenship, and all three attem pted to restrain their comments upon arrival; nevertheless, Soviet officials lost no tim e in declaring that these "renegades” were no longer members of the Soviet family. After Brezhnev's death, this policy was pursued som ewhat less rigorously. In 1983, just before actually losing citizenship, the novelist Georgy Vladim ov commented that, had he received his exit visa under Brezhnev, he would have been 100-percent certain that in the next two or three months he would be stripped of Soviet citizenship. Now, however, he was only 80-percent sure. It was not only people who were already living abroad who were denied citizenship. Soviet citizens applying to em igrate to Israel were required to renounce Soviet citizenship. In the 1970s a fee of 500 rubles was established for this procedure, plus 300 rubles for a passport to travel to a capitalist country. At the time, this was roughly the equivalent of five months’ salary.
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Émigré Politics Malaise Exile ... a narcissistic wound. William H. Qass After W orld W ar II had ended and it became apparent that the rich cultural environm ent of the First Wave would not be repeated by the Second Wave, many (the literary historian, Gleb Struve, for example) felt that Russian literature in exile had come to an end. By the late 1960s the number of subscribers to Novoe russkoe slovo, the ém igré com m unity's chief newspaper, had fallen drastically. But the malaise among the émigrés was more than matched by that being experienced by Soviet writers. Any hopes for reform were extinguished during the Brezhnev era, when the Soviet government entered what later came to be referred to as a period of economic and cultural "stagnation.” By that time, many Soviet writers had come to the conclusion that the sole function of the Soviet W riters' Union was the suppression of literature. One group of émigré writers even christened it "The Soviet Reptiles’ Union.” Literature in Russia was pronounced dead by many thinking persons who believed that only those who had not been compromised by collaboration with the Soviet regime offered hope for the future. Not all those who wished to em igrate were successful; an undetermined number of others applied for permission, but were turned down (Nadezhda Mandel'shtam, for example, in 1972), and still others at least seriously considered that option. W riters were prominent among the émigrés of the Brezhnev years. According to one study, prose writers and poets emigrated at about twice the rate of performing and graphic artists, forcing the Soviet authorities to adopt an especially hard-line stance in dealing with them . The average forced-labor camp sentence meted out to poets, for example, was estimated at 160 percent that for stage perform ers. When the Third W ave began to arrive in the West, its predom inant mood was one of considerable optimism. An impressive number of writers had already enjoyed prominence in the U.S.S.R. w hile others were trying their hand at writing for the first tim e. Both groups felt that whole new worlds of artistic opportunity were opening up to them. Like the "younger” generation of the First Wave, writers who had "found them selves” only after leaving Russia identified them selves specifically as émigré writers, thus setting themselves apart from those whom the First Wave would have referred to as the "older" generation. The prose writer Zinovy Zinik, for example, declared
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him self to be a w riter of the "third Russian revolution. Before revolution-emigration I was nobody.” As was true of earlier groups, Third-W ave émigré authors were part of a much larger stream, including ballet dancers, composers, and musicians, not to mention very ordinary people who were just trying to get on with their lives. Established émigré publications were revitalized by an upsurge in the number of subscribers, and new newspapers, magazines, and publishing houses sprang up. Nevertheless, Russian literature in exile continued to be poor in readers. A book with a print run of 500 or 1,000 copies hardly covered expenses, and certainly could not provide the author with an income. But there was also the inevitable shock of displacement, one fam iliar to others besides Russia's exile writers. For example, the German w riter Siegmar Faust, who was expelled from East Germany in 1976 after serving a jail term for alleged anti-state propaganda, wrote that he had experienced an identity crisis, because "here in the W est living takes first place and writing comes second.” And this from a w riter who had simply moved from one part of his native country to another. When the Soviets again cut off the flow of émigrés in the early 1980s, the mood turned especially sour. Boris Khazanov expressed the general malaise with his usual thoughtfulness: ... the generation which created in Europe, Israel, and Am erica som ething like a new Russia is growing older with each passing day — not only physically, but because it is living through the ideas, moods, and hopes o f the 1960s. A certain period is coming to a close, a fissure in tim e; and into that fissure is inexorably sliding that short-lived literary tribe o f those who were for the m ost pa rt already m iddle-aged when they left. There is no new growth; how can there be any except from the m other earth o f Russia herself? B ut there the iron gates which form erly le t out fortunate individuals have slam m ed shut — evidently forever.... Khazanov went on to complain that émigré writers were em bittered by their discovery that the colossal state which raised them was a spiritual province. Only now did they realize that Russian literature was something like a form er great power and that Russian books published abroad interested foreigners largely for nonliterary reasons. Abroad, it was taken for granted that the culture of contem porary Russia was an amateurish, home-grown phenomenon, antiquated and provincial. No one even spoke Russian. There remained only the Russian backwater, enormous and attractive as never before. But Russia grew more and more distant, and contact with readers there became more and more infrequent. The writers
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needed a truly fantastic, inexhaustible belief in themselves and in their talent, wrote Khazanov, a belief perhaps even in magic and in the power of the Russian word to maintain an enthusiasm bordering on despair: Where are our readers, where is our literary m ilieu? Surrounded by more ill-wishers than friends and him self m issing no chance to go on the attack, the irritated and disenchanted Russian writer abroad finds neither com petent critics n o r careful listeners. Instead there are only other refugees — ju s t like h im se lf— and he is forced to publish his work in journals which a ll too frequently rem ind one o f a quarrelsome Soviet "com m unal apartm ent“.... O ur émigré literature is still what it was in the U.S.S.R. — a regional literature.... The only thing that unites Russian writers abroad is a revulsion for the regime. While that is a ll the Soviet governm ent deserves, a literature im m ersed in this unified hatred is in danger o f reverting to activist journalism . A nd it appears that precisely this has happened.... For the last two decades Russian literature in exile has am ounted to throwing inkwells a t the devil. It is a literature o f exorcisms.... Khazanov went on to accuse Solzhenitsyn of wanting to resurrect the old tsarist slogan "Orthodoxy, Autocracy, and Nation,” and then com plained that other, unnamed authors (obviously, Limonov was one of them) were misusing their newly acquired artistic freedom to engage in obscenities. Khazanov's article, published in 1985, reflected a growing despondency among writers in the first half of the decade. A t the 1981 Los Angeles conference on Russian literature in exile, the writers all agreed that there was only one Russian literature, that no separate émigré tradition existed. Having concurred unanimously in this appraisal, they then bewailed their own separation from Mother Russia. A sim ilar cry of despair was received in 1982 by the Russian nationalist journal Veche (Town Meeting) from a Soviet writer, Leonid Borodin.® Borodin complained that the émigré community had lost its organic link with Russia, that it was ignoring "national” processes, and that all the quarreling going on within the émigré community was
•The editors published the article in 1985, when it was learned that Borodin had been sentenced to 15 years of forced labor and thus would probably not be further endangered by publication. It must be noted, even em phasized, that Borodin's open letter to the Russian ém igré community was addressed only to those who w ere ethnic Russians, thus excluding Russian-speaking non-Russians — i.e., the Jews.
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preventing it from being politically effective. Borodin's gloom was seconded by O. Polyakov, a Third-W ave émigré. Polyakov bemoaned what he saw as a disinterest in Russia on the part of the émigrés, a materialism which distracted them from things Russian, a lack of empathy and support for Russian dissidents, and a dearth of patriotic feeling. When I interviewed Andrei Sedykh in 1982, he also responded with a sim ilarly despondent evaluation of the cultural scene within the Third Wave, comparing it very unfavorably with that of the First Wave. Still, exile is rarely a happy state of affairs, and such despair had been voiced before. The 1923 letter of Zinaida Gippius to Nikolai Berdyaev could easily have been written by a Third-W ave writer: Here in Paris I have nothing to do. In the beginning, when we had ju s t arrived after a feverish half-year in Warsaw, tim es were som ewhat different Now it seems strange even to recall them. In the Russian sense, Paris now is a desert. There is nothing — not even opportunities for any sort o f existence. The émigrés are either abandoned individuals o r closed, elderly circles, such as the old Social Revolutionaries o r Mityukov's dried-up, stupid group. A ll this is immobile and im penetrable. The only newspaper, Mityukov's [Poslednie novosti], is ridiculous. There is only one option: to withdraw into oneself and one's own personal work.
Ideology ... to believe in belief; it is to be so little that the elves can reach to whisper in your ear; it is to turn pum pkins into coaches, and mice into horses, lowness into loftiness, and nothing into everything, fo r each child has its fairy godm other in its soul. Francis Thompson (1859-1907) Under the tsars, political pressures and censorship in Russia had politicized literature to a greater extent than was true for most W estern literatures, to such a degree, in fact, that literature became a sort of national debating society. In Soviet Russia censorship became even more rigid than it had been before 1917, but this only lent hidden political commentary the attractiveness of forbidden fruit. W riters continued to spend their energies inventing ways to circum vent the censors, but the range of the permissible was so severely circumscribed that until roughly 1987 it was only abroad that political views could be freely expressed. The uniformly anti-establishm ent mood of Third-W ave writers and many Soviet writers gave some
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observers the impression that there was basic agreement among them on the nature of political reform. This erroneous notion was further strengthened by the fact that the Third Wave was less involved in politics than the first two Soviet exoduses had been. When asked why they had left their country, Third Wavers usually responded that they could not stand living there any more and simply wanted to get on with their lives. Ultimately, of course, the Third Wave turned out to be a raucous and fragmented group, but emigration has always been this way. Any unity based only on the common denominator of a shared enemy will ultim ately prove to be short-lived. And there was the money factor. Once the exiles had arrived in the "Free W orld,” they quickly realized that while belles lettres were of considerably less interest p e r se in the W est than in Russia, writers could nevertheless continue practicing their craft on the literary stage of the Cold War. There were subsidies to publishing enterprises and jobs as Russian-language radio commentators, teachers of Russian language and literature, and political analysts in intelligence organizations. Swarms of reporters hung on every word of some of the better known dissidents. It was an exhilarating experience for people whom the state had taught they were insignificant malcontents who could be crushed at will. Once the writers began to involve themselves with politics, their differing views inevitably came to the forefront — much to the dismay of Western proponents of "diversity” and "democracy” who had labored to liberate w hat they thought were kindred souls. The émigrés’ views were formed largely before they arrived in the West, and their political leanings as a rule proved quite conservative, at least as compared to the range of views held in the West. It was naive to expect so different a culture to have produced a world view identical to that of the typical Western liberal. The traditional imperial view was propounded in the Munich journal Veche, which called upon Russia as a "great power” to continue to "organize life not only on the territory of the Russian state, but even in regions of the traditional Russian sphere of interest.” Veche also published such writers as Gennady Shimanov, who in 1975 called for a fusion of Russian Orthodoxy with a monarchial communism: THE SO VIET STATE IS PREGNANT WITH THEOCRACY. It is destined to become an instrum ent for the creation o f a thousand-year kingdom on earth, such as there has never existed in the history o f the world and which, if we believe the H oly Writings, m ust inevitably come to be.... Such a degree o f pow er has never existed.... A m onarchy... m aintains a liberal, good-natured attitude toward social moods.... But only now, with the form ation o f the Soviet state, has the opportunity arisen fo r an autocratic PARTY without political opponents to
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be guided — not b y the vague ideals o f ou r form er em perors and empresses — but by a PROGRAM fo r constructing a truly Christian society.... If we envisage the transform ation o f the Communist Party into THE ORTHODOX PARTY O F THE SO VIET UNION, we w ill truly arrive a t the ideal state ... But if Shimanov wanted to adapt the Soviet system to a new purpose, for others the very word "communism” was anathema. And there was the old quarrel as to whether the words "Soviet” and "Russian” should be equated. In 1949 Nikolai Berdyaev wrote that he had experienced the October 1917 coup as a moment in his own fate, not as something forced on him from without: That revolution took place within me, even though I viewed it critically and was angry a t its evil manifestations. I find deeply offensive the view o f m any émigrés who see them selves inevitably clothed in truth and brightness and believe the Bol'shevik revolution was created by some evil fdrces, o r even b y a handful o f criminals. Everyone is responsible fo r the revolution, m ost o f a ll the reactionary forces within the old regime. I had long considered the revolution in Russia to be inevitable and just. B ut I never idealized it. On the contrary, I had long since anticipated that freedom would be destroyed and that extrem ist elements, hostile to culture and the "spirit, " would win out. Berdyaev's view never enjoyed much popularity among the First Wave, which had generally opted for a strict demarcation of things Soviet from things Russian. The position of the Third Wave, on the other hand, was far less clear. In my 1983 interview with Andrei Sinyavsky and Mariya Rozanova, Mariya Vasil'evna com plained bitterly about what she saw as attem pts to whitewash Russia's sins by labelling them "Soviet.” And just as the group of intellectuals deported in 1922 was viewed by some émigrés then as having been sent to undermine the émigré community, Roman Qui' made sim ilar comments about Andrei Sinyavsky. The view that Russia had been duped and terrorized into proselytizing communism was presented by 0 . Biryukov: Responsibility lies on those Russians and nonRussians who denied their nationality, who denied Russia in the name o f an international utopia. Nourished by ideas alien to Russia and the Russian people, these persons were the bearers o f deception and force. How is it possible to speak o f some "just" vengeance to be im posed upon the Russian people for their "g u ilt“? The basic elem ent that distinguishes between Russophobes and non-Russophobes is the recognition o r non-
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recognition o f the belief that Bolshevism is a product o f the Russian spirit, that it is a social structure produced by the Russian national character, a natural continuation o f Russian history o r— on the contrary— that this is som ething brought to Russia from the outside, som ething alien and hostile to Russia. This is the watershed, the basis fo r a ll our beliefs. This m ountain ridge is clear and sharp; you can’t sit astride it, legs dangling down both sides. Either you are a Russophobe and recognize a ll things Soviet as Russian, o r you are a friend o f Russia and deny this allegation. Sinyavsky responded to the "Russophile” position as being disrespectful to the Russian people: If a handful o f foreigners m anaged to conquer all o f Russia, how much can such a great nation be worth? A nd if Russia and dem ocracy are incompatible, does this not infer that such a people — according to this interpretation — is inclined toward slavery? a Such statem ents rapidly transformed Sinyavsky the Soviet dissident into Sinyavsky the émigré dissident: In the émigré world I have come to understand that I am not only an enem y o f the Soviet government, but sim p ly— an enemy. An enem y per se — in a primary, m etaphysical sense.... The Soviet trial is followed by the émigré trial, and the evidence is the same. O f course, here they won't p u t me in a camp. B ut the camps are not the m ost terrible punishment. Things are even pretty good there, com pared to émigré life. More common within the Third W ave than in earlier groups, the view of Russia as perpetrator rather than victim led to intergenerational hostility, with Third-W ave figures often dismissing their predecessors in emigration as museum pieces. The comments of Israel Shamir, who left the Soviet Union in 1969, were typical in this regard: The Third Wave was connected with m odern-day Russia, not ju s t a Russia preserved in memory, and this distinguished it from the first emigration with its incantation that Russia had been covered over by snow [words o f a popular
•Sinyavsky is not the only writer to follow this line of reasoning. For another exam ple, see Vadim Belotserkovsky’s book From the Portable Gulag o f the Russian Emigration. This was essentially the sam e argument that had raged in Germ any during the 1930s. The writer Alfred Kantorowicz, for exam ple, vehem ently rejected the national-psychology argument, blaming everything that had happened on the governmental system.
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song o f the First Wave: JG]. M y generation perceived the First Wave as a herd o f old-regime bisons. Decked out in tsarist gold braid and old-fashioned curls, they were relics — som ething like the O ld Believers. For us, Russia had not been covered over with snow, and we m aintained a vibrant contact with her. Shamir is typical in his view. His views were essentially shared by Mariya Rozanova, editor of Sintaksis, in my interview with her and Sinyavsky, and also by Boris Khazanov, who wrote that the Third W ave found itself in a radically different position from that of the First Wave, which he saw as totally divorced from Russia. O f course, the Second Wave had left Russia after a quarter century of Soviet rule, so that it could hardly be accused of being ignorant of the Soviet Union. Second W avers tended to side with the First W ave; for example, Vera Pirozhkova, a journalist, wrote that the Third W ave's "chief goal” was to replace the anti-communist émigré community with a vaguely "rosy” émigré group. And some Third W avers also sided with the older group — Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and Vladim ir Maksimov, for example. Given this background, it was only natural that many ThirdW ave writers soon found themselves at loggerheads with the older ém igré editors. The publication base of Novyi zhum ai (The New Review), for example, had eroded, but its editor, Roman Gul', was not about to hand over the journal to people whom he regarded as Russian-speaking Russophobes, be they Jews or ethnic Russians. The response of those Third-W ave figures who found themselves shut out of the émigré publishing world was to complain bitterly of "censorship.” The older writers, who were actually that very same "younger" generation of the First W ave that had lodged these same com plaints against the "older” writers in the 1920s, responded that they were sim ply making the inevitable editorial decisions required in any publication process. The upshot of later disagreements was that a number of ThirdW ave émigrés founded their own journals, newspapers, and publishing houses. Later, in the late 1980s, when reform in the U.S.S.R. was on the upswing and émigré writers began publishing their works there, the image of the Soviet enemy paled somewhat and accusations of "proSovietism ” became harder to justify. Nevertheless, political disagreem ent continued to poison personal relations. The community of émigré writers came into closer personal contact with each other than would have been the case in Russia, and friction was unavoidable. One émigré observer, Mark Popovsky, com plained that the urge to slander each other under various pseudonyms in their books had undermined the moral thrust of émigré writers.
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America Themistodes after his banishm ent did not lose his fame am ong the Greeks, but won new fame among the barbarians. Plutarch U.S. statistics show that from 1820 to 1994 a total of 3,744,331 im migrants arrived in the United States from the Russian Empire (including the U.S.S.R and the Commonwealth of Independent States). The overwhelming majority came during the tsarist period: 3,273,602; First W ave arrivals (1917 to 1939) numbered 103,322; a mere 18,420 were in the Second Wave (1940-1969); and 183,382 in the Third Wave (1970-1991). The Fourth Wave, or post-Soviet emigration, is still an ongoing phenomenon, but from 1992 to 1994 alone 165,605 form er Soviet citizens arrived in the United States. When the Third Wavers began arriving in the early 1970s, they could still encounter elderly Russians who had emigrated during the tsarist period. As can be seen from the above figures, 87.4% arrived before 1918. In the 1990 U.S. census, 2,953,000 people indicated they were of Russian background. Obviously, the real number is much larger, but many people have lost track of their roots, and others are the children of interm arriage with other ethnic groups. Thus, most Russians in the New W orld are the descendants of tsarist émigrés. As a rule, they do not speak Russian and to the extent to which they attem pt to retain their Russian cultural heritage, this is largely through church activities. Altogether 241,798 persons indicated in the 1990 U.S. census that they spoke Russian at home. Approximately 60 percent of them were Third Wavers, of whom 75 percent were probably Jewish. A country with a pointedly multicultural identity, the United States has proven as attractive to the Third and Fourth Waves as to earlier groups. The Russian émigré in Germany, Britain, or France is constantly aware that he is an alien in his country of residence. In such large American cities as New York and Los Angeles, on the other hand, even the native-born American can find himself in the minority. Being one of many foreigners, the Russian feels at home in his new surroundings,3 and Russian boys have always dreamed of running away to America. Even now the belief, in many ways an unfounded
•S ee, for illustration, interviews with Sergei Dovlatov and Èduard Limonov in Conversations in Exile, 1991, and Besedy v izgnanii, 1992.
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one, that Russians and Americans are kindred souls is still commonly held in Russia. Certainly, Russian Jews find America just as attractive as Jews from other parts of the world do. The view of at least a part of Am erica's Jewish community was summed up by Jacob Neusner, an American professor of religious studies at Brown University, who saw Am erica as "a better place to be a Jew than Jerusalem”: If ever there was a Promised Land, we Jewish Am ericans are living in it. Here Jews have flourished, not alone in politics and the economy, but in m atters o f art, culture and learning. Jews feel safe and secure here in ways that they do not and cannot enjoy in the State o f Israel. A nd they have found an authentically Jewish voice— their own voice— fo r their vision o f themselves. That is not to say that the long centuries o f wandering have ended. God alone knows the future. B ut fo r here, now and for whatever future anyone can foresee, Am erica has turned out to be our Prom ised Land. In 1989, U.S. Senator Frank Lautenberg, a New Jersey Democrat, successfully proposed a legislative amendment establishing relaxed standards for the granting of asylum to Jews, Pentecostals, and other religious minorities. Admission under the Lautenberg Amendment mandated that air fare and resettlem ent costs — roughly $7,000 per person — be paid by the United States governm ent. Moreover, the elderly and persons incapable of work were provided with subsidized apartments, free medical care, and food stamps. Twothirds of elderly immigrants from Russia received Supplemental Security Income (SSI), rapidly converting the U.S. welfare system into w hat the W all Street Journal termed "a deluxe retirem ent home of the elderly of other countries.” Although this last claim is hardly fair, it is true that welfare payments to foreign nationals were not limited to Russia, but included many other countries; projected costs for SSI in the period 1995-2004 for all source countries were estimated at 328 billion dollars, an enormous sum. The Lautenberg Amendment engendered a flood of applications, only five percent of which were denied. Although the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service indicated that only about one half of one percent of those entering the United States as refugees under the Lautenberg Amendment met its mandated persecution requirements, 300,000 "refugees” had entered the country by 1993, and the INS complained that a "cottage industry” had sprung up to practice colossal, even "astronomical” deception, and that form al classes were being conducted on how to perpetrate "category fraud.” The Los Angeles Russian-language newspaper Panorama seemed to
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confirm this evaluation of the situation, claiming — in bold print — that 'Virtually no one will be denied entry to the U.S.A.” Indeed, from 1974 to 1989 no one was turned away, at least according to Panorama. In March 1992 one INS official in Moscow cabled W ashington that "certain interest groups were not able to tolerate even a small percentage of denials, but eventually the INS succumbed to their dem ands.” The Hebrew Immigration Aid Society (HIAS) responded to com plaints of abuse of U.S. law that Jewish lobby groups had an "honest disagreem ent’ over religious persecution in Russia. In 1989 U.S. President Ronald Reagan increased the quota of Russian Jews by 5,000 by reducing the quota for Southeast Asia by the same number. Fearing that such a policy could lead to resentment, several Jewish organizations requested that the increased Jewish quota be retained in addition to, rather than instead of, the Southeast Asia quota. The assignm ent of "political-refugee” status to persons from the form er U.S.S.R., originally limited under the Lautenberg Amendment to first 50,000 persons annually and later reduced to 40,000, was not lim ited to the elderly, but included a sizeable number of active, working adults. Remarkably, only half of the individuals who received this status in the 1990s actually made use of their newly acquired rights. The others sim ply put the papers aside in case they were ever needed in the future. Some people who emigrated to foreign countries continued to shuttle back and forth for either personal or professional reasons. Indeed, according to the Washington Post, most of Russia’s newly created “tycoons” or so-called “oligarchs,” are Jewish and eager to conceal this fact for fear of a backlash. In the 1990s U.S. immigration regulations began to curtail arrivals, and the m ajority of Jewish émigrés started to opt for Israel for lack of alternatives. In practice, people claiming political-refugee status had to dem onstrate to the U.S. Immigration Service not only that they were Jewish but also that they had close relatives in the United States. W ithout such connections, they would not even be granted an interview. Later, the INS tightened the rules still further, recognizing only parent-child and husband-wife relations (e.g., no siblings); moreover, claim s of purported Jewish background came to be examined more rigorously. Russian Jews in Am erica tend to be well-educated urban dwellers, and on the whole they have adapted quite successfully to life in America. The immigrants of the 1970s had a mean individual income of more than $34,000, as opposed to $22,000 for the average American. According to polls, 59 percent were fluent in English after two years of residence, and 67 percent were officially employed. (The corresponding figures for Russian Jews in Israel were lower: 46
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percent fluency in Hebrew and 46 percent employment.) There was a slight preponderance of women over men, reflecting the demographics of the form er U.S.S.R. For the most part, the new arrivals had little interest in religion. According to a poll taken by the Third-W ave journalist Mark Popovsky, 55 percent never set foot inside a synagogue, and another 38.2 percent did so no more than once or twice a year. The Third Wave favored the following 21 American cities to settle in: greater New York (including Brighton Beach, of course), Chicago, Los Angeles, Boston, Philadelphia, Baitimore/W ashington, D.C., San Francisco, Cleveland, Detroit, Miami, Greater M etropolitan New Jersey, Minneapolis/St. Paul, St. Louis, Pittsburgh, Denver, Milwaukee, Houston, Kansas City, Dallas, Atlanta, and Columbus. It is no surprise that New York is the chief center for Russian émigré cultural activities. By the mid-1990s there were approxim ately a quarter-m illion Third- and Fourth-Wave immigrants in the greater m etropolitan area. According to municipal statistics, they represented the second largest ethnic community in the city (after Hispanics). There is a wealth of Russian commercial activity in the city, some of it clearly crim inal in nature — a situation which may have implications for the literary scene: it is rumored that certain periodical publications have been involved in money laundering. Intellectuals prefer to live in Manhattan, if their finances perm it it, and Forest Hills in the borough of Queens from 62nd to 65th Street along 108th Street also has a large concentration of recent arrivals. Brighton Beach is absolutely remarkable; beneath the din of the elevated subway, doctors, dentists, store clerks, garage mechanics, and laundromat attendants all speak Russian, and the boardwalk with its pensioners is a piece of Odessa. Novoe russkoe slovo continues to be the most im portant newspaper. Nevertheless, as many as 30 other Russian weekly newspapers are published there, many of them reprinting articles from newspapers appearing in Russia.3 Even the form er bastion of Russian communism in North America, Russkii golos (Russian Voice), managed to survive, stripped of its ideological platform. Novyi zhurnal (The New Review) and Vremya i m y (Time and We) are still published there, and the bilingual journal Slovo (Word), edited by Larisa Shenker sponsors
•Som e newspapers w ere Vechem ii Braiton (Evening Brighton), M ost (Bridge), V novom svete (In the New W orld), Evreiskii m ir (Jewish W orld), Kaleidoskop, Kur'er (The Courier), N'yu-lorkskii kur'er (New York Courier), and Fortuna (Fortune).
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literary evenings.® New York remains a large market for Russian books, and many are actually published in the city, some by the authors themselves. But there are commercial Russian publishers in New York/New Jersey as well: Liberti, Èffekt, and Èrmitazh (Hermitage). Russian radio broadcasts make their appearance, followed by two Russian television stations. The Association of Russian-American Scholars in the U.S.A. is in New York State. When Third W avers began to arrive in Chicago, they found a Russian community large enough to support several Russian churches, which form ed the core around which Russian activities were centered, for example, a traditional annual ball on St. Tat'yana's day and a sum m er camp for children. Since the early 1970s Jewish Family Services brought about 30,000 people to the greater Chicago area. Crossworld Books was a large Russian bookstore,b and in 1982 there was a four-page newspaper entitled Chikago, but it soon closed. After the breakup of the Soviet Union several newspapers were founded which still appear, among them Svet (Light), Reklama (Advertising), and Am erika moya strana (America, My Country). Il'ya Rudyak directs Book Home (Dorn knigi), a book store and cultural center which conducts meetings with writers and arranges theatrical performances, and there is a Heritage Musical Society. When the Third W avers began arriving in California they found a colony of thousands of First- and Second-Wave arrivals. Many, perhaps most, of the First W avers had come from the Shanghai emigration, but there were also First-Wave émigrés who had moved on from Europe. Later many people arrived directly from Siberia, but in the early 1970s these were exceptions, and not the rule. By the tim e the U.S.S.R. collapsed, age had taken away most of the First Wave, and their children had been assimilated into American culture. Kalifom iiskii vestnik (California Herald) folded in 1980, refusing to allow the publication to be taken over by Aleksandr Polovets, who then founded the most im portant Russian newspaper in California, Panorama. There was a certain sense of alienation between older and newer arrivals,
•O ther Russian New York magazines are Alef, Arzam as, Edinaya tserkov' (Church United), Putnik (W anderer), Pushkin, Russkaya Am erika (Russian Am erica), Vashe zdoroy/e (Your Health), Svobodnyi m ir (Free World, published in Mount Vernon, New York), Sladkaya zhizn' (The Sw eet Life), and Russkoam erikanskii pravoslavnyi vestnik (Russian-American Orthodox Herald). ■Orossworlds w as bought up by Viktor Kamkin in Rockville, Maryland, which later acquired Four Continents Bookstore in Manhattan as well and controlled the Russian book trade in the United States until the Third and Fourth W ave reintroduced competition to the market.
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even some mistrust and hostility. Contacts were relatively few, since the older group tended to center its activities around the Orthodox Church, and the new arrivals were largely Jewish. The large age gap also tended to divide people. The older émigrés had their churches, ran music and ballet schools, and conducted occasional literary evenings. In Los Angeles, Nikolai Pushkarsky ran a cultural group that he called an "oral magazine,” and Lion Kann directed a club of intellectuals. The chief publication was Russkaya zhizn' (Russian Life), founded in San Francisco in 1920. The Soviet Consulate attem pted to propagandize the community by showing Soviet film s and handing out free copies of Soviet magazines. There was also the Rusait Society, which maintained cultural ties with Russia. Despite San Francisco's rich Russian background, the new arrivals preferred Los Angeles by a ratio of perhaps three or four to one, largely because of superior employment opportunities. Between 1970 and 1990 an estimated 180,000 Third W avers had arrived in California, and their numbers grew even faster after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Many of the cultural events of the latest arrivals were arranged by or under the aegis of organizations engaged in the resettlem ent of Russian-Jewish immigrants, and with the arrival of glasnost' and, later, the collapse of the Soviet Union, writers from Russia were able to travel frequently to California to give lectures and readings. The number of Russians in greater Boston is in the range of 65,000. Many are professionals attracted by the city's universities and the intellectual climate. Boston has several Russian newspapers: Bostonskoe vremya (Boston Times), Bostonskii kur'er (Boston Courier), Russkii Boston (Russian Boston), and Bostonskaya nezavisimaya (Boston Independent). There are also two Russian radio programs. Although the city has no Russian club, there are three Russian bookstores: Lavka chitatelya (Reader's Shop), Parnas (Parnassus), and the Russian Bookseller's Outlet. Philadelphia has attracted a large number of Russian-speakers, estim ated to number between 50,000 and 80,000. The city enjoys a wide range of Russian cultural activities, thanks in part to a Russian club run by Igor1 Kaplan, with the assistance of Elena Dubrovina. Kaplan publishes the almanac Poberezh'e (Coast), and Valentina Sinkevich publishes Vstrechi (Encounters). The newspapers M ir (World) and Filadel'fiiskie novosti (Philadelphia News) appear there, and there is a Sholom Aleikhem Cultural Center which serves the needs of Jewish immigrants. W ashington, D.C., has long had several Russian com m unities: ethnic Russians, who are numerous enough to support two Russian Orthodox Churches; the Russian Embassy community, which during
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the Soviet period maintained a pose of total isolation from Russian émigrés; and an ever increasing group of Third-W ave arrivals, some of whom are concentrated around the Jewish Community Center in nearby Rockville, although the majority appeared to attach little significance to religion. The W ashington, D.C., chapter of the Literary Fund, headed for years by Elena Yakobson, was basically an organization of older émigrés, but it managed to attract intellectuals from the other Russian communities in the area. The art and music salon of Otary and Bella Shiukashvili and the musical evenings of Leonid and Irina Kel’ner are basically successful Third-W ave phenomena. Greater W ashington is also home to many cultural institutions with strong Russian interests, among them the Kennan Institute for Advanced Russian Studies, the Hillwood Museum, the Library of Congress, and the International Research and Exchanges Board (IREX), to name only a few. Of course, W ashington is the site of many governm ental organizations, some of them intelligence-related, with broad areas of Russian expertise. There are also several large universities in the area, albeit with only the most peripheral interest in Russian literature. Indeed, so many are the Russian organizations and activities in the area that the W oodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars published a 417-page Scholars’ Guide to Washington, D.C., fo r Russian/Soviet Studies. Located in Rockville, the Viktor Kamkin Bookstore may well be the largest Russian bookstore in the world, including even Russia. Another 10,000 or so Russians reside in nearby Baltimore. The magazine Vestnik (The Herald), was founded there in 1976 with subscribers in 48 states. It has a Russian club, headed by Yakov Gendin.®
‘ Russian publications in other U .S . cities include Avtograph (Autograph) in Denver; Arizonskie novosti (Arizona News) in Tem ple; Novaya zhizn' (New Life) in Beavertown, Oregon; Russkii dom (Russian House) in Atlanta; and Shalom in San Diego. Russian organizations are actually quite numerous. Most of them have their offices in New York and New England: in N ew York State: the Congress of Russian Am ericans, the American Russian Aid Association, the Association of Russian Imperial Naval Officers in America, The First North American Russian Council, The Fund for Relief of Russian Writers and Scientists in Exile (Litfund), The Holy Trinity Monastery; The Russian Children's W elfare Association, The Russian Nobility Association, The Russian Orthodox Church in the U .S .A ., The Russian Orthodox Church of America, The Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, St. Vladim ir's Orthodox Theological Sem inary, Synod of Russian Bishops Outside Russia; in N ew Jersey. American Russian W elfare Society in Howell, The Carpatho-Russian Benevolent Association, The Lemko Association of the U .S . and Canada; in Pennsylvania: The Federated Russian Orthodox Club, The Russian Brotherhood Organization of the U .S .A ., The Russian Orthodox Catholic Mutual Aid
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Israel
"I'm a Zionist," said R oosevelt W ithout blinking, Stalin replied, "So am I." Yalta, 1945 I think that the Jews are m y people. I know that the Russians are n o t... It is like suddenly telling the truth after a long, long time o f acquiescing to a lie. Roman Rutman Before retracing the ups and downs of Jewish emigration from the form er Soviet Union, we must first understand the mechanism which made this exodus possible. According to the W ashington P o st from 1949 to 1991 the United States provided a total of 53 billion dollars in assistance to Israel. By way of comparison, this is more than four tim es the 12.5 billion dollars extended under the Marshall Plan to all of Europe, o r— otherwise expressed — roughly $120,000 per Israeli Jewish fam ily of four. And still more billions followed to reconcile other middle-east countries— especially Egypt— with their neighbor. With the fall of the Soviet Union, U.S. subsidies actually increased. Loan guarantees, for example, were set at ten billion dollars in 1995, as opposed to three billion in direct aid. And, of course, U.S. m ilitary actions against Libya and Iraq, plus direct m ilitary aid to Mid-Eastern countries willing to cooperate with America's Middle-Eastern policy, played a decisive role in ensuring Israel's m ilitary viability, w ithout which any migration to that country would have been impossible. Perhaps the largest subsidy manifests itself in U.S. willingness to maintain its armed forces at a sufficient level to be able to fight two major wars simultaneously so as to be able in any case to defend Israel (a promise made to Golda Meir in 1962 by John Kennedy, who confessed: "I know that I was elected by the votes of American Jews. I owe them my victory.”) Thus, direct and indirect U.S. assistance to Israel has been, and continues to be, the most massive per capita
Society of the U .S .A ., The Russian Orthodox Catholic W om en's Mutual Aid Society, The Russian Orthodox Fraternity Lyubov', The United Russian Orthodox Brotherhood of America; in California: The Holy Virgin Mary Russian Orthodox Cathedral, the Orthodox Church in America, The Society of Russian W ar Veterans of the World W ars; in Illinois: The Russian Mutual Independent Aid Society; in Connecticut St. Basil's College.
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transfer of national wealth ever to occur in world history, and these funds made Jewish emigration from the Soviet Union possible.3 From 1917 to 1947, 52,350 immigrants born in the Russian Empire settled in Palestine. Some of these were people who had lived in other countries prior to 1917, and others were First Wavers. Pre1970 Israeli statistics show a steady stream of Russian-Jewish immigrants, ranging from a high of 3,255 in 1949 to a low of 206 in 1954. The Third W ave began arriving in 1971, when Israeli statistics show a tenfold increase in immigration. Many of the original Third W avers who chose Israel were Georgian or Baltic Jews whose outlook was strongly Zionist. By the mid-1970s, however, this pool had begun to diminish, and the basic thrust of Jewish emigration came to be based as much on personal and professional motivation as on ideology and religion. If, in 1971, 99.6 percent of emigrating Soviet Jews went to Israel, by 1981 that number had dropped to 19.4 percent. When asked if they would emigrate if they could go only to Israel, only 18.7 percent answered with an unambiguous "yes.” Thus, freedom of emigration was only half the Zionist task; the other half involved persuading Russian Jews to choose Israel as their new home. The position of the Israeli governm ent was, and remains, that Jews already have a homeland and therefore do not need to request refugee status in any other country. Jewish organizations attempted literally to coerce Soviet Jews into moving to Israel. As early as the very late 1970s the Jewish Agency had stopped issuing invitations to Soviet citizens whose ém igré relatives had not settled in the Jewish state. At first, emigrants in transit facilities were only encouraged to continue on to Israel, while those who declined were autom atically referred to the Hebrew Immigration Aid Society (HIAS) for assistance in relocating to other countries. In August 1981, however, the Jewish Agency refused to make any more such referrals for persons who did not already have fam ily in those countries. On February 22, 1987, the Israeli Cabinet w ent even further and form ally requested that the United States deny Soviet Jews refugee status: Prime M inister Yitzhak Shamir pressed this Israeli proposal at meetings in Washington with President Ronald Reagan and Secretary of State George Shultz, but the request was
•This is not to say that the magnitude of this assistance is universally acknowledged. Binyamin Netanyahu, for exam ple, complained that Washington's assistance in resettling olim was "insufficient." For a pro-Israel analysis of the close Am erican-Jewish relationship see: Jewish Pow er by J. J. Goldberg. Books of a more critical bent include: The Fateful Triangle by Noam Chomsky: Taking Sides by Stephen Green; They D are to Speak O ut and Deliberate Deceptions by Paul Findley; The Sam son Option by Seymour M. Hersh; The Passionate Attachm ent by George and Douglas Ball; and The Lobby by Edward Tivnan.
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rejected. But then, under pressure from the Jewish lobby, the compromise 50,000 quota was established. Initially, Jewish emigrants had been housed in transit camps in Vienna and Ostia (outside of Rome), financing having been provided by the U.S. State Department through HIAS. Then the Israelis instituted direct flights via Bucharest. Plane passengers were granted Israeli citizenship while still in flight and thus — as citizens of a dem ocratic state — could not later apply for political refugee status in the United States. Subsequently, additional routes were established via Poland and Finland. The Zionist movement was amazingly successful in its "Russian campaign”: from 1970 to 1996 over one million people, of whom 80 percent purported to be Jews, emigrated to Israel from the U.S.S.R. and its successor, the Commonwealth of Independent States. And the process is still ongoing: in 1996 the form er Soviet ém igré Natan Shcharansky, newly elected Israeli M inister of Trade and Industry, announced that he intended "to bring another million Jews to Israel.” The 1989 census listed 1,449,156 Jews in the U.S.S.R., but the real number was probably considerably higher, and has been estimated to be as high as 3,000,000. According to one poll conducted in the form er U.S.S.R., 90 percent of all Jews intended to leave, but this figure would appear to be exaggerated. 1990 and 1991 marked a sudden, huge increase in Jewish emigration rates, which declined somewhat in subsequent years. But now, because of the American quota, the majority of Russian Jews were going to that same Israel which the overwhelming m ajority had rejected just a few years earlier. Even so, during just one month in the fall of 1989 the American embassy handed out a quarter million immigration applications, and in the years 1989 through 1991, depending on whose statistics are to be believed, between 379,000 and 464,000 Jews actually emigrated. Over time, the difficulties inherent in absorbing large numbers of immigrants to Israel became glaringly evident. According to a poll conducted in the early 1990s, 60 percent of immigrants in Israel were unemployed, and 30 percent hoped to leave within the next five years. Yakov Gorodetsky, a 1986 arrival from Leningrad, noted that many Soviet Jews did not feel Israel really cared about them and did not receive positive feedback from their relatives who had gone there ahead of them. Others of mixed descent were offended because they were not necessarily recognized in Israel as Jews, since their mothers were not Jewish. A number of new arrivals in Israel later wanted to move on to the United States, but as Israeli citizens were unable to receive refugee status. Since many left Israel without announcing their intentions so as to avoid having to repay the Israel governm ent subsidy
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which they had received earlier, the figure may actually have been considerably larger. By 1991 there was even a reverse migration of Jews to Russia, to which the Israeli Embassy responded that "the whole phenomenon [of remigration] is practically nonexistent ... not more than a curiosity.” Inevitably, the new influx of immigrants from the form er Soviet Union launched a surge in Russian cultural activities in Israel. Until the late 1950s, the only Russian-language periodical appearing in Israel was a bulletin issued by refugees from Harbin. In the 1950s and 1960s the journals Vestnik Izrailya (The Israeli Courier) and Sholom were established, both edited by A. Evzerov. From the 1960s on the overwhelm ing bulk of Israel's Russian-language publishing activity was engendered by recent arrivals. By the 1970s there were several newspapers: Tribuna (The Tribune), Nedelya (The Week), and lerusalim skii dnevnik (Jerusalem Diary). There were also magazines: Uzy (Ties), Rodina (Homeland), Ami, Nes (Miracle), Klub, Kinor (Fiddle), Kino, Menora, Salamandra, and IsraiT segodnya (Israel Today); the latter was founded as a daily in 1972. The chief daily newspapers as of the early 1990s were Vesti (News, edited by Èduard Kuznetsov) and Novosti nedeli (The W eek's News). One 1979 bibliography, which did not pretend to be exhaustive, listed some 600 books and periodicals. Of these 146 were works of fiction, 37 were biographies and memoirs, and 44 were periodicals. By 1988 over 20 Russian-language periodicals were appearing. In addition, a significant quantity of W estern books were being translated into Russian in pirated editions. A number of publications, both commercial and subsidized, were created to acquaint Russian Jews with the history of Jewish culture. The Aliya Library, for example, publishes books by Jewish writers which have been translated into Russian along with works of Russian literature by Jewish authors. The same is true of Narod i zem lya (The People and the Country), which calls itself a "magazine of Jewish culture.” As late as 1989 there were no dailies, and the New York newspaper Novoe russkoe slovo was widely sold, but there were already eight weeklies: the magazines Krug (Circle), Èkho (a women's magazine), and Alef, plus the newspapers Nasha strana (Our country), Panorama, Sputnik, Novosti nedeli (The W eek's News), and Feniks (Phoenix). O ther periodicals were Panorama Israilya (Panorama of Israel), Zerkalo (Mirror), 22, Vozrozhdenie (The Renaissance), Forum, and Rodnik (The Spring). Krug and A le f are similar, but A le f is more Jewish in its orientation. 22 is a classic "thick” Russian journal, com bining artistic, cultural, and political materials. (22 is so called
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because it broke off from Sion as of its 22nd issue.) Print runs for Russian-language magazines range from 1,000 to 14,000 copies. The new arrivals, not all of whom remained in Israel, numbered many active litterateurs, among them : Efrem Baukh, poet and editor of the magazine Kinor, Grigory Chelak, form er editor of the newspaper Vechem ii Kishinëv (Evening Kishinêv); Rafail Nudel'man, editor of the journal 22; the playwright Grigory Tsepliovich, who arrived in 1966; the poets Iosif Bein, ll'ya Bokshtein, Mikhail Gendelev, Igor' Guberman, Savely Grinberg, and Yuliya Khromchenko (Liya Vladim irova); the prose writers Leonid Girshovich, Izrail' Maler, Yury Miloslavsky, and Mark Zaichik.3 Russian Jews in Israel inevitably undergo an identity crisis, and authors are faced with the task of deciding whether they are Russian or Jewish writers. The periodical Krug, for example, demanded that Russian Jews abandon the Russian language and switch To Hebrew.
O th e r, earlier arrivals included the writers Asya Abramova, G ita Bakhrakh, Miryam Bakhrakh, Rakhil' Baumvol', Avraam Belov, M ira Blinkova, Igor' Borisov, David Dar, Feliks Dektor, Zalm an Dubnov, Vladim ir Glozm an, Avraam Gordon, Leonid Ioffe, Feliks Kandel', M aya Kaganskaya, Boris Kamyanov, Yakov Khromchenko, Moshe Landburg, Rina Levinzon, Èli Lyuksemburg, Grigory Lyuksemburg, David Markish, Lev Melam id, Itskhak Meras, Yury Miloslavsky, Viktor Perel'm an, Rivka Rabinovich, Aleksandr Rakovsky, Aleksandr Rozen, Feliks Roziner, Natal'ya Rubinshtein, Israil' Sham ir, Svetlana Shenbrunn, Yuliya Shmukler, Zinovy Shokhin, Dora Shturman, Mikhail Shul'm an, S o fy a Tartakovskaya, Julius Telesin, Tat'yana Tseitlina, Arkady Tsetlin, Yakov Tsigel'm an, Evgeny Tsvetkov, Naum Vaim an, Leonid Vainshtein, Boris Veksler, Aleksandr Vernik, Anry (Henry) Volokhonsky, Aleksandr Volovik, Nina Voronel’, R u f Zernova, Zinovy Zinik, and Israil' Zm ora. Many of these writers later moved on to other countries.
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Germany You can hear the heart o f Europe only in Berlin.... So follow m y advice and fall in love with this city. Love it because you love Paris and Rome, because you love that wretched crazy woman— Europe— who is now ensnared in the barbed wire o f Picardy, Poland, the Tyrol, and who lies in dried blood am idst the m ud that never dries. Love her messenger, sent ahead into an unknown future. Fall in love with this city o f revolting monuments and anxious eyes — B eriinl Il'ya Èrenburg In 1763 Catherine the Great, a transplanted German princess, issued a decree welcoming foreign settlem ent of Russia's vast territories, and many German peasants and artisans accepted the invitation, colonizing the area around Saratov on the Volga River in the mid-1760s. The period from 1785 through 1804 brought another influx of Germans, this tim e to Ukraine, and Germans began to arrive in Bessarabia and the Caucasus as early as 1824. And of course there were other Germans, with deep roots in the Baltic states. After Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, ethnic Germans were arrested as "collaborators” and deported to Siberia, Central Asia, and Kazakhstan. When the Nazi armies were defeated at Stalingrad, the Black-Sea Germans fled to Germany in a great exodus, but some were overtaken by Soviet armies, and those who actually reached Germany were forcibly handed over to the Soviets by the Western Allies. Most of them were sentenced by Soviet courts to hard labor, and upon their release in 1956 they were not fully "rehabilitated” or allowed to return to their homes. By mid-1957 the W est German embassy in Moscow had received over 100,000 applications for resettlem ent to W est Germany. These were the so-called "Aussiedler.” During the early 1970s, several thousand persons were perm itted to emigrate to Germany annually, but the collapse of the Soviet Union led to such an exodus that the W est German governm ent became alarmed that, combined with the difficulties in assimilating East Germany, such an influx could destabilize the country. To avoid such a train of events, the German governm ent offered material assistance to ethnic Germans willing to remain in Russia. Those who moved to Germany enjoy a situation sim ilar to that of Russian Jews in Israel, being considered to have "returned home” rather than emigrated. O f the most recent arrivals,
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more than half retained their apartments in the form er Soviet Union in case they should wish to return. Centuries of life outside Germany and political pressure to assim ilate left only 10 percent of Russian Germans with any real command of German, and many of those who expressed a desire to relocate to Germany ("zurück ins Reich,” in their words) spoke an antiquated dialect. Even after two years of residence in Germany only 14 percent had acquired a reasonably fluent command o f the language. The new arrivals are regarded in Germany by many as Russians, not Germans, and, indeed, they experience difficulty integrating themselves into a way of life that is still alien to them. They consider themselves German but associate mainly with members of their own group. As might be expected, many of their German hosts resent the financial privileges their long-lost countrymen enjoy as Aussiedler, and the situation can be a tense one. As early as the mid1960s, German immigration authorities were demanding that the Aussiedler have a command of German to be able to claim repatriation rights. This created a number of personal tragedies for people who had sold their homes, moved to Germany, and then were ordered deported. Another group emigrating from Russia to Germany consisted of Russian Jews. In 1990 W est German Chancellor Helmut Kohl and Heinz Galinski, then head of the Central Jewish Council in Germany, concluded an agreem ent under which any Russian Jew who claim ed to be "threatened,” as evidenced by an anonymous letter or even graffiti, had the right to resettle in Germany. Inevitably, the agreem ent's wording led to a large number of non-Jews claiming to be Jewish. In addition, as in the emigration to Israel, many spouses of the immigrants were non-Jewish. Thus, a large percentage of the new arrivals were apparently not Jewish, and of those who were, the m ajority were non-religious Jews who had been totally assimilated into Russian culture. One Russian Jew writing home commented that the m entality of the Russian Jews in Germany hardly differed from that of the Volga Germans, even if both sides of the fam ily had been Jewish for a number of generations and satisfied all the religious requirem ents of the Jewish community. "The Jews may have all the ethnic features of Jews,” he claimed, "but even so they're Russians.” In the period from 1991 to 1996,38,792 persons were officially adm itted under the Kohl-Galinski agreement, while still another 8,535 who had come as tourists refused to return home. And D er Spiegel magazine reported in 1996 that several hundred thousand other persons were on the waiting list who were planning to apply for immigration to Germany. Financial support was much more generous in Germany and Austria than in Israel, and some even managed to rem igrate to these
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countries after first settling in Israel. Although most Russian Jews in Germany say they tended to idealize life in the W est before emigrating, 78 percent of those in Germany would advise their friends and relatives to emigrate, while only 17 percent of those in Israel would proffer the same advice. Only 19 percent said they suffered from nostalgia, as opposed to 72 percent in the U.S.A. and 87 percent in Canada. So convinced were Russian Jews in Germany that life was better there than in Israel that 97 percent of them said they did not w ant to move to the Jewish homeland. A significant number of Russian Jews also resettled in Austria, which from 1983 to 1988 alone granted citizenship to some 5,000 of them on "humanitarian grounds.” When asked why they had made such a choice, a spokesman for the group responded that it was "hot and overcrowded” in Israel. One group wanted to return to Russia, but the Soviet governm ent would not perm it it. The fact that some Russian Jews are choosing Germany and Austria as their new homeland is a source of particular anguish to many Jews, and one group of American Holocaust survivors even published a statem ent in a Munich newspaper, arguing that Soviet Jews had no moral right to settle in Germany. Before the Soviet army withdrew from East Germany,3 many Russian Germans found employment servicing Soviet troops, but East Germany was not the country of choice for would-be Russian-Jewish emigrants. Moreover, Russian Jews were not permitted to resettle in East Germany in significant numbers, even though many of the founding fathers of East Germany had been Jewish. In the fall of 1989 the form er East German government collapsed, and on February 6 of the following year a citizens’ group, the Initiative for Peace and Human Rights, called upon the Modrow government to declare open immigration for Soviet Jews. The East German embassy in Moscow came under virtual siege from persons wishing to emigrate. Unlike W est Germany, however, East Germany had neither signed the Geneva convention on refugees nor passed a law on asylum. In March 1990 elections were held, and de Maizière's government was faced with the dilem m a of what to do. By the end of April the first tourists and form er Soviet officials in East Germany petitioned for permission to remain. A t first, only those who had arrived in Berlin by October 2, 1990, were to be permitted to stay (October 3, 1990, had been announced as the day of German unification). Then the deadline was
•W hen the Soviet Arm y withdrew from East Germ any, 600 Soviet soldiers stationed in that country applied for Germ an political asylum. Their applications w ere denied and they w ere scheduled for deportation.
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moved to December 31, and Russian Jews hurried to East Berlin with hastily packed suitcases. Confronted with this situation when it took over East Germany, the W est German governm ent repeatedly extended the final date, until it was finally established as May 3 ,1 99 1. By 1996 approximately 80,000 persons had settled in Germany under this agreement, "very many” of whom entered the country with falsified Jewish identification, according to German immigration authorities, but Klaus Kinkel, Minister for Foreign Affairs, remarked that the topic was too "sensitive” and that he did not want to "burn his fingers on it.” There is a vast difference in the educational level of Russian Germans and Russian Jews in Germany. Only 9 percent of the Germans have a university education, as opposed to 71 percent of the Jews.
Stay or Go Home? The exile waits for a change o f governm ent o r the tyrant's death, which will allow him to come home. If he stops waiting and adapts to the new circumstances, then he is not an exile any more. Mary McCarthy There is no exile without the intention to go back. Fernando Alegria ... exile from exile ... Leszek Kotakowski Jocasta: ‘ 77s said that exiles live upon their hopes. Polyneices: Their eyes hold promise, bu t they tarry ever. Euripides In the pre-glasnost' era Soviet publications frequently brought up the topic of would-be "rem igrants”; that is, emigrants who wished to return to Russia. In many cases it was unclear whether books and articles published by émigrés desiring repatriation were surreptitious Soviet propaganda or sincere statem ents by the émigrés themselves. In 1980 a book was published by one Efim Goland under the title They W ant to Go Home (Oni khotyat domoi). Goland waxed ecstatic over the free medical care he had enjoyed in the U.S.S.R., the wonderful
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relations he had enjoyed at his Soviet job, the casual and friendly atm osphere of the Soviet Visa Office (!), his beautiful Soviet apartment, and the delicate manners (!) of the Soviet customs-house employees when he departed from the U.S.S.R. W hy he originally decided to em igrate remained a mystery to the readers of his book, but his concluding paragraph was anything but equivocal: D o n t le t your spirits fall, miserable emigrants thirsting to return forever [em phasis m ine: JG ] to your homeland. D o n t despair, don't cry, d o n t contemplate suicide. You d o n t have long to wait. You will soon go home. Once more you will see the places you loved and your precious relatives, friends, and acquaintances. Once more you will enjoy all the blessings o f Soviet culture. A nd your tongue will become loosened, the scales w ill fall from your eyes, and your hearing w ill be returned. A nd in rare moments you will recall how life's storm carried you o ff to the capitalist world, where you suffered, wasted away, and nearly perished. A sim ilarly bleak picture was painted in a plethora of articles with such titles as: "The Bitter Bread of Alien Soil," "Here They Are Crippled by their Fates,” "In Penance," "Confession of an Emigrant,” "Escape From ‘Paradise’,” "The Tragedy of the Deceived,” "The Odyssey of a Renegade," "There Is No Life W ithout the Fatherland,” "Ten Years in a New York Dead-End,” "Lost Years,” "Invitation to a Quagm ire,” "W e Lived in the Hope of Returning,” "I Was Cruelly Punished,” and "I Kiss My Native Soil.” As if to accentuate the message, the KGB went even further, planting a bomb in the Munich offices of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty on February 21 ,1981. In 1982, the memoirs of Aleksandr Vertinsky, who had returned home during W orld W ar II, were republished in a facsimile edition in New York (they had originally been issued by the Soviet journal Moskva [Moscow] in 1962) without indication of the publisher*. It is unclear whether this was a planned action of the Soviet authorities or sim ply a pirated edition. The following year the Moscow publishing house Progress put out a propagandistic volume entitled Why We Returned to the M otherland: Testimony o f Remigrants, of which 100,000 copies were published and sold at of only 50 kopecks each. In late 1986 and early 1987 unsolicited applications for admittance to the U.S.S.R. and restoration of Soviet citizenship, printed in Russian, were placed in the mailboxes of émigrés living in New York and Cleveland. In December 1986, some 50 émigrés returned to the Soviet
•The original title, A Q uarter Century Without the Hom eland (Chetvert' veka bez rodiny), w as changed to Notes o f a Russian Pierrot (Zapiski russkogo P'ero).
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Union, complaining of urban crime, unemployment, and loneliness in the United States. After returning to the U.S.S.R., some of the returnees immediately applied for exit visas to go back to the W est, and the Soviet authorities evidently went to considerable effort to avoid further embarrassment of this sort by handing out medals and awards to the officials charged with managing the émigrés’ resettlem ent The early stages of perestroika and glasnost' posed a moral dilem ma for the émigré community of writers. Soviet writers began publishing works which were even bolder than some earlier works for which other writers had been forced to emigrate, and forbidden ém igré books were published in huge print runs in the U.S.S.R. Soviet writers who had form erly been denied exit visas visited the W est in w hat Soviet authorities would have earlier regarded as "fraternization with the enemy.” In 1990 a collection of Dmitry Merezhkovsky's works appeared in an edition of 1,700,000 copies! In the economic crisis of the post-Soviet period many publishers were unable to publish serious books at all, and if they did, it was only thanks to a subsidy.lrina Odoevtseva, a First-W ave figure, returned in 1987 and saw her memoirs, On the Banks o f the Neva (Na beregakh Nevy), become a Soviet bestseller. But the émigrés’ purported yearning to go back to Russia was not much in evidence among émigré writers. Aleksandr Zinov'ev violently rejected the very thought of return as late as 1985: I want to return to Russia, but I will never do th a t... There is no place to return to, no reason to go.... The Russia to which we m ight have returned no longer exists.... Where can you flee to and where can you return to if ... our illusion o f spiritual wealth was spat upon, defiled, maimed, and slandered — both here and th e re ? l... I did not betray Russia in leaving her. M y conscience is clear. On the contrary, only in this way was I able to remain loyal to her. Russia herself betrayed m e — ju s t as she betrayed m any o f her other loyal sons.... For us the M otherland has become so linked with the epoch that we are strangers in our own home. In returning home we would feel ju s t as alienated as we now do in the West. There is no way out. O ur true Russia has disappeared together with our epoch. Others of Russia's exile community were less direct. The W heatland Foundation Conference on Literature, held at the Library of
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Congress on April 23-25,1987, was the first event since the 1920s at which Soviet and émigré writers officially sat at the same table: Andrei Bitov and Oleg Chukhontsev represented the Soviet side and Joseph Brodsky, Efim Ètkind, and Andrei Sinyavsky represented the émigrés, with the W estern Slavist Michael Scammell serving as a commentator. Brodsky stated he would consider returning if his own work and that of his fellow writer's as well could be freely published. Sinyavsky allowed that he would return under two conditions: first, that he could write and publish (in the W est and the U.S.S.R.), and second, that he could enter and leave the country without restrictions. Curiously enough, Sinyavsky had stated just four years earlier that his dearest wish was "to return to Russia alive, not just in my books.” As political reform moved forward more and more vigorously under Gorbachêv, the situation became increasingly sim ilar to that of the 1920s, when writers could live abroad and publish in Russia, or publish books abroad that did not need to be clandestinely smuggled into the U.S.S.R. But if glasnost' and perestroika had introduced consternation into the émigrés’ ranks, the collapse of the U.S.S.R. confronted them point-blank with the question of return. In the words of one American Latvian, "if you’ve talked for 50 years about getting your country back, and you get it back, there’s a moment of truth: either you go there yourself, or all your talk was a lie. It’s a matter of personal integrity.” But when Russia's exiled literature eventually began to return home in the late 1980s, it did so largely without its creators, and the old them e of going home turned out to be yesterday's fantasy; one is reminded of the title of a book on Pakistanis in Britain: The Myth o f Return. Yuz Aleshkovsky summed up the attitude of many when he said in an interview with me: "Why should I live in hell? I'll have time for that later.” It was a repeat of the German experience. The German w riter Irmgard Keun returned to Germany after World W ar II only to experience a sense of total alienation. "I have but one wish,” she wrote to a friend, "to leave.” Or there was W olfgang Hildesheimer, who, when asked why he chose not to live in Germany, responded: "Because I don't have to” (Weil ich nicht muß). So it was not surprising that the Russians acted no differently from their German predecessors in exile. In 1991, four years after the W heatland Conference, Brodsky stated bluntly that he did not intend to return to Russia: "I'm not a boom erang or a pendulum .” Solzhenitsyn delayed his return to Russia by setting up a number of pre-conditions: that his citizenship be restored, that the treason charges against him be lifted, that all his works be published, and finally that suitable housing be found for him. More than one observer mused that life in Vermont was so comfortable that he m ight never go back. By the tim e he made up his mind to go home, it was 1994. Like Odoevtseva, Vladim ir Voinovich and Vasily
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Aksênov were given Moscow apartments, and they began spending part of their tim e in Russia while still maintaining residences abroad. Aksênov said he could see himself spending even more tim e there, but in no case would he want to return altogether. In Russia, he commented to me in 1994, people had begun to see him as an outsider. Pêtr Vail' noted that he had spent most of his adult life abroad and that he was not about to emigrate for a second tim e (although he did precisely that when his employer, Radio Liberty, transferred him to Prague). Andrei Sinyavsky died in 1997, a resident of France, not Russia. Most of the other writers began travelling to Russia, even paying extended visits there, but the overwhelming majority — after decades of breast-beating and fervent tears over the anguish of exile — preferred the com forts of W estern life. Political exile had metamorphosed into economic relocation. A not inconsiderable percentage of the émigrés retained a real hostility for thèir country of origin. The dividing line between Russian literature written within and outside Russia had been erased, leaving the form er exiles, on the whole, in better material circumstances than their colleagues back home and generally feeling somewhat superior to them. If the ranks of the exiles were cast into disarray by reform back home, bewilderm ent was also the lot of the utterly compromised Soviet W riters’ Union, which was now called upon to beat its corrupt collective breast in a million mea culpas before what Lev Kopelev quipped was an ém igré-dissident "Anti-Soviet W riters’ Union.” But even blatantly pro-establishm ent writers now declared themselves to have been "inner em igrants” who had stayed home to continue the struggle rather than abandon Russia. The implication was that it was the émigrés, not the stay-at-homes, who bore the burden of guilt on their shoulders. Surprisingly, even Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, who had been forcibly deported from the U.S.S.R. and never viewed himself as an émigré, also adopted this point of view, maintaining that "the people who em igrate are generally those who run away to save them selves from our horrible conditions. Much braver people, steadfast and devoted to their country, stay behind to improve the situation.” Again, the situation was comparable to that of German letters at the end of W orld W ar II. From Germany the w riter W alter von Molo wrote to Thomas Mann in California, entreating him to return home as a "doctor” who would "heal” Germany, while Frank Thiess, a German w riter who had not emigrated, accused Mann of having "forgotten” his countrymen and thus "abandoned his sick mother — Germ any.” Mann rejected von Molo's sycophant missive, saying that those German writers who had not emigrated had never known the "cardiac asthm a” of exile, the loss of roots, the nervous shock of losing one's homeland, but had instead preferred to reap the advantages of swearing loyalty
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to the "charism atic Führer (horrible, horrible — this drunken concept!)” He knew of no service which he could not render to the German people from California and he would accept no "banal ‘Come home, all is forgiven!’”: It is true, over the years Germany has become quite alien to me. You m ust concede, it is a country that produces anxiety. I confess that I have a fear o f German ruins, a fear that the relations between someone who lived through the witches’ sabbath on the outside and those o f you who danced along and waited upon H err Urian would always be difficult.... This m ay be superstition, but in m y eyes books that could be published in Germ any between 1933 and 1945 are less than worthless, and it does not behoove us even to take them into o u r hands. A stench o f blood and shame clings to them. They should a ll be pulped.... I will make the trip. But once I am there, I suspect that shyness and alienation, the products o f these 12 years, will not withstand the attraction, the long thousand-year-old memories that you have on your side. So it is A u f Wiedersehen, m y dear Mr. von Molo, for such is God's w ill! Mann's words are virtually identical to those of Georgy Adamovich, written, incidentally, at about the same time: It w ill soon be 20 years since I le ft Russia. A nd I do not think I w ill be able to return for quite a while; perhaps I never w ill return, ou t o f fear o f a disorientation which would be too hard and too sad for me to undergo in the country where I was born. I would like to live here in France, and nowhere else. I would not know how to carry out the little tasks o f everyday existence, which are the stu ff o f life. I would need years o f acclimatization. Predictably, Thiess's reaction to Mann's refusal to return to Germany was one of rage. Mann, he wrote, was wallowing in American luxury to such a degree that he no longer belonged to German letters. The German writers who had remained in Hitler's Germany were actually "inner émigrés” on whom Mann had turned his back: Truly, it is not an ocean that lies between him and us, but an abyss. N either m ountain ranges, nor languages, nor even the hatred o f w a r... can separate people as effectively as the difference between those who have acquired knowledge through suffering and those who fall into ignorance in the protection o f fame and "honorary degrees”.... So le t us once more bid farewell to a man whom we once revered and adm ired.... Will his books be read? Oh, certainly, why not? ... But no message from an "American
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world citizen” writing in German w ill lead us out o f our wretchedness and remorse, our uncertainties and anxiety, to new shores, to a new hope and a new confidence o f inviolable inner worth. O ther émigrés who chose to return to Germany also had somehow to come to terms with the non-émigrés, who were not above lecturing the returnees on patriotism . One writer, Hermann Kesten, even stated that "the entire German people lived in exile in the middle of the Third Reich.” The response of the émigrés to such talk was vehement. Thomas Mann's daughter Erika angrily declared that the émigrés had no desire to be represented by people who had not lifted a finger to keep the books of the émigrés from being burned. All too often, however, the returnees found themselves system atically ignored, overwhelmed by the "technique of being silenced to death,” to cite a phrase of the émigré w riter Fritz von Unruh. Another German ém igré author, Ludwig Marcuse, even coined the bitter maxim: "Once an émigré, always an ém igré.” All this was to be repeated in Russian letters. When Brodsky was asked in Paris in the fall of 1988 (just a year after the W heatland Conference took place) whether he would like to visit Russia, he responded in a fashion that Mann would undoubtedly have found very understandable: I find it difficult to imagine m yself a tourist in the country where I was bom and raised. That would be ju s t one more absurdity in an existence already replete with them. If a crim inal has reason to revisit the scene o f his crim e (perhaps to dig up the loot), it is senseless to return to a place o f love. O f course, I could make the trip, smile, say "yes," and accept congratulations, but that prospect is deeply revolting to me.... In general, I doubt [I'll go]. Later, when asked in Denmark about a possible return, he was equally nonchalant: Life is an eternal parting, and there is no returning to a past life. Physically, it no longer exists. B ut I would like to visit m y former hom eland [em phasis m ine: JG] to visit m y parents’ grave and once more see two o r three fam iliar apartments. Brodsky died in 1996, never having set foot on Russian soil since the day of his emigration. The homecoming of Russian expatriate literature was generally welcomed in Russia, but with reservations: the émigrés often found themselves dismissed as being stuck in the period of tim e in which they originally left Russia, while only those who had remained at home could follow the country's cultural development. Russia was referred
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to as the "M etropoliya,” while the "diaspora” somehow came off as peripheral. Émigré writers were criticized as having lived abroad but been too provincial to take advantage of the opportunity to broaden their horizons and, with a few notable exceptions, had been ignored by the W estern literary establishment. Even when they were applauded, it was the sort of honor paid to historical personages who had little or no relevance for post-Soviet Russia. And no one was about to grant the expatriates a license to lecture the stay-at-homes. For example, a book by Nelli Freinkman-Khrustalêva and Avraam Novikov which appeared in Moscow in 1995 castigated the journalist and poet Yuliya Vishnevskaya, who had broadcast for many years over Radio Free Europe. Vishnevskaya's voice from a distance (golos izdaleka) struck them as "false” (fal'shivo), coming from com fortable Munich: A position o f total negation ... is unproductive and testifies as to a break with reality. Russia ... does not require any condescending enlightenment, exposés, and especially m ockery from countries o f the so-called free world, in this sense Russian culture abroad has lost its status o f alternative Russian culture.
Belles Lettres The Mission and Role of Russian Émigré Literature Perhaps one can write in Trieste, Zürich, and Paris, while becoming more Irish than ever, a Dubliner o f dreams. Perhaps. William H. Gass The relationship of émigré literature to literature created in Russia continued to be a much discussed topic among Russian émigrés until their exile status was first undermined by perestroika and then imploded by the collapse of the U.S.S.R., converting them overnight from "exiles” into "expatriates.” A 1986 article by the émigré critics Aleksandr Genis and Pêtr Vail' foreshadowed the new mindset. The authors denied that Russian ém igré literature had achieved autonomous cultural status and saw a role for the ém igré community only as an "aesthetic colony of Soviet culture." Quoting my interview with Andrei Sinyavsky, who had expressed sim ilar views, Vail' and Genis maintained that Russian émigré literature lacked readers, social institutions, and cultural and educational centers. W orst of all, in their view, was the lack of continuity between generations. Bunin, in their opinion, had truly entered into the annals of Russian culture only when his nine-volume
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collected works were published in Moscow in the 1960s. Thus, they presented émigré literature as a supplem ent to official Soviet literature; in the W est writers could discuss political and sexual topics which were taboo in Russia proper, but the very thought of writing a book on a topic not connected with the Soviet government — for example, about the life of beavers — seemed absurd. Beavers could be described in Moscow. Vail' and Qenis then went on to decry what they perceived as the tendentious transformation of fiction into journalism . Soviet writers were preoccupied with politics rather than the artistic process: Vasil' Belov discussed demographics, Grigory Baklanov treated salinization of agricultural lands, and Valentin Rasputin and Sergei Zalygin were working to save Siberian rivers. Émigré writers entertained sim ilar delusions of power, Vail' and Genis maintained, quoting this tim e my interview with Vladim ir Maksimov, who discussed self-determ ination for Georgia (before the breakup of the U.S.S.R.). As for thé dream of a dialogue between émigré and Soviet literature, they saw it partly realized in the era of perestroika, but they thought that such an exchange was possible only if émigré writers abandoned their political pretensions and devoted themselves to pure art, thereby fulfilling a mission appropriate to their "colonial status.” Some of the iconoclastic observations of Vail' and Genis were obviously intended to scandalize the émigré community, and they definitely did not represent "mainstream” émigré thought, even if they did contain enough truth to make more than one reader uncomfortable. More typical was the view of the Third W aver Yury Miloslavsky, who furiously maintained that "censored” (podtsenzumaya) literature was a contradiction in terms and that nothing of value could be published in the Soviet Union. Doctor Zhivago, in his view, was a bad book, and brilliant Soviet writers such as Bulgakov and Shalamov were products of a pre-Soviet development. No literary process was taking place in Russia, he claimed. Miloslavsky's position was identical to that of Zinaida Gippius and Dovid Knut a half century earlier.
Assimilation A nd now also the axe is laid unto the root o f the trees. Bible, St. Matthew Assimilation is, by definition, the ever-present enemy of cultural identification with the home culture. In 1934 the émigré Dmitry Filosofov complained that "all sensible people” viewed the maintenance of a Russian ethnic group outside the borders of Russia as hopeless: loss of national identity, language, and way of life,
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material impoverishment, indifference on the part of the host countries, and deaths were all factors rendering the em igrant community superfluous and unable to play a meaningful political role. Twenty years later the Second-Wave figure Vladimir Poremsky voiced much the same anguish, gloom ily viewing the Russian emigration as assimilated and even "dying out biologically.” But assimilation was far more rapid for the Third W ave than it had been for the First, which generally looked back at the culture of imperial Russia with longing and nostalgia. When the Soviet era dawned, Russian culture had just gone through its "Silver Age,” and the early Soviet years witnessed some m agnificent literary output, particularly in poetry. By the tim e more than half a century had passed, however, the realities of Soviet life had become very unappealing on many levels; the shabbiness of life and the political oppression inspired in many of the new émigrés a revulsion, not just for the Soviet Union, but also for the crude propaganda known as "Socialist Realism.” Added to this was the old problem of anti-Semitism, which alienated many of the Third-W ave ém igrés alm ost totally. But even among ethnic Russians, distaste and scorn for Russia were not infrequent. The U.S.S.R. was, after all, the only Russia they had ever known. And while the Third Wave was originally very cohesive and émigrés tended to socialize largely with each other in the 1970s and early 1980s, as tim e passed this cohesiveness naturally began to erode. There was a weakening of ties, both to Russia and within the émigré community. Thus it was not surprising that a considerable number of the writers no longer viewed their roots as lying in Russian literature. On the other hand, Soviet culture was significantly different from the environm ent in which the new émigrés found themselves, and even those writers who learned a new language quite well still had not acquired the linguistic skills needed to create a literary work in the new tongue. An exception was Joseph Brodsky, who first saw himself as an English-language essayist and a Russian-language poet, but who with tim e began to edit translations of his own verse, and then actually began creating verse in English. Vasily Aksênov and Èduard Limonov, on the other hand, attempted to write in English, but only convinced them selves they were better off sticking with Russian. After the breakup of the Soviet Union, when the émigrés generally rejected the option of returning home, yearnings for a lost homeland generally died away. It is, after all, difficult to be nostalgic for a country in which you don't want to live. Formerly isolated in the Soviet Union from the rest of the world, many émigrés now actively reached out toward international culture and began to sense the unity of their new way of life with that of pre-1917 Russian expatriate writers, who travelled abroad freely and often. It was all part of a globalization
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of culture which is still rapidly stripping away the uniqueness of national traditions. Tokyo and Buenos Aires are becoming more and more like Munich, and an international book fair can market an author in dozens of countries and languages simultaneously. A w riter living outside Russia is only hours by air from Moscow. When all is said and done, exile is not what it once was, and soon it will be even less so. Èduard Limonov commented to me that the action in one of his books takes place in Nice, Paris, and New York — everywhere but Russia: For 15 years I have been a Westerner. A nd you c a n t take that aw ay from me. There were some problems. I changed countries and readers twice. I had language problem s here in France. B ut I never had problem s with the New World. People are the same everywhere. Language is nothing. Big de all [This last phrase was uttered in English: JQ]
Attempts at Soviet-Émigré Literary Detente The caricatured pom posity o f form er [S oviet citizens] cannot engender anything m ore than a smile, and we have long since learned that the foul-smelling, printed relics o f those who escaped punishm ent are nothing but a collection o f tawdry jokes, whose editors vainly strive to pass judgm ent on a great people.... Soviet journalist I. Mikhalev, Izvestiya, 1978 W hile the Soviet Union still existed, the émigrés returned over and over again to the idea of a tête-à-tête between Soviet and émigré literature. Georgy Adamovich had advocated such a dialogue for the First Wave, and Gleb Struve regarded émigré and Soviet literature as two currents which were eventually destined to flow together. Curiously, the very same image of two streams of a national literary tradition had been proposed for German literature in exile during the Nazi period. Western scholars also took up the idea, and in 1978 the University of Geneva organized an international symposium on the topic "One or Two Russian Literatures?” The Soviet response was explicit contempt. The only thing the Soviet establishm ent wanted from the émigrés was for them to disappear. The critic Vadim Baranov, for example, expressed outrage over the very phrase "Russian literature of the twentieth century” — a locution which he saw as a slogan of desperation intended to "obliterate the ideological dividing line.” According to Baranov, the
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com m onality of language provided no grounds for ignoring the "revolutionary primacy” of Soviet literature. But émigré hopes only grew with the arrival of perestroika. In 1987, the same year that Baranov's article appeared, the émigré Vladim ir Voinovich decided to test the waters by writing a letter to Sergei Zalygin, editor-in-chief of Novyi m ir (New World), a journal fam ous as the standard bearer of the liberals ever since the postStalinist "thaw.” Voinovich had read a newspaper account of a talk given by Zalygin to students at the University of Paris in which Zalygin announced that he was ready to publish the manuscripts of Russian writers living abroad. Taking him at his word, Voinovich promptly offered him his story B y M utual Correspondence (Putèm vzaimnoi perepiski) for publication. It had been written for Novyi m ir almost 20 years earlier, prepared for publication, and typeset. Voinovich had even received 60 percent of the royalties, but had been forced to emigrate, so that it had never been published. But why couldn't it appear now? Zalygin was more than cautious in his response, disdainfully rejecting the manuscript, questioning both its literary quality and Voinovich's right as an émigré to publish in Russia. In his outraged response Voinovich accused Zalygin of wanting to publish only the works of long-dead émigré authors: I had hoped to see this story stand in contrast to the slander which is still being heaped upon persons who share m y fate. O ur (or, if you like, your) straight-faced literary emissaries are proclaim ing a flowering o f glasnost', making fools o f our local public, inventing fairy tales to the effect that there is no censorship in the Soviet Union, no forbidden books o r names, and that émigré writers are not denied access to the pages o f Soviet publications, but that they themselves sim ply express no desire [to be published]. Supposedly, this lack o f desire is d e a rly dictated by a hatred for their own country and people. The newspaper Moskovskie novosti (Moscow News) has rebuked the émigrés for having struggled for glasnost' (yes, they made such an admissionl), and now that glasnost' has arrived, they do not hurry home to help us, but engage in slander and probably will rub their hands with pleasure if our perestroika fails.... I feel sorry for our (not only your) country. The ones who w ill rejoice w ill be your colleagues such as [pro-regim e writers Sergei] Mikhalkov, [Y ury] Bondarev, and other trash. They care for nothing but the feeding trough they've crawled into up to their ears.... There w ill never be any true glasnost' without truth, and in our (your) country, truth is controlled by patented Hats like
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[pro-regim e writers Aleksandr] Chakovsky, [N ikolai] Gribachëv, and others, o r by people who would tell the truth, provided their superiors perm itted it, but they no longer know what is. In January 1988 Zalygin was a member of a Soviet delegation visiting the United States, and I discussed the correspondence with him. If he did not wish to publish the piece, why had he not chosen the option of either sending a polite rejection or of not responding. After all, Voinovich's initial letter had been entirely polite; what had caused Zalygin to react in such a hostile manner? Zalygin responded to my question that Voinovich had too high an opinion of him self and in any case had no right to make the correspondence public, but he refused to discuss the m atter any further. But what actually happened? Zalygin had failed to gauge the imminent changes in the Soviet political climate, but his refusal can serve to date the end of an era.3 The years 1987-1991 marked the long-awaited homecoming of Russian literature. Even earlier the Soviet authorities had recognized that they needed to have a few token writers visit the W est to minimize the damage done to their image abroad by locking up Soviet writers at home. The poets Andrei Voznesensky and Evgeny Evtushenko and the literary scholar Evgeny Ovcharenko were selected to play that role. Even during the Brezhnev years, when Soviet writers were generally not perm itted to travel outside the U.S.S.R., these three continued to junket back and forth with no discernible limitations. In the process these two poets became quite well-known, since their readings were virtually the only immediate contact W esterners could have with Russian writers. Their verse was translated into English by prom inent English poets, and their agents began calling American universities seeking invitations to give poetry readings for large honoraria. Many universities agreed to these conditions. Inevitably, resentm ent against the two poets ran high — both in émigré circles and among Soviet writers who were denied exit visas. Voznesensky struck the pose of the artist, while Evtushenko even managed to come off as a sort of dissident. As a patent Stalinist, Ovcharenko was ignored by all except a few Slavists keen on continuing to receive Soviet visas. W hen I interviewed Ovcharenko, it was obvious that his junketing was not
■At a press conference held in Munich in mid-March 1988 by Voinovich to m ark the appearance of the Germ an translation of his satirical novel M oscow 2042, I brought the matter up with the Czech ém igré writer O ta Filip. Filip responded that he personally would never have written the sort of letter which Voinovich originally wrote to Zalygin. Filip took the view that he would have "compromised himself" in going to the Czech authorities and asking them to publish his works. H e felt strongly that it was up to the communist governments to apologize to the émigrés, and not for the émigrés to petition to be readmitted into print.
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w ithout purpose: he had been assigned the task of compiling lists of W estern Slavists whose views were judged hostile by the authorities in Moscow. These Slavists then found themselves blacklisted when they applied for a Soviet visa. Soviet publications, in the meantime, continued to heap abuse on the émigrés, but in a way these fulm inations were welcome music to those attacked. There was a certain consolation in a black-and-white situation. The enemy was the enemy, and that was that. But glasnost' and perestroika were as confusing to the émigrés as had been the announcem ent of NEP in 1921. Did the changes represent only a tem porary strategic manoeuver or constitute real reform? In March 1987 a letter signed by ten émigrés3 was published in Figaro, The Times, The Herald Tribune, Die Welt, Corriere della Sera, and The New York Times, questioning the true significance of glasnost'. Among the charges leveled by the signatories were: a) the release of human-rights activists was token in nature and conceived as a publicity stunt; b) serious economic reform was not being discussed; c) Soviet troops were still stationed in Afghanistan; d) although a number of deceased writers (for example, Boris Pasternak, Nikolai Gumilêv, and Vladim ir Nabokov) had been "rehabilitated,” this action had yet to apply to any living writer; e) the émigrés’ books were still forbidden; f) communist ideology was not rejected; g) the official Party line still called for a "historic struggle” with the bourgeois W est; and h) the Soviet government continued to practice disinform ation. To the amazement of the signers, the letter was published in the Moscow newspaper Moskovskie novosti (in a reverse translation from the French). Its publication marked the beginning of a dialogue with the émigré community. The year following publication of the letter saw incredible changes carried out in the Soviet Union under the banner of glasnost', and at least some of the signatories became uncom fortable with having signed a letter which now appeared rather harsh. In May 1988 the theater director Yury Lyubimov, who had been stripped of Soviet citizenship, made a 10-day trip to the Soviet Union, where he staged Pushkin's play, Boris Godunov, and negotiated a still
•Vasily Aksenov, Vladim ir Bukovsky, Aleksandr and Ol'ga Zinov'ev, Èduard Kuznetsov, Yury Lyubimov, Vladim ir Maksimov, Ernst Neizvestny, Yury Orlov, and Leonid Plyusch.
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longer visit to put on Alive (Zhivoi), by Boris Mozhaev. Although he contended that no negotiations were conducted concerning his possible return to the U.S.S.R., it was obvious that precisely this question was of prime interest both to him and to the Soviet authorities. When asked how he felt about having signed the "Letter of the Ten” (just one year earlier), Lyubimov responded that he did not know much about politics, that he had been asked by telephone to let his name appear under a text which was a translation of a translation, that he had never heard of the title of the article, and that he had never had anything to do with any "International Resistance” (the ém igré organization which supposedly sponsored the letter). The overall impression made by his statem ent seemed to be one of intentional ambiguity. On March 2 5 ,1 9 8 8 ,1 6 émigrés (five of whom were signatories of the earlier statement) signed the so-called "Cologne Statem ent,” which was intended as a "suggestion for a discussion” with the Soviet government. In contrast to the defiant and skeptical tone of the "Letter of the Ten,” the "Cologne Statem ent’ welcomed attem pts at reform. Nevertheless, its authors considered that reform was im possible within the political fram ework of the Soviet Union and that any "euphoria” over such reform would serve only to conceal the "long ignored disease of Soviet society.” Gorbachêv's efforts at open discussion were dismissed as "tim id steps intended to create political resonance abroad.” People should have the right to dem onstrate and strike, the signers m aintained: "as long as the U.S.S.R. remains a m ilitaristic empire with maniacal expansionist pretenses there can be no thought of any qualitative leap in the developm ent of the country. W hat is now occurring in this respect turns out to be merely a tactical device in an unchanging Soviet strategy aimed at world dom ination.” The letter then called for a dissolution of the "empire” and an end to "self-isolation.”a No sooner had the Cologne Statem ent been issued than it became evident that, like Zalygin, the émigrés had underestim ated the significance of perestroika: the Soviet Union witnessed numerous political dem onstrations and strikes, national hostilities were vented in the republics, the Estonians demanded an end to Russification, Soviet
•The Cologne Statem ent (Kêlnskoe obrashchenie) was signed by Abdurakhman Avtorkhanov, Vladim ir Bukovsky, Aleksandr Ginzburg, Natal'ya Gorbanevskaya, Sergei Khodorovich, Anatoly Koryagin, Anatoly Krasnov-Levitin, Èduard Kuznetsov, Èduard Lozansky, Vladim ir Maksimov, Leonid Plyushch, Vitaly Rapoport, Georgy Vladim ov, Mikhail Voslensky, Yury Yarym -Agaev, and Aleksandr Zinov'ev, and w as published in Russkaya mysl'. No. 3718, April 1, 1988.
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diplom ats made radical disarmament proposals to the West, and criticism of past Soviet policies continued to be permitted in Russia in a manner that none of the émigrés had earlier believed possible. Even more confusing, significant gestures of reconciliation with the émigrés were made from within the U.S.S.R., including the publication of a virtual flood of émigré works. Western observers had been lulled into such a torpor by previous Soviet publications that they were surprisingly slow to pick up on this turn of events. Peter Lubin in The N ew Republic, to cite only one example, noted several émigré publications in the Soviet press, but remained essentially uninformed as to the scope of events when he wrote — as late as August 1988 — that it was "unlikely” that the verse of Vladislav Khodasevich or such novels by Nabokov as The Gift, Invitation to a Beheading, or O ther Shores would be published "for many years to come.” In point of fact, such publications had been appearing throughout 1987. The appearance of émigré works in magazines was followed by book publication. W orks previously published in tiny émigré editions of as few as 200 copies appeared in runs of 100,000. A single year's printings of émigré writings in the Soviet Union easily exceeded the entire printings of all the previous years abroad. But many were still convinced that reform was only a flash in the pan, and exodus from Russia continued. Yury Druzhnikov, who em igrated in 1987, reflected the general mood in "Farewell Party” : The Hom eland’s flag flaps above the landing strip. It's the last plane out, and we're being taken away — forever. The embarking comrades will disem bark as gentlemen, A nd there's nothing to stare at. Just ordinary Jews. Some take furniture, others — children, Perhaps a portrait o f Pushkin ... o r o f Stalin. Some leave a ripe ear behind, others — a stalk, A nd still others have no roots a t all. Customs officers doze lightly, never sleeping, B ut pocketing whatever catches their eye. O ur Hom eland frisks us from head to heels. Hand it a ll over — ju s t save your mind.... A eroflot pours wine for you While the stewardess sings "Katyusha." O ur country trades us for grain and SALT. W hat swap will they g e t for those who remain behind?
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Believe me, our oppressors have it no better. We fly out, but they have no refuge. Theirs is the vow o f silence A nd slogans, read till death. The young snow m elts W ithout a thought o f Am ericas o r Asias. We're here now, so let's drink To those who were turned down. M ay your judgm ent be soft, Lord. D on't pick and choose those whom you would aid. A s for you, friends, our road is a long one, So let's give it a m om ent o f silence. A nd fleeI 4
W ithin the pro-Soviet camp, many readers felt betrayed by the publication in Russia of émigré books. After the publication of Voinovich's Chonkin ..., several Soviet magazines published letters of protest from readers. Typical was a letter entitled "Nothing Sacred?” in Pravda Ukrainy (Truth of Ukraine). The authors, veterans of W orld W ar II, accused Voinovich of offending the memory of the Soviet soldiers who fought in the war and termed the novel "antipatriotic.”
The Apolitical Reaction A ll passes. A rt alone Enduring stays to us; The Bust outlasts the throne, — The Coin, Tiberius. Henry Austin Dobson In 1927 Dmitry Filosofov had thrown his hands up in dismay over the religious and aesthetic preoccupations of Zinaida Gippius, saying it was "indecent” for her to occupy herself with trivial gam es in the face of major political cataclysms. Later, in 1938, Mark Aldanov had chided Nabokov, who had just submitted a manuscript to Poslednie novosti: "It's war! War! How can you waste your tim e on such trifles?” This standoff between émigré aesthetes and political writers was to be repeated by the Third Wavers. Russian literature has always maintained a long-standing tradition of political involvement, and exile inevitably strengthened this tendency. Once World W ar II had come to a close and the Cold W ar
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had begun, considerable financial support was available to support most of the Russian writers whose works were suppressed back home. Politically oriented writers viewed apolitical writing as juggling words and missing the point of literature. Aleksandr Zinov'ev and Èduard Kuznetsov wrote novels with the explicit goal of illustrating political ideas. The intense demands made upon literature in the Soviet period caused a number of writers to react against any political message in their writings and to attem pt to transcend even the exile experience. This sentim ent was expressed by many writers at the 1981 Los Angeles conference: Andrei Sinyavsky: To dem and o f a writer living in the Soviet Union that he occupy him self with politics and openly come out against the governm ent is — in m y view — immoral. Sasha Sokolov: M any [writers] leaving the Soviet Union understand freedom to mean the freedom to write against the Soviet governm ent instead o f in its support. To pose the question in this fashion is to proceed from non-literature. I believe that literature has nothing to do with "for” and "against.” I believe that literature is the creation o f aesthetic artifacts. Èduard Limonov: / feel m yself to be a representative o f an entirely new generation o f Russian writers. I sense a com patibility with writers like Sasha Sokolov, Aleksei Tsvetkov, Yury Miloslavsky, and Zinovy Zinik.... W hat actually unites us? I think that we represent an entirely new phenom enon— we are Russian literature outside o f politics. We cannot be used fo r any political purposes. Sergei Dovlatov: M ost Russian writers want to be the reader’s mentor, to educate him. A nd sometimes they do it in a very sharp, dem anding fashion. This unwanted messianism irritates Western audiences. They don't like it. And they d o n t buy [such books]. Over tim e this mood grew even stronger. In 1988 Boris Khazanov deplored the "melting down of literature ... into enormous puddles of publicistics [journalism ].” A literature, he maintained, that attem pted to serve as a surrogate for ethics, religion, sociology, history, politics, etc. was in imminent danger of being trivialized. And, of course, there were the writers, Viktor Nekrasov, for example, who in the U.S.S.R. had specialized in smuggling hidden political messages into their books and thus developed what might be called an "Aesopian poetics.” Now such authors found themselves at a loss as to how to proceed.
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The War of Words: Publications To start a magazine ... is to start a sort o f literary govem m ent-in-exile; up to then, you were ju s t expatriates sitting in cafés. Mary McCarthy I know a writer who designs his own book jackets, sets the type himself, does his own advertising, and is his own salesman. There are those who claim he also is his own reader and critic. B ut he lives on that and doesn't depend on anyone! Yuliya Vishnevskaya 4
Russian-language publishing outside the Soviet Union was like casting a bottle with a message into the ocean. How many of the books and periodicals actually reached Russia and how many sim ply circulated among the émigrés will never be known. But many of the publications were never even intended for Russia — especially the newspapers. W hereas the sheer size of the First W ave and its readership perm itted magazines and publishers to be self-supporting, many Second-W ave and Third-W ave publications existed, in large measure, thanks to subsidies. Western fear of the Soviet threat encouraged support for creators of fiction and prose who were often very distant from politics. This benefit was less available to émigré groups from other countries. Novyi Zhum al (The New Review) received money from the W hitney Foundation, Golos zarubezh'ya (Voice of the Emigration) from a Catholic organization, Strana i m ir (The Country and the W orld), Posev (Sowing), G rani (Facets), and Russkaya m ysl' (Russian Thought) from American government sources. Vremya i m y (Time and We) and Problem y vostochnoi Evropy (Problems of Eastern Europe) received grants from the National Endowment for Democracy, and the latter sim ply shipped all issues to the Soviet Union without attem pting to market them even to Western libraries. In addition, Radio Free Europe and the Voice of America employed a number of writers — on the staff or on a free-lance basis. Then there was the mysterious "International Literary Associates” in New York which purchased émigré publications and distributed them gratis to anyone who asked for them; the hope was that at least some of these publications would find their way to the U.S.S.R. Thus, intelligence funds supported not only the actual writing and publication of Russian émigré literature, but even supplied the readership. It is no exaggeration to say that much
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of post W orld W ar II Russian émigré literature — up to the breakup of the Soviet Union — owed its existence to the Cold War. The financing was largely clandestine, and it is difficult even now to come by information on this point. In 1997 I requested estimates from both the CIA and the FBI under the Freedom of Information Act and was denied even materials from the 1940s and 1950s. W hen Third-W ave émigré writers began to arrive in the West, they initially turned to Novyi zhumal, which was actually a publication of First-W ave figures continuing the traditions of Sovremennye zapiski. The editor, Roman G ul\ made a certain attem pt to accommodate the new arrivals, but the gap between the older émigrés and the most recent proved too large to bridge in a manner satisfactory to either group. Thus, Novyi zhum al was, to a certain extent, bypassed by the new arrivals. Many Third-W ave figures were openly hostile to the journal, describing it as a sort of ghost of the past, an obituary in print. Gul' died in 1986, but the journal was able to continue publication, thanks in part to support from Thomas Whitney, and also Sergei Vishtak, a businessman in Japan. For a tim e it was edited by Yury Kashkarov, who died in 1994. Later, Vadim Kreid took over the post of editor. The editors of G rani (Facets) held to a markedly more contem porary approach than did Novyi zhumal, and even claimed to have smuggled some 1,500 manuscripts out of the U.S.S.R. for publication in the West, as well as transferring significant financial sums to a number of authors in the Soviet Union. G rani had been founded in 1946 in Frankfurt am Main and, together with its publishers, Posev and the NTS, was supported with U.S. intelligence funds. (The Soviets claimed that Posev received only 20 percent of its income from sales and that the other 80 percent came from the CIA.) As the Third W ave began creating new journals, G rani received fewer submissions and, in an effort to keep abreast with changing times, hired the novelist Georgy Vladimov as editor in chief as soon as he emigrated in 1983. Vladim ov was a journalist by profession and had edited the prose section in the liberal Soviet journal Novyi m ir from 1956 to 1959. W ithin a very short tim e he began complaining that NTS was subjecting his choices to Soviet-style censorship. Vladimov’s superiors accused him of being uninterested in Soviet authors and of viewing the journal as a "landing strip” for émigré writers. They also took umbrage at his interference in the financial details of publication. Reluctantly, they dism issed him. On June 20,1986, a protest was lodged in Russkaya m ysl' in Paris entitled "Gray Begins and W ins.” The signers accused the editors
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and NTS of a lack of respect for editorial freedom of action.3 The entire affair was fundam entally a generational conflict, sharpened by the availability of American counter-intelligence funding. Six months after the protest appeared, the Soviet Literaturnaya gazeta (Literary Gazette), unable to restrain its satisfaction over this turn of events, published an article entitled "The Renegades Begin and Lose,” authored by one "B. Ivanov” (probably a pseudonym). "Ivanov” wrote that the NTS was a terrorist organization financed first by the Gestapo, then the British Secret Service, and later the CIA; that Vladim ov had declared himself Chairman of "the notorious anti-Soviet, anti-socialist organization ‘Amnesty International’”; that he was one of the "greedy opportunists” in the "so-called Moscow Helsinki G roup,” which slandered the Soviet Union; and, lastly, that his mother was Jewish. But if Vladimov expected total support from his fellow exiles, he was to be disappointed. When he asked Kronid Lyubarsky, editor of Strana i m ir (The Country and the W orld), to publish his response, Lyubarsky responded that NTS was an undemocratic political party and that Vladim ov should never have accepted the editorship of G rani: To agree to [be editor o f] Grani was a sin against principles, and now you are paying the price. There is som ething in you r act that rem inds me o f the explanations o f certain young people when they jo in the Communist Party o f the Soviet Union — that they want to reform it from within. Lyubarsky, who had refused to sign the letter of protest over Vladim ov's firing, now declined to publish Vladimov's letter on the grounds that Strana i m ir directed its attention exclusively to Soviet affairs, not émigré quarrels. The editors of Strana i mir, Lyubarsky wrote, "were not about to lower themselves to the level of an 'Editor's Colum n’” — a reference to Vladim ir Maksimov's column in Kontinent.
• The list of signatories w as impressive: Vasily Aksenov, Lyudmila Alekseeva, Gennady Andreev, Sergei Babênyshev, Aleksandr Batchan, Joseph Brodsky, Vladim ir Bukovsky, Tom as Venclova, G alina Vishnevskaya, Aleksandr Galich, Aleksandr Genis, Yury Glazov, Natal'ya Gorbanevskaya, Fridrikh Gorenshtein, Tat'yana Goricheva, Anatoly Gladilin, Aleksandr G lezer, Pëtr and Zinaida Grigorenko, Sergei Dovlatov, Natal'ya Dyuzheva, Pêtr Égides, Violeta Iverni, Feliks Kandel', Lev Kopelev, Anatoly Krasnov-Levitin, Èduard Kuznetsov, ll'ya Levin, Mikhail Lemkhin, Lev Losev, Yury Lyubimov, Mihajlo Mihajlov, Vladim ir Maksimov, Vladim ir Malinkovich, Vladim ir Maram zin, Èduard Neizvestny, Viktor Nekrasov, Vyacheslav Nechaev, Raisa Orlova, Dmitry Panin, Boris Paramonov, Tat'yana Plyushch, Kirill Pomerantsev, Vasily and E. Rakitin, Tam ara Sam sonova, Kira Sapgir, Sasha Sokolov, Vyacheslav and S. Sorokin, Andrei Tarkovsky, V era Tol'ts, Viktor and R. Fedoseev, Èitan Finkel'shtein, Tat'yana Khodorovich, Aleksei Tsvetkov, Sem en Chertok, Mikhail Shemyakin, Efim Ètkind, and L. Yudovich.
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Kontinent had been founded in Paris in 1974 with the goal of providing a forum, not just for exiled Russian writers, but for free thought throughout Eastern Europe. Thanks to assistance from Axel Springer, the conservative W est German publisher, the journal was able to pay royalties to authors and, according to Maksimov, achieved a print run of up to 4,000 copies. The journal rapidly evolved into one of the principal publications of the émigré community. Maksimov responded to Lyubarsky in his "Editor's Column”: Just compare the list o f m y authors and editorial hoard, including Andrei Sakharov, with your own to convince yourself that your editorial aspirations are ludicrous. That is what keeps you (and the KGB) from sleeping peacefully. It's easy to correct this situation, Lyubarsky: you sim ply have to make your own edition ju s t as serious and rich in content. B ut for that you need intelligence and talent, and in that respect nature has sidestepped you and your colleagues. D o n t worry about lowering yourself to the level o f m y "Editor's Column, ” because that danger does not threaten you; it's too high fo r you. Alas, it's impossible to fall low er than the level to which you have already descended. Conversations about questions o f p-r-rrinciple sound alm ost blasphemous coming from you; your reputation in that respect is well known. You have long since come to symbolize a total lack o f principle in our émigré community. A nd your dem agoguery about democracy is equally worthless. You ought to fear democracy in our country m ore than the plague, because if a dem ocratic order is ever established in Russia, a ll the more inevitable w ill be its vengeance for a ll the tricks o f you and your "dear friends” — tricks that you have committed, are committing, and (I am certain) have ye t to com m it in our political emigration. For better or worse, Maksimov's tone was not unusual in émigré publications. In the early 1990s he gave up editorship of the journal, and it moved to Russia. One of the more radically conservative journals was Veche (Town Meeting), founded in 1981 in Munich and conceived as a publication of the Russian "Nationalist, Orthodox” movement. Among Veche's declared antagonists were such "democratic” publications as Sinyavsky and Rozanova's Sintaksis (Syntax), which — according to the editors of Veche — had been created with the sole purpose of engendering hatred for Russia. Golos zarubezh'ya (Voice of the Emigration), another Munich journal, was also a bitter enemy; Nikolai Nefedov in a Veche article attacked it for "slowly but surely ... being transform ed from a Russian journal into a Russian-language journal," while the response of Golos zarubezh'ya was to accuse contributors
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of Veche of having had Nazi connections in the past and of now being Soviet agents and murderers. Another target of Veche was the New York newspaper Novoe russkoe slovo (The New Russian Word), which it described as "Jewish” and "Russophobic.” The Parisian newspaper Russkaya m ysl' (Russian Thought) was regarded as "not blatantly Jewish,” but as indifferent and deprecatory with regard to things Russian. Strana i m ir was created by Lyubarsky in 1984 and financed with American intelligence funds to support the hum an-rights movement, and ceased publication in 1992 when the funding was cut off. Altogether, 69 issues appeared. Lyubarsky returned to Russia, while his co-editor, Boris Khazanov, repeatedly attacked both in Golos zarubezh'ya and Veche, remained in Munich. After Andrei Sinyavsky published his Strolls with Pushkin in 1976, he suddenly found himself ostracized by the conservative ém igré publishing "establishm ent.”“ He and his wife, Mariya Rozanova, solved the problem in the classical émigré fashion: they founded their own journal, Sintaksis (Syntax), in 1978. By the tim e they got around to issue No. 4, the following year, they themselves were often forced to reject manuscripts and defend themselves against accusations of "censorship.” In the words of Yuliya Vishnevskaya, a supporter of the Sinyavskys, "a magazine is not a parliam ent.” Sintaksis, which still appears on an irregular basis, holds to an anti-nationalist platform . The journal Strelets (Archer) was founded by the poet and art historian Aleksandr Glezer in 1984 and, until 1989, when it was converted to an almanac, appeared m onthly,6 having originally been conceived in 1982 under the title Literatum yi kur'er (the Literary Courier) as an émigré response to the Soviet Literatum aya gazeta (Literary Gazette). Founded in a period of dram atic changes when a number of writers, both émigré and Soviet, were having difficulty in publishing their works, this New Jersey publication suffered from the usual financial crises, and appeared largely thanks to the enthusiasm and dedication of its editor. In keeping with the Russian tradition, political material coexisted with artistic, but literature and art were the core of the publication. Like some other émigré publications, the journal also issued a number of reprints of works from earlier periods — a fact which seemed to belie its claim of being flooded with original manuscripts. Unlike Kontinent and Grani, Strelets lacked outside
•S ee interview with Andrei Sinyavsky and Mariya Rozanova for their view of the question in Conversations in Exile (1990), Besedy v izgnanii (1991). b1989 editorial board: Vasily Aksenov, Dmitry Bobyshev, René G uerra, Vadim Kreid, Yury Kublanovsky, Georgy Vladimov, and Sergei Yur'enen.
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funding, and there were com plaints that it presented largely "marginal” ém igré authors. Nevertheless, it was of a high quality and was well received. The Blue Lagoon o f Modem Russian Poetry, edited by Konstantin Kuz'minsky and Grigory Kovalêv, was a large multi-volume undertaking intended to represent "non-official” or "underground” Russian poetry and art, as opposed to the selection offered in other émigré journals: Novyi zhum al supposedly presented only a token offering of modern poets; G rani was spurned out of hand; Sovremennik (The Contemporary), edited by Aleksandr Gidoni in Canada, had no taste; Arkady Rovner’s Gnosis was "excrement”; Sion (Zion), a Russian-language journal in Israel, "rotted away”; Kontinent was a "failed hope”; Tret'ya volna (The Third Wave) was printed on good paper but was uninteresting; and Kovcheg (The Arc), founded in 1978 by Arvid Kron and Nikolai Bokov, was too indiscriminate in its materials. Only Glagol (The Word), published by Carl and Ellendea Proffer, was deemed promising by Kuz'minsky and Kovalêv. Golos zarubezh'ya (Voice of the Emigration) was edited by Vera Pirozhkova in Munich and printed in Israel. It was founded in 1976, when Zhum al zarubezh'ya (Journal Abroad) folded; it had been in existence since 1963 or 1964 under the editorship of Sergei Fryulikh. Golos zarubezh'ya was essentially a Second-Wave journal which saw itself inundated by a flood of publications by Third-Wave figures. The polemical tone of the magazine was set by the regularly featured survey of the émigré press written by Vladim ir Rudinsky in Paris. Rudinsky spared virtually no one in his bellicose remarks, but even his ill-wishers waited eagerly to see whom he would rake over the coals in the latest issue. I asked Ms. Pirozhkova to list which writers she would not publish. She responded: Boris Khazanov ("Russophobe”), Viktor Perel'man ("praises Stalinism”), Èduard Limonov ("pornographic”), and Lev Kopelev ("pro-Soviet”). Her list was quite extensive, including such figures as Aleksandr Yanov, Vadim Belotserkovsky, Pëtr Vail' and Aleksandr Genis, Aleksandr Zinov'ev, and others. This sort of unpublished blacklist was the rule rather than the exception for Russian émigré letters. W hen the Soviet Union collapsed, Western funding for émigré journals dried up, but there was another problem as well. Even before the revolution, the émigré press had presented itself as a "spark” (the title of Lenin's exile newspaper, Iskra) of free Russian thought. In the Soviet period, too, the émigrés could publish things that were unthinkable in Russia, and they enjoyed a special aura in Russia — an ambience of freedom, even though their real mood was often that of the ém igré ghetto. With the breakup of the Soviet Union, however, the overwhelm ing m ajority of the works that were form erly published
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abroad began appearing in Russia. The exiles naturally wanted to jum p into the thick of the political fray — in publications coming out in Russia. Thus émigré publishers and journals became, in the eyes of some, superfluous. W hy should an émigré writer send an article or a story to an ém igré journal with a print run of 1,000 copies (usually even less) when he could publish it in a magazine with a much larger circulation in Russia? The same was true for books. Émigré writers now routinely send their works to Russia for publication there, and most of the émigré publishing houses and journals have dosed, even though publication in Russia is still no easy task, either. Perhaps the most im portant publishing house during the socalled "period of stagnation” was Ardis, founded in 1971 in Ann Arbor, Michigan, by Carl and Ellendea Proffer, two American scholar-editors who sympathized with the plight of Russian letters. They brought out hundreds of titles — translation, reprints, émigré and Soviet works, and even scholarly monographs. One of their form er employees, Igor' Efimov, and his w ife Marina later split off from Ardis and established Hermitage Press, first in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and then in Englewood, New Jersey. Once published and distributed, books are inevitably reviewed before reaching the lay reader. The nature of émigré life makes for a non-critical attitude to authors by editors and critics. The émigré literary community is relatively sm all; the editor who rejects a poem or the critic who criticizes a novel can usually count on meeting the author at a social gathering before very long. Moreover, these editors and critics know that many of these authors finance the publication of their own works out of modest fam ily budgets and have little hope of ever reaching a broad audience. The result is that reviews are either amorphously positive or devastating (personal enm ities displayed in print). When Nina Berberova arrived in New York from Europe, Roman Gul' met her and carried her luggage, and when Novyi zhurnal, which he edited, celebrated its 25th anniversary at New York University in 1967, he asked her to speak. But Berberova, despite her intelligence and erudition, was hardly known for her kindness and delicacy, and they had a falling out. For all his graciousness and kindness, Gul' was not one to endure rudeness silently and when he reviewed her memoirs, The Italics are Mine (Kursiv moi), he accused her of lying, ignorance, and any number of other sins. Berberova was so outraged that she responded in the most heated terms in the second edition. It was a typical settling of scores in the incestuous émigré world. Thus, the shortage of critics and the consequent lack of artistic self-discipline has been a recurrent problem in Russian émigré literature.
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Prose Writers Writers of High Seriousness To write a real book about your own country, you first have to leave it. Jean-Jacques Rousseau W ith some eight years in forced-labor camps behind him, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (b. 1918) resolved to subm it the manuscript of One Day in the Life o f Ivan Denisovich (Odin den' v zhizni Ivana Denisovicha) for publication after Khrushchêv delivered his famous speech denouncing Stalin at the 22nd Communist Party Congress in 1961. Aleksandr Tvardovsky, editor of the most im portant "liberal” Soviet so-called "thick journal” Novyi m ir (New World), showed the novella to Khrushchêv, who personally approved it for publication, although he appears to have perused it only casually. For a while it appeared that Solzhenitsyn's two novels Cancer Ward (Rakovyi korpus) and First Circle (V kruge pervom) might also be published in the U.S.S.R., but after Khrushchëv's fall from power Solzhenitsyn was first harassed (to a large extent at the persistent instigation of Yury Andropov, who was then Chairman of the KGB), then arrested by the authorities in 1974, and shortly thereafter deported. As a pensioner, Khrushchêv later expressed regret at having permitted Ivan Denisovich to be published. He maintained that this decision had contributed to his fall from office. Stripped of his Soviet citizenship, Solzhenitsyn became one of the true "exiles,” never having even tacitly consented to his own banishment. The Nobel Prize came in 1970. If one considers that Pasternak would have been sent into exile if he had not agreed to reject the prize and published an appeal asking that he not be separated from his country, four of Russia's five Nobel Prize winners in literature stood "on the other side of the barriers.” Only Mikhail Sholokhov, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1965, was a supporter of the regime (and a vehem ent one, at that). The official Soviet position with regard to Solzhenitsyn was unequivocal: he was an enemy of Russia and a puppet of the Cold W ar. There were the usual attacks on him signed by average citizens who had not read any of his works, but this was simply a repetition of w hat had happened many times in the past to other writers. Especially disheartening was the eagerness with which other Russian writers attacked him: The Soviet W rite rs, Union: In his "Open L e tte r he [Solzhenitsyn] has proved that his position is alien to our
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people and their literature, and in so doing has dem onstrated the necessity, justice, and inevitability o f his expulsion from the Union o f Soviet Writers.... Konstantin Simonov: Solzhenitsyn’s activities m ore and more step outside the bounds o f literature and have gradually acquired an openly anticom m unist and anti-Soviet nature. Yury Bondarev: A sense o f a vicious hatred, as if he were settling scores with the entire nation which offended him, is seedling volcano-like within Solzhenitsyn. He suspects every Russian o f a lack o f principle and backwardness, attributing to them a desire for an easy life, for power. A nd in an ecstasy o f self-degradation and rage he tears the shirt from his own body, shouting that he him self could become the executioner.... Sergei Mikhalkov: It was not Solzhenitsyn's expulsion from the Soviet W riters’ Union that was a mistake, bu t His prem ature admission to membership. Valentin Kataev: / had a feeling o f relie f when I read that the Supreme Soviet had stripped Solzhenitsyn o f citizenship and that our society was free o f him.... Konstantin Fedin: It is high time to expose to the Soviet public the true face o f this internal émigré. Mariètta Shaginyan: I'm am azed we tolerate this scum. Expelled from Russia, Solzhenitsyn purchased an estate in Cavendish, Vermont, and isolated himself, not only from the W estern m edia (at which he once literally threw stones), but from most of the émigré community as well. When invited to a luncheon for ém igré figures in the W hite House in 1982, he declined to participate, saying that he could not associate himself with émigré "politicians and dissidents.”3 He claimed to regard himself prim arily as a writer, not a political activist, and was irritated that the reading public was mainly interested in this secondary capacity. This dem onstrative gesture was met with considerable bitterness in some quarters. One of those who took offense at Solzhenitsyn's statem ent was Kronid Lyubarsky, a form er trustee of the Solzhenitsyn Fund to aid Soviet dissidents. Lyubarsky reminded Solzhenitsyn of the large number of Russian
•The other participants w ere Pëtr Grigorenko (a form er Soviet general who had been active in defending the rights of the Crim ean dissidents), Georgy Vins (the representative of the Evangelical Baptists), Valery Chalidze (editor of The Chronicle o f Hum an Events -- a publication which documented the persecution of Soviet dissidents), Aishe Seitm uratova (the representative of the Crim ean Tartars), Andrei Sinyavsky, Pavel Litvinov (one of the founders of the Soviet civil-rights movement and a participant in demonstration against the invasion of Czechoslo vakia), and Mark Azbel' (a form er leader of the Soviet Jewish m ovem ent).
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writers who under the Tsars had not hesitated to become involved in politics, for some reason including in his list Fëdor Tyutchev, a pillar of the regime. Despite his disclaimers, however, Solzhenitsyn had no intention whatsoever of distancing himself from politics and proceeded to launch a violent attack on the very idea of a pluralistic society as evidence of "degradation, loss of depth, indifference, relativism, nonsense, errors, and lies.” Democracy fared little better in his view: Freedom I To fill people's mailboxes, eyes, ears, and brains with com m ercial rubbish against their will, to show television program s that are impossible to watch with a sense o f coherence. Freedom I To force inform ation on people, taking no account o f their right no t to accept it o r their right to peace o f mind. Freedom I For publishers and film producers to poison the younger generations with corrupting filth. Freedom l For adolescents o f 14 to 18 to immerse themselves in idleness and pleasure instead o f intensive study and spiritual growth.... Freedom l For strikers ... to deprive a ll other citizens o f a norm al life.... Freedom l For speeches o f exoneration when the law yer him self is aware o f the guilt o f the accused.... Freedom l F or vulgar, casual pens to slide irresponsibly over the surface o f any problem .... Freedom l To divulge the defence secrets o f one's country for personal political gain.... Solzhenitsyn denied accusations that he wished to reestablish a new Byzantine theocracy or heavy-handed Russian nationalism and that his ideological criteria were based on "blood relations.” Even so, while he condemned the forced resettlem ent of the Crimean Tartars, he defended his statem ent on the topic: If we have offended someone who earlier offended us, our gu ilt is no t so serious; the shadow o f his own g u ilt throws a countershadow. Russia's Tartar yoke w ill always dilute any possible transgressions on our pa rt with regard to fragments o f the Horde. If Solzhenitsyn the artist and dissident had form erly been lionized in the West, such views were now perceived as authoritarian and intolerant. The Russian-Yugoslav dissident Mihaylo Mihajlov accused him of replacing the struggle for freedom and human rights with the struggle for nationalism, of a "constant confusion of religious, spiritual, national, Orthodox, and Christian rebirth,” while Valery Chalidze, a prom inent figure in the struggle for human rights, accused him of wanting to create "National Communism.” An added twist to the criticism were accusations of "anti-Sem itism .” In his Red Wheel Solzhenitsyn hypothesized that Russia could have escaped communism if the Russian head of state Pêtr Stolypin had not been
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murdered by the Jewish Social Revolutionary Dmitry Bogrov in 1911. He has also pointed out that it was another Jew, Aleksandr Izrail' Parvus-Gel'fand, who persuaded Lenin to accept the German proposal to smuggle him back into Russia in a sealed railroad car. Even though Solzhenitsyn was defended by a number of prom inent Russian Jews, the suspicion of anti-Semitism stuck in the minds of many and poisoned the atmosphere around him in America. So heavy was the censure levelled against him that he himself, in despair, gathered up the chief accusations: A falsifier o f facts.... a reactionary utopian.... He ceased to be a w riter and became a politician.... He likes to defend Nicholas /.... [Solzhenitsyn's bo ok]Lenin in Zürich is a historical pamphlet, a caricature.... Bankrupt.... He sublim ates ignorance in prophetic visions.... Homeric intellectual pretensions.... Calls up spirits in witch-doctor fashion.... Totally despises the Russian conscience.... Moralism feeding upon a base o f nihilism .... A level o f consciousness which is very sim ple and near to that o f the overwhelming majority, hence its accessibility.... A fanatic with associative rather than logical thought processes.... Foam on the lips, a paroxysm o f hate.... A political extremist.... A lone wolf.... A sm all man, vengeful and em bittered.... Raised on flattery.... Totally lost contact with reality.... A sleepwalker living in a world o f mummies.... Lies easily.... Attem pts to spread m onarchistic views b y playing on the people's religious and patriotic feelings.... Neo-Stalinist.... Lenin and Solzhenitsyn share an identical lack o f understanding o f freedom.... In his opinion the com m unist system is inappropriate fo r Russia only in that it is un-Russian (and not because it is atheistic and bloody).... Capitulated in the face o f totalitarianism .... A vicious supporter o f clerical totalitarianism .... The Ayatollah o f Russia.... If he were to achieve power, Solzhenitsyn would provide a dangerous variant on the current Soviet regim e.... His conduct is program m ed by the political mummies who once supported Hitler.... The danger o f a new fascism.... In his serm ons and political and social com m entary we see an amorality, a dishonesty, and anti-Sem itism o f the N azi variety.... A nd finally: The ideological founder o f a new GULAG. Solzhenitsyn dismissed his W estern critics as a leftist m afia which controls the W estern press and condemned his "pluralist” opponents as form er "Marxist philosophers, journalists, essayists, lecturers, movie and radio directors, even propaganda specialists who worked for the Central Committee (of the Soviet Communist Party), outside experts used by the Central Committee, and even
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prosecutors!” Persons of this sort, he claimed, refused to recognize their guilt before the Russian people, but instead preferred to blame the people for the evils of the system. But criticism of Solzhenitsyn was not limited to the political sphere. The late American scholar Edgar Lehrman summed up the W estern literary perception of his works by comparing him with Tolstoi, who devoted the end of his life to moralistic and religious works rather than literature as such. Reviewing Solzhenitsyn’s memoir The C alf Butted the O ak Tree (Bodalsya telênok s dubom), Lehrman bemoaned the "first-draft quality” of the work: "If Solzhenitsyn has now contracted Tolstoi's disease, may God have mercy on Russian literature!” Solzhenitsyn's chief literary activity in exile was the continuation of his Red W heel (Krasnoe koleso), a multi-volume historical novel about Russia during W orld W ar I and the 1917 October coup. Originally intended to occupy some 40 massive "knots” (uzly; meaning volumes), the project was abandoned after only four volumes appeared. They are full of historical documents and transcripts and failed to arouse anything like the form er level of interest which Solzhenitsyn had enjoyed among both Russian and Western readers. Curiously, although Solzhenitsyn is generally regarded as belonging to the classical tradition of Russian literature, one critic, Lev Losev, advanced a diam etrically opposite view — that Solzhenitsyn is actually closer to such m odernist writers as Bely and Dos Passos. In Losev’s view Solzhenitsyn is actually an innovator, a "post-m odernist,” and the "knots” of his Red Wheel represent a sort of double helix, twisting around each other in a tim e frame comprehensible only to the author while the protagonists remain fixed in poses of immobility. Fridrikh Gorenshtein (b. 1932) was best known in the Soviet Union for such film scripts as Solyaris and Slave o f Love (Raba lyubvi). He contributed to the unofficial almanac M etropol' in 1979 and em igrated to W est Germany in 1980. Although clearly a major talent, he found him self largely left out of the mainstream of Russian émigré letters and attracted little attention from Western critics. Gorenshtein refers to his own major work, Psalm (Psalom), as a rom an-razm yshlenie — a novel of reflections. Constructed in the form of five parables, it tells the story of Dan, the Antichrist and apocryphal brother of Jesus. Dan has been sent by God to Earth to witness the four torm ents described by the Prophet Ezekiel — the sword, famine, the beast (interpreted as lust), and disease. Born in Ukraine in 1933, Dan arrives during a highpoint in the second torment, that of hunger. He passes untouched through the fam ine caused by the collectivization of agriculture, W orld W ar II, and the anti-Jewish campaign of the late 1940s, and in the process begets several illegitim ate children, who are them selves destined to fulfill prophetic roles. One of them he fathers
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with his own adopted daughter. After conceiving a son who will carry on after he is gone, Dan dies. For him death is a return to God, and the events of his earthly life fly away from him like a dream. Throughout the work he is more a witness than a participant. W ritten from a deeply religious viewpoint, the book presents the Bible as the only true source of knowledge. In it a Russia which has rejected religion vainly attem pts to erect a Tower of Babel while spurning the majesty and sim plicity of Biblical wisdom, thus undermining God's will and dooming civilization. Gorenshtein compares God's truth with a cup. It is a modest artifact, but when dashed to the floor, it shatters into a multitude of complicated pieces. Thus has man smashed the sim ple vessel of his Creator's wisdom. Each of the five "parables” constituting the novel is preceded by philosophical reflections on the meaning of the Bible. These are followed by tragic incidents in Soviet life, in which small children are raised in conditions of ignorance, witness terrible violence, suffer hunger and deprivation, and themselves perish. Just as Joseph Brodsky sought to return to a classic vision of everyday life in his verse, so Gorenshtein tried in this work to resurrect a Biblical vision. This is a deeply philosophical work. W hether it is also a novel is open to question. Published in 1984, Gorenshtein's Atonem ent (Iskuplenie) tells the story of a Russian girl who denounces her own mother for stealing food — to feed the very child who betrays her. The daughter, who is depicted as a vessel of evil, falls in love with a young Jewish lieutenant whose fam ily was murdered, their bodies thrown into an outhouse pit. The m other ultim ately returns from prison and both m other and daughter give birth, atoning for the sins of a vicious world by giving life. Despite the them e of redemption, the violence and rage of the w ork are as total as they are overwhelming. Gorenshtein's play Berdichev is a description of life in a sm all Jewish town in what was the form er Pale of Settlem ent. Essentially, the play harks back to Gor*ky's "Lower Depths,” but in the atm osphere of the shtetl, and the action is limited to quarrels with fam ily and neighbors. It fits into the essentially inert tradition of Russian dram a — Ostrovsky, Chekhov, Gorsky — which emphasizes dialogue and minimizes action. Berdichev describes the life of a fam ily over the course of several decades. When the play was published in the ém igré journal Vremya i m y (Time & We), the editor received a number of com plaints about the negative presentation of Jewish life. Gorenshtein, however, views the quarrelsome atmosphere which he describes as his home. The plot revolves around a character who goes to Moscow and becomes a respected intellectual. On a visit home to Berdichev he states that he can no more reject the environm ent he came from than
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he can reject his own nose. He explicitly repudiates moral universalism and sees him self first and forem ost as a Jew. The play is characterized by an absence of action, with stress laid on local color, musical inserts, and mood. It is an ideological statem ent inserted into an artistic text. Gorenshtein lives in Berlin, having come to Germany, in his own words, to "settle scores” with that country. He may well be Russia's gloom iest writer. Yury Kashkarov (1940-1994) was a historian and prose writer who emigrated in 1976 and settled in the United States in 1980. In 1984 he began working as an editor of Novyi Zhurnal and became editor-in-chief after Roman Gul"s death in 1986. His Words o f Tsars and Days (Slovesa tsarei i dnei), which appeared in 1991, is a collection of stories and reminiscences. Kashkarov's manner is rem iniscent of Chekhov's, combining a deep feeling for traditional Russia with a revulsion for the Soviet overlay on rural life. In A Coffin From Luanda (Grob iz Luandy), the cremated remains of a Russian émigré are delivered to a Russian customs facility, and an official, hoping to find narcotics, samples the gritty powder on his tongue — to the laughter of his co-workers. At the same tim e another customs employee discovers that the large box from Luanda which she had been ignoring and against which she had painfully bumped her leg contains the remains of her own husband. The story M ount Athos (Afon) is a nostalgic and moody memoir of a visit to what in Russia was by then a long lost way of monastic life. Kashkarov himself at one point wished to take vows as a monk on Mount Athos. The general atm osphere of his work is morose, and the theme of futility appears frequently. In taking over the helm of Novyi zhurnal, Kashkarov attem pted to preserve its character as a publication of the older group. Georgy Vladim ov's (b. 1931) Three Minutes o f Silence (Trl minuty molchaniya), about life on a Soviet trawler, was the last long prose work Tvardovsky published in Novyi mir. It was attacked in a series of reviews containing such traditional Soviet headlines as "In A Twisted M irror,” "A False Course,” "Intellectual Sandbanks and Reefs,” "W ho Needs This Book!” and "Whom Are You Saving, Vladimov?” Vladim ov's Faithful Ruslan (Vernyi Ruslan) tells of a guard dog which is unable to adapt to life outside the forced-labor camps and continues to try to force people to line up in formation. After the politically loaded work was published in the West, the Soviet authorities again granted Vladim ov limited permission to publish his works, but he emigrated anyway in 1983. Once abroad, he republished Three M inutes o f Silence, including not only passages cut out by the censor, but even rewriting others, thus blurring the line separating Soviet from émigré fiction.
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The Aesthetes There is no such thing as a m oral o r an im m oral book. Books are well written, o r badly written. That is all. Oscar W ilde A number of émigré writers managed to smuggle out completed manuscripts. In many cases these books were intended from the very beginning for publication abroad and are just as much a cause of emigration as a by-product of it. Boris Khazanov's (b. 1928) novel A ntiTime: A M oscow Novel (Antivremya: Moskovskii roman) was written in 1976, but published only in 1984 — two years after the author left the Soviet Union to settle in W est Germany. The novel begins as a nostalgic romantic autobiography of a young Jewish mah who learns that he is adopted. His real father, who had been a loyal revolutionary, has been released from prison and has decided to emigrate, but feels he has no moral right to leave his son behind. Russia, he says, is a land without hope, without a future, and its people are as incurable as the country itself. Like many Jews, he had believed in the revolution and fought for it, but now he realizes that the tim e has come to leave. Territory, nation, clothing styles, language are only an episode for the Jews — like the role of an actor who plays Hamlet today and Polonius tomorrow. The young man refuses to go with him and returns home to discover an ugly scene in which the apartm ent of his adoptive parents, who are Russian, has been searched by the authorities. In a concluding scene of futile rage and love, the stepfather threatens the secret police agents with a gun in order to protect his adopted son, only to be led away to prison himself. The Russian man who raised a Jewish son and sacrificed himself for him thus embodies the same Russia as the Russia of the police henchmen. A literary scholar, Andrei Sinyavsky (1925-1997) began clandestinely to publish artistic prose in the W est in 1959 under the pen-name Abram Terts: two short novels, Lyubim ov and The Trial Begins (Sud idêt), a number of short stories, and a collection of aphorisms entitled Unguarded Thoughts (Mysli vrasplokh). In Lyubim ov his protagonist uses mass hypnosis to convince the residents o f a small town that he can turn a river into champagne and create a utopian state. Sinyavsky also criticized Socialist Realism and called for a literature of the grotesque and phantasmagoric fantasy. In Septem ber of 1965 he was arrested together with Yuly Daniel', who had been smuggling works out to the W est under the pseudonym Nikolai Arzhak. Daniel"s novel, This is M oscow Speaking (Govorit Moskva), is a fantasy in which the governm ent perm its random
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mayhem during a "Day of Public Murders.” W ithin a few months the two men were put on public trial in an atmosphere reminiscent of the show trials of the late 1930s. The affair attracted considerable attention in the W estern press and served to mark a significant tightening of the ideological screw clamping literature to the behemoth of State. Neither Sinyavsky nor Daniel' agreed to recant, and both were sentenced to hard labor. W hereas Daniel' elected to remain in the U.S.S.R. upon his release in 1970, Sinyavsky, released in 1971, chose to emigrate to France in 1973 together with his wife Mariya Rozanova. There he taught Russian literature at the Sorbonne. W hile in the camps, Sinyavsky was permitted to write two letters a month, with no lim itations on their length. The censors perm itted these letters to be sent since they did not violate the regulations forbidding discussion of politics or the difficult living conditions in the camp. It was from these lengthy (15 to 20 pages) letters that Sinyavsky constructed Strolls with Pushkin (Progulki s Pushkinym) and A Voice From the Chorus (Golos iz khora). The latter consists of philosophical musings and overheard camp anecdotes, but these fragm ents are united by their "point of discovery” — the forcedlabor camp in which Sinyavsky found himself. In a very real sense Sinyavsky's creative life represented a chain of em igrations: the psychological alienation of the Soviet "inner em igrant,” the emigration of his clandestinely penned work to the W est as what in the Soviet period was known as tamizdat, "published there,” and the physical emigration of the man himself. Ironically, this sequence was to culm inate in a sort of émigré "inner emigration.” Although Sinyavsky was initially greeted by the émigré community as a hero, after he described Pushkin as a "contemporary Charlie Chaplin strutting about in rhyme,” he became the subject of heated criticism, even abuse, by émigré readers, just as Solzhenitsyn had been. A fter his arrival in the West, Sinyavsky remained active as a scholar, publishing a major critical study of Gogol', written in Russia, and a book on the prose writer Vasily Rozanov. He also produced a controversial autobiographical Bildungsroman: Good Night (Spokoinoi nochi). The novel, which was actually written as well as published outside Russia, employs a fragmented approach reminiscent of Unguarded Thoughts and A Voice From the Chorus, but the fragments are linked by more than just the author's perception. Generically, Good N ight is neither fish nor fowl. Part factual, part fantasy, part novel, part autobiography, it grew out of Sinyavsky's aesthetic world view. Much of the work is a meandering through the author's often quite whimsical memories, which are sandwiched between the arrests of Sinyavsky's father and of Sinyavsky himself. The conclusion of the novel describes his relationship to a French woman, Hélène Pelletier-Zamoiska, who
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smuggled his manuscripts out to the West. The narration frequently shifts into stream-of-consciousness m usings— on spiritualism, politics, Russian history, and fam ily relationships. The description of Stalin's death is interlaced with scenes from the Time of Troubles, the m urder of the young Tsarevich in Uglich, and allusions to the false Dmitry. Virtually unstructured in the traditional sense, the work exhibits no plot developm ent and little adherence to any chronological fram ework. The reader wanders through the author's fanciful mindscape, rarely conscious of a goal and often losing patience with the author's undirected mental comings and goings, although there is more coherence in the book than is immediately apparent. In the novel, Sinyavsky revealed that his childhood classm ate Sergei Khmel'nitsky served as a political inform er for the KGB and was responsible for the arrests of two colleagues. Khmel'nitsky later was drawn into a KGB plot against Zamoiska (who was the daughter o f the French m ilitary attaché). After Khmel'nitsky himself ended up emigrating, he admitted his complicity in both affairs, but not only protested the totally black picture painted of him by Sinyavsky but even levelled a number of counter-accusations against Sinyavsky, the main one being that Sinyavsky himself had served as a KGB inform er in the plot against Zamoiska. Sinyavsky and Zamoiska both testified that Sinyavsky had revealed the KGB contact to Zamoiska and that together they attem pted to dupe the KGB. Born in 1943 in Canada, where his parents were part of a Soviet intelligence network that passed U.S. nuclear secrets to the Soviet Union, Sasha Sokolov returned to North Am erica in 1975 and the next year published his first novel, an introverted and highly stylized work entitled A School for Fools (Shkola dlya durakov), written while he was still in the Soviet Union. After that he wrote two other novels: Between Dog and W olf (Mezhdu sobakoi i volkom) and Palisandriya (English title — Astrophobia). Sokolov's subject m atter is nearly as intricate as his style — so much so that one m ight have expected him to work in genres shorter than the novel. When I interviewed him, I asked him to retell the subject of Between W olf and Dog. His disjointed response threatened to ramble on at such length that I finally had to shift the conversation to other topics. Sokolov leans toward stylistic innovation and game, rather than the ideological prophecy of many of his contemporaries. At various tim es he has stated that his artistic goal has been to "put an end to the novel as a genre” and "raise Russian prose to the level of poetry.” Indeed, for Sokolov language is more a goal than a means. Palisandriya is a mock memoir by a Kremlin insider in the year 2044, The protagonist, Palisandr Dai'berg, is a descendent of both Rasputin and Beriya, and has inadvertently caused the death of Stalin.
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He is also the winner of a Nobel Prize for leadership of the herm aphrodite civil rights struggle. Parody and satire are the key words to classify this work. Here, as in his other novels, Sokolov is first and forem ost a verbal artisan, a master of stylistic filigree. The novel has been, appropriately, discussed by the American Slavist Donald Barton Johnson as one of the first Russian contributions to international "m agic realism,” alongside Günter Grass's Tin Drum, Gabriel G arcia Marquez’s One Hundred Years o f Solitude, and Salman Rushdie’s M idnight Children. W ithin the Russian tradition, Sokolov's closest literary relative is Andrei Bely. The complexity of his novels has put off a number of readers who, while recognizing his talent, shunt him away to the "not-m y-cup-of-tea” category. Certainly his very strengths require no small effort on the part of readers who wish to follow the architecture of his style. At the same tim e the non-Russian reading public is unlikely to appreciate him because his very strengths are precisely those which are inevitably ground up in the translator's mill. Thus, even more than other writers, Sokolov will have difficulty in truly coming into his own outside Russia. Aleksei Kovalêv (b. 1944) is in many ways close to Sokolov; in foreign literatures Proust and Joyce come to mind first. His theatrical novel, W hat's Hecuba to Him (Chto emu Gekuba), is the description of a state of mind, a confusion on the part of an actor playing Hamlet between his real life and his role on stage. The novel's very title refers to Hamlet's emotional involvement with a mythological figure in the play he intends to stage before his mother and her new husband. Kovalêv was him self a professional actor in Russia, and the figure of the theater director in the novel actually depicts the Russian director Anatoly Èfros. Plot plays a secondary role, at best. Instead, the reader is confronted with fleeting moods and reflections in an overall tone of contem plative alienation. Kovalêv consciously wanted to transm it the dram atic arts through prose, and the novel is an attem pt to conjure an effect rather than tell a story. Also centered around the intersection of myth and the real world, Kovalêv's later novel, Sisyphus (Sizif), recreates the life and fate of one of the most enigmatic figures in Greek mythology. In it, the writer, who is attempting to come to grips with the death of his wife, is confronted with the real figure of Sisyphus, who attem pts to dissuade him from completing his creation. The novel displays a deep cultural background and sensitivity, and at the same tim e is eloquent testim ony that Russia in the person of Mr. Kovalev has returned to its classical roots, so eloquently described by Osip Mandel'shtam a half century earlier. The novels of Boris Fal'kov (b. 1946) are reminiscent of those of Sokolov and Kovalêv. A concert pianist who emigrated to Germany in 1987, he published a series of works after emigrating, some of
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which he had written earlier in the Soviet Union. Fal'kov's manner really fits more into the modern Latin-American tradition than into that of Russian literature, although his ironic detective novels do have precedents in the phantasies and allegories of Nikolai Gogol' and Mikhail Bulgakov. The Nutcracker o r A M anuscript Found in O ld Russa (Shchelkunchik ili Rukopis', naidennaya v Staroi Russe) is a fantastic tale of spies and intrigue set in Leningrad in 1968. If some of its chief actors are rats, that role in Peacemakers (Mirotvortsy), a tale of rebellion in a small Ukrainian town, is played by birds. The gothic novel In the Dream o f Earthly Existence o r M ozart from Karelia (Vo sne zemnogo bytiya ili Motsart is Karelii) is set against the background of a KGB institute seeking to achieve mind control through astrology and necromancy (communication with the dead). Trouvère (Truver), a work written after emigration, combines the style of a detective novel with futurological musings and is set in the Caucasus. The protagonist is an em igrant who has returned home clandestinely to participate in a rebellion which he himself understands poorly. As the action proceeds on the literal plane, the author plays on comparisons with Dante and Job in scenes evocative of the Day of Last Judgment. In the novelette Ham let in Britain (Gamlet v Britanii) the author synthesizes the legend of Hamlet with that of Tristan and in a flourish perhaps derived from musical compositions replicates the work's opening alm ost word for word on the last page. Several of Fal'kov's novels have been translated into German.
Creators of Situations and Ideas N il desperandum (Never despair) Horace W hile still only 17, Aleksandr Zinov’ev (b. 1922) was arrested but managed to escape. He even claims to have conspired to assassinate Stalin with a suicide bomb. In the confusion of the war years he managed to remain at large and became a m ilitary pilot. After the war he completed his education and became a professor of logic with several of his books translated into foreign languages. W hen Yawning Heights (Ziyaushchie vysoty) appeared in Lausanne in 1976, he was fired from his job and deprived of his academic titles and even his apartment. Just two years later he was forced to em igrate and was stripped of Soviet citizenship. He settled in a suburb of Munich. His Soviet citizenship was restored under Gorbachêv in 1990. Like Èduard Kuznetsov, Zinov'ev decided to use literature as a vehicle for political ideas. A logician by profession, he attem pted to use images to present his ideas in the form of Orwellian satire on
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Soviet stereotypes. It was not literature in the traditional sense of the word; "I do not write for entertainm ent,” he commented. Yawning Heights is a large, amorphous work consisting of one and two-page fragm ents which could be rearranged in virtually any order. Zinov'ev him self described his later works The Radiant Future (Svetloe budushchee) and Notes o f a Night Watchman (Zapiski nochnogo storozha) as missing parts of Yawning Heights. Even his The Loony Bin (Zhêltyi dom) is composed in the same fragmented fashion. The Radiant Future describes life in Ibansk, a country with a name that is obscene in Russian; it symbolizes the Soviet Union. Soviet bureaucrats and intellectuals are all given allegorical names; for example, the painter Èrnst Neizvestny is called Mazila (Dauber), Solzhenitsyn is called Pravdin (Mr. Truth), and Stalin is Vozhd' (The Leader). All of them w ithout exception are subjected to devastating ridicule. Zinov'ev's penchant for shocking those around him tended to alienate his fellow émigrés. For example, he once commented that if he were forced to choose tomorrow between the Soviet government and a governm ent run by Solzhenitsyn, he would choose the former. On other occasions he maintained that the émigrés were divorced from life in Russia and thus had nothing to say. Such statements tended to alienate the émigré community, and he complained to me that other ém igré writers were intentionally ignoring him. Since he did not receive a position in teaching or journalism, he had to make his living exclusively through book royalties — a situation that placed him under considerable financial stress. The son of Evgeniya Ginzburg, the author of a well-known memoir about her experiences in a forced-labor camp, Journey into the W hirlwind (Krutoi marshrut), Vasily Aksënov (b. 1932) was educated as a doctor but became popular in Russia as a representative of 1960s youth who rejected the ascetic ideals of the early communist years. In 1979 he and a group of other writers conceived the literary almanac M etropol', which they hoped to publish in the U.S.S.R. in circumvention of governm ent censorship. W hile such an undertaking might well have been perm issible under the later conditions of glasnost', this was one "happening" that was ahead of its time. Aksênov, who had previously been reprimanded by Khrushchêv for his un-communist frivolity, was forced to em igrate in 1980. Ironically, most other participants in this bland, apolitical typed manuscript were eventually forgiven and had their form er privileges in the W riters’ Union reinstated. Aksênov's novel Island Crimea (Ostrov Krym) is itself a docum ent of its tim e — an escapist phantasy of a Taiwan-like state ("Russia M inor” finally acquires its own territory) which has preserved a capitalist system. Its Soviet upper-crust heroes drive fast cars, sport St. Germain cashmere coats, wash their lobsters down with
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champagne, light their Marlboro and W inston cigarettes with Ronson lighters, surround themselves with scantily clad Califom ia-style girls, and fairly wallow in slang. Set alongside his m other's autobiographical account of Stalin's prisons, the novel provides no less eloquent testim ony of a generation gap than did Turgenev's Fathers & Sons in 1862. Aksênov settled in the United States — a country about which he had already published travel impressions in Around the Clock NonStop (Kruglye sutki non-stop) while still a Soviet writer. Ten years later, already an American citizen, he wrote further impressions of Am erica — In Search o f M elancholy Baby (V poiskakh grustnogo bebi). The book, which found an audience in the United States, was true to the Aksênov of form er years — the youthful writer enamored with life in the fast lane, described in a Russian replete with Americanisms. Aksênov's 1994 trilogy M oscow Saga (two volumes in English: Generation o f W inter and The Hero's Winter) is intended to provide an epic sweep through Russian history of the twentieth century. The novel belongs to the European fam ily chronicle popular in the nineteenth century, and thus aspires to be a sort of Forsyth Saga or W ar and Peace. The narration is deliberately traditional, with elements of post modern stylization and fantasy. Structurally, the work unfolds in the manner of television episodes. The story line is polyphonic. The novel opens in Moscow in 1925, in the home of a fam ous surgeon whose children have accepted the spirit of the revolution. The doctor fails to intervene in a sinister operation performed on People's Commissar Frunze, who dies on the operating table. For the rest of his life the professor cannot forgive him self for surrendering to fear and violating his Hippocratic Oath. Volume I closes in 1937, when the surgeon's sons fall victim to the purges, while he him self is nominated to the Supreme Soviet. In a paraphrase of Tolstoi's novel, volume II bears the title "W ar and Prison.” It covers the entire period of the Second W orld W ar and some of the post-war years. During the war one of the surgeon's sons is unexpectedly freed from a prison camp in Kolyma (NorthEastern Siberia) when Moscow is on the verge of being captured by the Germans and given command of an entire army. In yet another paraphrase of Tolstoi, volum e III is entitled "Prison and Peace.” The surgeon's grandson volunteers for the army, only to end up killing Poles instead of fighting Germans. At the end of the 1940s he returns to Moscow and finds the large fam ily apartm ent ransacked: his father has perished and his mother has remarried — the American m ilitary attaché, with whom she has left for the United States. He takes up the life of a Moscow fop and athlete and becomes a champion road racer for the Air Force Sports Club, which is looked after by Stalin's own son. But then Lavrenty Beriya, head of the secret
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police, kidnaps and rapes his cousin and has her husband cruelly beaten. A t the end of the novel the grandfather-surgeon redeems his earlier guilt by denouncing the 1953 "Doctors’ Plot,” and ends up in the Lubyanka Prison. Dozens of plot lines intersect within the novel, treating the reader to a rapid sequence of dram atic love intrigues, betrayals, love found anew, jealousy, and — on occasion — frank eroticism. Aksênov makes rich use of the techniques of collage and montage, employing fragm ents of newspaper articles and "reincarnations” of historical figures as animals, all interwoven into the fabric of an otherwise realistic historical novel. Aleksandr Suslov's (b. 1950) novel Seven Throngs (Shesf sonmov; English title: Loosestrife City) is a truly unusual work for ThirdW ave lite rature— a gothic novel structured around intrigue, dream, and Biblical references. The protagonist is a young woman living with her in-laws and a husband whom she does not love. She gives birth prem aturely and the child is stolen by a woman doctor who conspires with her mother-in-law, who tries to convince her she is mad. The dead return to life, at least in her delirium, and devils and vampires literally lurk in every corner. The reader is never certain whether the action is satanic or the product of nightmare; the heavy mood is reminiscent of Gorenshtein's Psalm, and the manner is surrealistic: A ll the floors, walls, and stairways abruptly collapsed into a fiery furnace, and a pale cleft arose.... She could see the place was em pty o f people, and beyond the river's black glass, dark steps were hewn into a granite c liff edged with trees. A nd precisely because no one was here, her steps resounded loudly, flapping like dark wings against the stone. From the river em erged the dark figure o f a ferryman with a twisted, distant leg; he flung an iron gangplank a t her feet and she crossed over to the stairs. When she looked back, there was neither gangplank nor ferryman — ju s t the prone, black water. A s she raised her head, she saw rising above her 12 enormous columns with stone cornices twisting upward to form arches. From the distant tops o f the columns gardens stirred, and further on she could make out still other columns bearing new parks, pulsating fountains, soaring castle roofs, and the m arble foundations o f bridges reaching into the sky.
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The Natural School Reborn Here in the W e s t... the people strike me as tiny; tiny ants swarming over the m onum ents o f a previous life. The spectacle depresses me bitterly, for the allure o f stones alone is not enough to nourish the soul. Apollon Grigor'ev, 1858 Just as official Soviet painting, sculpture, and architecture strove toward exaggerated, heroic effects, the governmental literary canon called upon the writer to create images of the unbending, selfsacrificing Soviet man. Partly reflecting its sense of im potence and perhaps also partly in unconscious protest against the monumental pose of Soviet culture, the counterculture leaned toward the pointedly antiheroic in all the arts. Bulat Okudzhava, a w riter who did not emigrate, described himself as a "Moscow ant,” reflecting the general mood of the "sixtiers,” many of whom became the émigrés of the 1970s and 1980s. The literary protagonists of émigré literature are ordinary people involved in the everyday trivia of Soviet and émigré life. W hile Brodsky perceived the grandeur and horror of a figure such as General Zhukov, and Gorenshtein created a lofty Biblical image in his Psalm, Anatoly Gladilin, Aleksandr Suslov, Yuz Aleshkovsky, Vladim ir Maramzin, and Éduard Limonov wrote of the little people. It was a rebirth of the "Natural School” of nineteenth-century Russian literature, and its heroes are the multiple offspring of Gogol"s Akaky Akakievich and Dostoevsky's Makar Devushkin. It is this pointed lack of "high seriousness” that is most typically characteristic of the tone and mood of Third-W ave literature. The action takes place in train station cafeterias, dormitories, shared ("communal”) apartments, and collective farms. The protagonists are waitresses, locksmiths, soldiers, harried mothers waiting in line for life's everyday essentials. The characters are passive figures: the Chonkins, Ivan Denisoviches, and Èdichkas. Èduard Limonov (pseudonym of Èduard Savenko, b. 1943) became known (or notorious, depending on one's point of view) in émigré circjes after the appearance of his first novel It's Me — Eddie (Èto ya — Èdichka) in 1979, although he began his literary career as a poet. Limonov is the ultimate "outsider” in Russian society: rebelling against Russian traditional morality as well as aesthetic traditions, he described the life of a social outcast in New York, dwelling in great detail on the protagonist's experiments in homosexuality and fetishism , as well as his heterosexual relationships. Along with his rejection of the sexual mores of traditional society, he also refused to respect the
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political views and authority figures of the émigré community — Solzhenitsyn and Sakharov. Limonov called his work a "novel,” but it m ight more appropriately be called a "memoir,” since it is really a nonfictional autobiography. The work is actually a love story, or — to be more precise — a story of love rejected. In this context, it is unusual in Russian letters in that it is a love story told in profane language. The protagonist finds him self in an America whose scales of measurement place the poet at the bottom of the pecking order. He works as a busboy, envying the waiters their uniforms. All his émigré acquaintances find themselves in the same situation: form er journalists, musicians, underground millionaires, and champion athletes, in Am erica they have become dishwashers, welfare recipients, and common laborers. Limonov is the instinctive revolutionary, rejecting equally the Soviet and the American establishments. Artistically, Limonov is the ultimate realist, reproducing in photographic detail his sensations, observations, and impressions. The critics Pëtr Vail' and Aleksandr Genis identified his manner with that of the traditional Soviet novel, and termed his faithfulness to minutiae, together with his shocking sexual descriptions and "simple-minded” self-analysis, "literary childishness.” In general, such a negative response to Limonov is typical, but he is unquestionably among the most widely read émigré authors. After It's M e— Eddie, Limonov added two more novels to create a trilogy: Teenager Savenko (Podrostok Savenko) and A Young Scoundrel (Molodoi negodyai), both written in the same manner as Eddie. Curiously, when glasnost' permitted Russian émigré writers to publish their works in their native land, Limonov — ever the dissident — used the opportunity to become an arch-conservative supporter of the im perial Russian state, which he declared to be a super-ethnic civilization based on territorial rights rather than nationality. If the Baltic states were to be permitted to secede from the union, Limonov argued, Estonian nationalists would soon attem pt to capture St. Petersburg. Democracy in his view is the opium of the people, and the state has no business getting involved in moral judgments. Might makes right. He also denounced the statem ent by the Soviet chapter of PEN Club condem ning violence by Soviet agents in Lithuania as treason. Soviet man, again according to Limonov the eternal dissident, need not be ashamed of the history of his country, which played a relatively more positive role than the W est from 1945 to 1985. Even so, it was startling to see television pictures of him strafing the helpless city of Sarajevo at the invitation of the Bosnian Serb leader Radovan KaradZic. And all this from a person who form erly declared his total disinterest in politics.
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W ithin the relatively puritanical tradition of Russian letters the name of Yuz Aleshkovsky (b. 1929) is also alm ost autom atically associated with the use of profanities. His explicit sexual descriptions are combined with a clearly defined ideological platform, clothed in a form of satire which is actually social protest. The language of official Soviet publications was extremely rigid and bureaucratic prior to the onslaught of g lasn osf in the late 1980s, and Aleshkovsky's language — not just the profanities — represents a vehem ent rejection of the official style. Aleshkovsky uses much the same language as Limonov, but they belong to quite different schools. Limonov is a realist in the undiluted, 19th-century sense of the word, while Aleshkovsky dwells in a fantasy world imagined as a patent distortion of reality. He sees him self as the representative of a new "phantasmagorical realism.” His novels are frequently structured in monologue form — 4a feature for which he has been repeatedly criticized on the grounds that it is monotonous. Aleshkovsky wrote children's books in the Soviet Union and was the author of a popular satirical song about the Soviet forced-labor camps (in one of which he spent a year of his life). His novel Kangaroo (1981) is a phantasy about a computer which the KGB has programmed to invent political accusations. In exchange for favorable prison conditions, the protagonist confesses to one of the crimes offered to him by the machine — that of having raped and viciously murdered the oldest kangaroo in the Moscow Zoo. The work which brought fam e to Vladim ir Voinovich (b. 1932) in the W est was his satirical novel The Life and Extraordinary Adventures o f Private Ivan Chonkin (Zhizn' i neobychainye priklyucheniya soldata Ivana Chonkina), which is generally referred to — not inaccurately — as a Soviet version of The Good Soldier Schweik, and was first published in the W est while Voinovich was still in the Soviet Union. After a series of activities which displeased the Soviet authorities, including defending Sinyavsky and Solzhenitsyn, Voinovich was expelled from the Soviet W riters' Union in 1974 and forced to em igrate under tragic circumstances in 1980. So severe was the pressure on him to emigrate that his mother-in-law and father-in-law died of heart attacks and he himself suffered a heart attack — all within the space of a few hours. He settled in W est Germany, but now spends half his tim e in Moscow. In his major work in exile, the satirical novel M oscow 2042; Voinovich uses a classic device of science fiction, the tim e machine, as his artistic vehicle. In it he travels to Moscow of the future, where he discovers a society in almost total ruin and theoretically run by his old acquaintance Lêshka Bukashev, who has been proclaimed the country's "genialissim o.” Bukashev has been kept alive over the years
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by an elixir of life, but was deemed to be too much of an idealist and was shot off into orbit so that he might be revered only from a distance. In fact, Bukashev hates the system which he helped to establish and which launched him into space. A sort of wretched communism has already been established in Moscow, which is surrounded by "rings of hostility.” The narrator is met as a hero and plans are laid to celebrate his hundredth birthday, but he is asked to rewrite his novel so that the name of a focal character satirizing Solzhenitsyn will not be mentioned. He refuses to do so, and is cast out into the second circle of hostility, where people have to turn in their own feces to receive food. In setting off for the future, the narrator was to have distributed Solzhenitsyn's Red Wheel (Solzhenitsyn's "knots” are here referred to as "slabs”). He was then to return to the present to report to Solzhenitsyn what the future holds. Solzhenitsyn is referred to as Sim Simych Karnavalov, and all his followers are "Simites” (pronounced in Russian just as if the word read "Semites”). Karnavalov-Solzhenitsyn complains bitterly about the "pluraliste” who do not recognize him as the greatest writer in the world and accuse him of wanting to be Emperor. Ultimately Solzhenitsyn-Kamavalov has him self frozen so as to wake up in the future and return to conquer Russia on a white horse and be proclaimed "Tsar Serafim .” The entire population is immediately converted to Russian Orthodoxy, machines are replaced by draught animals, men over 40 are required to wear beards, and women are forbidden to ride bicycles. The novel was heatedly discussed in the émigré community as it appeared in serial form in Novoe russkoe slovo, and was criticized for what was perceived as a disrespectful attitude toward the man Voinovich had originally defended — Solzhenitsyn. Vladim ir Maramzin (b. 1934) began publishing children's books and film scenarios while still in the Soviet Union, but many of his writings circulated in sam izdat He was arrested in 1974 and sentenced to five years in a "strict-regim e” camp for helping to prepare a fivevolum e collection of Brodsky's poetry. He recanted in court and his sentence was commuted to probation, whereupon he immediately em igrated to France. There, together with Aleksei Khvostenko, he co founded the magazine Èkho. His stories are humorous, with a hint of surrealistic fantasy. Zinovy Zinik (pseudonym of Zinovy Gluzberg, b. 1945) published only theatrical reviews in the Soviet Union. In 1975 he left for Israel and later moved on to England. His The Russophobe and the Fungophile (Russofobka i fungofil) is a novelist's explicit rejection of ideology and politics. The male protagonist, a Russian, is consumed with his own culinary interests to such a degree that he perceives the East/W est confrontation in the light of food recipes. To leave Russia,
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he marries a harried British woman who ends up perceiving him as a savage who despises England's cultural heritage. Replete with Rabelaisian descriptions of food, sex, and bodily functions, the whimsical plot leads the protagonist, and eventually the narrator as well, through a landscape of nuclear missile-launching pads and mushroom-hunting sites to a grotesque homesickness. This Gogolian work, which meanders through the absurd and the grotesque, is defined by the author in the novel's last sentence as a "phantasm agoria” intended to distract a bored Russian émigré, and is akin to the writings of Yuz Aleshkovsky and the young ll'ya Èrenburg in its whimsical irony. Anatoly Gladilin (b. 1935) is a prose writer and essayist who published some ten books in the Soviet Union before em igrating to France in 1976. Like Aksênov, he was known as a young people's writer, and many of his short stories revolve around the böy-m eets-girl them e. Gladilin worked for a number of years as a journalist in the Paris offices of Radio Liberty. When that office was closed, he wrote I Was Killed by the Pell Anim al (Menya ubil skotina Pell). Eugene Pell was the director of Radio Liberty at the time, and the book is a description of how Gladilin lost his job. Not really a novel, the work is more of a satirical autobiography with some names unchanged and others only thinly veiled and is of interest in its description of the traum a inflicted on both the enormous egos and the financial status of those émigré writers who had become accustomed to supporting their lifestyles from cold-war funds. For many the denial of these privileges was no less excruciating an experience than the decision to emigrate. Certain Third-W ave writers who feel their Jewish roots very strongly write to some extent in the humorous-satirical manner of Sholom Aleikhem, dwelling chiefly on the foibles of Jewish life. The Yard (Dvor), by Arkady L'vov (b. 1927), is precisely such an exercise in what in Russian is known as bytopisatel'stvo. The first volum e of this lengthy novel is a sort of shtetl vaudeville. The second is more serious and takes on an intentionally lethargic, even epic manner, dwelling on the details of life over a 20-year period (1936 to 1956). Against the background of this tragic period of Russian history, covering the purges and W orld W ar II and extending slightly beyond the Stalinist era into the aborted "thaw,” L'vov weaves a complex web of Odessa workingclass characters who squabble over trivia while fearing arrest. L'vov emigrated in 1976 after being accused of Zionism and seeing his books removed from library shelves. W ritten in much the same manner as Lvov's novel, M ark Girshin's Brighton Beach (1981) is a satirical view of everyday life in the New York community of Russian-Jewish émigrés, many of whom are from Odessa. It describes their speech, which is not always in
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keeping with literary norms, the criminals who would have spent five years in prison if they had remained in the Soviet Union, their respect for the man who should have served 20, and the boardwalk with its gossiping pensioners. Sergei Dovlatov (1941-1990) was a journalist in the Soviet Union who had difficulty publishing his humorous stories and began distributing them through sam izdat in the late 1960s. In 1978 he emigrated and settled in the United States. His story, Suitcase (Chemodan), and book with the same title, tell how he was forced to leave Russia and of his emotions as he realized that his total worldly possessions fit into one shabby valise. In 1980 he co-founded Novyi am erikanets (The New American), a Russian language newspaper in New York City, and was its editor-in-chief until it closed in 1982. In The Trade (Remeslo) he tells how he and some fellow émigrés launched the project and eventually failed in their efforts. Partly Jewish in origins, Dovlatov saw himself as a Russian with a fascination for everything American. He frankly admitted to me that he preferred American literature to Russian and saw himself as a storyteller, rather than belonging to the grand tradition of Russian philosophical prose, which he regarded as long-winded: I have always been drawn to the conscious brevity o f Am erican literature, so uncharacteristic o f our own. Back in Russia, Am erican literature seem ed to me to be incredibly unconstrained com pared to our home-grown tradition. It freely explored things that were not allowed in Russian literature, nam ely the nature o f human relationships. It seem ed to us that Am erican literature was always honest, because there were no external pressures on it to be false. The adventures o f some m ysterious southerner in the works o f Faulkner were both closer and more interesting to me than what happened to the heroes o f Soviet Socialist Realism. I was fascinated by all that and, consciously o r unconsciously, began to im itate several Am erican writers, especially Hemingway. Dovlatov's genre was the short story, which he created from collections of absurd incidents, and his books are still larger accum ulations of absurdities, related in a pointedly down-to-earth manner. Nevertheless, the collections are them atically unified as parts of an autobiographical mosaic of unconnected incidents with ironic endings, but without traditional plot development. All his stories are as much musings or confessions as they are fiction, and they are all centered around the figure of the observer-narrator. There is no anger in these short works, which are actually conversational anecdotes, but the humor is often laced with a rueful sadness. Some of his stories are self-deprecating tales of his civilian life in the Soviet Union, others are
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about his experience as a guard in a Soviet prison camp, and still others ironically present Soviet man transplanted to America. The effect is not only like that of Shalamov, but there are even straight forward instances where Dovlatov uses a device or incident from Shalamov, except with a comic (sometimes tragi-comic) goal. W hile both writers were minimalists and creators of mosaics, ShalamoVs tragic tales stand in contrast to those of Dovlatov, who was a twentieth-century Gogol', a bard of the absurd. When I interviewed him, he denied the Shalamov influence, but it was clearly evident, for example in the stories The Poplin Shirt (Poplinovaya rubashka) and One Man O ut (Lishnii), to cite only two examples. Sadly, the videotape of the interview, which was accepted for perm anent storage by two m ajor universities, was lost, probably stolen by persons who do not suspect that they possess the only copies. Like Dovlatov, Yury Mamleev (b. 1931) writes absurdist short stories structured like those of Dovlatov, but whereas Dovlatov's characters engender humor and even sympathy, Mamleev’s fetishism inspires sheer revulsion. His tales combine pathological violence with incredibly sordid sexual topics whose language and images would be inappropriate anywhere. Basically, Mamleev wants to shock, and his artistic method is that of the grotesque absurd, which he achieves by replicating a dream (actually, nightmarish) world in which logic plays no role. For example, in The Teacher (Uchitel'nitsa), two men live in a m énage-à-trois with a woman who was form erly (and literally) a fox. Ultimately she reverts to her form er condition, chews off their testicles while they sleep, and disappears. Then the two men are both appointed generals commanding batteries of intercontinental ballistic missiles — all this is in a story that is barely 2,000 words long. Igor' Efimov (b. 1937) emigrated to the United States in 1978 and originally worked for Ardis Publishers in Ann Arbor before establishing Hermitage Publishers in Englewood, New Jersey, where he and his w ife Marina issued an impressive list of Russian ém igré books during the late Soviet period and then continued to publish books even after the abolition of censorship. At the same tim e Efimov has been active as a keen observer of the political scene and as an essayist. On the strictly literary front, his As One Flesh (Kak odna plot*) is a work which was begun and partially published in the Soviet Union but completed and issued in its entirety by Ardis in 1981 and as such is part of that large but undefined category of books which bridged the gap between émigré and Soviet publications. Skipping back and forth between the narrator's childhood and adult life, this novella is structured in the form of a first-person narration. Efimov is the product of the Leningrad school of writing (he was a member of the group Gorozhane [City Dwellers]), along with Sergei Dovlatov, Vladim ir
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Gubin, Vladim ir Maramzin, and Boris Vakhtin. Many Leningrad writers devoted themselves to their psychological, inner world, and certainly this was Efimov's approach in penning A s One Flesh. Efimov attributed this "chamber” style to the more severe censorship suffered under by Leningrad writers than by their Moscow colleagues, and thus this particular work is interesting as an exile publication continuing a local Russian tradition. The work is plainly anti-Soviet, and Efimov had originally intended it to develop into a strictly philosophical text, but that he restrained him self at the last minute and chose not to mix two such disparate genres. His picaresque 1990 novel Seventh Wife (Sed’maya zhena) is a romantic, semicomic thriller combining seven love stories with adventure on the high seas and satirical social commentary.
Poets Poets of High Seriousness A rt should be independent o f a ll claptrap, should stand alone, and appeal to the artistic sense o f eye and ear, without confounding this with em otions entirely foreign to it, as devotion, pity, love, patriotism, and the like. James McNeill W histler Joseph Brodsky (1940-1996) was the third Russian émigré to receive the Nobel Prize. This stubbornly independent, rebellious man, who even as a 14-year-old dropped out of school to continue his education independently, who as a 23-year-old responded to the Soviet judge about to sentence him for "parasitism” that his poetic gift was "from God,” who maintained a love-disdain (actually, more disdain than love) relationship with his fellow Russian émigré writers, stubbornly pursued his own paths. And in his Nobel speech he programmatically defined the function of poetry in precisely these term s— as uniqueness, as a refusal to shape either himself or his art according to anyone else's pattern. He was alm ost totally self-educated, and any influence came through his contacts with Anna Akhmatova, who was a sort of m entor to him, and from reading such 17th century metaphysical poets
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as John Donne® and Andrew Marvell. After he emigrated Brodsky established contact with Wystan Auden and Stephen Spender. Brodsky the Russian poet followed quite a different manner from that of Brodsky the English-language essayist. The essayist's slangy barbs and quips find no place in the intentional archaicisms of the versifier. Never a poet of the street, Brodsky's strings of contem porary sensations and musings hark back to the images of classical antiquity, creating an Arnoldian "touchstone” to which foreign readers and critics — so crucial in making a name for any Russian w riter — could relate. Odysseus's letter to Telemachus is actually Brodsky's own missive to his son, left behind in the Soviet Union, and the poem "On Zhukov's Death” is nothing less than a classical ode: Through the columns o f his frozen grandsons I see the horse's rump, the coffin on the gun carriage. The wind doesn't carry the wail o f Russian trumpets. I see a corpse decked out in m edals: Fiery Zhukov riding o ff into death.... M arshall Greedy Lethe will swallow both these m y words and your dusty boots. B ut I offer this pitifu l spoken tribute to a man who saved his country. Beat, drums, and le t a soldier's flute rage like a bullfinch. Brodsky's readings attracted large audiences, and it is both puzzling and remarkable that foreign audiences, who could not understand the original, were so responsive. But there is a prosaic quality to his metaphysical, moral searchings, which came across very effectively in English translation. One can sense in his verse the tradition of orally read poetry, still vibrantly alive in Russia. His poems are intonationally oriented— abrupt, tense phrases strung together and punctuated with sardonic contrasts (rage ... like a bullfinch). All this was delivered in a nasal chant. I once asked him how it happened that he read in this manner. As usual, he tried to evade the question, but then claimed it came from Russian church singing.
•W hen I interviewed Brodsky in 1979, I asked him about Donne's influence on him, and he responded that the question was "nonsense." But it w as typical Brodsky misinformation. Almost immediately he conceded the point. In general, the entire interview amounted to him constantly covering his tracks and then confessing the opposite to be true.
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In 1979 I Invited Brodsky and Igor' Chinnov to give a reading in W ashington, D.C., before an almost exclusively Third-W ave émigré audience. The reception they gave Brodsky was sim ultaneously one of fam iliarity and resentment, the latter perhaps related to the acclaim he had achieved. The tension was not alleviated by Chinnov, who insisted on interpreting the joint reading as a collapse of Brodsky's form er stance of aloofness from most of the other émigré writers. After a spate of hostile questions and remarks from his compatriots, Brodsky read the Zhukov poem in a defiant voice. It was a glorification of a hero of the Stalinist period, a man who had sacrificed the lives of his own soldiers just as ruthlessly as he had attacked the enemy, but a man who nevertheless had played a key role in defeating the Germans. (One should keep in mind that most of the audience consisted of Russian Jews, and Brodsky himself was Jewish.) There followed a tense silence and then a grudging acceptance. It was a very ordinary church basement, but a remarkable moment for Russian letters. The rejoicing within the émigré community which took place when Bunin was awarded the Nobel Prize was not paralleled in Brodsky's case. On the contrary, the reaction was largely hostile. In the words of the émigré critics Pëtr Vail' and Aleksandr Genls, if Brodsky the loner "scored one” for the Russian team, it was a victory for the Russian language, not for Russian literature. Some poets develop relatively late in their careers. The fact that Brodsky matured as a poet so early allowed him to establish him self abroad even before he emigrated. This was particularly fortunate in view of his death at only 56. He had undergone two heart bypass operations, and the theme of death obsessed him. The verse of Lev Mak (b. 1939) has something in common with Brodsky's in its philosophic and metaphysical preoccupations, but his is a very different poetic personality, one that perhaps lacks the discretion Brodsky displays in maintaining an economy of imagery. Mak makes broad use of paradoxes and sudden them atic shifts, attem pting to dissolve that hierarchical order in which we normally organize our perceptions. He freely mixes classical, Biblical, and Slavic m ythology with the realities of twentieth-century existence in an attem pt to recreate the sense of high tragedy we associate with antiquity. The resulting tension between mythmaking on the one hand, and the tawdriness of an age on the other, produces a powerfully grotesque effect, as can be felt from this translation by Daniel W eissbort:
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The apartm ent is empty. M y wife's slip hangs weightlessly, twisted over a chair. The rag-doll sprawls, loosely embracing a potty. Sadly the teddy bear sits on m y trunk. Soon I shall leave m y house, never again to return. THE CHILDREN HAVE GONE TO THE ZOO TO LO O K A T THE ZEBRA. It's bad being a zebra in Odessa. Slightly better to be a Jew in Russia and, understanding your times, to accept each day, each second, your chastisem ent dissolving in the heat, to aw ait the rattle and howl o f the hunt, throat on fire, to drink the putrid liquid that trickles from the rusty faucet in your place o f refugeI Scorn I Scorn I Scorn I They're recruiting them now in the Jewish quarters. W orldly wisdom, fear, and Darwin, all studied in school, have made the choice easy for them. In the evening paper there's a picture o f a wolf, gnawing the hide o f the ill-fated sheep he'd sprung from that morning.... SUITCASES LINE THE WALL. THE CHILDREN, MOTHER AND WIFE REMAIN, PERHAPS FOREVER. W hat makes us good? W hat makes us evil? Wise? Base? Blessed? Is it that force which molds the clouds and the hills, which folds back the bristling red sabres o f grasshoppers, allowing them to leap, which has given to man his omnivorous stomach and delicate soul, and allowed him to live, filling the one and the other.... YOU G ET U.S.ED TO ANGUISH, LIKE THE SMELL O F FISH THE NEIGHBORS A R E FRYING.... Farewell, Russia. Forgive me m y tearful goodbye. Do not weep over me — behind you, even now, lurks the spy with the barbed Tartar noose — both eunuch, and husband, and im potent violator is h e !... Lousy Jew I — he cries through your lips. In a whisper I answer — Farewell, M otherl
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Yury Kublanovsky's (b. 1947) first collection of verse was published by Ardis Publishers in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Such transgressions were judged by the Soviet authorities sufficient grounds to force him to emigrate in 1982. Like Brodsky, who published Kublanovsky's first collection while his fellow poet was still in the U.S.S.R., Kublanovsky is a poet who attempts to achieve in his verse the effect of what Matthew Arnold called "high seriousness.” Taken to a large extent from words still extant in Russian today, Kublanovsky's vocabulary is exceptionally rich, but often known chiefly from historical texts. This general linguistic orientation matches his conservative, nationalist politics and rejection of Western values. Regrettably, Kublanovsky's greatest strength — his language — is precisely what makes it difficult to translate his poems. In this respect he is at a disadvantage in verse comparable to that of Sasha Sokolov in prose. A t the same tim e he is truly a master craftsman. Kublanovsky himself sees his verse as having been influenced by Mandel'shtam's Voronezh cycle and Akhmatova, and this assessment is valid, to a degree, but the intentional obstruction of meaning, the opulent vocabulary, and the jew eler's approach to verse are more reminiscent of Maksimilian Voloshin. Certainly, Kublanovsky by virtue of both his language and this them es is one of Russia's most "Russian” poets: Hooves flail above a twisting serpent while beneath a thin toga ripple the patinaed shoulders o f conceiver and executioner. From the ram parts o f his new fort he peers out over the hummocked ice, clenching in a m uscular fist the bridle o f the Neva's soaring mouth. O rphaned now o f Peter's rule, we long fo r its tenderness. Valery Petrochenkov (b. 1940) is a literary scholar and im pressionist poet whose verse is characterized by virtually total withdrawal from ideology and emotional minimalism against a backdrop of nature: Nettles instead o f sorrel in the soup, A crust o f bread, A fistful o f chaff, A nd no sirens o f war, Just buttercup and crowfoot — Summ er's swashbuckling greeting. Velvet the lining o f the junkm an's cloak,
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Bottom less his sack; You lose yourself in it in pairs, Like convicts in a cattlecar. The m achinist sounds reveille, echoed by a mindless whippoorwill, A s the old city crawls out from under, Thrashing the dust from its pajam a's worn flannel. Vadim Kreid (b. 1936) is a poet and critic who emigrated in 1973 and as editor of Novyi zhurnal helped to bridge the gap between the First and Third Waves. His verse deals chiefly in moods and displays a rich vocabulary: Submissive, clairvoyant thoughts scurry like silverfish across transparent silence while life's harried aimlessness lies discarded in a heap o f turnip greens and serenity. A guest a t nature's birthday feast, I praise the bitter clusters o f birdcherry, inhale the heady aroma o f savory, and adm ire the vermillion splash o f woodpecker in lanky heather. In the quick calm o f morning, blue and fragile as autumn, The snap o f a twig beneath a cautious tread is m y poached b o o ty ... o f secret, glad tidings. Naum Korzhavin (pseudonym of Naum Mandel', b. 1925) was arrested in 1947 and exiled to Siberia. Korzhavin is cut from a different cloth than the believers in artistic experimentation. A man straight out of the 19th century, he is respected as a believer in the moral message of art, as in the following poem in which he sees the fate of his fellow men as even more difficult than that which befell the Decembrists: We can string words on a line Like beads on a string. B ut no one will call us To rebellion on Senate Square....
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There'll be no crowns for us. No real women will follow us In carriages through the snow, A nd our Decem ber will never come. Before emigrating, Natal'ya Gorbanevskaya (b. 1936) had published only a handful of her poems in Soviet magazines, although her verse was circulated privately and published abroad. On August 25, 1968, she took part in a demonstration on Red Square protesting the invasion of Czechoslovakia. She also edited a letter addressed to world public opinion which was reprinted in a large number of foreign newspapers in August and September 1968 and founded the dissident publication Chronicle o f Current Events (Khronika tekushchikh sobytii). Not knowing how to deal with her, the Soviet authorities had her confined briefly in the Kashchenko Psychiatric Hospital with a diagnosis of "possible latent schizophrenia.” Gorbanevskaya described her experiences in an autobiographical sketch entitled "Free Medical Care.” In 1975 she was permitted to emigrate and joined the staff of Kontinent in Paris, and later began to write for Russkaya mysl'. Gorbanevskaya's verse, which is often intense and reflects her political activity, can also be lyrical: A curse! Joy! W riting! Words move like m ountainsI While I, like a butterfly, Flutter am ong the lines. O nly yesterday, skirting unbelief and sadness, did I not dum bly squirm like a stranded fish? A nd now each little stream chatters like a goldfinch, the river flows — its speech a warble a t m y cheek.
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A nd in m y weak, woman's throat (Goldfinch/ Cuckoo! Starlingl) the breeze o f the universe wanders among the lines .* In his own words, Dmitry Bobyshev (b. 1936) was one of "Akhmatova's orphans"; together with Joseph Brodsky, Anatoly Naiman, and Evgeny Rein, he was formed as a poet under her tutelage. He is a mystical poet, and upon arriving in America struck up a firm friendship with Yury Ivask, who was a sort of m entor for him — a circumstance which can be felt in his verse. He converted to Christianity after a religious experience and writes mystical verse, sometimes couched in archaisms, but sometimes pointedly prosaic: The plum bing rolls out a fugue, the fam ily icebox tugs against its electric bellystrap, the tank hisses, scraping scum from the float's rosy cheek, and the faucet's drops are lithe and pliant as silk. Themes interweave, now together, now separate, the m eter's disk whistles, and beyond the wall the elevator moans. A ll this m uted din is the whisper o f a friend, a soaring caryatid, an obelisk against the sky. Aleksei Tsvetkov (b. 1947) was a journalist in Russia and continued on in that profession after emigrating in 1975, working for a tim e as a coeditor of the San Francisco daily Russkaya zhizn' (Russian Life). After receiving a Ph.D. in Russian literature from the University of Michigan, he then became a radio journalist, first for the Voice of Am erica in W ashington, D.C., and then for Radio Free Liberty in Munich and Prague. In term inology taken from an earlier period he could be called a representative of the "younger generation” within the Third Wave, having established himself as a poet only after em igrating. His manner, however, is far from the sim plicity cherished by those
•Translation by Daniel Weissbort.
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earlier colleagues in exile; his is an intentionally complex and sophisticated manner that plays on the ironic combination of traditional poetic measures with images chosen for their ungainly nature and alogical links: / rem em ber an ashen m orning elm s colorful in the a ir cranes against an azure backdrop unpretentious assyrian hieroglyphs the square burdened with dew crystallized like an asthma attack brilliant asters finally grew there there m ust be a reason only one firm eternity that love is incurable to the final pyre the grave remembers where i backtracked a tidy fish in slate a fly m eticulously defined in am ber T afyana Fel' (b. 1948) demonstrates a fragile fem ininity in her verse, which she composes in English as well as Russian: Foreseen as torturous crescendo, One looks in vain to find a resolution So beautifully made, A s if a fantasy created A lingering desire to disdain: A m ood so vaguely non-existent that it evokes in us a poignant shame, Too soft and simple to obey.
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Light-Hearted Poets Redeem The time. Redeem The unread vision in the higher dream While jew eled unicorns draw by the gilded hearse. T. S. Eliot Mikhail Kreps (1940-1994), who published literary criticism in the U.S.S.R. but no poetry, was a sophisticated, som ewhat ironical poet whose themes hearken back to those of Osip Mandel'shtam. Kreps used free verse and intentionally prosaic language to reflect, not just on the condition of the poet cast ashore in a new country, but about the life of an intellectual in general: I pass m y form er perm anent residence A nd watch the lam p glow in the window That once told me M y fam ily was a t home. Now that glim m er means nothing to me. N or do the walls between which Part o f m y life slid past. Once passed.... Where are our m orning-whispered words, O ur sighs in the night? The prints o f im patient glances on the pane? The pastel reflections on the New Year's ceiling? O ur plans, our toasts to the future? The light that was once mine is alien to me. Behind me the beep o f an im patient m otorist Reminds me that the traffic light's eye has turned green. I p u ll away, Looking back once more to someone else's light. That driver m ust be right: It's time to go — forward.
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The tradition of aphorisms has a long history in Russia and is alive in the émigré community, for example, in the verse of ll'ya Rudyak (b. 1939). Igor* Guberman (b. 1936) is a poet who specializes alm ost entirely in the ironic quatrain, which he successfully declaims at émigré literary evenings: I'm pleased with bread and wine, with not being too dilapidated, and if you want to please m y kind, m ake sure m y g u t is always sated. Bakhyt Kenzheev (b. 1950) emigrated in 1982 and settled in Canada. As can be guessed from his name, this Torontan tartar is a product of Russia's imperial past. Mixing lofty poetic images with everyday impressions in a tragicom ic manner, he expresses a constant enthrallm ent with nature and with the wonder of being. H alf an apple, first snow, the clanking tread o f an exhausted age. The questions are wrong, and the answers, too. Beyond the door the long light rustles. I'm back a t m y labors now, tired o f pursuing your tracks. Just as the Soviet literary establishment had its own small army of purported literary masters, Russian intellectuals made a cult of those writers whom they particularly revered, and for the most part these two groups were mutually exclusive. The "avant-garde,” on the other hand, rejected both official Russian culture and the icons of the so-called "intellectual establishm ent.” As Henri Volokhonsky put it to me in Munich in 1988, "we didn't like Pasternak because they [other intellectuals] shoved him down our throats.” Despite Volokhonsky's disclaimers, however, most of his verse lies within the greater Russian tradition, but often with a twist strictly his own: The overripe m idday heat percolates Valhalla's fu ll stomach belches Pegasus quacks while the bazaar neighs Turkeys m utter and the Galls gobble. The avant-garde was published in Konstantin Kuz'minsky's multi-volum e Blue Lagoon Anthology o f Russian Literature and is represented by such figures as Ina Bliznetsova, ll'ya Bokshtein, Mikhail Gendelev, Aleksei Khvostenko, Genrikh Khudyakov, and Viktor Tupitsyn, among others.
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Another poet creating in this same tongue-in-cheek key is Mikhail Vasserman (b. 1949), who emigrated in 1972, first to Israel and then to the United States, where he writes quasi-classical poems with strict rhyme, regular meter, and meanings hovering painfully between humor and shy, intim ate tragedy. His play, Hannibal, uses the tale of a black man in 18th-century Europe as a m etaphor for coping with being different from other people. It is written partly in blank verse masquerading as prose. Vasserman is one of the very few poets who has actually tried his hand at composing verse in English: Hieroglyphics o f m y m outh! I p ity lim bs and skin; O riginality o f sin Is like a m iser's house. B ut lilac, daisy, hyacinth A nd lily o f the valley's son W ill finger, but not sally on Like hyssop, rye and mint. The avant-garde overlaps with the sardonic, self-deprecating verse of many of its fellow poets. Lev Losev (Lev Lifshits, b. 1937) is a literary scholar and critic who did not begin to write poetry seriously until 1974, at the age of 37. As a young man his literary interests were limited strictly to reading contem porary Russian poets whom he knew personally, and the inner-directed, alm ost incestuous circumstances of unofficial Russian poetry definitely left their im print on his artistic manner, with its strong emphasis on Russian themes and lexicon. Much of his verse is pointedly prosaic and ironic, as in the following poem entitled “Leaving”: easily I clim bed the stairs to the plane, was I flying o r lying prone? m y jo y was serious, intent, but there was also surprise a t the faces, pu ffy with tears, registered in a flash b y m y half-deceased head. I spread two fingers — in the sym bol o f Victory and cuckolded Russians, oh, pray for me, a fool. One poet who could fit just as easily under the rubric "high seriousness” as "light-hearted” was Aleksandr Galich (pseudonym of Aleksandr Ginzburg, 1918-1977), a so-called "bard” (he actually
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disliked the term) who sang his verse to music, accompanying himself on a guitar. Although he had written a number of plays and movie scripts, Galich became fam ous in the 1960s thanks to his satiric, often tragic songs. He wrote one song, for example, about a man who wants the factory in which he works to win the "Shop of Communist Labor Award” — it m anufactures barbed wire for prison and forced-labor camps. In the song "Comrade Paramonova” Galich pokes fun at the Party's intrusion into problems of fam ily life. Other songs are in a more tragic key, for example when Galich fantasized how he would one day make his way back to Russia: When I return, nightingales w ill whistle in February — the old motif, ancient, forgotten, hackneyed. A nd I w ill fall down, crushed b y m y own victory, burying m y head in Your knees, like a boat a t a dock. When I return. A nd when w ill I re tu rn ? !... In early 1972 Galich was expelled from the W riters’ Union at the insistence of Dmitry Polyansky, a member of the Politbyuro. He em igrated in June 1974 and in 1977 died in Paris, where he accidently electrocuted him self while repairing a tape recorder, thus cutting short what would obviously could have been a very meaningful contribution to Russian culture abroad, in addition to the work of his Soviet period.
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Dissolution of Empire Reunification at Last! B ut I know that you rem em ber me. F or you I am that same traveller who le ft for a country from which no one returns. You haven't forgotten me (after all, its only been three years), but you never think about me in the present tense. A little more, and I'll be transform ed into the shade o f Ham let's father and return to tell you about days o f old, before good King Claudius took his place on the throne. If there really were a spirit world, its inhabitants would consider our earthly world to be a world o f spirits. A nd I catch m yself thinking o f you as dead. Boris Khazanov On January 1,1992, Russia sloughed off most of her colonies: the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was no more. But when the shrunken but still vast empire reached out in guilt to her abandoned and exiled children, it became evident that all was not about to be forgiven and that the children, as is often the case in fam ily feuds, were in no hurry to press their contrite lips to the parental fist. True, Russian literature was finally reunified, but has any fam ily peacemaking process ever totally erased the memory of old hurts? As for the writers, they were now reunified with their colleagues back home, but the tim e had come to redefine both their own selves and their works, and the pose of dissident and exile had lost its cachet. Yury Miloslavsky, for example, even went so far as to dismiss the form er political confrontation: I le ft behind the so-called persecutions b y the authorities, although now one can speak o f them only in a hum orous vein: I believe they should be tossed out o f the biography o f any honorable person. Each o f us back then played his role. I declaim ed m y verse a t certain clandestine o r sem i-clandestine readings, then they called me in, conducted interrogations and searches.... I played the role o f dissident poet, and they played the role o f bloodthirsty chekists [agents o f the secret police]. A ll that is in the past. Other exiles also played down the significance of exile for them as writers. When asked whether he had a sense of being a w riter abroad, Pêtr Vail' responded that any such concepts struck him as
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pompous. He happened to have moved and, aside from the fact that he could not return, it was a move like any other: "you get on with your life and do your job.” Strictly financial considerations had always played a much larger role than most émigrés wanted to admit. The long-predicted reunification of Russian literature dealt a devastating blow to émigré publishing. W ith the fall of the iron curtain, the W est lost not only its fear of Russia, but also much of its interest in it. Cold W ar subsidies to ém igré publishing houses and journals largely dried up, while émigré writers naturally wanted to be published in Russia. Some writers even dismissed publication abroad as the sign of a writer who could not be published in Russia, and who himself was not only forced to subsidize his own book but to do it for a minuscule audience. Thus, what was still left of the rich history of Russian-language publications was now seriously threatened — precisely at the moment when its stated goals were so abruptly and unexpectedly achieved. And there was another problem — this tim e for émigré publishers who had brought out the books of writers in the Soviet Union. They were accused of not having paid royalties to writers living in the Soviet Union. A great many publications about the émigrés appeared in Russia, some written by sympathetic observers and others by form er literary henchmen. Initially perplexed by the unexpected turn of affairs, Soviet scholars and critics who had specialized in attacking the émigrés now struck an entirely new note in their writings. The editor of a six-volum e anthology of Russian literature in exile, which began to appear in Moscow in 1990, Anatoly Afanas'ev, wrote of the "feats” of the ém igré community, of how First-Wave émigrés had enriched world literature and culture, and how the center of Russian intellectual life had resided in the W est in the 1920s, not in the Soviet Union. Just five years earlier Afanas'ev had written in a quite different key: The pack o f Fascist sycophants and crim inals whom we did not manage to finish o ff is now being jo in ed by disgusting little people reaching for their own se n ile peace o f meat. These individuals — Voinovich, Brodsky, Gladilin, A ksênov— only recently declared their devotion to the ideals o f pure a rt and creative freedom and held forth loftily on their love fo r the Fatherland. The opuses being penned about these "m ost recent” émigrés with titles such as ” Pushkin and Brodsky” engender nothing but revulsion. He who is capable o f betrayal, betrays. They have made their choice by following the path o f treason, and the kindest thing that can be said o f them is that they have been transform ed into ideological clowns. Their "prophecies," trashy mysticism, flirtations with their pitifu l god, "repentances," and supposedly angelic "spirit o f self-
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sacrifice” are intended to convince the Western reader and viewer o f the "prim itivism ” o f the Russian and the Soviet soul. These are spectacles fabricated in the num erous assem bly lines o f bourgeois propaganda and slander. The 1991 Moscow book of Aleksei Sokolov is a publication which dem onstrates long-standing work in this subject, but from a pro regime point of view. For example, Sokolov writes that Shul'gin had "found the courage to recognize that he was wrong and return home.” In point of fact, Shul'gin was taken forcefully to the U.S.S.R., where he spent 12 years in a forced-labor camp, and only later wrote the "open letter” discussed earlier. W hile writers and critics reassessed their relations, the scope of emigration spiraled upward. According to the U.S.S.R. M inistry o f the Interior, 452,000 citizens emigrated in 1990, the largest num ber beginning their journey from the Russian Federation — 103,600— and from Ukraine — 95,300. An estimated 40 percent of those leaving Russia come from Moscow or Leningrad and its environs. In late February 1991 a poll conducted by the United States Information Agency showed that 35 percent of urban Russian males under 40 with a higher education wanted either to go abroad for a lengthy period or to em igratel Subsequent emigration continued at a strong pace, dim inished som ewhat both by the more rigid restraints on immigration in a number of countries and by the jerky, fitful nature of Russian economic normalization. W hile an individual may choose to leave his country for a single reason, the same is definitely not true of large groups. People em igrate en masse for a combination of political, economic, and personal reasons. W hile all this is true of the Fourth Wave, it is also true that this group is strongly motivated by an ordinary desire to arrange a normal way of life for themselves — something not always easily achievable in Russia today. Russian writers joined their countrymen in the great exodus from Mother Russia, many of them spending lengthy periods abroad, not only to see the West, but also to supplem ent their incomes with lectures and teaching stints. The dividing line between "Soviet” and "ém igré” no longer existed; indeed, the very words "ém igré” and "em igration” seemed to have lost their meaning. New York alone acquired literally dozens of Russian newspapers and magazines, and some form er émigré ghettos seem to have been transform ed into colonies. Earlier "exiles” tended to assim ilate relatively rapidly; now that there is a larger Russian com m unity that regularly travels between Russia and the W est, this cultural absorption will undoubtedly be slowed down. If the relatively unfettered movement of the Fourth W ave to and from foreign countries reestablished pre-1917 freedom of movement,
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the makeup of the newest arrivals created a contrast with their predecessors reminiscent of that between the First and Second W aves. The new arrivals were far less likely to come from an intellectual upper crust intent on pursuing cultural and political goals. Often these were Russian businessmen and people with practical am bitions whose cultural interests were definitely of a relatively modest nature. The Fourth Wave is sometimes — unfairly — referred to as the "sausage em igration.” The phrase which became popular partly out of envy on the part of Russians who stayed behind and partly out of a sense of superiority within the Third Wave, however the Fourth Wave faces nothing comparable to the hostility experienced by the Third W ave itself when it encountered the First and Second Waves.
The Near Abroad (blizhnee zarubezh'e) Every day I wake up in a foreign country Naum Korzhavin The tim e period covered in this book ends with the breakup of the Soviet Union at the end of 1991, but large as the Russian diaspora described here may have been, it was but a prelude to today's situation, in which 36 million persons whose native language is Russian — 25 million ethnic Russians plus an additional 11 million Russophones — find themselves living in the non-Russian republics of the form er Soviet Union. When the U.S.S.R. broke up, there were nearly 17 million people who spoke Russian as their native language in Ukraine, another 8 million in Kazakhstan, over 3 million in Uzbekistan, 2 million in Belarus, and over 1 million each in Latvia, Moldova, and Kyrgyzstan. Estonia, Azerbaijan, Tajikistan, Georgia, Lithuania, and Turkmenistan each had around half a million, and only ethnically pure Arm enia had as few as 67,000. The U.S.S.R. had form ed a common market economy, where even in Russia itself only 82.6% of the population was actually ethnically Russian. In fact Russians historically enjoyed a certain mobility within the boundaries of an expanding Empire — for both political and economic reasons — although residence permits and limited housing never perm itted them the sort of freedom of movement characteristic of the United States, for example. Relocation outside the empire was simply an explosive expression of a huge longing for a more mobile life style. A t the same time, Russians in the various republics showed them selves even more reluctant to assimilate than Russians in W estern Europe; almost all of them continued to speak Russian as their native language.
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Russians in the "near abroad” often favored independence from Russia, as in the Baltic states and Ukraine, and even in the Crimea, where they constituted a majority. During the Soviet period the number of Russians living beyond the borders of Russia proper had grown from 6.7 percent to 17.4 percent; with the possible exception of the Baltic countries, they had higher incomes than the locals and were better educated and more urban in their life styles. In the post-Soviet era, Russia is in a chaotic state and, rightly or wrongly, Russians in the various form er republics sometimes perceived their countries of residence as being better situated to enter the new post-Soviet world than was Russia. Their adjustm ent to the new circumstances was made easier by the fact that many of them had generally seen them selves as Soviet citizens rather than Russian, as opposed to the titular nationalities, which perceived themselves first and forem ost as Estonians, Armenians, and so forth. But what Russians in the various form er republics failed to appreciate was the wave of "post-socialist nationalism .” Latvia and Estonia, for example, passed rigid laws on citizenship, and non-citizens were free only to leave the country, not to enter it. Russians found it difficult to advance professionally in an environm ent where they were required to speak the local language. In Moldova Russians encountered a flood of discrim inatory measures in institutions of higher learning and at their jobs. Statues of Pushkin were desecrated in several Ukrainian cities, and the plaque on Bulgakov's house in Kiev was defaced. If, in 1990, 20,900 Russians arrived in Uzbekistan, 59,700 left, while the analogous figures for Jewish russophones were 500 arrivals and 20,500 departures. Estimates of the number of Russians who will return to Russia by the year 2000 now run from 2.3 to 5 million. Beginning in 1975 their numbers have considerably exceeded those leaving Russia, so that the Russian Federation has had a large positive net immigration since that year, whereas prior to that tim e Russians were leaving Russia in large numbers. Certainly if all Russians in the "near abroad” were to opt to return home it would lead to even greater disarray in the Russian economy than currently exists. In 1993 alone the number of persons moving to Russia from the other form er republics exceeded the number of those emigrating from Russia by 430,1001 On the literary plane, the situation has obviously been radically altered. The Soviet government position on Russian literature in the various republics was generally paternalistic, sometimes patronizing, and often oppressive. Russian literature in the national republics was viewed as part of the Russian tradition while at the same tim e as also part of the literature of the republic. In the words of one official critic, Russian literature as a whole and Russian literature in the republics
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represented "a whole and Its parts.” But what will happen now? W hat does the future hold for Russian letters in Riga or Kiev? As this book goes to press, the whole system of book publication even in Russia is still in a state of disarray. Market forces are driving out quality books, publishers cannot get paper, and the entire network of distributors has been virtually swept away. The major newspapers are often not available in the form er republics. The whole process of getting books to readers in the newly independent states is even less efficient than in Russia proper, although as more conventional market conditions begin to establish themselves, some normalization can be expected. But how long will that take?
Conclusions The Russians seem to think they have a m onopoly on exile. They are self-centered writers who think that their situation is the m ost im portant thing in the world.... Frankly; / am sick and tired o f Russian literature. [Applause] Anton Shammas, Palestinian writer, 1987 W heatland Conference on Literature in Exile W hile I have presented the Soviet period within the context of the far longer sweep of Russian history, it cannot be denied that this span of tim e was truly unique for Russian writers abroad in that never before had they been so cut off from their native land. Many émigré writers saw their role as preservers of traditional Russian culture. Actually, this same sort of preservationism had any number of precedents in world culture: it lay at the heart of French classicism's "rules” for observing the literary principles established by ancient classic writers, and of Matthew Arnold's "touchstones” — great works whose aesthetic impact could serve to measure the achievements of later periods. But W estern culture had moved on from measuring itself by past achievements to frantically pursuing innovation and novelty. Those Russian writers who sought to be assimilated into the modern literary process and become co-participants in it had to leave behind the preservationist goals of many of their comrades in exile. Thus, we can speak of a continuum extending from pure preservationism, on the one hand, to assimilation, which now meant innovation, on the other. The preservationists were nationalists struggling to overcome their separation from Russia, while the assimilationists welcomed that same alienation. The claim to represent the true native culture, which had been suppressed back home, was preservationism. This seemed so self-evident that a writer like Aleksandr Kuprin, to cite but one
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example, sim ply ignored his physical location and continued to w rite as if he had never left home. And he was not alone; there was little in many expatriate works to indicate that they had been created outside Russia. But there are other, impassioned works that sprang precisely from the despair of exile: Bunin's Cursed Days (Okayannye dni) and Galich's We're buried somewhere close to Narva (My pokhoroneny gde-to pod Narvoi), for example. Sergei Dovlatov saw him self as assimilated into Russian Third-W ave émigré culture more than into American life. Joseph Brodsky, Aleksei Tsvetkov, and Sasha Sokolov, on the other hand, argued that they had broken free of the Russian "ghetto” and now belonged to a world literary tradition. Even the proponents of cultural assimilation usually ended up supporting linguistic preservation — if only because they were not up to the demands of artistic creation in a foreign tongue. But there were different form s of assimilation. A writer like Nabokov could choose a non-Russian topic and even switch to a different language in some works, while constantly returning to Russian topics in others. He even attempted to keep one foot in the Russian arena by translating Lolita into Russian. But there was a second continuum — one with aesthetic goals and moral goals at its extreme ends. These two intersecting continuum s provide a grid for classifying writers which allows us to classify Russian writers abroad: preservation aesthetics
+
m orality
assimilation-innovation A moral orientation in exile usually assumes political form. For example, throughout the Soviet period of his life abroad Aleksandr Zinov'ev viewed art as a means to an end. The Leningrad would-be plane hijacker and journalist Èduard Kuznetsov wrote novels as straightforward political illustration. But moral searches, more personal and subtle, can engage the aestheticists as much as the ideologues. Rather than comprise mutually exclusive fiefdoms, these poles coexist in adynam ic relationship which is crucial in defining the writer's mindset and the nature of his text. The Parisian Note, for example, was an attem pt to link aesthetics and morality to serve a preservationist goal. The writer's orientation within this scheme of things should be viewed as an inclination, rather than an absolute; none of the four extremes are totally alien to most writers. Limonov is a linguistic assim ilationist who in my interview with him claimed he did not want to be a Russian writer, but his topics are Russian and when the Soviet Union collapsed he became an ultra-nationalist. It is equally
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difficult to locate his position along the aesthetics/m orality axis. His artistic method is the merciless realism of a camera and his pornographic descriptions are hardly the stuff of morality plays, but his anti-aestheticism and desire to shock are actually moral and artistic in thrust, being a rejection of popular moral and artistic concepts. So total is his rebellion that he rejects both poles simultaneously, but in so doing he sim ply creates their m irror image in a sort of artistic anti matter. This grid produces some clearly classifiable types: Brodsky, for example, was an assim ilationist and an aestheticist while Solzhenitsyn is a m oralist and preservationist. But where were do we classify Andrei Sinyavsky, who lived in France for a quarter century but never learned to speak French? His works all dealt with things Russian. He obviously cannot be put in the same camp with Solzhenitsyn and Maksimov, but m ight best be described as belonging to the camp of linguistic preservationism and stylistic aestheticism. Assim ilationists may seek to swim the literary seas of the host nation or of world literature. In the case of Jewish writers who feel their own national origins keenly but do not emigrate to Israel, it is a m atter of definition whether they are "preserving” or being "assim ilated.” *
Having dwelt at such length on the history of émigré letters, we must finally answer the question: does there exist a distinct Russian expatriate literary tradition, separate from that of Russia proper? The First-W ave critic Al'fred Bern took a gloomy view of literary continuity in 1934, fearing that the Russians’ prolonged stay abroad was inevitably pushing them to fuse with a foreign culture, not merely take an interest in it. Russians started out as "viewers,” but were ending up as participants. The shift from one position to another, he lamented, was barely noticeable, but nevertheless extremely important psychologically: You can become so interested in an alien way o f life that it becom es your own. Once a writer has crossed this line, he drops out o f the national tradition, even if he preserves his native language. He ceases to be a Russian writer, because his link with tradition and general literary developm ent is broken.... I perceive as very widespread a lack o f appreciation o f the literary tradition in our young literary generation.... Recently I read a story by Boris Poplavsky ... taken from foreign life — a young Catholic priest suddenly falls in love with a young g irl whom he is tutoring.... I was am azed by its un-Russianness. I am not referring to the topic, but to the tonality, to the m anner in which the subject was presented. The
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story has no relationship to the Russian literary tradition. To m y m ind it sim ply falls out o f the tradition o f Russian literature, even though it is quite sophisticated in m anner.... Bern feared that Poplavsky's story was not an isolated phenomenon. He saw Russian prose abroad as separated from the traditions of its national literature, moving into a dead end and inadvertently ceasing to be Russian at the core, while remaining Russian in language. Of course, Bern ignored the fact that much of Russian literature, being derivative from European literature, often dealt with non-Russian topics, settings, and characters. For example, there were the historical novels by Polevoi, Kukol'nik, and Bryusov. Some of Aldanov's works are set in Germany, with an all-German cast. The question of continuity in Russian émigré letters is a controversial one. When the First-Wave critic and scholar Yury Ivask reproached Third-W ave critics for ignoring their First-W ave predecessors, the Third-W ave scholar Efim Ètkind responded that he was "particularly offended” by Ivask's article, in which he perceived a condescending attitude toward the Third Wave and its literary scholars. Ètkind saw (correctly) Ivask's view as typical and pointed out that he himself had published and written about a number of First-W ave figures. Ivask in turn accused Ètkind of dry scholarship, of a shallow understanding of literature, and of Marxist logic. The exchange of views took place in the Parisian newspaper Russkaya m ysl' (Russian Thought), whose editors noted that Ètkind's response was received on February 14,1986 — the day after Ivask's death. According to Ivask, who had left Russia more than half a century before Ètkind, the two men "spoke different languages”; in Ètkind's view, they belonged to the same world. O f course, there is a conservative undercurrent here implying that continuity means "Russianness” and is thus desirable, while being different is somehow alien and undesirable. Russian literature outside of Russia has a tradition which goes back over the centuries, and throughout the 20th century there has been a continuous émigré presence beyond the borders of Russia, but each of the individual waves of emigration was educated and artistically formed without having been seriously influenced by its predecessor. Moreover, there was usually a great deal of intra-group heterogeneity even at any one period of time. Contiguity and continuity do not necessarily coincide; a row of pencils placed end to end does not fuse into a totality. In T. S. Eliot's words, tradition "cannot be inherited, and if you want it you must obtain it by great labor.” The maintenance of a separate, viable tradition has shown itself to be a will-o'-the-wisp for Russian émigré letters. Not only is there little continuity between such disparate traditions as pilgrim age accounts and the modern literature of exile, to take but one example, but even
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if we lim it ourselves to the Soviet period, we will see that the three constituent "waves” have been fundam entally inconsonant. Moving beyond literature to émigré culture as a whole, we can see that, with the possible exception of the First Wave, the Russian em igration has not been able to achieve a coherence independent of Russia, but has, rather, served as a pendant to its geographical motherland. Latin American literature, which is sometimes said to have its capital in Madrid, could serve as a model of an "émigré” tradition (or, for that matter, so could literature in Canada and the United States), and by that standard the theoretically possible separate Russian émigré tradition remains a theory. A possible model is Jewish literature — an émigré tradition which for centuries was without a homeland. Perhaps better models are to be found in Chinese and, especially, Irish culture. By some estimates there are as many as 78 million persons of Irish descent outside of Ireland, while the population of the island of Ireland itself, even including the entire population of the contested Northern Ireland, amounts to only 3.6 million persons! *
The Soviet government persistently gloated over the supposedly wretched state of the "renegades” (otshchepentsÿ) abroad, and the émigrés themselves were often all too eager to support such an appraisal. Thus, words like "tragedy,” "loneliness,” "parting,” "separation,” "isolation,” etc. became the stock and trade of émigré studies. The émigrés were not the heroic Odysseus or Jason, but Orpheus and Lot, forbidden even to glance backwards. There is no denying the tragic elem ent in the experience, but was the picture entirely black? True, Khodasevich and Berberova were impoverished in Paris, but their lives would undoubtedly have been both less pleasant and shorter if they had remained in Russia. Tsvetaeva was often wretched in Prague and Paris, but it would be hard to make the case that she was better off hanging herself in Elabuga. On the cultural plane, life abroad was, and is, an enrichment. Russians "broadened their horizons,” and foreigners came to learn more about Russia's splendid cultural heritage. On the other hand, uniqueness is usually the product of isolation, and in this sense Russia's contact with the outside world through her expatriates "westernized” her and made her less exceptional, but this, too, is part of a larger process. Ultimately, of course, distance is relative to technology, and modern transportation and communication make Moscow and New York closer nowadays than Moscow and St. Petersburg were for Gogol' and Pushkin. The Slavophiles lost out not so much to the W esternizers as to the engineers. And now that the Soviet experience is over, expatriate life has once again become quite common, even ordinary.
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The Soviet government's campaign to transcend national cultures was comparable to its plans for industrialization. In both instances the intent was to speed up the implementation of processes that were inevitable anyway. The forced tempo, however, was perceived as (and often actually amounted to) physical and cultural genocide, creating a paradoxical situation in which Russians fled Russia — to preserve Russian culture. Only in foreign countries which were (and are) at best indifferent, and at worst hostile, could the bearers of Russian culture work to preserve what was ravaged back home with such terrible efficacy by a governmental policy of denationalization. The tenacity of Russian national culture abroad has been surprising, even if it never succeeded in producing a second generation. Once abroad, those same Russians who at home were fascinated with everything Western become fixated oh everything Russian. To spend an evening at a Russian émigré gathering is to discuss only Russia — a favorite pastry shop in Leningrad (Leningrad, not St. Petersburg, for this is Russia in a tim e warp), Russia's economic woes, the horror of the purges, etc., etc. Thus, the "washout" of national culture may be inevitable, but it will not occur overnight. The self-im age of Russians abroad during the Soviet era was anomalous. Prior to 1917, Russians residing in different countries never had to question their identity as Russians. Only during the seven decades of com m unist rule was the view inculcated that Russians in the "far abroad” were prodigal sons forever rejected from the fold. Russian culture in general and Russian literature in particular, the Soviets declared, could not exist outside the borders of Russia. The official governm ent view of the emigration was actually intended purely for purposes of indoctrination and was not believed even by the persons who created the propaganda. Nevertheless, it was effective in one way: the lie was so brazen that even the émigrés accepted the absurd claim that somehow they were not to be classified together with tsarist émigrés and exiles. This view has now been totally cleared from the table. W hat has remained unchanged, and perhaps even been strengthened since pre-1917 days, is that Russian writers abroad have persistently perceived themselves as representatives of a distinct culture and literary tradition. They are Russian because they say they are Russian; indeed they even define themselves in this fashion. This may sound primitive, but it is a straight forward fact. At the same time, Russian culture and tradition have changed almost beyond recognition over the ages. The culture of the East Slavs had been overrun before, first by the apostles of a proselytizing Byzantium and then by the onslaught of modern secular culture. W hat is im portant is not the point
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o f departure, but the elastic link dynam ically tethering the two Russias to each other. If Solzhenitsyn were asked how he felt about Kurbsky, he would alm ost certainly respond that both of them were exiled Russian writers. That is to say, he would feel a bond between himself and Kurbsky by virtue of their belonging to the same Russia, much as Russia may have changed, and it is this national spatial-temporallinguistic continuity that keeps them in the same family. O f course, there are observers who would draw the same conclusion, but by a quite different line of reasoning — on the basis of ethnicity and religion. This view was discussed earlier, and there is no reason to cover that ground once more, but the reader may imagine how different a book this would be if it were limited to persons of purely Russian stock and/or members of the Russian Orthodox Church. *
Russian literature has now truly been reunited — the two "stream s” have finally flowed into one, as predicted, and the "mission” of the emigration — an artifact of the Soviet period — has been accomplished. Russia's émigrés did more than simply preserve (the concept of the "Parisian Note”) and serve as a cultural intermediary between Russia and other countries; they made a magnificent contribution, not only to Russian culture, but to world culture as well, even though émigré publications were so often forced to subsist on the level of a "vanity press.” The minor writers also played a role. As the em inent literary scholar Yury Tynyanov pointed out, literary history should not be reduced to a history of the "generals.” *
W hat does the future hold for Russia abroad? The Russian Federation itself contains 21 republics and ten national areas and autonom ous regions, with 17.7 million non-Russians. In late 1990 Tatarstan, Karelia, Yakutia, Komi, Bashkiria and certain other “autonom ous republics“ declared sovereignity. Chechnya even fought a brutal war to achieve independence. Nations are held together largely by central economic and military power — quantities in very short supply in Russia today. It is entirely possible that the Russian Federation will break up, leaving the Russians in the same situation as German speakers in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. If that happens, the entire deck of cards will be thrown in the air, and where they will fall is anyone's guess. If Russia is fragmented, much as was the case before Muscovy began to assert itself in the 15th century, this may well be an end of "Russia abroad,” which is defined, after all, by what it is not: Russia abroad consists of Russians living outside Russia. But if Russia itself ceases to exist, the whole question of national identity will have to be redefined.
Chronology906 After a relatively successful campaign against Byzantium, Prince Oleg, heir to the Viking rulers of the kingdom of the East Slavs, returns home after hanging his shield on Byzantium's city gates.
911 Oleg concludes a treaty with Byzantium, normalizing relations between Kievan Rus' and the Byzantine Empire.
previously hostile
944 After an unsuccessful campaign against Byzantium, Oleg's successor, Igor1, is forced to sign a new treaty, essentially confirming the 911 treaty but renouncing ail rights to the Crimea and pledging not to establish posts at the mouth of the Dnepr.
971 Prince Svyatoslav, lgor”s son, is forced to sign an agreement forswearing attacks on Byzantium.
1049 or 1050 Anna, daughter of Yaroslav the Wise, ruler of Kievan Rus\ is betrothed to Henry I of France. Upon arrival in France and marriage to Henry, she is proclaimed Queen of France.
1060 Anna founds the monastery of S t Vincent, France.
1063 Anna writes out the Latin form of her name and title, Anna regina, in Cyrillic letters. This is the oldest known signature of any Russian prince or princess and is one of the oldest specimens of Russian writing.
1080 The first Russian monastery, dedicated to S t Panteleimon, is founded on Mount Athos, in Greece.
1106 (possibly 1108) The pilgrim Daniil writes a rather sophisticated description of his trip to the Holy Land: The Life and Pilgrimage of Daniil, At>bot of the Russian Land.
1200 Archbishop Antony of Novgorod visits Constantinople, possibly to study the liturgy, and writes a moralistic and rather detailed description of the city and its relics.
Between 1261 and 1391 Anonymous travel guide: Tale of the Holy Places, About Konstantingrad [Constantinople] (Skazanie o svyatykh mestekh, o Konstantinegrade ...).
1348-1349 The pilgrim Stefan of Novgorod visits Byzantium and provides detailed descriptions of the city's holy places.
1370? (possibly XV century) Abbot Grefeny visits Palestine but restricts his account to little more than an itinerary of his journey.
“Pseudonyms are given in square brackets [ ] in Chronology and Nam es Index.
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1389 Ignaty of Smolensk accompanies Metropolitan Pimen on his third journey to Byzantium and keeps a diary.
Between 1391 and 1396 Under the year 6903 (1395) the Novgorodian Fourth Chronicle contains an èxtremely short description of 21 sites in Byzantium. The author, Deacon Aleksandr, made the trip partly to view the religious sites and partially to trade.
1418-1422 Zosima, a monk of the Trinity Sergiev Monastery near Moscow, begins the first comprehensive trip to all the holy places: Byzantium, Mount Athos, Salonika, and Palestine. In his account Zosima describes how his ship was boarded by pirates and he was robbed.
1456 The monk Varsonofy, possibly from Novgorod, makes the first of two pilgrimages to Palestine, creating an inventory of the sights he has seen as he travelled through Kiev, Belgrade, Constantinople, Crete, Rhodes, Cyprus, Tripoli, Beirut, and Damascus to Jerusalem.
1461 Varsonofy, the first Russian pilgrim to visit Mount Sinai, sets out on his second journey to Palestine, stopping this time in Cairo.
1462 Varsonofy describes both trips in one manuscript.
1465 From Bursa, in northwestern Anatolia, the merchant Vasily sets out for Cairo and from there makes a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, opening up a new route to Palestine.
1466 Vasily composes an account of his journey. The single existing manuscript, dating from the 16th century, provides a description of Cairo and Jerusalem.
1466 The merchant Afanasy Nikitin visits Persia, Africa, and India
1472 Nikitin describes his journey in a memoir: Journey Beyond the Three Seas.
1560 At the request of Moscow Metropolitan Makary, loakim, abbot of the Russian Panteleimon Monastery on Mount Athos, provides a detailed account of Mount Athos.
1561 Moscow merchant Vasily Poznyakov, who has just returned from a diplomatic mission to Palestine, writes a report supporting the hope of Patriarch Joachim of Jerusalem that Russia will liberate the Christian Orient from the Turks. He also provides a traditional description of the holy places.
1564 Prince Andrei Kurbsky defects to Uthuania and launches a fierce epistolary dispute with Ivan the Terrible.
1570 Ivan the Terrible declares the Khilindar* Monastery on Mount Athos under his personal protection.
492
JOHN GLAD 1582
Political exile within the empire is first mentioned in Russian legislation (although practiced earlier, in the reign of Ivan III). Triton Korobeinikov is sent by Ivan the Terrible to reward Joachim of Jerusalem for his advice and also to make contributions in the Holy Land on the occasion of the birth of his daughter Feodosia. The report contains a detailed account of how the money was spent.
1583 Kurbsky dies.
1584 Ivan dies.
1590 Archimandrite Danylo of the Korsuny Monastery in Belorussia makes a pilgrimage to Palestine.
1591-1593 Danylo supposedly translates a volume of religious texts from the Greek into Russian while staying at the Sabbas Cloister. The authenticity of thç manuscript in which this claim is asserted is questionable.
Between 1593 and 1602 A revised document based on PoznyakoVs text is passed off as a new manuscript, supposedly written by Ivan Korobeinikov after he was sent to Palestine by Ivan the Terrible in 1582. This so-called “pseudo-Korobeinikov" account, found in numerous manuscripts, becomes the most popular Russian pilgrimage account
1602 Tsar Boris Godunov sends 15 young men to England to study, only one of whom returns to Russia.
1637 Vasily Gagara, a merchant from Kazan', returns from the Orient, having spent most of his time in the Orient, and writes a description of his trip in Church Slavonic while partly imitating the rhythm of the Russian folk epos. One of the Russian titles in the sixteen manuscripts which have been preserved is: Khozhdenie v polestinskikh mestekh ubogogo Vasiliya, po prozvishchu Gogary.
1640? Tale of a Certain Elder (Slovo o nekoem startse). The son of the Don Cossack ataman, starets Sergy, is abducted by the Crimean Tartars and sold in Jaffa. The manuscript describes travelling by camel across the Mediterranean and Black seas and refers to 10,000 monks at the Sabbas Cloister, where there were probably not more than 50. The text may have been composed in the second half of the seventeenth century.
1649 The monk Iona Malen'kii (literally: Jonah the Small) sets out on a pilgrimage to Palestine.
RUSSIA ABROAD 493 1652 Arseny Sukhanov, having returned from a diplomatic pilgrimage to Constantinople, Cairo, and Palestine, writes the longest pilgrimage account (120 printed pages) and a detailed account of religious rites in the East Iona composes a balanced account of his pilgrimage to Palestine (1649*1652) accompanying the patriarch Paisios of Jerusalem on his trip home from Moscow. The work is well structured, free of the fantasies characteristic of sixteenth-century pilgrimage accounts, and very detailed with regard to the contemporary state of the sites he visited.
1653 A decree of the Tsar sanctions exile within the Russian realms as a possible substitute for the death penalty. Archpriest Awakum writes a letter to Patriarch Nikon protesting against Nikonian reforms aimed at bringing Russian religious texts and rites in line with the Greek Church and is exiled to Siberia.
1653 Arseny Sukhanov sets out tor Mount Athos.
1655 Sukhanov returns with 500 Greek manuscripts. Those that are reiigous in nature are used to check the authenticity of Russian religious texts.
1663 Awakum is returned to Russia from Dauria.
1664 Court scribe Grigory Kotoshikhin defects to the W est
1666-1667 Kotoshikhin writes a detailed report of life in Russia: On Russia bn the Reign of Aleksy Mikhailovich (O Rossii, v tsarstvovanie Aleksiya Mikhailovicha), Stockholm.
1667 Archpriest Awakum is exiled to Pustozersk, on the White Sea. Kotoshikhin is executed in Sweden for having murdered his translator in a brawl over the man's wife.
1672-1675 Awakum writes his autobiography.
1676 Vasily Polozov of Kostroma sends a petition (chetobitnaya) to Tsar Fddor Alekseevich, describing how he was captured by the Crimean Tartars and sold into slavery to the Turkish Sultan. Originally sentenced to death for his faith, he becomes a galley slave and, after suffering shipwreck, makes a pilgrimage to the Holy Land to thank God tor his salvation. Awarded 1,000 rubles by the Tsar for the 25 years he spent outside Russia, he is appointed court investigator and surveyor.
1662 Awakum is burned to death for heresy.
1697 Pötr I (Peter the Great) visits the Baltic countries, Germany, Holland, and England. Worried over the possibility of a coup in his absence, he directs that all others in positions of power in Russia also undertake visits abroad at the same time. Pôtr's journey opens up Russia to the West and results in a number of written accounts of the trips by these travelling diplomats, among them the diarist Pötr Tolstoi.
494
JOHN GLAD 1698 Pêtr I is forced to rush home to put down the rebellion of the streFtsy
regiment.
1699 Tolstoi, having spent most of the year in Italy, returns to Moscow and evidently at this time finishes his travel diary.
1703 The Old Believer Ioann Lukyanov, having returned from a pilgrimage to Palestine, composes an extensive account of his pilgrimage (100 printed pages). The work is far more modem and personal in nature than previous accounts, describing in detail Luk'yanov's travails en route, such as how he fell ill with the plague and warded off the threat of Arab raiders and sea pirates. In some places the actual descriptions of the Holy Land are modelled after earlier accounts and are generally more cursory than his descriptions of the journey itself.
1707 The monks Makary and SilVestr, having returned from a pilgrimage to Palestine, provide a much less sophisticated account of their journey than Luk'yanov's. They briefly discuss Constantinople, mention the pyramids (the Pharaoh's mountains), and provide an inventory of the sites in the Holy Land. Part of the text is taken from the pseudo-Korobeinikov account
1707-1709 Ippolit Vishensky, a monk of the Chernigov Monastery, pilgrimage to Mount Sinai, Palestine, and Mount Athos.
undertakes
a
1707-1708 Andrei Ignafev makes a pilgrimage to Palestine and Mount Sinai and write an account of his journey and how his ship was capsized.
1714 Varlam Lenitsky of the Crypt Monastery in Kiev writes an account of his pilgrimage to Palestine and styles it in the manner of an adventure story.
1722 Matvei Nechaev creates a pilgrimage account replete with pirate attacks and authorial exclamations, thus moving the genre into a form closer to secular literature.
1726-1730 Vasily Trediakovsky travels to Western Europe.
1731 The poet Antiokh Kantemir is appointed ambassador to England, where he spends much of his time penning satires in the spirit of Boileau, Pope, and Locke.
1735 Trediakovsky publishes A New and Brief Way of Composing Russian Verse with proposals for a German-derived syllabo-tonic system of versification.
1736-1741 Mikhailo Lomonosov travels to Germany and France and brings back a syllabo-tonic versification system which becomes predominant in Russian poetry.
1789 The writer and historian Nikolai Karamzin travels to Western Europe and writes Letters of a Russian Traveller.
1815-18 Otto Kotzebue keeps a diary of his world cruise.
RUSSIA ABROAD 495
1829 The playwright Aleksandr Griboedov is killed in a riot in Teheran.
1832 Rush with impressions from his year abroad, Ivan Kireevsky founds his own magazine in Moscow: Evropeets (The European).
1833 Vladimir Pecherin is sent to Berlin to prepare himself for a university professorship. From population records of the Russian-American Company's colonies: 563 Russian men, 64 Russian women, 511 creole men, 480 creole women, 4,462 native men, 4,658 native women. Total: 10,738.
1834 The poet Efim Zaitsevsky joins the Russian diplomatic mission in Naples. The poet and translator Pêtr Gabbe is allowed to go abroad without permission to return to Russia.
1835 Vladimir Pecherin and Pêtr Kozlovsky return from Europe. Aleksandr Gertsen and Wilhelm Küchelbecker (Küchelbecker after ten years of solitary confinement) are sent into internal exile.
1836 Mikhail Lunin, sent into internal exile after the aborted Decembrist coup, begins his Letters from Siberia. Sovremennik (The Contemporary), a magazine founded by Aleksandr Pushkin, publishes a selection of 24 poems by Fêdor Tyutchev under the title Poems Sent From Germany (Stikhi, prislannye iz German»). Pêtr Chaadaev, who has been to Western Europe during the Napoleonic wars, publishes his first philosophical letter in The Telescope. Chaadaev views Russia as a backward country capable only of learning from the West as a pupil. Nikolai Nadezhdin is exiled to Siberia for publishing Chaadaev's letter. Pêtr Kozlovsky is sent to Poland as a diplomat. Discouraged by the negative reaction to his play The Inspector General, Nikolai Gogol' leaves for Europe. Vladimir Pecherin flees Russia
1837 Mikhail Lermontov writes his famous poem Death of a Poet after Pushkin is killed; Lermontov is arrested and transferred to the Caucasus. A Russian church is dedicated in Berlin. Aleksandr Bestuzhev-Marlinsky dies.
1838 Ivan Turgenev goes to Germany to study at the University of Berlin. Konstantin Aksakov travels to Germany and Switzerland.
1839 September: Gogol’ visits Moscow to give a reading from Dead Souls. Nikolai Grech: Travel Letters from England, Germany and France (Putevye pis'ma iz Anglii, German» i Frantsii), St. Petersburg.
1840 The political thinker Nikolai Sazonov emigrates.
496
JOHN GLAD
The memoirist Pavel Annenkov sees this year as marking a new interest in Western Europe, especially France as opposed to Germany, on the part of Russians. Annenkov himself makes his first (three-year) trip to Western Europe. Annenkov mediates successfully to avert a scheduled duel in Berlin between Mikhail Bakunin, the anarchist and revolutionary, and Mikhail Katkov, the future publisher and critic. Grigory Kotoshikhin's manuscript is published for the first time in Russia and is used by Westemizers seeking to undercut Slavophile claims about the virtues of prePetrine society. Pêtr Kozlovsky dies in Baden-Baden. 1841 Although he doubts the Finns will ever wish to learn Russian, Yakov Grot accepts an appointment as professor of Russian language and literature at the Aleksandr University in Helsinki. The poet and translator Vasily Zhukovsky settles permanently in Germany. The poet, revolutionary, publisher, and philosopher Nikolai Ogaröv begins a five-year stay abroad. A Russian parochial school is opened in Sitka, Alaska. The prose writer Ivan Golovin emigrates. The prose writer and publisher Prince Pötr Dolgorukov goes to Paris. March: convinced he is destined to fulfill a divine mission, Gogol’ calls upon the actor Mikhail Shchepkin, the critic and poet Konstantin Aksakov, and the historian and journalist Mikhail Pogodin to take him back to Russia: “I must be nursed and cherished — not for my own sake.... [In my person] they will bring a clay vessel ... full of cracks, rather old and hardly intact, but it contains a treasure that must be cherished." Deaths: Pötr Gabbe, Mikhail Lermontov. 1842 Selected publications: 1. Nikolai Gogol', Dead Souls (Mêrtvye dushi), written abroad. 2. Nikolai Gogol', The Overcoat (Shinef), written abroad. 3. Pötr Dolgorukov, Notice sur les principales familles de la Russie, Paris; contains a number of details compromising Russian noble families. 1843 The poet Evgeny Baratynsky (Boratynsky) undertakes a ‘pilgrimage" to Europe. Theologian and diarist Ivan Gagarin, who has lived much of his adult life abroad as a Russian diplomat, emigrates and becomes a Jesuit priest Pötr Dolgorukov is summoned back to Russia. The monk and poet Semön Vesnin sets out on a four-year pilgrimage to Mount Athos. The prose writer and translator Elizaveta Kologrivova visits Europe. Second half of year: according to Pavel Annenkov, Gogol’ for the first of three times destroys the manuscript of Dead Souls.
RUSSIA ABROAD 497 Selected publications: 1. Nikolai Gogol': Collected Works in Four Volumes (Sobranie sochinenii v chetyrökh tomakh), Moscow. 2. Nikolai Grech: Letters from Germany, Switzerland and Italy (Pis'ma s dorogi iz German», Shveitsarii i Italii), St. Petersburg. 1844 Emperor Nikolai I issues a decree prohibiting Russians from going abroad before the age of 25 and imposes a heavy tax on foreign passports in order to discourage further emigration. Mikhail Bakunin and Ivan Golovin are stripped of inheritance rights and sentenced in absentia to hard labor for their refusal to return to Russia Ivan Bom receives permission to reside permanently abroad. The Russian government allocates 4,000 silver rubles for the publication of Yakov Grot's Swedish-Russian Lexicon. Fêdor Tyutchev returns from Europe. Evgeny Baratynsky dies in Naples. 1845 Nikolai Sazonov is unable to return to Russia for fear of debtor's prison. Ivan Turgenev follows Pauline Viardot abroad for the first time. Evdokiya Rostopchina goes abroad, travelling through Poland, Germany, France, and Italy. 1846 Pavel Annenkov writes that there is "an entire Russian colony" in London. In Severnaya pchela (The Northern Bee), Faddei Bulgarin publishes Evdokiya Rostopchina's ballad, The Forced Marriage (Nasil'nyi brak), sent from Italy. Ivan Golovin receives British citizenship. Deaths: Aleksandr von Kotzebue and Wilhelm Küchelbecker. 1847 Belinsky goes to Germany for medical treatment Gogol', upon reading Belinsky's negative review of Selected Passages from a Correspondence With Friends (Vybrannye mesta iz perepiski s druz'yami), writes to Belinsky from Frankfurt, requesting an explanation. On July 1-3 Belinsky composes his famous letter to Gogol’ in Salzbrunn, denouncing Gogol’ for his arch-conservatism. Evdokiya Rostopchina returns to Russia. Semdn Vesnin returns from Mount Athos. Selected publications: 1. Nikolai Gogol', Selected Passages from a Correspondence With Friends. 2. Vasily Botkin, Letters on Spain (Pis'ma ob Ispanii), serial publication in Sovremennik. 3. Nikolai Grech, Parisian Letters with Notes on Denmark, Germany, Holland and Belgium (Parizhskie pis'ma s zametkami o Danii, German», Golandii i Bel'gii), S t Petersburg. Aleksandr Gertsen goes abroad and meets with Bakunin, Belinsky, and Ivan Turgenev. 1848 Revolution in France induces Nikolai I to establish the so-called "censorship over censors” committee. The library of the Aleksandr University in Helsinki contains 10,000 Russian books.
498
JOHN GLAD
At a cost of 4V& million silver rubles the Russian government completes construction of a railroad from Warsaw to Vienna, thus providing a vastly improved transportation link with Western Europe. The monarchist journalist and writer Nikolai Grech denounces Germany as far more dangerous and revolutionary than France and proposes that young Russians not be permitted to visit this hotbed of anarchism. Tyutchev is appointed censor. Karolina Pavlova publishes A Double Life (Dvoinaya zhizn’), Moscow. The prose writer and poet Andrei Ivanovsky, who kept minutes of the interrogation of the Decembrists, dies in Belgium.
1849 Fêdor Dostoevsky is arrested and ultimately sentenced to jail and exile in Siberia Gertsen resolves to remain abroad. Vasily Zhukovsky publishes his translation of The Odyssey.
1860 After refusing to obey Nikolai I's order that he return to Russia, Gertsen is stripped of all rights of inheritance and is declared an “eternal exile” (vechnyi izgnannikj. Appearance of a German translation of Gertsen's From the Other Shore (S togo berega); the first Russian edition will appear only in 1855, in London. Zhukovsky completes the manuscript of Thoughts and Remarks (Mysli i zamechaniya), which is rejected by the Russian censor. A report of the Russian bishopric in Alaska lists nine churches, 37 chapels, nine priests, two deacons, and about fifteen thousand converts to Russian Orthodoxy. Ivan Bom dies in Stuttgart.
1851 The poet Efim Zaitsevsky is appointed Russian General Counsul in Sicily. Aleksandr Dukhnovich publishes the poem, I Am a Ruthenian, later set to music, which becomes virtually a national anthem for the Ruthenians living in the Carpathian Mountains. Semôn Vesnin leaves permanently for Mount Athos.
1852 Ivan Turgenev is arrested for having circumvented imperial censors and for his contacts with Gertsen and Bakunin and is ordered by Nikolai I to live on his estate. February 11-12: Gogol' again bums the manuscript of Dead Souls. Gertsen moves to London for the next 12 years of his life. The writer and translator Ivan Betsky emigrates. Ivan Turgenev publishes Diary of a Sportsman (Zapiski okhotnika). Nikolai Gogol’ dies and the Russian government issues a directive discouraging any inflammatory speeches in his memory. Other deaths: poets Nikolai Knyazhevich (Vienna) and Vasily Zhukovsky (Baden-Baden).
1853 Gertsen founds The Free Russian Press in London. The poet, novelist, and translator Karolina Pavlova emigrates. Semôn Vesnin dies on Mount Athos.
1852-1868 Gertsen works on M y Past and Thoughts (Byloe i dumy).
RUSSIA ABROAD 499 1854 In Paris Nikolai Sazonov publishes La vérité sur l'empereur Nicholas, accusing Nikolai I of strangling Russian literature.
1855 Nikolai I dies. His son and successor, Aleksandr II, relaxes censorship and limitations on travel abroad. A mutual aid society for Russian political refugees is founded in Geneva. Aleksandr Gertsen publishes Letters from France and Italy (Pis'ma iz Frantsii i Italii) in London and founds the periodical Polyamaya Zvezda (Polar Star). Konstantin Batyushkov dies.
1856 Ivan Golovin receives permission to return to Russia, but turns down the offer because of its accompanying restrictions. Ivan Turgenev is again permitted to travel abroad. Nikola Ogarev emigrates and becomes Gertsen's closest associate. Deaths: Pëtr Chaadaev and Nikolai Nadezhdin.
1857 Ivan Golovin is granted permission to return to Russia without any conditions but still does not accept the offer. Nikolai Turgenev makes his first trip to Russia after leaving in 1824. Future revolutionary and memoirist Vasily Kel'siev defects in Plymouth, England. Serials founded include: Kolokol (The Bell, London), Golosa iz Rossii (Voices from Russia, London). Bakunin is exiled to Siberia after being released from prison. Aleksei Evstafev dies in New York.
1858 Aleksandr II grants Nikolai Sazonov permission to return to Russia. Serials founded include: Ob'yavlenie o russkikh knigakh (Announcement of Russian Books, London), Russkii zagranichnyi sbomik (Russian Compendium Abroad, Berlin-Paris-London). Ivan Golovin publishes Rovira: A Drama in Three Acts (Drama v trêkh deistviyakh), Leipzig. Deaths: Aleksandr Golitsyn and Aleksandr Ivanov.
1859 The utilitarian critic Nikolai Chemyshevsky travels to London for negotiations with Gertsen. Pëtr Dolgorukov emigrates (evidently clandestinely). Nikolai Turgenev makes his second trip to Russia. In Russia the first pogroms occur, providing a prelude to massive Jewish emigration beginning in the mid-1870s. Ivan Golovin publishes Notes (Zapiski) in Leipzig. Serials founded include: Biagonamerennyi (The Well Intentioned, Berlin), Istoricheskii sbomik vol'noi russkoi tipografii v Londons (Russian Compendium of the Free Russian Press in London), Pod sud (On Trial, London). Nikolai Golovin publishes English Shadows: Stories (Angliiskie teni: Rasskazy), Berlin. Faddei Bulgarin (Tadeusz Butharyn) dies in Derpt, Estonia.
500
JOHN GLAD
1860 Prince Pêtr Dolgorukov in Paris writes in a book entitled La vérité sur la Russia that “the press (in Russia) is shackled by censors who act capriciously and according to their moods. The sole advantage derived by Russia from their activities is the establishment of several Russian presses abroad, which have been founded out of their reach because of the ludicrous severity of the Russian censorship." Agapy Goncharenko flees to England after receiving a summons to return from Kiev to Moscow for having published materials in Gertsen's The Bell. 214 Russian families reside in Nice. The prose writer and feminist Elizaveta Kologrivova emigrates to Paris.
1861 Gertsen publishes Pecherin's long poem Triumph of Death (Torzhestvo smerti) in Polyamaya zvezda. Vladimir Bakst establishes a press in Bern, Switzerland. Pötr Dolgorukov is stripped of ail titles and inheritance rights for refusing to withdraw his book from circulation, and is condemned in absentia to eternal exile. Following student riots in Russia, a number of students enroll in the University of Heidelberg either to continue their studies or to escape arrest. Writer and critic Elizaveta Salias-de-Tumemir [Elizaveta Tur] leaves for France, where she spends ton years. A Russian church is dedicated in Wiesbaden. Census data show 576 Russian men and 208 Russian women as residing in Alaska. Nikolai Ogardv publishes Clandestine Russian Literature ofth eX iX th Century (Russkaya potaönnaya literatura XIX stoletiya) in London.
1862 Dostoevsky travels to Western Europe and meets several times with Gertsen in London. Later Gertsen recalls him as a pleasant and sincere, albeit naive individual. Kotokol (No. 1172) publishes a list of persons to be arrested upon their return to Russia; among them are Födor Dostoevsky, the journalist and literary historian Valentin Korsh, and the writer Aleksei Pisemsky. Dostoevsky's papers are to be searched and any suspicious books, newspapers, or letters forwarded to the Third Division (Trefe Otdelenie). Agapy Goncharenko participates in the Greek revolution. Serials founded include: Listok izdavaemyi kn. Petrom Dolgorukovym (A Newsletter Published by Prince Pötr Dolgorukov, London), Obshchee veche (Town Meeting, Brussels), Pravdolyubivyi (The Lover of Truth, Beriin-Brussels), Svobodnoe stovo (The Free Word, Beriin-Brussels, folds the same year). Leonid Blyummer writes in Svobodnoe stovo (The Free Word) that the émigrés go through three stages: guilt, admiration for the West and shame over Russia, and the establishment of goals and strategies tor reform. Nikolai Turgenev publishes A View of Russian Affairs (Vzglyad na delà Rossii), Leipzig. Deaths: the poet, prose writer, and salon hostess Zinaida Volkonskaya (Turin), Nikolai Sazonov (Geneva).
1863 Russian poet Nikolai Berg is sent to Warsaw as a journalist and remains there until his death.
RUSSIA ABROAD
501
Vladimir Pecherin writes in a letter to Ogardv: I f Russia were like England, where everyone can stroll about freely, say and do whatever he likes ... I would probably take up my affairs there immediately. But as things stand, what is there for me to do in Russia?" Gertsen establishes contact with the “young emigration." The poet, critic, and censor Prince Pôtr Vyazemsky establishes permanent residence abroad. In August Dostoevsky wins a considerable sum of money playing roulette in Wiesbaden, but by early September he writes to his brother that he is penniless and is fearful he will be evicted from his hotel. A few days later he writes to his coeditor of the journal Vremya (Time), Nikolai Strakhov, describing for the first time the plot of his future novel The Gambler (Igrok) and asking for a 300 ruble advance. The “Third Division" maintains surveillance over 60 Russian students at the University of Heidelberg. Leonid Blyummer founds the magazine Evropeets (The European, Berlin) after Svobodnoe slovo closes. The prose writer and critic Konstantin Leont’ev is sent to Crete to serve in the Russian Counsular Service. Vladimir Bakst closes his press in Bern. The Russian émigré colony in Heidelberg disintegrates rapidly after the Polish rebellion and the reopening of the university in St. Petersburg. The prose writer and journalist Sergei Koioshin (Kaloshin) emigrates to Italy.
1864 Nikolai Chemyshevsky is sentenced to forced labor in the silver mines of the Irkutsk region. Agapy Goncharenko moves from Europe to Alaska. Nikolai Turgenev makes his third trip to Russia. Konstantin Leont’ev strikes the French consul with a riding crop for a remark insulting to Russia and is transferred from Crete to Adrianople. Dolgorukov gives up his magazine Budushchnost'. Gertsen travels to Geneva to meet the younger generation of émigrés and is very discouraged by the ideological gap between them and himself. An émigré congress is held in Geneva (late 1864 and early 1865).
1865 Gertsen leaves London to travel in Europe. The émigré community in Geneva continues Aleksandr Semo-Solov'evich, a representative a nervous breakdown after a meeting in Bern in which Gertsen. Although Semo-Solov'evich also took part in
to grow. of the younger émigrés, suffers a number of émigrés attacked the criticism, Gertsen pays his
hospital bills. In the few months before his death the revolutionary, Ivan Kel'siev, constructs an elaborate strategy linking the émigré press in London with a distribution center in Constantinople and a network of militant revolutionaries working inside Russia to disseminate propaganda and prepare for revolution. Mikhail Bakunin founds the International Brotherhood. The Works of Princess Zinaida Volkonskaya (Sochineniya kn. Z. A. Volkonskoi) are published in Paris and Karlsruhe.
502
JOHN GLAD 1865 Gertsen and Dolgorukov leave London for Geneva. Books and periodicals are exempted from preliminary censorship in Russia. The novelist, playwright, and critic Pëtr Boborykin goes abroad for six years. The philosopher and memoirist Grigory Vyrubov emigrates to France.
1866 The poet Nikolai Vorms emigrates. Konstantin Leont'ev is transferred to Belgrade. Mikhail Èlpidin founds the magazine Podpol'noe stovo (The Underground Word) in Geneva, but it closes after the second issue. The “Ruthenian" poet Aleksandr Dukhnovich dies.
1867 Russia sells Alaska to the United States, thus converting Alaska's Russian citizens into American "citizens by purchase.” Some return to Russia, but others move on to California Dostoevsky leaves for a four-year stay in Germany, Switzerland, and Italy; once abroad he describes himself as “cut off’ (otrezannyi lomot). According to Dostoevsky, Ivan Turgenev admits in a letter to poet Apollon Maikov that he actually agrees with the words of Potugin, a character in Ivan Turgenev's novel Smoke (Dym) — that if Russia were to disappear from the face of the earth, it would be no loss to humanity. The novel was written and set in Baden-Baden. Turgenev allegedly told Dostoevsky that he considered himself a German, not a Russian, and was proud of it The revolutionary, literary critic, and aesthetician Pëtr Lavrov is sent into internal exile. Vasily Kel'siev voluntarily surrenders to Russian authorities on Bessarabian border, is returned to Russia and pardoned. Slavyanskaya zarya (Slavic Dawn) is founded in Vienna. Gertsen terminates publication of Kotokol in Russian, although a Frenchlanguage edition continues to appear for another year. Nikolai Grech, memoirist and author of travel letters, dies on Madeira.
1868 Gertsen completes M y Past and Thoughts (Byloe i dumy). The Alaska Herald — a newspaper published in English and Russian — is founded in San Francisco to service the entire west coast. The future prose writer and publisher Varvara Lutovskaya marries the Secretary to the Russian missions in France and Switzerland. Later she divorces him and marries the Russian ambassador to Rome. Upon learning that Gertsen has called him a man of the ‘new world” and a nihilist, Grigory Vyrubov writes a letter to Kotokol, stating that the "time of denials and revolutions” has passed. Födor Dostoevsky publishes The Idiot. Serials founded include: Narodnoe deto (The People's Cause) and Sovremennost' (Contemporaneity), both in Geneva. Deaths: Mikhail Golitsyn (Warsaw), Pëtr Dolgorukov (Bern), and Sergei Koloshin (Florence).
1869 The literary critic Varfolomei Zaitsev emigrates. Bakunin is expelled from the First International.
RUSSIA ABROAD
503
Revolutionary terrorist Sergei Nechaev flees Russia, then returns home and murders a fellow revolutionary who he fears will expose him to the authorities, and subsequently escapes again to Switzerland. Nechaev preaches that the goal of revolution justifies any means employed to achieve it, that work should be mandatory under threat of death, and that all affairs of state should be run by an anonymous committee accountable to no one. The prose writer Anna Korvin-Krukovskaya emigrates to Germany and later to France. The prose writer and mathematician Sofya Kovalevskaya goes to Western Europe to study. The magazine Narodnaya razprava (The People's Vengeance) is founded in Geneva. Aleksandr Semo-Solov'evich commits suicide.
1870 Ivan Turgenev writes that it is almost impossible to write Russian stories while living abroad. Pötr Lavrov flees Russia Starting this year, the poet, playwright, and tsarist censor Pëtr Kapnist spends most of the last three decades of his life in Europe (Germany, Switzerland, Italy, and France), visiting Russia from time to time. Bakunin and Ogarev denounce Nechaev. Dostoevsky begins work on The Devils (Besy), which he completes after returning to Russia. The family of Mariya Bashkirtseva emigrates. Bashkirtseva keeps a diary of her life abroad. The periodical Obshchina (The Commune) is founded in London. Deaths: Aleksandr Gertsen (Paris) and Nikolai Vorms (Switzerland).
1871 Pëtr Boborykin and Fêdor Dostoevsky return to Russia. Konstantin Leont'ev goes to Mount Athos to recover from a spiritual crisis, and is appointed Russian Counsul in Salonika. The Canadian census shows 607 persons of Russian origin. Pogroms in Odessa. The periodical Slavyanskii mir (The Slavic World) is founded in Prague. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 673. Nikolai Turgenev dies in a suburb of Paris.
1872 The revolutionary and terrorist Sergei Nechaev is handed over by Swiss authorities to the Russian government. In Paris the prose writer Anna Korvin-Krukovskaya is sentenced to hard labor in New Caledonia for participating in the uprising of the Parisian Commune. Her husband is sentenced to death, but the sentences are commuted. The novelist and editor Elizaveta Salhias-de-Toumemfr [Elizaveta Tur] returns to Russia after a ten-year stay in France. The novelist Elena Apreleva [Ardov] goes abroad. Adelaida Lukanina, a future prose writer and memoirist, goes to Zürich to study medicine. The prose writer, poet, and journalist Grigory Machtet goes to America.
504
JOHN GLAD
Konstantin Leont'ev returns to Russia. The headquarters of the Russian Church in America is moved from Alaska to San Francisco. Ivan Golovin offers to become an agent of the Russian Secret Service (the Third Division"), but is rejected. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 1,018. Vasily Kel'siev dies in Russia
1873 The prose writer, poet, tsarist secret police agent, and theosophist Elena Blavatskaya emigrates to the United States. Machtet returns from America, where he has worked in the agricultural commune of Vladimir Geins [William Frey]. Radical revolutionary and editor Pêtr Tkachêv emigrates. The revolutionary magazine Vperèd (Forward) is founded, listing its place of publication as London-Zürich. Created with the assistance of Pötr Lavrov, it is intended to polemicize against Bakunin's view that the Russian people are ready for revolution, and also against Tkachdv's conspiratorial views. Grigory Machtet founds the periodical Akrostikh svobode (An Acrostic to Freedom). The Alaska Herald is renamed Svoboda (Freedom). Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 1,634. Fôdor Tyutchev dies.
1874 The utopian writer, populist, and terrorist Sergei Kravchinsky flees abroad ter the first time. Konstantin Leont'ev returns to Russia from Constantinople and the island of Khalke. Sofya Kovalevskaya returns to Russia. The anarchist, explorer, and writer Prince Pdtr Kropotkin is imprisoned in Russia. A Russian church is dedicated in Dresden. Grigory Machtet again goes abroad, evidently with the goal of political conspiracy. The prose writer Anna Korvin-Krukovskaya gives up living exclusively abroad. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 4,073.
1875 January: a Russian reading room is founded in Paris by Ivan Turgenev and G. A. Lopatin. May 27: Dostoevsky arrives in Berlin and leaves the same day for Bad Ems, where he continues work on A Raw Youth (Podrostok). The playwright, prose writer and journalist Pëtr Korvin-Krukovsky emigrates to Paris (approximate date). Valentin Korsh, former editor of Moskovskie vedomosti (Moscow News), the most widely read newspaper in Russia, emigrates to Western Europe, hoping to found in Berlin a newspaper intended to be ‘‘revolutionary” but at the same time not rejecting private property or even the monarchy. Serials founded include: N abat(The Alarm, Geneva); Rabotnik (The Worker: a Newspaper for Russian Workers); Vperôd (Forward, London).
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A. S. Kurbsky publishes A Russian Works for a North-American Plantation Owner: Memoirs, Sketches, Notes (Russkii rabochii u severo-amerikanskogo plantatora: Vospominaniya, ocherki, zametki), S t Petersburg. Machtet returns to Russia Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 7,997. 1876 Pdtr Kropotkin escapes to the W est Construction of the Russian Aleksandrovsky Theater is completed in Helsinki. Pêtr Korvin-Krukovsky and Alexandre Dumas the younger collaborate in writing a melodramatic play, Les Danicheff, about the love of a young nobleman for a young lady being raised by his mother. The memoirist Aleksandra Smirnova settles in Western Europe. The future prose writer and memoirist Adelaida Lukanina receives her medical degree from the Women's Medical College in Philadelphia, but is denied permission to return to Russia because of her radical political associations. A Russian church is dedicated in Bad Ems, Germany. Lavrov gives up his editorial functions in Vperêd because of a difference of views with other editors. The editor, literary historian, and journalist Valentin Korsh attempts to establish himself in Paris, visits the salon of the atheist philosopher Grigory Vyrubov, and then leaves tor Italy, where be begins writing about European literatures. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 4,775. Selected publications: 1. Konstantin Leont'ev: From the Life of Christians in Turkey (Iz zhizni khristian v Turtsii), Moscow. 2. Nikolai ll'in, Six Months in the United States of America (Shesf mesyatsev v Soedinënnykh Shtatakh Ameriki), St. Petersburg. Mikhail Bakunin dies in Bern, Switzerland. 1877 Marxist ideologue and aesthetician Georgy Plekhanov flees to Berlin and Paris for half a year. The literary critic Varfolomei Zaitsev becomes co-editor of Obshchee delo (The Common Cause: A Literary and Political Newspaper) in Geneva. The paper’s political orientation and viewpoint are moderately leftist Elena Apreleva [Ardov] returns to Russia. Vperêd ceases to appear. Valentin Korsh returns to Russia. Pavel Annenkov publishes Memoirs and Critical Essays (Vospominaniya i kriticheskie ocherki) in St. Petersburg. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 6,599. Nikolai Ogarôv dies in Greenwich. 1878 Elena Blavatskaya leaves the United States for India The late 1870s and early 1880s mark the turning of the Russian ‘populists" (narodnik!) to terrorism. The critic and revolutionary Vera Zasulich escapes to Switzerland in tear of being retried for having wounded General Fêdor Trepov, the governor of St. Petersburg, who ordered the whipping of an imprisoned revolutionary.
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JOHN GLAD Pêtr Kropotkin meets Ivan Turgenev in Paris. Ivan Turgenev and Victor Hugo jointly chair an international writers’ congress
in Paris. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 3,048. Prince Pdtr Vyazemsky dies.
1879 July 24-August 29: Dostoevsky again visits Bad Ems for medical care and continues work on The Brothers Karamazov. Kravchinsky flees abroad after having assassinated the Chief of Police in Petersburg in 1878. Vera Zasulich returns to Russia. Slavyanskii al'manakh (Slavic Almanac) is founded in Vienna. Translator ll'ya Gai'perin-Kaminsky refuses to return to Russia (possibly 1880). Nina Amol'di publishes Vasilisa in Geneva (place of publication falsely indicated as Berlin). Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 4,453.
1880 The number of politically active Russian revolutionaries in Western Europe is estimated at between 200 and 225 during the early 1880s, of which about 37% are in Switzerland, 25% in France, and 6% in England. The prose writer and translator Varvara MacGahan (née Elagina) is sent to the United States as a correspondent for Golos (Voice) and Novoe vremya (The New Time) to cover the presidential elections and remains as a permanent resident. Vera Zasulich emigrates to Western Europe. Georgy Plekhanov leaves for a 37-year stay in Europe. Serials founded include: Zemo (Grain, Geneva) and Chëmyi peredel (The Black Redivision, London). Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 5,014.
1881 Pêtr Kropotkin learns that he has been accused of participating in the assassination of Aleksandr II and has been condemned to death by the "Sacred Fellowship" (Svyashchennaya druzhina). At the insistence of the Russian government, he is ordered to leave Switzerland and moves to France. The assassination of Tsar Aleksandr II in St. Petersburg generates a wave of pogroms over the next three years which are a major factor leading to massive Jewish emigration. Late in the year: Pêtr Lavrov and Vera Zasulich become official foreign representatives of "The Red Cross of the People's Will." The Canadian census shows 1,227 persons of Russian origin. Vol'noe sbvo (The Free Word) is founded in Geneva. In St. Petersburg N. A. Popova publishes The Russian Plant Louse Abroad (Russkaya tlya zagranitsei), criticizing Russians in Paris as a menagerie of spongers and fops. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 5,041. Fêdor Dostoevsky dies.
1882 Pêtr Lavrov is briefly deported from France for revolutionary activities. He is permitted to return, but under a different name.
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A Russian church is dedicated in Baden-Baden. Serials founded include: Na rodine (In the Homeland, London), Pravda (The Truth, Geneva). Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 16,918. Deaths: Ivan Gagarin, Sergei Nechaev, Aleksandra Smirnova, Varfolomei Zaitsev.
1883 The poet Pêtr Buturlin is sent as counsellor to the Russian Embassy in Rome. In France Pêtr Kropotkin is condemned to five years imprisonment for anarchist activities. Chemyshevsky is permitted to return from internal exile to Astrakhan. Sofya Kovalevskaya emigrates. Serials founded include: Nigilist (The Nihilist, Paris) and Vestnik narodnoi voli (Bulletin of the People's Will, Geneva). Ivan Turgenev dies and the Russian reading room in Paris is named the Turgenev Library in his memory. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 9,909.
1884 Elena Blavatskaya returns to Europe after a six-year stay in India. Sergei Kravchinsky is forced to flee Italy to London in order to avoid extradition to Russia. The Russian Orthodox Church in America reestablishes two schools in Alaska. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 12,689. Deaths: Mariya Bashkirtseva (Paris), Nikolai Berg (Warsaw), Elizaveta Kologrivova (Paris).
1885 Anna Korvin-Krukovskaya, a prose writer to whom Dostoevsky had once proposed marriage, is put under surveillance by the Russian police. A treaty is signed between Russia, Germany, and Prussia, providing for the deportation of “undesirable aliens." Adelaida Lukanina is given permission to return to Russia. Journalist and translator Evgeniya Konradi moves to Switzerland. Pêtr Korvin-Krukovsky translates into Russian a play jointly written with Alexandre Dumas the younger (Russian title: Danishevÿ) and has it staged in the Aleksandriisky Theater. Poet and playwright Vasily Lashkov publishes his semi-historical verse melodrama, Unsuccessful Vengeance (Neudavshayasya m esf), in Kishinêv. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 17,158. Deaths: Vladimir Pecherin (Dublin), Vladimir Zhemchuzhnikov (Menton, France).
1886 Kropotkin is released from French prison and moves to London. Vestnik narodnoi voli (Herald of the People's Will) ceases publication. Vyacheslav Ivanov studies history and classical philology at the University of Berlin. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 17,800. Pêtr Tkachëv dies in Paris.
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JOHN GLAD 1887 The periodical Samoupravlenie (Seif-Rule) is founded in Geneva. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 30,766. Deaths: Pavel Annenkov (Dresden) and Anna Korvin-Krukovskaya (Paris).
1888 February 22: the ‘ Union Terrorist Circle” (Soyuznyi terroristicheskii kruzhok) experiments with building bombs intended to assassinate Aleksandr III. One Russian émigré is killed and another seriously wounded just outside Zürich during a test of one of the devices. Vladimir Burtsev flees Siberian imprisonment to Switzerland. Varvara MacGahan authors New Trappings on Old Linings (Novoe na staroi podkladke) in Vestnik Evropy (European Bulletin). Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 33,487. Serials founded include: Bor'ba (The Struggle, Switzerland), Sotsial-demokrat (Geneva, later moved to London, then back to Geneva), Svoboda (Freedom, Geneva), and Svobodnaya mysl’ (Free Thought, Paris).
1889 Members of the ‘ Union Terrorist Circle” are deported from Switzerland. In London Sergei Kravchinsky organizes the Society of Friends of Russian Freedom (Obshchestvo druzei russkoi svobody). Revolutionary poet and prose writer Feliks Volkhovsky flees Russia. The funeral of anarchist Nikolai Sokolov, who helped establish a Russian library in Paris in the 1870s and 1880s, attracts the largest crowd ever to attend a Russian émigré funeral in that city. Grigory Vyrubov takes French citizenship. Sergei Kravchinsky publishes (in English) Career of a Nihilist in London. Serials founded include: Sotsialist (The Socialist, Paris), Svobodnaya Rossiya (A Free Russia, London), Znamya (The Banner, New York). Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 33,916. Nikolai Chemyshevsky dies.
1890 The prose writer and essayist Nikolai Hin travels to Germany, Belgium, and the United States, exhibiting a picture by the Russian artist Nikolai Ge, which has been banned from public viewing by the Russian censors. A second group of Russian émigrés is arrested in Switzerland after testing a bomb intended to assassinate Aleksandr III. The journalist and populist Egor Lazarev flees Siberian exile to America by way of Japan. Pëtr Buturlin publishes his Sibyl and Twelve Other Poems (Sibill i dvenadtsaf drugikh stikhotvorenii) in St. Petersburg. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 35,598. Serials founded include: Listok sotsial-demokrata (The Social-Democrat's Newsletter, Geneva); Sotsial demokrat (Geneva-London-Geneva). Deaths: Ivan Betsky (Florence) and Ivan Golovin (Paris).
1890s The Russian Jewish colony in Berlin has an active Zionist movement.
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1891 The prose writer and playwright Shloime Rapoport emigrates. Nikolai ll'in returns to Russia. Pötr Buturlin publishes his Twelve Sonnets (Dvenadtsaf sonnetov) in Kiev. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 47,426. Deaths: Elena Blavatskaya (London), Sofya Kovalevskaya (Stockholm), and Konstantin Leont'ev (Sergiev Posad). 1892 Grand Duke Sergei orders all Jews (including war veterans) removed from Moscow. Twenty thousand people are expelled from the city. Nikolai ll'in emigrates to Australia. The prose writer Lidiya Znov'eva-Annibal emigrates to Italy. Znamya (The Banner) closes in New York. Pêtr Boborykin publishes Vasily Tôrkin in St. Petersburg. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 81,511. Serials founded include: Russkie novosti (Russian News, New York), Russkii parizhanin (The Russian Parisian, Paris), Russko-amerikanskii vestnik (The RussianAmerican Herald), Russkii mirok (The Little Russian World, U .S A ). Elizaveta Salhias*de*Toumemfr [Elizaveta Tur] dies in Warsaw. 1893 Late March: from Karlsruhe, Germany, Evno Azef sends a letter to the S t Petersburg police department offering his services as an informant on Russian émigré activities. Despite a storm of protest among Russian émigrés, U.S. President Cleveland signs into law a bill permitting extradition of political ‘‘criminals’’ to Russia. Future prose writer Semên Yushkevich goes to Paris to study medicine. In Paris Pötr Lavrov begins editing Materials for the History of the Russian Socialist-Revolutionary Movement (Materialy dlya istorii russkogo sotsial'norevolyutsionnogo dvizheniya). A Russian church is dedicated in Beriin-Tegel. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 42,310. Serials founded include: Progress (Chicago), Russko-frarrtsuzskii vestnik (Russian-French Herald, Nice), Soyuz (The League, Paris), S rodiny i na rodinu (From the Homeland and to the Homeland, Geneva). Karolina Pavlova dies. 1894 Sergei Kravchinsky publishes Pavel Rudenko, Member of the Stunde (Pavel Rudenko Shtundist) in Geneva. (The Stunde, often called Stunda in Russian, was a religious sect inspired by German Baptist colonizers and popular in the southern European areas of the Russian Empire.) The political thinker and journalist Aleksandr (Aron) Lande (pseudonym: Izgoev, meaning "exile") is forced to go abroad after participation in student disorders. Populist Egor Lazarev moves from America to London to take part in the work of the Free Russian Press Fund (Fond vol'noi russkoi pressy). Alexandre Dumas the younger takes Korvin-Krukovsky to court when the latter denies him permission to put on the play, Les Danicheff. The periodical Russkii rabochii (The Russian Worker) is founded in ParisGeneva.
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JOHN GLAD Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 39,278.
1895 The playwright, proponent of religious Marxism, and future Soviet political figure Anatoly Lunacharsky goes to Zürich to study. Egor Lazarev moves from London to Switzerland, where he creates a forum in his home for Russians of all political leanings. Vladimir Korolenko publishes Without a Language (Bez yazyka), describing the life of Russian emigrants in the United States. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 35,907. Deaths: Pêtr Buturlin (Florence) and Sergei Kravchinsky (London).
1896 Symbolist poet Konstantin Bal'mont travels to Western Europe. Lande-Izgoev returns to Russia China permits the Russian government to build a railroad across Manchuria, thus creating the basis for a large Russian colony on Chinese territory. The prose writer Vladimir Bonch-Bruevich emigrates. The prose writer Isaak Shkiovsky [Dioneo] goes to London, where he writes for Russian newspapers back home, such as Russkie vedomosti, Rusäkoe bogatstvo, and Vestnik Evropy (Russian News, Russia's Wealth, European Bulletin). Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 51,445. Serials founded include: Nashe vremya (Our Time, London), Listok rabotnika (A Worker's Newsletter, Geneva), Rabotnik (The Worker, Geneva), Soldatskaya gazeta (A Soldier's Newspaper, Paris). Selected publications: 1. Sergei Kravchinsky, A Uttle House on the Volga (Domik na Voige), Geneva. 2. Mikhail Bakunin, Letters (Pis'ma), Geneva.
1897 The Tolstoyan and future émigré publisher Vladimir Chertkov is deported. Pêtr Kropotkin makes his first lecture tour to the United States. The Polish-bom future poet and Socialist-Revolutionary terrorist Ivan Kalyaev goes to Moscow to study. The future prose writer and translator Aleksandra Moiseeva [Miré] is permitted to travel to Western Europe after being arrested several times for spreading revolutionary propaganda and after three years under police surveillance. Vladimir Burtsev calls for the assassination of Aleksandr III. Konstantin Bal'mont lectures at the Taylor Institute in Oxford. Five million Jews reside within the Pale of Settlement Svet (The Light) is founded in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania The feminist and future Soviet ambassador Aleksandra Kollontal sends a story to the magazine Russkoe bogatstvo (Russia's Wealth), but it is not published. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 25,816. Serials founded include: Avtonomno-demokraticheskaya konstitutsiya (The Autonomous Democratic Constitution, Zürich), Narodovolets (London-Geneva), Rabochaya m ysl'(Working Thought, S t Petersburg-Berlin-Warsaw), Sankt-Peterburgskii rabochii listok (The St. Petersburg Workers’ Newsletter, S t Petersburg-Geneva), Sovremennik (The Contemporary, London). The poet and memoirist Dmitry Blagovo dies in Rome.
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1898 Lev Bronshtein [Trotsky] is exiled to Siberia. Pavel Biryukov, biographer of Lev Tolstoi, begins living mainly abroad. 450 students from the Russian empire are enrolled in Belgian universities. Vladimir Burtsev is convicted of “seditious libel” in London. Anatoly Lunacharsky returns to Russia. Work begins on the Far East railroad through Manchuria. The philosopher Sergei Bulgakov travels to Western Europe to study. The first Russian school is opened in Harbin. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 29,828. Serials founded include: Bratskii listok (Brotherly Newsletter, Mundon), Listki svobodnogo stova (Sheets of the Free Word, first Christchurch, then Purieigh, then Essex), Rabochee znamya (Workers’ Banner, London-Belostok), Svobodnoe slovo (Free Word, Purieigh-Onex-Christchurch). Deaths: censor, poet, and playwright Pôtr Kapnist (Rome); journalist and translator Evgeniya Konradi (near Paris).
1899 Vladimir Bonch-Bruevich accompanies a group of Dukhobors to Canada. Altogether, some 8,000 Dukhobors emigrate to Canada in the period 1898-1900, partially financed by the royalties from Lev Tolstoi's novel Resurrection. The future émigré publisher Zinovy Grzhebin goes to Munich and then Paris to study art. Four different Russian printing presses are established in Harbin. Ivan Kalyaev is sent into internal exile for participating in student disorders. The poet Maksimilian Voloshin goes abroad and spends most of the next 19 years in Paris. Russian churches are dedicated in Bad Homburg and Darmstadt. Kropotkin publishes his Notes of a Revolutionary (Zapiski revolyutsionera) in English. The Russian edition does not appear until 1902, also in London. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 60,982. Serials founded include: Nakanune (On the Eve, London), Rabochee deb (Workers’ Cause, Geneva), Svobodnaya mysl' (Free Thought, Geneva-Paris).
1900 Vera Zasulich pays an illegal visit to St. Petersburg. Exile for life within the Russian empire is abolished under the terms of the Penal code, but 298,577 people are registered as exiled in Siberia. Vladimir Ul’yanov [Lenin] emigrates. Sergei Bulgakov returns from study in Western Europe. 13,000 Russian Jews are registered as resident in Germany. 2,350 citizens of the Russian empire reside in Belgium. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 90,787. Serials founded include: Byulleten' (The Bulletin, Geneva), Bybe (Bygone Days, London), Finlyandskaya gazeta (The Finnish Newspaper, Helsinki), Iskra (The Spark, Paris-Leipzig, then Munich, then London, then Geneva), Iz zapisnoi knizhki sotsial-demokrata (From the Notebook of a Social Democrat, Geneva), Listok rabochego delà (The Newsletter of the Working Cause, Geneva), Parizhskaya gazeta (The Parisian Newspaper), Parizhskii vestnik (The Parisian Herald), Russkaya vysshaya shkola v Parizhe (The Russian University in Paris, Leipzig-Munich-London-Geneva),
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Revoiyutsionnaya Rossiya (Revolutionary Russia, Kuokalla-Tomsk-Geneva-LondonParis), Russkaya zhizn’ v Amerika (Russian Life in America, New York), Slavyanskii vek (Slavic Age, Vienna). Memoirist, poet, and prose writer Elizaveta D'yakonova goes to Paris to study at the Sorbonne. Pêtr Lavrov dies in Paris.
1901 Maksim Gor*ky is sent into internal exile by the Russian government Russian counter-intelligence (the Okhranka) opens an office in Berlin to keep a watch over Russian and especially Russian-Jewish students in Germany, and also to provide security ter Russian royalty abroad. The Canadian census shows 19,825 persons of Russian origin. Some 250 Russian students study at the University of Berlin. The Russian library in Harbin opens. Serials founded include: BibliotekaAgramo-sotsialisticheskoi //gr/ (Library of the Agrarian Socialist League, Geneva), Byulleten' (The Bulletin, London), Byulleten' Zagranichnoi ligi russkoi revolyutsionnoi sotsial-demokratii (Bulletin of the Russian Revolutionary Social-Democrat League Abroad, Geneva), Kanun revotyutsii (Eve of the Revolution, Geneva), Letuchii listok (The Roaming Newsletter, Geneva), Narodnye listki (The People's Newsletters, Onex, Geneva), Poslednie izvestiya (The Latest News, London-Geneva), Rabochii golos (Workers' Voice, London), Svoboda (Freedom, Geneva), Vestnik russkoi revotyutsii (Herald of the Russian Revolution, Geneva), Voprosy boriby (Questions in the Struggle, Geneva), Zarya (Dawn, Stuttgart). 1901-1911: the Molokans, a Russian religious group, leave Russia and settle mainly in east Los Angeles. Prose writer Nadezhda Zharintseva (Nadine Jarinzov) emigrates to England. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 85,257. Grigory Machtet dies.
1902 Trotsky flees Siberian exile and illegally crosses the border into Austria Konstantin Bal'mont leaves again for Europe. Ivan Kalyaev goes to Lemberg (Lvov, Lviv), then part of Austro-Hungary, to study. En route to Berlin he is arrested at the German border for transporting revolutionary articles, including copies of Iskra, and is handed over to the Russian authorities. After imprisonment in Warsaw, he is exiled to Yaroslavl', where he comes into contact with Social Revolutionaries. The critic Vatslav Vorovsky (Waclaw Worowcki) goes abroad after imprisonment and internal exile. The Gogol' Library is founded in Rome on the fiftieth anniversary of GogoCs death. Boris Savinkov is sent into internal exile in Vologda Aleksandr Amfiteatrov is sent into internal exile in Minusinsk after penning a lampoon on the Romanov dynasty. Serials founded include: Izm aterialov ‘Revolyutsionnoi Rossir (From Materials of "Revolutionary Russia", Geneva), Krasnoe znamya (Red Banner, Geneva), Letuchii listok (Roaming Newsletter, Berlin), Listki zhizni (Life's Newsletters, Geneva), Mayak (The Lighthouse, New York), Narodnoe deb (The People's Cause, Geneva-Paris), Osvobozhdenb (Liberation, Stuttgart-Paris), Otkliki (Resonances, Geneva), Pravda
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(Truth, New York?), Studencheskii byulleten’ (Student Bulletin, Bern), Svistok (Whistle, Onex), Zhizn' (Life, London). Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 107,347. Selected Publications (posthumous): 1. Grigoiy Machtet, Last Stories an d Letters from Honolulu (Poslednie rasskazy i pis'ma iz Gonolulu), Zhitomir. 2. Grigory Machtet, In Foreign Countries (V chuzhikh krayakh), Kiev. Lev Rozenfel'd [Kamenev] goes to Western Europe to work for Iskra and meets his future wife Ol'ga Bronshtein, sister of Lev Trotsky, in Paris. The poet Lidiya Lebedeva emigrates to Italy. In Austria the diarist Elizaveta D'yakonova commits suicide after being romantically rejected by a French psychiatrist.
1903 July-August: the second congress of the Russian Social Democrat Workers’ Party begins in Brussels but is forced to move to London because of pressure exerted by the Russian government on Belgium. 43 delegates represent 26 Marxist organizations. The falling out of the moderate Men'sheviks with the more radical Bol'sheviks dates back to this congress. Winter (continuing on into the spring of 1904): a number of Russian and Polish students are arrested in Berlin for political activism, and the issue of Russians in Germany becomes a matter of public concern. Work is completed on the Far East railroad through Manchuria. Trotsky and Lenin have an ideological and organizational falling out. Aleksandra Moiseeva [Miré] returns to Russia. Vyacheslav Ivanov publishes Guiding Stars (Kormchie zvêzdy), a collection of his verse, in St. Petersburg. Serials founded include: Beriinskii listok (Berlin Newsletter), K oruzhiyu (To Arms, London), Khleb i voiya (Bread and Freedom, London-Geneva), Kishinôv (BerlinCharlottenburg), Narodnaya voiya (The People's Will, Geneva), Studen’ (Gelatin, Berlin), Zem lya i voiya (Land and Freedom or Will, Geneva). The writer and revolutionary Boris Savinkov escapes from Vologda and flees to Geneva. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 136,093.
1904 The prose writer Aleksandr Amfiteatrov emigrates to Paris. January 14: the historical tragedy St. M ars (Sen-Mars) by Pôtr Kapnist premieres (unsuccessfully) on the stage of the Malyi Theater. July 15: Vyacheslav Pleve, Russian Minister of the Interior, is assassinated by Egor Sozonov in St. Petersburg; the deed was prepared by Ivan Kalyaev and Boris Savinkov, who traveled to Russia that same year to organize the act Both men manage to escape abroad, but Sozonov is arrested and later commits suicide. October: Lunacharsky moves to Paris. November: Kalyaev and Savinkov return to Russia to prepare the assassination of Grand Duke Sergei Aleksandrovich, unde of Nikolai II and GovernorGeneral of Moscow. Vyacheslav Ivanov publishes his poetry collection Transparency (Prozrachnosf) in Moscow. His wife, Lidiya Zinov'eva-Anibal, publishes her three-act drama Rings (Kol’tsa), also in Moscow.
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Serials founded include: Biblioteka i arkhiv (Library and Archive, Geneva), Byulleten’ (Bulletin, Bern), Kodimo (Paris), Listok Osvobozhdeniya (The Liberation Newsletter, Stuttgart-Paris), Rassvet (Dawn, Paris-Geneva), Realist (Rome-Geneva), Russko-yaponskaya voina (The Russo-Japanese War, Geneva), Sila ip ravo (Authority and Law, Geneva), Skandalissimus: A n Annual Hum orous-Satirical-Scandabus R eview (Karislruhe), Sozialdem okrat (Social Democrat, Geneva), Vestnik Bunda (Herald of the Bund, Geneva), Vozrozhdenie (Renaissance, London). Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 145,141. Selected publications: 1. Nikolai Ogaröv, Poems (Stikhotvoreniya), posthumous publication, Moscow. 2. Vladimir Chertkov, A Sectarian's Confession (Ispoved' sektanta), Christ church, England. Varvara MacGahan dies in New York.
1905 After spending two weeks in prison for allowing the Central Committee of the Russian Social Democrat Working Party to meet in his apartment the writer Leonid Andreev is released. Fearing violence from right-wing political organizations, he leaves for Western Europe. Aleksandr Radishchev's works are published in Russia February 2: in Moscow Ivan Kalyaev refrains from throwing a bomb at Grand Duke Sergei Aleksandrovich because the Grand Duke is accompanied by his wife and two children from the royal family. February 4: acting alone, Kalyaev kills the Grand Duke with a bomb. April 5: Kalyaev appeals to the St. Petersburg Senate, explaining the motives for his act, but refuses to plead for mercy. May 10: Kalyaev is hanged in the SchlQsseiburg fortress in S I Petersburg. December: Anatoly Lunacharsky is arrested for “disrespect for authority." New pogroms provide a strong impetus to Jews to emigrate. Dukhobors who had been exiled to Yakutia arrive in Canada Britain restricts immigration under the Aliens A ct Vladimir Bonch-Bruevich, Vladimir Burtsev, Anatoly Lunacharsky, Vladimir Lenin, Shloime Rapoport, Lev Trotsky, Vera Zasulich, and a number of other revolutionaries return to Russia. Georgy Plekhanov is unable to make the trip because of illness. 261 of the 360 Russian students at the University of Berlin are Jewish. Ivan Ladyzhnikov establishes a Marxist publishing house in Geneva (he later moves it to Berlin). The future émigré publisher Zinovy Grzhebin returns to Russia. Aleksandrov Amfiteatrov settles in Paris. Konstantin Bal'mont begins a period of travel abroad that lasts until 1913. Vyacheslav Ivanov and his wife Udiya Zinov'eva-Annibal return to Russia. Preliminary censorship is abolished in Russia. Serials founded include: Byulleteni dlya partiinykh organizatsii (Bulletins for Party Organizations, Geneva), Chêm oe znam ya (Black Banner, Geneva), Dnevnik sotsial-demokrata (Diary of a Social Democrat, Geneva), Iz materiatov Iskry (From Iskrä s Materials, Geneva), N a rodnoi storone (In Our Native Country, Geneva), Kommuna (The Commune, Paris), Listok gruppy Beznachalie (Newsletter of the Beznachalie Group, Paris), Listok Iskry (Iskräs Newsletter, Geneva), Literature partii
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Narodnoi voli (Literature of the People's Will Party, Geneva), N ashi trebovaniya (Our Demands, Geneva), Novosti bor'by (News of the Struggle, London), Novyi m ir (New World, Paris), Otechestvennaya oborona (Defense of the Fatherland, Paris), Proletarskoe delo (Proletarian Cause, Geneva), Proletarii (The Proletarian, Geneva), Vol'nyi diskusstonnyi listok (The Free Discussion Newsletter, Paris), Zem iya i volya (Land and Freedom or Will, SL Petersburg-Paris). Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 184,897. Selected publications: 1. Pëtr Kropotkin, Ideals an d Realities in Russian Literature (published in English), London. 2. Vladimir Lenin, Party Organization and Partisan Literature (Partiinaya organizatsiya i partiinaya literatura). 3. Elizaveta D'yakonova (posth.), The Diary o f E. D'yakonova (Dnevnik E. Dyakonovoi), vol. I, St. Petersburg.
1906 The Russian Philharmonic Orchestra is founded in New York City under the patronage of Margaret Wilson, daughter of President Woodrow Wilson. Pogroms and Jewish emigration continue, producing the first wave of Russian theatrical emigration. The number of Russian students at the University of Berlin rises to 450. There are sixteen Russian schools in Harbin. Serials founded include: Buntar’ (The Rebel, Paris), Burevestnik (The Stormy Petrel: A Publication of the Russian Anarchist Communists, Paris), Byulleten’ (Bulletin, Geneva), G obs Krest'yanskogo soyuza (Voice of the Peasant League, Paris), Parizhskii kur'er (Parisian Courier), Proletarii (The Proletarian, Moscow, Geneva, Paris), Vesti s rodiny (News from the Homeland, Geneva), Z a rubezhom (Abroad: A Daily Uterary-Political Newspaper, Berlin). Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 215,665. Selected publications: 1. Maksim Gor'ky, M y Intervbws (Moi interv'yu), Stuttgart. 2. Maksim Gor'ky, Mother, in English, Appleton Magazine, New York. 3. Leonid Andreev, The Governor (Gubernator), Moscow. 4. Nadezhda Zharintseva, Letters From England (Pis’ma iz Anglii), in the magazine Slovo. The playwright and editor Valentin Kozhevnikov, poet and prose writer Lyudmila Vilenkaya-Minskaya [Lyudmila W kina], novelist Dmitry Merezhkovsky, and poet and memoirist Zinaida Gippius go abroad. Dmitry Filosofov, Zinaida Gippius, Maksim Gor'ky, Anatoly Lunacharsky, Dmitry Merezhkovsky, Mikhail ll'in [Osorgin], Aleksandr Malinovsky, Nikolai Rubakin, and Nikolai Vilenkin [Minsky] emigrate. Leonid Andreev joins Gor'ky on Capri.
1907 February: under threat of arrest, Lunacharsky leaves Stockholm for Italy. Lenin emigrates for the second time. Trotsky is exiled to Siberia for a second time, but escapes to Finland. In London he first meets Stalin at the fifth congress of the Russian Social Democratic Workers’ Party. This is the beginning of his Vienna period. Leonid Andreev returns to Russia.
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Mikhail ll'in, living near Genoa, begins to contribute to émigré journals under the pseudonym Osorgin. The poet Mikhail Gerasimov emigrates after his arrest in Russia. Egor Lazarev goes to S t Petersburg from Switzerland in order to take part in the activities of the Social Revolutionaries in the Second Dum a He leaves after the Duma is disbanded. Serials founded include: Anarkhist (Anarchist, Geneva), G obvotyap (The Bungler, Paris), Listki Krasnogo znam eni (Newsletters of the Red Banner, Paris), U stok Parizhskoi gruppy sotsial-revolyutsionerov (Newsletter of the Paris Social-Revolutionary Group, Paris), Ustok Zem li i voli (Land and Freedom Newsletter, Paris), Rabochii byulleten’ (Workers’ Bulletin, Paris), Rabochii zagovor (Workers’ Conspiracy, Geneva), Raduga (The Rainbow: a Monthly Literary, Scientific, and Political Magazine, Geneva, ceases publication in 1908), Sirius (Paris, ceases publication same year), Z an a ro d (For the People, Paris), Znam ya truda (Labor's Banner, Paris). Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 258,943. Selected publications: 1. Anatoly Lunacharsky, Five Farces for Am ateurs (Pyat* farsov dlya lyubitelei), St. Petersburg. 2. Leonid Andreev, Darkness (T'ma), Moscow. 3. Nikolai Turgenev, A n Exile's Notes (Zapiski izgnannika), S t Petersburg. Lidiya Zinov'eva-Anibal, wife of Vyacheslav Ivanov, dies in Zagor'e, Mogildv (Russia). 1908 Vladimir Chertkov returns to Russia Revolutionary Evno Azef is proven by Vladimir Burtsev to be an agent of the secret police (the Okhranka). Archbishop Platon founds the Orthodox Immigration Society, maintaining a shelter on East 14th St. in Manhattan. The number of Russian students at the University of Berlin falls to approximately 250. The Russian government demands the extradition of a Russian emigrant, but a petition signed by 70,000 American citizens prompts President Theodore Roosevelt to free the man. The strip of land used by the trans-Siberian railroad in China, including Harbin, is granted a form of autonomy. Serials founded include: B ez rulya (Rudderless, Paris), Byloe (The Past, Paris), Davosskii Vestnik (Davos Herald, Davos, Switzerland), Golos sotsial-demokrata (Voice of a Social Democrat, Geneva), Izvestiya Oblastnogo komiteta zagranichnoi organizatsii (News of the Disctrict Committee of the Organization Abroad, Paris), Pravda (Truth, Vienna, Lausanne, Lvov; editor: Lev Trotsky), R alxichaya gazeta (Workers’ Newspaper, Geneva), Revolyutsionnaya m ysl' (Revolutionary Thought, London-Paris), Russkaya gazeta (The Russian Newspaper: A Literary-Social and Political Newspaper, Geneva), Russko-amerikanskii rabochii (The Russian-American Worker, New York), Sotsialdemokrat (The Social Democrat, St Petersburg-Vilnius-Paris-Geneva), Zagranichnaya gazeta (The Newspaper Abroad, Geneva). The prose writer, critic, and translator Nina Petrovskaya emigrates to Paris. Grigory Rozenfel'd [Kamenev] emigrates to Western Europe, where he becomes a close co-worker of Lenin. Il'ya Èrenburg and Aleksandra Kollontai leave tor Europe.
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Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 156,711. Selected publications: 1. Aleksandr Bogdanov, R ed S tar (Krasnaya zvezda), St. Petersburg, science fiction novel. 2. Aleksandr Amfiteatrov, Twilight o f the Petty Gods (Sumerki bozhkov), vol. I, St. Petersburg. 3. Maksim Gor'ky, The Last Ones (Poslednie), Berlin. 4. Leonid Andreev, From a Story That Will N ever Be Finished (Iz rasskaza, kotory nikogda ne budet okonchen), Moscow. Prose writer and memoirist Adelaida Lukanina dies.
1909 Bogdanov, Bazarov, and Lunacharsky organize a school on Capri promulgating the idea that working humanity should be a “god-building” force rather than a conspirational organization — an idea opposed by Lenin. 1909-1912: Hundreds of Russians arrive to work in the Hawaiian sugarcane fields. Egor Lazarev again comes from Switzerland to St. Petersburg and is appointed Secretary of the magazine Vestnik znaniya (Herald of Knowledge). Impressario Sergei Dyagilev organizes his “Russian Seasons” in Paris (19091911). Serials founded include: Al'manakh (Almanac, Paris), Al'm anakh “Byvshye lyudT (The Almanac “Former People," Paris), Èmigrantskii listok (An Émigré Newsletter, New York), Izveshcheniya Parizhskoi gruppy sotsialistov-revolyutsianerov (Announc ements of the Parisian Social-Revolutionary Group), Izvestiya Ukrainskogo soyuza (News of the Ukrainian League, Geneva), Obshchee d e b (Common Cause, Paris), Otkliki Bunda (News of the Bund, Geneva), Russko-amerikanskoe èkho (The RussianAmerican Echo, New York), Trudovaya respublika (The Laboring Republic, London). The artist Lev Rozenberg [Bakst] begins residence abroad, chiefly in Paris. Boris Savinkov [V. Ropshin] emigrates. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 120,460. Selected publications: 1. Elena Guro, The Barrel Organ (Sharmanka), SL Petersburg. 2. Nikolai Vilenkin [Minsky], The Iron Specter (Zheleznyi prizrak), Paris. 3. Leonid Andreev, Anfisa: A Dram a in Four Acts (Anfisa: Drama v chetyrêkh deistviyakh), Berlin. 4. Maksimilian Voloshin, Poems (Stikhotvoreniya), Moscow.
1910 The prose writer, poet, historian, and philosopher Lev Karsavin is sent to France and Italy as a historian to do archival work. German census figures record 137,697 Russians traveling or living in Germany. Burevestnik ceases publication. 7,490 citizens of the Russian empire reside in Belgium. Serials founded include: D'tskussionnyi feto/r (Discussionary Newsletter, Paris), Parizhskii listok (Parisian Newsletter), Probtarskoe znam ya (Proletarian Banner, Paris), Rabochaya g azeta (The Workers' Newspaper, Paris), Russkoe sbvo (Russian Word, New York City), Sotsialist-revolyutsbner (The Social Revolutionary: AQuarteriy LiteraryPolitical Review, Paris, ceases publication in 1912), Tikhoe semeistvo (Quiet Family,
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Paris), V pom oshch (In Assistance, London), Zhum al diya vsekh (A Magazine for Everyone, New York). The composer Igor1 Stravinsky and and the artist Sonya Delone (Terk) begin living abroad. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 186,792. Selected publications: 1. Maksim Gor’ky, The Life o f M atvei Kozhemyakin, first part (Zhizn’ Matveya Kozhemyakina), Berlin. 2. Mikhail Artsybashev, A t the Last Line {Uposlednei cherty), Munich-Leipzig). 3. Vera Kryzhanovskaya, Hellish Attractions (Adskie chary), St. Petersburg. Deaths: prose writer Mariya Krestovskaya-Kartavtseva.
1911 April: the Bavarian government reduces the number of Russian students at the University of Munich from 393 to under 200. Heidelberg also institutes limitations. Russian Baptists celebrate one of their first church services in San Francisco. The Russian Progressive Library is founded in Toronto. Egor Lazarev, who had been arrested in connection with the student disorders organized by Social Revolutionaries after the death of Lev Tolstoi, is sentenced to four years exile in Siberia, but then deported (decision of Pêtr Stolypin). Jurgis Baltruéaitis publishes Earthly Steps: Elegies, Songs, Poem s (Zemnye stupeni: Èlegii, pesni, poèmy), Moscow. The philosopher Nikolai Berdyaev and poet Vladislav Khodasevich travel to Italy. The poet Sergei Alymov travels abroad. The poet Dmitry Klenovsky travels to Switzerland for medical treatm ent The novelist Pdtr Boborykin and poet literary scholar, and translator Lev Kobylinsky [Èllis] emigrate. Serials founded include: Budushchee (The Future, Paris, ceases publication in 1914), inform atsbnnyi listok Zagranichnoi organizatsii Bunda (Informational Newsletter of the Bund's Foreign Organization, Geneva), Listok Golosa sotsialdem okrata (Newsletter of the Social-Democrat Voice, Paris), Listok zagranichnogo byuro Tsentral'nogo komiteta R .S-D . rabochei partii (Newsletter of the Foreign Bureau of the Russian Social-Democrat Central Committee, Paris), N a chuzhbine (In Foreign Lands, Liège), Pam yalnaya knizhka (Notebook, Paris), Rabochaya zhizn' (Working Life, Paris), Rabochii (Worker, Paris). Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 158,721.
1912 January 19: French and Polish writers in Paris celebrate the 25th anniversary of Bal'monfs literary career. March 26: at the Russian border station in Verzhbolovo, Russian guards confiscate the manuscript of the novel, Aleksandr I, from Dmitry Merezhkovsky, who is returning from Paris to St. Petersburg. Georgy Plekhanov gives a talk in Paris entitled Life an d A rt (Zhizn’ i iskusstvo). Trotsky is sent as a correspondent by the newspaper Ktevskaya m ysl' (Kievan Thought) to the Balkans. Trotsky's Vienna newspaper Pravda closes.
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Some 5,000 students from Russia are registered for study at German universities, primarily Berlin (1,174), Leipzig (758), Munich (552), Königsberg (435), Heidelberg (317), and Halle (283). Andrei Bely goes abroad to study with the anthroposophist Rudolph Steiner. Vyacheslav Ivanov visits Switzerland and Rome. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 162,395. Serials founded include: Inostranets (The Foreigner, bi-monthly newspaper, Paris), Khleb i volya (Bread and Freedom, Chicago), Ustok Organizatsionnogo komiteta po sozyvu obshchepartiinoi konferentsii (Newsletter of the Steering Committee for the Convening of an All-Party Conference, Brussels), Motot (Mallet, Paris), M oryak (The Sailor, Vienna), M ysl' (Thought: a Political, Social and Literary Newspaper, Paris); Pochin (The Initiative, Paris), Rabochii m ir (Working World, ZQrich-London-Paris), Vestnik Zagranichnoi Federatsii grupp sodeistviya Partii sotsialistov-revolyutsianerov
(Bulletin of the Federation Abroad to Assist the Socialist-Revolutionary Party, Paris), Z a partiyu (For the Party, Paris), Zagranichnye otkliki (Responses Abroad: A Social, Political, Literary and Economic Newspaper, Berlin, ceases publication in 1914). Selected publications: 1. Aleksandr Bogdanov, Engineer M anny (Inzhener Mènni), Moscow. 2. Boris Savinkov, W hat N ever Was (To, chego ne byio), published in Zavety (No. 1-8). 3. Mikhail Tsetlin [Amari], Lyrics (Lirika), Paris. 4. Elena Guro, A n Autum nal Dream (Osennii son), St. Petersburg. 5. Lyubov* Dostoevskaya, Èmigrantka (The Emigrant), St. Petersburg.
1913 Tafyana Smimova-Maksheeva goes to the south of France for medical treatment and never returns to Russia. Lyudmila Vilenkaya-Minskaya [Lyudmila W kina] returns to Russia. The poet Mark-Mariya-Lyudovik Talov settles abroad and does not return until 1922. Emigration from Russia to the United States reaches its peak this year — 291,040. The Russian Progressive Club in Toronto numbers some 400 members, most of whom are probably Belorussian. Russian churches are dedicated in Leipzig and Danzig. Maksim Gor'ky and Konstantin Bal'mont return to Russia under general amnesty for political émigrés. Serials founded include: Byulleten' Komiteta zagranichnoi organizatsii Rossiiskoi sotsial'-demokraticheskoi rabochei partii (Bulletin of the Steering Committee of the Russian Social-Democratic Workers’ Party, Paris), Evreiskii student (The Jewish Student, Berlin, ceases publication in 1914), Gelios (Helios, Paris), Ustok redaktsii zhum ala Politicheskie zaklyuchènnye (Editor's Newsletter of the journal Political Prisoners, Krakow), N a tem y dnya (On Topics of the Day, Paris), Studencheskii informatsionnyi listok (Student Informational Newsletter, Berlin), Studencheskii listok (Student Newsletter, Berlin), Voi'naya obshchina (The Free Commune, London), Yug (The South: A Social-Political and Literary newspaper, Nice).
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Selected publications: 1. Maksim Gor'ky, Childhood (Detstvo), in Russkoe slovo (separate edition: Berlin, 1914). 2. Nikolai ll'in, Letters from Australia (Pis'ma iz Avstralii), S t Petersburg (Newspaper Novoe vremya, August 14). 3. Konstantin Leont'ev, M onastb Life, the Monastery, an d the World: Four Letters from Mount Athos (Otshel'nichestvo, monastyr’ i mir: Chetyre pis’ma s Afona), Sergiev Posad. 4. Nikolai Vilenkin [Minsky], Chaos (Khaos), Paris. 5. Mikhail Osorgin, Sketches o f M odem Italy (Ocherki sovremennoi Italii), Moscow. The prose writer Iosif Perel'man [Osip Dymov] emigrates. Vyacheslav Ivanov, Valentin Kozhevnikov, Aleksandr Malinovsky [Bogdanov], and Dmitry Klenovsky return to Russia. Deaths: Elena Guro and Aleksandra Moiseeva [Miré].
1914 January: Grigory Rozenfel'd [Kamenev] returns to Russia as4Lenin's personal emissary to oversee the operations of Pravda August: many Russians in Germany and Austria, among them Lev Trotsky, flee to Russia or Switzerland to escape being assaulted after Germany declares war on Russia on August 2. Some 23,000 are arrested in Germany and many end up in internment camps, including Konstantin Fedin. August 5: British Home Secretary Reginald McKenna successfully introduces the Aliens Restriction A ct The prose writer and ethnographer Feliks Kon emigrates from Poland to Switzerland. The poet, playwright and journalist Vasily Lashkov returns to Kishinôv. Zinaida Gippius, Dmitry Merezhkovsky, and Vladimir Burtsev return home from Europe. The prose writer and literary critic Pëtr Kozhevnikov, who has lived largely in Switzerland and France since the early 1910s, no longer visits Russia. The poet and prose writer Vitol'd-Konstantin Rozenblyum [Konstantin L'dov] establishes residence in Paris. Lyudmila Vilenkaya-Minskaya [Lyudmila W kina] again goes abroad. The Zionist Vladimir Zhabotinsky is sent to Europe as correspondent for Russkie vedomosti (Russian News). The prose writer and memoirist Vladimir Baryatinsky emigrates. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 255,660. Serials founded include: Byulleten' Ob'edinönnogo komiteta rossiiskoi èmigratsii (Bulletin of the United Committee of the Russian Emigration, Paris), Golos (Voice, Paris), Golos Yaponii (Voice of Japan, Tokyo), N abat (Alarm, Geneva-Paris), Nachalo (A Beginning, Paris), Novosti (News, Paris), Svobodnoe stovo (The Free Word, Liege), Vechera (Evenings, monthly collection of poetry, edited by ICya Èrenburg, Paris), Vestnik katorgi i ssylki (Bulletin of Hard Labor and Exile, Paris). Selected publications: 1. Anatoly Lunacharsky, “Letters on Proletarian Literature” (Pis'ma o proletarskoi literature), BoYba, Paris. 2. Lev Èllis, Argo (Slang), Moscow.
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Feliks Volkhovsky dies in London.
1915 Russkoe slovo (New York) becomes a daily newspaper.
German nationals in Russia are required to sell all real estate within eight months or forfeit it to Russian banks at 10% of assessed value. Mikhail Gerasimov is deported from France back to Russia for authoring anti war propaganda. Sergei Sokolov [Krechetov] publishes memoirs of two First-Wortd-War campaigns in Eastern Prussia — With Iron in Hand, With a Cross in the Heart: An Officer's Notes (S zhelezom v rukakh, s krestom v serdtse: Zapiski ofitsera), Petrograd. The sketches are presented in a nationalist spirit and describe Russia as an “all-Slavic Rome” (vseslavyansky Rim) destined to achieve a great feat. Vitol'd-Konstantin Rozenblyum [Konstantin L'dov] returns to Paris after having been forced by the outbreak of World W ar I to return to Russia temporarily. The artists Natai'ya Goncharova and Mikhail Larionov emigrate. Grigory Shvarts-Bostunich publishes From Enem y Captivity: Sketch o f a Survivor: History o f a Russian Journalist in Germ any (Iz vrazheskogo plena: Ocherk spasshegosya: Istoriya russkogo zhumalista v Germanii), Petrograd. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 26,187. December: the newspaper Russkii vestnik (Russian Herald) is founded by the German government for Russian prisoners of war to instill in the men the notion of German-Russian friendship. The newspaper soon claims a circulation of over 100,000. Other serials founded include: Golos zarubezhnogo studenchestva (Voice of Students Abroad, Geneva), Intem atsional i voina (The International and War, Zürich), Intem atsional m olodêzhi (International of Youth, Zürich), Izvestiya zagranichnogo S e k re ta ria t organizatsionnogo komiteta Rossiiskoi sotsialdemokraticheskoi rabochei partii (News of the Foreign Secretariat of the Steering Committee of the Russian SocialDemocrat Workers' Party, Geneva), Kommunist (Geneva), Morskoi listok (Naval Newsletter, London), Nashe èkho (Our Echo, Paris), Nashe sbvo (Our Word, Paris), Rossiya i svoboda (Russia and Freedom, Paris), Vestnik voennoplennogo (Newsletter of the Prisoner of War, Geneva), Zhizn’ (Life, Paris), Z a rubezhom (Abroad, Paris).
1915-1921 A six-year wave of pogroms is set off by the belief that the Jews were to blame for Russian defeats in World W ar I.
1916 Andrei Bely returns to Russia after being called up for military service. Trotsky is deported from France to Spain, where he is arrested by Spanish authorities. In the United States 169 Russian Orthodox churches count some 99,861 members. To escape prerevolutionary turmoil in Russia, the family of future poet Lidiya Khaindrova moves to Harbin. Aleksandr Amfiteatrov and Mikhail Osorgin return to Russia. Fmlyandskaya gazeta (The Finnish Newspaper, Helsinki) and Nashe slovo (Our Word, Paris) close. The poet, critic, and artist Boris Anrep is sent to England as part of a government mission.
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Evgeny Zamyatin goes abroad to supervise the construction of Russian icebreakers in England. Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States: 7,842. Serials founded include: Byulleten', izdavaem yi ob'edinënnymi gruppam i Partii sotsialistov-revolyutsianerov (Bulletin Published by the United Groups of the SocialistRevolutionary Party, Geneva), Byulleten' Zagranichnogo komiteta Bunda (Bulletin of the Bund's Committee Abroad, Geneva), Druz'ya russkogo soldata (Friends of the Russian Soldier, Paris), N a chuzhbine (In a Foreign Land, Geneva), Nedelya (The Week, Vienna), Otkliki zhizni (Life's Resonance, Paris), Parizhskaya gazeta (Parisian Newspaper), Russkii zhum al (Russian Journal, Manchester, England), Sbom ik sotsialdem okrata (Collection of a Social Democrat, Geneva), Voennaya gazeta dlya russkikh voisk vo Frantsii (Military newspaper for Russian Troops in France, a publication of the General Staff, Paris, ceases publication 1917). Selected publications: 1. Il'ya Èrenburg, Poems about the Eves (Stikhi o kanunakh), Moscow. 2. Maksimilian Voloshin, Anno mundi ardentis, Moscow. Agapy Goncharenko dies in New York.
1917 January 15-March 27: Trotsky moves to New York, where he is a member of the staff of the communist newspaper Novyi mir. February: many Russian emigrants return to Russia after the February revolution. The Russian-Jewish socialist Aleksandr Parvus (Helphand) persuades the German High Command to dispatch some four hundred Russian exiles, among them Lenin, to Russia. October: a coup d'état, the so-called October Revolution, occurs in Russia. December: 230,000 Russian prisoners of war in Germany work in agriculture and another 650,000 in industry. Russian émigrés in many countries enthusiastically welcome the overthrow of the government. Russian émigrés in Brisbane, for example, christen their organization the "Australian Soviet.” Il'ya Èrenburg, Feliks Kon, Aleksandra Kollontai, Egor Lazarev, Pêtr Kropotkin, Anatoly Lunacharsky, Lev Trotsky, Maksimilian Voloshin, Evgeny Zamyatin return to Russia. The poet Antonina Grivtsova [A. Gorskaya], whose husband is a diplomat, arrives in Persia. The industrialist and future publisher of Paris newspaper Vozrozhdenie Abram Gukasov emigrates. The literary scholar and prose writer Evgeny Lyatsky moves to Finland, remaining there after Finland becomes independent. The poet Dmitry Magula and family of the future poet Galina Soboleva emigrate. The popular historical novelist Sergei Mintslov refuses to return to Russia. Emigrants from the Russian empire to the United States: 12,716. Serials founded include: Russkii g obs (The Russian Word, New York), Russkii vestnik (Russian Herald, Bern), Svobodnaya Rossiya (A Free Russia, Chicago), V plenu (In Captivity, Bern).
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1918 The Fund for the Relief of Russian Writers and Scientists in Exile is founded in New York. January 19: Metropolitan of the Russian Orthodox Church Tikhon anathemizes the Bol'sheviks. August 12: 37 issues of the New York socialist newspaper Novyi m ir are seized by the Post Office. Three days later Novyi m ir is denied the privilege of even receiving mail. October 10: of the 1.4 million Russian prisoners of war, 1 2 million are still in Germany. November 29: the Special Committee for Russian Affairs in Finland is created to provide financial assistance to Russian refugees. The Committee receives a grant of 500,000 marks from the Finnish government. November: in la§i, Romania, a meeting is held by the Entente to discuss military intervention in Russia. A number of Russian émigrés are present, including li'ya Fondaminsky, Aleksandr Krivoshein, Manuil Margulies, Pavel Milyukov, Vadim Rudnev, and Vasily Shul'gin. November: over one million Russian prisoners of war are still held in Germany. November 28: the Provisional Russian Council (Vremennyi russkii sovet) is created in Tallinn. It denies Estonia's right to independence. December 13: the Second General Congress [S'ezd] of Russian organizations is held in New York City. December 31: the prose writer Sergei Mintslov flees with his family from Finland to London via Sweden and Norway. In Paris Boris Savinkov represents the interests of Admiral Kolchak's Siberian army. Lev Rozenfel'd [Kamenev] goes to Europe for 2Vz years as Lenin's special’ emissary. Leonid Andreev moves to his dacha in Finland to escape starvation. The Library of the Russian Merchants' Society is founded in Finland (still in existence today). The prisoner-of-war newspaper Russkii vestnik is shut down. Serials founded include: Dosug (Leisure, New York), Golos Rossii (Voice of Russia, Berlin), Izvne (From Without, Stockholm), Novaya russkaya zhizn' (The New Russian Life, Helsinki), Novaya zarubezhnaya kniga (The New Book Abroad, Prague), Obshchee deto (The Common Cause, Paris), Rassvet (The Dawn, Helsinki), Russkaya pochta (The Russian Post, Chicago), Russkaya zhizn' (Russian Life, Helsinki; closes same year), Severnaya zhizn' (Northern Life, Helsinki), Sodruzhestvo poètov (Commonwealth of Poets, Vyborg), Zhizn' i deto (Life and the Cause, New York). The composer Sergei Prokofev goes abroad for nine years. The artist Boris (Ber) Anisfel'd emigrates. The following writers emigrate: prose writers Nikolai Freidenshtein [Yury Fel’zen], Ekaterina Dykhova-Gardner, Dmitry Nikolaevich Krachkovsky, Vladimir Krymov, and Aleksei Tolstoi; painter and prose writer Nikolai Rerikh (Roerich); prose writer and revolutionary Boris Savinkov (not first time); poet Igor1 Lotarév [Severyanin]; poet and literary scholar Gleb Struve; prose writer and poet Kallistrat Zhakov. The poet
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Dmitry Maguia, who had been sent to Sweden in 1917, refuses to return to Russia and emigrates to the United States. Deaths: Historian and political activist Vladimir Burtsev (Paris), Marxist theoretician Georgy Plekhanov (Terioki, Finland), editor and professor Aleksandr Yashchenko (Berlin).
1918-1922 An estimated 250,000 Russians flee to the Far E ast more than half of them to China, mainly to Manchuria.
1919 January: the number of Russian prisoners of war in Germany is reduced to less than 700,000, but the Allied Armistice Commission curtails further transportation of Russian prisoners to keep them from being drafted into the Red army. Struggling to beat the Allied deadline of February 2, German authorities repatriate 400,000 Russians within a little more than two weeks. February 6: from Finland Leonid Andreev publishes a call to the West to help save Russia from Bolshevism (Spasite! SO S, London). Early February: the Provisional Russian Council in Estonia acknowledges Estonia's right to independence, reversing its previous position. April: the French evacuate the first group of Russian refugees from Odessa. May 21: censorship is reestablished in Russia with the establishment of Gosizdat, headed by the former émigré Vatslav Vorovsky. Fall: the Allies abdicate control over Russian prisoners of war in Germany. Fall: after the appearance of the first few volumes of Gor'ky's World Literature (Vsemimaya literatura) series, Grzhebin takes over publication, but there is strong resistance within the Soviet government to the project. Gor'ky writes his famous letter to Lenin, placing himself at the service of the Bol'sheviks. The “Czech-Russian Union” (Öesko-ruska Jednota) is founded in Prague. Igor* Severyanin publishes Bard (Menestrel) in Berlin. Serials founded include: Golos Rossii (Voice of Russia, Berlin), Khleb i volya (Bread and Freedom, New York), Luch sveta (Ray of Light Berlin-Munich), Novaya russkaya zhizn' (The New Russian Ufe, Helsinki), Prizyv (Call to Arms, Paris), Rassvet (The Dawn, Helsinki), Segodnya (Today, Riga), Svoboda Rossii (Russia's Freedom, Revel [Tallinn]), Vremya (Time, Berlin), Zam itsy (Distant Lightning, Harbin). The artists Pavel Chelishchev and Boris Grigor'ev emigrate. The following writers emigrate: historical novelist Mark Aldanov, critic Allred Bern, poet and translator Aleksandr Bisk, poet and critic Anatoly Bumakin, poet and prose writer Zinaida Gippius, prose writer Nadezhda Gorodetskaya, novelist and editor Roman Gul', future prose writer Natai'ya Kodryanskaya, prose writer, poet, and critic Aleksandr Koiransky, prose writer and poet Aleksandr Kondrat'ev, novelist and general Pêtr Krasnov, prose writer Aleksandr Kuprin, prose writer and poet Vladimir Ladyzhensky, poet Gizella Lakhman, novelist Dmitry Merezhkovsky, poet and prose writer Elizaveta Kuz'mina-Karaeva (Skobtsova, Mother Mariya), Egor Lazarev, literary critic Konstantin Mochul'sky (possibly 1920), Ol'ga Morozova, family of Kirill Nabokov and Vladimir Nabokov, family of future poet Anatoly Shteiger (returns briefly to Russia), prose writer and poet Grigory Sosunov, humorous writer [Nadezhda Tèffi], philosopher Nikolai Trubetskoi, poet and singer Aleksandr Vertinsky, editor Mark Vishnyak,
RUSSIA ABROAD 525 theologian Vasily Zen'kovsky, Vladimir Zlobin (poet, memoirist, and personal secretary to Merezhkovsky and Gippius). Deaths: prose writer Leonid Andreev, critic and revolutionary Vera Zasulich.
1920 Approximately 300,000 Russian emigrants are estimated to be living in Germany. January 20: second evacuation from the North Black Sea coast area, this time from Odessa and Novorossisk. February 2: the Soviet Union recognizes Estonia's independence. February: claiming to be the Grand Duchess Anastasiya, daughter of Tsar Nikolai II, a woman surfaces in Europe under the name "Anna Anderson.” (In October 1994 DNA tests reveal that her claim could not possibly have been true and that she was probably Franzisca Schanzkowska, of Polish peasant stock.) March 21: the White General Denikin transfers authority to General Pötr Vrangel’ (Wrangel) and leaves Russia that same day on a British military ship. June: the Russian Academic Group (Russkaya akademicheskaya gruppa) is founded in Berlin. June 15: General Aleksei Brusilov in Izvastiya calls upon professonal soldiers of the tsarist army to return to Russia, abandon the class struggle, and fight for the homeland. July: France becomes the only country to recognize the government of General Pötr Vrangel'. July: Boris Savinkov establishes the Russian Political Committee. August 8: the first meeting of the League of Russian Students (Soyuz rossiiskikh studentov, later the name is changed to Soyuz russkikh studentov) is held in Berlin. Late August-early September: founding meeting of the League of Russian Artists held in Berlin. September 1: Eduard BeneS, Czechoslovak minister of foreign affairs, in conjunction with Aleksandr Kerensky, establishes the so-called ‘Administrative Center” to provide financial assistance to Russian émigré scholars and writers, channeling it through the Social Revolutionary Party. September 23: Russians in China lose diplomatic status. November 11-16: third Black Sea evacuation of 150,000 persons on 130 ships. November 15: in Constantinople General Vrangel’ creates the Russian Council (Russkii sovet) in an attempt to unite the émigré community. November 30: Pötr Kropotkin writes an open letter to Lenin protesting the taking of political hostages and another open letter to the Eighth All-Russian Congress of Soviets defending the right of free publishing houses to exist December 20: the Germany Ministry of Internal Affairs declares that the majority of Russian prisoners of war have been repatriated. December: General VrangeC's card catalogue contains the names and addresses of 190,000 Russians in Turkey. The Russian Red Cross and Zemgor (Ob'edinenie zemskikh i gorodskikh deyatelei, also referred to as Vserossiiskii soyuz zemstv i gorodov) make the first attempt to unite the more than 80 Russian organizations in Berlin.
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The League of Russian Jews in Germany (Soyuz russkikh evreev v German») is founded in Berlin. Viktor Shimkin takes over editorship of New York newspaper Novoe russkoe slovo.
The American Red Cross estimates the number of Russian émigrés residing in Germany at 560,000. Antonina Grivtsova [A. Gorskaya] leaves Persia for France after the Persian government recognizes the Bolsheviks. The Futurist literary group Zheieznaya kogorta (Iron Cohort) is founded in Harbin. The literary scholar and prose writer Evgeny Lyatsky moves from Finland to Stockholm, where he establishes the Russian publishing house Sevemye ogni (Northern Lights). The Russian Library is founded in Belgrade. The New York communist newspaper Novyi m ir is raided by the Lusk Committee. The paper’s printing presses are damaged, forcing it out of business. Several thousand aliens are deported, 90 percent of them to Russia t Russian-American church groups opposed to the Soviet government form the Russian Orthodox Church outside Russia and sever all ties with the Patriarch of Moscow. The poet Nikandr Alekseev and biographer Pavel Biryukov return to Russia Serials founded include: Al'manakh “Russkaya àm igraîsiya " (Almanac T h e Russian Emigration,” Belgrade), Bich (Scourge, Paris), Blokha (Rea, Paris), D al' (Distance, Harbin), Dal'nii Vostok (Far East, Shanghai), Gryadushchaya Rossiya (A Future Russia, Paris), Knigopisets (Bookwriter, Sofia), M ayak (Lighthouse, Libava [Liepaja]), Nashe slovo (Our Word, Kishinev), Novaya Rossiya (New Russia, New York), Novaya zarya (New Dawn, San Francisco), Novoe varshavskoe slovo (The New Warsaw Word), Okno (Window, Harbin), Petushok (Cockerel, Warsaw), Poslednie izvestiya (The Latest News, Revel), Poslednie novosti (The Latest News, Paris), R ul’ (The Helm, Berlin), Russkoe àkho (Russian Echo, Shanghai), Russkaya pravda (Russian Truth, Sofia), Russkaya zhizn' (Russian Life, San Francisco), Russkoe obozrenie (Russian Review, Peking-Shanghai), Satir (Satyr, Riga), Sovrem ennye zapiski (Contemporary Annals, Paris), Svoboda (Freedom, Warsaw), Teatr i zh izn ’ (Theater and Life, Riga), U gobk literatury i zhizni (Comer of Literature and Life, Rezhitsa [Rezekne]), Vesêlyi obyvatel' (Cheerful Philistine, Harbin), Volya Rossii (Russia's Will, Prague), Za svobodul (For Freedom, Warsaw), Zelênaya palochka (Green Stick, Paris). Selected publications: 1. Aleksei Tolstoi, R oad to Calvary (Khozhdenie po mukam), in Gryadushchaya Rossiya, Paris. 2. Sergei Alymov, A Piece o f Tenderness (Kusok nezhnosti), Harbin. 3. Konstantin Balmont, Selected Poems (Izbrannye stikhi), New York. The artists Mikhail Andreenko-Nechitailo, Nikolai Remizov, Ivan Puni, and Sergei Sudeikin emigrate. The following writers emigrate: prose writer Gleb Alekseev [Chamotsky], prose writer Arkady Averchenko, poet Konstantin Balmont, prose writer Arkady Bukhov, prose writer and future Nobel Prize winner Ivan Bunin, artist and poet David Buriyuk, prose writer Evgeny Chirikov [Evgeny Valin], poet Lidiya Devel [Lidiya Alekseeva], prose
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writer Aleksandr Dikgof-FerentaT, prose writer Aleksandr Drozdov, prose writer Gaito Gazdanov, humorous writer Aleksandr Glikberg [Sasha Chêmy], writer and husband of Marina Tsvetaeva Sergei Èfron, prose writer Georgy Grebenshchikov, prose writer and poet Valentin Ivanov [Valentin Goryansky], family of poet and scholar Yury Ivask, the families of future poets Irina Knorring and David Fiksman [Dovid Knut], family of Alla Golovina, poet and prose writer Iosif Kallinikov, poet and prose writer Vladimir KotvinPiotrovsky, poet and memoirist Galina Kuznetsova, prose writer Boris Lazarevsky, Mikhail Lopatto [M. Lopatin], prose writer Ivan Lukash, poet and critic Sergei Makovsky, poet Viktor Mamchenko (?), family of poet and critic Yury Mandel'shtam, poet Ol'ga Mozhaiskaya, novelist Evdokiya Nagrodskaya, prose writer and editor Ivan Nazhivin, Yan Plyashkevich [Ivan Novgorod-Seversky], family of poet and memoirist Valery Pereleshin, poet and prose writer Kirill Pomerantsev, family of prose writer Boris Poplavsky, poet and prose writer Pêtr Potèmkin, poet and translator Evgeny Rabinovich [Evgeny Raich], poet Rostislav Sazonov, prose writer and playwright Andrei Selitrennikov [Rennikov], poet Aleksandra Serebrennikov (together with husband, publisher Ivan Serebrennikov), poet Anatoly Shteiger (second time), humorous writer Aminad Shpolyansky [Don-Aminado], prose writer and poet Vladimir Smolensky, prose writer Yakov Tsvibak [Andrei Sedykh], poet, prose writer, and editor Zinaida Shakhovskaya, poet Dmitry Shakhovskoi [Strannik], prose writers Sergei Sokolov [Krechetov] and Ivan Sokolov-Mikitov, poet Daniil Solozhev, poet Vasily Sumbatov, prose writer and critic Vladimir Sosinsky, poet and prose writer Ekaterina Tauber, poet and literary critic Yury Terapiano, poet and memoirist Vladimir Varshavsky, family of poet and prose writer Tamara Velichkovskaya, poet and prose writer Lyudmila Vilenkaya-Minskaya [Lyudmila W kina], poet Georgy Villiam, prose writer Semön Yushkevich, poet and artist Il'ya Zdanevich [H'yazcQ, editor and political figure Vladimir Zenzinov. Vyacheslav Ivanov's third wife dies of starvation and deprivation. After an unsuccessful attempt to leave Russia, he goes to the northern Caucasus region and from there to Baku, where he is appointed professor of classical philology. The linguist and literary scholar Roman Yakobson (Jakobson) goes to Prague as a member of the Red Cross while still retaining Soviet citizenship. Admiral Aleksandr Kolchak, head of the White army in Siberia, is executed by the Soviets. The poet Lyudmila Vil'kina dies in Paris.
1921 January 3: in Constantinople the monarchists convene a meeting of members of the State Duma and the State Council. Twenty former state officials attend under the chairmanship of Nikolai LVov, member of third and fourth Dumas. January 8: the Constituent Assembly (Uchreditel'noe sobranie) is convened in Paris at the initiative of the Paris-based Cadets. Only 33 persons attend. February 14: the bylaws of the Russian Academic Group are approved in Tallinn. March 18: the Treaty of Riga grants Poland major eastern territories with sizeable Russian populations. April 2: Antony, Metropolitan of Kiev and Galitsiya, appoints Evlogy head of Russian Orthodox churches in Western Europe and Asia. May 22: tuition for foreigners studying in Germany is doubled.
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Spring: a church convention is held in Constantinople to discuss the reestablishment of the Russian monarchy. May: Vrangel' orders that his army remain intact, but in semi-dandestine form. May 30-June 14: the first assembly of monarchists is held in Bad Reichenhail, Germany, establishing a Supreme Monarchist Council attended by representatives of 75 monarchist groups. The majority supports the claim of Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich over that of Grand Duke Kirill Vladimirovich. June: the Congress for Russian National Unification (S'ezd russkogo natsionai'nogo ob'edineniya) is convened in Paris. June 29: 100 Russian soldiers and officers are arrested in Istanbul under suspicion of being Bol'shevik agents. Summer: in an interview printed in Poslednie novosti Vrangel’ claims his intelligence sources have reported to him that the communists are at the end of their rope. Similar views are expressed by a number of other prominent émigrés, among them Grigory Aleksinsky, Nikolai Avksent'ev, Pdtr Struve, and Pavel Milyukov. July: Sergei Chakhotin of the Changing Signpost movement writes an article entitled To Canossa / calling upon Russian emigrants to repent and return. July 15: the French government stops issuing rations to some 8,000 civilians accompanying VrangeC’s army in Turkey. August 7: In Paris the poets Boris Bozhnev, Aleksandr Ginger, Dovid Knut, and Boris Poplavsky and the prose writer Sergei Sharshun create the literary group Palata poàtov (Chamber of Poets). September 21: Norwegian explorer Fridjof Nansen is appointed High Commissioner for Russian Refugee Affairs. October 9: the first convention of Russian Scholars and Scientists (S'ezd russkikh uchdnykh) is held in Prague. October 21 : Poland and the Soviet Union reach an agreement provicfing for compensation to Poland for lost properties and requiring that Russian and Ukrainian military forces be expelled from the country. November 3: the All-Russian Central Executive Committee (Vsesrossiiskii Tsentral'nyi Ispolnitel'nyi Komitet) declares a general amnesty for military men who served in the White Army. 121,843 émigrés return to the Soviet Union in 1921 and 60,000 in the next nine years — a figure estimated to comprise 10-15% of the total number of émigrés. November 11 : Poslednie novosti quotes Gorky, just arrived in Berlin, as predicting that 35 million people will die of hunger in the Soviet Union. Since virtually all of the émigrés have left relatives and friends behind, they are deeply upset at the prediction. November 14: at a meeting of the People's Freedom (Narodnaya svoboda) Party, Pavel Milyukov denounces the Changing Landmarks followers as “neoBol'shevjks” and ‘communist agents." November 22: in Pravda Lenin publishes a literary review of Arkady Averchenko's A Dozen Knives in the Back o f the Revolution (Dyuzhina nozhei v spinu revolyutsii), just published in Paris. November 21-December 3: the Russian Church Abroad meets in Sremski Kariovci (Serbia) in a Church Council (Sobor) and calls for the reestablishment of the monarchy.
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December 15: the All-Russian Central Executive Committee declares stateless all persons who have spent longer than five years abroad and who have no Soviet identification papers issued by June 1, 1922 (O lishenii prav grazhdan nekotorykh kategorii lits, prozhivayushchikh za granitsei). Late in the year: VrangeP’s army is redeployed to the Balkans. 1921-1922: 2,041 Russians arrive in New York from Constantinople. The Soviet Union and Poland conclude a peace treaty, and Boris Savinkov revives the National League for the Defence of the Homeland and Freedom (Natsional'nyi soyuz zashchity rodiny i svobody). Among its members are Dmitry Merezhkovsky, Zinaida Gippius, and Dmitry Filosofov, who edits the newspaper Z a svobodul (For Freedom!). Savinkov actually resides in Paris and makes frequent trips to Poland to direct the activities of the League. 20,000 Russians are resident in Tallinn, most of them laborers in local shipyards and factories. In Berlin Yuly Veitsman, owner of the Rossica book dealership, publishes his first catalogue. The prose writer and poet Fêdor Tetemikov [Sologub] is denied permission to emigrate; his wife, the critic, editor, and playwright Anastasiya Chebotarevskaya, commits suicide by jumping from a bridge when she learns the news. The YMCA Press is founded in Prague. The Confraternity o f Russian Truth is founded in Berlin, headed by Prince G. Leuchtenberg, prose writer Sergei Sokolov [Sergei Krechetov], and popular novelist General Pötr Krasnov, with the goal of overcoming Bol'shevism. The immigration Quota Act is passed in the United States. Eurasianism is founded by Nikolai Trubetskoi, Georgy Florovsky, Pötr Savitsky, and Pötr Suvchinsky when they publish a collection of essays entitled Exodus to the East (Iskhod k vostoku) in Sofia. The Moscow publishing house Gelikon is refounded in Berlin. Organizations founded: House of the Arts (Dorn iskusstv, Berlin), the Russian People's University (Russkii narodnyi universitet, Paris), The League of Russian Writers and Journalists (Soyuz russkikh pisatelei i zhumalistov), with branches in Paris, Harbin, and other cities, and The Russian Popular Ubrary (Prague). The New Economy Policy (NEP) is established in the Soviet Union, and a number of Russian publishing houses are established in Berlin to service the Soviet market. The novelist Aleksei Tolstoi moves from Paris to Berlin. Semên Yushkevich leaves Paris for New York. Serials founded include: Al'manakh sovremennoi literatury (Almanac of Contemporary Uterature, Constantinople), Bezhenets (Refugee, Dalmatia), Èkonomicheskaya literatumaya g a ze ta ( Economic Literary Newspaper, Constantinople), Èshafot (The Scaffold, Gallipoli), G rëzy (Daydreams, Torun), Igrushka (Plaything, Harbin), Kharbinskoe obozrenie teatrov (The Harbin Theatrical Review), Kolokol (The Bell, New York), Kolyuchaya provoloka (Barbed Wire, Torun), List'ya (Leaves, Constantinople), M lechnyi put’ (The Milky Way, Gallipoli), Nasha stikhiya (Our Element Novi Sad), N ashi dni (Our Days, Constantinopole), Novaya russkaya kniga (The New Russian Book, Berlin), Novoe vremya (The New Time, Shanghai), Novosti Shangkhaya (Shanghai News), Novyi m ir (The New World, Shanghai), Otechestvo (The Fatherland, Paris), Otkliki (Reverberations, Revel), Russkaya kniga (The Russian Book, Berlin),
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Russkaya m ysl' (Russian Thought, Sofia-Shanghai), Russkie vesti (Russian News, Helsinki), Russkoe delo (The Russian Cause, Sofia-Beigrade-Constantinople), Sibirskii nastol'nyi kalends? (Siberian Table Calendar, Shanghai), S in iizh u m a l{ Blue Magazine, Harbin), Sm ena vekh (Changing Landmarks, Prague), Spolokhi (Northern Lights, Berlin), Svobodnaya rech’ (Free Speech, Sophia), Vestnik (Herald, Lvov), Vol'naya Litva (A Free Latvia, Kovno), Voiynskoe sbvo (The Volynia Word, Rovno), Zarya (Dawn, Kovno), Zam itsy (Distant Lightning, Constantinople-Sofia), Zarubezhnyi klich (Battle Cry Abroad, Sofia), Z erkab (The Mirror, Kovno), Zhar-ptitsa (Firebird, Berlin-Paris), Zhêltyi lik (Yellow Face, Shanghai), Znam ya (Banner, Berlin). Selected publications: 1. Leaves: a Literary Collection (Ustya: literatumyi sbomik), Constantinople. 2. Don Aminado, Sm oke without the Hom eland (Dym bez otechestva), Paris. 3. Aleksandr Ginger, A Loyal Pack (Svora vemykh), Paris. 4. Nikolai Karabchevsky, W hat M y Eyes Saw (Chto glaza moi videli), Berlin. 5. Il’ya Èrenburg, Khulio Khurenito (Julio Jurenito), Berlin. 6. General Pêtr Krasnov, From the Double-Headed E ag b to the R ed Banner (Ot dvuglavogo orla kkrasnomu znameni), Berlin, 1921-22; popular historical novel. 7. David Buriyuk, Climbing Mount Fuji (Voskhozhdenie na Fudzi-San), Yokohama. 8. Yan Plyashkevich [Ivan Novgorod-Seversky], H ow Crosses Grow (Kak rastut kresty), Istanbul. The artists Vasily Kandinsky and Georgy Pozhedaev emigrate. The following writers emigrate: prose writer Nikolai Breshko-Breshkovsky, poet Aleksei Gryzov [Achair] (possibly 1922), prose writer Aleksandr Amfiteatrov, poet Nikolai Agnivtsev, poet novelist, and literary theoretician Andrei Bely, prose writer Evgeny Chirikov [Evgeny Valin], Slavist Dmitry Chizhevsky, prose writer Aleksandr Drozdov, poet Vadim Gardner, philosopher Sergei Gessen, poet and prose writer Aleksandr Ginger, Maksim Gor'ky, publisher Zinovy Grzhebin, prose writer, poet, and playwright Anatoly Kamensky, prose writer Sergei Gusev-Orenburgsky, poet Antonin Ladinsky, modernist writer Aleksei Remizov, prose writer and poet Natal'ya Reznikova, poet, critic, and literary scholar Dmitry Svyatopolk-Mirsky, prose writer Zinaida Vengerova, philosopher and historian Georgy Vernadsky. Theologian Nikolai Arsen'ev emigrates. Il'ya Èrenburg goes abroad with an official Soviet passport Deaths: Nina Amol'di, Pêtr Boborykin, Pêtr Kropotkin. 1921-1928 Joint Soviet-émigré publications are permitted under the Soviet "New Economic P o lie/’ (NEP). 1922 January: a group of Russian émigré writers, among them Yuly Aikhenval’d, sends a letter of protest against Soviet censorship to Anatoly Lunacharsky. February: the Literary-Artistic Society is founded in Belgrade. February 26: the Prague group Herm itage o f Poets (Skit poètov) holds its first meeting. March 28: a schism is formed in the Russian Orthodox Church when the imprisoned Moscow Metropolitan Tikhon declares invalid the call of the Russian Church Abroad to restore the monarchy.
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April 14: Aleksei Tolstoi publishes an open letter to émigré ecfitor Nikolai Chaikovsky announcing his intention to return to Russia April 16: the Soviet and German governments sign the Treaty of Rapallo, launching a period of cooperation between the two countries; the agreement causes considerable consternation in émigré ranks and provides a significant incentive for Russians in Germany to emigrate further to other countries. April 22: editor, politician, and historian Pavel Mityukov publishes article in Poslednie novosti, attempting to neutralize the effect of Aleksei Tolstoi's open tetter. April 24: 80 cultural, educational, and professional organizations are united under the umbrella organization, The Russian Committee in Turkey. May 5: the League of Russian Writers and Journalists votes to expel all members of the Changing Landmarks newspaper Nakanune (On the Eve). June 1 : Nakanune opens a Moscow office. June: Boris Bakhmetev gives up the post of Russian Ambassador to the United States. During his tenure in office he has spent $77,000,000 in United States government credits, much of it going to support VrangeT's army. June 24: the Soviet Trade Office in Berlin (Torgpredstvo) concludes an agreement with émigré publisher Zinovy Grzhebin promising to purchase a large number of books. Summer: General Vrangel"s army is disarmed. Vrangel’ is informed that as of October 1 no more support will be provided by the French and that his men will be considered refugees. July 3-5: a conference is held in Geneva which makes specific recommendations as to providing Russian refugees with the travel document which later comes to be known as the “Nansen Certificate." August-September: the Soviet government on the decision of Lenin and Trotsky deports 161 writers, journalists, and other prominent figures, among them the philosophers Nikolai Berdyaev, Sergei Bulgakov, Semën Frank, Lev Karsavin, Nikolai Lossky, Mikhail Osorgin, and Fêdor Stepun, the critic Yuly Aikhenval'd, and the historian Aleksandr Kizevetter. September 1: poet and painter David Burlyuk moves from Japan to New York. September 30: Agitprop issues an instruction providing for the material support of Changing Landmarks publications. November 3: in Sofia Nikolai Boicharov assassinates Aleksandr Ageev, editor of the newspaper Na rodinu (Return to the Homeland). November 16-22: toe second assembly of monarchists is held in Paris, representing 120 monarchist groups. Late in toe year: An initiative group is formed in Berlin to create The Writers' Club (Klub pisatelei). Participating members are: Yuly Aikhenval'd, Andrei Bely, Nikolai Berdyaev, Semën Frank, Vladislav Khodasevich, Pavel Muratov, Mikhail Osorgin, Aleksei Remizov, and Boris Zaitsev. December: toe Russian Academy of Religion and Philosophy is founded in Berlin, with lectures delivered by Nikolai Berdyaev, Ivan Hin, Lev Karsavin, Fêdor Stepun, and Semën Frank. Fêdor Sologub is granted permission to emigrate but remains in Russia. The number of Russians in Estonia shrinks to 14,000. Grand Duke Kirill Vladimirovich declares himself Protector of toe Throne (Blyustitel Prestola).
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The publishing house Slovo (The Word) is founded in Berlin by Iosif Gessen with the support of Ullstein Publishers. A number of members of the Moscow Art Theater defect and create the Prague Group of the Moscow Art Theater under the leadership of Mariya Germanova. Poet and prose writer Iosif Kallinikov, who had been evacuated from the Crimea to Egypt in 1920, leaves for Bulgaria. Novelist and scholar Evgeny Lyatsky moves from Stockholm to Prague. Several Molokan families return to Russia from San Francisco. The literary society Muza (Muse) is founded in Lvov. The Berlin newspaper R ul’ is attacked for the third time; local newspapers attribute the break-in to communists, while Pravda claims the action is the work of “revolutionary workers." The 1922-1923 level of financial assistance from the French government for Russian students is set at 575,000 francs. A sham monarchist organization (MOSR or MOR) is formed in the U.S.S.R. to infiltrate the central monarchist bodies. Later it is renamed “The Trust.” Khodasevich's calendar shows that he met 109 times wijh Andrei Bely between July 1922 and September 1923. In Bulgaria the League for Return to the Homeland (Soyuz dlya vozvrashcheniya na rodinu) is created with the goal “not only to repatriate refugees, but first to make of them loyal citizens of Soviet Russia." During its first year of existence it sends 6,800 persons to the U.S.S.R. The newspaper Volya Rossii (Russia's Will, Prague) shifts from a daily to a weekly and then becomes a bimonthly magazine. Aleksandr Yashchenko, publisher of the journal Novaya russkaya kniga (The New Russian Book), writes that a “bridge” must be built between émigré and Soviet literature. The magazine Russkaya mysl’ moves from Sofia to Prague. The daily newspaper Rossiya in Harbin is closed by the Chinese government The poets Nikolai Aseev, Valentin Pamakh, and Mark-Lyudovik-Mariya Talov and the prose writer Ivan Sokolov-Mikitov return to Russia. The poet Nikolai Dvorzhitsky [All] emigrates from China to the United States. The League of Russian Writers and Journalists in the Czechoslovak Republic is founded. May 9-late August: Sergei Esenin and Isadora Duncan travel abroad. From New York Esenin writes to Anatoly Mariengof: “W e sit here without a copeck, waiting to ... return to Moscow. The best thing I have seen in this world is still — Moscow ... I will say of myself ... that I simply do not know how to exist and how to live now. Previously, despite all Russia's privations, we were wanned by the awareness of ‘foreign lands,’ but now that I have seen these, I beseech God not to let me dte spiritually and in my love tor my art. No one needs my art here." Serials founded include: Byulleten' (Bulletin, Harbin), D en’ (The Day, Riga), Èpopeya (Epic, Berlin), Fiai (Phial, Harbin), Grant (Facets, Berlin), Kazach'ya lava (Cossack Lava, Prague), Khutor (Farm, Prague), Kltaets (The Chinaman, Harbin), Kitezh (Harbin), K novym gorizontam (Toward New Horizons, New York), Lemkovshchina (New York), M ladorus’ (Young Rus', Prague), M olodaya Rossiya (Young Russia, Berlin), Niva (Sown Field, Shanghai), Novaya Rossiya (The New Russia, Sofia), Novosti literatury (Literary News, Berlin), Novosti zhizni (Life's News,
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Harbin), Pigm ei (Pigmy, Tuchola), Rassvet (Dawn, Berlin), Russkoe àkho (Russian Echo, Prague), Russkii student (Russian Student, Harbin), Safrut (Berlin), Sem einyi kaJendar’ (Family Calendar, Berlin-Munich), Seraptonovy brat'ya (Serapion Brothers, Berlin), Skit poètov (Hermitage of Poets, Prague), Smekhomôt (Laugh Ringer, New York), Studencheskie gody (Student Years, Prague), Tsekh poètov (The Poets’ Guild, Berlin), U dar (The Blow, Paris), Val (The Breaker, Harbin), Vereteno (Spindle, Berlin), Veretânysh (Berlin), Via sacra (Yuriev), Vilenskaya rech’ (Vilno Talk, Vilno), Vyunsdorfskoe solntse (Wûnsdorf Sun), Vsemimyi panteon (Global Pantheon, Berlin), Yunyi drug (Young Friend, Uzhgorod), Z a rubezhom (Abroad, Shanghai), Zelönaya biblioteka (Green Library, Berlin), Zhili-byli (Once Upon a Time, Bizerta, Tunisia), Zhivoe stovo (Living Word, Tkhoda). Cease publication: G obs Rossii (Voice of Russia), Novaya russkaya zhizn’ (The New Russian Life, Helsinki), Sm ena veld) (Changing Landmarks). Selected publications: 1. Andrei Bely, Kotik Letaev , Petrograd. 2. Zinaida Gippius, Poem s (Stikhi), Berlin. 3. Aleksandr Kusikov, The N am ebss Bird (Ptitsa bezymyannaya), Berlin. 4. Nikolai Vilenkin [Minsky], From Darkness to Light (Iz mraka ksvetu), Berlin. 5. Ivan Sokolov-Mikitov, The Basket (Kuzovok), Berlin. 6. Aleksei Tolstoi, Aèlita, in Krasnaya nov", Moscow. 7. Georgy Grebenshchikov, Churaevy, Paris. 8. Vyacheslav Ivanov and Mikhail Gershenzon, A Correspondence from Two Com ers (Perepiska iz dvukh uglov), Berlin. The following writers emigrate: Nina Berberova, Lidiya Chervinskaya, Varvara Iskul' von Gildebrand, Natal'ya ll'ina, Georgy Ivanov, Vladislav Khodasevich, Aleksandr Kusik’yan [Kusikov], prose writer and art historian Pavel Muratov, historian Sergei Mel'gunov, Irina Odoevtseva, poet Stepan Petrov [Skitalets], Sofiya Pregel', Anna Prismanova, Juhani Savolainen [Ivan Savin], Viktor Shklovsky, Ivan Shmelëv, Marina Tsvetaeva, Boris Zaitsev. Vladimir Nabokov, father of novelist Vladimir Nabokov, is killed by Pötr Shabel'sky-Bork and Sergei Taboritsky in an assassination attempt on Pavel Milyukov in Berlin. Poet and literary historian Yury Nikol’sky dies.
1923 February 17: the Russian Institute of Science and Scholarship (Russkii nauchnyi institut) is founded in Berlin with the goal of studying Russian culture. February 17: in Paris Isadora Duncan declares that she married Sergei Esenin only in order to get him a passport to America; Esenin adds that he wanted her money and the opportunity to travel. March 9: Yugoslav authorities permit creation of the Gallipolean League (Soyuz gailipoliitsev). March: religious thinker and former personal secretary of Lev Tolstoi, Valentin Bulgakov, is deported from Russia. April 28: Glavlit issues a “top secret" (sovershenno sekretno) instruction, signed by Pavel Lebedev-Polyansky, head of Glavlit (censorship), outlawing the importation and distribution of any books published by Zinovy Grzhebin. Before the year is up all Russian books published in Germany are outlawed.
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January-April: In Bulgaria the Society for Return to the Homeland sends 3,750 Russians to the U.S.S.R. May: an arbitration hearing rules that the Soviet Trade Offices in Berlin shall pay Grzhebin $15,000 plus other expenses to compensate him for expenses of thirty million marks after Soviet Trade fails to live up to its agreement to publish books on a firm-order basis. Late August: 2,000 Russian refugees return to Russia from Yugoslavia September 9: in Bulgaria the Stambolisky government is overthrown, and the new regime outlaws the communist party, thus creating a sympathetic atmosphere for Russian immigrants. Fall: Pavel Muratov moves from Germany to Rome. Late in the year: Zinovy Grzhebin organizes an exhibition of his publishing house; from May 1922 until October 1923 he has published 225 titles. Some of the money to finance the project was transferred to Berlin from Moscow with the permission of the Soviet government. Grzhebin declares bankruptcy and moves to Paris. Georgy Grebenshchikov founds Churaevka community in Connecticut. End of year: about 8,000 Russians remain in Constantinople. The feminist and novelist Aieksandra Kollontai goes abroad as a Soviet diplomat. The magazine Zhar-ptHsa (Firebird) relocates from Berlin to Paris. The Pushkin Library is founded in Montreal. In Munich the monarchist organization Molodaya Rossiya (Young Russia) (later renamed the Mladoross League) conducts its first convention, proclaiming the slogan T h e Tsar and the Soviets." League of Nations figures show 600,000 immigrants from Russia in Germany. Regular postal service is established between France and Russia, and Russian emigrants begin sending food packages home. In Berlin alone approximately 360,000 Russians apply for refugee status. The prose writer, poet, and playwright Prince Fëdor Kasatkin-Rostovsky moves from Yugoslavia to Paris. The Russian population of Harbin numbers between 200,000 and 250,000. The Russian population of San Francisco numbers between 8,000 and
10,000. France introduces a free immigration policy with the result that in 1923 and 1924 a large number of Russian émigrés in Germany move to France. In China a four-year period of heavy Soviet influence begins. In Yugoslavia the literary circle Gamayun is founded. From 1923 until World War II escape from the U.S.S.R. becomes virtually impossible, so that during that period the Russian émigré community is supplemented almost exclusively by defectors. The YMCA Press is moved from Prague to Berlin. Nikolai Dvorzhitsky [Nikolai All] moves from China to the United States. The political group Struggle for Russia (Bor'ba za Rossiyu) is founded, headed by Mikhail Fêdorov and Sergei Mel'gunov. Vladimir Zhabotinsky becomes a staff correspondent of Rassvet (Dawn), a publication of Zionist Jews in Western Europe. By the end of the year nearly 60 Russian émigré publishing houses are founded in Berlin alone.
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The publishing house and book store Plam ya (The Flame) is founded in Prague. The New York daily Novoe russkoe slovo claims a circulation of 31,240 and is challenged by the communist newspaper Russkii g obs (Russian Voice), which offers to contribute $5,000 to a charitable organization if Novoe russkoe sbvo is able to prove it has 30 percent of that number. The publisher, memoirist, and political figure Ekaterina Kuskova (deported in 1922) comes out in favor of return to Russia — “without regrets and humiliation” (b ez raskayaniya i unizhenil).
Return to Russia: Nikolai Agnivtsev, Gleb Alekseev, Andrei Bely, Aleksandr Drozdov, Yury Klyuchnikov, NataTya Krandievskaya, Venedikt Matveev [Venedikt Mart], Boris Pasternak, Viktor Shklovsky, Aleksei Tolstoi. Igor' Voinov leaves Finland for Paris. In Berlin Aleksandr Yashchenko receives a personal letter from Maksimilian Voloshin describing the mass executions in the Crimea. Serials founded include: Baltiskil al'manakh (Baltic Almanac, Zittau-KaunasToronto), Bayan (Accordion, Harbin), Beseda (Conversation, Berlin), Iks (X, Riga), K azak na chuzhbine (The Cossack Abroad, Prague), Krest'yanskaya Rossiya (Peasant Russia, Shanghai), M agaram (Shanghai), M eduza (Belgrade), N a chuzhoi storone (In an Alien Country, Berlin-Prague), Nasha rech’ (Our Speech, Bucharest), N ashi dni (Our Days, Warsaw), Novyi ogonëk (New Flame, Berlin), O/cno (Window, Paris), Rodnye motivy (Native Motifs, San Francisco), Russkoe d e b (The Russian Cause, Belgrade), Sbom ik sovrem ennoi russkoi poèzii (Collection of Modem Russian Verse, Lvov), Shankhaiskli drakon (The Shanghai Dragon), Staryi narvskii listok (The Old Narva Newsletter, Narva), Strugi (can mean either “wood planes” or “boats,” Berlin), Sungaiislde vechera (Evenings on the Sungari, Harbin), Vërsty (Miles, Paris), Zavtra (Tomorrow, Berlin), Zveno (Link, Paris). Selected publications: 1. Mark Aldanov, The Ninth o f Thermidor (Devyatoe Termidora), Berlin. 2. Aleksei Remizov, Fairy Tabs of the Russian P eopb (Skazki russkogo naroda), Berlin. 3. Marina Tsvetaeva, A Craft (Remeslo), Berlin. 4. Viktor Shklovsky, It H appened (Èto bylo), Berlin. 5. Il’ya Èrenburg, Trust for the Destruction o f Europe (Trest D. E.), Berlin. 6. Nikolai Dvorzhitsky [Nikolai Ail], Èkten'ya (Litany), Harbin. 7. Gleb Alekseev, The D ead Sprint: Stories o f Years Spent Abroad (Mörtvyi beg — povesti zarubezhnykh let), Berlin. 8. Semôn Yushkevich, Avtomobil' (The Car), Berlin. 9. Maksim Gor’ky, M y Universities (Moi universitety), Berlin. The following writers emigrate: Georgy Adamovich, Mikhail Artsybashev, Il’ya Britan, essayist Kirill Khenkin, Arseny Mitropol'sky [Nesmelov], Georgy Otsup [Raevsky]. Vatslav Vorovsky, tsarist émigré and first head of Gosizdat (responsible for censorship), is assassinated in Lausanne by White officer M. Konradi. Deaths: the poet Aleksei Baiov and the prose writer and memoirist Elena Apreleva. 1924 January: Turkish authorities hand over the Russian Embassy and Consulate in Constantinople to Soviet representatives.
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January 29: Lenin's widow Nadezhda Krupskaya writes to Trotsky assuring him of Lenin's warm feelings for Trotsky right up until Lenin's death. February 11: the monarchist newspaper Russkaya gazeta publishes an anonymous article accusing the publisher Zinovy Grzhebin of being a communist agent February 16: Bunin gives a speech on the mission of the Russian exile community. February 21: Deputy People's Commissar for Education Z. I. Grinberg receives a list of émigré publishers whose books may not be imported into Russia. It includes those of Èpokha, Ladyzhnikov, and Grzhebin. March 10: the League of Russian Publishers and Booksellers in Germany (Soyuz russkikh izdatelei i knigoprodavtsev v German») sends a letter to Grzhebin in Paris expressing support for him and rejecting the accusation levelled in Russkaya gazeta. July 19: a convention of 67 Russian social organizations is held in Paris. Two committees are formed: the Russian Committee of United Organizations (Russkii komitet ob'edinênnykh organizatsii) and the Council of Social Organizations (Sovet obshchestvennykh organizatsii). May 31 : the trans-Siberian railroad begins joint Soviet-Chinese operations, and the Russian émigrés are forced to choose between Soviet and Chinese citizenship. June 9: the amnesty of non-officers who served in the White Armies is declared applicable to those who served in the Far East Summer: the literary circle Daliborka is founded in Prague. August 15: Boris Savinkov crosses the Soviet border illegally and is arrested. August 29: Savinkov is condemned to death but the sentence is commuted to ten years' imprisonment August 31 : in Coburg Grand Duke Kirill Vladimirovich declares himself Tsar. Many émigrés oppose him because of his role in persuading Nikolai II to renounce the throne. September 1: the Russian All-Soldiers’ League (Russkii obshche-voinskii soyuz — ROVS) is organized by General Vrangel' to replace the disbanded White Army and unite the various political factions under the slogan of "non-predetermination'' (nepredreshenchestvo), but is actually controlled by the monarchists. September 13: an article appears in Izvestiya, allegedly written by Savinkov: "Why I Accepted Soviet Rule.” September 16: in Warsaw a letter from Savinkov is delivered to Dmitry Filosofov, calling upon him and his fellow revolutionaries to return to Russia and support the Soviet state. October: France grants diplomatic recognition to the U.S.S.R., and Vasily Maklakov is ousted from the Russian embassy. Vrangel’ visits Berlin to express support for Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich and thus undercuts the claims of Kirill Vladimirovich. Grzhebin travels to Berlin hoping to receive the money awarded him by the arbitration court from Soviet Trade Offices and to either reestablish relations with Gosizdat or join forces with émigré publisher Ivan Ladyzhnikov. The Berlin publishing house Slovo closes. The Russian Institute of Science and Scholarship (Russkii nauchnyi institut) moves from Berlin to Paris. French authorities permit Il’ya Èrenburg to return to France.
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Most Russians in China take Soviet passports, but some accept Chinese citizenship. The Circle of Friends of Russian Literature (Kruzhok druzei russkoi literatury) is founded in Berlin. Valentin Bulgakov is elected Chairman of the League of Russian Writers and Journalists in Czechoslovakia (possibly 1925). The secret society Dolg Rodine (Duty to the Motherland) is created in Western Europe with the goal of overthrowing communism in Russia. The United States establishes immigration quotas based on the U.S. population in the 1920 census. The prose writer Georgy Grebenshchikov moves from France to the U .S A The Czechoslovak government provides assistance to over 4,000 Russian émigré students and some 200 émigré professors as part of the “Action Russe" (Ruskâ akce). The money is rumored to come from gold of the tsarist government. Boris Zaitsev moves from Germany to Paris. Volya Rossii (Russia's Will) becomes a monthly publication. A 140-page book appears in Germany (by historian F. Jung) on Russia, only five pages of which are devoted to the émigrés — a fact which is declared “significant” by a contemporary German scholar. The home town of former émigré Grigory Radomysl'sky (ZinoYev] is renamed Zinov'evsk in his honor. Zinaida Gippius claims that all the significant Russian writers have emigrated. The level of financial assistance rendered to Russian émigrés from the French government is set at 675,000 francs for 1924-1925. In Prague the Russian Book Committee publishes the first part of a “bibliographic survey” of Russian literature abroad. Nakanune (On the Eve, Berlin) ceases publication. Eighty-six of the publishing houses existing outside the U.S.S.R. are located in Berlin. Serials founded include: Argus (Riga), Ém igrant (Revel), lllyustrirovannaya Rossiya (Illustrated Russia, Paris), Kavkazskii gorets (Caucasian Mountaineer, Prague), Kazachii spotokh (Cossack Flash, Prague), Kooperativnoe obozrenie (The Cooperative Review, Berlin), buch sveta (Ray of Light, Novi Sad, Serbia), Nashe budushchee (Our Future, Belgrade), Novaya nedelya (The New Week, Riga), Rodnaya niva (Native Field, Harbin), Rossiya (Russia, Berlin), Russkaya zhizn' (Russian Life, Sofia), Russkoe obozrenie (Russian Review, Berlin), Russkii invalid (The Russian Disabled Soldier, Issy-Les Moulineaux), Russkoe Sorrento (Russian Sorrento), Standart (Harbin-Shanghai), Svoim i putyam i (On Our Own Paths, Prague), Vplenu neboskrëbov (In the Captivity of Skyscrapers, New York), Vremennik (Chronicle, New York), Zapiski nablyudatelya (An Observer's Notes, Prague), Zlatovsvet (Golden Light, Berlin). Selected publications: 1. Konstantin Bal'mont, From M e to H er (Moê — ei), Prague. 2. Evgeny Zamyatin, W e (in English), London. 3. Boris Savinkov [Ropshin], D ark Stallton (Kon* voronoi), Moscow. 4. Nadezhda Lappo-Danilevskaya, Emigration an d Catholicism (Èmigratsiya i katoiichestvo), Paris. Vyacheslav Ivanov is sent abroad by Narkompros (The People's Commissariat for Englightenment). Ivanov says: “I am going to Rome to live and die there."
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The artists Mstislav Dobuzhinsky, Nikolai Benua (Benois) (possibly 1925), Aleksandra Èkster, and Aleksandr Serebryakov emigrate. The following writers emigrate: Yury Annenkov, Elena Deisha [Georgy Peskov], Vladimir Veidle (Weidle). The prose writer Aleksandr Dikgof-Derental’ and publisher-writer Evgeny Lundberg return to Russia. The prose writer Vyacheslav Gribovsky dies.
1925 January 19: the first Eurasian congress opens in Berlin. January 25: Maksim Gor'ky writes to émigré publisher Zinovy Grzhebin complaining that no one in Russia wants to buy belles lettres, while Henry Ford's M y Life is published in an edition of 150,000 copies. Gor'ky compliments Grzhebin for publishing good books but advises him that they will find no market in Russia. April 22: under the patronage of TornaS Masaryk, President of the Czechoslovak Republic, the Kondakov Seminar (named after Professor Nikodim Kondakov) for the study of Byzantine Art and Russian Archeology is founded in Prague. October 1 : the League of Russian Writers and Journalists t in Belgrade is established by Aleksei Ksyunin and Evgeny Zhukov. October 16: the Russian People's University in Prague is founded. December 21 : at the Fourteenth Party Congress in Moscow former émigré Lev Rozenfel'd [Kamenev] delivers a five-hour speech against Stalin and one-man rule. December 23: Vasily Shul'gin makes a clandestine visit to the Soviet Union. Russian books are published in 32 cities outside of Russia. British authorities in Egypt and Palestine deport a number of Russian émigrés. Under the sponsorship of Metropolitan Eviogy and with the financial support of the YMCA, the Russian Orthodox Theological Institute is founded in Paris. In Berlin Iosif Gessen creates an office to compete with the Russian Delegation (Vertrauenstelle) in representing the interests of the Russian immigrant community. The new institution is christened the Conference of Russian Social organizations and Institutions in Germany (Soveshchanie russkikh obshchestvennykh organizatsii i uchrezhdenii v German»). France recognizes the "Offices russes,” headed by Vasily Maklakov, as responsible for the civil affairs of Russian immigrants in France. The Society for Economic and Cultural Approvem ent With the New Russia (Obshchestvo èkonomicheskogo i kultumogo sblizheniya s Novoi Rossiei) is established in Prague. The last Russian refugees flee southern Sakhalin when the Japanese leave. In Russia the All-Union Society for Cultural Links With Foreign Countries (Vsesoyuznoe obshchestvo svyazi s zagranitsei — VOKS) is established. A resolution published in Pravda and Izvestiya entitled ‘ Party Policy in the Field of Imaginative Literature" calls for a gradual transition to a proletarian literature. According to a popular estimate, 85 percent of the émigrés support the monarchists. The Turgenev Library celebrates its fiftieth anniversary. Aleksandr Kerensky banishes Mikhail Osorgin from the pages of the Berlin newspaper Dni (Days) for his anarchist views.
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364 Russian émigré periodicals are published in this year. The League of Young Poets and Writers (Soyuz molodykh poètov i pisatelei) is formed in Paris to represent the “younger generation." The YMCA Press moves from Berlin to Paris. Marina Tsvetaeva leaves Prague for Paris. Family of Galina Soboleva moves from China to Australia. The League of Russian Jews in Germany shows approximately 20,000 Russian-Jewish refugees in that country. Serials founded include: Dni (Days, Paris), EO S (Bulgaria), Kazachii byt (The Cossack W ay of Life, Paris), Khozyain (The Boss, Prague), Kniga russkoi terpelivosti (The Book of Russian Patience, Harbin), Knizhnyi ukazatel’ (Book Index, Prague), Knut (The Lash, Narva), Kovcheg (The Ark, Prague), Nash ogonêk (Our Flame, Riga), Nash zhum al (Our Magazine, Paris), Nedalya (The Week, Bucharest), Nov" (Virgin Soil, Prague), Obshchii put' (The Common Path, Paris), Perezvony (Reverberations, Riga), Put’ (Path, Paris), Rodina (The Homeland, Paris), Rodnaya zem lya (The Native Land, Paris), Rodnoi korpus (Our Homeland's Corps, Belgrade), Russkaya nedelya (Russian Week, Paris), Russkii zhum al (Russian Magazine, Prague), Vestnik Russkogo Studancheskogo Khristianskogo Dvizheniya (Bulletin of the Russian Student Christian Movement, Paris), Vozrozhdenie (The Renaissance, Paris; chief literary critic: Vladislav Khodasevich), Vremennik (The Chronicle, Paris), Zaatlanticheskii kumach (Transatiantic Calico, New York), Zam itsa (Distant Lightning, New York). Cease publication: B eseda (Conversation, Berlin), Zhar-Ptitsa (Firebird, Berlin). Selected publications: 1. Maksim Gor'ky, The Artam onov Business (Delo Artamonovykh), Berlin. 2. Ivan Bunin, Mitya's Love (Mitina lyubov'), Paris. 3. Zinaida Gippius, Living Faces: Articles (Zhivye litsa: Stafi), Prague. 4. Dmitry Merezhkovsky, Birth o f the Gods: Tutankhamen on Crete (Rozhdenie bogov: Tutankamon na Krite), Prague. 5. Mikhail Artsybashev, The Devil: A Play (D'yavol: P'esa), Warsaw. 6. Aleksandr Alland, Poems (Stikhi), New York. 7. Yevgeniya Khristiani, Georgy Golokhvastov, Dmitry Magula, Vladimir ll'yashenko. 1925. From Am erica (Iz Ameriki), New York. 8. Evgeny Lyatsky, Tundra, Prague (one of the first novels about émigré life). 9. Vyacheslav Ivanov, Roman Sonnets (Rimskie sonety). Dramatist and theoretician Nikolai Evreinov, religious philosopher Georgy Fedotov, pianist Vladimir Gorovits (Horowitz), composer Aleksandr Grechaninov, and prose writer Zinaida Zhemchuzhnaya emigrate. Boris Savinkov dies in a Soviet prison on May 7, rumored to have been thrown out a window. When his son is executed, the son's family commits suicide — the wife, two children, and the wife’s mother. One of the children writes: “Grandma, we're going to die soon...." Other deaths: humorous writer Arkady Averchenko; the prose writers and playwrights Sofya Boborykina and Nikolai Karabchevsky; poet Nikolai Zubov.
1926 January 9: a congress of the Non-Partisan National League of Russians in Germany (Vnepartiinoe ob'edinenie russkikh v German») is held in Berlin.
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February: the second combined convention in Paris of the Russian Committee of United Organizations and the Council of Social Organizations increases its membership to 83 organizations. Vasily Shul'gin returns from a secret trip to the Soviet Union, and is suspected by some (Vladimir Burtsev, for one) to have been either duped by the GPU or to have been their agent. February 2: prose writer Ivan Nazhivin makes his first attempt to receive Soviet citizenship. March 17: Vyacheslav Ivanov converts to Catholicism. April 4-11: in Paris a “Russian Congress Abroad" is sponsored by the newspaper Vozrozhdenie and chaired by Pötr Struve. 450 delegates attend, representing 200 organizations in 26 countries. Intended to reflect the full range of émigré political views, it elects Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich, unde of Nikolai II and commander in chief of the Russian armies in 1914-1915, as leader of the national movement of resistance. The Congress holds to a platform of nepredreshenchestvo and, in the words of Pêtr Struve, aims at a Russian “renaissance, not a restoration." May 12: the international convention on Russian refugees is signed. June: monarchist congress held in Bad Reichenhall. November 26: the Prague group Russian Hearth (Russkii ochag) holds its first meeting. Khodasevich and Berberova dedde that they are really émigrés rather than expatriates and move from Sorrento, where they have been living with Gorky, to Paris. Trotsky is expelled from the Politbyuro. Zinovy Grzhebin is forced to shut down his publishing operation, and some of his books are purchased by Ivan Ladyzhnikov. Lev Rozenfel'd [Kamenev] is sent as Soviet ambassador to Mussolini's Italy. Valentin Ivanov [Valentin Goryansky] moves from Yugoslavia to Paris. 117,217 Russian émigrés are employed in Paris, of whom 4,198 are women. The Russian community in Harlem, New York, founds the Russian Emigrant Children's Welfare Sodety (Obshchestvo pomoshchi detyam russkoi èmigratsii). The poet Sergei Alymov and the prose writer and poet Nikolai Sosunov return to Russia. The poet Aleksandr Kusikyan [Kusikov] leaves Berlin for Paris. The literary drde Motodaya Churaevka and the literary magazine Rubezh (The Border) are founded in Harbin. The newspaper Dni (Days) temporarily doses. The newspaper Rassvet (Dawn) moves from New York to Chicago. The mission of émigré literature becomes an espedally common topic of discussion in émigré drdes. The “younger generation” of writers begins to make itself evident, and the journal Volya Rossii (Russia's Will) begins to publish their works on a regular basis. In Prague, Roman Yakobson and Nikolai Trubetskoi do pioneering work with Czech literary scholars in the area of structuralism. In Paris the 25th anniversary of Boris Zaitsev's literary activity is celebrated with speeches by M. A. Adamov, Nikolai Avksent'ev, Sasha Chömy, Mikhail Kantor, Antonin Ladinsky, S. S. Maslov, Pavel Mityukov, V. A. Obolensky, Pôtr Ryss, Pôtr Struve, Boris Vysheslavtsev, and Sergei Potresov [Yablonovsky].
RUSSIA ABROAD 541 On February 6 the Union of Young Prose Writers and Poets sponsors an unusually successful poetry reading by poet Marina Tsvetaeva. ROOVA, the Consolidated Mutual Aid Society of America, is founded in New York. Spring: prose writer and poet Sofya Taube receives permission to leave the Soviet Union under the pretext of medical treatment Serials founded include: B al pressy (The Press's Ball, Berlin), B bgonam erennyi (The Well-Intentioned, Brussels), Boi'ba za Rossiyu (The Struggle for Russia, Paris), Goofy (Years, Prague), Golos minuvshego na chuzhoi storone (Voice of the Past in a Foreign Land, Paris), Krast'yanskaya faderatsiya (Peasant Federation, Baden, Vienna), Moskva (Moscow, Berlin), Nasha zhizn’ (Our Life, Berlin), Nash soyuz (Our Union, Paris), Nezavisim ost’ (Independence, Prague), Novaya Niva (The Newly Sown Field, Riga), Novyi dom (New Home, Paris), later renamed Novyi korabl' (New Ship), Otgoloski (Reverberations, U .S A ), Prizyv (Call to Arms, Belgrade), Rodnoe sb vo (Native Word, Warsaw), Russkaya nedetya (Russian Week, Prague), Terem (Tower, W est Germany), Ukhvat (Tongs, Paris), Vërsty (Milestones, Paris), Vseslavyanskii /calendar" ”Plam ya ” (The All-Slavic Calendar “Flame," Prague). Selected publications: 1. Nikolai Otsup, In the Sm oke (V dymu), Paris. 2. Ivan Shmelöv, Sun o f the Dead: Memoirs (Solntse môrtvykh: Vospominaniya), Paris. 3. Vladimir Nabokov, M ary (Mashen'ka), Berlin. The following writers emigrate: humorous writer, playwright, and poet Vladimir Ashkinazi and poet Leonid Gansky. Deaths: prose writer Leonid Dobronravov-Donich; prose writer and poet Pötr Potdmkin; poet Georgy Villiam; editor, philosopher, and memoirist Maksim Vinaver; prose writer and poet Kallistrat Zhakov.
1927 February 5: the Green Lamp Society of Dmitry Merezhkovsky and Zinaida Gippius holds its first meeting; Sunday soirées are conducted as an offshoot of the Society, continuing until shortly before World W ar II. February 9: White general PStr Vrangel’ strips General Nikolai Skoblin of his rank in ROVS after Skoblin's wife, the popular singer Nadezhda Plevitskaya, declares in New York that she is “above politics." February 10: Dina Kirova and Fêdor Kasatkin-Rostovsky found the Intimate Theater (Intimnyi teatr) in Paris. April: a “Central Committee,” headed by editor, statesman, and memoirist Vasily Maklakov, is established to coordinate the activities of the various local committees established to celebrate the “Day of Russian Culture," celebrated on Pushkin's birthday. May 22: White émigré Yury Voitsekhovsky attempts to assassinate the head of the Soviet Trade Mission in Warsaw. June 7: White émigré Boris Koverda assassinates Soviet ambassador Pavel Voikov in Warsaw, even though representatives of the “Trust" know of the plan and have warned Voikov. Voikov was a participant in the murder of the Russian royal family. June 29: Metropolitan Sergy in Moscow issues a pastoral letter demanding that Russian priests abroad sign a loyalty oath to the Soviet State (Poslanie pastyryam i pastve).
542
JOHN GLAD
July 10: Paris-based newspaper Posiednie novosti publishes an anonymous plea for help from the U.S.S.R. entitled T o Writers of the World." December 15: the Chinese Nationalist government breaks relations with Moscow, leaving Russians in that country without representation. December 25-29: the first convention of the agricultural party, Kresfyanskaya Rossiya, is held in Prague. 80 Russian periodicals are published in Czechoslovakia during the period 1920-1927. ROVS moves its headquarters from Yugoslavia to Paris. Twenty hostages are murdered in the Soviet Union in retaliation for the assassination of Pavel Voikov in Poland. The Russian émigré Osip Traikovich is shot dead in the Soviet Mission in Warsaw. White general Ivan Zaitsev, who fought in Kolchak's army, returns to Russia under the terms of an amnesty, but Is arrested and sent to the Solovki forced-labor camps. Trotsky is expelled from the Executive Committee of the Communist International and the Central Committee of the Communist Party, and then from membership in the party. The secret society Dolg rodine (Duty to the Homeland) is replaced by Vnutrennyaya liniya (The Inner Une). Membership is voluntary, but any attempt to withdraw from the organization is punishable by death. The organization is suspected of being a Soviet-sponsored plot to control the émigré community. Volya Rossii moves its editorial offices to Paris. The Berlin newspaper Dni (Days) is reopened in Paris under the continuing editorship of Aleksandr Kerensky. The Soviets announce that the supposed monarchist organisation known as The Trust” is a sham which has been providing European intelligence services with false information. Dovid Knut claims that the capital of Russian literature is Paris, and not Moscow. Zam itsa (Distant Ughtning, New York) ceases publication. Zionist leader Vladimir Zhabotinsky settles in Paris. The prose writer and art historian Pavel Muratov moves from Rome to Paris. The Soviet critic Dmitry Gorbov claims in Pechat’ i revolyutsiya (The Press and Revolution): "It is now possible to state definitely that émigré literature, in a holistic sense, no longer exists." Isaak Babel' makes the first of three visits to the West and stays with his wife and daughter in Paris, but chooses to return to Russia, claiming he can work only there. Vladimir Nabokov: "In these days, when the dismal Soviet revolution is being celebrated, we celebrate ten years of contempt, loyalty, and freedom. Let us not abuse our exile, but repeat the words of an ancient warrior, as described by Plutarch: ‘At night, in the empty fields, far from Rome, I erected my tent And my tent for me was Rome.’" M. K. Gorchakov Publishers in Paris issues books "revealing the dark forces of masonry, sectarianism, socialism and Judaism, so dangerous for humanity."
RUSSIA ABROAD
543
Serials founded include: D en ' prosveshchen'rya (Day of Enlightenment, Tallinn), Nasha zhizn’ (Our Life, Vilno), Nash krai (Our County, Prague), Nezavisim yi (The Independent, Brussels), Odnodnevnaya akadem icheskaya literatumaya gazeta, posvyashchônnaya pam yati velikogo p o àtaA . S. Pushkina (One-Day Academic Literary Newspaper Dedicated to the Memory of the Great Poet A. S. Pushkin, Harbin), Rossiya (Russia, Paris), Rubezh (The Border, Harbin), Russkii kobkol (Russian Bell, Berlin), Ulan zalat (Prague), Vestnik (The Herald, Chicago), Zodchii (The Architect, Belgrade). Selected publications: 1. Vladislav Khodasevich, Collection o f Verse (Sobranie stikhov), Paris. 2. Evgeny Zamyatin, W e (My), Prague; the Czech, French, and English editions appeared in 1924. 3. Ol’ga Bebutova, The Azure Shore (Lazumyi bereg), Sofia. 4. Iosif Kallinikov, The Woman Dragon (Baba-zmeya), Moscow. The composer Sergei Prokofev is harshly criticized by the Russian émigré community when he makes a trip to Russia. The prose writer Arkady Bukhov returns to Russia. Deaths: Mikhail Artsybashev, Konstantin Mazurin, Konstantin Nabokov, Ivan Savolainin [Savin], Semön Yushkevich, Aleksandr Zhirkevich. 1928 March: Gosizdat announces in Pravda the forthcoming complete works of Maksim Gor’ky, including 20 selected stories given as a present to Grzhebin on November 20, 1919. Grzhebin writes to Gor’ky to ask whether the newspaper rumors are true that Gor'ky received a royalty of somewhere between $250,000 and $350,000 from Gosizdat. June: the newspaper Dni closes permanently and is replaced by a weekly magazine with the same title, still edited by Aleksandr Kerensky, and with Mikhail Osorgin as its literary editor. September 25-30: a world conference of Russian émigré writers in exile is held in Belgrade with 111 participants, guests, and observers. The decision is taken there to unite the various writers' unions in Western European countries, with headquarters in Paris and Belgrade. Some six hundred writers and journalists are registered as members. October: the German publisher Ullstein agrees to pay Vladimir Nabokov 5,000 marks for a serialization of King, Queen, Knave in Vossische Zeitung and 2,500 marks for book rights. The royalty for the Russian edition is only 300 marks. October 16: the Merezhkovskys arrive in Zagreb at the invitation of Croatian writers to give a series of lectures. Fall: Russian youth groups in Yugoslavia are united in the League of Russian National Youth (Soyuz Russkoi Natsional'noi molodêzhi). November 4: after Gor'ky refuses to answer Grzhebin's letters regarding the Soviet publication of 20 stories given earlier to Grzhebin as a present, Grzhebin writes again, this time demanding $4,000 compensation. Fifty countries now recognize the "Nansen Certificate." In Paris the arch-conservative Markov II publishes Wars o f the D ark Powers (Voiny têmnykh sil), in which he rails against Jewish-Masonic conspiracies. The literary group Perekrëstok (Intersection) is founded in Paris.
544
JOHN GLAD
The Russian Library in Belgrade, numbering some 52,000 volumes, is transferred to the Cultural Committee, which uses it as the basis for the Russian Public Library. Trotsky is exiled to Alma-Ata. With the knowledge of General Kutepov, ROVS makes plans to assassinate Trotsky. In Yugoslavia the League to Preserve the Purity of the Russian Language (Soyuz revnitelei chistoty russkogo yazyka) is founded. According to a report of the League of Nations there are 919,000 Russian emigrants throughout Europe (and Turkey) distributed in the following countries: France
450,000
Lithuania
10,000
Germany
150,000
Hungary
5,294
Poland
90,000
Belgium
5,000
China
76,000
Turkey
Latvia
40,000
Britain
3,000
Yugoslavia
36,000
Switzerland
2,268
Czechoslovakia
30,000
Greece
2.075
Bulgaria
26,494
Italy
1,154
Finland
10,000
4
3,000
The Russian population of San Francisco numbers approximately 15,000. The New Economic Policy (NEP) is abandoned in the Soviet Union and joint Soviet-émigré publications become totally impossible. Maksim Gor'ky visits the U.S.S.R. The family of poet Kira Slavina emigrates to the United States. The Holy Trinity Monastery of Jordanville, New York, begins publishing the semi-monthly Pravoslavnaya R us' (Orthodox Russia). The Russian daily Novaya Zarya (New Dawn) is founded in San Francisco. The following literary groups are founded: Kochev'e (A Nomad's Camp, Paris), Novyi Arzam as (The New Arzamas, Belgrade). Serials founded include: Donskoi kalendar“ (Don Calendar, Prague-Riga), Kazachii smekh (Cossack Laughter, Prague), Krestnyi put' (Way of the Cross, Shanghai), Literatura i zhizn’ (Literature and Life, Riga), Nedetya (The Week, Prague), Rossiya i slavyanstvo (Russia and Slavdom, Paris), Russkii shofër (Russian Cabbie, Paris), Stikhotvorenie (Poem, Paris), Zvonar’ (Bell Ringer, Paris). Novyi korabl’ (The New Ship), Zveno (The Link), and Vërsty (Miles) cease publication. After Zveno closes, critic Georgy Adamovich switches to Poslednie novosti.
RUSSIA ABROAD 545 Selected publications: 1. Mikhail Osorgin, Sivtsev Vrazhek (English title: Quiet Street), Paris — a popular novel about the early Soviet period. 2. Aleksandr
Amfiteatrov,
Yesterday's Ancestors (Vcherashnie
predki).
Belgrade. 3. Georgy Ivanov, Petersburg Evenings: Memoirs (Peterburgskie vechera: Vospominaniya), Paris. 4. Dovid Knut, A Second Book of Verse (Vtoraya kniga stikhov), Paris. 5. Vadim Andreev, The Illness of Being: A Second Book of Verse (Nedug bytiya — vtoraya kniga stikhov), Paris. 6. Marina Tsvetaeva, After Russia (Posle Rossii), Paris. The playwright and theater critic Boris Glagolin and composer Aleksandr Glazunov emigrate. The artist Sergei Chekhonin emigrates. The former tsarist émigré Aleksandr Malinovsky [Bogdanov] dies after conducting an experiment by giving himself a blood transfusion. Other deaths: critic Yuly Aikhenvai'd, prose writer and publisher Varvara Iskul’ von Gil'denbrand, prose writer Mikhail Pervukhin, prose writer and critic Nina Petrovskaya, White general Pötr Vrangel'. 1929 The Soviet Law on Religious Associations is passed, after which church buildings are converted into clubs and dance halls and religious education is prohibited even more strictly than before. Quiet Street (English title of Osorgin's Sivtsev vrazhek) becomes a bestseller in America. February: Trotsky is deported to Turkey. March 3: a formal banquet is held in honor of Pavel Milyukov in the Paris Hotel Lutèce. The next day Vozrozhdenie publishes a letter from Vasily Maklakov, who refused to attend, saying that demonstrative public celebrations are inappropriate in view of the “common guilt” of the left and the right in the overthrow of the tsarist government. May 27: the Chinese police conduct a raid on the Soviet consulate in Harbin, after which a number of Russians who accepted Soviet citizenship are arrested. Late June: in Saint Julien, not far from Geneva, a convention is held of young Russian émigrés in France. July: the first convention of the League of Russian National Youth (Soyuz russkoi natsional'noi molodözhi) is held in the Bulgarian city of Veliko-Tymovo. Conference slogan: “The purpose of the League is to continue the White struggle” (Delo Soyuza, èto prodolzhenie beloi bor'by). December 1: in Paris the third combined convention of the Russian Committee of United Organizations and the Council of Social Organizations increases its membership to 175 organizations. End of year: rumors spread in Paris that General Kutepov has received ten million francs, deposited by the government of Admiral Kolchak in Japan in 1919. End of year: after the death of Grzhebin, Maksim Gor’ky sends $4,000 to his estate. The Soviet writer Boris Pil'nyak is sharply criticized in the Soviet press for having published his novel Mahogany (Krasnoe derevo) in the West.
546
JOHN GLAD
Under pressure from the German government the Soviets permit several thousand Russian Germans to emigrate (1929-1930). Fiercely anti-Soviet the new arrivals contribute to a climate of hostility toward the U.S.S.R. Stalin removes the former émigré Anatoly Lunacharsky from his position of Minister of Education. The literary scholarship society In the Verbal Skiff (Na struge siov) is founded in Riga by Georgy Matveev and Nikolai Istomin. The Literary Commonwealth (Uteratumoe sodruzhestvo) is founded in Warsaw. The poet and prose writer Georgy Ivanov conceives the journal Chisla (Numbers), which is to become the chief outlet for the “younger generation” of writers. In his Uterstojre in Exile (Uteratura v izgnanii, Belgrade), Aleksandr Amfiteatrov provides an “optimistic” view of Russian literature in exile, but in the same breath claims that it has no future because it has no young writers. Serials founded include: Kazaki (Cossacks, Prague), Moskva (Moscow, Chicago), Nash dosug (Our Leisure, Louvain), Sbomik stikhov (Collection of Verse, Paris), Slova v iïlyustratsyakh (Illustrated Words, Riga), Voskresen'e (Sunday, Shanghai), Zarubezhnyi sinii zhumal (The Blue Book Abroad, Paris).* Selected publications: 1. Sasha Chêmy, A Rosy-cheeked Booklet (Rumyanaya knizhka), Belgrade. 2. Nikolai Breshko-Breshkovsky, Mannequin's Novel (Roman manekena), R iga 3. Avgusta Damanskaya, Wives (Zhöny), Paris. 4. Vladimir Korvin-Piotrovsky, Beatrice, Berlin. 5. Mariya Vizi, Poems (Stikhotvoreniya), Harbin. 6. Lev Karsavin, On the Individual (O lichnosti), Kaunas. 7. Aleksandr Kizevetter, At the Boundary of Two Centuries: Memoirs (Na rubezhe dvukh stoletii: Vospominaniya), Prague. The pretender to the throne Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich dies, leaving Kirill Vladimirovich's claim unopposed. Other deaths: poets Vladimir Dikson, Leonid Eshchin, and Solomon Shamipol'sky, prose writers M. Babchenko [Magdalina Bars] and Lev Urvantsov.
1930 January 26: in Paris Soviet agents kidnap White General Aleksandr Kutepov, General Pêtr VrangeC’s successor. March: Metropolitan Evlogy gives a sermon in Westminster Abbey castigating the Soviet government. April 29: appeal of a group of exiled academics: “The years pass, and our physical isolation from our motherland is making itself felt, with special impact upon the rising generation. The very idea [of Russia] is becoming ever more abstract, the feeling for her is weakening and there is reason to fear that this phenomenon will grow stronger with every year. People of the older generation, having lived a good part of their lives pn Russia] and having had the good fortune to experience her directly, are gradually disappearing.” July 1-5: the first united convention of the National League of Russian Youth is held in Belgrade. Its center is established in Belgrade, while its official publication is the monthly newspaper Za Rossiyu (For Russia), published in Sofia.
RUSSIA ABROAD
547
The magazine Chisla publishes a questionnaire for writers, asking whether Russian literature is in decline and, if so, what are the symptoms and causes of that phenomenon. Close to 200,000 Russians are resident in France. The Soviet government ceases to pay Vyacheslav Ivanov a salary. A Eurasianist Congress is held in Brussels. July: the Solidarist movement is established at a conference in Belgrade. In the Soviet Union the works of the former moderate revolutionary and populist Pêtr Lavrov fall into disfavor and are declared anti-Marxist. Serials founded include: Bukh (Bang, Belgrade), Chisla (Numbers, Paris), Color and Rhyme (New York), Georgievskii d e n '(S t George's Day, Harbin), Mladoross (Paris), Mir i iskusstvo (The World and Art, Paris), Novaya zhizn' (New Life, Kishinêv), Ponedel'nik (Monday, Shanghai), Russkii magazin (The Russian Magazine, Derpt), Sbomik russkikh poètov v Pol'she; (Collection of Russian Poets in Poland, Lvov). Novoe vremya (The New lim e , Belgrade) ceases publication. Selected publications: 1. Vladimir Nabokov, The Defense (Zashchita Luzhina), Berlin. 2. Ivan Bunin, The Life of Arsen'ev (Zhizn’ Arsen'eva), Paris. 3. Gaito Gazdanov, An Evening at Claire's (Vecher u Kler), Paris. 4. Aleksandr Kuprin, The Wheel of Time (Koleso vremeni), Belgrade. 5. Viktor Glikman [Iretsky], Cold Coal (Kholodnyi ugol1), Berlin. 7. Roman Yakobson, On the Generation that Squandered its Poets pokolenii, rastrativshem svoikh poètov), Berlin. The writer Anatoly Kamensky returns to Russia, where he will be Illegally repressed” and posthumously “rehabilitated." Deaths: poet Sofiya Beloborodova (Moscow), prose writers Ekaterina Kurbanovskaya [Èk], Evdokiya Nagrodskaya, and Nadezhda Zharintseva.
1931 July 22: the All-Russian Fascist Party is founded in Manchuria, headed first by D. V. Kosmin, then by Grigory Semönov, and finally by Konstantin Rodzaevsky. Early October: the offices of the Berlin newspaper RuT (Helm) are attacked, presumably by communists. RuT ceases publication (later in the year) and is replaced by Nash vek (Our Age). December 25-28: the second convention of the National League of Russian Youth is held in Belgrade. With certain exceptions, only persons bom after 1895 may be members. The organization calls for the use of terror in the struggle with communism. Its name is changed to National League of the New Generation (Natsional'nyi Soyuz Novogo Pokoleniya). The Nansen Office for Refugees assumes charge of international refugees. The group Struggle for Russia (Bor’ba za Rossiyu), founded in 1923, ceases to exist. The Russian Mutual Aid Society is founded in Chicago with a membership of approximately 1,500 persons. The Gabima Theater, founded by Evgeny Vakhtangov in the early 1920s, is moved to Tel Aviv, where it becomes the national theater. The 1931-1932 level of financial assistance to Russian émigrés from the French government sinks to 205,000 francs.
548
JOHN GLAD
The theme of lathers and sons” becomes a common topic of discussion in the émigré community. Leading Men'sheviks in Moscow are put on trial for economic sabotage and are declared “enemies of the cause of democracy and socialism." Maksim Gorky returns to Russia According to the first edition of the Groat Soviet Encyctopedia, 181,432 persons return home during the decade 1921-1931. Serials founded include: Bagul'nik (Ledum-Harbin), Detroitskii Zhuravel’ (Detroit Stork), Dobroe staroe vremya (The Good Old Times, Nice), Kazachestvo (Cossacks, Paris), Kino, (Cinema, Paris), Mansarda (Attic, Riga), Nasha zhizn' (Our Life, Sofia), Nash put’ (Our Path, Shanghai), Novaya gazeta (The New Paper, Paris), Novyi grad (The New City, Sofia), Parus (Sail, Shanghai), Rassvet (Dawn, Paris), Satirikon (Paris), Serp i molot (Hammer and Sickle, New York), Tridtsatye gody (The Thirties, Paris), Utês (The Crag, Vilno). Selected publications: 1. Georgy Ivanov, Roses (Rozy), Paris. 2. Mark Aldanov, The Tenth Symphony (Desyataya simfontya), Paris. 3. Vladislav Khodasevich, Derzhavin: A Biography (Derzhavin: Biografiya), Paris. 4. Antonin Ladinsky, A Northern Heart (Sevemoe serdtse), Berlin. 5. Georgy Golokhvastov, Semi-Sonnets (Polusonety), Paris. 6. Dmitry Magula, Evening Light (Svet vechemii), Paris. 7. Ivan Zaitsev, Sobvki: Communist Hard Labor, or a Place of Torture and Death (Solovki: Kommunisticheskaya katorga, ili mesto pytok i smerti), Shanghai. 8. Arseny Mitropol'sky [Nesmelov], Without Russia (Bez Rossii), Harbin. Aleksandra Tolstaya, daughter of Lev Tolstoi, defects in Japan. Deaths: Nikolai Biryukov (author of biography of Lev Tolstoi), prose writer Boris Butkevich [Boris Beta], poet Igor* Lapko.
1932 Early in the year: the literary circle Klin (Wedge) is founded in Harbin. February: the Presidium of the Central Committee of the Soviet Union strips 37 émigrés of Soviet citizenship, among them Lev Trotsky and also members of the Men'shevik Party. February 6: Japanese troops enter Harbin; Russian émigrés openly celebrate. March: a meeting is held in Paris of Russian exiles who hope that the Japanese army in Manchuria will also liberate” part of Russia. March 6: the Society of Friends of the Russian Press (Obshchestvo druzei russkoi pechati) is founded in Berlin. March 12: the Swedish match manufacturer Ivar Kreuger commits suicide, having gone bankrupt. The funds received by General Kutepov for ROVS from the Japanese deposit of Admiral Kolchak were largely invested with him. May 6: in Paris Pavel Gorgulov, Russian émigré poet, assassinates French President Paul Doumer. November 30: Sovremennye zapiski holds a banquet to celebrate the appearance of volume 50. Georgy Florovsky takes vows as Orthodox priest The German government halts subsidies to the Russian Institute of Science and Scholarship (Russkii nauchnyi institut); it closes.
RUSSIA ABROAD
549
The Confraternity of Russian Truth (Bratstvo russkoi pravdy, founded 1921) closes. Il'ya Èrenburg is appointed European Correspondent for Izvestiya, ending his formerly half-émigré, half-Soviet status. The number of Russian émigré charitable and social welfare bodies grows to 180. The theater director Fêdor Komissarzhevsky writes a letter to Elena Malinovskaya, Director of the BoTshoi Theater, inquiring about the possibility of returning to Russia. He is promised a job and an apartment, but does not follow up on the offer. Evgeny Zamyatin is permitted to emigrate after writing a letter to Stalin. Abroad, he hails Sirin (Nabokov) as a dazzling talent, the greatest acquisition of émigré literature. Over 300 Dukhobor men and women are arrested for public nudity in Canada. A number are sentenced to three years’ inprisonment. In the U.S.S.R. all professional writers' organizations are disbanded, and the Soviet Writers’ Union is created. The literary scholar Dmitry Svyatopolk-Mirsky returns to Russia. The Japanese complete their seizure of Manchuria, and the Russian community begins to move south to Shanghai. Serials founded include: Byulleten’ (Bulletin, Sofia), Kazachii literatumoobshchestvennyi al'manakh (Cossack Uterary and Social Almanac, Paris), Luch Azii (Ray of Asia, Harbin), Molva (The Rumor, Warsaw), Prozhektor (The Projector, Shanghai), Revizor (The Inspector General, Paris), Sovremennyi mir (The Contemporary World, Paris), Vestnik (Herald, Paris), Vremennik (The Chronicle, Lvov), Utverzhdeniya (Affirmations) and Volya Rossii (Russia's Will) cease publication. Selected publications: 1. Boris Zaitsev, The Life of Turgenev: A Biography (Zhizn' Turgeneva: Biografiya), Paris. 2. Yury Fel'zen, Happiness (Shchast'e), Berlin. 3. Aleksandr Gefter, Ships at Sea (V more korabli), Paris. 4. David Buriyuk, V2 Century (Vi veka), Yokohama/New York. 5. Vladimir Pecherin, Notes From Beyond the Grave (Zamogil'nye zapiski), Moscow. Deaths: poet Nikolai Agnivtsev; prose writers Pötr Aleksandrov and Vladimir Ladyzhensky; poet and critic Anatoly Bumakin; humorous writer Aleksandr Glikberg [Sasha Chömy]; poets and playwrights Vasily Lashkov and Evgeny Chirikov; poet and artist Maksimilian Voloshin.
1933 April 2: the Berlin newspaper Nash vek (Our Age) publishes an open letter congratulating Hitler on assuming office. April 9: the Nikolai II Russian House (Russkii dom pamyati imperatora Nikolaya II) is dedicated in Belgrade in the presence of Yugoslav King Aleksandr I. March 5: the fourth combined convention in Paris of the Russian Committee of United Organizattons and the Council of Soda! Organizations increases its membership to 275 organizations. July: Trotsky is permitted to leave Turkey for France. After Hitler comes to power, a future war involving Russia on two fronts — against both Germany and Japan — becomes a popular topic among Russian émigrés.
550
JOHN GLAD
ROND (The Russian Liberation National Movement) is founded in Germany as a “National-Socialist" organization but is forbidden by the German government Altogether some 50,000 Russians remain in Germany, of whom roughly 10,000 are in Berlin. ROVS for a second time lays plans to assassinate Trotsky, who may have been warned by the GPU. Germany secedes from the League of Nations, depriving Russian exiles of the protection of the League's Refugee Bureau. Vasily Yanovsky is elected General Secretary of The Union of Writers and Poets in Paris. The Convention on the Legal Status of Russian and Armenian Refugees is adopted in Geneva. The weekly magazine Dni closes. Marina Tsvetaeva's husband Sergei Èfron applies for a Soviet visa. November 9: Ivan Bunin is awarded the Nobel Prize, the first Russian writer to received this honor. The prose writers Roman Gul' and Vladimir Krymov and poets Raisa Blokh, Mikhail Gorlin, and Zinaida Trotskaya emigrate from Germany to France. Serials founded include: Almanakh “Vozrozhdentsev” (Almanac of the Vozrozhdenie Group, Prague), Avstralaziya (Australasia, Sydney), Dtya vas (For You, Riga), Fashist (The Fascist, Putnam, Connecticut), Kalendari-spravochnik (The Reference Calendar, Billancourt), Klich (War Cry, Brussels-Vyborg-Viipuri), Nauchnoliteratumye zapiski (Scholarly-Literary Notes, Lvov), Novoa stovo (New Word, Berlin). Novosti (News, Prague), Rossiya (Russia, New York), Russkaya gazeta (The Russian Newspaper, New York), SHEK (Shanghai), Sidneiskii kolokol (The Sydney Bell), Za rulëm (At the Helm, Paris), Zhum al Sodruzhestva (Journal of the Commonwealth, Viipuri). Selected publications: 1. Galina Kuznetsova, Prologue (Prolog), Paris. 2. Mariya Vega, Wormwood (Polyn1), Paris. 3. Ven'yamin Korsak, Under New Stars (Pod novymi zvôzdami), Paris. 4. Viktor Petrov, Under the American Flag (Pod amerikanskim flagom), Shanghai. The poets Georgy Saprykin [Georgy Granin] and Sergei Petrov [Sergei Sergin] commit suicide in Harbin sometime between 1933 and 1935. Other deaths: the prose writers Ivan Boldyrev [Ivan Shkott], Ol'ga Koval'skaya, Kazimir Koval'sky, Pêtr Kozhevnikov, Anatoly Lunacharsky, and Sergei Mintslov; the poet and prose writer Boris Evreinov; and the historian and memoirist Aleksandr Kizevetter.
1934 April 15-19: the third convention of the National League of the New Generation (former National League of Russian Youth) is held in Belgrade. June 7: the Central Committee of the Communist Party passes a resolution declaring flight from the country to be punishable by execution (or, under mitigating circumstances, by imprisonment for ten years with confiscation of all property). August 12: Ivan Solonevich crosses the Soviet-Finnish border, having escaped a forced-labor camp on the White Sea Canal. August 14: Boris Solonevich also arrives in Finland, having escaped from the same camp as his brother.
RUSSIA ABROAD
551
October: In Belgrade the poet and translator Il'ya Golenishchev-Kutuzov founds the group Literary Wednesdays (Literatumye sredy). November 17: on the fortieth day after the assassination by Croatian and Macedonian terrorists of Aleksandr I, King of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenians, The League of Russian Writers and Journalists in Belgrade issues a one-day newspaper, Rossiya (Russia), honoring the memory of this strong supporter of Russian immigrants in Yugoslavia. Among the contributors are: Mark Aldanov, Konstantin BaTmont, Ivan Bunin, Zinaida Gippius, Aleksandr Kuprin, Dmitry Merezhkovsky, and Ivan Shmelêv. November: Za Rossiyu, a publication of the National League of the New Generation (the Solidarist movement), publishes articles stating that “Stalin, Kaganovich, Yagoda, Kirov and their ilk have to be gotten ‘rid o f (nado ubraf).” December 1 : Sergei Kirov (real name: Kostrikov), head of the Leningrad branch of the Communist Party, is assassinated, and a great wave of terror is launched in the Soviet Union. December 23: Pravda accuses the National League of the New Generation of participation in Kirov's murder. December 29: the Japanese create the Bureau of Russian Émigré Affairs in the Manchurian Empire. Ivan Nazhivin again attempts to obtain Soviet citizenship. On the initiative of Valentin Bulgakov, the Russian Cultural-Historical Museum is created in Zbraslav, near Prague. The Soviet government pressures the Bulgarian authorities to close the Solidarist newspaper Za Rossiyu. Beginning with issue 34, no place of publication is indicated. Later it is renamed Za Novuyu Rossiyu (For a New Russia) and then Za Rodinu (For the Homeland), once more indicating the place of publication. The Yugoslav branch of ROVS numbers over 25,000 members. The Evlogian Church temporarily makes peace with the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad. The prose writer V. G. Aleksandrov receives a prize at a literary competition of the League of Russian Writers in Yugoslavia for Birch Sisters (Sdstry berözy). The prose writer Stepan Petrov [Skitalets] returns to Russia. Evgeny Rabinovich [Raich] moves from Germany to England. In the Soviet Union the first congress of the Union of Soviet Socialist Writers is held, and “Socialist Realism” is declared the only acceptable literary approach for loyal Soviet writers. Dmitry Filosofbv proposes the creation of an émigré literary academy (the project is never brought to fulfillment); he also declares that émigrés who seek assimilation are “dead" to the émigré community. The “crisis" in émigré literature (and especially in poetry) continues to be a common topic of discussion in émigré publications. In Harbin the literary circle Churaevka closes. Bulgaria and Czechoslovakia extend diplomatic recognition to the U.S.S.R., and Russian émigré activities are severely curtailed in those countries. Serials founded include: Bich (Scourge, Smolensk-Minsk), Invalid (Paris), Lik (Countenance, Paris), Mech (The Sword, Warsaw), Vstrechi (Meetings, Paris), Vrata (Gates, Shanghai), Vzlêt mechty (Flight of Fancy, New York), Vziëty (Flights, Lyons), Zototoi petushok (The Golden Cockerel, Bucharest). Chisia ceases publication.
552
JOHN GLAD
Selected publications: 1. Lidiya Chervinskaya, Approximations (Priblizheniya), Paris. 2. Tèffi, Plays (P'esy), Berlin. 3. Vera Bulich, The Pendulum: First Book of Verse (Mayatnik: Pervaya kniga stikhov), Helsinki. 4. Boris Volkov, In the Dust of Alien Roads (V pyli chuzhikh dorog), Berlin. The death of Andrei Bely, a former émigré, is noted by Fddor Stepun: “For many of us Bely ... was our ptalics by Stepun] last major figure in Soviet Russia.... This deepens our orphaned émigré state and our loneliness." Other deaths: poet Nikolai Gronsky; prose writer Aleksandr Mel'nikov; poets and prose writers Sergei Petrov [Sergei Serginj and Iosif Kallinikov; poet, prose writer, and literary historian Evgeny Shmurio; poet and dramatist Lyubov* Stolitsa; publisher, scholar, editor Aleksandr Yashchenko.
1935 March 2: Vladimir Nemirovich-Danchenko and Konstantin Stanislavsky send a telegram to the United States stating that the actors performing there as members of the Moscow Art Theater (MKhAT) no longer have any connection with MKhAT. May 2: France signs a mutual assistance treaty with tHe Soviet Union, strengthening the position of the Germanophiles versus the Francophiles within the Russian émigré community. June: at an international congress of writers held in Paris to publicize the Nazi threat, Pasternak finally meets Tsvetaeva, with whom he has corresponded intensely. October: 28: the German government issues a decree supporting the Sremski Kariovci church. Ivan Solonevich launches a series of 117 articles in Poslednie novosti entitled Russia in a Concentration Camp (Rossiya v kontslagere). The All-Russian Fascist Party in Manchuria has 19,800 members. A number of Russians lose their jobs after legislation is passed in France severely limiting the employment rights of foreigners. The U.S.S.R. sells its interest in the trans-Siberian railroad to the Manchurian government for 140 million yen, but receives a check for only 23 million. A number of Russians with Soviet passports leave for the Soviet Union. Trotsky moves to Norway. His first wife, Aieksandra Sokolovskaya, is exiled to Siberia, where she dies a few years later. His son hands over part of his archive (correspondence) to the Institute for Social History in Amsterdam. Czechoslovakia signs a mutual assistance treaty with the Soviet Union. The Literary Commonwealth (Literatumoe sodruzhestvo) in Warsaw ceases to function. The League of Russian Writers and Journalists in Belgrade celebrates its tenth anniversary. The literary society Krug (Circle) is founded in Paris. Dmitry Svyatopoik-Mirsky, who has returned to Russia, is attacked in the Soviet press but defended by Goriky. The ethnic Russian population of Latvia is counted as 233,366 (12% of the entire population); Jews, most of whom speak Russian as their first language, number 93,479 (4.8% ). Of Riga's 385,000 residents, 33,000 are Russians and 43,000 are Jews. The impending war becomes a popular topic of émigré literature, and international tension leads to heightened émigré political activity.
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The Russian Orthodox Church in America temporarily unites with the Russian Church Abroad. After the Soviet Union signs mutual assistance pacts with France and Czechoslovakia, the climate for Russian émigrés in those countries grows markedly less friendly, particularly in view of the prevailing economic depression. N. N. Alekseev, an employee of the Paris newspaper Vozrozhdenie, is arrested (and released after 14 months) on suspicion of pro-German sympathies. For one month during that summer the paper does not appear. V. Orekhov, editor of the ROVS-sponsored Chasovoi (Sentinel), is forced to move from Paris to Brussels because of his openly expressed pro-German sympathies. Poland and the Baltic states attempt to force the assimilation of Russian minorities, along with Ukrainians and Belorussians. Gaito Gazdanov’s request ter permission to return to Russia is denied. Aleksandr Vertinsky moves to Shanghai. Nikolai Freidenshtein [Yury Fel'zen] is elected Chairman of the League of Russian Writers and Journalists. Vladimir Voitinsky leaves Paris for the United States. Mikhail Tsetlin: T h e common impoverishment of poetic talent in all literatures is no accident... Poetry is ‘out of step' with our time: inter arma silent musae. W e are living in an era of wars and revolutions, so that the very source of poetry as art — the poetic ‘medium’ of the human soul — seems to dry up.... Probably, a certain 'atmosphere' is necessary, an atmosphere which is formed under conditions of spiritual tranquility, in the calm of an ordered way of life. But now everything has been stripped bare and rendered vain by tragic conflicts." Serials founded include: Krug (Circle, Paris), Vseobshchii kalendar" (Universal Calendar, Harbin), Ogni: Uteratumo-obshchestvennyi zhumal (Lights: a Literary and Social Magazine, Munich), Zametki k Slovu o polku Igoreve (Notes on the Igor Tale, Prague), Zarya (Dawn, Yugoslavia). Selected publications: 1. Georgy Fedotov, Culture and Life: Why Are We Here? (Kultura i zhizn’ — pochemu my zdes'?) Sovremennye zapiski. 2. Ekaterina Tauber, Loneliness (Odinochestvo), Berlin. 3. Viktoriya Yankovskaya, It happened in Korea: Travel Notes (Èto bylo v Koree — Putevye zametki), Novina, Korea. 4. Yury Mandel'shtam, The Third Hour (Tretii chas), Berlin. 5. Mikhail Ivannikov, An Aviation Story (Avia-rasskaz), Paris (Sovremennye zapiski). 6. The Circle of Russian Émigrés in Japan (Kruzhok russkikh èmigrantov v Yaponii), To the East: An Irregular Collectton (Na vostoke: Neperiodicheskii sbomik), Tokyo. 7. Egor Lazarev, My Life (Moya zhizn1), Prague.
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Deaths: prose writer, critic, and translator Anna Anichkova [Ivan Strannik]; political thinker Aleksandr Lande [Izgoev]; prose writers Ekaterina Lopatina [K. El'tsova], Boris Poplavsky, and Isaak Shklovsky [Dioneo]; literary scholars Tikhon Polner and Sergei Zavadsky. 1936 May: White General Vasily Biskupsky is appointed head of the restructured Russian Registration Bureau in Berlin (the Vertrauenstelle). He selects as his deputies Sergei Taboritsky and Pëtr Shabel'sky-Bork, the two assassins of the elder Nabokov. April 27: Ivan Nazhivin writes an unsuccessful letter to Stalin requesting amnesty. May: the All-Russian Fascist Party and the Russian National-Socialist Party conduct a joint congress in Berlin. June: the Solonevich brothers, having moved from Paris to Sofia, help to publish the first issue of Golos Rossli (Voice of Russia). Fall: in Paris ICya Fondaminsky establishes the Russian Theater. September: Biskupsky attempts to register the Russian émigrés in Germany. December 25: General Miller issues “Circular No. 845," detailing how Russian émigrés can join Franco's army in the Spanish civil war. 4 The fifth (and last) combined convention in Paris of the Russian Committee of United Organizations and the Council of Social Organizations attracts representatives of 445 organizations. Konstantin Rodzaevsky names Boris Tödtli ‘ European Leader" of the AllRussian Fascist Party. The U.S. Department of Commerce shows 229 Russian parishes with 89,510 members. Gaito Gazdanov publishes an article in Contemporary Notes denying that the “younger generation” of émigré writers (with the exception of Nabokov) has produced anything of lasting value. Vladimir Varshavsky: “There are plenty of writers in Russia and abroad who write a good deal, and write well, but not one has said anything so truly new and important as to how we should view our lives on the final judgment day that we might believe him the way we believe Tolstoi, Dostoevsky, and Blok." Mark Aldanov: “In Russia ... there was a ‘vital and invigorating' literary atmosphere. As far as I can tell, such an atmosphere exists in individual émigré circles.... I speak here of Russian Paris (I can't say how matters stand in the ‘provinces').... Our catastrophe is of a different nature.... Russian writers abroad are not troubled by the question of a second profession, since they dont have a primary profession. For the émigré, literature is not a trade. It produces no income for the majority of writers, particularly the young." Vyacheslav Ivanov's Soviet citizenship lapses. Family of Anatoly and Alla Shteiger (married name: Golovina) is “re-adopted” by the Canton of Berne in recognition of their Swiss ancestry. Former ambassador to the United States of the Provisional Government Boris Bakhmetev donates $1,400,000 from the funds of the former embassy to Columbia University to expand its Russian studies program. The Bakhmetev Archive is now one of the chief repositories of archival materials on Russian literature in exile. The poet and prose writer Aleksandr Dekhterev takes vows as a monk. Ekaterina Tauber moves from Yugoslavia to France.
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The pro-Soviet Russian Defense League (Russkoe oboroncheskoe dvizhenie) is founded. Serials founded include: Avala (Shanghai), Klich (Battle Cry, Sofia), Russkii nabat (The Russian Alarm, New York), Russkii skaut (The Russian Scout, Shanghai), Zemlya Kolumba (The Land of Columbus, New York). In Belgrade Bukh ceases publication. Selected publications: 1. Boris Poplavsky, The Snowy Hour (Snezhnyi chas), Paris. 2. Anatoly Shteiger, Ingratitude (Neblagodamost1), Paris. 3. Mark Levi [M. Ageev], A Novel with Cocaine (Roman c kokainom), Paris. 4. Georgy Adamovich and M. L Kantor (eds.). The Anchor: An Anthology of Russian Emigre Poetry (Yakor1: Antologiya russkoi poèzii vèmigratsii), Beriin-Petropolis. 5. Vladimir Zhabotinsky, The Five (Pyatero), Paris. Maksim Goriky is poisoned in the Soviet Union on Stalin's orders. NKVD agents make off with a portion of Trotsky's archive in the Institute for Historical Studies in Paris. August: at the first of three so-called ‘show trials" — that of "the TrotskyZinov'ev Center" — Trotsky and his stepson Lev Sedov are sentenced, in absentia, to death. Sergei Prokofev returns to Russia permanently, although he continues to tour abroad until 1938. Former tsarist émigrés Grigory Apfelbaum [Zinov'ev] and Lev Rozenfel'd [Kamenev] are executed in the U.S.S.R. Other deaths: publisher Vladimir Chertkov (in Moscow); prose writers Ekaterina Dykhova-Gardner, Viktor Glikman [Iretsky], S. S. Krym, Boris Lazarevsky, Vasily Nemirovich-Danchenko, Sergei Sokolov [Krechetov]; poet Mikhail Dolinov; composer Aleksandr Glazunov. 1937 January: Trotsky arrives in Mexico, having been granted political asylum. January: a group of 150-200 Russian officers in France sends a petition to Vasily Biskupsky in Berlin asking permission to relocate to Germany to take part in the struggle with Bolshevism. The Gestapo does not allow Biskupsky to respond. August 23: Boris Solonevich writes that publishing a newspaper in Belgium is 50 percent more expensive than in Sofia. His brother Ivan returns to Bulgaria, but Boris stays on in Brussels. September 22: former White Army General Evgeny Miller, head of the allRussian Military Union, is kidnapped in Paris by Soviet agents, taken to the Soviet Union, and shot. Accomplices in the act are White General Nikolai Skoblin and his wife, the singer Nadezhda Plevitskaya. Skoblin succeeds in fleeing, but Plevitskaya is arrested. September 24: White General headquarters of ROVS is to be moved from September 30: Pravda claims that December 5: the trial of Nadezhda
Födor Abramov announces that the Paris to Sofia. Skoblin was actually a German agent Plevitskaya begins. She is sentenced to
20 years hard labor. The National League of Russian Writers and Journalists in France (Natsionai'noe ob'edinenie russkikh pisatelei i zhumalistov) is created under the chairmanship of Ivan Tkhorzhevsky with the goal of mutual support.
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Trotsky’s son Lev Sedov calls for Stalin's assassination. Cossack writers in Paris found their own society, entitled Kruzhok kazakovliteratorov (Circle of Cossack Men of Letters). Trotsky's youngest son, Sergei Sedov, and his nephew, Boris Bronshtein, are arrested and shot in the Soviet Union. The Solonevich brothers return to France from Sofia In western Europe the "Day of Russian Culture” is celebrated with more pomp than ever by the émigrés. The bullet-riddled body of defected Soviet agent Evgeny Poretsky [Ignaty Reiss] is found sprawled on a highway near Lausanne. Tsvetaeva's husband Sergei Èfron is implicated and flees to the U.S.S.R. Some 2,500 Russians work as taxicab drivers in Paris. The League in France for the Return to the Motherland (Soyuz vozvrashcheniya na rodinu vo Frantsii) is renamed the League of Friends of the Soviet Motherland (Soyuz druzei sovetskoi rodiny). Fôdor Stepun is dismissed from his position as Professor of Philosophy at Dresden University. Returned refugee Dmitry Svyatopolk-Mirsky is arrested in toe U.S.S.R. An evidently senile Aleksandr Kuprin is taken to Russia by his daughter. On June 18 an article, supposedly signed by him, appears in Izvestiya, claiming that he has long desired to return to Soviet Russia because he experienced nothing but anguish and separation among the other émigrés: ‘ Even toe flowers smell differently in toe homeland. Their aroma is stronger, headier than that of foreign flowers. People say our soil is richer and more fertile. Perhaps. In any case, everything is better in the homeland!" Among those who leave Germany for France are the philosopher Semön Frank and Vladimir Nabokov. Serials founded include: Belgradskii Pushkinskii sbomik (The Belgrade Pushkin Collection), Pushkin (Paris), Russkie zapiski (Russian Annals, Paris-Shanghai), Sodruzhestvo (Commonwealth, Viipuri). Selected publications: 1. Antonin Ladinsky, The Rfteenth Legion (XV Legion), Tallinn. 2. Elizaveta Kuz'mina-Karavaeva [Mother Mariya], Poems (Stikhi), Berlin. 3. Galina Kuznetsova, Garden of Olives (Olivkovyi sad), Paris. 4. Valery Pereleshin, On the Road (V puti), Harbin. 5. Nikolai Turoverov, Poems (Stikhi), Besançon. Nikolai Ustryalov and Venedikt Matveev [Venedikt Mart] are executed in toe U.S.S.R. Other deaths: prose writer and literary historian Evgeny Anichkov; philosopher and theologian Father Pavel Florensky; playwright Mariya Klimenko; poets Daniil Ratgauz and Yulian Yavorsky; prose writers and poets Vitol'd-Konstantin Rozenblyum [Konstantin L'dov] and Aleksandr Savitsky; poet Nikolai Vilenkin [Minsky]; prose writers Sergei Volkonsky and Evgeny Zamyatin; prose writer and playwright Anatoly Vorotnikov; translator Zinaida Zhuravskaya. 1938 January 7: Boris Pryanishnikov arrives in Berlin from France to set up a secret printing press, financed by toe Japanese government, to publish materials of toe National Labor League of toe New Generation for distribution in toe Soviet Union.
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February 25: the German government turns over all churches and property of the Evlogian church to the Russian Church Abroad. February: in Bulgaria a mail bomb kills the wife (Tamara Vladimirovna) and secretary (P. N. Mikhailov) of writer and editor Ivan Solonevich, who has launched steady attacks against both ROVS and the Soviet government After burying his wife he relocates his newspaper to Germany. Altogether six attempts are made on Solonevich's life. February: Trotsky's oldest son, Lev Sedov, dies under unclarified circumstances in Paris. In Moscow, his older brother Aleksandr Bronshtein, is executed. March: in the U.S.S.R. the “triä of the 21" is conducted. Bukharin is a leading defendant April 19: Aleksei Tolstoi is awarded the Order of Lenin. May 18: the Nattonal Front is created in Berlin, uniting the Russian National Veterans' League (Russkii Natsional'yi Soyuz Veteranov Voiny), the so-called "junior capitains” (shtabs-kapitany) of Ivan Solonevich, Rodzaevsky's Russian Fascist League, and the Russian National-Socialist Movement It is called "the first Russian émigré organization without Jews and Freemasons." August 14-24: the second Synod (Sobor) of the Russian Church Abroad is held in Sremski Kariovci, reconfirming its unwillingness to rejoin the Moscow Patriarchy. November 20: the National Labor League of the New Generation, together with the Society of Friends of a National Russia (Obshchestvo Druzei Natsional'noi Rossii), celebrate the 950th anniversary of the Christianization of Russia in the Saint Vincent Abbey, founded in 1060 by Anna, Queen of France and daughter of Yaroslav the Wise. Many Russian organizations as well as many Frenchmen take part in the event Asked during his last trip abroad how he can tolerate Soviet totalitarianism, Sergei Prokofev responds that he is not interested in politics. Two literary and art societies are founded in Harbin, one under the auspices of the YMCA, and the other by the monarchists. The National Labor League of the New Generation begins infiltrating agents into the Soviet Union to gather intelligence and to establish revolutionary cells. Ivan Solonevich declares that a number of nations, including Italy, Portugal, Germany, and Hungary, have successfully implemented the White Idea. The International Committee on Refugees assumes charge of refugees (until 1947). The Parisian newspaper Poslednie novosti has a print run of 39,000 copies. A portion of the library of the Kondakov Institute, which was evacuated from Prague after the Germans occupied Czechoslovakia, is moved to Belgrade. Vladislav Khodasevich, echoing the words of critic Vladimir Veidle, writes about the ‘death of art." Evgeny Rabinovich [Räch] moves from England to the United States. Grand Duke Vladimir Kirillovich is declared Head of the Russian Imperiä House. The prose writer and memoirist Zinäda Zhemchuzhnaya moves from Tänjin (China) to Austräia. The Russian Defense League ceases to exist Krug (Circle) ceases publication.
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JOHN GLAD
Lenin's entire first Politbyuro, consisting mostly of tsarist émigrés, is executed under verdicts handed out during the show trials. The confessions are attributed variously to the defendants being drugged or attempting to save the lives of family members. Of the first post-Lenin Politburo Stalin alone survives. Novyi mir (The New World, New York) ceases publication. Selected publications: 1. Georgy Ivanov, Decay of the Atom (Raspad atoma), Paris. 2. Vladimir Nabokov, Invitatton to a Beheading (Priglashenie na kazn*), Paris. 3. Yury Mandel'shtam, Searchers: Articles (Iskateli: stat'i), Shanghai. 4. Yury Ivask, Northern Shore (Sevemyi bereg), Warsaw. 5. Gaito Gazdanov, Story of a Journey (Istoriya odnogo puteshestviya), Paris. Grand Duke Kirill Vladimirovich, pretender to the throne, dies. Other deaths: poets Boris Gordon, Lidiya Lebedeva, and Stanislav Openkhovsky [Sarmatov]; prose writers Gleb Alekseev, Aleksandr Amfiteatrov, Aleksandr Kuprin, Aleksandr Nikolaev; philosophers Lev Shestov and Nikolai Trubetskoi. 1939 Early in the year: Rosenberg orders that the so-called National Front (RNSUV, RNSD, RFS, and others) be more or less disbanded to unite their remnants under Russian émigré general Biskupsky. April 12: the French government unexpectedly requires registration of all foreign organizations but does not provide specific instructions. Russian cultural organizations find themselves in a sort of legal limbo. July 26: General Skoblin is tried in absentia in a French court for the kidnapping of General Miller and is found guilty. September 1: “undesirable foreigners” are rounded up in France for deportation. These included Russians who had collaborated with the Nazis in Germany and also members of the pro-Soviet Union for Return to the Homeland. Vladimir Nabokov writes to the Literary Fund in the United States asking for financial support, but the Fund is able to send only $20. When he sends a manuscript to the newspaper Poslednie novosti, Mark Aidanov responds: “Ifs war! War! How can you waste your time on such trifles?” Sergei Rakhmaninov, although he has never met Nabokov, sends him 2,500 francs when he learns of Nabokov's “ghastly destitution'' (Nabokov's phrase). 45,000 Russian speakers are registered in Harbin and other cities in Manchukuo (Manchuria). The Tolstoi Fund (Tolstovskii Fond) is created in New York by Aleksandra Tolstaya (daughter of Lev Tolstoi) and Tafyana Shaufus. The family of Mariya Turkova [Vizi] emigrates from Shanghai to San Francisco. Petropolis Publishers, directed by Yakov Blokh, moves from Berlin to Brussels. The Institute for the Study of Russia in Belgrade sponsors 39 scholarly talks. The collection of the Russian Public Library in Belgrade numbers some 120,000 volumes. The Green Lamp Society ceases to function. Illyustrirovannaya Rossiya, Novyi grad, and Russkie zapiski cease publication. Bi-lingual Russian-Lithuanian poet and prose writer Jurgis Baltrusaitis moves from Lithuania to Paris.
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The Society of Russian Writers in Carpathian Rus’ (Soyuz russkikh pisatelei v podkarpatskoi Rusi) is founded in Mukachevo. The Prague group Skit poàtov is closed. The Paris-based newspaper Vozrozhdenie abruptly shifts from a pro-Hitler position to one loyal to the French government. Roman Yakobson flees Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia for Scandinavia. Serials founded include: Evreiskii mir (Jewish World, Paris), Gran’ (Facet, Paris), Kalendaf-pamyatka (The Memo Calendar, Belgrade-Geneva), Uteratumyi smotr (Literary Inspection, Paris), Rodinovedenie (Study of the Homeland, Brussels), Vestnik (The Herald, Paris), Vesennii sbomik literatumo-khudozhestvennogo kruzhka (Spring Collection of the Literary-Artistic Circle, Harbin). Selected publications: 1. Georgy Adamovich, In the West: Poems (Na zapade: stikhi), Paris. 2. Irina Knorring, A Window to the North (Okno na sever), Paris. 3. Aleksei Gryzov [Aleksei Achair], Paths (Tropy), Harbin. 4. S. Bart, Straw Flutters (Voroshiteli solomy), Warsaw. 5. Mikhail Tsetlin [Amari], Blood on the Snow (Krov* na snegu), Paris. Aleksei Èisner and Marina Tsvetaeva return to Russia. Tsarist émigré Mikhail Gerasimov dies in the purges. Other deaths: critic and poet Vladislav Khodasevich, prose writers Boris Suvorin, Lev Goier, and Konstantin Korovin, and historian Ivan Okuntsov.
1940 January 27: prose writer Isaak Babel', who visited the West three times but refused to defect, is executed. March 1 : the Solidarist newspaper Za Rodinu, newly transferred from Sofia to Belgrade under its original title, Za Rossiyu, comes out with a special page showing previous titles of the publication and a lead article by Dmitry Zavzhalov, Chairman of the Bulgarian branch of the Solidarist movement: “We now stand face to face before the events which we have waited for for so long and toward which we have striven. The days are close when in practice — in the severe practice of life — we will have to justify the correctness of the path which we have selected, to reaffirm our preparation, our readiness for battle, and our will to fight for Russia." May 10: in prison Nadezhda Plevitskaya confesses that her husband General Skoblin admitted to her that he had betrayed General Miller. He told her he took Miller to a house in the town of Saint-Cloud, where they were received by three men who spoke good German and Russian. Miller was put to sleep by injection. May 23: An unsuccessful attempt is made on Trotsky's life in Mexico City. July 28: in Belgrade Tsarskii vestnik (Tsarist Herald) puts out its last issue; in September it is replaced by Russkii narodnyi vestnik (The Russian People's Herald), which, unlike its forerunner, does not display the Imperial Russian two-headed eagle. August 20: a Spanish agent of Stalin, Ramon Mercader, strikes Trotsky on the head with a pickax. Trotsky dies the next day. August 28: the Germans dissolve all foreign organizations in the occupied area of France, including approximately 800 Russian cultural and charitable bodies. September: in Paris the Turgenev library is confiscated and taken to Germany, where it disappears, parts later appearing in Moscow's Lenin Library. October 5: Nadezhda Plevitskaya dies in a French prison.
560
JOHN GLAD October: Trotsky's youngest sister, Ol'ga Kameneva, is executed in the Soviet
Union. A number of Russians flee German-occupied Paris for the south. The library and archive of Iosif Gessen is lost. Mikhail Osorgin nearly emigrates to the United States but declines the opportunity; when the Germans occupy Paris, he and his wife flee to Chabris, in the unoccupied zone of France. Vladimir Nabokov and Mark Vishnyak leave France for the U .S A Lev Karsavin is in Uthuania when it is occupied by Soviet troops. Among the many publications which cease publication are: Segodnya (Today), Sovremennye zapiski (Contemporary Annals), Vestnik Russkogo Studencheskogo Khristianskogo Dvizheniya (Bulletin of the Russian Student Christian Movement), P u t (The Path). 1,812 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. Serials founded include: Itogi 7-mi dnei (Summary of the Seven Days, New York), Russkie skauty (Russian Scouts, Harbin). Selected publications: 1. Larisa Andersen, Along Earthly Meadows (Po zemnym lugam), Shanghai; collection of poetry. 2. Evgeny Kiskevich, Poems About the Weather (Stikhi o pogode), Belgrade. 3. Nina Fêdorova, The Family (original publication in English; did not appear until 1952 in Russian — Sem'ya, New York). In Latvia, the poet and novelist Yury Goncharenko [Yury Galich] commits suicide after receiving a summons from the NKVD. Other deaths: philosopher Dmitry Filosofov; poet, prose writer, and playwright Fêdor Kasatkin-Rostovsky; literary scholar Nikolai Kul'man; prose writers Ivan Lukash and Ivan Nazhivin; journalist and former mayor of Moscow Vadim Rudnev; Zionist leader, prose writer, and translator Vladimir Zhabotinsky.
1941 March 15: Aleksei Tolstoi is awarded the first of three Stalin Prizes. April 6: much of the Kondakov Library is destroyed in a German bombing raid on Belgrade. May 14: the poet Mikhail Gorlin is arrested by the Germans in Paris. June 22: Germany invades the U.S.S.R., and many Russian émigrés are arrested on suspicion of sympathy for or cooperation with the Soviet government June 22: Valentin Bulgakov is arrested in Prague by the Gestapo and spends four years in concentration camps. June 23: White General Skorodumov requests German permission to form an émigré division to fight on the eastern front Permission is originally denied. July 21 : in Belgrade Skorodumov arranges a book burning on the territory of the former Russian embassy; among the books burned are works by Amfiteatrov, Nemirovich-Danchenko, Gippius, and Merezhkovsky. Summer: Dmitry Merezhkovsky gives a radio speech in support of Germany's “heroic feat’ in declaring a “crusade” against the U.S.S.R. August 31 : Marina Tsvetaeva commits suicide in Yelabuga, U.S.S.R. September 12: Skorodumov receives a cable from the German army requesting that he form a Russian military unit
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September 12: Hitler signs a decree creating the Defense Corps, also called the Russian Corps. September 15: in Yugoslavia Russkii byulleten’ (The Russian Bulletin) is shut down by the Germans. October: 16: Sergei Èfron, Tsvetaeva's husband, is executed in U.S.S.R. October 22: Hitler signs a decree creating Cossack military units. The number of Russian emigrants in Yugoslavia is estimated at approximately 50,000. Following the Nazi attack on the Soviet Union, German authorities in France detain a large number of Russians, viewing them as a potential fifth column. Among the writers who find themselves in cities occupied by the Germans are Boris Filippov (Novgorod), Sergei Maksimov (Smolensk), and Boris Nartsissov (Tartu). Leonid Surazhevsky (later name changed to Leonid Rzhevsky) becomes a prisoner-of-war. The poet Mariya Karamzina is deported to the U.S.S.R. from Estonia. Il'ya Èrenburg and Kirill Khenkin return to U.S.S.R. Georgy Fedotov, Mark Landau [Mark Aldanov], Mikhail Tsetlin, Zinaida Trotskaya, and Roman Yakobson arrive in the United States. 1,794 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. The Tolstoi Fund is given 74 acres in Valley Cottage, New York, which eventually becomes the Tolstoi Center. Serials founded include: Novaya zhizn' (The New Life, Berlin), Rampa ([Stage] Apron), San Francisco), Signal (Berlin). Selected publications: 1. Vladimir Nabokov, The Read Ufa of Sebastian Knight, Norfolk, Connecticut; Nabokov's first novel written in English. 2. Sergei Makovsky, Evening (Vecher), Paris. 3. Nikolai Sergievsky, The Spanish Undertaking (Gishpanskaya zateya), New York. The poet Il'ya Britan is executed in Paris by the Germans. The journalist and prose writer Vasily Nikiforov-Volgin is executed in the Soviet city of Kirov. Other deaths: Vladimir Baryatinsky, Anatoly Kamensky, Igor' Lotardv [Severyanin], Dmitry Merezhkovsky, Stepan Petrov-Skitalets, Zinaida Vengerova, Pötr Yakobi.
1942 January: Zinaida Shakhovskaya arrives in England. June: on the basis of NKVD documents seized by the Germans in Minsk, it is determined that the émigré Sergei Tret'yakov, grandson of the founder of the Tret'yakov Art Gallery in Moscow, is a Soviet secret agent in Germany. July 17: Mikhail Gorlin is deported from France to Germany. July or August: Soviet General Andrei Vlasov is captured by the Germans. By March 1, the Germans take 3,600,000 Russian prisoners of war, among them the poet Andrei Al'tamentov [Kasim]. Late in the year: many Russian émigrés in France are arrested by the Germans and then released.
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The leftist Federation of Russian Canadians is bom of the Russian Workers’ and Fanners' Clubs and the Russian Committees to Help the Motherland. The prose writer Boris Shiryaev is in Cherkassk when it is occupied by the Germans. Prose writer Gennady Khomyakov is taken prisoner by Germans. Anna Radlova is in Pyatigorsk when it is captured by the Germans. The literary scholar Nikolai Poltoratsky and his father relocate to Germanoccuped areas of the Soviet Union, where they remain until 1944. Aleksei Tolstoi is awarded the second of three Stalin Prizes. Hélène Iswolsky: ‘Our belief is that the ‘disintegration of culture and personality,' which seems characteristic of the young Russian émigré authors, was partly due to the influence of the modem school of French literature; these tendencies would have probably been overcome in due time, just as the ‘decadent1 trends of the beginning of the century were overcome by previous generations.... Today, we do not find in Russian literature an author worthy of continuing the great Russian humanist tradition.” Georgy Fedotov: ‘ Marina Tsvetaeva belonged to the Moscow, and not the Paris School. Her place is there — between Mayakovsky and Pasternak. In tune with the revolution as a natural storm, she could not come to terms with communist slavery. Abroad she found poverty, emptiness, loneliness. Now she is in her native country, but we don't hear her songs. Perhaps the nightingale has been fed, but a free bird won't sing in a cage.” Tsvetaeva was already dead by the time this was written. The poet and future editor Valentina Sinkevich and the future poet Viktoriya Babenko are pressed into forced labor and taken to Germany. Bunin's pupil and mistress, Galina Kuznetsova, leaves him. The poet Yury Mandel'shtam is arrested in Paris and later deported to Germany. The literary historian and memoirist Razumnik Ivanov [Ivanov-Razumnik] is sent to a labor camp in Germany. The poet Dmitry Iosifovich Krachkovsky [Dmitry Klenovsky] flees to Germany. The poet Mikhail Demushkin [Nadezhdin] flees to Poland, then to Czechoslavakia, and later to Germany. Almost one million Russian volunteers (Hilfswillige) serve in the Wehrmacht The editor Iosif Gessen, prose writer and editor Yakov Tsvibak [Andrei Sedykh], and novelist and memoirist Vasily Yanovsky move to the United States. 811 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. Serials founded include: Novosel'e (Housewarming, New York, moved to Paris in 1949), Novyi put' (The New Path, Belgrade, replaces Russkii byulleten’ [The Russian Bulletin], which was shut down by the Germans), Novyi zhumal (The New Review, New York), Parizhskii vestnik (The Parisian Herald, German-subsidized), Sevemoe slovo (Northern Word, Revel), Trud: Ezhenedel'naya gazeia dlya russkikh rabochikh (Labor: A Daily Newspaper for Russian Workers, Berlin). Selected publications: 1. Andrei Sedykh, The Road Across the Ocean (Doroga cherez okean), New York. 2. Aleksandr Perfil'ev, A Person Without Memories (Chelovek bez vospomaninii), Riga. 3. Kleopatra Bolotina, Stories (Rasskazy), New York.
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4. The Ark (Kovcheg), anthology of Russian literature abroad, New York. The publisher Sergei Karachevtsev is executed by the Soviets. Il'ya BunakovFondaminsky, Boris W d e [Boris DikoQ, and Anatoly Levitsky die in German concentration camps. Other deaths: poet Konstantin Bal'mont; editor Vladimir Burtsev; prose writers Anna Gippius and Mikhail ll'in [Mikhail Osorgin]; poet and translator Anatoly Levin [Lugin]; poet and prose writer Elizaveta Knauf-Magnusgovskaya; prose writer and literary scholar Evgeny Lyatsky; prose writer and critic Pötr Pil'sky; poet and journalist Evgeny Shklyar (possibly 1943).
1943 January: the newspaper Zarya (Dawn) is created by the Germans to replace the openly Nazi newspaper Klich (Battle Cry). 600,000 copies are printed of the initial issues, which contain Vlasov's political platform, and later issues have print runs of 150,000-200,000 copies. February: Elizaveta Kuz'mina-Karavaeva [Mother Mariya] is arrested by the Gestapo. July 24: Yury Zherebkov brings Vlasov's deputy, Vasily Malyshkin, to Paris, where he speaks to an audience of 6,000 Russians in the Salle Wagram. November 7: the pro-Soviet League of Russian Patriots and its newspaper Russkil patriot (Russian Patriot) are founded clandestinely in Paris. November: the Nazi government promises to return the Cossacks their land after the defeat of the Soviet Union. 480 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. Yury Fel'zen is arrested and deported to Germany, where he evidently dies in a concentration camp. Elizaveta Skobtsova [Mother Mariya] and Raisa Blokh are also sent to concentration camps. In occupied Paris Nikolai Evreinov assumes the directorship of a Russian theater. Aleksandr Vertinsky returns to Russia after a quarter century spent in Western Europe and China. The poet Mikhail Kachurovsky [Shipovnikov] flees to Germany. The poet Sergei Zubarev becomes a German prisoner of war. Valery Pereleshin moves from Harbin to Peking, and later to Shanghai. Razumnik Ivanov [Ivanov-Razumnik] is released from a German camp. The poet Vladimir Shatalov arrives in Western Europe. Tafyana Fesenko goes to Germany. The American Book-of-the-Month Club selects Aidanov's novel The Fifth Seal (original title: Nachato kontsa), causing heated protests from persons who regard the U.S.S.R. as an ally. The poet and sculptor Mirtala Kardinalovskaya is pressed into forced labor and taken to Germany. The novelist Nikolai Breshko-Breshkovsky leaves Prague for Berlin to join the German-supported Russian émigrés but dies during an air raid. Serials founded include: Na dosuge (At Leisure, Berlin), Nashi dni (Our Days, Wustrau), Rodina (The Homeland, Wustrau). Selected publications: 1. Dmitry Magula, The Last Rays (Poslednie luchi), New York.
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2. Galina Izdebskaya, Meetings (Vstrechi), New York. 3. Aleksandr Brailovsky, From the Classics (Iz kiassikov), New York. The following writers flee Russia: the poets Ol'ga Anstei, Ella Bobrova, Sergei Bongart, Mikhail Lazukhin, Viktor Lazukhin, Sergei Maksimov, Ivan Matveev [Ivan Elagin], Boris Shiryaev, Sergei Tol', Vladimir Tripol'sky [Vladimir Ant], and prose writer and poet Evgeniya Dimer. Other deaths: the poets Raisa Blokh (?), Lev Èngel'gardt, Mikhail Gorlin (?), Irina Knorring, Yury Mandel'shtam, Sergei Rafalovich, Semdn Lebedev; prose writer Nikolai Freidenshtein [Yury Fel'zen]; scientist, editor, and memoirist Iosif Gessen; Pavel Mityukov; writer Veniamin Zavadsky.
1944 May 28: British Ambassador Archibald Clark Kerr writes to Vyacheslav Molotov, Soviet Foreign Affairs Commissar, asking that Russians pressed into German service be granted either amnesty or “considerate treatment.” Molotov immediately rejects Kerr's request. June 6: Sergei Trefyakov is executed by the Germans in a concentration camp in Oranienburg, near Berlin. August: Paris is liberated from the Germans. September 4: the British Cabinet approves Anthony Eden's decision to repatriate Russian prisoners of war who have served in German units. Early September: the Russian émigré Voitsekhovsky, who was appointed by the Germans to take charge of the Russian colony in Belgium, is assassinated. October 4: the Soviet of People's Commissars resolves that Soviet citizens abroad should be returned to the Soviet Union. Many émigrés in territories occupied by the Soviet army are arrested. November 14: from Prague the Vlasov movement issues a 14-point Manifesto, interpreted as a non-predetermination program (Nepredreshenchestvo). SMNR (Youth League of the Peoples of Russia) is created by KONR (The Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia in Germany). In Prague the Russian Free University (formerly the Russian People's University) ceases to function. Many Russians flee Yugoslavia tor Austria to escape the Soviet army of occupation, among them Lidiya Alekseeva (in October). The League of Russian Patriots is renamed the League of Soviet Citizens in Paris (Soyuz sovetskikh grazhdan v Parizhe). 439 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. Vasily Shul'gin is arrested in Yugoslavia and returned to the U.S.S.R. The poet Nonna Mikiashevskaya [Belavina] leaves Yugoslavia for Germany. The poet Yury Ivask flees Estonia for Germany. The poet Igor’ Chinnov moves from Latvia to Germany. German-supported Parizhskii vestnik (Parisian Herald) ceases publication. The poet Mikhail Daraganov is taken prisoner by the Germans (exact date uncertain). Serials founded include: Nashakhty Ç[o#\e Mines, Dortmund), N ashidnl(Our Days, Paris). Selected publications: 1. Valery Salatko-Petrishchev [Pereleshin], The Victim (Zhertva), Harbin.
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2. Elena Antonova-All, Reflections (Otrazheniya), New York. 3. Mariya Volkova, Poems (Stikhi), Paris. 4. Boris Filippov, The Invisible City (Grad nevidimyi), Riga. 5. Kira Slavina, Paper Wings (Bumazhnye kryl'ya), New York. 6. Zinaida Trotskaya, Echoes (Otgoloski), New York. 7. Vyacheslav Ivanov, Roman Diary (Rimskii dnevnik), in Svet vechemii. The following writers emigrate: prose writers Anatoly Darov, poet Nikolai Nikolaevich Marchenko [Morshen], family of Oleg ll'insky. Deaths: prose writers Vladimir Astrov, Veniamin Korsak, Kapitolina Matveeva; poet and prose writer Jurgis Baltruäaitis; poets Pötr Bronshtein, Aleksei Durakov (?); poet, prose writer, and journalist Vladimir Klopotovsky [Leri]; poet and prose writer Nikolai Peterets; poet Anatoly Shteiger; the philosopher and theologian Father Sergei Bulgakov.
1945 February 11 : the Yalta Accords provide for the repatriation — forced or voluntary — of former Soviet citizens abroad, who number as many as five million. February 12: a group of prominent émigrés, including the last pre-revolutionary Russian ambassador to France, Vasily Maklakov, pays a visit to the Soviet embassy to state that they recognize the Soviet Union as Russia's national state. Early April: Lavrenty Beriya, Soviet Deputy Prime Minister in charge of security, calls a secret meeting to discuss how to handle both forced and voluntary repatriations from Western Europe to the U.S.S.R. April 21 : nineteen persons are handed over by the Finnish government to the Soviet Union, among them seventeen members of ROVS and the National Labor League of the New Generation. Most are naturalized Finnish citizens. Spring: 35,000 Cossacks reside in an area around Tolmezzo in the Italian Alps, a few miles from the Austrian border, given them by Alfred Rosenberg's Ostministerium to establish a new Kazakiya. May 6-7: Vlasov's army plays a decisive role in the Prague uprising against the Germans. May 12: the Russian Corps (Russkii Korpus) surrenders its weapons to British troops in the Klagenfurt area. May 28-June 7: 35,000 Cossacks are forcibly handed over to Soviet troops by the British army in the area of Judenberg and Lienz, Austria May 29: the British hand General Krasnov over to the Soviets, who take him to Moscow for trial. June 14: the Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R. issues a decree (ufcaz) granting Russian émigrés the right to apply for citizenship. June 15-30: an additional 13,350 Soviet citizens are handed over to the Red Army at Judenberg, bringing the total to nearly 50,000. June 29: 154 Soviet citizens in a prisoner-of-war camp at Fort Dix, New Jersey, riot upon being told that they are to be returned to the Soviet Union. July 26: four Kariovcian bishops in Soviet-occupied Manchuria and China appeal to the Moscow Patriarch to accept them back into his fold. August 31 : the Fort Dix contingent is sent by ship to be handed over to Soviet representatives in Europe.
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September: the above-mentioned Karlovcian bishops in Soviet-occupied Manchuria and China send a laudatory telegram of congratulations to Stalin asking for God's blessings on him. October 4: Eisenhower suspends forcible repatriation of Soviet citizens. November 10: the Soviet government issues an amnesty to Russians in Manchuria. November 11: with the notation ‘Approved by UNRRA," Posev, the first Russian displaced-persons publication appears. Because of a shortage of paper, it is printed on the reverse side of German application forms. November 15: a committee representing the U.S. Army, Navy, and State Department prepares a paper rejecting forced repatriation except for Soviet citizens captured in German uniform, deserters from the Soviet armed forces, and persons who had ‘voluntarily rendered aid and comfort to the enemy." December: Eduard BeneS, President of Czechoslovakia, gives the Russian Historical Archive Abroad (Russkii zagranichnii istoricheskii arkhiv) in Prague to Soviet authorities; at least a part of it is shipped to the U.S.S.R. in fifteen freight cars. December 16: 3,100 Russians are in camps in Austria, 2,500 outside the camps, and an estimated 1,500 are in hiding in the hills. December 22: Truman directs that displaced persons be given preference in determining U.S. immigration quotas. Aleksandra Kollontai retires as diplomat and returns to Russia. Between 1945 and 1948 some 180 Russians churches are established in Germany, most of them in barracks. The poet and prose writer Vsevolod Nikanorovich Ivanov returns to Russia. The Parisian newspaper Russkii patriot (Russian Patriot) is renamed Sovetskii patriot (Soviet Patriot). The VMCA Press is reestablished in Paris. The philosopher Semên Frank moves from France to England. The monarchist historian Nikolai Chukhnov flees from Yugoslavia to Austria. 431 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. In the wake of the Soviet occupation of Manchuria, the Russian émigré community shifts to Shanghai. Serials founded include: Chestnyi sion (The Honest Elephant, Paris), Literatumo-khudozhestvennyi al'manakh (The Literary-Artistic Almanac, Salzburg), Nashi vesti (Our News, New York City), Nezavisimoe slovo (The Independent Word, Paris), Russkie novosti (Russian News, Paris), Strannik (The Wanderer, Garfield, New Jersey), V chasy dosuga - V minuty razdum'ya (In Hours of Leisure, In Moments of Contemplation, Sydney), Vstrecha (Meeting, Paris), Zveno (Link, Buenos Aires). The artistic-literary magazine RubezhÇÏhe Border, Harbin) ceases publication. Selected publications: 1. Nikolai Turoverov, Sirko: A Poem (Sirko: Poèma), Paris. 2. Vladimir Krymov, Fen'ka, Paris. 3. Iosif Levin, Tale of a Raven (Skazanie o vorone), New York. 4. Anatoly Darov, The Blockade (Blokada), Munich; prose work published in mimeographed form about the siege of Leningrad.
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Aleksei Gryzov [Achair] and Arseny Mitropol'sky [Nesmelov] are arrested in China and forcibly returned to the U.S.S.R. Gryzov spends four years in a forced-labor camp, and Mitropol'sky dies in a transit camp. Other deaths: Literary scholar Alfred Bern (executed by the Soviets in Prague), the poets Vsevolod Èikhenbaum, Zinaida Gippius, Elizaveta Kuz'minaKaravaeva ([Mother Mariya], Skobtsova, née Pilenko), Boris Novosadov (?), prose writers Solomon Polyakov-Litovtsev, Aleksei Tolstoi, Lev LVovich Tolstoi (son of Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoi), poet, prose writer, and editor Mikhail Tsetlin, publisher Ivan Ladyzhnikov.
1946 January 19: Russian prisoners at Dachau riot in an attempt to prevent being repatriated. January 22: the Soviet government issues a second amnesty to Russians in Manchuria. February: in Paris N. Pyatnitsky, editor of the pro-Nazi Parizhskii vastnik (Parisian Herald), is sentenced to ten years hard labor. February 20: Pope Pius XII protests “the repatriation of men against their will and the refusal of the right of asylum." February 24:1,590 Russians are handed over to the Soviets at Rattling. Five men commit suicide, and a number of others are forestalled in attempts to do likewise. March 5: Winston Churchill delivers his famous ‘ Iron Curtain” speech at Fulton, Missouri. May 13: 222 more Russians at Rattling are forcibly repatriated. March 16: The League of Russian Writers and Journalists in Paris discusses the émigrés' relationship to the Soviet government. June 6: the British Cabinet agrees to comply with the American decision to limit forced repatriations. June 14: the Supreme Soviet decrees an amnesty for all Russian émigrés residing in France and offers them the opportunity to apply for Soviet citizenship. Soon similar amnesties are declared for other countries. August 2: Pravda announces the execution of Andrei Vlasov and nine of his officers. They had surrendered to American troops and been handed over to the Soviets. August 11-14: approximately one thousand Russians in camps in Italy are moved to an American camp near Pisa and a British camp at Riccione, just south of Rimini, under the code names “Operation Keelhaul’’ and “Operation Eastwind.” Early fall: American authorities in the displaced-persons camps order that all publications be shut down until officially licensed. November: the Russian Orthodox Church of America withdraws from the Synod. December 15: in the United Nations Andrei Gromyko complains that the resettlement of displaced persons is being conducted in such a fashion that “war criminals, quislings, and traitors” are being permitted to escape. The number of Russians in France declines to 55,000. Of those living in Paris, one third speak French badly or not at all. The poets and prose writers Aleksandr Ginger and Antonin Ladinsky and the poet Anna Prismanova accept Soviet citizenship.
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Attacks on the Soviet magazine Zvezda and on Anna Akhmatova and Mikhail Zoshchenko by Andrei Zhdanov cause many émigrés to reexamine the pro-Soviet attitudes they had developed during the war. The Soviet writer Konstantin Simonov is sent to France to persuade Ivan Bunin to return to the Soviet Union. Nikolai Fêdorov [N. Roshchin] returns to Russia. 986 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. Serials founded include: Èkho (Echo, Regensburg), Ezhemesyachnyi otryvnoi kalendar’ (The Monthly Tear-Off Calendar, Fischbeck), Grani (Facets, Frankfurt am Main), Iskorka (The Spark, Fuessen-Schleissheim), Mir Bozhii (God's World, Mittenwald), Nashi dni (Our Days, Fuessen-Schleissheim), Novaya zemlya (The New Land, Paris), Obshchekazachii zhumal (The All-Cossack Journal, New Jersey), Ogni ('Fires" or "Lights,” produced on a duplicating machine in a displaced-persons camp on outskirts of Munich), Petrushka (Munich), Rodina (The Homeland, Geneva), Rodnoe sbvo (Native Word, Bad Aibling), Russkaya mysT (Russian Thought, Dachau), Sootechestvennik (Countryman, Hamburg), Svobodnyi gobs (Free Voice, Paris), Tizis (Turol), Vesëlyi listok (The Cheerful Newsletter, Fuessen-Schleissheim), Zemlya (The Earth, Paris). Selected publications: 1. Yury Terapiano, Trip to an Unknown Land(Puteshestvie v neizvestnyi krai), Paris. 2. Anna Prismanova, Twins (Bliznetsy), Paris. 3. Elena Rubisova, The Duel (Duèl*), Paris. 4. Yury Trubetskoi, Petersburg Strophes (Peterburgskie strofy), Germany, duplicating machine. 5. Mikhail Chekhonin, Poems (Stikhi), New York. 6. Nikolai Berdyaev, The Russian Idea (Russkaya ideya), Paris. 7. Irina Saburova, The DP Alphat>et (Dipiologicheskaya azbuka), Munich. Deaths: Igor* Demidov, Razumnik Ivanov [Ivanov-Razumnik], Solomon Pozner, Nikolai Rubakin.
1947 February 17: Russian Section of the Voice of America broadcasts its first program. March 31 : a Soviet liaison officer in Rome concedes to British Headquarters that a number of forcibly repatriated Russians may commit suicide en route home. May 8: Russians from the British camp in Riccione realize their train is taking them east and riot, but are subdued. May: Posev Publishers, which has been shut down since November, is reopened. May 24: the League of Russian Writers and Journalists in Paris votes to expel those members who accepted Soviet passports. Among the members who protest the vote by withdrawal from the association are Georgy Adamovich, Vera Bunina, Gaito Gazdanov, poet and translator Perikl Stavrov, Vladimir Varshavsky, and prose writer Leonid Zurov. Two weeks later Ivan Bunin also withdraws from the Association. May 25: the League of Writers and Journalists (Ob'edinenie pisatelei i zhumalistov) is founded in Munich, chaired by A. I. Mikhailovsky.
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Summer: Russian émigrés in Europe are excited by the rumor that America will accept displaced persons. August 15: the League of Soviet Patriots in Paris is renamed as the League of Soviet Citizens (Soyuz sovetskikh grazhdan); it claims a membership of 11,000 members. BSMNR (Militant Union of Russian Youth) is created in Germany. August to November 30:2,500 Russian émigré families return to Russia from China, their expenses paid by the Soviet government September 9: prose writer Yury Tregubov, who as a child was with his mother when she defected in Berlin in 1926, is kidnapped by the MGB as a former Vlasov officer, taken to the U.S.S.R., and sentenced to 25 years’ imprisonment (serves eight). November 25: in Paris leaders of the League of Soviet Citizens are rounded up for deportation to the Soviet Union. The newspaper Sovetskii patriot (Soviet Patriot) is shut down by the police. Acceding to Soviet pressure, American authorities conduct ‘‘screening” of inmates of displaced-persons camps and expel those who have been politically active. Canadian Prime Minister MacKenzie King institutes a period of liberal immigration for refugees. The number of Russians in Germany sinks to about 80,000. The 120,000-volume collection of the Russian Public Library and its archive in Belgrade is broken up after being examined by a Soviet commission. A portion of the books is shipped to Moscow and others are given to a Serbian cultural society. In 1949 the society is disbanded, and the books are transferred to the Serbian Academy of Sciences. In the Trenches of Stalingrad (V okopakh Stalingrada), the 1946 novel by the future émigré Viktor Nekrasov, is awarded the Stalin Prize. On October 4 a meeting is held of the planning committee of the monarchist movement abroad to reestablish the movement. Igor1 Chinnov moves from Germany to Paris. 2,393 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. Vladimir Zhabinsky [Turasov] escapes to Western Europe from East Germany, where he was first in the Soviet army of occupation and later was employed there as a civilian. The poet Lidiya Khaindrova moves to Russia from China. The poet and prose writer Vadim Andreev, son of Leonid Andreev, prose writer Natal'ya ll'ina, and poet Mikhail Spurgot return to Russia. Mark Aldanov returns to Europe from the U .S A Nikolai Arsen'ev and Mirtaia Kardinalovskaya move to the U .S A The “Anti-Cosmopolite" campaign is launched in the U.S.S.R. Serials founded include: KalendaT (Calendar, Landshut), Kitaisko-russkaya gazeta (The Chinese-Russian Newspaper, Shanghai, perhaps 1948), Literatumyi al'manakh (Literary Almanac, Kellerberg), Uteratumyi byulleten’ (Literary Bulletin, Munich), Merkurii (Mercury, Munich), Nachato (Beginning, Fischbeck), Nashi vesti (Our News, Schleissheim), Novyi mir (The New World, Munich-Feldmoching), Otdykh (Relaxation, Frankfurt am Main and Regensburg), Russkaya mysl’ (Russian Thought, Paris), Russkoe sbvo (The Russian Word, Shanghai), Svyatochnyi al'manakh (The
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Holy Days’ Almanac, Schonbach), U vrat (At the Gates, Munich), Vestnik (The Herald, Munich), Zhar-pt'itsa (The Firebird, Shanghai-San Francisco). Selected publications: 1. Ivan Elagin, On the Road From There (Po doroge ottuda), Munich. 2. Vladimir Markov, Poems (Stikhi), Regensburg. 3. Irina Saburova, The Kingdom of Crimson Towers: Christmas Tales (Korolevstvo alykh bashen: Rozhdestvenskie novelly), Munich. 4. Il'ya Zhdanevich, The Letter (Pis'mo), Paris. 5. Aleksandr Neimirok [Nemirov], Roads and Meetings (Dorogi i vstrechi), Regensburg. General Pdtr Krasnov is hanged in the U.S.S.R. Other deaths: prose writer Vladimir Gushchik; poet Lev Kobylinsky [Èllis]; literary scholar Aleksandr Pogodin; historian, economist, and editor Pêtr Struve.
1948 April or May: the League to Struggle for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia (Soyuz bor’by za osvobozhdenie narodov Rossii — SBONR) is established from the former BSMNR, with headquarters in Munich. May 16-18: in Munich the Union of Russian Émigrés in the4American Zone (Tsentral'noe Predstavitel'stvo Rossiiskoi Èmigratsii [TsPRÈ]) holds a convention. 169 delegates arrive, representing some 30,000 persons. June: Èkho, a National Labor League (Natsional'nyi trudovoi soyuz [NTS]) newspaper, has a circulation of 8,000. June 20: the issuance of new currency in West Germany radically and abruptly undermines the financial underpinnings of the émigré publishing trade. Èkho, to cite only one example, is forced to ask all employees to work without pay, but even so, by winter circulation drops from 8,000 to 3,000. November 27: In New York 21 Russian social organizations meet under the chairmanship of Prince Sergei Belosel'sky-Belozersky. Their immediate declared goal is to assist in the movement of émigrés from European displaced-persons camps to the United States. December 19: 34 delegates representing 25 branches of the Russian monarchist movement in Germany and Austria meet in Munich. They claim a membership of over 4,000. Daniil Andreev, son of Leonid Andreev, is condemned to 25 years imprisonment in the U.S.S.R. Valentin Bulgakov and Yury Sofiev [Bek-Sofiev] return to Russia. Vladimir Pomerantsev may also have returned this year. Father Georgy Florovsky moves from Paris to New York to become a professor at the St. Vladimir Theological Seminary. Lev Karsavin is arrested in Lithuania. Aleksei Remizov takes Soviet citizenship and wills his archive to the U.S.S.R. The Russian Library of Munich is conceived as a Russian book center in Europe. 2,447 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. The British Book Society selects Aldanov's novel Before the Deluge (Russian title: Istoki ).
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Serials founded include: Belaya liliya (White Lily, Munich), Drug russkogo naroda (Friend of the Russian People, New York), Golovolomka (Puzzle, Munich), Ittifak (Munich), Uteratumyi sbomik (Uterary Anthology, Regensburg), Narodnaya pravda (The People's Truth, Paris-New York), Nasha strana (Our Country, Sofia, moved the same year to Buenos Aires), Novosti inostrannoyi pressy (News of the Foreign Press, Munich). Selected publications: 1. Boris Bashilov, The Unusual Life and Adventures of Aristarkh Orlov (Zhizn' i neobychainye priklyucheniya Aristarkha Orlova), Regensburg. 2. Ivan Elagin, You, M y Century (Ty, moê stoletie), Munich. 3. Fëdor Kasatkin-Rostovsky, By Way of the Cross to Resurrection (Krestnym putôm k voskreseniyu), Paris (published posthumously). 4. Evgeny Tverskoi, Sketches (Ètyudy), Regensburg. Deaths: poet and literary critic Sergei Alymov; philosopher Nikolai Berdyaev; playwright Boris Glagolin; poets Mikhail Struve and Leib Yaffe; prose writer Evgeny Gagarin; biographer, critic, and prose writer Konstantin Mochul'sky. The library of Nikolai Rubakin is shipped from Switzerland to Moscow and his body is reburied in Novodevichii Cemetery.
1949 November 5: the Congress of Monarchist Organisations is held in Munich, voting unanimously and without discussion to restore the monarchy in Russia under the sceptre of Grand Duke Vladimir Kirilovich, who resides in Madrid. November 11: in New York the North-American Monarchist League (Obshchemonarkhicheskoe ob'edinenie v Sevemoi Amerika) is founded. December 9: Èkho ceases publication. 4,119 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year, among them the writers Lidiya Alekseeva, Nonna Belavina, Sergei Bongart, Nikolai Chukhnov, Yury Ivask, Galina Kuznetsova, Iraida Vandellos [Lëgkaya], Sergei Maksimov, and Vladimir Markov. SBONR Congress ranks the Solidarists among those groups considered “unfit for cooperation with democratic-republican groups." Prince Sergei Belosel'sky-Belozersky organizes the Russian Anti-Communist Center around the New York daily Rossiya (Russia). A communist government is proclaimed in mainland China, and the Russian colony in Shanghai is evacuated to the Philippines; by the mid-1950s almost all are gone. Defector Viktor Kravchenko, author of / Chose Freedom, successfully sues the French weekly, Lettres Françaises, for libel. The Committee Free Europe is established. The magazine Novosel'e moves from Paris to New York. Dovid Knut leaves France for Israel. Serials founded include: Bud’ gotov (Be Prepared, Paris), DP-Satirikon (Munich, Feldmoching-Augsburg), Iskra (The Spark, Belgium), Ivan (Munich), Mestnaya zhizn' (Local Life, Philippines), Vestnik russkogo khristianskogo dvizheniya (Bulletin of the Russian Christian Movement, had ceased publication during the war, refounded in Munich), Volya narodov (Will of the People, Rio de Janeiro), Vozrozhdenie (Renaissance, Paris), a magazine using the name of the pre-war newspaper.
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Selected publications: 1. Sergei Maksimov, Denis Bushuev, Frankfurt am Main. 2. Ol’ga Anstei, A Door in the Wall (Dver1 v stene), Munich. 3. Irina Knorring, After Everything (Posle vsego), Paris. 4. Yury Odarchenko, A Day (Denôk), Paris. 5. Yan Plyashkevich [Ivan Novgorod-Seversky], Semiprecious Stones (Samotsvety), Paris. 6. Anna Prismanova, Salt (Sol1), Paris. Deaths: poets Aleksandr Gindenburg [Fddorov], Vyacheslav Ivanov, and Anna Radlova; prose writers and poets Valentin Ivanov [Valentin Goryansky] and Aleksandr Otsup [Sergei Gomy]; prose writer Abram Vysotsky.
1950 June: Radio Free Europe first goes on the air. August: 8: on the fourth anniversary of Vlasov's death Andrei Turkul is proclaimed leader of a United Vlasovite movement at a meeting in a DP camp near Munich, reportedly attended by 700 émigrés. October: the Russian Section of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation is established. 11,050 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. Ivan Solonevich claims that the bomb which killed his wife and secretary in 1938 in Sofia was the work of Nikolai Abramov of the organization Vnutrennyaya liniya, purported to be a Soviet front organization. The Russian Cultural-Educational Society is founded in Toronto. It publishes a magazine entitled Edinenie (Unification), which is subsequently renamed Russkoe siovo v Kanada (The Russian Word in Canada). The Institute for the Study of the U.S.S.R. is founded in Munich with U.S. intelligence funding. The Synod of the Russian Church Abroad relocates from Yugoslavia to Munich, and then to the United States. Bunin's 80th birthday is celebrated modestly in Paris. Ol'ga Anstei, Nina Berberova, Mikhail Demushkin [Nadezhdin], Evgeniya Dimer, Vladislav Èllis, Tafyana Fesenko, Boris Filistinsky [Filippov], Mikhail Kachurovsky [Shipovnikov], Nikolai Marchenko [Morshen], Elena Matveeva, Gennady Panin, and Valentina Sinkevich move from Europe to the United States. Èlla Bobrova leaves for Canada. Valery Pereleshin attempts to relocate from China to the United States but is deported for purportedly having "attempted to create a communist cell" and is denied the right to ever return to the U.S. Later Henry Kissinger cancels the ban. Leonid Rzhevsky is appointed editor of Grani (until 1953). Antonin Ladinsky is expelled from France and spends five years in Germany. Yury Ivask writes in Novyi zhumal that Paris remains the center of the Russian émigré community. The Russian Anti-Communist Center (Rossiiskii Antikommunisticheskii Tsentr) is founded in New York at a March 25-26 convention. Archbishop Vitaly sums up its mood in the words: "Send down ruin, Lord, upon the kingdom of the Godless” (Razori, Gospodi, bezbozhnoe tsarstvo).
RUSSIA ABROAD
573
The Vestn'ik russkogo khristianskogo dvizheniya is moved from Munich back to Paris. The Conciliatory Commission of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives votes to accept 341,000 displaced persons by the end of July, 1951; this includes most of the remaining refugees on Tubabao, in the Philippine archipelago. Serials founded include: Edinenia (Unification, Australia), Mayak svobody (Freedom's Ughthouse, England), Salamandra (Salamander, New York), Shipovnik (Wild Rose, Munich), Zerkaltse (The Small Mirror, Munich). Selected publications: 1. Gennady Andreev, The Sotovets Islands (Solovetskie ostrova), Frankfurt am Main. 2. Dmitry Klenovsky, Trace of Life (Sled zhizni), Frankfurt am Main. 3. Vladimir Korvin-Piotrovsky, The Kite (Vozdushnyi zmei), Paris. 4. Igor1 Chinnov, Monobgue (Monolog), Paris. 5. Sergei Sharshun, The Observer (Nablyudatel', a play), Paris. 6. Anatoly Shteiger, 2 x 2 = 4: Poems, 1926-1939 (Dvazhdy dva chetyre: Stikhi), Paris. Deaths: poet and critic Nikolai Bakhtin; poets Nikolai Belotsvetov and Tatyana Timasheva [S. Gorlova]; philosophers Semön Frank and Sergei Gessen; prose writer and art historian Pavel Muratov; prose writers Boris Panteleimonov and Ivan Shmeldv; memoirist and daughter of Lev Tolstoi Tafyana Sukhotina-Tolstaya. 1951 September 28: in New York the Russian Anticommunist Center conducts a demonstration protesting the alleged "leftist-liberal” mindset of the American Committee of Friends of the Russian People. November 7: The American Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia (Amcomlib) is established at a conference in Wiesbaden. SBONR and NTS are among the signatories. Early December: the Israeli government informs the Soviet Foreign Ministry that Israel's overriding aim is “the return of Jews to their historic homeland." 12,072 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. The National Labor League (NTS) begins using balloons to send literature to Russia and eastern Europe. Almost 20,000 Dukhobors are resident in Canada. Il'ya Golenishchev-Kutuzov is imprisoned in Yugoslavia for ties to Soviet intelligence operations. Ivan Solonevich is deported from Argentina to Uruguay for opposing "rule by generals” (date approximate). The number of Russians in France declines to 35,000. The Chekhov Publishing House is founded in New York City. The poets Andrei Al'tamentov [Kasim], Ivan Burkin, Vladimir Shatalov, and Vladimir Tripol'sky [Vladimir Ant] and prose writer Vladimir Zhabinsky [Yurasov] move to the United States from Western Europe. The poet Boris Nartsissov emigrates to Australia. Serials founded include: Delo (The Cause, San Francisco), Literatumyi sovremennik (Literary Contemporary, Munich), Na rubezhe (At the Border, Paris-New
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JOHN GLAD
York), Novyi golos (New Voice, Chicago), Russkii vestnik (Russian Herald, Buenos Aires), Satirikon (Frankfurt am Main), Tropa (The Path, Germany). Narodnaya pravda (The People's Truth, New York) ceases publication. Selected publications: 1. Zinaida Gippius (posthumously), Dmitry Merezhkovsky, Paris. 2. Vladimir Zlobin, After Her Death (Poste eô smeiü), Paris. 3. Aleksandr Burov, Immortal Russia (Rus‘ bessmertnaya), Paris. 4. Sergei Makovsky, A Circb and Shades (Krug i teni), Paris. Deaths: philosopher and historian Georgy Fedotov; poet and prose writer Karl Gershel'man; poets Elizaveta Roos-Bazilevskaya, Valentin Pamakh (in Russia); philosopher and literary historian Evgeny Spektorsky; poet and literary scholar Ivan Tkhorzhevsky.
1952 January 1 location of Second-Wave Soviet refugees abroad: West Germany and Austria— 103,716, England— 100,036, Australia— 50,307, Canada— 38,681, U .S A — 35,251, Sweden — 27,570, France — 19,675, Belgium — 14,729, Finland — 6,961, Argentina— 4,085, Brazil— 3,710, Venezuela— 2,804, Holland— 2,723, Norway— 2,619, Denmark — 1,540, Turkey — 1,174, Paraguay — 860, Palestine — 692,kNew Zealand — 631, Switzerland — 489, Italy — 437, Morocco — 355, other countries — 25,344. Only 7.02% claim to be ethnic Russians, but the figure is undoubtedly an understatement, since Russians fleeing forced repatriation have an obvious motivation to conceal their origins. March 24: Truman recommends to the U.S. Congress that special support be provided to refugees from the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. April 12-13: the Second Russian Congress Abroad (Vtoroi Rossiiskii Zarubezhnyi S'ezd), with 103 delegates representing various political, social, and church organizations, creates the All-Russian Committee of Uberation (Vserossiiskii Komitet Osvobozhdeniya), chaired by Sergei Belosel'sky-Belozersky. May 7: in the British House of Commons Anthony Eden states that the United Nations Command has no alternative but to resist the forcible repatriation of communist prisoners of war. August 7: the U.S. Congress unanimously passes a measure legalizing the immigration of some 214,000 refugees from Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. October 10: Truman signs a bill providing $100,000,000 for support of refugees from Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. October 19: the Congress of Russian National Organizations (S'ezd Rossiiskikh Natsional'nykh Organizatsii) is conducted in Brussels. 12,754 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. Roman Gul’ moves from Europe to the United States. Valery Pereleshin emigrates from China to Brazil (possibly 1953). Grand Duke Vladimir, pretender to the Romanov throne, appeals to Western powers to wage war against the Soviet Union. Serials founded include: Kolokol (The Bell, Hamburg), Podyuzhnym krestom (Under The Southern Cross, Buenos Aires), Rodnye perezvony (Native Echoes, Brussels), Smekh (Laughter, Buenos Aires), Svoboda (Liberty, Munich).
RUSSIA ABROAD
575
Selected publications: 1. Vladimir Yurasov, Enemy of the People (Vrag naroda), New York (republished in 1972 under the title Para/Jax). 2. Yury Elagin, The Taming of the Arts (Ukroshchenie iskusstv), New York. 3. Boris Shiryaev, DPs in Italy (DP v Italii), Buenos Aires. 4. Tamara Velichkovskaya, The White Staff (Belyi posokh), Paris. 5. Vasily Alekseev, Invisible Russia (Nevidimaya Rossiya), New York. 6. Sergei Maksimov, Taiga, New York. 7. Nikolai Narokov [Nikolai Marchenko], Imaginary Magnitudes (Mnimye velichiny), New York. 8. Gaito Gazdanov, Night Roads (Nochnye dorogi), New York. 9. Andrei Selitrennikov [Rennikov], Caucasian Rhapsody (Kavkazskaya rapsodiya), Paris. Deaths: prose writers Ol'ga Bebutova, Viktor Chelishchev, Nadezhda Buchinskaya [Tèffi]; poet-prose writer-historian-philosopher Lev Karsavin (in Soviet forced-labor camp); feminist and occasional writer Aleksandra Kollontai.
1953 January 13: disclosure of the “doctors’ plot' in Moscow. March 1 : Radio Liberation (later renamed “Radio Liberty") formally first goes on the air. March 3: the U.S. House of Representatives urges the Soviet Union to permit freedom of emigration to Jews, making no mention of other ethnic groups. March 5: Stalin and Sergei Prokofev die. July: Soviet Union resumes relations with Israel. 1,832 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. il'ya Golenishchev-Kutuzov is released from a Yugoslav prison. The Viktor Kamkin Bookstore is founded in Washington, D.C. Igor’ Chinnov and Gaito Gazdanov move from Paris to Munich. Leonid Rzhevsky moves from Germany to Sweden. Boris Nartsissov emigrates from Australia to the United States. Serials founded include: Informatsiya dlya pechati (Information for the Press, Frankfurt am Main), Krest'yanskaya Rossiya (Peasant Russia, Munich), Narodnotrudovoi soyuz (The People's Labor Union, Frankfurt am Main), Nash put’ (Our Path, Los Angeles), Niva (Sown Field, New York), Obshchee delo (Common Cause, New York), Opyty (Experiments, New York). Selected publications: 1. Marina Tsvetaeva, Prose (Proza), New York. 2. Leonid Rzhevsky, Between Two Stars (Mezhdu dvukh zvôzd), New York. 3. Sofiya Pregel', Shores (Berega), Paris. 4. Aglaya Shishkova, Alien, Distant Lands (Chuzhedal1), Frankfurt am Main. 5. Yury Ivask (ed.), In the West (Na zapade), anthology of Russian émigré poetry, New York. 6. Mikhail SoloVëv, When the Gods Are Silent, the Russian original does not appear until 1963 (Kogda bogi molchat, New York). 7. Grigory Klimov, The Berlin Kremlin (Beriinskii Kreml1), Frankfurt am Main (German translation published earlier). 8. Vera Aleksandrova (ed.), Colorful Tales (PSstrye rasskazy), New York.
576
JOHN GLAD
Deaths: Literary scholars Pdtr Bitsilli and Konstantin Viskovaty; poets Veniamin Levin and Elizaveta Zhuravskaya; prose writer and poet Ivan Bunin; prose writers Vladimir Zenzinov; playwright Nikolai Evreinov; critic and poet Leonid Galich; critic and poet Sergei Potresov [Yablonovsky] (possibly 1954).
1954 August 10: 23 members of the New York branch of NTS formally withdraw from the organization and begin publishing Trfouna on a duplicating machine. September-November: two employees of Radio Liberation are murdered in Munich, evidently by Soviet agents. The first small-scale emigration from the Soviet Union to Israel begins. The Soviet Union permits Soviet citizens in China to relocate to the Soviet Union, but only to the so-called “Virgin Lands." Over the next two years a number of Russians accept the offer, some even with enthusiasm. 2,013 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. At the Second All-Russian Writers’ Congress the Soviet writer Konstantin Fedin claims (incorrectly) that Ivan Bunin accepted Soviet citizenship. In the Soviet Union some political prisoners are released" in the wake of Stalin's death, and ll'ya Èrenburg publishes a novel entitled The Thaw (OttepeT) to characterize the period. The magazine Rodnye dali (Distant Native Haunts) is founded in Los Angeles. The Second-Wave NTS leader Vladimir Poremsky estimates the Second W ave as numbering only 130,000, of whom 70 percent are located outside Europe. Serials founded include: ërsh (Sao Paulo), Nedetya (The Week, Tokyo), Put' pravdy (Path of Truth, Los Angeles), Svobodnaya Rossiya (A Free Russia, Los Angeles), Staroe vremya (Old Times, New York). Selected publications: 1. Lidiya Alekseeva, The Forest Sun (Lesnoe solntse), Frankfurt am Main. 2. Gleb Glinka (ed.), At the Pass (Na perevale), New York. 3. Boris Zaitsev, Chekhov, New York. Deaths: poet Vera Bulich; philosopher and literary scholar Ivan Lapshin; poet and prose writer Aleksandra Parkau (Nilus); prose writers Sergei Shishmaröv, Ivan Solonevich, and Savely Tartakover; prose writer and poet Boris Volkov.
1955 September 17: by decree of the Presidium of Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R., an amnesty is declared for Soviet citizens who were German prisoners-of-war or who served in the German army, police, or “special units.” Several hundred such persons are permitted to emigrate to the W est End of year: eleven of 19 persons handed over by the Finnish government to the Soviet Union are permitted to return to Finland. Six are known to have died in prison and two prefer to remain in the Soviet Union. Israeli Prime Minister Moshe Sharett advises David Ben-Gurion and Shaul Avigur that the time is ripe to press for Jewish emigration from Russia. Several Soviet front organizations are created to influence Russian émigrés: the Rodina (Motherland) Society, the newspaper Golos Rodiny (Voice of the Motherland), and the committee Za vozvrashchenie na rodinu (For the Return to the Motherland). Headquarters are in Moscow and East Berlin, with branches in various countries.
RUSSIA ABROAD
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The Russian Archive is founded in Sydney, Australia. 1,731 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. H'ya Golenishchev-Kutuzov and Antonin Ladinsky return to Russia Thanks to an agreement concluded by Konrad Adenauer with the Soviet government, the prose writer Yury Tregubov is permitted to return to West Germany. Serials founded include: Bogatyri (Heroes, Sydney), Rossiyskaya nezavisim ost’ (Russian Independence, New York). Selected publications: 1. Georgy Adamovich, Loneliness and Freedom (Odinochestvo i svoboda), New York. 2. Nikolai Evreinov, History o f the Russian Theater (Istoriya russkogo teatra), New York. 3. Nikolai Berner, A Trace on a Rock (Sled na kamne), mimeograph form, place of publication not indicated. 4. Vladimir Nabokov, Lolita, Paris (in English). The literary scholar Nikolai Poltoratsky relocates from France to the United States. Deaths: Vladimir Bonch-Bruevich, David Fiksman [Dovid Knut], Perikl Stavrov.
1956 Late January: a split occurs within the NTS between the offices in Frankfurt and Munich. The Frankfurt group renames itself ‘The People's Labor League of Russian Solidarists” (Narodno-Trudovoi Soyuz rossiiskikh solidaristov); the Munich group with 133 members adopts the title T h e Russian National Labor League” (Rossiiskii Natsionai'no-Trudovoi Soyuz). February 24-25: Khrushchëv delivers his famous speech denouncing Stalin. October: halt of ail emigration from the U.S.S.R. to Israel. 3,984 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. Oleg ll'insky moves from Germany to the United States. Vasily Shul'gin and Daniil Andreev are released from Soviet prisons. Leonid Andreev's body is moved from Finland to Leningrad for reburial. A selection of verse by Marina Tsvetaeva is published in Uteratum aya Moskva (Literary Moscow). A five-volume collection of the work of Ivan Bunin is published in the Soviet Union. Chairman of the Mladoross (Young Russian) Union A. L Kazem-Bek returns to Russia. Chekhov Publishers (New York) and Vozrozhdenie Publishers (Paris) cease
operations. Serials founded include: Byulleten' (Bulletin, San Francisco), Stennye kalendari (Wall Calendars, Philadelphia), Vestnik (The Herald, Melbourne). Selected publications: 1. Gleb Struve, Russian Literature in Exile (Russkaya literature v izgna New York; the most systematic study to date of the “First Wave," with a few pages devoted to the ‘Second Wave.” Struve writes that Russian literature in exile has “reached its inevitable end."
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JOHN GLAD
2. Vladimir Varshavsky, The Unnoticed Generation (Nezamechennoe pokolenie), New York. 3. Georgy Èristov, A Blue Evening (Sinii vecher), Milan. 4. Lidiya Chervinskaya, Twelve Months (Dvenadtsaf mesyatsev), Paris. 5. Irina Yassen, The Heart's M em ory (Pamyaf serdtsa), Paris. 6. Vladimir Veidle, Russia's Task (Zadacha Rossii), New York. Deaths: poets Andrei ATtamentov [Kasim] and Vadim Gardner; prose writers Nikolai Fôdorov [N. Roshchin], and Aleksandr Getter; Lebedev; historian and editor Sergei Mel'gunov; prose writer, playwright, and journalist Il'ya Surguchdv. 1957 March: the U.S.S.R. and Poland sign an agreement whereby persons bom on Polish territory incorporated into the Soviet Union as a result of World W ar II may relocate to Poland. A number of Jews take advantage of the opportunity and then move on to Israel and, later, the United States. May 20: in Leningrad, one day before his death, Aleksandr Vertinsky gives his last performance. By mid-year: the West German embassy in Moscow h^s received over 100,000 applications from ethnic Germans requesting permission to resettle in W est Germany. September: Khrushchêv claims that Soviet Jews have no interest in emigration. During a visit to the U.S.S.R. by Eleanor Roosevelt, Khrushchêv tells her that all Soviet Jews who want to emigrate will eventually receive permission to do so. The delivery of émigré political pamphlets to Russia by balloon is ordered stopped by U.S. authorities, who fear the balloons might interfere with U-2 overflights. 4,657 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. The Chinese communist government stops requiring Soviet permission before granting Russians exit visas. Doctor Zhivago is published in Italian, giving rise to the term tam izdat (items published ‘over there"; that is, abroad). The poet Sergei Tol’ moves to the United States. First-Wave prose writer Yury Rerikh returns to Russia Russkii zhum al (The Russian Magazine) is founded in New York. Selected publications: 1. Marina Tsvetaeva, The Sw ans' Cam p (Lebedinyi stan), Munich. 2. Viktor Mamchenko, The Singer's Hour (Pevchii chas), Paris. 3. Vasily Sumbatov, Poems (Stikhotvoreniya), Milan. Deaths: prose writers Mark Landau [MarkAidanov], Aminad Shpolyansky [Don Aminado], Aleksei Remizov, Sofiya Taube [S. Anichkova]; prose writer and playwright Andrei Selitrennikov [A. Rennikov]; Nikolai Tsurikov; Ekaterina Vystavkina; poet Rakhil' Chekver [Irina Yassen]; statesman and poet Vasily Maklakov; poet and bard Aleksandr Vertinsky. 1958 The Israeli radio station Kol Zion Lagola increases Russian broadcasting to the U.S.S.R. to a daily basis.
RUSSIA ABROAD
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B'nai B'iith compares the Soviet treatment of the Jews to Nazi practices. 2,114 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. March 22-24: a monarchist convention is held in New York City. One of the speeches is given by Boris Brazol': "...Holy R us’ is gone, replaced by the kingdom of the Antichrist, the black hell of the red beast, under whose clawed paw groan millions of our brothers...." Boris Pasternak is awarded the Nobel Prize but is forced to decline it when Khrushchôv suggests he emigrate. Khrushchev personally permits the future prose writer Viktoriya KochurovaSandor [Alla Ktorova] to leave Russia as the wife of an American citizen. Serials founded include: M edved’ (The Bear, Cleveland), M osty (Bridges, Munich), Rossiya (Russia, Frankfurt am Main). Opyty (Experiments) ceases publication. Selected publications: 1. Boris Nartsissov, Poems (Stikhi), New York. 2. Valentin Ivanov, Parfandr and Glafira, Paris. 3. Fëdor Kubansky, As a Keepsake (Na pamyaf), New York. 4. Literature A broad (Literatumoe zarubezh'e), Munich; anthology. Deaths: Georgy Ivanov, Nikolai Otsup.
1959 May: Radio Liberation is renamed to Radio Liberty. July 19: the U.S. Congress unanimously passes the "Captive Nations W eek Resolution.” Russian émigrés are displeased that "Russian” communism is viewed as the enslaver of other nations. in the U.S.S.R. the 1934 Central Committee resolution declaring flight from the country to be treason punishable by execution is abrogated. 2,872 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. Thanks to the income received from Lolita Vladimir Nabokov is able to give up teaching and leaves the United States for Switzerland. The Turgenev Library is reestablished in Paris with German war indemnities. The First-Wave critic Yury Terapiano writes in the journal Grani (Facets) that he senses an essential commonality of approach and world view between the poetry of the First W ave and of the Second Wave. Roman Gul’ takes over editorship of Novyi zhum al (The New Review; he formally becomes editor-in-chief in 1966). Gaito Gazdanov returns to Paris from a six-year stay in Munich. Andrei Sinyavsky [Abram Terts] and Yuly Daniel [Nikolai Arzhak] clandestinely publish their work in the West. Serials founded include: Berega (Shores, Melbourne), G us’ (The Goose, Chicago), Vestnik Izrailya (The Israeli Herald, Tel Aviv). Selected publications: 1. Nikolai Marchenko [Morshen], The S eal (Tyulen1), Frankfurt am Main. 2. Gennady Khomyakov [G. Andreev], Difficult Roads (Trudnye dorogi), Munich. 3. Raisa Blokh, Selected Poems (Izbrannye stikhotvoreniya), Paris. 4. Lidiya Alekseeva, On the W ay (V puti), New York.
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5. Valentin Goryansky, Labardan, Paris (in Vozrozhdenie, October-November). Deaths: prose writer and translator Avgusta Damanskaya [Arseny Merich], poet Modest Gofman; historian and editor Mikhail Karpovich; prose writers Osip PereTman [Osip Dymov] and Boris Shiryaev. 1960 2,472 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. U.S. congressman Alvin M. Bentley claims Soviet Jews are being liquidated." Lev Lyubimov, deported from France to the U.S.S.R. in 1947, returns for a visit to Paris: "I again felt pleasure at speaking not as an emigrant grateful for asylum, and not as a Russian with an undefined and dubious relation to his country, but as a full-fledged representative of my Fatherland who needs curry no one's favor.” November 18: pro-Soviet New York newspaper Russkii golos (The Russian Voice) publishes an open letter to the Russian émigré community from Vasily Shul'gin, calling for an acceptance of Soviet rule. Khrushchdv claims that more Jews wish to return to Russia than emigrate. Serials founded include: the almanac Sovrem ennik (The Contemporary) Toronto), Vozdushnye putl (Aerial Paths, New York). Selected publications: 1. Antonina Gorskaya, The Fence (Ograda), Paris. 2. Dmitry Shakhovskoi [Strannik], Wanderings (Stranstviya), New York. 3. Vladimir Korvin-Piotrovsky, D efeat (Porazhenie), Paris. The prose writer and critic Vladimir (Bronislav) Sosinsky returns to Russia. Deaths: prose writers Vyacheslav Nechaev, Yury Rerikh, Vladimir Voitinsky; poets Yury Odarchenko, Boris Pravdin, and Ignat Pobegailo. 1961 2,352 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A . this year. In Czechoslovakia Pdtr Savitsky is imprisoned for publishing a collection of verse in Paris under the pseudonym “Petrony Vostokov." The Soviet journal Moskva (Moscow) publishes Ivan Bunin's The Life o f A rsen’ev, omitting many pages. The Soviet publishing house Moskovskii rabochii (Moscow Worker) publishes a collection of stories and memoirs of Ivan Bunin. Selected publications: 1. Nonna Belavina, A Blue World (Sinii mir), New York. 2. Rodion Berözov, A Miracle (Chudo), place of publication not indicated. 3. Leonid Bogdanov, Without Socialist Realism (Bez sotsialisticheskogo realizma), Munich. 4. Nikolai Otsup, Life an d Death (Zhizn' i smerf), Paris. Deaths: poets Mikhail Demushkin [Nadezhdin], Vladimir Gal'skoi, Aleksei Gryzov [Achair], Vladimir Smolensky, and Viktor Trefyakov; poet and prose writer Antonin Ladinsky (Moscow); prose writer and memoirist Zinaida Zhemchuzhnaya. 1962 2,277 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A . this year. The future émigré Valery Tarsis is arrested and placed in a Soviet mental hospital after sending his manuscripts abroad tor publication.
RUSSIA ABROAD
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Thirty-two Russian Pentecostals from the village of Chemogorsk, Siberia, rush without warning into the American embassy in Moscow to seek asylum and request that over 100 Pentecostals from their village be permitted to emigrate. The event receives wide coverage in the world press. Natal’ya Tarasova becomes chief editor of Grani. Galina Kuznetsova leaves the United States to return to Europe (Munich). Igor’ Chinnov moves to the United States from Western Europe. Serials founded include: Otechestvo (The Fatherland, New York), Russkii invalid (The Russian Invalid, Paris), Satira i yum or (Satire and Humor, New York), Zlatosvet (Golden Light, Burlingame). Selected publications: 1. Vyacheslav Ivanov, The Evening Light (Svet vechemii), Oxford (posthumous). 2. Aleksandr Bisk, O f M e and Others (Svoê i chuzhoe), Paris. 3. Vladimir Dukel'sky, Passions o f an Aging W erther (Stradaniya nemolodogo Vertera), Munich. 4. Vladimir Dukel'sky, Missives (Poslaniya), Munich. Deaths: prose writers Vladimir Kostetsky (?), Tat'yana Manukhina, Aleksandr Zemin; poet and critic Sergei Makovsky; Ariadna Tyrkova-Williams; historian and theologian Vasily Zen'kovsky. 1963 January 22: Soviet writer Mikhail Sholokhov in Pratvda claims that Bunin has been almost forgotten by Soviet readers, while Gor’ky and Serafimovich, Bunin's contemporaries, will not be forgotten. 2,045 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. Deutsche Welle begins broadcasting in Russian. Clandestine American government assistance to a number of émigré publications is partially terminated. The Soviet writer and future émigré Valery Tarsis announces that he rejects membership in the Soviet Writers' Union and in the Communist Party. The Soviet journal Moskva (No. 1) publishes verse of Vladislav Khodasevich. The prose writer and literary scholar Leonid Rzhevsky, his wife the poet Aglaya Rzhevskaya-Shishkova, and the poet Yury Gertsog move to the U .S A Grand Duke Vladimir Kirillovich, pretender to the Russian throne, issues statement on the occasion of the 350th anniversary of the Romanov dynasty. The prose writer Yury Krotkov defects. Serials founded include: Al'manakh (Almanac, Caracas), Shalom (Tel Aviv). Selected publications: 1. Boris Filippov, A M usic Box (Muzykal'naya shkatulka), Washington, D.C. 2. Nikolai Evseev, The W iki Field (Dikoe pole), Paris. 3. Evgeny Raich, A Contemporary (Sovremennik), Paris. 4. Tat'yana Fesenko, The Tale o f the Ragged Years (Povesf krivykh let), New York. 5. Vladimir Smolensky (posthumously), Poems (Stikhi), Paris.
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JOHN GLAD
Deaths: Aleksandr Drozdov, Viktor Emel'yanov, Georgy Golokhvastov, Sergei Gusev-Orenburgsky, Natal'ya Krandievskaya, Georgy Otsup [Raevsky], Leonid Strakhovsky.
1964 April 5-6 :5 00 representatives of 24 Jewish organizations meet in Washington, D.C., to discuss strategy for forcing the Soviet Union to permit Jewish emigration. 1,802 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. 539 Soviet exit visas are granted this year. The Soviet journal Moskva publishes two stories of Nadezhda Buchinskaya [Tèffi] (No. 1). Vladimir Zhabotinsky's body is moved to Jerusalem (from New York) tor reburial. Two collections of the works of Arkady Averchenko are published in Moscow: Humorous Stories (Yumorosticheskie rasskazy) and The Occult Sciences (Okkultnye nauki). The Soviet journal Nash sovremennik (Our Contemporary) publishes verse of Aleksandr Glikberg [Sasha Chêmy] (No. 11). Khrushchëv temporarily orders that jamming of Russian-language Western radio broadcasts cease. After Khrushchôv's removal from office the new Soviet authorities adopt a less restrictive emigration policy for Soviet Jews, but a more repressive policy toward dissidents. Joseph Brodsky is put on trial tor being without formal employment. The magazine Student is founded in London. Serials founded include: Kryl'ya (Wings, Sydney), Sbom ik (Anthology, Sao Paulo). Selected publications: 1. Lidiya Alekseeva, A Transparent Track (Prozrachnyi sled), New York. 2. Klavdiya Pestrovo, Flowers on a Window Sill (Tsvety na podokonnike), Munich. 3. Nikolai Evreinov, W hat Has No N am e (Chemu net imeni), Paris. 4. Vladimir Ant, M y Tankas (Moi tanki), New York. Deaths: prose writers Nikolai Alekseev and Georgy Grebenshchikov; poets Marianna Kolosova and Aleksei Posazhny, historian Nikolai Vol'sky (Valentinov).
1965 September: Andrei Sinyavsky and Yuly Daniel’ are arrested in Moscow. 1,853 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. 1,444 Soviet exit visas are granted this year. In the Soviet Union the future exile Andrei AmaTrik is prosecuted for his “antiSoviet pornographic” plays. The first in a nine-volume collection of the works of Ivan Bunin is brought out in the Soviet Union (edition completed in 1968). Don (No. 6) republishes four stories of Aleksei Tolstoi which were first published in Paris in Zhar-Ptitsa in 1922. The prose writer Vyacheslav Sorokin defects.
RUSSIA ABROAD
583
The magazine Russkil ugolok (Russian Comer) is founded in Caracas. Sotsialisticheskii vestnik (Socialist Herald, New York) closes. Selected publications: 1. Aleksandr Ginger, The H eart (Serdtse), Paris. 2. Leonid Gansky, Words (Slova), Paris. 3. Gizella Lakhman, Mirrors (Zerkala), Washington, D.C. 4. Galina Soboleva, The Invisible Woman (Nevidimka), Sidney, Australia. 5. Gleb Struve, The H ovel (Utloe zhil'ô), Washington, D.C.-Munich. 6. Valery Tarsis, W ard # 7 (Palata No. 7), Frankfurt am Main. 7. Yury Annenkov, A Diary of M y Meetings (Dnevnik moikh vstrech), vol. I„ Washington. Deaths: poet and prose writer Aleksandr Ginger; prose writer and poet Kristina Krotkova [Irmantseva]; prose writer Evgeny Lundberg (in Russia); philosophers Nikolai Lossky and Fêdor Stepun; historian and bibliographer Sergei Postnikov.
1966 February 12: in Moscow Andrei Sinyavsky is sentenced to seven years at hard labor, and Yuly Daniel' to five. May 18-19: At a plenary session of Moscow Writers’ Union the critic G. Levin suggests that the works of Vladislav Khodasevich be published in the Soviet Union. July 22: Soviet writer Konstantin Simonov reveals that he was given an unofficial commission in 1946 to persuade Ivan Bunin to return to the Soviet Union, but that Bunin refused. December: in response to a question posed by an American journalist, Soviet Prime Minister Aleksei Kosygin states that there should be no objections to limited emigration. The annual number of exit visas has actually tripled since 1964 to 1,892. 1,362 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. Incited by Mao's “Cultural Revolution,” Chinese crowds bum down the Nikolai Cathedral in Harbin and violate a number of other remaining Russian churches and graveyards. The Soviet critic V. Chivilikhin complains in Uteratum aya Rossiya (Literary Russia) about Soviet “imitations” of Bunin (May 6). The American Communist Party joins other national communist parties in questioning the refusal of Soviet authorities to permit Jewish emigration. The actor and “bard" Vladimir Vysotsky marries French actress Marina Vladi (Polyakova), a member of the French Communist Party, and through her is able to receive frequent exit visas. The Soviet critic A. Izotov in Prostor (Space, No. 10) suggests that the pre revolutionary works of Georgy Grebenshchikov could be republished in the Soviet Union, since “they bear no relation to our life." U.S. Senator Robert Kennedy supposedly tells Soviet poet Evgeny Evtushenko that the CIA revealed the identities of Andrei Sinyavsky [Abram Terts] and Yuly Daniel’ [Nikolai Arzhak] to the Soviet authorities. Evtushenko claimed that the purpose of the U.S. action was to provoke the Soviets into arresting the two writers and give the Americans an opportunity to distract public opinion from the Vietnam war. The term sam izdat (literally: “self-publication") is coined in the Soviet Union.
584
JOHN GLAD Selected publications: 1. Tafyana Fesenko
(editor),
The
Commonwealth
(Sodruzhestvo),
Washington, D.C. 2. Oleg ll'insky, Poem s: Book Three (Stlkhi: Tretya kniga), Munich. 3. Yury Annenkov, A Diary o f M y Meetings (Dnevnik moikh vstrech), vol. II, Washington, D.C. Svetlana Allilueva, daughter of Joseph Stalin, defects to the W est The Czechoslovak-born poet ll'ya Kostovsky leaves for East Germany. Èmanuil Shtein (Sztein) leaves Poland for the United States. The following writers emigrate: Igor1 Eltsov (defects), Leonid Finkel'shtein [Leonid Vladimirov], Valery Tarsis (stripped of Soviet citizenship for “actions discrediting a Soviet citizen"), Grigory Tsepliovich. Deaths: scholar and memoirist Valentin Bulgakov, poet and prose writer Vlacfimir Korvin-Piotrovsky, poet Georgy Matveev.
1967 1,033 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. One million signatures are gathered abroad in support of the right of Soviet Jews to emigrate. Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita is published in Russian in the author's translation. Gaito Gazdanov moves once again from Paris to Munich. The last issue of Vozdushnye puti appears. Selected publications: 1. Nikolai Chukhnov, In Troubled Years: Essays on O ur Struggle in the Years 1941-1965ÇJ smyatennye gody— Ocheriti nashei bor'by vgody 1941-1965), New York. 2. Svetlana Allilueva, Twenty Letters to a Friend (Dvadtsaf pisem k drugu), New York. 3. Nikolai Morshen, Coton (Dvoetochie), Washington, D.C. 4. Vsevolod Pastukhov, Tremulous Flight (Khrupkii polöt), New York. 5. Ol'ga York, The River o f Time (Reka vremên), Madrid. Artist and poet Oleg Sokhanevich flees with friend across Black Sea to Turkey in inflatable rubber life raft. Deaths: poet and artist David Burlyuk; journalist, prose writer, critic Ilya Èrenburg; poets Aleksandr Kondrafev, Yury Ofrosimov; prose writers Nikolai Elenev, Vsevolod Pastukhov, and Sergei Maksimov; poet and editor Viktor Shimkin; critic and memoirist Vladimir Zlobin.
1968 1,113 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. The Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia further alienates Russian intellectuals, providing an additional stimulus to emigration. Aleksandr Il'ich Ginzburg, Yury Galanskov, Vera Lashkova, and Aleksei Dobrovol'sky are sentenced for dissident activities. Ginzburg is charged with smuggling out a White Book on Sinyavsky-Daniel’ trial, and Galanskov with having assisted in its preparation. The critic Arkady Belinkov requests political asylum in the United States. The Soviet B rief Literary Encyclopedia pronounces Nabokov a “denationalized author.'
RUSSIA ABROAD
585
Selected publications: 1. Valery Tarsis, Gray Youth (Sedaya Yunosf), Frankfurt am Main. 2. Yakov Berger, Spring in Ch. (Vesna v Ch.), Tel Aviv. 3. N. I. Katenev, Tales o f S ea and Earth (Rasskazy morya i zemli), Paris. 4. Iraida Lôgkaya, The Wind to Our Backs (Poputnyi veter), Washington, D.C. 5. Gleb Glinka, In the Shade (V teni), New York. 6. [Strannik], Rem oval o f the Moon (Uprazdnenie mesyatsa), New York. 7. Yury Gertsog, The Beginning o f an Epic (Nachalo èpopei), Washington, D.C. The following writers emigrate: poet and prose writer Georgy Trifonov [Mikhail Ddmin] (defects), poet Dora Kustanovich. Deaths: poet and playwright Elena Grot; poet, prose writer, and critic Aleksandr Koiransky; poet, critic and scholar Lolly LYov; prose writers Vladimir Krymov, Ol'ga Morozova, Dmitry Skobtsev-Kondrafev, poet Pötr Savitsky.
1969 May 23: Time magazine does a cover story on Nabokov in conjunction with publication of Ada. Fall: the Israeli government launches a widely publicized campaign calling for the free emigration of Jews to Israel, and the number of applicants quadruples. December 19: Stalin's daughter Svetlana Allilueva is stripped of Soviet citizenship. 931 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. The future émigré Natalya Gorbanevskaya is committed to a psychiatric hospital for her role in publishing and distributing the Chronicle o f Current Events. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn is expelled from the Writers' Union. Andrei AmaTrik publishes in the West his prophetic essay: Will the Soviet Unton Exist until 1984? (Prosushchestvuet li Sovetskii Soyuz do 1984-go goda). Other selected publications: 1. Aleksandr Ginzburg [Galich], Songs (Pesni), Frankfurt am Main. 2. Anatoly Kuznetsov [A. Anatoly], Babii Yar, a new edition of a work first published in the Soviet Union, but with toe censors’ deletions reestablished and highlighted. 3. Mikhail Èizenshtadt [Argus], A Different Life and A Distant Shore (Drugaya zhizn’ i bereg dai'nii), New York. 4. Nina Berberova, The Italics A re Mine, New York (appears later in Russian as: Kursiv moi). 5. Alla Ktorova, Face o f the Firebird (Utso Zhar-Ptitsy), Washington, D.C. The prose writer Israil' Shamir settles in Israel. Deaths: poet Boris Bozhnev; poet and translator liya Golenishchev-Kutuzov; poet and prose writer Yan Plyashkevich [Ivan Novgorod-Seversky]; prose writers Vyacheslav Mikhailovich Lebedev, Nikolai Vladimirovich Marchenko [Narokov]; poets Gizella Lakhman, Mark-Lyudovik-Mariya Talov; publisher Abram Gukasov.
1970 January: toe magazine Vozrozhdenie finally switches to toe new orthography — more than a half century after toe change was adopted in toe Soviet Union.
586
JOHN GLAD
June 21 : a festival of Russian émigré poetry is held in Melbourne, Australia. 34 poets participate, of whom sixteen reside in Sydney, ten in Melbourne, four in Adelaide, two in Brisbane, one in Newcastle, and one in south Australia October: Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn is awarded the Nobel Prize for literature. November 3: Lithuanian seaman Simas Kudirka attempts to defect from Soviet fishing vessel, but the Americans permit his commanding officers to beat and arrest him. The case is discussed widely in the Western press, finally exposing “American Keelhaul,” the code designation for the forcible repatriation of Soviet citizens to the U.S.S.R., instituted just before the end of World War II. Boris Khazanov: “Somewhere between the 1960s and the 1970s it became totally clear that it was all over for Soviet literature” (s sovetskoi literaturoi koncheno). The Russian Orthodox Church in America accepts “autocephaly" (autonomy) from the Moscow Patriarchate — an act which is heavily criticized by many émigrés who believe that the Moscow Patriarchate cannot grant any authority inasmuch as it has been infiltrated and is even controlled by the KGB. More than 30,000 Soviet Jews receive affidavits inviting them to Israel. From October 1968 through 1970 4,235 Jews emigrate. 912 persons bom on Soviet territory are officially registered as having emigrated to the U .S A this year. U.S. Census data: 334,615 Americans declare Russian as their mother tongue. Russian Americans have 31 publications, 25 in Russian and six in English, with a total circulation of 65,128 copies. The so-called ‘airplane trial": a group of Soviet citizens unsuccessfully attempt to hijack a plane to escape to the West from Leningrad. Èduard Kuznetsov and Mark Dymshits are originally sentenced to death but are released as a result of a worldwide outcry. The serial A m i is founded in Jerusalem. Selected publications: 1. Ludmila Foster, Bibltography o f Russian Émigré Literature, in two volumes, Boston. 2. Andrei AmaTrik, Plays (P'esy), Amsterdam. 3. Yury Ivask, Cinderella (Zolushka), New York. 4. Nikolai Ul'yanov, Pod kammenym nebom, New Haven, Connecticut. The following writers emigrate: writer, critic, and translator Simon (Shimon) Markish, poet Yulius Telesin. Deaths: critic Arkady Belinkov, editor Roman Grinberg (Èrge], poet Aleksandr Kusikov (Kusikyan), poet and literary scholar Robert Magidov, prose writer Yuly Margolin, poets Yury Mirolyubov and Igor* Voinov.
1971 Early spring?: Soviet authorities decide to permit large-scale Jewish emigration, which reaches 13,022 this year. August-September: the Kariovcian Council of Bishops declares invalid the granting of autocephaly to the Orthodox Church in America. Ardis Publishers and Russian Literature Tri-Quarterly are founded in Ann Arbor, Michigan, by Carl and Ellendea Proffer. Andrei Sinyavsky is released from a forced-labor camp. The Russian Metropole Orthodox Church renames itself the Orthodox Church in America.
RUSSIA ABROAD
587
The last issue of Mosty (Bridges) appears. After U.S. Senator Clifford Case reveals that Radio Liberty is actually financed clandestinely by the C .IA , Senator J. William Fulbright attempts to have the station closed. The future émigré Aleksandr Ginzburg [Aleksandr Galich] is expelled from the Soviet Writers' Union and the Literary Fund. Twenty-four men and women, including the writer Èfraim Sevela, occupy the offices of the Supreme Soviet to protest the plight of the “refuseniks" (in Russian: otkazniki, meaning persons denied permission to emigrate). The following writers emigrate: poets Iosif Bein, Mikhail Grobman, Yuliya Vishnevskaya; poets and prose writers Rakhil’ Baumvol', Evgeny Dubnov, Mikhail Yakobson; prose writers Pavel Gol'dshtein, Anna Grosman, Èfraim Sevela, Isaak Shapiro; prose writer and playwright Nelli Gutina; artists and poets Oleg Prokofev, Mikhail Shemyakin. Many go to Israel, if only temporarily. Selected émigré and tamizdat Publications: 1. Organizing Committee for Festival of Russian Poets in Austrailia (Komitet po organizatsii festivalya russkikh poètov Avstralii), Sbomik stikhov, Melbourne. 2. Vladimir Maksimov, The Seven Days of Creation (SenT dnei tvoreniya), Frankfurt am Main. 3. Yuly Daniel', Poems from Confinement (Stikhi iz nevoli), Amsterdam. 4. Evgeniya Ginzburg, Krutoi marshrut (English title: Journey into the Whirlwind), Frankfurt am Main. 5. Zhores and Roi Medvedev, Who's Crazy? (Kto sumasshedshii?), London. Deaths: Gaito Gazdanov and Nikolai Istomin. 1972 January: beginning of Soviet press campaign against Solzhenitsyn. August: the Soviet government institutes an “education tax” requiring that émigrés repay the cost of their educations. The tax is denounced as a “ransom.” October: The U.S. government grants Soviet Jews political refugee status. February 14: the Soviet Cinematographers' Union expels Aleksandr Ginzburg [Galich]. The Soviet science-fiction writers Arkady and Boris Strugatsky in Literatumaya gazeta (The Literary Gazette) protest the publication by Posev of their novel Ugly Swans (Gadkie lebedi). Purported Jewish emigration: 31,681. When Jewish emigration from the U.S.S.R. skyrockets, the Institute for the Study of the U.S.S.R. in Munich is denied further American funding and is closed (no German support was ever provided). Its library with 80,000 volumes and unique archives is given to the University of Cologne, although many materials are supposedly either destroyed or stolen. The NTS radio station Free Europe is shut down by West German authorites. The poet and future émigré Vasily Betaki is expelled from the Soviet Writers’ Union. Solzhenitsyn ties Shakespeare for the number of languages into which his works have been translated. Moscow-Jerusalem Publishers is founded in Israel. The magazine Ston (Zion) is found in Tel Aviv.
588
JOHN GLAD
Selected publications: 1. Nikolai P. Poltoratsky (editor), Russian Literature in Exile (Russkaya literatura v èmigratsii), Pittsburgh. 2. Ivan Burkin, A Journey From Black Into White (Puteshestvie iz chömogo v beloe), Munich. 3. Mirtala Kardinalovskaya, Poems (Stikhi), Madrid. 4. Viktoria Babenko, Sadness (Grusf), Columbus, Ohio. 5. Irina Saburova, About Us (O nas), Munich. 6. Aleksandr Ginzburg [Galich], The Generation o f the Doom ed (Pokolenie obrechônnykh), Frankfurt am Main. Nadezhda Mandel'shtam is denied permission to emigrate. The following writers emigrate: poet and essayist Joseph Brodsky; poets ll'ya Bokshtein, Valery Dunaevsky, Tafyana Fel', Marina Glazova, Leonid Ioffe, Vladimir Naumov, Mikhail Tylkin [Oeza], Mikhail Vasserman; editor Ekaterina Breitbart; prose writers Leonard Gendlin, Yury Glazov, Yury lote, Moshe Landburg, Viktor Muravin, David Ol'shansky, Vladimir Rybakov [Shchetinsky, Maiashin], Grigory Svirsky; poets and prose writers Èli Lyuksemburg, Grigory Lyuksemburg, David Markish, Emigration from the U.S.S.R. reaches 35,069. Deaths: poets and critics Georgy Adamovich, Antonina Grivtsova [Gorskaya]; poet and prose writer Vsevolod Nikanorovich Ivanov; poet and editor Sofiya Pregei'; poet Nikolai Turoverov; prose writer, critic, and playwright Boris Zaitsev. 1973 The Soviet government creates VAAP, the All-Union Copyright Agency (Vsesoyuznoe agentstvo po avtorskim pravam), granting it — not the authors — the exclusive right to negotiate publishing contracts with foreign publishers. Under these contracts the bulk of the royalties go to VAAP. When asked about his decision to return to the Soviet Union Russian prisoners of war who had served in German units, Sir Anthony Eden replies that he cannot “remember any details” and declines comment Purported Jewish emigration: 34,733. The following writers emigrate: poet and critic Marina Bergel'son; poets Vasily Betaki, Mara Fel'dman, Vladimir Glozman, Vera Gort, Violetta Ivemi, Yakov Khromchenko, Yuliya Khromchenko [Liya Vladimirova], Nikolai Kishiiov, Aron Kupershtok [Andrei Klönov], Boris Lysy [Boris Noril'sky], Naum Mandel’ [Naum Korzhavin], Anri Volokhonsky; prose writers Genrikh Èlinson, Vladimir Matlin, Yury Miloslavsky, Lyudmila Raiz, Moisei Shnaider, Mikhail Shul'man, Aleksandr Sukonik, Mark Zaichik; poets and prose writers Pavel Leonidov, Genrikh Shakhknovich; prose writers and editors Viktor Perel'man, Garry Tabachnik; prose writer and playwright Aleksandr Radovsky; editor Mariya Rozanova; poet and literary scholar Vadim Kreid; prose writer and literary scholar Andrei Sinyavsky [Abram Terts]; translator of poetry Anatoly Yakobson. Kirill Khenkin emigrates for second time. Mark Veinbaum, editor of Novoe russkoe slovo, dies, and Andrei Sedykh becomes editor-in-chief Other deaths: poets Aleksandr Bisk and Nikolai Kishiiov, poet and literary historian Vadim Morkovin, historian Georgy Vernadsky, and philologist Boris Unbegaun.
RUSSIA ABROAD
589
1974 January: Radio Liberty begins serializing Solzhenitsyn's Gulag Archipelago in its entirety. February 2: Willy Brandt issues a statement that Solzhenitsyn may live and work freely in West Germany. February 8: the Soviet ambassador to Bonn, Valentin Falin, informs Paul Frank, an Undersecretary of the Foreign Ministry, that the Soviet Union wishes to expel Solzhenitsyn to Germany, and asks whether West Germany will accept him. February 11: ethnic Germans seeking permission to emigrate conduct a demonstration in front of the Communist Party Central building in Moscow. February 12: Solzhenitsyn is arrested and incarcerated in Moscow's Lefortovo Prison. February 13: Solzhenitsyn is put on a plane and sent to Frankfurt am Main. March 5: the Politbyuro authorizes Vneshèkonombank to transfer Solzhenitsyn's royalties to his Swiss bank and not deduct any commission or fees. May 2: Andropov reports to the U.S.S.R. Council of Ministers that Solzhenitsyn continues to be hostile to the Soviet government. Andropov mistakenly believes that the Western media have lost interest in Solzhenitsyn. October 14: the West German liberal writer Günter Grass in an article in the Frankfurter Allgem eine Zeitung expresses discomfort over the fact that Kontinent is being printed by the conservative West German publisher Axel Springer. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn informs Western correspondents of threatening telephone calls and letters and denounces the Writers’ Union for having expelled Lidiya Chukovskaya (January 9) after she gave him shelter in her home in Peredelkino. The Jackson-Vanik ammendment is passed by the U.S. Congress, making receipt by the Soviet Union of "most-favored nation" trade status dependent on the right of Jews to leave the U.S.S.R. The Soviet Union responds by throttling emigration back to 20,628. Vestnik Russkogo Studencheskogo Khristianskogo Dvizheniya (Herald of the Russian Student Christian Movement) changes its name to omit the word "Student" The Chekhov Society is founded in Ottawa Vladimir Voinovich is expelled from the Soviet Writers' Union. Serials founded include: Kontinent (Paris), M enora (Jerusalem). Selected publications: 1. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, From Under the Rubble (lz-pod glyb), Paris. 2. Vasily Betaki, Short Circuit in Time (Zamykanie vremeni), Paris. 3. Grigory Svirsky, Hostages: A Documentary N ovel (Zalozhniki: Romandokument), Paris. The following writers emigrate: poets and prose writers Leonid Chertkov, Èduard Savenko [Èduard Limonov], Arkady Rovner; prose writers Emil Dreitser, Mark Girshin, Vladimir Maksimov, Viktor Nekrasov, Tamara Maiskaya, ll'ya Suslov, Evgeny Temovsky, Aieksandra Zakhavi; literary scholar Efim Ètkind; poets Viktoria Andreeva, Aleksandr Ginzburg [Galich], Genrikh Khudyakov, Mikhail Kreps, Evgeny Kushev, Lev Mak, Valery Petrochenkov, Vladimir Tarasov, Grigory Varshavsky; editor Arvid Kron; prose writer and essayist Yury Mamleev; poet and playwright Nina Voronel'; literary historian Yury Mal'tsev.
590
JOHN GLAD
The last text written by Aleksandr Ginzburg [Galich] before emigrating: “I write about this without rage and even without bitterness.... Today I am setting out on the long, difficult road of exile with its eternal grief.... My Russia remains with me.... i cannot be separated from her! No power can force me to part with her, for the Motherland is not a geographical concept for me. Motherland is an old lullaby sung to me by my mother; I see it in the beautiful faces of Russian women — young and old; I see it in their untiring hands, in the hands of surgeons and the working people; I sense it in the air, in the smell of pine needles and snow...." Deaths: artist, critic, prose writer, and memoirist Yury Annenkov, prose writer and essayist Konstantin Chkheidze, poet Nikolai Evseev, book seller Viktor Kamkin, poet and journalist Vladimir Mansvetov, prose writer Nataliya Potapenko.
1975 January 30: Vladimir Maksimov is stripped of Soviet citizenship. Solzhenitsyn accuses Andrei Sakharov of being opposed to the "Russian national renaissance." Vladimir Maramzin publishes a letter in the French press, recanting the compilation (together with Lev Losev) of a five-volume collection of theyerse of Joseph Brodsky. Maramzin is sentenced to five years on parole, but is permitted to emigrate. U.S. president Gerald Ford refuses to meet with Solzhenitsyn. Purported Jewish emigration: 13,221. Founded: Chalidze Publications (New York), Leviafan (Leviathan, Jerusalem). Serials founded include: M ir (Israel/Philadeiphia), Vremya i m y (Time and W e, Israel). Selected publications: 1. Georgy Vladimov, Loyal Ruslan (Vemyi Ruslan), Frankfurt am Main. 2. Natal'ya Gorbanevskaya, Three Notebooks o f Poems (Tri tetracfi stikhotvorenii), Bremen. 3. Vladimir Maramzin, A Tw o-C obred B b n d (Blondin obeego tsveta), Ann Arbor. 4. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Lenin in Zürich (Lenin v Tsyurikhe), Paris. 5. Arkady Rovner, R eg b n al Guests: Stories (Gosti iz oblasti: Rasskazy), Munich. 6. Yuliya Khromchenko [Liya Vladimirova], The Link o f Time (Svyaz’ vremen), Tel Aviv. 7. Andrei Sinyavsky, Strolls With Pushkin (Progulki s Pushkinym), London. 8. Vladimir Voinovich, The Life an d Extraordinary Adventures o f Prive Ivan Chonkin (Zhizn’ i neobychainye priklyucheniya soldata Ivana Chonkina), Paris. The poet Mariya Lang [Mariya Vega] and Viktor Yakhontov, editor of proSoviet newspaper Russkii gobs, return to Russia. The following writers emigrate: critic German Andreev; poet and prose writer Viktor Ènyutin [Viktor Zubov]; prose writers Nikolai Bokov, Mark Èndlin, Zinovy Gluzberg [Zinovy Zinik], Lyudmila Shtem, Sasha Sokolov, Aleksandr Suslov; poets Vadim Delone, Konstantin Kuz'minsky, Natal'ya Medvedeva, Boris Shapiro, Viktor Tupitsyn; poets and translators Elizaveta Mnatsakanova, Gennady Shmakov; poet and editor Aleksandr Gidoni; prose writer and editor Aleksandr Glezer; poets and journalists Natal'ya Gorbanevskaya, Aleksei Tsvetkov; prose writer and playwright Vladimir Maramzin; prose writer, literary scholar, and editor Rafail Nudel'man.
RUSSIA ABROAD
591
Deaths: poet Yury Bek-Sofiev, editor Boris Bogaevsky, prose writer Sergei Sharshun, poet and literary scholar Vladislav Kobyiinsky [Èllis], literary scholars Aron Shteinberg and Kirill Zaitsev, editor Mark Vishnyak, poet and artist Il'ya Zdanevich [ll’yazd].
1976 September: 44 Russian Jews wearing the yellow Star of David march through downtown Moscow to the Central Committee of the Communist Party, demanding the right to emigrate. October 19: Nataliya Solzhenitsyna, wife of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, is stripped of Soviet citizenship. November: a group of left-tiberal” émigré thinkers in Paris, including Leonid Plyushch, Anatoly Levitin-Krasnov, German Andreev, and Vadim Belotserkovsky, issue the first volume of The U .S .S .R .: Democratic Alternatives, in opposition to Solzhenitsyn and Kontinent. Purported Jewish emigration: 14,261. Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty are merged and funded directly by the U.S. Congress. Vladimir Bukovsky is exchanged for Luis Corvalan, head of the Chilean Communist Party. Bukovsky writes: ‘ No, I didn't want to leave. The Jews were going to Israel, the Germans to Germany. That was their right; it is the right of every man to go wherever he wants. But where were we to go, we Russians? There was no other Russia. And why, when you come to think of it, should we be the ones to leave?" NTS radio station Free Europe broadcasts from Taiwan cease. The novelist and editor of Paris-based Kontinent Vladimir Maksimov declares that Western liberals are guilty of self-deception and that Russian intellectuals, who warned them of the dangers of communism, will have a clean conscience when these same Western liberals are marched off to the forced-labor camps. In an interview given to the Polish émigré journal Kultura Andrei Amal'rik accuses Vladimir Maksimov of intolerance. The widow of Gaito Gazdanov donates his archive to Harvard's Houghton Library. Publishers’ W eekly estimates that some thirty million copies of Solzhenitsyn's books have been sold. Serials founded include: Goloszarubezh'ya (Voice of the Emigration, Munich), Tretya volna (The Third Wave, Frankfurt am Main, later listed as Paris/Jersey City), Vestnik (The Herald, Baltimore). Selected publications: 1. Arkady Belinkov (posthumous), The Surrender and Death o f a Soviet Intelhctual: Yury Olesha (Sdacha i gibel’ soviet intelligents: Yury Olesha), Madrid. 2. Aleksandr Zinov'ev, The Yawning Heights (Ziyayushchie vysoty), Lausanne. 3. Sasha Sokolov, School for Fools (Shkola dlya durakov), Ann Arbor. 4. Lev Mak, From the Night (Iz nochi), Kansas City, Missouri. The following writers emigrate: playwright and political thinker Andrei Amal'rik; poets Tafyana Filanovskaya, Boris Kam'yanov, Rina Levinzon, Il’ya Rubin, and Èmiliya Slezinger; family of Rozina Nezhinskaya; prose writers Anatoly Gladilin, Nisim llishaev, Arkady LVov, Lev Nussberg, Gennady Pokrass, Yuliya Troll', Evgeny Tsvetkov, Ruf Zernova; prose writer and editor Yury Kashkarov; poet and literary scholar Lev Losev; poets and prose writers Boris Polyakov, Aleksandr Volovik, and Yury Vudka.
592
JOHN GLAD
Deaths: poet and prose writer Vadim Andreev; poet Dmitry Krachkovsky [Dmitry Klenovsky]; poet and artist Mikhail Kachurovsky [Shipovnikov]; poet and memoirist Galina Kuznetsova; journalist and memoirist Lev Lyubimov (in U.S.S.R.); prose writer Boris Lazarevsky; prose writer, poet, and political figure Vasily Shul'gin (in U.S.S.R.); literary scholar Mark Slonim.
1977 May: Lev Magerovsky, curator of the Bakhmetev Russian émigré archive for 26 years, is fired by Columbia University — much to the consternation of some émigrés who donated their works to the archive and who support him. Purported Jewish emigration: 16,736. According to the H arvard Encycbpedia o f Am erican Ethnic Groups, 500,000 first-generation Russian Americans reside in the United States, of whom about half have roots in Belorussia or Ukraine. Literatumaya gazeta announces a raid on the apartment of Aleksandr Il'ich Ginzburg; money which belonged to the Russian Social Fund (supported by royalties from Solzhenitsyn's Gulag Archipelago) is confiscated. A government leaflet is released in Moscow containing ta price list for emigration: 500 rubles for forfeiture of Soviet citizenship, plus 300 rubles for a passport (the average monthly salary at the time is approximately 140 rubles). November 5-7: a writers' Congress on "Human Rights and Literature” is conducted in West Berlin by Kontinent. December: the Frankfurter Allgem eine Zeitung publishes an article by Andreas Razumovsky stating that concepts such as tolerance, liberalism, and democracy are alien to the editors of Kontinent He also quotes Roy Medvedev in Moscow as criticizing Kontinent tor being overly intent on ideology and the Czech émigré writer Ota Filip in Munich as attacking the journal's editorial office for being more like a censor's office. The inauguration of Baptist Jimmy Carter as President of the United States encourages Baptists in the Soviet Union to apply for permission to emigrate. Èfraim Sevela leaves Israel and settles in the United States (date approximate, sources differ). Serials founded include: Giagol (The Word, Ann Arbor, Michigan), Krug (The Circle, Tel Aviv), Perekrêstki (Intersections, Philadelphia). Selected publications: 1. Joseph Brodsky, A Part o f Speech (Chasf rechi), Ann Arbor. 2. Gennady Faibusovich [Boris Khazanov], The Sm ell o f Stars (Zapakh zvözd), Israel. 3. Genrikh Shakhnovich, A Drum S o b : Stories (Solo na barabane: Rasskazy), Tel Aviv. 4. Nina Voronel', The Fern: Poems (Paporotnik: Stikhi), Jerusalem. 5. Mikhail Shemyakin (ed.), A polbn - 77, Paris. The following writers emigrate: prose writers [Aleksandr Baskov], Aleksandr Gol'dman, Feliks Kandel', Vladimir Khanelis, Fridrikh Neznansky, David Ryvkin [David Dar], Mikhail Shepelöv, Aleksandr Skachinsky, Romen Yarov, Aleksandr Zinov'ev, and ll'ya Zundelevich; poets Mikhail Gendelev, Lev Khalif, Yury Lekhtgolts [Yury Lekht], and Viktor Urin; critics Aleksandr Genis and Pötr Vail'; poet and singer Aleksei Khvostenko; poets and prose writers Vladimir Lazaris, Daniil Nadezhdin; prose writers and editors Kronid Lyubarsky and Mikhail Morgulis; and editor Aleksandr Sumerkin.
RUSSIA ABROAD
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Former Soviet general Pêtr Grigorenko emigrates. Deaths: theologian Nikolai Arsen'ev; literary historian Dmitry Chizhevsky; prose writer Elena Deisha [Georgy Peskov]; poets Aleksandr Ginzburg [Galich] and Vasily Sumbatov; novelist, poet, and literary scholar Vladimir Nabokov; writer and editor Mariya Tsetlina; leader of Mladoross Party Aleksandr Kazem-Bek (in Russia). 1978 February: Vladimir Bukovsky writes a letter to the Frankfurter Allgem eine Zeitung protesting what he sees as a campaign directed against the journal Kontinent and accusing the writer Andrei Sinyavsky and his wife Mariya Rozanova of “pathological hatred." April 13-15: international conference on Russian literature in exile is held in Geneva. The offices of the New York newspaper Novoe russkoe slovo are set afire, possibly by a Soviet agent Russian émigrés in Paris establish the Vladimir DaT Prize for Literature. Nineteen Pentecostal families seek refuge in the American embassy. The socalled “Siberian Seven” live in the basement of the American embassy tor five years while the U.S. and Soviet governments debate their fate. In Leningrad the historian Grigory Barikhnovsky publishes a history of White émigré politics, based on the official Party line. Purported Jewish emigration: 28,864. Vladimir Maksimov claims a total print run of between 4,200 and 4,600 for Kontinent.
A. Ladov writes in the journal Sintaksis of “Bolshevism as a Russian phenomenon." Silver Age Publishers (Serebryanyi vek) is founded in New York. The Soviet anti-Zionist author Lev Korneev publishes pamphlet entitled The Sword o f David, changing his name to Leo Korn to give it a Jewish ring. It is distributed in English by Novosti. John Glad and Daniel Weissbort publish in English translation Russian Poetry: The M odem Period, an anthology of twentieth-century Russian poetry, in which three of six sections are devoted to émigré poetry (a later edition is entitled Twentieth Century Russian Poetry).
The chess master Viktor Korchnoi, the musician and composer Mstislav Rostropovich and his wife, the singer Galina Vishnevskaya, and the writer Aleksandr ZinoYev are stripped of Soviet citizenship. Serials founded include: Dvadtsat' dva (Twenty-Two, Israel), Èkho (Echo, Paris), Gnozis (New York), Kovcheg (The Ark, Paris), Sintaksis (Syntax, Paris). Selected publications: 1. Anatoly Gladilin, Rehearsal on Friday (Repetitsiya v pyatnitsu); Paris. 2. Èfraim Sevela, Monya Tsatskes — Standard-Bearer (Monya Tsatskes — Znamyanosets), Jerusalem. 3. Valentina Sinkevich, The B reak o f D ay (Nastuplenie dnja), Philadelphia. The following writers emigrate: poets Shlomo Bilga, Igor* Burikhin, Leonid Èntin, Elena Klyueva, Evgeniya Levina, Simon Perel’man, Sergei Petrunis, Kira Sapgir [T. Gurvich, I. Sadovsky], Dmitry Savitsky [Aleksandr Dimov], Marina Têmkina,
594
JOHN GLAD
Aleksandr Vernik; prose writer and future editor Sergei Dovtatov; playwright Leonid Itselev; prose writers Evgeny Lyubin, Vadim Bakinsky [Vadim Nechaev], Aleksandr Sirotin, Kirill Uspensky [Kostsinsky], Ol'ga Ustinova; poets and prose writers Izrail’ Maler, Feliks Roziner, Èduard Topol', Naum Vaiman; poet and translator Igor’ Pomerantsev; poet and essayist Aleksandr Radashkevich; novelist-publisher Igor1 Efimov; poet and prose writer Marina Rachko. The prose writer Sergei Yur’enen defects. Deaths: prose writer and poet Dmitry Kobyakov, historian Pötr Kovalevsky, prose writer Vladimir Varshavsky, and literary scholar and translator Anatoly Yakobson.
1979 June 1: a new Soviet law on citizenship replaces the old law of 1938: Soviet citizenship can now be lost only as a result of an act of state, not by the decision of an individual; the children of Soviet citizens are themselves considered Soviet citizens; disloyalty by such persons when abroad is to be regarded as treason. June: a conference is held in Munich to allow German writers to exchange experiences with East European exile writers (Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Romania). Among the Russians attending are Efim Ètkind, Anatoly Gladilin, NataTya Gorbanevskaya, Andrei Sinyavsky, and Viktor Nekrasov. The Czech exile writer Ota Filip says that he personally does not consider his own exile a tragedy, since the Czechoslovaks are ‘Western people, after all,” more so than “our Russian friends." The Russian émigré colony in Paris is estimated by American Sovietologist and editor Abraham Brumberg to number 20,000, of whom roughly 5,000 are Third Wavers. This is in obvious contradiction to an estimate of 50,000 made in 1969— before the arrival of the Third Wave. Solzhenitsyn accuses his translator Olga Carlisle of having taken payments equal to about half the royalties from the world-wide sale of The First Circle; in a twomillion-dollar law suit Carlisle and her husband charge Solzhenitsyn and his American publisher, Harper & Row, with libel and invasion of privacy. The newspaper Moskovskaya pravda (Moscow Truth) complains about the smuggling of "malicious, vile, anti-Soviet slander” in the form of émigré publications, but notes that "these writings, which attempt to discredit our country and our socialist system, have, through the will of the vigilant border guards, now become a heap of waste paper." Stripped of Soviet citizenship: novelists Èduard Kuznetsov (April 27), Viktor Nekrasov (April 24); others include the dissidents Aleksandr Il'ich Ginzburg, Valentin Moroz, Georgy Vins, and Mark Dymshits. Purported Jewish emigration: 51,320 (largest figure until 1989). The almanac Metropol' is published in Ann Arbor. The Russian Writers’ Club is founded in New York City. The novelist Vasily Aksönov resigns from the Soviet Writers’ Union. Selected publications: 1. Igor* Chinnov, Antithesis (Antiteza), College Park, MD; collection of poetry with preface by Victor Terras and John Glad. 2. Dmitry Bobyshev, Hiates (Ziyaniya), Paris; a collection of verse. 3. Nikolai Bokov, The Bestseller and Other Works (Bestseller i drugoe), Paris. 4. Vladimir Maramzin, Funnier Than Before (Smeshnee chem prezhde), Paris; stories. 5. Èduard Limonov, It's Me — Eddie (Èto ya — Èdichka), New York.
RUSSIA ABROAD
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The following writers emigrate: prose writers Yuz Aleshkovsky, Yury Gal'perin, Èduard Kuznetsov, Dmitry Mikheev, Aleksandr and Lev Shargorodsky, Anatoly Turovsky [Ya. Zemlyanin], Kirill Tyntarev; poets Gennady Barabtario, Roman Bar-Or, Inessa Bliznetsova, Dmitry Bobyshev, Inna Bogachinskaya, Aleksandr Ocheretyansky, Grigory Patlas, Yakov Rabiner, Naum Sagalovsky, Valery Strashinsky, Èlli Vainerman, and Boris Vetrov; poets and prose writers David Kerzhner, Vladimir Kotlyarov [Tolsty], Simon Kopel'man, Igor1 Mikhalevich-Kaplan, and Anatoly Shepievker; poet and playwright Dmitry Malkin; literary scholar Aleksandr Zholkovsky. Deaths: prose writers Vladimir Chemyavsky and Anatoly Kuznetsov [A. Anatoly]; the theologian and religious historian Father Georgy Florovsky; prose writer and poet Irina Saburova; literary scholar Vladimir Veidle.
1980 Stripped of Soviet citizenship: Vasily Aksênov (November 20); others include the dissidents Vasily Sosnovsky, Gunars Rode, Tafyana Goricheva, Natal'ya Malakhovskaya, Tat'yana Mamonova, Ada Plyushch, and Evgeniya Lebedeva Foreign Russian-language stations begin to be jammed because of Soviet concern over the rise of the Solidarity movement in Poland. Purported Jewish emigration: 21,471. Vladimir Sosinsky, who returned to Russia in 1960, publishes in the pro-Soviet New York newspaper Russkii g o b s (No. 48) an “open letter to friends abroad,” praising the Soviet Union and maintaining he has no desire to go abroad again. John Glad begins videotaping interviews with Russian émigré writers. Serials founded include: A tef (Tel Aviv), Antologiya noveishei russkoi poèzii u Goluboi laguny (The Blue Lagoon Anthology of Modem Russian Poetry, Newtonville, Massachusetts/New York), Novaya gazeta (The New Newspaper, New York), Novyi am erikanets (The New American, New York), Panoram a (Los Angeles). Selected publications: 1. Efim Goland, They W ant to Go Hom e (Oni khotyat domoi), New York. 2. Sergei Dovlatov, A S o b on the Underwood (Solo na undervude), Paris. 3. Arkady Rovner et al. (editors), The Gnosis A nthobgy (Antologiya Gnozisa), New York. 4. Feliks Kandel', The Gates o f O ur Exodus (Vrata iskhoda nashego), Tel Aviv. 5. Aleksandr Bakhrakh, Bunin in a Dressing Gown (Bunin v khalate), Bayville, New Jersey. 6. Anatoly Gladilin, The Parisian M arket (Parizhskaya yarmarka), Paris-Tel Aviv. 7. David Ryvkin [David Dar], Confessbn o f an Irresponsibb R eader (Ispoved' bezotvetstvennogo chitatelya), Jerusalem. The following writers emigrate: prose writers Vasily Aksênov, Nodar Dzhindzhikhashvili [Nodar Dzhin], Fridrikh Gorenshtein, LevKonson, Vladimir Voinovich, Aleksandr Zhurzhin, poets Olesya Babich, Pavel Babich, Boris Bilker, Lev Druskin, Efim Krimerman [Grigore Singurei], Valery Skorov, Mikhail Taranov [Yupp]; poet and critic Irina Basova; poets and prose writers Yury Belov, Semên Kontorovich [Simon Lempert]; prose writer and critic Mikhail Kheifets; literary scholar and historian Lev Kopelev; essayist-editor Vladimir Malinkovich [Mikhail German, V. M.]; essayist-poet Tat'yana Mamonova; poet and playwright Donat Mechik; writer and journalist Yuliya Voznesenskaya.
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JOHN GLAD
Deaths: historian-playwright Andrei Amal'rik, philosopher Aleksandr Bogolepov, poet Elena Nedel'skaya, bibliographer Pdtr Kashtanov [Mikhail Shatov (Schatoff)], poet and critic Yury Terapiano.
1981 February 21 : a bomb is planted in the Munich offices of Radio Liberty. May 14-16: a conference on Russian literature in emigration is organized at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, by American Slavist Ol'ga Matich. August 29: San Francisco newspaper Russkaya Zhizn’ (Russian Life) celebrates its 60th anniversary. September 14: A week after the end of the Moscow Book Fair, the Association of American Publishers and the Fund for Free Expression sponsor a gathering at the New York Public Library entitled The Third M oscow Book Fair: Reception in Exile. Idea for the event suggested by Robert Bernstein, Chairman of Random House. Stripped of Soviet citizenship: Vladimir Voinovich (June 16); others include the literary scholar and historian Lev Kopelev, his wife the literary critic and memoirist Raisa Orlova, and the dissidents Viktor Kovalenko and Serafima Strubbe. Purported Jewish emigration: 9,447. Hermitage Publishers [Èrmitazhj is founded by Igor1 Efimov. The Hebrew Immigration Aid Society (HIAS) lists the following top 21 American cities for Jewish immigration from the Soviet Union: New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Baltimore/District of Columbia, Boston, San Francisco, Cleveland, Detroit Miami, Greater Metropolitan New Jersey, Minneapolis/St. Paul, S t Louis, Pittsburgh, Denver, Milwaukee, Houston, Kansas City (Missouri), Dallas, Atlanta, Columbus (Ohio). Serials founded include: Novyi svet (The New World, New York), Veche (Town Meeting, Munich). Kovcheg (The Ark) ceases publication (Paris). Selected publications: 1. L. K. Shkarenkov, Agony o f the White Emigration (Agoniya beloi èmigratsii), Moscow. 2. Vasily Aksönov, Island Crim ea (Ostrov Krym), Ann Arbor. 3. Yuz Aleshkovsky, Kangaroo (Kenguru), Ann Arbor. 4. Arkady LVov, The Yard (Dvor), Munich. 5. Naum Korzhavin, interweavings (Spleteniya), Frankfurt am Main. 6. Ruf Zernova, W om ens' Stories (Zhenskie rasskazy), Ann Arbor. 7. Vladimir Maksimov, A Tale o f Rhinoceroses (Saga o nosorogakh), FJMain. 8. Igor' Efimov, As One Flesh: A N ovel (Kak odna plot': Roman), Ann Arbor. 9. Roman Gul', / Took Russia With m e: Russia in G erm any (Ya unës Rossiyu: Rossiya v Germanii), vol. I, New York. The following writers emigrate: prose writers Grigory Chelak, Aleksandr Donde, Filip Berman, Aleksandr Fradis, Aleksei Kovaldv, Maksim Krotkov, Andrei Nazarov, Dina Yablonovskaya; poets Ol'ga Barskaya [Denisova], Evgeny Khorvat Maksim Krotov [O. Kustaröv], ll'ya Lapirov, Vladislav Tolmachöv, Sergei Zalin, Vadim Kozovoi. Deaths: prose writer, poet, and critic Mikhail Lopatto [M. Lopatin]; poet and prose writer Sergei Rafai'sky; poet Anatoly Velichkovsky.
RUSSIA ABROAD
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1982 May: the Partisan R eview holds a conference at the New School for Social Research in New York City on literature in exile. The Soviet head of state Leonid Brezhnev dies, but a hard line is maintained on emigration. An open letter is received from imprisoned Soviet writer L. Borodin, who complains that the émigré community has lost its organic link with Russia, that it ignores “national" processes, and that all the quarreling going on within the émigré community prevents it from being politically effective. Lev Korneev's Class Essence o f Zionism is published in the U.S.S.R. Purported Jewish emigration: 2,688. Viktor Nekrasov is expelled from the editorial board of Kontinent. In the Soviet town Aleksandrovo the first in a series of annual readings of the verse of Marina Tsvetaeva is given. A group of émigré dissidents is received at the Reagan White House: Mark Azbel', Valery Chalidze, Pôtr Grigorenko, Pavel Litvinov, Aishe Seitmuratova, Andrei Sinyavsky, and Georgy Vins. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn declines the invitation. Serials founded include: Uteratum yi kurter (The Literary Courier, New York/Chicago), Petukh (The Cockerel, New York). Selected publications: 1. Pêtr Vail’ and Aleksandr Genis, Contemporary Russian Prose (Sovremennaya russkaya proza), Ann Arbor. 2. Aleksandr Sumerkin (editor), Russica - 81, New York. 3. Aleksandr Zinov'ev, Homo Sovieticus, Lausanne. 4. Joseph Brodsky, Roman Elegies (Rimskie èlegii), New York. 5. Fridrikh Gorenshtein, Three Stories, in Vremya i my, No. 68. 6. Yury Mamleev, The Inside-Out o f Gauguin: Stories (Iznanka Gogena: Rasskazy), Paris-New York. 7. Elizaveta Mnatskanova, Steps an d Sighs: Four Books o f Poems (Shagi i vzdokhi: Chetyre knigi stikhov), Vienna. 8. Il'ya Suslov, Access to the Sea: Stones (Vykhod k moryu: Rasskazy), Ann Arbor. 9. Mark Girshin. Brighton Beach, New York. The following writers emigrate: poets Bakhyt Kenzheev and Yury Kublanovsky, prose writer and essayist Gennady Faibusovich [Boris Khazanov]. Deaths: poets Fêdor Dosuzhkov, Viktor Mamchenko, Boris Nartsissov; prose writer Yury Krotkov; poet and critic Nikolai Raevsky; poet and prose writer Tat'yana Smimova-Maksheeva; linguist and literary scholar Roman Yakobson (Jakobson). 1983 June 13: U.S. Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) shows the film The Russians A ie Here, moderated by Jessica Savich, which presents what is felt by many to be an unfair and negative depiction of the life led in the U .S A by émigrés from the U.S.S.R. Among those interviewed for the film are the poet Konstantin Kuz'minsky and the prose writer Lev Khalif. An unsuccessful effort is made to bring a lawsuit against Savich and PBS.
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JOHN GLAD
September 5: Yury Lyubimov's play based on Crime and Punishment is premiered in a suburb of London. An employee of the Soviet Embassy tells Lyubimov: ‘You've committed a crime, and now you'll pay the price.... We'll find you, no matter where you go." October: the communist city government of Bologna rejects a request from Moscow that Lyubimov not be permitted to stage Wagner's Tristan an d Isolde. The so-called ‘Siberian Seven" (Pentecostalists seeking refuge in the American embassy in Moscow) receive permission for their families to emigrate. Nina Berberova claims that the reunification of Russian and Soviet literature has already taken place in the period 1972-1983. A Soviet publication claims that Russian literature abroad has been ‘amazingly barren” and that ‘ Russian émigré literature was a failure" (ne sostoyalas). Purported Jewish emigration: 1,314. In a propaganda effort intended to dissuade Russians from emigrating, the Moscow publishing house Progress puts out a volume entitled W hy We Returned to the Hom eland: Testimony o f Remigrants (Pochumu my vemulis' na rodinu: Svidetel'stva reèmigrantov). Yury Mamleev and Èduard Savenko [Limonov] move from the U .S A to France. Stripped of Soviet citizenship: the prose writer Georgy Viadimov (July 1) and the historian and critic Mikhail Geiler (December 16). Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn states that ‘pluralism” should not be equated with moral relativism. Émigré journalist Vadim Belotserkovsky accuses Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn of antisemitism. An appeal to return Evlogian churches given by the Nazi government to the Russian Church Abroad is turned down in a German court. Serials founded include: Forum (Munich), Kaleidoskop (New York), Tribuna (Tribune, Paris), Vstrechi (Meetings, Philadelphia). Selected publications: 1. Anri Volokhonsky, A D eceased N ovel (Roman-Pokoinichek), Jerusalem. 2. Yury Kublanovsky, With the Last Sun (S poslednim solntsem), Paris. 3. Irina Odoevtseva, On the Banks o f the Seine (Na beregakh Seny), Paris. 4. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, The R ed W heel (Krasnoe koleso), Paris. 5. Vasily Yanovsky, Elysian Fields: A Book of M em ory (Polya Eliseiskie: Kniga pamyati), New York. 6. Aleksandr and Lev Shargorodsky, Shutka-Bakha: Stories (Shutka-Bakha: Rasskazy), Los Angeles. 7. Georgy Viadimov, D o n t P ay Attention, M aestro: A Story for Heinrich Bôll (Ne obrashchaite vnimaniya, maèstro: Rasskaz dlya Genrikha Bêllya), Frankfurt am Main. 8. Valery Petrochenkov, Autumn of the A ge (Osen’ veka), New York. The following writers emigrate: poet Anatoly Kopeikin; theater director Yury Lyubimov; prose writers Mikhail Lemkhin [Valentin Romios], Georgy Volosevich [Georgy Viadimov].
RUSSIA ABROAD
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Deaths: poets Vadim Delone, Arseny Formakov, Irina Vail', Mariya Volkova; prose writer and memoirist Natal'ya Kodryanskaya; philosopher Sergei Levitsky; poet and prose writer Yustiniya Kruzenshtem-Peterets; prose writers Pêtr Lapikin and Valery Tarsis; historian Sergei Pushkarêv; critic and prose writer Vladimir Sosinsky.
1983-1988 Some 5,000 Soviet Jews are granted Austrian citizenship on “humanitarian grounds."
1984 January 24: the London newspaper The Evening Standard judges Lyubimov's Crime an d Punishment the best play of the season. Georgy Volosevich [Viadimov] is appointed chief editor of Grani. Svetlana Allilueva returns to the Soviet Union. Accusations are made that books in the Gogol’ Library in Rome are being stolen and either resold or shipped to the U.S.S.R. The New York newspaper Novoe russkoe slovo (The New Russian Word) refuses to publish articles by persons who also publish in the émigré nationalist journal Veche (Town Meeting). Purported Jewish emigration: 896. In Orange, Connecticut, Emanuel Shtein (Sztein) founds the used book store and publishing house Antikvariat. July 11 : Yury Lyubimov is stripped of Soviet citizenship. On August 1 the French Communist Party issues a statement condemning the Soviet action. March 7: in Moscow Anatoly Èfros is appointed to replace Yury Lyubimov as Director of the Taganka Theater. May 18: Vladimir Maksimov writes a letter to the Russian-Yugoslav dissident Mihajlo Mihajlov expelling him from the editorial board of Kontinent for “participating in publications which persistently and systematically campaign against Kontinent” Serials founded include: Muleta, Paris; Russkoe samosoznanie (Russian SelfAwareness, Richfield Springs, N.Y.); Strelets (The Archer, Jersey City); Strana i mir (The Country and the World, Munich). Selected publications: 1. Roman Gui', Ya unës Rossiyu: Russia in France (I Took Russia With Me: Rossiya vo Frantsii), vol. 2, New York. 2. Aleksandr Zinov'ev, An Open Letter to the Third Emigration (Obrashchenie k tret'ei èmigratsii); Zinov'ev declares that any cooperation with the Soviet authorities is treason. 3. Andrei Sinyavsky, Good Night (Spokoinoi nochi), Paris. 4. Viktor Perel'man, Theater of the Absurd (Teatr absurda), New YorkJerusalem-Paris. 5. Bakhyt Kenzheev, Selected Lyric Poems: 1970-1981 (Izbrannaya lirika: 1970-1981), Ann Arbor. 6. Aleksei Khvostenko and Anri Volokhonsky, Fables (Basni), Paris. 7. Yury Miloslavsky, From the Noise o f Horsemen and Marksmen (Ot shuma vsadnikov i Strelkov), Ann Arbor. 8. Feliks Roziner, M ale Gam es of Spring (Vesennie muzhskie igry), Tenafly, New Jersey. "Anna Anderson," the woman who had falsely claimed to be Grand Duchess Anastasiya, daughter of Tsar Nikolai II, dies.
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The poet Yury Kolker emigrates. Deaths: prose writer and poet Yury Bol'shukhin, prose writers Gennady Khomkyakov [G. Andreev], Kirill Uspensky [Kostsinsky], Georgy Trifonov [Mikhail Dömin], poet and prose writer Pavel Leonidov, American publisher Carl Proffer, essayist Yakov Vin'kovetsky.
1985 January 31 : the lease of the Gogol’ Library in Rome expires and the library's holdings are placed in municipal storage. February 12: using British actors, Yury Lyubimov stages the premier of The Possessed in Paris. The Soviet government claims that there is no “objective basis” for emigration from the U.S.S.R. and that the term “compatriot abroad” includes the children and grandchildren of emigrants. A group of Russian émigré writers pens an obituary for the German writer Heinrich Böll, praising him as a defender of human rights. Thousands of Soviet Christians emigrate under Israeli visas in a Sovietgovernment inspired charade. Purported Jewish emigration: 1,140. The journal Vremya i my (Time and We, editor: Viktor Perel'man) moves from Israel to United States. The Israeli journal 22 (editor: Rafail Nudel'man) and the literary critic Maiya Kaganskaya receive the R. N. Ettinger Award. The Soviet magazine Novoe vremya (New Times) accuses the émigré Vladimir Bukovsky, the CIA, and Meier Kahane of having murdered Jessica Savich for participating in the PBS film The Russians Are Here. The magazine also accuses Israel of murdering émigrés from the U.S.S.R. who wish to return home. The Munich-based journal Gotes zarubezh'ya (Voice of the Emigration) publishes a letter by E. Karmazin accusing Strana i mir (The Country and the World, also located in Munich) of being against the working people and for the Andropov regime (No. 38). 0 . Polyakov in Veche accuses Andrei Sinyavsky, and also Radio Liberty and the Voice of America, of intentionally confusing the concepts “Russian” and “Soviet,” thus setting for themselves the goal of genocide of the Russian people. Polyakov equates his opponents with the Nazis invading Russia and predicts they will suffer the same fate that befell the Nazis. Selected publications: 1. Anatoly Afanas'ev, Wormwood in Foreign Fields (Polyn’ v chuzhikh poiyakh), Minsk; Soviet book on the émigré community. 2. Liya Vladimirova, A Letter to Myself (Pis'mo k sebe), Tel Aviv. 3. Aleksei Tsvetkov, Eden (Èdem), Ann Arbor. 4. Lev Losev, A Marvelous Sortie: Poems (Chudesnyi desant: stikhotvoreniya), Tenafly, New Jersey. 5. Boris Polyakov, Experiment and Mumblings: A Novel in Three Books (Opyt i lepet: Roman v trëkh knigakh), Tel Aviv. 6. Mark Zaichik, The Phenomenon: Stories (Fenomen: Rasskazy), Tenafly, N.J. Third-Wave emigration from the U.S.S.R. drops to 2,368.
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The following poets emigrate: Irina Grivnina, Boris Khurgin, Igor* Savel'ev, Aleksandr Stupnikov. Deaths: critic and memoirist Aleksandr Bakhrakh; poets Ol'ga Anstei, Irina Borman, and Sergei Bongart; memoirist Lidiya Ivanova; prose writer Boris Polyakov; prose writer and playwright Antonina Ryazanovskaya [Nina Fëdorova]; Slavists Rostislav Pletnöv and Gleb Struve; novelist, critic, and historian Nikolai Ul'yanov.
1986 January-October: of the 736 Jews who have emigrated from the U.S.S.R. during this period only 22.4% chose Israel. June 6: angered by an interview granted by Vladimir Maksimov to John Glad (Vrem ya i my. No. 38), Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn writes to Maksimov, protesting that he himself is not a nationalist and denying Maksimov the right to speak in his behalf. Maksimov subsequently attempts to suppress further publication of the interview. July 20: a protest is lodged in Russkaya mysl’ accusing NTS of a lack of respect for editorial freedom by its firing of Georgy Vladimov as editor of Grani. September 21 : Soviet television shows The Russians A re H ere in an attempt to cfiscourage emigration. October 24: the Soviet publication Knizhnoe obozrenie (Book Review) publishes a selection of verse by Vladimir Nabokov. November 29-December 6: Andrei Voznesensky publishes an essay in Ogonëk on Vladislav Khodasevich. December 3: the U.S. State Department issues a report criticizing Soviet performance in family reunification cases. December 17: the Soviet publication Literatumaya gazeta (The Literary Gazette) criticizes the Handbook o f Russian Literature (Yale University Press, edited by Victor Terras) for including émigrés. December: some fifty émigrés return to the Soviet Union, complaining of urban crime, unemployment, and loneliness. Soviet newspapers run articles on the disappointed “illusions” of émigrés who have applied for readmission to the U.S.S.R. December: the Soviet journal Moskva begins publication of Nabokov's novel Luzhin's Defense, with a preface by Oleg Mikhailov. Purported Jewish emigration: 914. Third-Wave Literary scholar Efim Ètkind writes in Paris newspaper Russkaya m ysi’ (Russian Thought) that he is “particularly offended" by the assertion of First-Wave scholar and critic Yury Ivask that the Third Wave and its literary scholars are poorly acquainted with the First Wave. Ivask responds that they ‘speak different languages." Gorbachêv's policy of perestroika is proclaimed. Rumors begin to circulate that individual writers might be invited to return home. The Paris-based magazine Èkho (Echo) ceases publication. Of the 735 Jews who emigrated from the U.S.S.R. from January to October 1986 only 22.4 percent chose Israel as their ultimate destination. The Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R. responds to the granting of political asylum in the West to Soviet citizens by extending political asylum to a U.S. family (Arnold and Lauren Lokshin, and children). Svetlana Allilueva remigrates. The Viktor Kamkin Russian bookstore in Rockville, Maryland, claims an inventory of three million books, the overwhelming majority of which are Soviet editions. Four Continents Bookstore in New York refuses to sell any émigré editions.
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In late 1986 and early 1987 unsolicited applications for readmittance to the U.S.S.R. and restoration of Soviet citizenship, printed in Russian, are placed in the mailboxes of émigrés living in New York and Cleveland. Selected publications: 1. Yury Terapiano (posthumous), The Literary Life o f Russian Paris over a H alf Century (Literatumaya zhizn’ russkogo Parizha za polveka), Paris/New York. 2. Aleksandr Glezer and Sergei Petrunis (editors), Russian Poets in the W est (Russkie poèty na zapade), Jersey City. 3. Yury Mamleev, Living W ater (Zhivaya voda), Paris. 4. Viktor Nekrasov, A Sm all S ad Tale (Malen'kaya pechal'naya povesf), London. 5. Sergei Yurtenen, A Son o f the Empire: A n Infantih N ovel (Syn imperii: infantil'nyi roman), Ann Arbor. 6. Aleksandr Suslov, Loosestrife City (Shesf sonmov — Plakun gorod), Ann Arbor. 7. Vadim Kreid, The Octagon: Poems (Vos’migrannik: stikhi), New York. 8. Irina Ratushinskaya, I'll Live to S ee the Day: Poems (Ya dozhivu: Stikhi), New York. 9. Zinovy Gluzberg [Zinovy Zinik], The Russophobe an d the Fungophile (Russofobka i fungofil), London. 10. Yury Ivask, I'm a Philistine (Ya — meshchanin), Mount Holyoke, Massachusetts. The following writers emigrate: Irina Ratushinskaya, Aleksandr Aleksandrovich Pushkin. Deaths: prose writer and editor Roman Gul'; prose writer and literary scholar Leonid Rzhevsky; poet and memoirist Galina Kuznetsova; poet and playwright Mikhail Shmeisser; poets Valeriya Hoecke, Yury Ivask, Lidiya Khaindrova (Krasnodar, U.S.S.R.), Richard Yanin; curator of Bakhmetev Archive Lev Magerovsky.
1987 January 1 : a new law is adopted formally establishing the legal grounds on which a Soviet citizen may emigrate or be refused that right Under normal circumstances an invitation from abroad (vyzov) is sufficient. June 6: Irina Ratushinskaya is stripped of Soviet citizenship. April 23-25: Soviet writers officially sit at the same table with émigré writers for the first time (Wheatland Conference on Literature, held at the Library of Congress). Following a meeting between Presidents Reagan and Gorbachôv, Soviet authorities begin issuing visas to émigrés to visit the Soviet Union. Purported Jewish emigration: 8,155. The founder of the journal Grani, Evgeny Ostrovsky [Romanov], complains in an interview about a shortage of high-quality submissions from Soviet writers, hie also states that Georgy Vladimov was fired as editor for his inability to work cordially with other members of the journal rather than for ideological reasons. Émigré publications Forum (Munich), A — ya (Paris), and SSSR-Vnutrennie protivorechiya (The U.S.S.R.: Internal Contradictions, Vermont) cease publication. Strana im ir (Munich) begins appearing only on a bi-monthly basis. Springer Publishers decides to terminate financial subsidies to Kontinent in Paris.
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March 30: Morris B. Abram, chairman of the National Conference on Soviet Jewry, announces after a trip to the U.S.S.R. that within the year the Soviet government will permit thousands of Jews to emigrate to Israel on direct air flights via Romania. Since such persons automatically receive Israeli citizenship, they are not eligible for political refugee status in the United States. 39,100 persons emigrate from the U.S.S.R., of them 9,700 (24.8%) from Russian proper. Joseph Brodsky receives the Nobel Prize tor literature. February 22: a resolution passed by the Israeli Cabinet reads: T h e government of Israel believes that the status of refugees now accorded (by the U.S. government) to the Soviet émigrés whose declared goal is Israel should be abolished." March: Teatral'naya zhizn' (Theatrical Life) announces that two different theaters, one in Moscow and one in Leningrad, are planning to stage plays based on Nabokov's Invitation to a Beheading. March 7: Vladimir Voinovich writes letter to Sergei Zalygin, editor-in-chief of the Soviet journal Novyi m ir (New World), suggesting that Novyi m ir publish his work. Zalygin refuses. March 22: a group of ten émigrés publish an open letter questioning the sincerity of perestroika (Aksönov, Bukovsky, Kuznetsov, Lyubimov, Maksimov, Neizvestny, Orlov, Plyushch, A. Zinov'ev, O. Zinov'eva). March 29: the above letter is republished in Moskovskie novosti (Moscow News). March 31: Pravda Ukrainy (Truth of Ukraine) announces that Yury Lyubimov can return to the Soviet Union if he so desires. April: Israel's Cabinet discusses a possible influx of Jews from the Soviet Union and receives a report estimating it may cost 220 million dollars to settle 10,000 newcomers in Israel. April 11 : Sovetskaya kuFtura (Soviet Culture): These Lyubimovs, Aksönovs, Maksimovs, Vladimovs and all their ilk have no use for perestroika.... Their point of departure is hostility, hatred, and slander." April 12: Moskovskie novosti declares that the signatories of the above letter "have deprived themselves of their home." May 21 (made public June 20): Joseph Brodsky resigns from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters in protest of its induction of Evgeny Evtushenko as an honorary member. May 31: the Soviet poet Bulat Okudzhava praises émigré poet and bard Aleksandr Ginzburg [Galich] in Moskovskie novosti. June 10: M otodêzh' Èstonii (Estonian Youth) publishes an article entitled Treason (Predatel'stvo) about émigrés who leave family members behind. May 20: the Soviet newspaper Literatumaya gazeta (Literary Gazette) accuses émigré theater director Yury Lyubimov of "defiling the classic repertoire." June 26: the British Slavist Gerald Smith writes in the Times Literary Supplem ent "Nothing has yet happened to change the fundamental fact that the Russian poetry that matters most is published in the West." July 2: the Soviet poet Evgeny Evtushenko says of Solzhenitsyn in interview granted to West German magazine D er Stem : "I find it in bad taste and arrogant for a person living in the West to attack his Soviet colleagues who are still fighting for freedom. One has no moral right to do that."
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July 31 : the Soviet historian V. Mel’nichenko writes in Pravda Ukrainy that, while it is improper to depict Bukharin as having played a strictly negative role in history, it is equally incorrect to neglect the anti-Soviet views of the “odious” Vladimir Nabokov. August: Soviet sociologist Igor* Kon writes in Moscow newspaper Argum enty i fakty (Arguments and Facts) of a “recent" court case in which a reader was prosecuted for pornography after a copy of Lolita was found in his possession. The court refused to admit testimony from Soviet writers Fazil' Iskander, Vladimir Soloukhin, and Andrei Voznesensky, but finally dropped the case after receiving a letter from Academician Dmitry Likhachöv. August: the Moscow Hermitage Theater (Èrmitazh) announces plans to stage a play written by Aleksandr Ginzburg [Galich]. August 11 : Sovetskaya Kultura (Soviet Culture) publishes an article on the émigré community entitled: The M ost Terrible Thing About Émigré Life is Waking Up. September 10: Soviet authorities at the Sixth Moscow International Book Fair confiscate a number of books presented by Ardis books, among them Sasha Sokolov's School for Fools, Aksênov's The Bum, and Voinovich's M oscow 2042. September 13: Moskovskie novosti publishes an obituary of émigré writer Viktor Nekrasov and is reprimanded by senior Party official Egor Ligachdv in an unpublished speech. September 30: the writer Georgy Vladimov is attacked as a traitor and renegade by Literatumaya gazeta for emigrating. September 30: the Soviet critic Feliks Kuznetsov concedes that Nabokov was a talented writer who should be published in the U.S.S.R., but that some Soviet publications about Nabokov gloss over his anti-Soviet views. The October issue of Novyi mir, in which Solzhenitsyn's C ancer W ard w as to have been published, is removed from circulation. November: the Soviet critic Dmitry Umov writes in Literatum aya uchôba that he has hated Nabokov all his life. November 21: Sovetskaya kuitura (Soviet Culture) publishes article on an album of Aleksei Remizov. December: Ardis Publishers in Ann Arbor, Michigan, publishes its 415th title: 191 are in Russian, and 224 are either in English or are bilingual. Average print run: 1,000 copies. The poet Igor* Severyanin's centennial is celebrated in the city of Cherepovets (Russia) with a scholarly conference and in Tallinn with a theatrical performance. Selected publications: 1. Mikhail Kreps, The Budding H ead (Buton golovy), Philadelphia. 2. Tatyana Fesenko, Double Vision (Dvoinoe zrenie), Paris. 3. Vladimir Voinovich, M oscow 2042, Ann Arbor, Michigan. 4. Yuliya Voznesenskaya, The Chernobyl’ S tar (Zvezda ChemobyT), New York. 5. Nelli Gutina, The M agazine (Zhumal), Tel-Aviv. 6. Nisim llishaev, The Portage: A N ovel (Pereval: Roman), Tel-Aviv. 7. Joseph Brodsky, Uraniya, Ann Arbor. 8. Èduard Topol', A Stranger's Face: Submarine U -137 (Chuzhoe litso: Submarine U-137), New York. 9. Vadim Kreid, The Green Window (Zelönoe okno), New York.
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10. Pötr Vail’ and Aleksandr Genis, Russian Cuisine in Exile (Russkaya kukhnya v izgnanii), Los Angelos. 11. Boris Fal'kov, In the Dream o f Earthly Existence or M ozart from Karelia (Vo sne zemnogo bytiya ili Motsart iz Karelii), Munich. The First-Wave poet and memoirist Irina Odoevtseva returns to Russia and is given a pension and apartment off Nevskii Prospekt in Leningrad. The following writers emigrate: prose writers Yury Druzhnikov, Boris Fal'kov, and Evgeniya Pavlovskaya; poets Vladimir Frenkel' and Larisa Ratnikova; and poet and prose writer David Shraer-Petrov. Deaths: poets Alla Golovina, Ivan Elagin, Aleksandr Saltavets [Rostovsky]; prose writer Viktor Nekrasov.
1987 Soviet Republications of Emigre Writings Jan.: O gonyok — memoir by Vladislav Khodasevich. March: N edelya — article on Igor* Severyanin. April: N ovyi m ir — study on Gogol’ by Nabokov. May 13: Uteratum aya gazeta — memoir of Igori Severyanin on Mayakovsky. May 15: Uteratum aya Rossiya — verse and memoir of Igor* Severyanin. June: Yunost' — remark by Nabokov on Pushkin. July: O gonök — story by Vladimir Nabokov. Aug. 1 : Avrora — story by Khodasevich. Aug. 14: Uteratum aya R ossiya — memoir on Leonid Andreev by Boris Zaitsev. Aug. 21 : Uteratum aya Rossiya — poems of Nikolai Otsup. Sept.: N edelya — essay on Pushkin by Khodasevich. Sept.: Voprosy IHeratury — essay by Khodasevich on the poet Semôn Nadson, plus a selection of autobiographical materials. Sept. 11 : Uteratum aya Rossiya — poems of Bunin and memoir on Bunin by émigré critic Aleksandr Bakhrakh. S ept 12-19: O gonök — Evtushenko publishes selection of verse of Vladimir Nabokov. Oct. 24: Vitaly Korotich, editor of Ogonök, tells Stockholm Dagens Nyheter that Brodsky is welcome to submit his poems for publication. Nov. 20: Uteratum aya Rossiya — story by Shmeidv. The critic who prepared the publication, Oleg Mikhailov, is awarded the paper's "Prize of the Year" for the publication. Nov. 28: O gonök — Evtushenko publishes poem of Arseny Nesmelov. December: Novyi m ir — selection of poems by Joseph Brodsky.
1988 January 1: the Soviet journal Voprosy literatury (Questions of Literature) publishes an article calling for a thorough review of the history of Russian literature, with the inclusion of émigré writers. January: Nikolai Bukharin, Lev Kamenev, and Grigory Zinov'ev are "rehabilitated" in the U.S.S.R., along with other victims of the show triads of 1936-37 — Karl Radek, Yury Pyatakov, and Aleksei Rykov. Jan 29: Uteratum aya gazeta publishes a complaint by Valery Pilipenko about a story by First-Wave novelist Ivan Shmelêv published on November 20, 1987; Pilipenko opposes the publication of a writer who collaborated with the Nazis. Pilipenko asks rhetorically if Zaitsev will now be published and accuses the paper of concealing
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Shmelöv's past and violating the principles of glasnost1. Oleg Mikhailov, who supervised preparation of the Shmelöv publication, accuses Pilipenko of ‘Stalinist dogmatism." March 2-4: a conference held on the outskirts of Copenhagen brings Soviet and émigré writers together. March 22: Vladimir Solodin, head of an officiai Soviet committee formed to review books and journals kept from Soviet readers for decades, states that 3,500 of 4,000 previously forbidden books are to be returned to library shelves. April: reports are received from Moscow that recent invitations (yyzovÿ) to Soviet Jews to emigrate to Israel have stipulated that the Israeli visas should be picked up at the Israeli Consulate in Bucharest, rather than in Vienna in order to pressure Soviet Jews to move to Israel rather than other countries. May: the director of Moscow's Institute of Historical Archives, Yury Afanas'ev, in Novyi mb' calls Nabokov ‘an unquestioned master of the word." May 8: Yury Lyubimov is permitted to return to Russia to stage Boris Godunov in Moscow's Taganka Theater. May 12: the board of governors of the Soviet Cinematographers’ Union votes unanimously to revoke the 1972 expulsion of Aleksandr Ginzburg [Galich] from membership. May 13: Komsomol'skaya pravda (Komsomol Truth) notes that the majority of readers’ responses to the attack on Brodsky by P. Gorelov were negative and publishes a joint letter from two readers criticizing Gorelov's article. May 16: Austrian Minister of the Interior Karl Blecha is assured in Moscow by Soviet authorities that no pressure will be put on Jewish emigrants to leave only through Bucharest rather than Vienna. May 27: the Moscow House of Film (Moskovskii Dorn Kino) puts on an evening in memory of Aleksandr Ginzburg [Galich]. Spring: Sweden stops granting political asylum to Soviet citizens, arguing that political reform in the U.S.S.R. renders such a step unnecessary. April 7: a directive of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R. formally permits Svetlana Allilueva to renounce Soviet citizenship. April 12: a reading is held of Joseph Brodsky's poems in the Palace of Theatrical Figures (Dvorets teatral'nykh deyatelei) in Leningrad. April: Golos rodiny (The Voice of the Homeland) publishes an article on former Soviet citizens besieging the Soviet embassy in Bonn with requests to be permitted to return to the Soviet Union. May 1 : the Soviet critic Lev Anninsky writes in Moskovskie novostr. ‘ Nabokov descended upon us like an avalanche." June: the Apprentice Studio of the Moscow Art Theater (MKhT) puts on the play A Sailor's Silence (Matrosskaya tishina), written by Aleksandr Ginzburg [Galich] under the new title The M ainland (Bol'shaya zemlya). The play was banned in 1957 by Soviet censors. June: Yury Afanas'ev calls for Lev Trotsky to be exonerated of criminal charges. June: the Moscow theatrical studio Third Direction stages play by Aleksandr Ginzburg [Galich] entitled When I Return (Kogda ya vemus1), the title taken from song by Galich written before emigrating. June 21 : film producer Èl'dar Ryazanov states that he has been attempting to obtain permission to produce a film based on Voinovich's Chonkin.
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June 27-28: the editor of the Soviet journal Novyi m ir Sergei Zalygin announces that he is negotiating to publish Solzhenitsyn's C ancer Ward. Solzhenitsyn's publisher, Roger Straus, denies that Solzhenitsyn ever received such a request. July: Bavarian Radio reports that Solzhenitsyn has accepted an invitation from Mikhail Gorbachëv to visit the Soviet Union and that all of Solzhyenitsyn's books — including The Gulag Archipelago — will be published in the U.S.S.R.; Natal’ya Solzhenitsyn issues a denial. July 15: TASS (The Telegraph Agency of the Soviet Union) reports that Aleksandr Ginzburg [Galich] has been posthumously reinstated to the Soviet Writers’ Union. Nikolai Gubenko, director of Moscow's Taganka Theater, states that it would be ‘just and normal” that Lyubimov be permitted to return to direct the Taganka Theater again. August 2: An article in Sovetskaya kultura states: “W e are all guilty ... before the memory of a great writer [Ivan Bunin]." August 10: Andrei Demenfev, chief editor of Yunost’ (Youth), announces plans to publish Voinovich's Chonkin and poems of Naum Korzhavin. August 17: the Soviet magazine Knizhnoe obozrenie (Book Review) publishes an article demanding that Solzhenitsyn's citizenship be reinstated. Solzhenitsyn issues a categorical denial that he has been approached about returning to the Soviet Union or having his banned works published there. September: Solzhenitsyn declines a role in a Soviet panel for a memorial to the victims of Stalin, saying that he could not take part in the ‘civic life” of a country that had accused him of treason and sent him into exile. September: an article by two Soviet Jews appears in Vek X X i m ir (The XXth Century and the World) on why they chose not to emigrate. October 5: the prose writer Aleksandr Zinov'ev states that perestroika is a farce instituted by Gorbachëv to seize power over the Communist Party and reestablish Stalinism. October: Novyi mir, with a press run of over one million copies, is forced to reprint the cover for issue No. 10, on which the forthcoming work by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn has been announced. October: The Secretariat of the Soviet Writers’ Union appoints a commission headed by Bulat Okudzhava to investigate the literary heritage” left behind by Aleksandr Ginzburg [Galich]. An evening of his poetry is announced in the Central Writers’ House, and three records of his songs are planned for release. October: the non-émigré writer Anatoly Pristavkin pays a visit to West Germany and meets with a number of émigré writers: “And now we once more unite that which was forcibly, unjustly divided." November: Politbyuro chief Vadim Medvedev condemns Solzhenitsyn's writings as attacks on socialism and Lenin and declares that to publish them would be to undermine the system. November: a meeting between Soviet and émigré writers takes place in Strasbourg. November 29: broadcasts of Radio Liberty are no longer jammed. Engineers at the Voice of America and Radio Liberty estimate that the Soviet Union spent between 500 million to one billion dollars annually on jamming.
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December: the Paris-based magazine Kontinent issues a statement claiming Solzhenitsyn had no right to conduct negotiations with Sergei Zalygin on publishing his works in Novyi mir. December 26: the Soviet newspaper Vechem ii Leningrad (Evening Leningrad) publishes an article by B. Mazo suggesting that those responsible for Brodsky's trial be punished. December 30: Andrei Sinyavsky is denied a Soviet entry visa for the third time. October-December: only 6.2 percent of Soviet Jews temporarily quartered in Vienna opt to emigrate to Israel. 108,200 persons emigrate from the Soviet Union, 20,700 (19.1% ) of them from the Russian Federation. 47,572 ethnic Germans and their families, most of whom speak Russian as their native language, resettle from the Soviet Union to Germany. The Soviet government ceases its policy of stripping émigrés of Soviet citizenship (some 175 persons had been subjected to this action in the period 19661988). VAAP (the Soviet All-Union Copyright Agency) is no longèr authorized to conclude agreements with foreign publishers without the consent of the author. The Cologne Statem ent, ten émigré figures claim that reform is impossible within the political framework of the Soviet Union and that any “euphoria” over such reform can serve only to conceal the long ignored disease of Soviet society." According to its vice-president, the New York newspaper Novoe m sskoe slovo has a circulation of nearly 50,000 copies in 47 countries. Purported Jewish emigration: 18,965. The Zionist Forum of Soviet Jewry (Sionistskii forum sovetskogo evreistva) unites Israeli Russian-Jewish organizations. The U.S. President's Commission on Organized Crime concludes that the Soviet government is exporting professional criminals to the United States among the émigrés. Approximately twelve organized crime groups are said to exist in New York, with other groups in Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Cleveland, Chicago, Dallas, Portland, Boston, Miami, and San Francisco. Many of these criminals are supposedly recruited to work for the KGB, along with an undetermined number of professional spies. Sacramento becomes a favorite place of resettlement for Soviet Christians. Jews favor Los Angeles and San Francisco. Pentecostalists favor Oregon. 1,100 Russian Jews settle in Los Angeles. Of Soviet citizens who entered the United States in 1987-1988, 95 percent are judged by the Immigration and Naturalization Service to be eligible to become permanent residents in 1989 — the highest proportion of any major refugee group. The magazine Russkii byulleten’ (Russian Bulletin) is founded in Boston. Selected publications: 1. Tamara Maiskaya, The Love Boat (KorabC lyubvi), New York. 2. Vladimir Voinovich, The Fur Cap (Shapka), London. 3. Valentina Sinkevich, / Live H ere (Zdes' ya zhivu), Philadelphia. 4. Boris Vel'berg, The Gospel A fter Aurelius: An Apocryphal Tale (Skazanie ot Avreliya: Apokrificheskoe skazanie), New York. 5. Fridrikh Gorenshtein, Three Plays (Tri p'esy), New York. 6. Ina Bliznetsova, The Valley o f Snares (Dolina Tendt), Tenafly, New Jersey.
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7. Mikhail Armalinsky, On Both Sides of Orgasm (Po obe storony orgazma), Minneapolis. 8. Semön Reznik, The Bloody Carousel: Historical Tales (Krovavaya Karusel': Istoricheskie povesti), Washington, D.C. 9. Marianna Volkova and Sergei Dovlatov. Not Just Brodsky: Russian Culture in Portraits and Anecdotes (Ne tol'ko Brodsky: Russkaya kultura v portretakh i anekdotakh), New York. Deaths: poet and prose writer Tafyana Bemadskaya; poet Lidiya Chervinskaya; prose writer, poet, and critic Lev Gomolitsky.
1989 January: Moskovskie novosti (Moscow News) publishes an interview with Aleksandr Yakovlev, head of a section of the U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences Institute of State and Law, who states that “flight abroad or refusal to return from abroad to the U.S.S.R.” will no longer be viewed as treason under Soviet penal code. January: Edgar Bronfman, President of the World Jewish Congress, proposes that Soviet Jews be permitted to emigrate to Israel in return for lifting the Jackson-Vanik trade bill. Under the proposal emigrants would be given no choice of destination other than Israel. January 3: after being denied a visa on three separate occasions, Andrei Sinyavsky is permitted to visit the Soviet Union to attend the funeral of Yury DanièT. February 13: on the 15th anniversary of Solzhenitsyn's deportation, 1,500 persons gather in Moscow to hear a recording of his voice. February: the émigré poet and translator Aleksandr Glezer announces the creation of an “international association of the intelligentsia” to support the artistic goals of glasnost’ and perestroika in the Soviet Union. February: 6,000 Russian Jews are in Rome and another 1,000 in Vienna waiting for permission to enter other countries, chiefly the United States. March: the monthly journal of the Soviet Peace Committee, Dvadtsaty vek i mir (Twentieth Century and Peace), publishes Solzhenitsyn's essay Live Not by Lie. March: the Centrai House of Writers in Moscow conducts a formal discussion on contemporary émigré literature — the first such meeting to be held in the U.S.S.R. on a formal basis. March 4-9: the editors of Soviet magazine Ogonëk publish a statement denying ever having received a manuscript submitted by Solzhenitsyn for publication. March 16: Moskovskii literator (Moscow Writer) announces that the expulsion of Vladimir Voinovich from the Writers’ Union has been annulled. However, since Voinovich's Soviet citizenship has not been reinstated, he is still ineligible tor membership. March 30: the Presidium of the Ukrainian Writers’ Union posthumously reinstates Victor Nekrasov's membership. April: Natal'ya Reshetovskaya, former wife of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and author of a mid-1970s book critical of him, publishes an article in Sobesednik (Interlocutor) claiming that her book had actually been intended to help Solzhenitsyn but that the censors had cut out much of it and actually written new parts themselves. April: the Book Institute in Moscow conducts a poll and discovers that, depending on the group surveyed, between 73 percent and 83 percent of Soviet readers want to read Solzhenitsyn, 63-77 percent — Galich, 52-76 percent — Brodsky, 61-75 percent — Nekrasov. Sasha Sokolov and Aleksandr Zinov'ev also poll high (exact
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results not given). 71 percent of those surveyed had read Aksdnov, and 50-60 percent want to read more of his works. March: Sovetinterperiodika, a Soviet organization responsible for ordering foreign periodicals, announces that it will purchase part of the print runs of four unnamed émigré publications, which are to be sold at retail by Soyuzpechat', a periodicals-distribution network. May: a group of 22 former political prisoners and Western intellectuals meet in Paris to counter the positive publicity reaped by the U.S.S.R. as a result of its policies of reform. Poet Irina Ratushinksaya states that perestroika is a last-ditch attempt to prop up an ailing system: “Stalin and Khrushchöv would have done the same." May: a group of Soviet World War II veterans writes a letter of protest to the Soviet magazines Yunost’and Ogonêk, claiming that Voinovich's Chonkin is slanderous and blasphemous and should not have been published by these magazines. Ogonêk publishes a rejoinder by a war invalid in No. 25. May 23: Yury Lyubimov's Soviet citizenship is restored. May 26: in Knizhnoe obozrenie Naum Korzhavin declares that “nowadays we have to concentrate on how to write, and not on how to get a manuscript published." Summer: some of the first Pentecostal families arrive in San Francisco during the period of glasnost'. June: Andrei Sinyavsky and Mariya Rozanova make atrip to the Soviet Union. June 30: an open meeting of the 26-member Board of the Soviet Writers’ Union votes unanimously to urge publication of The Gulag Archipelago. The Board also votes to reinstate Solzhenitsyn in the Writers’ Union. July: in an interview published in Time magazine Solzhenitsyn says he won't return to the Soviet Union until his multi-volume epic Red Wheel is available in every bookstore there. He further states that it might even be dangerous for him to return. July 13: Sovetskii pisateT (Soviet Writer) publishers and the magazine Novyi mir announce plans for a seven-volume set of the works of Solzhenitsyn. July 16: the Soviet editor Sergei Zalygin announces that Novyi m/irwill publish Solzhenitsyn's Gulag Archipelago and would have begun issuing other works of his in 1988, except for the fact that Solzhenitsyn demanded that the first work published be The Gulag Arpichelago. July: Vasily Aksönov's The Surplussed Barrelware (Zatovarennaya Bochkotara) is staged by Oleg Tabakov's theatrical studio in Moscow. August: the Soviet film producer Èl'dar Ryazanov writes in Ogoné/cthat he has given up all hope for production of a film based on Vladimir Voinovich's Chonkin. August 24: émigré political scientist Mikhail Agursky predicts (incorrectly) that it is reasonable to expect Solzhenitsyn to return to Russia by the end of the year, probably on the eve of some Church holiday. August 30: the literary critic Natal'ya Ivanova writes in tAoskovskie novosti that the Soviet Union must invite home creative representatives of the Russian emigration but they must not point an accusing finger at those who chose not to emigrate. September 8: the mathematician historian Igor' Shafarevich publishes an article in Literatumaya gazeta accusing Sinyavsky and Aleksandr Zinov'ev of having insulted Russia. Persons who have abandoned their country, he maintains, are incapable of making a contribution to culture.
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September 8: Stanislav Kunyaev, editor of the Soviet monthly Nash sovremannik (Our Contemporary), tells Radio Moscow that he will start publishing Solzhenistyn’s October 1916 in the beginning of 1990. September 8: an editorial in The Baltimore Sun accuses the Soviet authorities of “hypocrisy” and “body snatching” for attempting to return the remains of Sergei Rakhmaninov and Fêdor Shalyapin (Chaliapin) while failing to honor the memory of such victims of Stalin's terror as the poets Marina Tsvetaeva and Osip Mandel'shtam. October: Vladimir Voinovich responds to Èl’dar Ryazanov, presenting his version of the factors which prevented Ryazanov from producing a film based on Chonkin. December 21: Sovetskaya Rossiya (Soviet Russia) publishes an article declaring the émigré literary scholar Lev Kopelev to be ‘unclean ... opportunistic ... professionally impotent ... and a mediocre compiler." 235,000 persons emigrate from the U.S.S.R., of them 47,500 (20.2% ) from Russian proper. Resettlement to Germany doubles from the previous year — to 98,134. The total number of Russian Jews who have arrived in Israel since the early 1970s is 180,000. Izvestiya, Pravda, and Uteratumaya gazeta, in what appears to be a low-key, orchestrated gesture to the émigré community, all publish articles rejecting the former blanket condemnation of the émigrés and calling for a “balanced" approach which would distinguish between those émigrés who are “patriotic” and those who continue to be “anti-Soviet." Purported Jewish emigration: 71,217. Stretets (Archer) begins appearing only annually after having come out over a period of five years as a monthly publication. U.S. President George Bush requests $85 million to meet additional Soviet refugees admissions requirements. U.S. Senator Frank Lautenberg, a New Jersey Democrat successfully proposes a law granting special asylum to Soviet Jews, Pentecostais, and other religious groups. Selected publications: 1. Yuz Aleshkovsky, The Broken Dog: Tuiy Tales (Slomannaya sobaka: Malen'kie povesti), Mount Holyoke, Massachusetts. 2. Gennady Val'dberg, The Flower (Tsvetok), Jerusalem. 3. Aleksandr Gidoni, Homo Eros: A Cycle of Novels (Khomo Èros: Novellotsikl), New York. 4. Viktor Ènyutin, An Offended Dionysius: A Novel in Polytexts (Obizhennyi Dionis: roman v politekstakh), Monterey. 5. Yury Druzhnikov, Angels on the Head of a Pin: A Novel (Angely na konchike igly: Roman), New York. 6. Dmitry Bobyshev, Saint Anthon/s Bestiary (Zveri Svyatogo Antoniya: Bestiarii), New York. 7. Vladimir Matlin,
The Liberzon Effect (Èffekt Liberzona:
Dvenadtsaf
rasskazov), Tenafly, New Jersey. 8. Vladimir Solov'Sv, Operation Mausoleum (Operatsiya Mavzolei), New York. The following writers emigrate: poet Aleksandr Barash, poet and editor Pôtr
Vegin.
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Deaths: prose writers Gleb Glinka, Vasily Yanovsky; prose writer and poet Meta Roos; poet Ivan Bazilevsky.
1990 January: a Soviet historian writing in Nedelya (Week) notes with surprise the “massive rebirth of the White movement” February 6: an East German citizens group, the Initiative for Peace and Human Rights, calls upon the Modrow government to issue blanket permission for immigration of Soviet Jews. March 16: Literatumaya Rossiya (Literary Russia) publishes an article written by a Russian émigré in Munich, Sergei Soldatov, who calls for an end to Russophobia and for a Russian renaissance. Quoting the New York émigré Aleksandr Yanov, Soldatov claims the life of the Third Wave has been a light vaudeville” thanks to the fact that the bulk of capital resources in the world are in Jewish hands. April: the poet Vladimir Salimon announces plans of the “Soviet-West German” publishing house Vsya Moskva (All of Moscow) to issue an almanac bringing together Soviet and émigré writers with the goal of presenting the “united literary front of the 1970S -1980S ."
Spring: using the name Sokhnut, the Jewish Agency opens offices in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Kiev, and seven other cities of the former Soviet Union. May 15: Vasily Aksönov states that “inner censorship” is a reality for American writers. May: the Krestovsky Island Library in Leningrad devotes a reading room to Russian émigré publications. Roughly 1,500 journals and books are made available under the sponsorship of the Fund for Free Russian Modem Art. April: the prose writer Arkady LVov visits his home city of Odessa for the first time since emigrating in 1976: “For some reason, I'm not sure why, I feel more at home in Paris or Vienna than I do in Odessa. Maybe it's the faces. These aren't the faces I knew. I don't know what it is...." May 20: the Soviet Ministry of Foreign Affairs announces that the Soviet government has proposed that the United States open its doors more widely to Soviet Jewish émigrés. June: Georgy Volosevich [Vladimov] makes his first trip to the Soviet Union since emigrating in 1983 and gives an interview in which he refers to himself as a “fourth-generation émigré” and expresses disagreement with Vladimir Maksimov, who supposedly stated that the center of Russian publishing has moved back to Moscow. June 6: in an inteview granted to Pravda Aleksandr Zinov'ev states that he “sees no tragedy in an émigré writer living and working in the W est" June 13: Pravda publishes an article by an émigré who returned to Russia after living in Israel; he states that the time has come for émigrés to come home. July 13: Literatumaya gazeta threatens New York émigré political scientist Aleksandr Yanov with a slander suit for claiming that the paper is rapidly being transformed into an arm of Russian fascism. July 20: an exhibition of works by and photographs of Russian émigré writers opens in Moscow with more than 600 books and magazines on display. July 27: the First-Wave writer and editor Zinaida Shakhovskaya complains of distortions in her interview granted to Soviet journalist and writer Feliks Medvedev.
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August: by decree of the President of the U.S.S.R., citizenship is restored to persons stripped of Soviet citizenship in the period 1966-1988, including such émigré writers as Vasily Aksdnov, Irina Ratushinskaya, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Valery Tarsis (posthumously), and Vladimir Voinovich. August 8: Kronid Lyubarsky, editor of the Munich-based Strana i mir, states that the journal, which has had a circulation of as many as 3,500 copies (largely smuggled into the Soviet Union for free distribution), may soon move from Munich to the U.S.S.R. (It ceases publication in the summer of 1992.) September: Aleksandr Zinov'ev publishes an article in Komsomofskaya pravda depicting life in the West in extremely negative terms. January-September: 305,000 citizens of the former U.S.S.R. receive exit visas. November 24: Izvestiya publishes an article on Voinovich's satirical novel with the subtitle T h e Year 2042 has arrived in Moscow far earlier than one would have expected." December: Boris Eltsyn addresses “countrymen abroad,” assuring them that if they wish to help in achieving a Russian renaissance, their knowledge and experience will be accepted with gratitude. 452,300 persons emigrate from the Soviet Union, of whom 103,600 (22.9%) are from the Russian Federation. According to the Soviet Ministry of Interior Affairs KGB Chief Vladimir Kryuchkov, 59 percent of visa applicants are rejected. Nearly 60% go to Israel, one third go to Germany, and only 2.9 percent to the United States. Purported Jewish emigration: 213,042. A relative of Boris Savinkov hands over the latter's literary archive to the Soviet Cultural Fund. Posev Publishers in Munich opens an office in Moscow. The U.S. Immigration Act of 1990 raises the worldwide immigration ceiling from 270,000 a year to 700,000 for 1992-94, and 675,000 from 1995 onward. Founded: the magazines Russkii kufer (Russian Courier, Paris) and Kamera khraneniya (Checkroom, SL Petersburg). Selected publications: 1. Alla Ktorova, Sweet Gift (Sladostnyi dar), Washington, D.C. 2. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, How We Can Fix Russia (Kak nam obustroif Rossiyu), Moskovskii komsomolets, September 18. 3. Mara Fel'dman, Look at Your Heart (Vzglyani na serdtse tvoê), Israel. 4. Arkady LVov, Chimeras: A Novel (Khimery: Roman), New York. 5. David Arans, Biblbgraphy of Russian Books Published Outside the Borders of the U.S.S.R.: 1980-1989 (Bibliografiya russkikh knig, izdannykh zapredelam i SSSR: 1980-1989), Washington, D.C. 6. Maksim Shraer, Tabun nad lugom (Herd Above the Meadow), New York. 7. Igor1 Efimov, Sed'maya zhena (The Seventh Wife), Tenafly, New Jersey. The following poets emigrate: Elena Ignatova, Andrei Gritsman, Vadim Groisman, Aleksandr Perchikov, Sara Pogréb. The literary scholar and philosopher Nikolai Poltoratsky returns to Russia for the first time since 1944, delivers a lecture at St. Petersburg University, and dies a few hours later in his hotel room. Other deaths: the Soviet literary scholar specializing in émigré literature Anatoly Alekseev; poets Lev Druskin and Tamara Velichkovskaya; prose writers Sergei
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Dovtatov and Rodion Akul'shin [Rodion Berözov]; poet and memoirist Irina Odoevtseva; historian Sergei Zen’kovsky; art historian Evgeny Klimov; theologian Kirill Fotiev.
1991 February: the last date by which Soviet Jews in East Germany supposedly can request and receive asylum in the unified Germany. February 1: the New York newspaper Russkii golos celebrates its 74th anniversary, although it appears to have been founded in 1907, rather than 1917. February 10: a ‘ Day of Confidence” is declared by AKTIV (Steering Group for Culture, Creativity, and Art [Aktiv kultury, tvorchestva, iskusstva]) in support of democracy in Russia with the support of a number of émigré writers, including Vasily Aksênov, Joseph Brodsky, Vladimir Maksimov, and Vladimir Voinovich. February 13-15: a symposium on Russian émigré theater is held at the Harvard Theatre Collection, Cambridge, Massachusetts. February 15-March 1: according to a poll conducted by the U.S. Information Agency, 35 percent of Russian males under 40 from medium- and large-sized cities with higher education want to go abroad for a long period or emigrate! May: the Soviet critic Evgeny Ovanesyan in Mobdayagvardiya (Young Guard) calls Voinovich's novel Chonkin ... a moral and artistic joke. 4 May 5: the Russian émigré writer Èduard Limonov denounces the statement of the Soviet chapter of PEN Club condemning violence by Soviet agents in Lithuania as treason. May 20: by a vote of 320 to 37, with 32 abstentions, the Supreme Soviet passes a ‘ Law on Exit and Entry of U.S.S.R. Citizens” giving every Soviet citizen the right to a passport, valid for five years, for travel anywhere. Soviet estimates of the number of Soviet citizens who could head for the West range from three to eight million. August 19-31: the Supreme Soviet of the Russian Federation conducts in Moscow a ‘Congress of Countrymen” (Kongress sootechestvennikov) in Moscow, chaired by Mikhail Tolstoi. The announced goal of the Congress is to heal the wounds of the past and ‘unite the soul of Russia, which has been scattered throughout the world." The Congress is attended by 417 persons from 26 countries. The largest delegation (147) is from the United States, followed by France (50), Australia (38), England (about 30), and Germany (21). The session coincides with an aborted putsch. The Congress is preceded by a demand on the part of conservative émigré figures that Jews be excluded as alien to Russia. (The Congress is reconvened in S t Petersburg in 1992 and in Moscow in 1993). September 17: the Soviet Union declares groundless the treason charges against Solzhenitsyn, who has announced his plan to return home wthout indicating a date. October 15: in Moscow the Cultural Fund (Kul'tumyi fond) together with the magazine Kulft/moe nasledie (Cultural Heritage) arrange an evening in honor of Novyi zhumal. Editor Yury Kashkarov and frequent contributor Igor’ Chinnov are present. October 16: the Central Writers’ Home (Tsentral'nyi dom literatorov) arranges a second evening in honor of Novyi zhumal. November 6: 74 year old Grand Duke Vladimir Kirillovich, Pretender to the Russian throne, visits Russia for the first time (he dies the following year.) December 31 : the Soviet Union ceases to exist, and 36 million russophones (25 million ethnic Russians plus 11 million persons of non-Russian ethnic heritage) abruptly find themselves living in foreign countries.
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328,000 persons emigrate from the U.S.S.R., 88.3 percent of them from the Russian Federation. Purported Jewish emigration: 179,720. The magazine Nashi vesti (Our News) celebrates its 50th anniversary, the Los Angeles newspaper Panorama its 10th, the magazine Veche its 10th, and YMCA Press its 70th. Russian émigrés in Germany issue a “call for caution” in permitting the breakup of the Russian empire. 45% of officially recognized refugees in California are from the former Soviet Union. Confidential internal memos of the U.S. Internal Immigration and Naturalization Service indicate a “cottage industry” has developed to practice “astronomical fraud” under the relaxed refugee standard of the Lautenberg Amendment New arrivals in Israel write to their friends and relatives in the termer Soviet Union of difficult housing and work conditions in Israel, and the flow of emigration to that country is drastically reduced. At the same time Israeli immigration authorities say they expect one million Soviet Jews to arrive by the end of 1993. Following the failed August coup in Moscow, Russian Pentecostal leaders encourage their followers to “flee from Babylon before it is consumed by plagues and fire." Selected publications: 1. Yury Kashkarov, Words of Tsars and Days [Slovesa tsarei i dnei], New York. 2. Anatoly Gladilin, I Was Murdered by the Animal Pell [Menya ubil skotina Pell], Moscow. 3. Aleksei Kovalöv, What's Hecuba to Him? (Chto emu Gekuba), Boston. 4. Vladimir Tsveibakh, Profites (Profili), Florence. 5. Valery Skorov, Raviniya, New York. 6. Aleksandr Ocheretyansky, A Portrait That Won't FA in the Frame (Ne vlezayushchii v ramu portret), New York. 7. Rina Levinzon, First Hom e— Last Home (Pervyi dom — poslednii dom), TelAviv. 8. Ina Bliznetsova, A View of the Sky (Vid na nebo), Tenafly, New Jersey. 9. Mark Kogan, Caprices of a Scornful Star (Zabavy nasmeshlivoi zvezdy), New York. 10. Mikhail Armalinsky, Voluntary Confessions — Forced Correspondence (Dobrovol'nye priznaniya — Vynuzhdennaya perepiska), Minneapolis. The political scientist Mikhail Agursky dies of a heart attack in the Hotel Rossiya in Moscow during the failed coup. The prose writer Natal'ya H'ina dies. Graffito on William Howard Taft Bridge in Washington, D.C., next to office of John Glad: “Trotsky lives!"
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Secondary Sources •A* Abramova, G 'g a 1988. “Vtoraya lastochka,’ Moskovskie novosti, April 10. Abusch, Alexander. 1947. “Die Begegnung: Die innere und die äußere Emigration in der deutschen Literatur,” Aufbau, No. 10. Abyzov, Yury. 1990*91. Russkoe pechatnoe slovo vLatvii, 4 volumes, Stanford. Acoutrier, Michel. 1981. “"Les revues de l'émigration et de la dissidence russes,” Le Débat, Feb., No. 9, 72-79. Adamovich (Adamovitch), Georgy (Georges). 1949. L'autre patrie, Paris. ------- . 1955. Odinochestvo i svoboda, New York. Afanas'ev. Anatoly. L 1985. Polyn’ v chuzhikh polyakh, Minsk. ------- . 1990-ongoing. Literatura russkogo zarubezhya: Antologiya vshestitomakh, Moscow. Afanas'ev, Yury. 1988. “Fenomen Vladimira Nabokova Novyi mir. No. 5,210*213). -------------. 1988. Uteraturnaya Rossiya, No. 24. Agursky, Mikhail. 1980, Ideologiya natsional-bol'shevizma, Paris. ------------ . 1989. “Waiting for Solzhenitsyn to Return,” Jerusalem Post, Aug 24, pg. 4. Aksakov, I. S. 1886, Biografiya Fedora Ivanovichs Tyutcheva, Moscow. Aksénov, V.; Bukovsky, V.; Kuznetsov, È.; Lyubimov, Yu.; Maksimov, V. Neizvestny, È.; Orlov, Yu.; Plyushch, L ; Zinov’ev, A.; Znov'ev, O. 1987. “Is ‘Glasnosf a Game of Mirrors?", New York Times, March 22. Russian text: “Pusf Gorbachev predostavit nam dokazatel'stva,” Moskovskie novosti. No. 13, March 29. Aksénov, Vasily. 1989. “Chuvstvo Rossii,” Strelets, 148-153. -------------. 1994, conversation with John Glad, Washington, D.C., December 14. Aksénov, Korzhavin, Kostsinsky, Efimov, Popovsky. 1985. “Soyuz reptilii,” Strana i mir, No. 6. Akulov, 1 .1986. ‘‘‘Shrapnel" iTsRU,” Radio Liberty monitoring of Golos rodiny, No 13 (2521). Aldanov, Mark. "O polozhenii èmigrantskoi literatury," Sovremennye zapiski. No. 61, 400*409. Alékhin, M. 1934. “Èmigratsiya belaya,” Bol'shaya sovetskaya èntsiklopediya, first edition, vol. 64, 159-176. Aleshkovsky, Yuz. 1988. Interviewed by Gennady Faibusovich, “Poverkh bar'erov: Kul'tumo-politicheskii zhumal,” Radio Liberty, July 29*30. -------------. 1991. Telephone conversation with John Glad, Washington, D. C., Middletown, Connecticut, Jan. 1. Alexeyeva, Ludmilla. 1985. Soviet Dissent: Contemporary Movements for National, Religious, and Human Rights, translated by John Glad and Carol Pearce, Middletown, Connecticut. Almazov, Aleksei. 1989. Interview conducted by John Glad in Washington, Dec. 7, unpublished. Al'seika, Vitautas. 1972. “Ispoved1èmigranta," Komsomol'skaya pravda, December
2. Alékhin, M. 1933. "Razmeshchenie èmigratsii,” Bol'shaya sovetskaya èntsiklopediya (first edition), Vol. 64, 164-165. Andreevsky, 1.1890-1917. Èntsiklopedicheskii slovar', Brokgauz i Efron, Moscow. Annenkov, Pavel. 1928. Literaturnye vospominaniya, Leningrad. Anninsky, Lev. 1988. “Vozrashchenie k Nabokovu,” Moskovskie novosti. No. 18.
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Annotated Index of Personal Names Aas, Maksim [Lev Maksim], arrested by the Germans in 1941 or 1942; 198 Abd al-Majid (1823-1861), Ottoman sultan 1839-61; 153 Abram, Morris (b. 1918), Chairman of the Conference of presidents of major American Jewish organizations; 387, 603 Abramov, Fëdor Fëdorovich, W hite Army general; 555 Abramov, Nikolai, suspected m ember of Soviet terrorist organization; 572 [Abramovich, R.], see: Rein, Rafail [Achair, Aleksei], see: Gryzov, Aleksei Alekseevich AdamoviC, L , Latvian Minister of Education in 1930s; 197 Adamovich, Georgy Viktorovich (1892-1972), poet and critic, emigr.: 1923; 138, 149, 168, 170, 176, 250, 253, 255, 260, 2 6 1 ,2 6 2 , 265, 266, 270, 297, 338, 340, 423, 428, 535, 544, 555, 559, 568, 577, 588 Addison, Joseph (1672-1719), English essayist; 244 Adenauer, Konrad (1876-1967), First W est German Chancellor; 362, 577 Aeschylus (525-45c B.C .), Greek founder of tragedy; 30 Afanas'ev, Anatoly L , Soviet literary critic; 479, 600 Afanas’ev, Yury Nikolaevich (b. 1934), historian and political activist; 606 Agafonov, Aleksei Semënovich (1746-1792), translator, lived in China 17711782; 216 [Ageev, M.], see: Levi, Mark Agnivtsev, Nikolai Yakovlevich (1888-1932), poet, emigr.: 1921, returned to Russia: 1923; 184, 530, 535, 549 Agranov [Sorendson], Yakov Saulovich (1893-1939), senior communist official and member of G PU; 140, 141 Agursky, Mikhail (Melik) Samuilovich (1933-1991), political scientist, emigr.: 1975; 610, 615 Aikhenval'd, Aleksandr Yul'evlch (1899-1941), Soviet economist and son of Yuly Aikhenval'd, executed; 303 Aikhenval'd, Yuly Isaevich [Yu. Al'd, B. Kamenetsky] (1872-1928), critic and poet, deported from the Soviet Union: 1922; 148, 303, 530, 531,
545 Aikhenval'd, Yury Aleksandrovich (b. 1928), non-émigré writer and political dissident, grandson of Yuly Aikhenval'd; 160 Akhmatova, Anna Andreevna (1889-1966), poet; 135, 142, 146, 164, 166, 249, 260, 343, 366, 465, 469, 472, 568 Aksakov, Konstantin Sergeevich (1817-1860), Slavophile ideologue and journalist; 79, 495, 496 Aksel'rod, Pavel [Paul', Pinkhus] Borisovich (1850-1928), Men'shevik political figure, emigr.: 1874, in Russia 1875 and 1879, returned to Russia in 1917, later remigrated; 120, 212
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641
Aksênov, Vasily Pavlovich (b. 1932), novelist, emigr.: 1980; 26, 394, 422, 427, 431, 438, 440, 455, 456, 457, 462, 479, 594, 595, 596, 603, 604, 610, 612, 613, 614
Akul’shln [Berezov], Rodion Mikhailovich (1891 or 1896-1988 or 1990), Second-W ave prose writer; 614
[Aldanov, Mark], see: Landau, Mark Aleksandrovich Alegrla, Fernando (b. 1918), Chilean writer who emigrated to the United States after the overthrow of the Allende government in 1973; 418
Aleksandr, a fourteenth-century deacon who travelled to Constantinople; 41, 491
Aleksandr I (1888-1934), prince regent of Serbia and king of Serbia, studied in Russia 1899-1909; 180, 182, 183, 321, 551, 549 Aleksandr I (1777-1825), Tsar; 55, 69, 518 Aleksandr II (1818-1881), Tsar, assassinated; 52, 57, 61, 80, 81, 84, 88, 90, 102, 103, 172, 212, 499, 506 Aleksandr III (1845-1894), Tsar; 91, 103, 508, 510 Aleksandr Nevsky (1220-1263), prince of Novgorod; 320 Aleksandra Fedorovna (1798-1860), wife of Tsar Nikolai I; 165 Aleksandra Fedorovna (1872-1918), Tsaritsa, wife of Nikolai II; 281 Aleksandrov, V. G., First-W ave writer; 551 Aleksandrov, Pëtr Nikolaevich (1863-1932), First-W ave poet; 549 [Aleksandrova, Vera], see: Shvarts, Vera Aleksandrovsky-Adams, Vladimir (Valmar) (1899-1993), Russian-Estonian poet; 201 Alekseev, Anatoly Dmitrievich (1922-1990) Soviet literary scholar specializing in Russian émigré literature; 613 Alekseev, Gleb Vasil'evich [Charnotsky] (1892-1938 or 1943 or 1944), prose writer and critic, emigr.: 1917, returned to Russia: 1923; 160, 250, 526, 535, 558 Alekseev, Nikandr Alekseevich (1891-1963), First-W ave poet, returned to Russia: 1920; 526 Alekseev, Nikolai Nikolaevich (1879-1964), prose writer and legal specialist;
153, 553, 582 Alekseev, Vasily Ivanovich, Second-W ave writer; 575 [Alekseeva, Lidiya], see: Devel', Lidiya Alekseevna Alekseeva, Lyudmila Mikhailovna (b. 1927), essayist, historian, emigr.: 1977; 438
Aleksei Mikhailovich (1629-1676), Tsar; 67, 78, 291, 493 Aleksei Petrovich (1690-1718), son of Pëtr I (Peter the Great), fled to Russia when his conspiracy
against his father was discovered, forcibly
returned and executed; 50, 285 Aleksinskaya, Tat'yana Ivanovna (1886-1968) journalist and historian; 275 Aleksinsky, Grigory Alekseevich (1879-1967), prose writer; 528
642
JOHN GLAD
Aleshkovsky, Iosif (Yuz) Efimovich (b. 1929), novelist, emigr.: 1979; 2 0 ,4 2 1 , 458, 460, 462, 595, 596, 611
Alland, Aleksandr, First-W ave poet and prose writer; 539 Allllueva, Svetlana Iosifovna (b. 1926), memoirist, emigr.: 1967; returned to Russia: 1984; re-emigrated: 1985; 393, 584, 585, 599, 601, 606 [Allin, Andrei], see: Blyum, Andrei Al'tamentov [Kasim], Andrei Ivanovich (1893-1956), poet, Germ an prisoner of w ar in 1942, left for U.S.A. 1951; 561, 573, 578 Alyab'ev, N., First-W ave poet; 219 Alymov, Sergei Yakovlevich (1892-1948), poet and literary critic, emigr.: 1911, returned to Russia: 1926; 219, 518, 526, 540, 571 Amal'rik, Andrei Alekseevich (1938-1980), historian and playwright, emigr.: 1976; 393, 582, 585, 586, 591, 596 Amfiteatrov, Aleksandr Valentinovich (1862-1938), prose writer, critic, playwright, poet, lived abroad in late 1880s, 1904-1916, fled abroad in 1921; 138, 205, 236, 290, 320, 512, 513, 514, 517, 521, 530, 545, 546, 558, 560 Amfiteatrov [Kadashev], Vladimir Aleksandrovich (1888-1942), prose writer and literary historian, son of Aleksandr Amfiteatrov; 160, 176 Anastasy (Gribanovsky) (1873-1965), Metropolitan of the Russian church in exile, emigr.: 1919; 322, 331 Anatra, M. Æ, First-W ave émigré; 160 Anaxagoras (c. 500 B.C.-c. 428 B.C .), G reek philosopher; 99 Andersen, Larissa Nikolaevna [Larisa Baranova] (b. 1914), poet, returned to Soviet Union from China at end of World W ar II; 220, 222, 343, 560 Anderson, Anna, see: Schanzkowska Andreenko-Nechltailo, Mikhail Fedorovich (1894-1982), artist, emigr.: 1920;
526 Andreev, Daniil Leonidovich (1906-1959), son of Leonid Andreev, poet, condemned to twenty-five years imprisonment in 1948 but released in 1955; 65, 570, 577 [Andreev, G.j. see: Khomyakov [Andreev, German], see: Fain Andreev, Leonid Nikolaevich (1871-1919), prose writer, lived much of later life in Finland; 64, 65, 204, 278, 514, 515, 516, 517, 523, 524, 525, 569, 570, 577, 605 Andreev, Nikolai Efremovich (1908-1982), literary scholar, family moved to Estonia in 1919, arrested by Soviet army in 1945, released and emigrated via Berlin in 1947; 15, 178, 318 Andreev, Vadim Leonidovich (1902-1976), poet and prose writer, son of Leonid Andreev, emigr.: 1917, returned to Russia: 1947; 250, 545, 569, 592 Andreeva, Tamara, First-W ave poet; 219
Andreeva, Vlktorlya Alekseevna (b. 1942), poet, emigr.: 1974; 589
RUSSIA ABROAD
643
Andropov, Yury Vladimirovich (1914-1984), General Secretary of the CPSU ; 443, 589, 600
Anichkov, Evgeny Vasil'evich (1866-1937), prose writer and literary historian, sent abroad on government affairs repeatedly before revolution, lived in Paris in late 1890s and early 1900s, lived permanently abroad as of 1917; 178, 556 Anichkov, V. P., First-W ave prose writer; 227 Anichkova, see: Taube, Sofiya Anichkova, Anna Mitrofanovna [Ivan Strannik] (1868-1935), prose writer, critic, and translator, wife of Evgeny Anichkov, abroad at turn of century; 554
Anisfel'd, Boris (Ber) Izrailevich (1879-1973), artist, emigr.: 1918; 523 Anna Ivanovna (1693-1740), Tsaritsa; 51 Anna Yaroslavovna (eleventh century), daughter of Yaroslav the W ise and wife of French King Henry I, evidently returned to Russia; 3 3 ,4 9 0 , 557
Annenkov, Pavel Vasil'evich (1812 or 1813-1887), memoirist, critic, prose writer, lived abroad much of 1830s and 1840s, settled abroad permanently as of m id-1860s; 48, 164, 172, 496, 497, 505, 508 Annenkov, Yury Pavlovich [Boris Temlryazev] (1889-1974), prose writer, studied abroad 1911-1913, defected in 1924; 290, 338, 538, 583, 584, 590 Annensky, Innokenty Fëdorovlch (1856-1909), poet, playwright, literary critic, translator; 262, 366 Anninsky, Lev Aleksandrovich (b. 1934), non-émigré literary critic; 606 Anrep, Boris Vasil'evich (1883-1969), poet, critic, artist, studied and lived abroad for a number of years before being sent to England as a diplomat in 1916, remaining in Western Europe until his death; 146,
521 Anri, V. A., First-W ave editor; 237 Anstel, Ol'ga Nikolaevna (1912-1985), poet, emigr.: 1943, left Europe for Am erica in 1950; 346, 365, 563, 572, 601 [Ant, Vladimir], see: Tripol'sky Antonios IV, fourteenth century, Patriarch of Constantinople; 35 Antonova-All, Elena Anatol'evna (b. 189? or 1904), poet; 565 Antony (eleventh-twelfth centuries), Archbishop of Novgorod, pilgrim; 34,490 Antony (Aleksei Pavlovich Khrapovitsky) (1863-1936), Metropolitan of Kiev and later head of Russian Church Abroad, evacuated to Poland in 1918 but soon returned to Russia, emigr.: 1920; 138, 139, 527 [Apfel'baum], see: Zinov'ev, Grigory [Apollinaire], see: Kostrowltsky Apreleva, Elena Ivanovna [E. Ardov] (1846-1923), prose writer, translator, memoirist; 60, 503, 505, 535
Arabazhin, Konstantin Ivanovich (1865-1929), literary historian; 205
644
JOHN GLAD
Arans, David L'vovich (b. 1946), bibliographer-specialist on Russian ém igré literature, emigr.: 1975; 17, 613 [Ardov], see: Apreleva [Argus], see: Èizenshtadt, Mikhail Konstantinovich [Armallnsky, Mikhail], see: Pel'tsman, Mikhail Izrailevich Arnold, Matthew (1822-1888), British poet, essayist and critic; 91, 469, 483 Arnol'di, Nina (Anna) Aleksandrovna (18437-1921), novelist, emigr.: either late 1860s or early 1870s; 506, 530 Arnol'dov, Lev Valentinovich (1887-1968), poet and essayist; 219 Aronson, Grigory Yakovlevich (1887-1968), poet and memoirist; 317 Arsen'ev, Nikolai Sergeevich (1888-1977), theologian, emigr.: 1920; 530, 569, 593 Artsybashev, Mikhail Petrovich (1878-1927), prose writer, playwright, journalist, emigr.: 1923; 190, 277, 278, 535, 539, 543 Artunov, A. Æ, First-W ave member of Social Revolutionary Party; 119 [Arzhak, Nikolai], see: Daniel’ Aseev, Nikolai Nikolaevich (1889-1963), poet, emigr.: 19177, returned to Russia: 1922; 219, 268, 532 Ash, Sholem (1880-1957), Jewish writer; 376 Ashklnazl, Vladimir Aleksandrovich [V. Azov] (1873-1941 or 1948), humorous prose writer, playwright and poet, emigr.: 1926; 541 Ass, Maksim Mikhailovich [Lev Maksim, M. Mikhailov] (1874-19417) FirstW ave journalist; 198 Astrov, Nikolai Ivanovich (1868-1934), last mayor of Moscow during tsarist period, emigr.: 1920; 113, 117 Astrov, Vladimir (1885-1944), prose writer and philosopher; 565 Atatürk; Kemal (former name: Mustafa, Kemal (1881-1938), founder of modern Turkey; 151 Auden, Wystan Hugh (W. H.) (1907-1973), Anglo-American poet; 466 Avenarius, Richard (1843-1896), Germ an philosopher; 93 Averchenko, Arkady Timofeevich (1881-1925), prose writer, emigr.: 1920; 190, 249, 287, 288, 289, 526, 528, 539, 582 Avigur, Shaul (1899-1978) key figure in Haganah and senior israeli government official; 375, 576 Avksent’ev, Nikolai Dmitrievich (1878-1943), Minister of Foreign Affairs in Provisional Government, one of editors of Sovrem ennye zap iski and R usskie zapiski, abroad: 1899-1905, 1907-1917, deported by the Kolchak government in 1918; 23, 165, 169, 236, 528, 540 Avtorkhanov, Abdurrakhman (1908-1997), Second-W ave historian and political scientist; 432 Aw akum Petrovich (1620 or 1621-1682), memoirist, sent into internal exile in Siberia in 1653, returned to Moscow in 1663, exiled to W hite S ea area in 1667; 67, 68, 70, 493 Azbel', Mark Ya. (b. 1932), leader of Soviet Jewish movement; 444, 597
RUSSIA ABROAD
645
Azof (Azev), Evno Fishelevich (1869-1918), terrorist, revealed to be a double agent of the Okhranka and the revolutionaries by Vladimir Burtsev in 190, fled abroad in 1892, back in Russia: 1898-1901, 1907; 88, 91, 187, 516
Babchenko, M. [Magdalina Afanas'evna Bars] (1902-1929), First-W ave novelist; 546
Babel', Isaak Èmmanuilovich (1894-1940), prose writer, visted the W est three times, first in 1927-1928, perished in the purges; 1 4 7 ,1 4 8 , 249, 262, 542, 559 Babenko-Woodbury, Viktoriya Aleksandrovna (b. 1924), poet, emigr.: 1942, returned and then remigrated: 1945; 334, 562, 588 Babënyshev, Sergei [Maksudov], Third-W ave demographer; 438 Babich, Olesya (b. 1974), poet, emigr.: 1980; 595 Babich, Pavel Aleksandrovich (b. 1933), poet, emigr.: 1980; 595 Bacon, Francis (1561-1626), English statesman, man of letters, proponent of scientific method; 298 [Bagritsky], see: Dzyubin Baidalakov, Viktor Mikhailovich (18997-1967), NTS political leader; 1 8 3 ,3 5 0 Baikln, Vsevolod S. (1898-7), First-W ave poet; 188, 190 Baiov [Gotviir], Aleksei Alekseevich (7-1923), Russian poet in Estonia; 201, 535 Bakhmetev, Boris Aleksandrovich (1880-1951), chemist and ambassador of the Provisional Government to the United States 1916-1922; 170,228,
531, 554 Bakhrakh, Aleksandr Vasil'evich (1902-1985), critic, emigr.: 1920; 56, 595, 601, 605
Bakhrakh, Gita; 414 Bakhtin, Nikolai Mikhailovich (1894 or 1895-1950), poet and linguist, elder brother of Mikhail Bakhtin, literary theorist, emigr.: 19207; 168, 573 Bakinsky, Vadim Viktorovich [Vadim Nechaev] (b. 1937), prose writer, emigr.: 1978; 594 [Baklanov], see: Fridman Baksheev, A. P. (1873-7), head of Office of Russian Émigré Affairs in Manchuria, opened in 1938; 316 [Bakst], see: Rozenberg, Lev Bakst, Vladimir O ., revolutionary émigré; 500 Bakunin, Mikhail Aleksandrovich (1814-1876), revolutionary, emigr.: 1840, extradited back to Russia in 1850, fled to Western Europe via Japan in 1861; 60, 62, 85, 86, 164, 172, 496-499, 501-505, 510 Bakunina, Ekaterina Vasil'evna (1889-1976), poet and prose writer, worked in Alaska before 1917, emigr.: early 1920s; 227, 250 Bakunina, Tat’yana Aleksandrovna (1815-1871), sister of Nikolai Bakunin; 87
Balakshin, Pëtr P. (1898-1990), prose writer; 227, 358 Baldwin, James (1924-1987), black American expatriate novelist; 23
646
JOHN GLAD
Baletsky, Emel'yan D. (b. 1919), poet and prose writer; 211 [Baliev, Nikita], see: Balyan, Mkritich Balyan, Mkritich Asvadurovich [Nikita Fëdorovich Baliev] (1876 or 18871936), actor and theater director, emigr.: 1920; 293, 295 Bal'mont, Konstantin Dmitrievich (1867-1942), poet, emigr.: 1920; 114,165, 249, 257, 258, 265, 328, 510, 512, 514, 518, 519, 526, 537, 551, 563 BaltruSaitis, Jurgis (Georgy Kazimirovich) (1873-1944), bi-lingual RussianLithuanian poet and prose writer, left Latvia in 1939; 518, 558, 565 Balzac, Honoré de (1799-1850), French novelist; 62 Barabtarlo, Gennady Aleksandrovich (b. 1949), poet, emigr.: 1979; 595 Baranov, Vadim Il'ich (b. 1930), Soviet literary critic; 428, 429 Barash, Pavel Aleksandrovich (b. 1960), poet; 611 Baratynsky, Evgeny Abramovich (1800-1844), poet, spent much tim e in Finland; 366, 496, 497 Barlkhnovsky, Grigory, non-émigré historian; 593 Bar-Or, Roman Semënovlch (b. 1953), poet, emigr.: 1979; 595 [Bars, Magdalina Afanas'evna], see: Babchenko, M Barskaya, Ol'ga Viktorovna [Ol'ga Denisova] (b. 1944), poet, emigr.: 1981; 596 [Bart, Sergei], see: Kapel'man Baryatinsky, Vladimir Vladimirovich (1874-1941), prose writer, memoirist, emigr.: 1914; 520 [Bashilov, Boris], see: Tamartsev Bashkirova, Irina, First-W ave poet; 201 Bashkirtseva, Mariya Konstantinovna (1860-1884), keeper of diary, emigr.: 1870; 507
[Baskov, Aleksandr] (b. 1937), prose writer, emigr.: 1977; 592 Basova, Irina Borisovna (b. 1937), poet and critic, emigr.: 1980; 595 Batchan, Aleksandr Matveevich (b. 1953), journalist, critic, essayist, emigr.: 1973.; 438
Baturin, Kirill (d. 1971), First-W ave poet; 222 Batyushkov, Konstantin Nikolaevich (1787-1855), poet and essayist, in France with victorious Russian army in 1812 and diplomat in Naples 1819-1820; 498 Baukh, Efrem Itskhokovich (b. 1934), emigr.: prose writer and poet; 414 Baumvol', Rakhll' L'vovna (b. 1914), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1971; 414, 587 Bazhenova, Taisiya A., First-W ave poet; 219, 227 Bazilevskaya, Elizaveta Alfredovna (née Roos) (1902-1951), First-W ave poet, sister of M eta Roos; 250 Bazilevsky, Ivan Viktorovich (1898-1989), First-W ave poet; 201, 612 Bebutova, Ol'ga Mikhailovna (Georgievna) (1879-1952), prose writer, emigr.: shortly after revolution; 543, 575
RUSSIA ABROAD
647
B echer, Johannes R obert (1891-1958), German writer in Russian exile 19351945; 310 B eckett, Sam uel (1907-1989), Irish-French prose writer and playwright; 291 B eecher-S tow e, H arriet (1811-1896), American novelist; 204 B ein, Io sif Zalm anovich (b. 1934), poet, emigr.: 1971; 414, 587 B ek-S oflev, Y u ry B orisovich [Y ury S oflev] (1899-1975), poet, returned to Russia; 1948; 184, 250, 252, 570, 591 [B elavina, N onna], see: M iklashevskaya B el'denlnov, S ergei I., prose writer; 324 B ellnkov, A rkady V iktorovich (1921-1970), defected: 1968; 25, 371, 372, 373, 393, 584, 586, 591 B elinsky, V issarion G rigor'evich (1811-1848), critic, abroad 1847; 4 6 ,5 7 ,5 8 , 62, 86, 497 B eloborodova, S o fiya Ivanovna (7-1930), First-W ave poet; 547 B elo sel'sky-B elozersky, S ergei, prominent émigré social activist; 213, 570, 571, 574 B elotserkovsky, Vadim V ladim irovich (b. 1928), journalist, emigr.: 1972; 379, 401, 441, 591, 598 B elotsvetov, N ikolai A leksandrovich (1863-1935), publisher, left Latvia for Yugoslavia in 1932; 196, 197 B elotsvetov, N ikolai N ikolaevich (1892-1950), First-W ave poet, son of N. A. Belotsvetov; 250, 573 B elousov, D., deported from France to Soviet Union in 1947; 342 [B elov, A vraam ], see: Èlison. B elov, V adim , First-W ave prose writer and journalist, returned to Russia; 199, 232 B elov, V a sily (V a s il') Ivanovich (b. 1932), non-émigré writer; 426 B elov, Y u ry S ergeevich (b. 1940), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1980; 595 [B ely, A n d rei], see: B ugaev, B oris B elyaev, Ivan D m itrievich [Inno Vask] (1893-1928), First-W ave prose writer and poet, returned to Russia in 1926, died in Soviet forced-labor camp; 199, 201 B elyaev, N ., deported from France to Soviet Union in 1947; 342 B elyshev, A . Z., publisher in Harbin; 219 Bern, A l'fre d Lyudvigovlch (1886-1945), First-W ave literary critic and scholar, emigr.: 1919, executed in Prague after Soviet occupation; 178, 190, 252, 263, 325, 485, 486, 524, 567 B en es, E dw ard (1884-1948), former President of Czechoslovakia; 174, 236, 325, 525, 566 B en-G urion, D avid (1886-1973), Polish-born Zionist leader; 374, 384, 576 B enkendorf, A leksandr K hristoforovich (1781-1844), creator and director of the Third Division (Tret'e otdelenie), the secret police; 52, 73, 74 B entley, A lvin M ., U.S. Congressman; 384, 580 [B entov], see: K ardlnalovskaya
648
JOHN GLAD
Benua (Benois), Aleksandr Nkolaevich (1870-1960), artist and art historian, abroad as of 1926; 168, 540 Benua (Benois), Nikolai Aleksandrovich (1901-1988), artist, emigr.: 1924; 538 Berberova, Nina Nikolaevna (1901-1993), poet, prose writer, and memoirist, emigr.: 1922; 107, 144, 149, 160, 161, 170, 250, 255, 264, 270, 297, 325, 339, 442, 487, 533, 540, 572, 585, 598 Berdyaev, Nikolai Aleksandrovich (1874-1948), philosopher, abroad 1907OS, deported from the Soviet Union: 1922; 113, 124, 127, 144, 160, 162, 168, 240, 241, 242, 253, 312, 325, 398, 400, 518, 531, 568, 571 Berezhansky, Nikolai Grigor'evich (7-1935), First-W ave journalist and prose writer; 196 [Berezov, Rodion], see Akul'shin Berg, Nikolai Vasil'evich (1823-1884), poet and translator, emigr.: 1863; 500, 507 Bergel'son, Marina L'vovna (b. 1943), poet and critic, emigc: 1973; 588 Berger, Yakov (b. 1926), émigré poet; 585 Bering, Vitus (1680-1741), Danish explorer in Russian navy; 95 Beriya, Lavrenty Pavlovich (1899-1953), head of Soviet secret police, executed; 308, 452, 456, 565 Berman, Filipp Isaakovich (b. 1936), prose writer, emigr.: 1981; 596 Bernadskaya [Bernadskaya-lvans], Tat'yana Vladimirovna (1895-1988), Second-W ave poet and prose writer; 609 Berner, Nikolai Fëdorovlch [Berner-Bozhidar] (1890-after 1965), poet, emigr.: during World W ar II; 577 Bernstein, Leonard (1918-1990), American composer, conductor, and pianist; 596 BerziQé, Alfreds (1899-1977), senior Latvian government official in 1930s; 197 Bestuzhev, Nikolai, Russian who travelled to W estern Europe in early nineteenth century; 44 Bestuzhev-Marllnsky, Aleksandr Aleksandrovich (1797-1837), prose writer and critic, sentenced to internal exile after suppression of the Decembrist uprising of 1825; 71, 80, 495 [Beta, Boris], see: Butkevich Betakl, Vasily Pavlovich (b. 1930), poet and critic, emigr.: 1973; 587, 588, 589 Betakl, Violetta [Violetta Iverni] (b. 1937), poet, emigr.: 1973; 438, 588 Betsky, Ivan Egorovich (1818-1890), translator, writer, publisher, emigr.: 1852; 498, 508 Bevin, Ernest, British Foreign Secretary at end of World W ar II; 331 [Bezobrazov, Apollon], see: Boris Poplavsky Bienek, Horst (1930-1990), German writer, editor, film m aker, political prisoner in East Germany; 25
RUSSIA ABROAD
649
Bikerman, Iosif Mmenassievlch (1867-1942), First-W ave co-editor of 1923 book published in Germ any on Russians and the Jews; 140 Bilga, Shlomo (b. 1939), poet, emigr.: 1978; 593 Bilibin, 1.1., led Russian youth group in England in the interwar period; 214 Bilibin, Ivan Yakovlevich (1876-1942), artist, emigr.: 1920, returned to Russia: 1936; 145, 168 Biryukov, O., nationalist émigré writer; 400 Biryukov, Pavel Ivanovich (1860-1931), writer and biographer of Lev Tolstoi, mainly abroad 1898-1920; 511, 526, 548 Bisk, Aleksandr Akimovich (1883-1973), poet and translator, emigr.: 1919; 524, 581, 588 Biskupsky, Vasily V. (1879 or 1889-1945), W hite Russian general, emigr.: 1919 or 1920; 307-309, 554, 555 Bitov, Andrei Georgievich (b. 1937), non-emigre writer; 421 Bltsilll, Pëtr Mikhailovich (1879-1953), historian and literary scholar, emigr.: 1920; 126, 193, 346, 576 Blagovo, Dmitry Dmitrievich (1827-1897), poet and memoirist; 510 Blavatskaya, Elena Petrovna [Radda Bai] (1831-1891), religious and mystic writer, emigr.: 1873; 63, 504, 505, 507, 509 Blecha, Karl, Austrian Minister of the Interior; 606 Blinkova, Mira Mikhailovna (b. 1919), critic and journalist, emigr.: 1977; 414 Bliznetsova, Inessa (Ina) Viktorovna (b. 1958), poet, emigr.: 1979; 4 7 5 ,5 9 5 , 607, 615 Blok, Aleksandr Aleksandrovich (1880-1921), poet and scholar; 20, 127,
147, 164, 168, 172, 262, 351, 366, 376, 554 Blokh, Raisa Noevna (1889 or 1899-1943), First-W ave poet and prose writer; 161, 250, 326, 550, 563, 564, 579
Blokh, Yakov Noevlch (1892-1968), First-W ave First-W ave publisher; 157, 238, 558
Blücher, Gebhard Leberecht von (1742-1819), German general, first in the Swedish Army and then in the German; 48 Blum, Léon (1872-1950), French Jewish socialist politician; 340 Blyum, Andrei [Allin] (1919-?), poet and essayist; 153, 340 Blyummer, Leonid P., nineteenth-century writer and publisher; 173, 500, 501 Boborykin, Petr Dmitrievich (1836-1921), novelist, playwright, literary critic, literary historian, memoirist, translator, lived abroad 1865-1871 and 1890-1921 (chiefly) as expatriate; 62, 502, 503, 509, 518, 530 Boborykina, S ofya Aleksandrovna (née Zborzhevskaya) (1845-1925), prose writer and playwright; 63, 539 Bobrishchev-Pushkln, Aleksandr Vasll'evich (1875-1937), lawyer, FirstW ave Change of Landmarks writer, emigr.: 1920, returned to Russia in 1923, executed; 124, 126 Bobrova, Èlla Ivanovna (b. 1911), poet, emigr.: 1943; 563, 572
650
JOHN GLAD
Bobyshev, Dmitry Vasll'evich (b. 1936), poet, emigr.: 1979; 440, 472, 594, 595
Bogachinskaya, Inna Yakovlevna (b. 1946), poet, emigr.: 1979; 595 [Bogdanov, Aleksandr], see: Malinovsky [Bogdanov, Leonid], see: Sagotov Bogdanov, Pëtr Aleksandrovich (7-1940?), journalist and m ember of the Yudenich government, arrested in Estonia by the Soviets and shot; 313 Bogdanovich, Pavel Nikolaevich, First-W ave editor and W hite officer; 322 Bogolepov, Aleksandr (1886-1980), émigré philosopher; 596 Bogomolov, Aleksandr Efremovich (1900-7), Soviet ambassador in France
1945-46; 337, 342 Bogrov, Dmitry Grigor'evich (1887-1911), double agent of O khranka and the revolutionaries, assassinated Petr Stolypin, Russian head of state, in Kiev in 1911; 88, 446 Bolcharov, Nikolai, assassinated Aleksandr Ageev, editoc of pro-Soviet newspaper, in Sofia in 1922; 193 Boikov, Mikhail Matveevich (19157-19607), journalist and prose writer, supposedly killed by Soviet agents; 344, 345 Boileau-Despreaux, Nicolas (1636-1711), French critic and poet; 51, 494 Bokhan, Dorofel Dorofeevlch (7-1939), First-W ave poet, translator, editor;
177 Bokov, Nikolai Konstantinovich (b. 1945), prose writer, emigr.: 1975; 441, 590, 594
Bokshteln, ll'ya Venlyamlnovich (b. 1937), poet, emigr.: 1972; 4 1 4 ,4 7 5 , 588 [Boldyrev, Ivan], see: Shkott, I. A [Boleslavsky], see: Strzeznltski [Bolestis], see: Dzevanovsky Boll, Heinrich (1917-1985), German novelist, short story writer, and playwright; 598, 600 Bolotina, Kleopatra, émigré prose writer; 562 Bol'shukhin, Yury (1903-1984), Second-W ave prose writer and poet; 3 6 5 ,6 0 0 Bonch-Bruevich, Vladimir Dmitrievich (1873-1955), prose writer and playwright, in Europe 1896-1905; 94, 510, 511, 514, 577 Bondarev, Yury Vasll'evich (b. 1924), Soviet writer. 429, 444 Bongart, Sergei Romanovich (1918-1985), poet, emigr.: 1943; 563, 571 ,60 1 Boris Fëdorovich Godunov (1551-1605), Tsar; 77, 212, 492, 606 Borisov, Igor'; 414 Borisov, N., pseudonym of Dmitry Odinets? Borman, Irina Konstantinovna [Ir-Bor] (1901-1985), First-W ave poet; 201 Borman, Martin (1900-19457), one of Hitler's top advisors; 317, 601 Born, Georg, German writer in Soviet exile during Nazi period, executed?; 310 Born, Ivan Martynovlch (Johann Georg) (1778-1851), poet and censor, spent most of his life after 1813 in Germany; 53, 497, 498
RUSSIA ABROAD
651
Borodin, Leonid Ivanovich (b. 1938), non-émigré prose writer and poet; 397, 398, 597
Bosquet, François Josef (1810-1961), French marshal; 191 Botkin, Sergei Dmitrievich, tsarist ambassador to Italy, head of the Russian Registration Bureau in Berlin; 156 Botkin, Vasily Petrovich (1811-1869), essayist, critic, translator; 26, 47, 48, 497 Bozheryanov, Aleksandr, copublisher of literary journal in Paris in 1907 together with Nikolai Gumilev and Mstislav Farmakovsky; 165, 167 Bozheryanov, M., First-W ave émigré; 165, 177 Bozhnev, Boris Borisovich (1898-1969), First-W ave poet; 250, 528, 585 Brailovsky, Aleksandr (b. 1884), prose writer and poet; 250, 563 Brams, Yakov Iosifovich (1898-1981), First-W ave journalist and editor; 198 Brand, Vladimir Vladimirovich (7-1942), poet and journalist; 190 Brandt, Willi (Herbert Karl Fram) (1913-1992); 589 Braslavsky, Aleksandr Yakovlevich [A. Bulkin] (b. 19007), First-W ave poet; 250 Bratov, Yury, First-W ave prose writer; 227 Brazol', Boris L'vovlch (1885-1963), literary scholar and prose writer; 230, 579
Brecht, Bertolt (1898-1956), Germ an writer; 354 Bredel, Willi (1901-1964), German writer, in Soviet exile 1934-45; 310 Breltbart, Ekaterina Alekseevna (b. 1941), critic, essayist, editor, emigr.: 1972; 588
Breitman, Grigory Naumovich, First-W ave prose writer; 159 Breshko-Breshkovskaya, Ekaterina Konstantinovna
(1844-1934), revolutionary, emigr.: abroad 1903-1905, emigr.: 1919; 276 Breshko-Breshkovsky, Nikolai Nikolaevich (1874-1943), prose writer, emigr.: 1920 or 1921; 316, 530, 546, 563 Brezhnev, Leonid Il'ich (1906-1982); 372, 386, 394, 395, 430, 597 Bridges, Edward, Secretary to the British Cabinet at end of World W ar II; 330 Briker, Boris L'vovlch (b. 1954), poet, emigr.: 1980; 595 Britan, ll’ya Aleksandrovich (1885-1941) First-W ave poet, emigr.: 1923; 535, 561 Brodsky, Iosif (Joseph) Aleksandrovich (1940-1996), poet, emigr.: 1972; 16, 22, 26, 31, 381, 391, 421, 424, 427, 438, 448, 458, 461, 465-468, 472, 479, 484, 485, 582, 588, 590, 592, 597, 603-607, 609, 614 Bronfman, Edgar Miles (b. 1929), President of World Jewish Congress; 387, 609
Bronshtein, Alexander (d. 1938), nephew of Lev Trotsky, executed in USSR; 557
Bronshtein, Boris (d. 1937), nephew of Lev Trotsky, executed in USSR; 556 Bronshtein, Lev Davidovich [Lev Trotsky] (1879-1940), communist political leader and author of book on Russian literature, deported: 1929; 93,
652
JOHN GLAD
94, 102, 111, 121, 140, 148, 154, 164, 200, 212, 228, 240, 266, 289, 300-301, 308, 393, 511-516, 518, 520, 521, 522, 531, 536, 540, 542, 544, 545, 548, 549, 550, 552, 555, 556, 557, 559, 560, 606, 615 B ronshtein, O l'ga Davidovna, sister of Lev Trotsky and wife of Lev Rozenfel'd [Kamenev]; 303, 513 B ronshtein, P ëtr A bram ovich [P ëtr G arvi, Yu. K arelin] (1881-1944), FirstW ave poet; 565 B row ne, C harles Farrar [A rtem us W ard] (1834-1867), American humorist; 54 B rum berg, A braham (b. 1926), American editor and historian; 594 B rusilov, A leksei A lekseevich (1853-1926), Russian general who refused to join the W hite armies during the civil war; 525 B ryullov, K arl Pavlovich (1799-1852), painter, lived mostly in Italy after 1823; 216 B ryusov, V alery Yakovlevich (1873-1924), poet; 138, 148, 172, 249, 486 B uber, M artin (1878-1965), Jewish philosopher; 242, 244 B ubnov, A ndrei S ergeevich (1883-1940), senior communist official, executed; 140, 141 B uchinskaya, N adezhda A leksandrovna [T èffi] (1872-1952), prose writer, poet, playwright, emigr.: 1919; 245, 289 B udynsky, P., member of literary society in Riga in 1929; 197 B ugaev, B o ris N ikolaevich [A ndrei B ely] (1880-1934), novelist, poet, literary scholar, spent most of 1910-1916 abroad, emigr.; 1921, returned to Russia 1923; 144, 145, 160, 161, 168, 172, 249, 257, 262, 279, 280, 447, 453, 519, 521, 530-533, 535, 552 B ukharin, N ikolai Ivanovich (1888-1938), Marxist theoretician and sociologist, abroad: 1911-1917; 9 4 ,1 2 6 , 137, 140, 228, 289, 303-305, 557, 604, 605, 612 B ukhov, A rkady S ergeevich (1889-1937), prose writer and editor, emigr.: 1920, returned to Russia: 1927; 526, 543 B ukovsky, V ladim ir K onstantinovich (b. 1942), prose writer, freed in 1976 in exchange for Luis Corvalan (head of Chilean Communist Party); 386, 431, 432, 438, 591, 593, 600, 603 B ulgakov, M ikhail A fanas'evich (1891-1940), prose writer, denied permission to emigrate; 112, 125, 147, 294, 426, 454, 482 B ulgakov, S ergei N ikolaevich (1871-1944), philosopher, studied in W estern Europe 1898-1900, deported from the Soviet Union: Jan. 1 ,1 9 2 3 ; 117, 124, 178, 242, 511, 531, 565 B ulgakov, V alen tin Fëdorovich (1886-1966), scholar, memoirist, and prose writer, personal secretary of Lev Tolstoi, deported from the Soviet Union: 1923, returned 1949; 178, 533, 537, 551, 560, 570, 584 B ulgarin, Faddel Venediktovich (Tadeu sz B utharyn) (1789-1859), novelist, critic, historian, journalist, newspaper publisher, Pole who began writing in Russian as of 1820; 72, 73, 497, 499
RUSSIA ABROAD
653
Bulich, Vera Sergeevna (1898-1954), prose writer and poet; 205, 250, 552, 576
[Bulkin, A.], see: Braslavsky, A [Bunakov], see: Fondamlnsky Bunin, Ivan Alekseevich (1870-1953), prose writer, emigr.: 1920; 1 5 ,5 6 ,1 0 9 , 114, 126, 148, 168, 170, 246, 247, 249, 254, 256, 273, 274, 278, 282, 286, 316, 338, 339, 359, 425, 467, 484, 526, 539, 547, 550, 551, 562, 568, 572, 576, 577, 580, 582, 583, 605, 607 Bunlna-Muromtseva, Vera Nikolaevna (1881-1961), memoirist, wife of Ivan Bunin; 338, 568 Burikhln, Igor’ Nikolaevich (b. 1943), poet, emigr.: 1978; 593 Burkin, Ivan Afanas'evich (b. 1919), poet, emigr.: 1940s; 573, 588 Burkin, I. N., publisher in Harbin; 219 Burlyuk, David Davidovich (1882-1967), poet, painter, and editor, abroad: 1902-03, 1905, 1910, emigr.: 1920; 2 3 1 ,2 3 3 , 526, 530, 5 3 1 ,5 4 9 , 584 Burlyuk, Mariya Nikiforovna, wife of David Burlyuk; 233 Burnakln, Anatoly Andreevich (7-1932), First-W ave poet and critic, emigr.: 19197; 152, 524, 549 [Burnazel'sky, N.], see: Ul'yanov, Nikolai
Burov, Aleksandr Pavlovich [Aleksandr Burd-Voskhodov] (1876-1967), First-W ave prose writer and playwright; 574 Burtsev, Vladimir L'vovlch (1862-1942), historian, political figure, editor, escaped Siberian imprisonment in 1888, returned to Russia in 1905, re-em igrated in 1907, again returned to Russia in 1914, emigrated for third tim e in 1918; 88, 118, 164, 187, 236, 508, 510, 511, 514, 516, 520, 524, 540, 563 Bush, George Herbert Walker (b. 1924); 387, 611 Butashevich-Petrashevsky, Mikhail Vasll'evlch (1821-1866), leader of revolutionary circle in which the young Dostoevsky was involved; 75
Butkevich, Boris Vasll'evlch [Boris Beta] (7-1931), prose writer; 548 Butler, Samuel (1835-1902), English author; 393 Buturlin, Pëtr Dmitrievich (1859-1895), poet, went to school in England 18707-1874, 1883-1893 in Paris and Rome; 507-510 Byalik, Khaim (1873-1934), Hebrew and Yiddish poet, emigr.: 1920; 225 Byron, Lord George Gordon (1788-1824), English poet; 57, 71, 172 Carlisle, Olga, translator of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn; 594 Carlyle, Thomas (1795-1881), Scottish essayist and historian; 119 Carnegie, Andrew (1835-1919), American steel manufacturer and philanthropist; 292
[Carroll, Lewis], see: Dodgson, Charles Carter, James (Jimmy) Earl (b. 1924), U.S. President; 592 Case, Clifford Philip (1904-1982), U.S. Senator; 587 Cather, Wllla Sibert (1876-1947), American author; 296 Catherine the Great, see: Ekaterina II Alekseevna
654
JOHN GLAD
C elm s, see: Tsel'm s C ervantes S aavedra, M iguel de (1547-1616); 180 C haadaev, P ëtr Yakovlevich (1794-1856), prose writer and philosopher; 51, 62, 69, 495, 499 C h âtelet, C., 19th-century French author of book on Russia. C hagall, M arc, see: Shagal, M ark C haikin, Vladim ir, First-W ave prose writer; 190 C haikovsky, N ikolai V asil'evich (1850-1926), journalist, political activist, editor, emigr.: 1874, returned to Russia in 1905; travelled to U .S.A ., 1906-1907, remigrated: 1919; 186, 212, 237, 531 C hakhotin, S ergei S. (1883-?), First-W ave Change of Landmarks writer; 23, 124 C hakovsky, A leksandr B orisovich (1913-1994), prose writer and Soviet literary bureaucrat; 430 C halidze, V alery N ikolaevich (b. 1938), physicist, publisher, essayist, human rights activist, defected: 1972; 393, 444, 445, 590, 597 C haplin, C harles (C h arlie) S pencer (1889-1977); 451 C harlem agne (C harles th e G reat, C harles I) (7427-814), king of the Franks; 33 [C harno tsky], see: A lekseev, G leb C hâteaubriand, François René de (1768-1848), French writer and statesman; 12, 245, 265 C h âtelet, C ., 19th-century French writer; 81 C haucer, G eoffrey (c. 1340-1400); 240 C hebotarevskaya, A nastasiya N ikolaevna (1876-1921), prose writer and translator, wife of Fedor Sologub, commited suicide upon learning that they had been denied permission to emigrate; 147, 529 C h egrin tseva [Tsegoeva], È m iliya K irillovna (1904-1989), First-W ave poet; 161, 178, 250 C hekhonin, M ikhail G eorgievich, émigré prose writer and poet; 250, 568 C hekhonln, S ergei V asil'evich (1878-1936), artist; 545 C hekhov, A nton Pavlovich (1860-1904); 152, 242, 290- 295, 297, 448, 449 C hekhov, M ikhail A leksandrovich (1891-1955), actor, emigr.: 1 9 2 8 ,2 9 5 ,2 9 6 C hekver, R akhil’ Sam ollovna [Irina Yassen] (1893-1957), poet and publisher; 578 C helak, G rigory Il'ich (b. 1925), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1981; 596 C hellshchev, Pavel Fedorovich (1898-1957), artist, emigr.: 1919; 524 C helishchev, V ikto r N ikolaevich (1870 or 1872-1952), prose writer and journalist; 575 C herkashenln, M ikhail (16th century), ataman (leader) of the Don Cossacks; 41 C herkashenln, S ergy M ikhailovich (son of Mikhail Cherkashenin), mentioned in pilgrim account; 41
RUSSIA ABROAD
655
C hernenko, K onstantin U stinovich (1911-1985), Soviet head of state, 19841985; 386 C hernov, V ikto r M ikhailovich (1873-1952), socialist activist, sociologist, editor, abroad: 1899-1905, 1908-17, emigr.: 1920; 187 [C hërny, S asha], see: G likberg, A leksandr C hernyavsky, V ladim ir (1930-1979), prose writer; 595 C hernyshev, Prince; 57 C hernyshevsky, N ikolai G avrilovich (1828-1889), radical journalist, critic, novelist, mock execution and exile to Siberia; 6 2 ,8 6 ,8 9 4 9 9 , 5 0 1 ,5 0 7 , 508 C h ertko v, Leonid N atanovich (b. 1933), writer, poet, literary historian, emigr.: 1974; 589 C h ertko v, V ladim ir G rigor'evich (1854-1936), publisher and writer on social topics, deported: 1897, returned to Russia: 1908; 94, 510, 514, 516, 555 C h ertok, Sem ën (S him on) M arkovich (b. 1931), journalist, art and literary critic, emigr.: 1979; 438 C hervinskaya, Lidiya D avydovna (1907-1988), First-W ave poet, emigr.: 1922?; 250, 260, 533, 552, 578, 609 C hiang K ai-S h ek (1887-1975); 217 C hinnov, Ig o r’ V ladim irovich (1909-1996), Latvian born poet, fled Riga in 1944; 197, 250, 366, 369, 466, 564, 569, 573, 575, 581, 594, 614 C h irikov, E vgeny N ikolaevich [Evgeny V alin] (1864-1932), émigré playwright and prose writer; 177, 178, 257, 292, 526, 530, 549 C h ivilikhin, V ., non-émigré literary critic; 583 C hizhevsky, D m itry Ivanovich (1894-1977), literary scholar, emigr.: 1921; 178, 530, 593 C hkheldze, K onstantin A leksandrovich (1897-1974), First-W ave prose writer and essayist; 178, 590 C hukhnov, N ikolai N ikolaevich, First-W ave historian and poet; 1 8 1 ,3 3 6 ,3 5 7 , 566, 571, 584 C hukhontsev, O leg G rig o r’evich (b. 1938), non-émigré poet; 421 C hukovskaya, Lidiya K orneevna (1907-1996), non-émigré writer, essayist, dissident; 107, 589 C hukovsky, K ornel K orneevich (1904-1965), non-émigré writer; 205 C h urchill, W inston (1871-1947); 329, 330, 333, 567 C h urilov, N ikolai [N ikolai K usakov], b. 1900?, novelist; 344 [C huzhoi, B o ris], see: Sokolov, B oris Fedorovich C lem enceau, G eorges Benjam in Eugène (1841-1929), French editor and statesman; 247 C leveland, (S teven ) G rover (1837-1908), U.S. President; 509 C o leridge, Sam uel Taylor (1772-1834), English poet and critic; 328 C o n stan tin e I (C o nstan tine th e G reat) (288?-337), Roman emperor; 35
656
JOHN GLAD
Corvalan, Luis, head of Chilean Communist Party, exchanged for Vladim ir Bukovsky in 1976; 591 Cowley, Abraham (1618-1667), English poet; 353 Cowper, William (1731-1800), English poet; 199 Crane, Charles R., American who provided financial support to the Kondakov Sem inar in Czechoslovakia; 178 Cunningham, Allan (1784-1842), Scottish poet and man of letters; 105 Custlne, Adolph Marquis de (1790-1857), French writer who published a widely read book, La R ussie en 1839, with many comments critical of the Russian national character; 54 Dal', Vladimir Ivanovich (1801-1872), writer, lexicographer; 222, 593 [Dalln, D], see: Levin, David Damanskaya, Avgusta Filippovna [Arseny Merlch] (1885 or 1889-1959), prose writer and translator; 546, 578, 580 [Dan, Fëdor], see: Gurvich, Fëdor Daniel', Yuly Markovich [Nikolai Arzhak] (1925-1988), dissident writer who published clandestinely in W est together with Andrei Sinyavsky; 450, 451, 579, 582, 583, 584 Daniels, Kamilla, First-W ave prose writer in China in interwar period; 227 Daniil, twelfth-century abbot who m ade a pilgrimage to Jerusalem; 26, 34, 36, 490
Dante Alighieri (1265-1321); 14, 25, 72, 285, 454 Danton, Georges Jacques (1759-1794), French revolutionary; 245 Danylo, sixteenth-century Belorussian archimandrite who m ade pilgrimage to Palestine; 492 [Dar, David], see: Ryvkin, David Yakovlevich Daraganov, Mikhail Timofeevich (1920-?), Second-W ave poet; 564 Darov, Anatoly Andreevich (1920-1997), prose writer, emigr.: 1944; 363,565, 566 Davis, Jerome (b. 1891), American scholar; 229 Dean, Patrick, advisor to British government during World W ar II; 329 de Gaulle, Charles (1890-1970); 185, 330 Delsha, Elena Albertovna [Georgy Peskov] (1885 or 1898-1977), prose writer, emigr.: 1924; 538, 593
Dekhterev (Dekhtyarëv?), Aleksandr Petrovich (1889-?), prose writer and poet, after taking vows as monk in 1936 he took the name "Aleksei."; 193, 211, 554 Dektor, Feliks, Third-W ave émigré writer; 414 Delone, Vadim Nikolaevich (1947-1983), poet, emigr.: 1975; 518, 590, 599 Dement'ev, Andrei, non-émigré editor; 607 Demidov, Igor'Platonovich (1873-1946), member of Provisional Government, journalist, emigr.: 1920; 568 deMllle, Cecile Blount (1881-1959), movie producer; 280 [Dëmln, Mikhail], see: Trifonov
RUSSIA ABROAD
657
Demushkin [Nadezhdin], Mikhail Iosifovich (1902-1961), poet, emigr.: 1942, moved to U.S.A. in 1950; 562, 572, 580 Denikin, Anton Ivanovich (1872-1947), W hite general, emigr.: 1920; 1 5 ,1 0 5 , 109, 148, 150, 188, 191, 293, 299, 313, 525 [Denisova, Ol'gaj, see: Barskaya, Ol'ga Viktorovna Derzhavin, Gavrila Romanovich (1743-1816), poet and statesman; 20, 211, 270
Despotull, Vladimir Mikhailovich (1895-?), First-W ave poet and editor; 323, 327
Devel', Lidiya Alekseevna [Lidiya Alekseeva] (1909-1989), First-W ave poet, emigr.: 1920; 526, 564, 571, 576, 579, 582 [Deza], see: Tylkin
Dickinson, Emily (1830-1886), American poet; 370 Dienes, Laszlo (b. 1945), Hungarian-American Slavist and biographer ofG aito Gazdanov, emigrated from Hungary in 1969; 287
Dikgof-Derental', Aleksandr Arkad'evich (1885-?), First-W ave prose writer, emigr.: 1920, returned to Russia: 1924; 527, 538
[Dikol, Boris], see: Vil'de, Boris Dikson, Vladimir Vasil'evich (1900-1929), First-W ave poet; 546 Dimer, Evgeniya Aleksandrovna (b. 1925), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1943; 564, 572 Diogenes Laertius (3rd century A. D.), Greek antiquarian; 99 [Dloneo], see: Shklovsky, Isaak Vladimirovich Disraeli, Benjamin (1804-1881), English statesman and novelist; 79 Divish, Nina, First-W ave poet in China; 227 Dmitrieva, Faina, First-W ave poet, returned to Soviet Union from China at end of World W ar II; 220 "The False Dmitry I” (?-1606), pretender to Russian throne; 77 "The False Dmitry II” (?-1610), pretender to Russian throne; 452 Ddblln, Alfred (1878-1957), German writer; 354 Dobosh, Vasily Vasil'evich (1917-?), First-W ave poet; 211 Dobrolyubov, Nikolai Aleksandrovich (1836-1861), “utilitarian” critic; 6 2 ,8 9 Dobronravov-Donich, Leonid Mikhailovich (1887-1926), First-W ave prose writer and editor; 541 Dobrovol'sky, Aleksei Aleksandrovich (b. 1938), essayist, dissident; 584 Dobryansky, Adol'f Ivanovich (1817-1901), Carpatho-Russian writer and political figure; 210
Dobson, Henry Austin (1840-1920), English poet and essayist; 434 Dobuzhinsky, Mstislav Valerianovich (1875-1957), artist, emigr.: 1924; 538 Dodgson, Charles Lutwidge [Lewiss Carroll] (1832-1898), English writer and mathematician; 235
Dolgorukov, Pëtr Vladimirovich (Prince) (1817-1868), prose writer, journalist, publisher, abroad: 1841-1843, emigr.: 1859; 81, 82, 173, 496, 499, 500, 501, 502
658
JOHN GLAD
D olgorukov, V asily, chief of tsarist police, mid-19th century; 82 D olgoruky, Ig o r’ (? -1970s), Russian in Brazil who claimed to be a prince; 345 D ollnov, M ikhail A natol'evich (1892-1936), poet, emigr.: early 1920s; 555 D ollnsky, Sem ën D., First-W ave writer; 254 D om brovsky, A . S. (1889-1938), First-W ave writer; 188 D om brovsky, B. M ., émigré publisher in Paris in interwar period; 170 [D on-A m inado], see: Shpolyansky D onat, A leksandr (1905-1983), publisher-editor of Holocaust Library; 382 D onde, A leksandr S ergeevich (b. 1938), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1981 ; 596 D os P assos, John R oderlgo (189-1970), American novelist; 447 D ostoevskaya, Lyubov’ Fëdorovna (1869-1926), daughter of Fëdor Dostoevsky, prose writer, born in Dresden; 519 D ostoevsky, Fëdor M ikhailovich (1821-1881), novelist, abroad 1862, 18671871; 45-47, 74-76, 80, 86, 126, 189, 274, 294, 353, 364, 390, 458, 498, 500-504, 506, 554 D osuzhkov, Fëdor N ikolaevich (1899-1982), First-W ave poet; 597 D oum er, Paul (1857-1932), President of France, assassinated by Pavel Gorgulov, Russian émigré poet; 110, 165, 548 D ovlatov, S ergei D onatovich (1941-1990), prose writer and editor, emigr.: 1978; 20, 224, 390, 403, 435, 438, 463, 464, 484, 594, 595, 609, 614 [D ozorov, N ], see: M itropol’sky 220 D rayton, M ichael (1563-1631), English poet; 371 D reltser, È m ll’ A bram ovich (b. 1937), prose writer, emigr.: 1974; 581 D rozdov, A leksandr M ikhailovich (1896-1963), First-W ave prose writer, emigr.: 1920, returned to Russia: 1923; 1 4 3 ,1 6 0 , 250, 527, 530, 535, 582 D ruskin, Lev S avel'evich (1921-1990), poet, emigr.: 1980; 595, 613 D ruzhnikov, Y u ry Il'ich (b. 1933), prose writer, emigr.: 1987; 433, 605, 611 D ryakhlov, V alerian Fëdorovlch, First-W ave poet; 250 D ubnov, Evgeny Leonidovich (b. 1949), poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1971; 587 D ubnov, S. M. (1860-1941), historian; 103 D ubnov, Zalm an, émigré writer in Israel; 414 D ubrovlna, Elena (b. 1946), Third-W ave poet and novelist; 408 D udin [G radoboev], Lev V ladim irovich, Second-W ave journalist; 330 D udorova, N atal'ya, First-W ave poet; 227 D ukel'sky, V ladim ir A leksandrovich [Vernon Duke] (1903-1969), poet and composer, emigr. before 1920; 222, 581 D ukhnovich, A leksandr V asil'evich (1803-1865), “Carpatho-Russian” poet and prose writer; 211, 498, 502 D um as, A lexandre th e younger (1824-1895), French dramatist and novelist; 62, 505, 507, 509
RUSSIA ABROAD
659
D unaevsky, V alery A bram ovich (b. 1938), poet and engineer, emigr.: 1972 (from Tbilisi); 588 D uncan, Isadora (1880-1927), American interpretive dancer, married to Sergei Esenin; 532, 533 D upln, A m andine A u ro re Lucie [G eorge Sand] (1804-1876), French novelist; 60, 62 D urakov, A leksei Petrovich (1898 or 1899-1944?), First-W ave poet; 565 D u retskaya, O ., émigré prose writer; 345 D u rrell, Law rence (1912-1991), British author born in India of Irish parents; 23 D vorzhltsky, N ikolai N ikolaevich [N ikolai A ll] (b. 1909), poet, cam e to the U.S.A. in 1923; 219, 532, 534, 535 D yagllev, S ergei Pavlovich (1872-1929), First-W ave impressario, editor, theater director, largely abroad after 1911 and especially after 1917; 166, 168, 517 D 'yakonova, E lizaveta A leksandrovna (1874-1902), poet and diarist, went abroad to study in 1900; 512, 513, 515 D ykhova-G ardner, E katerina Ivanovna (1849-1936), novelist, emigr.; 1918; 204, 523, 555 [D ym ov, O sip], see: Perel'm an, Iosif D ym shlts, M ark, one of a group which unsuccessful attempted to hijack a plane in Leningrad in 1971; 394, 586, 594 D yuzheva, N atal'ya P avlovna (1949-1993), critic, essayist, and journalist, emigr.: 1971; 438 D zerzhinsky, Feliks Èdm undovlch (1877-1926), founder of the CHEKA, ran counter-esponage abroad, periods abroad before 1917; 1 3 6 ,1 4 1 ,2 4 1 , 275 D zevanovsky, N ikolai Vyacheslavovich [N ikolai B olestsls] (b. 1897), FirstW ave poet; 176, 177 D zhlndzhikhashvili, N odar [N odar D zhin] (b. 1942), prose writer, emigr.: 1980; 595 D zhugashvili [S talin ], Io sif V issarionovich (1879-1953), visited W estern Europe in 1912 (twice) and 1913; 93, 94, 111, 121, 135, 141, 143, 145, 173, 240, 2 7 1 ,2 7 4 , 276, 280, 290, 300-304, 308, 310, 312, 316, 317, 329, 330, 333, 334, 340, 342, 345, 347, 352, 360, 371, 373-375, 383, 384, 393, 443, 452, 454-456, 515, 538, 546, 549, 551, 554-556, 558-560, 566, 575, 576, 585, 607, 610, 611 D zhugashvili, Y akov Iosifovich, Stalin's son, died in German prisoner of w ar camp; 316, 456 D zyubln [B ag ritsky], Èduard G eorgievich (1895-1934), Soviet poet; 366 Eden, A n th o n y (1897-1977), senior British statesman, forcibly repatriated Russian prisoners of w ar who had served in German units during World W ar II; 329, 347, 564 E fim ov, Ig o r’ M arkovich [A ndrei M oskovtt] (b. 1937), prose writer, emigr.: 1978; 17, 442, 464, 465, 594, 596, 613
660
JOHN GLAD
Efimova, Marina (b. 1937), publisher and journalist, emigr.: 1978; 442, 464 Èfron, Ariadna Sergeevna, daughter of Sergei Èfron and M arina Tsvetaeva; 145
Èfron, Georgy Sergeevich, son of Sergei Èfron and Marina Tsvetaeva; 145 Èfron, Sergei Yakovlevich (1893-1941), editor and prose writer, emigr.: 1920, returned to Russia: 1937; 1 5 ,1 2 8 ,1 4 5 , 157, 238, 254, 266, 267, 268, 308, 527, 550, 556, 561 Èfron, Sheer Khaimovich [Savely Konstantinovich Litvin] (1849-1925), prose writer, playwright, and memoirist, emigr.: 1920?; 102, 103 Èfros, Anatoly Anatoly Vasil'evlch (1925-1986), theater director. 453, 599 Égides (Abovin-Ègides), Pëtr Markovich (1917-1997), signed 1986 collective letter critical of the NTS; 438 Èlkhenbaum, Vsevolod Mikhailovich (1882-1945), First-W ave poet; 567 Elsenhower, Dwight David (1890-1969); 331, 332, 566 Èisner, Aleksei Vladimirovich (1905-1984), poet and prose writer, returned to Russia: 1939; 143, 177, 559 Èlzenshtadt, Mikhail Konstantinovich [Argus, Zheleznov, M. L ] (1900-after 1970), poet and prose writer, cam e to the U.S.A. in 1924; 289, 585 [Èk]. see: Kurbanovskaya Ekaterina II Alekseevna ("Catherine the Great") (1729-1796), Germ an princess who becam e empress of Russia after she murdered her husband Pëtr III; 69, 95, 101, 211, 415 Èkster, Aleksandra Aleksandrovna (1882-1949), artist, emigr.: 1924; 538 [Elagin, Ivan] see: Matveev, Ivan Elagin, Yury Borisovich (1910-1987), violinist, historian, memoirist, emigr.: during World W ar II; 363, 575 Elagina, Varvara Nikolaevna, see: MacGahan Elenev, Nikolai Artem'evlch (1894-1967), First-W ave prose writer and critic; 177, 254, 584 Èllnson, Genrlch Davidovich (b. 1935), prose writer and artist, emigr.: 1973; 588 Eliot, Thomas Stearns (1888-1965), Anglo-American poet; 14, 23, 127,137,
348, 365, 474, 486 [Ellshlveva], see: Lisheva-Zhlrkova Èllson [Belov], Avraam-Egoshua Moiseevich]; 414. Elizabeth I (1533-1602), queen of England and Ireland; 212 [Èllis], see: Kobylinsky El'pidin, Mikhail, revolutionary publisher in G eneva in second half of nineteenth century; 502 El'tsin, Boris Nikolaevich (b. 1931), Russian head of state; 613 El'tsov, Igor’ Ivanovich (b. 1928), prose writer, defected in 1966; 584 [El'tsova, KJ, see: Lopatina Emel'yenov, Viktor Nikolaevich (1899-1963), First-W ave prose writer; 582 Emerson, Ralph Waldow (1803-1882), American essayist and poet; 299
RUSSIA ABROAD
661
Èndlln, Mark Volfovich (b. 1938), prose writer, emigr.: 1975; 590 Èngel’gardt, Lev Evgen'evich (d. 1943), poet and editor; 564 Enghien, Duc d' (Louis Antoine Henri de Bourbon-Condé) (1772-1804), French nobleman ordered executed by Napoleon; 246
Èntin, Leonid Grigor'evich (b. 1938), poet, emigr.: 1978; 593 Ènyutin, Viktor Viktorovich [Viktor Zubov] (b. 1943), poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1975; 611
Èrenburg, ll'ya Grigor'evich (1891-1967), prose writer, poet, critic, journalist, emigr.: 1908-1917, extensive stays abroad as journalist and Soviet official: 1921-1941; 34, 156, 160, 162, 164, 172, 289, 347, 374, 415, 462, 516, 522, 530, 535, 536, 549, 561, 576, 584 Èristov, Georgy Zakhar'evlch (b. 1902), poet; 578 Esenin, Sergei Aleksandrovich (1895-1925), poet and husband of Isadorah Duncan, abroad with her 1922-1923; 148, 249, 273, 366, 532, 533 Eshchln, Leonid Evseevich (7-1929), First-W ave poet; 546 Ètklnd, Efim Grigor'evich (b. 1918), literary historian, emigr.: 1974; 3 7 6 ,4 2 1 , 438, 486, 589, 594 Euripedes (c. 484-407 or 406 B.C .), tragedian of ancient Athens; 418 Evlogy (Vasily Semenovich Georgievsky) (1868-1946), Metropolitan of the Russian Orthodox Eparchy in France, emigr.: 1920; 115, 116, 117, 181, 342, 350, 527, 538, 546 Evreinov, Boris Alekseevich (1888-1933), poet and prose writer, abroad before revolution, emigr.: 1925; 190, 550 Evreinov, Nikolai Nikolaevich (1879-1953), playwright and theater director, emigr.: early 1920s; 295, 539, 563, 576, 577, 582 Evseev, Nikolai Nikolaevich (1891-1974), poet; 581 Evstav'ev, Aleksei Grigor'evich (1783-1857), Russian diplomat, wrote in Russian and English; 499 Evtushenko, Evgeny Aleksandrovich (b. 1933), poet and prose writer, long stays abroad; 430, 583, 603, 605 Ezhov, Nikolai Ivanovich (1895-1939), chief of NKVD, mass murderer, executed; 140, 310 Faibusovich, Gennady Moiseevich [Boris Khazanov] (b. 1928), prose writer, emigr.: 1982; 20, 22, 29, 390, 396, 397, 402, 435, 440, 4 4 1 ,4 5 0 , 478, 586, 592, 597 Fain [German Andreev], German Naumovich (b. 1928), critic and essayist, emigr.: 1975; 590, 591
Fainzil'berg, ll'ya Arnol'dovich [ll'f] (1897-1937), non-émigré writer; 381 Falln, Valentin Mikhailovich (b. 1926), Soviet diplomat and journalist; 589 Fal'kov, Boris Viktorovich (b. 1946), prose writer, poet, and pianist, emigr.: 1987; 453, 605
Farlnich, Aleksei Alekseevich [Semtsya Gor'koust, Alesha Makovichanin], First-W ave poet, prose writer, critic; 211
662
JOHN GLAD
Farmakovsky, Mstislav, co-publisher of literary journal in Paris in 1907 together with Nikolai Gumilev and Aleksandr Bozheryanov; 165 Farquhar, George (1678-1707), British dramatist; 54 Faulkner, William (1897-1962), American novelist; 463 Faure, Sebastien (1858-1942), French anarchist; 164 Faust, Siegmar (b. 1944), writer expelled from East Germ any in 1976; 396 Fedln, Konstantin Aleksandrovich (1892-1977), prose writer, memoirist, First Secretary of Union of Soviet W riters, abroad 1914-1918, Germ an prisoner during World W ar I; 158, 268, 274, 275, 444, 520, 576 Fëdor Aleksandrovich, First-W ave émigré, nephew of Nikolai II; 134 Fëdor Alekseevich (1661-1682), Tsar; 38, 493 Fëdor Ivanovich (1557-1598), Tsar, son of Ivan the Terrible; 77, 292 [Fëdorov, Aleksandr Petrovich], see: Glndenburg, Aleksandr Petrovich Fëdorov, Mikhail Mikhailovich, First-W ave émigré who cooperated with Sergei Mel'gunov to found Struggle for Russia (Bor'ba za Rossiyu);
137, 534 Fëdorov, N. I., edited poetry anthology in Argentina in 1951 ; 345 Fëdorov, Nikolai Yakovlevich [N. Roshchin] (1896-1956), First-W ave prose writer, returned to Russia: 1946; 143, 338, 568, 578 Fëdorov, Vasily Georgievich (1895-?), First-W ave prose writer; 177, 178 [Fëdorova, Nina], see: Ryazanovskaya, Antonina Fëdorovna Fedoseeva, Rakhil’, Third-W ave journalist; 438 Fedoseev, Viktor Ivanovich (b. 1929), writer, essayist, journalist, emigr.: 1971; 438 Fedotov, Georgy Petrovich [E. Bogdanov] (1886-1951), philosopher, deported from Russia: 1905, returned 1908, again abroad 7-1914, emigr.: 1925; 108, 111, 135, 168, 539, 553, 561, 562 Fel', Tat'yana Tsodekovna (b. 1948 in Riga), poet, emigr.: 1972; 473, 588 Fel'dman, Mara Il'inichna (b. 1949 or 1950), poet, emigr.: 1973; 588, 613 [Fel'zen, Yury], see: Freidenshtein, Nikolai Feodosiya Ivanovna, daughter of Ivan the Terrible; 492 Fesenko, Tat'yana Pavlovna (1915-1995), poet, memoirist, scholar, emigr.:
1943; 347, 348, 364, 563, 572, 581, 584, 604 Feuchtwanger, Lion (1884-1958), German expatriate writer; 14 Feuerbach, Ludwig Andreas (1804-1872), Germ an philosopher; 82, 84 Fevr, Nikolai Mikhailovich (7-1952), journalist and prose writer, supposedly killed by Soviet agents; 323, 344 Field, Andrew, biographer of Nabokov; 284 Fiksman, David Meierovich (Mironovich?) [Dovid Knut] (1900-1955), poet and prose writer, emigr.: 19207; 168„ 170, 210, 248, 250, 254, 255, 256, 265, 270, 271, 426, 527, 528, 545, 571, 577 Filanovskaya, Tat'yana Pavlovna (b. 1937), poet, emigr.: 1976; 591 Filip, Ota, Czech émigré writer; 430, 592, 594
RUSSIA ABROAD
663
Filippov (formerly: Filistinsky) Boris Andreevich (1905-1991), poet and editor, emigr.: 1941, moved to U.S.A. in 1950; 561, 565, 572, 581
Filonov, S. F., First-W ave publisher in Yugoslavia; 183 Fllosofov, Dmitry Vladimirovich (1872-1940), editor, emigr.: 1920; 1 4 2 ,1 8 8 , 189, 243, 278, 426, 434, 515, 529, 536, 551, 560 Finkershtein, Èitan Samuilovich (b. 1942), emigr.: 1982, physicist and essayist; 438 Flnkel'shteln, Leonid Vladimirovich [Leonid Vladimirov] (b. 1919 or 1924), prose writer, defected: 1966; 584 Flaubert, Gustav (1821-1880), French writer; 60 Florensky, Pavel Aleksandrovich (1882-1937), philosopher and theologian, died in Soviet prison camp; 556 Florovsky, Anatoly Vasil’evich (1884-1968), philosopher, deported from the Soviet Union: 1922; 126, 128, 178, 242, 529, 548, 595 Florovsky, Georgy Vasil'evlch (1893-1979), theologian, emigr.: 1920; 570 Foch, Ferdinand (1851-1929), French marshal; 106 Foelkersham, lawyer, Baltic German with Monarchist sympathies who defended the assassins of the elder Nabokov; 281 Fondaminsky, Ily a Isidorovich [I. Bunakov] (1880 or 1881-1942), editor, abroad: 1900-02, 1906-17, emigr.: 1918, died in German gas chamber; 135, 165, 168, 169, 236, 249, 309, 326, 523, 554, 563 Fonvizln, Denis Ivanovich (1744 or 1745-1792), playwright; 26, 42, 215, 291 Ford Gerald Gerald (b. 1913), U.S. President; 386,590
Ford, Henry (1863-1947); 123, 382, 538 Formakov, Arseny Ivanovich (1900-1983), First-W ave poet; 599 Foster, Lyudmila Aleksandrovna (b. 1931), Slavicist and journalist, compiler of a major bibliography of Russian literature in exile; 235, 586 Fotlev, Kirill Vasil’evlch (1928-1990), First-W ave theologian; 614 Fotinsky, Aleksei V., First-W ave poet; 176, 177 Fourier, François Marie Charles (1772-1837), French social reformer; 82 Fradls, Aleksandr Alekseevich (b. 1952), poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1981; 596 Franco, Francisco (1892-1975), Spanish head of state; 356, 554 Frank, Paul, German diplomat; 589 Frank, Semen Lyudvigovich (1877-1950), philosopher, abroad 1899-1901, deported from the Soviet Union: 19212; 124, 241, 244, 531, 556, 566, 573 Freldenshteln, Nikolai Bernardovlch [Yury Fel'zen] (1894-1943), prose writer, emigr.: 1918, died in Nazi concentration camp; 250, 523
Freinkman-Khrustalëva, Nelli Sergeevna, émigré scholar writing about the Russian emigration; 425 Frenkel', Vladimir Zinov'evich (b. 1944), poet, emigr.: 1987; 605
[Frey, William], see: Geins, Vladimir
664
JOHN GLAD
Fridman [Baklanov], Grigory Yakovlevich (b. 1923), non-émigré prose writer; 426
Friedrich, Caspar David (1774-1840), German painter; 57 Frost, Robert (1874-1963), American poet; 226 Frunze, Mikhail Vasil'evich (1885-1925), tsarist revolutionary and Soviet general, rumored to have been ordered murdered by Stalin; 456 Fryuaf, I. V., émigré poet in Shanghai in the interwar period; 222 Fulbrlght, James William (1905-1995), U.S. Senator; 587 Gabbe, Pëtr Andreevich (1777 or 1779-1841), poet and translator, permitted to go abroad in 1834 without permission to return; 495, 496 Gabrilovich, Leonid Evgen'evich [Leonid Galich, Gog I Magog] (18781953), critic and poet, emigr.: after 1917; 576 [Gadalin, V. V.], see: Vasil'ev, Vasily Vladimirovich Gagara, Vasily Yakovlev, seventeenth-century merchant who made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land; 36, 37, 492 Gagarin, Evgeny Andreevich (1905-1948), prose writer; 5714 Gagarin, Ivan Sergeevich (1814-1882), Jesuit priest and theologian, abroad with family: 1820-1823; largely abroad as diplomat: 1833-1843; emigr.: 1843; 61, 62, 82, 496, 507 Galanskov, Yury Timofeevich (1939-1972), poet and essayist, dissident who died in forced-labor camp; 584 [Galich, Aleksandr], see: Ginzburg, Aleksandr Grigor'evich [Galich, Leonid], see: Gabrilovich [Galich, Yury], see: Goncharenko Galinskl, Heinz (1912-1992), head of Central Jewish Council in Germ any, concluded 1990 agreement with German Chancellor Kohl to grant Soviet Jews asylum; 416 Gal'perin, Yury Aleksandrovich (b. 1947), prose writer, emigr.: 1979; 595 Gal'perin-Kaminsky, Il'ya Danilovich (1858-1936), defected in 1879 or 1880, translator; 309, 506 Gal'skol, Vladimir L'vovlch (1908-1961), poet, emigr.: 1920; 580 Gammer, N. A., publisher in Harbin; 219 Ganfman, Maksim Ippolitovich (1872-1934), journalist and editor, emigr.: (Kiev to Lithuania): 1921; 195 Gansky, Leonid Iosifovich (1905-?), First-W ave poet; 250, 541, 583 Ganusovsky, B. K., First-W ave editor; 320 Garcia Mérquez, Gabriel (b. 1928), Colombian novelist; 453 Gardner, Vadim Danilovich (1880-1956), poet, emigr.: 1921; 205, 530, 578 Garrison, William Lloyd (1805-1879), American abolitionist; 85 [Garvy, Petr], see: Bronshtein Pëtr Abramovich Gass, William H. (b. 1924), American novelist and essayist; 18, 395, 425 Gazdanov, Georgy Ivanovich (Galto) (1903-1971), prose writer and critic, emigr.: 1920; 138, 250, 251, 254, 287, 325, 338, 359, 527, 547, 553, 554, 558, 568, 575, 579, 584, 587, 591
RUSSIA ABROAD
665
Ge, Nikolai Nikolaevich (1831-1894), artist, lived in Italy 1857-1869; 508 Getter, Aleksandr Aleksandrovich (1855-1956), First-Wave prose writer; 549, 578 Geinike, see: Ivanova, Iraida Geins, Vladimir [William Frey], founder of agricultural commune in U .S A in the second half of the nineteenth century; 101 Geller (Heller), Mikhail Yakovlevich (1922-1997), Third-W ave émigré critic and historian; 394, 598
Gendelev, Mikhail Samuilovich (b. 1950), poet, emigr.: 1977; 4 1 4 ,4 7 5 , 592 Gendin, Yakov; 409 Gendlin, Leonard Evgen'evich (b. 1923), novelist, emigr.: 1972; 588 Genik, Æ, deported from France in 1944; 342 Genis, Aleksandr Aleksandrovich (b. 1953), critic, essayist, journalist, emigr.: 1977; 425, 426, 438, 441, 459, 467, 592, 597
Georgievsky, Mikhail Aleksandrovich (7-1952), Solidarist leader; 1 3 2 ,1 3 3 , 183
Gerasimov, Mikhail ProkoTevIch (1889-19397), poet, emigr.: 1907, deported back to Russia from France for writing anti-war propaganda in 1915, died in purges; 516, 521, 559 Germanova, Mariya Nikolaevna (1884-1940), actress, emigr.: 1 9 1 9 ,2 9 3 ,2 9 4 , 532 Germogen (7-1945), Archbishop and First-W ave émigré, executed by Tito's partisans; 277, 322, 328 Gershel'man (Hoerschelmann), Karl Karlovich (1899-1951), poet, prose writer, and artist, emigr.: 1920; 201, 250, 574 Gershenzon, Mikhail Osipovich (1869-1925), non-émigré literary historian; 124, 533 Gertsen (Herzen), Aleksandr Ivanovich (1812-1870), prose writer, editor, memoirist, emigr.: 1847; 12, 26, 28, 29, 46, 54, 60, 61, 74, 82-85, 87, 99, 164, 172, 173, 215, 495, 497, 498, 499-503 Gertsog, Yury Alekseevich (1913-1972), poet; 581, 585 Gessen, Aleksei Vladimirovich (1900-1925), First-W ave poet; 142, 250 Gessen, Iosif Shaulevlch (Vladimirovich) (1865 or 1866-1943), editor and memoirist, emigr.: 1917, returned: 1918, remigr: 1919 or 1920; 118, 142, 157- 160, 163, 238, 532, 538, 560, 562, 564 Gessen, Evgeny Sergeevich, poet; 142 Gessen, Sergei Iosifovich (1887-1950), philosopher, studied abroad 19051911, emigr.: 1921; 142, 530, 573 Gessen, Vladimir Iosifovich (1901-7), First-W ave journalist and prose writer, son of Iosif Gessen; 142, 307 Glda Vladimirovna (7-1066), daughter of Vladimir Monomakh and wife of English King Harold II; 212
Gide, André (1869-1951), French writer; 127, 256, 339
666
JOHN GLAD
Gldoni, Aleksandr Grigor'evich (1936-1992), poet and editor, emigr.: 1975; 441, 590, 611 Gil'debrand, Varvara Ivanovna pskul'von GH'debrand] (1850-1928), prose writer and publisher, spent much tim e abroad before revolution as wife of two different Russian diplomats, emigr.: 1922; 533, 545 Glndenberg [Fedorov], Aleksandr Mitrofanovich (1868-1949), prose writer; 193, 572 Ginger, Aleksandr Samsonovich (1897-1965), First-W ave poet and prose writer; 160, 250, 254, 341, 383, 528, 530, 567, 583 Gins, Georgy Konstantinovich (1887-?), historian and literary scholar; 219 Ginzburg, Aleksandr Arkad’evich [Aleksandr Galich] (1918-1977), poet, playwright, and “bard,” emigr.: 1974; 381, 390, 393, 476, 477, 484,
585, 587-590, 593, 603, 604, 606, 607, 609 Ginzburg, Aleksandr Il'ich (b. 1936), essayist, journalist, dissident, in 1979 together with Èduard Kuznetsov and three other prisoners (M ark Dymshits, Georgy Vins, Valentin Moroz), exchanged 4for two Soviet spies; 394, 432, 584, 592, 594 Ginzburg, Evgeniya Semenovna (1906-1977), writer and historian; 455;587
Gipplus (Hipplus), Zinaida Nikolaevna (Merezhkovskaya) [Anton Krainii, Lev Pushchin] (1869-1945), poet and critic, abroad: 1906-1914, emigr.: 1919; 90, 149, 168-170, 186, 187, 189, 190, 243, 247, 249, 257, 259, 275, 286, 296, 297, 320, 325, 353, 398, 426, 434, 515, 520, 524, 525, 529, 533, 537, 539, 541, 551, 560, 567, 574 Girshin, Mark Danilovich (b. 1923), prose writer, emigr.: 1974; 462, 589, 597 Girshovlch, Leonid Moiseevich (b. 1948), prose writer, emigr.: 1973; 414 Glad, John (b. 1941), American Slavist; 11,12, 19, 20, 21, 27, 31, 108, 256, 373, 382, 390, 398, 425, 436, 430, 437, 441,452, 463, 464, 465, 466, 467, 593, 594, 595, 615 Gladilin, Anatoly Tikhonovich (b. 1935), prose writer, emigr.: 1976; 438,458, 462, 479, 591, 593, 594, 595, 615 Glagolln, Boris Sergeevich (1879-1948), playwright and theater critic, emigr.: 1928; 545, 571 Glazov, Yury Yakovlevich (b. 1929), prose writer and critic, emigr.: 1972; 438, 588 Glazova, Marina Grigor’evna (b. 1938), poet, prose writer, linguist, emigr.: 1972; 588
Glazunov, Aleksandr Konstantinovich (1865-1936), composer and orchestra director, emigr.: 1928; 545, 555 Glezer, Aleksandr Davydovich (b. 1934), art critic, journalist, editor, emigr.: 1975; 438, 440, 590, 602, 609 Glikberg, Aleksandr Mikhailovich [Sasha Cherny] (1880-1932), abroad: ca 1906, emigr.: 1920, poet and prose writer; 289, 527, 549, 582 Gllkman, Viktor Yakovlevich [Vladimir Iretsky] (1882-1936), First-W ave prose writer, deported from the Soviet Union in 1922; 547, 555
RUSSIA ABROAD
667
G linka, G leb A leksandrovich (1903-1989), prose writer, prisoner of w ar in World W ar II and remained in West; 576, 585, 612 G linka, M ikhail Ivanovich (1804-1857), composer, 69 G lozm an, V ladim ir Iosifovich (b. 1951), poet, emigr.: 1973. 414, 588 G luzberg, Zinovy Efim ovich [Zinovy Zinlk] (b. 1945), prose writer, emigr.: 1975; 389, 391, 395, 414, 435, 461, 590, 602 G odunov, B oris, see: B oris Fëdorovich G oebbels, Joseph Paul (1897-1945), Nazi Minister of Propaganda; 382 G oethe, Johann W olfgang von (1749-1832), German writer and scientist; 57, 71 G ofm an, M odest Lyudvigovlch (1887-1959), First-W ave poet and literary scholar, defected: 1922; 580 G ogel', S ergei K onstantinovich (1860-1930), First-W ave professor; 1 5 2 ,1 5 3 G ogol', Nikolai Vasil'evich (1809-1852), expatriate writer; 19, 20, 26, 55, 57, 58, 60, 62, 80, 126, 172, 215, 232, 293, 294, 347, 454, 458, 464, 487, 495-498, 512 G oier (vo n ), Lev V iktorovich (1875-1939), First-W ave prose writer; 559 G oland, Efim M oiseevich (b. 1920?), prose writer, emigr.: 1972, returned to Russia; 418, 595 G ol'dm an, A leksandr M oiseevich (b. 1943), prose writer, emigr.: 1977; 592 G ol'dm an, Èm m a (1869-1940), anarchist, emigr.: 1886, deported to Russia from U.S.A, in 1919, remigrated: 1921; 292 G oldm an [R ein hardt], M ax (1873-1943), German theater director, emigrated from Germ any to Austria in 1933 and in 1938 to America; 161 G ol'dshtein, Pavel Y u l'evich (1917-1982), prose writer, emigr.: 1971; 587 G olenlsh chev-K utuzo v, ll'ya N ikolaevich (1904-1969), poet, historian, translator, emigr.: 1920 or 1921, returned to Russia in 1955; 1 8 2 ,1 8 4 , 252, 551, 573, 575, 577, 585 G olitsyn, First-W ave emigre; 160 G olitsyn, A leksan d r S ergeevich (1789-1858), poet, military appointment in Poland in 1817; 499 G olitsyn, M ikhail G rigor'evich (1808-1868), poet; 502 G olitsyna, E katerina G eorg'evna, socialite in London who organized Russian cultural activities; 214 G olokhvastov, G eorgy V ladim irovich [N ikita K azarlnov] (1882-1963) FirstW ave prose writer and poet; 230, 265, 539, 548, 582 G olovin, Ivan G avrilovich (1816-1890), prose writer, emigr.: 1842. 80, 496, 497, 499, 504, 508 G olovin, N ikolai N ikolaevich (1875-1944), W hite general and First-W ave ém igré, abroad 1908, emigr.: 1918; 309 G olovina, A lla Sergeevna (née S h teiger) (1909-1987), poet, emigr.: 1920; 176, 250, 527, 605 G oltz, von d er, Germ an General; 202 G om berg, V lad im ir G erm anovich [V ladim ir Lidin] (1894-1979), writer; 160
668
JOHN GLAD
GomolKsky, Lev (Leon after 1945) Nikolaevich (1903-1988), First-W ave prose writer, poet, critic, artist; 176, 188, 189, 190, 250, 609
Goncharenko, Agapy (Church name of Andrei Onufrlevich Gumnltsky) (1832-1916), prose writer and editor, fled Russia in 1860; 99, 100, 104, 500, 501, 522 Goncharenko, Georgy Ivanovich [Yury Galich] (1877-1940), First-W ave prose writer and poet; 198, 560 Goncharov, Ivan Aleksandrovich (1812-1891), non-émigré writer; 46, 53 Goncharova, Nataliya Sergeevna (1861-1962), artist, emigr.: 1915; 168, 521 Gorb, Fëdor I. [Fedor Kubansky], Second-W ave prose writer; 579 Gorbachëv, Mikhail Sergeevich (b. 1931), last Soviet head of state; 2 4 ,4 2 1 , 432, 454, 601, 602 Gorbanevskaya, Natal'ya Evgen’evna (b. 1936), poet, emigr.: 1975; 432,
438, 471, 585, 590, 594 Gorbov, Yakov Nikolaevich (1896-1982), prose writer; 542 Gorchakov, M. K., First-W ave publisher; 542 Gordin, Yakov, First-W ave playwright and editor; 100 Gordon, Boris Abramovich (7-1938), First-W ave poet; 414, 558 Gorelov, Pavel, opposed publications in Russia of the works of Joseph Brodsky; 606 Gorenshtein, Fridrikh Naumovich (b. 1932), prose writer, emigr.: 1980; 438, 447, 448, 458, 595, 597, 607
Gorgulov, Pavel [Pavel Bred] (1895-1932), First-W ave poet and prose writer, assassinated Paul Doumer, President of France; 110, 111, 548
Goricheva, Tat'yana Mikhailovna (b. 1947), writer and femininist, expelled from U .S.S.R . in 1980; 394, 438, 595 [Gor'ky, Maksim], see: Peshkov, Aleksei Gorlin, Mikhail Genrikhovich [Mlraev, collective name used by him and wife Raisa Blokh] (1909-1943 or 1944), First-W ave poet, translator and literary scholar, family emigrated: 1919, died in Germ an concentration camp; 250, 326, 550, 560, 561, 564 [Gorny, Sergei], see: Otsup, Aleksandr Gorodetskaya, Nadezhda Danilovna (1901-1985), prose writer, emigr.: 1919;
524 Gorodetsky, Yakov, 1986 emigrant to Israel; 411 Gorovits (Horowitz), Vladimir Samoilovich (1904-1989), pianist, emigr.: 1925; 539 [Gorskaya], see: Grivtsova Gorsky, I., wrote essay in Smolensk during World W ar II; 324 Gort, Vera Yakovlevna (b. 1940), poet, and translator, emigr.: 1973; 588 [Goryansky, Valentin], see: Ivanov, Valentin Ivanovich Goul, Roman Borisovich, see: Gul', Roman Borisovich Gourmont, Rémy de (1858-1915), French novelist and critic; 14 Grabar’, Igor’ Èmmanullovlch (1871-1960), non-émigré painter; 154
RUSSIA ABROAD
669
[Gradoboev], see: Dudln Granovsky, Timofei Nikolaevich (1813-1855), historian and prominent social figure; 86
Grass, Günter (b. 1927), German novelist, lyricist, artist, and playwright; 453, 589
Graves, Robert Ranke (1895-1985), expatriate British writer and literary scholar; 23 Gray, Thomas (1716-1771), English poet; 57
Grebenshchikov, Georgy Dmitrievich (1883-1964), First-W ave prose writer, emigr.: 1920; 227, 231, 527, 533, 534, 537, 582, 583 Grech, Nikolai Ivanovich (1787-1867), journalist, writer, and philologist, travelled abroad; 495, 497, 502 Grechaninov, Aleksandr Tikhonovich (1864-1956), composer, emigr.: 1925; 539 Greffeny, fourteenth- or fifteenth-century abbot who made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land and wrote a travel account; 490 Gregory VII (Hildebrand) (c. 1021-1085), Pope; 61, 337 Grlbachëv, Nikolai Matveevich (b. 1910), prose writer and Soviet literary bureaucrat; 430 Griboedov, Aleksandr Sergeevich (1790-1829), playwright and poet, diplomat in Persia 1818-1822, 1828-1829; 51, 495 Grlbovsky, Vyacheslav Mikhailovich (1866-1924), First-W ave prose writer; 538 Grigg, P. G., British Secretary of State for W ar during World W ar II; 329 Grigorenko, Pëtr (Petro) Grigor'evich (1907-1987), Soviet general, dissident, and memoirist, emigr.: 1977; 394, 438, 444, 593, 597 Grigorenko, Zinaida, wife of Petr Grigorenko; 438 Grigor'ev, Apollon Aleksandrovich (1822-1864), poet and critic; 7 6 ,2 1 5 ,4 5 8 Grinberg [Èrge], Roman Nikolaevich (1897-1970), First-W ave editor; 360, 586
Grinberg, Savely Solomonovich (b. 1914), poet and translator, emigr.: 1973; 414
Grinberg, Z., Deputy People's Commissar for education in early 1920s; 536 Grishin, A., author of 1985 letter to magazine Veche) 378 Gritsman, Andrei Yur'evich (b. 1947), poet, emigr.: 1990; 613 Grlvnlna, Irina Vladimirovna (b. 1945), poet, emigr.: 1985; 601 Grlvtsova, Antonina Alekseevna [A. Gorskaya] (1893-1972), poet and critic, abroad with diplomat husband as of 1917; 250, 522, 526, 588
Grobman, Mikhail Yakovlevich (b. 1939), poet, emigr.: 1971; 587 Grolsman, Vadim Aronovich (b. 1963), poet, emigr.: 1990; 613 Gromyko, Andrei Andreevich (1909-1989), Soviet diplomat and memoirist; 334, 374, 567
Gronsky, Nikolai Pavlovich (1909-1934), poet and prose writer, born in Finland, left for Paris in 1920 with parents; 250, 552
670
JOHN GLAD
Grosman, Anna Isaakovna (b. 1944), prose writer, emigr.: 1971; 587 Grosse, Lev, émigré in China who died in a Soviet prison upon returning to Russia after World W ar II; 343
Grot, Elena Petrovna [also: von Grot] (1891-1968), poet and playwright; 585 Grot, Yakov Karlovich, professor of Russian language and literature in Finland 1840-1852; 202, 496, 497
Grudzlnsky, K., First-W ave poet; 327 Gryzov, Aleksei Alekseevich [Aleksei Achalr] (1896 or 1898-1960 or 1961), poet and journalist, emigr.: either 1921 or 1922, forcibly returned from China to Russia in 1945 and imprisoned until 1956; 219, 250, 343, 530, 559, 567, 580 Grzhebln, Zinovy Isaevich (1877-1929), publisher and artist, studied abroad 1899-1905, emigr: 1921; 157-159, 206, 238-240, 511, 514, 524, 530, 531, 533, 534, 536, 538, 540, 543 Guberman, Igor’ Mironovich Pgor’ Garik] (b. 1936), Third-W ave poet and prose writer; 414, 475 Gubenko, Nikolai Nikolaevich (b. 1941), actor and director; 607 Guchkov, Aleksandr Ivanovich (1862-1936), industrialist and minister in Provisional Government, emigr.: 1918 or 1919; 136, 281, 299, 362 Guerra, René, French Slavist; 440 Gukasov (Gukasyants), Abram Osipovich (1872-1969), industrialist and publisher, lived widely abroad before revolution, emigr.: 1917, financed publishing house and newspaper Vozrozhdenie\ 170, 360, 522, 585 Gukovsky, Aleksandr Isaevich (7-1925), First-W ave editor, committed suicide; 169, 236 Gul’ (Goul), Roman Borisovich (1896-1986), novelist, editor and memoirist, evacuated to Germany: 1918; 1 5 ,2 8 , 29, 8 8 ,1 3 8 ,1 4 5 ,1 4 9 ,1 5 7 ,1 6 2 , 163, 245, 250, 338, 352, 359, 400, 402, 437, 442, 449, 524, 550, 574, 579, 596, 599, 602 Gumllëv, Nikolai Stepanovich (1886-1921), poet, travelled widely before 1917, executed; 140, 164-166, 170, 252, 260, 273, 366, 368, 431 Gurevich, M., émigré publisher in America in the 1920s; 231 Guro, Elena Genrikhovna (also: Èleonora von Notenberg) (1877-1913), poet and prose writer; 202, 517, 519, 520 Gurvich, Fedor Il'ich [Theodor Dan] (1871-1947), physician and First-W ave M en’shevik editor, abroad: 1901-1902, 1904-1905, 1907-1913, deported from the Soviet Union in 1922; 120 [Gurvich, T.], see: Sapgir, Kira
Gusev-Orenburgsky, Sergeilvanovich (1867-1963), First-W ave prose writer, emigr.: 1921; 219, 220, 230, 530, 582 Gushchik, Vladimir Efimovich (1892-1947), prose writer, emigr.: 1919, arrested by the Soviets in the early 1940s and executed; 201, 313, 570
Gushchin, Æ, deported from France in Novem ber 1917; 342
RUSSIA ABROAD
671
G utlna,
N elli A leksandrovna (b. 1946), prose writer and playwright, emigr.: 1971; 604 G utu ev, R., writer in W arsaw in 1920s; 190 H ailie S elassie (1891-1975), em peror of Ethopia; 356 H ardenburg, Friedrich von [N ovalis] (1772-1801), German romantic writer; 71 H egel, G eorg W ilhelm Friedrich (1770-1831), German philosopher; 82, 84,
86 H eine, H einrich (1797-1856), German poet and prose writer; 12, 14, 54, 212 H enry I (1008-1060), king of France; 33 H enry IV (1367-1413), king of England; 337 H erw egh, G eorg (1817-1875), German poet; 12, 84 H esiod (probably post-Homeric), G reek poet; 195 H esse, H erm ann (1877-1962), Germ an-Swiss writer; 127 H ildesherim er, W olfgang, German writer; 421 H im m ler, H einrich (1900-45), organizer of the Gestapo; 139, 317, 334 H itler, A d o lf (1889-1945); 117, 122, 123, 132, 133, 138, 188, 281, 286, 289, 305, 306, 310-312, 314, 315, 317, 322, 324, 335, 340, 382, 415, 423, 446, 549, 550, 559, 561 H oecke (n ée G ubanova), V aleriya K onstantinovna (1904-1986), First-W ave poet; 602 H om er; 279 Hood, Thom as (1799-1845), English poet; 174 H oover, H erbert C lark (1875-1964), U.S. President; 278 H o ro w itz, see: G orovlts Hugo, V icto r M arie (1802-1885), French poet and novelist; 14, 71, 172, 506 H untington, W . C hapin, historian; 296 H usserl, Edm und (1859-1938), German philosopher; 242 H uxley, A ldous Leonard (1894-1963), English novelist; 280 Ievleva, V arvara N ikolaevna, First-W ave poet and prose writer; 343 Ignatova, E lena A lekseevna (b. 1947), poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1990; 613 Ign at'ev, A n drei, made pilgrimage to Palestine and Mount Sinai in 1707-1708 and composed travel account; 39, 49, 494 Ignaty, accompanied Metropolitan Pimen on pilgrimage in 1389 and wrote travel account; 35, 491 Ig o r’ (?-945), prince of Kiev; 32, 33, 490 [ll'f], see: Fainzil'berg ll’ln, Ivan A leksandrovich (1883-1954), philosopher, deported from the Soviet Union in 1922; 241, 531 ll'ln , M ikhail A ndreevich [M ikhail O sorgln] (1878-1942), prose writer, emigr.: 1906 or 1907-1916, deported in 1922; 15, 138, 170, 225, 227, 240, 252, 278, 279, 359, 515, 516, 520, 521, 531, 538, 543, 545, 563
672
JOHN GLAD
ll’in, Nikolai, in 1876 in St. Petersburg published an account of his six-month trip to the United States; 505, 508, 509, 520 ll'in, Vladimir Nikolaevich (1891-1974), theologian and philosopher, emigr.: 1919; 230 ll'lna, Natal'ya (1914-1991), First-W ave prose writer, returned to Russia in 1947; 143, 343, 533, 569, 615 ll'lnsky, Oleg Pavlovich (b. 1932), poet, emigr.: 1944, left for U.S.A. in 1956; 565, 577, 584 llishaev, Nlsim Iosifovich (b. 1923), prose writer, emigr.: 1976; 591, 604 ll'nek, Nina, poet, returned to Soviet Union from China from China at end of World W ar II; 220 ll'yashenko, Vladimir Stepanovich (1887-?), poet, philosopher, editor; 265, 539 Inber, Vera (1890-1972), poet; 166 Inverchapel of Loch Eck, Archibald John Kerr Clark Kerr (1882-1951), British ambassador to the Soviet Union 1942-46; 328, 564 loachlm, Patriarch of Alexandria; 491 Ioann (Maksimovich, Mikhail Borisovich) (1896-1966), Archbishop, emigr: during Russian civil war; 115 lofe, Yury Matveevich (1921-1992), poet, emigr.: 1972; 179, 588 Ioffe, Leonid Moiseevich (b. 1943), poet, emigr.: 1972; 414, 588 Iona Malen'kll ('T h e Small Jonah"), monk who visited the Holy Land 16491652; 37, 492, 493 lonln [Rakltln], Yury L'vovlch (1882-1952), First-W ave theater director; 438 Ipat'ev, N. N., m em ber of literary circle in Zbraslav (Czechoslovakia) in the 1920s; 178 Pretsky, Vladimir], see: Gllkman, Viktor Yakovlevich [Irmantseva, K.], see: Krotkova Irtel', Pavel Mikhailovich (1896-1979), First-W ave poet and prose writer; 201 Iskander, Fazil’ Abdulovich (b. 1919), non-émigré poet and prose writer; 604 Istomin, Nikolai Pavlovich (1907-1971), First-W ave Russian poet, prose writer, and critic in Latvia who returned to the Soviet Union; 197, 546, 587 Istomina, Avdot'ya Il'inichna (1799-1848), ballet dancer; 51 Iswolsky (Izvol'skaya), Hélène (Elena Aleksandrovna), writer and translator;
562 Itselev, Leonid Izrailevich (b. 1946), playwright, emigr.: 1978; 594 Ivan III Vasil'evich (1440-1550), Grand Duke of Moscow; 206, 207, 492 Ivan IV Vasil'evich (Grozny, meaning 'T h e Terrible") (1530-1584), Russian tsar; 37, 48, 49, 76, 77, 207, 212, 291, 336, 491, 492 Ivannikov, Mikhail Dmitrievich (1904-1968), prose writer, emigr.: 1920?; 176, 553
Ivanov, Aleksandr Andreevich (1806-1858), artist, lived in Italy from 1831; 216, 499
RUSSIA ABROAD
673
Ivanov, G eorgy V ladim irovich [K ondrat'ev] (1894-1958), poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1922; 1 6 0 ,1 6 8 , 250, 260, 263, 264, 366, 533, 545, 546, 548, 558, 579 Ivanov, R azum nik V asil'evich [Ivanov-R azum nik] (1878-1946), critic, journalist, literary historian, taken from German-occupied area to East Prussia in 1942; 562, 563, 568 Ivanov, V alen tin Ivanovich [V alentin G oryansky] (1887 or 1888-1949), prose writer, editor, poet, emigr.: 1920; 335, 527, 540, 572, 579 Ivanov, V sevolod N ikanorovich (1888-1972), First-W ave poet and prose writer, returned to Russia: 1945; 143, 219, 222, 566, 588 Ivanov, V sevolod Vyacheslavovich (1895-1963), Soviet writer; 143, 158 Ivanov, V yacheslav Ivanovich (1866-1949), poet, playwright, historian, lived most of the period 1886-1905 in Europe, sent abroad by Narkompros in 1924; 184, 249, 255, 257-259, 341, 507, 513, 514, 519, 520, 527, 533, 537, 539, 547, 554, 565, 572, 581 Ivanova, Iraid a G ustavovna [Irina V ladim irovna O doevtseva] (née Geinike [Heinicke]) (1895 or 1901-1990), poet and memoirist, emigr.: 1922, returned to Russia: 1987; 1 4 3 ,1 6 0 , 260, 420, 421, 533, 598, 605, 614 Ivanova, Lidiya V yacheslavovna (1896-1985), memoirist and daughter of Vyacheslav Ivanov; 601 Ivanova, Y u liya, First-W ave poet; 201 Ivanovsky, A ndrei A ndreevich (1791-1848), prose writer and poet; 74, 498 Ivantsov, D. V ., First-W ave professor in Czechoslovakia; 178 Ivask, Y u ry P avlovich [B. A fanas'evsky, G. Issako] (1907-1986), poet and critic, family moved to Estonia in 1920, fled to Germany in 1944, moved to US in 1949; 2 0 ,1 9 7 , 2 0 1 ,2 5 0 , 360 369, 472, 486, 527, 558, 564, 571, 572, 575, 586, 601, 602 Iverni, V io letta Isaakovna [V io letta B etaki] (b. 1937), poet, emigr.: 1973; 438, 588 Izdebskaya, G alina S., First-W ave prose writer and memoirist; 250, 563 [Izgo ev], see: Lande Izo to v, A ., non-émigré literary critic; 583 Izvol'skaya, see: Isw olsky Jackson, H enry M artin (1912-1983), U.S. senator; 375, 385, 387, 589, 609 Jakobson, Rom an, see: Yakobson Jam es, H enry (1843-1916), expatriate American novelist and critic; 23, 60 Jänisch, see: Pavlova Janson, A leksei K irillovich (1866-1941), school director and cultural activist in Estonia in inter-war period, Russian-Estonian background, born in Estonia, executed by German occupation government for participation in pro-Soviet activities; 200 Jeanne d 'A rc (Joan of A rc) (1412-1431); 66 Joachim , Patriarch of Jerusalem in sixteenth century; 48, 49, 491, 492 Johnson, D onald B arton (b. 1933), American Slavist; 453
674
JOHN GLAD
Joyce, Jam es (1882-1941), Irish writer; 280, 297, 453 Jung, F., German historian; 537 [K achalov], see: S hverubovlch K achurovsky [S hlpovnikov], M ikhail Il'ich (1900-1976), poet, emigr.: 1943, left for U.S.A. in 1950; 563, 572, 592 K achva, B., deported from France to Soviet Union in Novem ber 1947; 342 K adom tsev, Boris, Mladoross ideologue; 130 K afka, Franz (1883-1924), Czech-born German novelist; 283 Kagan, A bram Saulovich (1889-1983), publisher, deported from the Soviet Union: 1922; 157, 238 K aganovich, L azar’ M oiseevich (1893-1991), revolutionary and Secretary of Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, influential in conducting the purges; 551 K aganskaya, M aiya Lazarevna (b. 1939), critic and essayist, emigr.: 1976; 414, 600 K ahane, M eier (1932-1990), Zionist proponent of terrorism, assassinated.386 K aigorodova, Irina D m itrievna, First-W ave poet; 201 K allinikov, Io sif Fëdorovich (1890-1934), First-W ave poet and prose writer, evacuated with W hite army: 1920; 527, 532, 543, 552 K alyaev, Ivan P latonovich (1877-1905), poet and Socialist-Revolutionary terrorist, born in W arsaw, left for Russia in 1897, in 1902 went to Lemberg (Russian Lvov, Ukrainian Lviv, then part of Austria), returned by German police to Russian authorities that sam e year, went to Berlin and G eneva in 1903, again in Russia in 1904 and 1905, executed for assassinating Grand Duke Sergei Aleksandrovich; 91, 510-514 Kam ensky, A n ato ly Pavlovich (1876-1941), poet, prose writer, playwright, emigr.: 1920, returned to Russia: 1930 and “illegally repressed"; posthumously “rehabilitated"; 152, 530, 547, 561 K am kln, V ikto r P etrovich (1902-1974), bookseller; 222, 407, 409, 575, 590, 601 [K am enev], see: R ozenfel'd Kam eneva, O l'ga D avidovna (18817-1941), Trotsky's younger sister and wife of Lev Kamenev, executed in the Soviet Union; 580 K am inka, A vgust Isaakovich (1865-1940) Cadet party leader and editor; 118, 281 K am yanov, B oris Isaakovich (b. 1945), poet, emigr.: 1976; 414, 591 K am yshnikov, Lev M., First-W ave prose writer and publisher; 230, 231 K am yshnyuk, Fedor Leont'evich, poet, brought to Harbin as an infant, returned to Russia in the early 1930s; 219 K andel', Feliks Solom onovich [F. Kam ov] (b. 1932), prose writer, emigr.: 1977; 414, 438, 592, 595 K andinsky, V asily V asil'evich (1866-1944), one of the founders of abstract painting, abroad after 1897, with the exception of the period 19141921; 154, 168, 530
RUSSIA ABROAD
675
Kannegisser, Leonid Akimovich (1896 or 1898-1918), student and poet, assassinated Moisei Uritsky in 1918; 276 Kant, Immanuel (1724-1804); 275 Kantemir, Antlokh Dmitrievich (1709-44), poet and satirist, abroad as diplomat 1732-44; 51, 494
Kantor, Mikhail L'vovich (1885 or 1889-1970 or 1971), First-W ave editor and poet; 540, 555
Kantorowicz,
Alfred (1899-1979), German writer, abroad 1933-1946, emigrated from East Germ any to W est Germ any in 1957; 401 Kapel'man, Sergei V. [Sergei Bart], First-W ave poet; 188, 190 Kaplan, Igor’, see: Mikhalevich-Kaplan Kaplun [Sumsky], Solomon Gltmanovlch (1883 or 1891-1940), First-W ave émigré publisher who went bankrupt and returned to Russia; 158 Kapnlst, Pëtr Ivanovich (1830-1898), poet, playwright, tsarist censor, lived abroad for most of 1870-1898; 53, 503, 511, 513 Kapp, Wolfgang (1858-1922), founder of the German Vaterlandspartei, unsuccessfully attempted a coup in 1920; 122 Karabchevsky, Nikolai Platonovich (1851-1925), novelist and playwright, emigr.: shortly after revolution; 530, 539 Karabelesh, Andrei, émigré poet; 211 KaradZié, Radovan (b. 1945), Bosnia Serb politcial leader, accused of w ar crimes; 459 Karamzin, Nikolai Mikhailovich (1766-1826), historian, prose writer, and traveller; 34, 43, 44, 69, 154, 494 Karamzina (née Maksimova), Mariya Vladimirovna (1900-1942), First-W ave poet, deported to U .S.S.R . from Estonia in 1941; 201, 561 Karachevtsev, Sergei Vasil'evich (1891-1942), First-W ave publisher; 198, 563 Kardinalovskaya [Bentov], Mirtala Sergeevna (b. 1929), poet and sculptor, taken to Germ any for forced labor in 1943; 563, 569, 588 Kardovsky, Dmitry Nikolaevich (1866-1943), painter; 154 Karmazin, E; 600 Karpovich, Mikhail Mikhailovich (1888-1959), historian and editor, sent by Provisional Government to Russian Embassy in Washington, remained in U.S.A; 359, 580 Karpuk, V., émigré writer in America in 1920s; 230 Karsavin, Lev Platonovich (1882-1952), philosopher, historian, linguist, deported from the Soviet Union: 1922; 126, 128, 517, 531, 546, 560, 570, 575
Karsavina, Tamara Platonovna (1885-1978), ballerina, sister of Lev Karsavin, emigr.: 1918; 272, 273
Kartashev, Anton Vladimirovich (1875-1960), theologian, emigr.: 1919; 117, 126, 203, 205
676
JOHN GLAD
Kasatkin, Nikolai (18367-1912), sent to Japan in 1860 as Russian Orthodox missionary; 233
Kasatkin-Rostovsky, Fedor Nikolaevich (1875-1940), First-W ave poet, prose writer, playwright, emigr.: after 1920; 183, 534, 541, 560, 571
Kashin, Aleksandr Adrianovich, émigré prose writer; 365 Kashkarov, Yury Danilovich [D. Skalon] (1940-1994), prose writer and editor, emigr.: 1976; 437, 449, 591, 614, 615
Kashtanov, Petr [Mikhail Vasll'evich Shatov] (1920-1980), bibliographer of émigré periodicals; 596
[Kasim, A.], see: Al'tamentov Kasso, Lev Arlstldovlch (1865-1914), tsarist minister of education; 209 Kataev, Evgeny Petrovich [Petrov] (1903-1942), non-émigré writer; 381 Kataev, Valentin Petrovich (1897-1986), non-émigré writer; 209, 294, 444 Katenev, N. I., émigré prose writer; 585 Katkov, Mikhail Niklforlvich (1818-1887), journalist, critic, publisher, studied abroad; 53, 61, 496 Kaufman, E. S., publisher in Harbin; 219 Kavetsky, Leonid (1906-7), First-W ave poet; 197 Kazem-Bek, Aleksandr L'vovich (1890? 19027-1977), émigré leader of the Young Russia League in the 1920s, fled to the U .S.S.R . from the United States in 1956 or 1958; 129-131, 577, 593 Keats, John (1795-1821), English poet; 256, 273 Kedrov, A. E., tsarist admiral and First-W ave émigré; 337 Kel'berin, Lazar’ Izrailevich (1907-1975), First-W ave poet and critic; 2 5 0 ,2 5 2 Kel'ner, Irina Matveevna (b. 1944), physician, radio journalist, hostess of musical salon, emigr.: 1974; 409 Kel'ner, Leonid Samuilovich (b. 1939), businessman and host of musical salon, emigr.: 1972; 409 Kel'siev, Vasily Ivanovich (1835-1872), revolutionary and memoirist, defected in Plymouth, England, in 1857, voluntarily surrendered to Russian authorities in 1867, returned to Russia and w as pardoned; 499, 501, 502, 504 Kennaway, Alexander, second-generation Russian author; 214 Kennedy, John Fitzgerald (1917-1963), U. S. President; 410 Kennedy, Robert (1925-1968), U.S. Senator; 583 Kenzheev, Bakhyt (b. 1950), poet, emigr.: 1982; 475, 597, 599 Kerensky, Aleksandr Fedorovich (1881-1970), lawyer, head of Provisional Government in 1917, emigr.: 1918; 89, 109, 111, 113, 119, 166, 174, 236, 278, 279, 281, 313, 320, 350, 525, 538, 542, 543 Kerr, Archibald Clark, see: Inverchapel of Loch Eck Kerzhner, David Naumovich (b. 1919), poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1979; 595
Kesten, Hermann (b. 1900), Germ an writer and publisher, emigrated from Germ any in 1933; 424
RUSSIA ABROAD
677
Keun, Irmgard (1905 or 1910-1982), German writer; 421 Khaindrova, Lidiya Yuliyanovna (1910-1986), poet, emigr.: 1916, returned to Soviet Union from China at end of World W ar II; 220, 343, 521, 569, 602 Khalif, Lev Yakovlevich (b. 1930), poet, emigr.: 1977; 592, 597 Khanelis, Vladimir (b. 1946), prose writer, emigr.: 1977; 592 Khariton, Boris Iosifovich (Osipovich?) (1876-after 1941), editor, deported from the Soviet Union: 1922; 195, 198 [Khazanov, Boris], see: Falbusovich, Gennady Moiseevich Kheifets, Mikhail Ruvimovich (b. 1934), prose writer and critic, emigr.: 1980; 595 Khenkin, Kirill Viktorovich (b. 1916), essayist, emigr.: 1923; returned to Russia: 1941; re-em igrated 1973; 535, 561, 588 Khlebnikov, Viktor [Velimir] Vladimirovich (1885-1922), Futurist poet (noném igré); 366 Khmel'nitsky, Sergei Dmitrievich; 452 K hodasevich, V ladislav Felitsianovich (1886-1939), poet, critic, and literary historian, emigr.: 1922; 20, 144, 145, 149, 158, 160, 168, 170, 236, 237, 239, 245, 255, 260, 265, 270, 275, 282, 297, 433, 487, 518, 531533, 539, 540, 543, 548, 557, 559, 581, 583, 601, 605 K hodorovich, S erg ei, dissident and m anager of the Fund to Aid Political Prisoners; 432 Khodorovich, Tat'yana Sergeevna (b. 1921), essayist and linguist, emigr.: 1977; 438 Kholchev, Aleksei L , First-W ave poet; 250 Khomyakov, Aleksei Stepanovich (1805-1860), poet, playwright, theologian; 79, 126 Khomyakov, Gennady Andreevich [G. Andreev] (1906-1984), prose writer, taken prisoner by the Germans in 1942; 348, 562, 579, 600 Khorvat, Evgeny Anatol'evich (1961-1992), poet, emigr.: 1981; 596 Khrlstiani, Evgeniya Aleksandrovna, First-W ave poet; 539 Khromchenko, Yakov Borisovich (b. 1924), poet and documentary film director, emigr.: 1973; 414, 588 Khromchenko, Yuliya Vladimirovna [Liya Vladimirova] (b. 1938), poet, prose writer, film script writer, emigr.: 1973; 414, 588, 590, 600 Khrushchev, Nikita Sergeevich (1894-1971), Soviet head of state; 362, 372, 384, 443, 455, 577-580, 582, 610 Khudyakov, Genrikh Fëdorovich (b. 1930), poet, emigr.: 1974; 475, 589 Khurgin, Boris Mikhailovich (b. 1945), poet, emigr.: 1985; 601 Khvorostlnln, Ivan (7-1625), Russian courtier; 77, 78 Khvostenko, Aleksei L’vovich (b. 1940), poet and singer, emigr.: 1977; 391, 461, 475, 592, 599 Kierkegaard, Seren (1813-1855), Danish philosopher and religious thinker; 242
678
JOHN GLAD
Klndyakova (Rynkevlch), Sofya Efimovna, First-W ave poet; 188 King, MacKenzie, Canadian Prime Minister in late 1940s; 569 Kinkel, Klaus (b. 1936), German Minister of Foreign Affairs; 418 Kipling, Rudyard (1865-1936), English author; 232; 362 Kiprlan (13367-1406), Bulgarian Metropolitan of Kiev and Lithuania; 35 Kireevsky, Ivan Vasil'evlch (1806-1856), philosopher and critic, 1830 spent in Germany; 79, 495
Kirienko-Voloshin [Voloshin, more infrequently Kirienko], Maksmllian Aleksandrovich (1877-1932), poet and artist, in Europe: 1899, abroad most of 1901-1917; 66, 67, 164, 165, 249, 289, 469, 511, 517, 522, 535, 549 Kirill Vladimirovich (1876-1938), Grand Duke, pretender to the throne, emigr.:
1917; 121-123, 130, 157, 349, 528, 531, 536, 537, 546, 558 Klrkhner (Kirkhlner?), O., First-W ave publisher; 157 [Kirov, Sergei], see: Kostrikov Kirova, Dina Nikolaevna (?-early 1950s), actress and theater .director, wife of Fëdor Kasatkin-Rostovsky, emigr.: 1920; 295, 541
Kirsanov, Semën Isaakovich (1906-1972), non-émigré poet; 366 Kishilov, Nikolai Borisovich (1934-1973), poet, emigr.: 1973; 588 Kiskevlch, Evgeny Mikhailovich (1891-1945), First-W ave poet; 560 Kissinger, Henry (b. 1923); 572 Kistyakovsky, Bogdan (Fedor) Aleksandrovich (1868-1920), non-émigré philosopher; 124
Kizevetter, Aleksandr Aleksandrovich (1866-1933), historian and memoirist, deported from the Soviet Union in 1922; 118, 178, 531, 546, 550 [Klenov, Andrei], see: Kupershtok, Aron Il'ich [Klenovsky, Dmitry], see: Krachkovsky Dmitry Iosifovich Klimenko, Mariya Apollonovna (1869-1937), Riga playwright; 556 Klimov, Evgeny Evgen'evich (1901-1990), art historian; 614 Klimov, Grigory Petrovich (b. 1919), prose writer, defected in late 1940s; 575 Klochkov, Mikhail, First-W ave poet; 197, 250 Klopotovsky, Vladimir Vladimirovich [Leri] (1883-1944), First-W ave poet, artist, journalist; 565, 570 Klyuchnikov, Yury Veniaminovich (1886-1938), First-W ave Change of Landmarks writer, emigr.: 1919, returned to Russia in 1923, executed;
124-126, 535 Klyueva, Elena Mikhailovna (b. 1915), poet, emigr.: 1978; 593 Knauf, Elizaveta Avgustovna [Magnusgofskaya] (1893-1942), First-W ave poet and prose writer; 563 Knipper-Chekhova, Ol'ga Leonardovna (1868-1959), actress, wife of Anton Chekhov; 293, 294 Knorrlng, Irina Nikolaevna (1906-1943), poet, family emigrated in 1920; 527, 559, 564, 572
Knorrlng, Nikolai Nikolaevich, historian, emigr.: 1920; 527
RUSSIA ABROAD
679
[Knut, Oovld], see: Flksman, David Mironovich Knyazev, Boris, émigré poet; 345 Knyazhevlch, Nikolai Maksimovich (1794-1852), poet; 498 Kobyakov [Sirin], Dmitry Yur'evich (1902-1978), First-W ave prose writer, editor, poet; 176, 183, 250, 594
Kobylinsky, Lev L'vovich [Lev Èllis] 1879-1947), poet, literary scholar, translator, emigr.: 1911; 257, 518, 520, 570, 572, 591 Kobylyansky, Izrail' Davidovich (1894-1941?), First-W ave journalist; 198 Kochurova-Sandor, Viktoriya Ivanovna [Alla Ktorova] (b. 1926), prose writer, emigr.: 1958; 15, 371, 579, 613 Kodryanskaya, Natal'ya Vladimirovna (1901-1983), prose writer, emigr.: 1919; 524, 599 Kogan, A. È., émigré publisher in Berlin in 1920s; 238 Kogan, Mark Venetsianovich (b. 1937), writer and historian, emigr.: 1979; 615 Kohl, Helmut (b. 1930), German Chancellor; 416 Kolransky, Aleksandr Arnol'dovich (1884-1968), First-W ave prose writer, emigr.: 1919; 524, 585 Kotakowskl, Leszek (b. 1927), Polish professor of philosophy, left Poland in
1968; 67, 95, 101 Kolbaslna, see: Chernova-Kolbasina Kolchak, Aleksandr Vasil'evich (1874-1920), arctic explorer, tsarist admiral, appointed supreme ruler of Russia in November 1918, handed over by Czech troops to the Red Army and executed; 1 0 5 ,1 3 7 ,1 8 6 ,2 0 3 , 213, 523, 527, 542, 545, 548 Kolker, Yury Iosifovich (b. 1946), poet, emigr.: 1984; 600 Kollontai, Aleksandra Mikhailovna (1872-1952), prose writer and femininist, abroad: 1898-1899, 1903-1904, 1908-1917, 1923-1945; 2 7 0 ,5 1 0 ,5 1 6 , 522, 566, 575 Kolody, Oleg (7-1937), First-W ave poet; 190 Kologrivova, Elizaveta Vasil'evna (1809-1884), prose writer and translator, abroad in 1843, emigr.: 1860; 496, 500, 507 Koloshln (Kaloshin), Sergei Pavlovich (1825-1868), prose writer, emigr.: 1863; 501, 502 Kolosov, M., Second-W ave emigrant; 356 [Kolosova, Marianna Ivanovna], see: Pokrovskaya, Rimma Ivanovna Komissarzhevskaya, Vera Fëdorovna (1864-1910), actress; 292 Komissarzhevsky, Fëdor Fedorovich (1882-1954), theater director and theatrical scholar, emigr.: 1919; 294, 295, 549 Kon, Feliks Yakovlevich (1864-1941), memoirist, ethnographer, prose writer, born in Poland, in Siberian exile 1891-1894, returned to Poland 18941914, back in Russia 1917, spent some time in Kiev; 25, 520, 522
Kon, Igor’ S., non-émigré sociologist; 604
680
JOHN GLAD
Kondakov, Nikodim Pavlovich (1844-1925), historian of Byzantine and ancient Russian art, emigr.: 1920; 178, 318, 538 Kondratenko, Tat'yana, First-W ave playwright, poet, and essayist; 193 Kondrat'ev, Aleksandr Alekseevich (1876-1967), prose writer, poet, critic, memoirist, resided in an area ceded to Poland in 1920, later emigrated to U.S.A.; 524, 584 Konovalov, D., émigré publisher in Paris in interwar period; 170 Konradi, Evgeniya Ivanovna (1838-1898), journalist and translator, emigr.: 1885; 507, 511 Konradi, M., W hite officer who assasinated Vatslav Vorovsky in 1923; 299, 535 Konson, Lev Faitelevlch (b. 1927), prose writer, emigr.: 1980; 595 Konstantin Nikolaevich (1827-1892), Grand Duke; 80 Konstantinov, Dmitry Vasil'evlch (b. 1908), Second-W ave journalist and church historian; 344 Konstantinovich, M., writer in W arsaw in 1920s; 190 Kontorovich, Semën Osipovich [Simon Lempert] (b. 1914) poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1980; 595 Kontsevlch, S., First-W ave writer; 188 Kopeikin, Anatoly Aleksandrovich (b. 1957), poet, emigr.: 1983; 598 Kopelev, Lev Zinov'evich (1912-1997), literary scholar, dissident, historian, emigr.: 1980; 394, 422, 438, 441, 595, 596, 611 Kopel'man, Simon Iosifovich [R. Vainer] (b. 1922), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1979; 595 Kopetsky, Leonty Vasil'evlch (1894-1976), First-W ave linguist; 178 Kopysov, Ivan, journalist who corresponded with Solzhenitsyn in 1960s; 388, 389 Kopytova, G., member of literary discussion group in Harbin; 219 Korchnoi, Viktor L'vovlch (b. 1931), chessmaster, defected: 1976; 394, 593 Korneev [Korn], Lev Aleksandrovich (b. 1930), non-émigré historian highly critical of Zionism; 377, 378, 593, 597 Kornfel'd, German K., pre-revolutionary publisher; 288 Kornfel'd, Mikhail Germanovich (1884-1973), publisher, emigr.: 1919; 288 Korobeinikov, Trlfon, sixteenth-century merchant sent by Ivan the Terrible to Mount Athos and Constantinople; 39, 49, 492 Korolenko, Vladimir Gelaktionovich (1853-1921), non-émigré writer, critic, social activist; 96, 510 Korolëva, Lina, actress and wife of Pavel Orlov [Orlenev]; 292 Korotich, Vitaly Alekseevich (b. 1936), non-émigré journalist, editor, poet, prose writer; 605 Korovaeva, Nataliya, First-W ave poet; 321 Korovin, Konstantin Alekseevich (1861-1939), prose writer and artist, emigr.: 1923.559 Korrodi, Eduard, German author; 248
RUSSIA ABROAD
681
[Korsak, V . V .], see: Zavadsky Korsh, Valentin Fédorovich (1828-1883), editor, journalist, literary historian, translator, abroad: 1875-1877; 227, 500, 504, 505 Korvin-Krukovskaya, Anna Vasil'evna (1843-1887), prose writer and political activist, emigr.: 1869, after 1874 lived alternately in Paris and St. Petersburg; 503, 504, 507, 508 Korvin-Krukovsky, Pëtr Vasil'evich (1844-1899), playwright, prose writer, journalist, emigr.: 1875; 504, 505, 507, 509 Korvin-Piotrovsky, Vladimir L'vovich (1891 or 1901-1966), poet and playwright, emigr.: 1920?; 160, 169, 325, 527, 546, 573, 580, 584 Koryagin, Anatoly Ivanovich (b. 1939), psychiatrist, human-rights activist; 432 [Korzhavin, Naum], see: Mandel', Naum Moiseevich Kosmln, D. V., one of founders of All-Russian Fascist Party in Manchuria in 1931; 547 Kostetsky, Vladimir G. (7-1962?), First-W ave poet and prose writer; 581 Kostovsky, ll'ya Il'ich (b. 1933 in Czechoslovakia), poet; 584 Kostrlkov [Kirov], Sergei Mironovich (1886-1934), Bol'shevik revolutionary, m em ber of Politbyuro, assassinated, possibly on Stalin's instructions; 140, 302, 310, 372, 551 Kostrowitsky, Guillaume Apollinaire de [Apollinaire], French poet of Polish descent; 256, 268 [Kostsinsky], see: Uspensky, Kirill Kosygin, Aleksei Nikolaevich (1904-1980), Soviet Prime Minister; 375, 384, 583 Kotlyarov, Vladimir Solomonovich [Tolsty] (b. 1937), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1979; 595 Kotoshlkhin, Grigory Karpovich (c. 1630-1667), diplomat and writer, emigr.: 1664; 78, 79, 493, 496 Kotsiubinskaya, E. N., member of literary circle in Prague in interwar period; 178 Kotzebue, August-Friedrich-Ferdinand von (1761-1819), German writer and lawyer, employed as tsarist official, assassinated; 45, 497 Kotzebue, Otto Evstaf'evich von (1788-1846), naval officer and author of travel descriptions, undertook at least three world cruises: 18 0 3 ,1 8 1 5 1818, 1823-1826; 45, 494 Kovalenko, Viktor Karpovich (b. 1930), dissident; 394, 596 Kovalév, Aleksei Leonidovich (b. 1944), prose writer, actor and journalist, emigr.: 1981; 453, 596, 615
Kovalëv, Grigory, editor; 441 Kovalevskaya, Sof'ya Vasil'evna
(1850-1891), prose writer and mathematician, studied abroad 1869-1874, emigr.: 1883; 503, 504,
507, 509
682
JOHN GLAD
Kovalevsky, Evgraf Petrovich (1865-?), member of fourth Duma, emigr.: 1920; 171
Kovalevsky, Pëtr Evgrafovich (1901-1978), historian, emigr.: 1920; 1 0 5 ,1 7 1 , 185, 226, 232, 594
Koval'skaya (née Khrenovskaya), Ol ga Nesterovna (1876-1933), prose writer, translater, journalist, emigr.: 1920s, moved to Turin: 1932; 550 Kazimir Adol'fovich (1878-1933), prose writer, playwright, translator, journalist, emigr.: 1920s, moved to Turnin: 1932; 550 Koverda, Boris Sofronovich (1907-1987), Russian émigré who assassinated the Soviet ambassador to Poland in 1927; 188, 541 Kozhevnikov, Pëtr Alekseevich (1871 or 1872-1933), prose writer and literary critic, lived abroad early 1910s, did not return to Russia after 1914; 176, 520, 550 Kozhevnikov, Valentin Alekseevich (1867-1931), editor, playwright, engineer, in Paris: 1906-1913; 515 Kozlovsky, Pëtr Borisovich (1783-1840), diplomat, am ateur scientist, political and social commentator, poet, abroad 1803-1835, 1836-1840; 53, 54, 495, 496 Kozovoi, Vadim Markovich (b. 1937), poet and translator, emigr.: 1981; 596 Krachkovsky, Dmitry Iosifovich [Dmitry Klenovsky] (1893-1976), poet and essayist, abroad frequently before 1917, emigr.: 1942; 176, 523, 562,
Koval'sky,
592 Krachkovsky, Dmitry Nikolaevich (1882-no earlier than 1934), First-W ave prose writer, emigr.: 1918; 176, 369 Krainsky, First-W ave professor of psychiatry in Yugoslavia; 319 [Krainy, Anton], see: Gipplus, Zinaida Krandievskaya, Natal’ya Vasil'evna (1888-1963), poet and memoirist (third wife of Aleksei Tolstoi), repatr.: 1923; 535, 582 Krasnov, Pëtr Nikolaevich (1869-1947), prose writer and army general, emigr.: 1919, brought back under arrest to Moscow in 1945 and hanged in Lefortovo Prison; 15, 139, 254, 315, 333, 345, 524, 529, 530, 565, 570 Krasnova, Valentina, First-W ave poet; 345 Krasnov-Levrtin (Levttin-Krasnov), Anatoly Èmmanullovlch (1915-1994), dissident essayist and memoirist, emigr.: 1974; 432, 438 Kravchenko, Viktor Andreevich (1905-1966), Soviet defecter, arrived in U.S.A. in 1943; 571 Kravchinsky, Sergei Mikhailovich (1851-1895), prose writer and translator, fled abroad 1874, travelled abroad again 1877, fled abroad again (without returning to Russia) 1879; 504, 506-510 [Krechetov, Sergei Alekseevich], see: Sokolov, Sergei Alekseevich Kreld (formerly Kreldenkov), Vadim Prokop'evlch (b. 1936), poet and critic, emigr.: 1973; 17, 437, 440, 470, 588, 602, 604 Kreishman, First-W ave publisher; 157
RUSSIA ABROAD
683
Kreps, Mikhail Borisovich (1940*1994), poet and critic, emigr.: 1974; 474, 589, 604
Krestovskaya-Kartavtseva, Mariya Vsevolodovna (1862-1910), prose writer; 518
Kreuger, Ivar (1880-1932), Swedish match manufacturer who had held part of treasury of G eneral Kutepov, originally received from Admiral Kolchak; 548
Krimerman,
Efim
Semënovich
[Grigore
Singurel]
(b. 1923),
poet,
emigr.: 1980; 595
Krivoshein, Aleksandr Vasil'evich
(1857-1921), prominent banker and political figure during the Soviet period and under Provisional Government, emigr.: 1920?; 523 Krivoshein, Igor’ Aleksandrovich, son of Aleksandr Krivoshein?, returned to Russia after World W ar II and was imprisoned, remigrated: 1974; 341 Kron, Arvid (b. 1936), editor, emigr.: 1974; 441, 589 Kropotkin, Pëtr Alekseevich (1842-1921), anarchist, literary historian, explorer, writer, abroad: 1872, fled abroad from tsarist prison in 1876, returned to Russia in 1917; 88, 89, 208, 276, 504-507, 510, 511, 515, 522, 525, 530 Krotkov, “younger generation” First-W ave author; 254 Krotkov, Yury Vasil'evich (1917-1982), playwright, journalist, KGB agent, defected: 1963; 581, 597 Krotkova, Kristina Pavlovna [Irmantseva] (1904-1964 or 1965), prose writer and poet; 582 Krotkova, N., one of organizers of literary circle in Czechoslovakia in the interwar period; 176, 177 Krotov, Maksim (b. 1958), poet, emigr.: 1981; 596 Krupp (né: von Bohlen und Haibach), Gustav, German industrialist, married into the Krupp family, supported Hitler; 123 Krupskaya, Nadezhda Konstantinova (1869-1939), revolutionary and wife of Vladim ir Lenin, abroad 1901-1905, 1907-1917, rumoured to have been poisoned; 300, 536 Kruzenshtern-Peterets, Yustlnlya Vladimirovna [Merry Devil] (1903-1983), journalist, prose writer, poet, translator, emigr.: after October revolution; 343, 599
Krylenko, Nikolai Vasil'evich (1885-1938), revolutionary and Soviet People's Commissar of Justice, chief prosecutor in show trials, executed; 119 Krylov, Viktor Aleksandrovich [Viktor Aleksandrov] (1838-1906), Russian playwright; 103 Krym, S. S. (1867-1936), First-W ave prose writer; 555 Krymov, Vladimir Pimenovlch (1878-1968), novelist and journalist-editor, abroad in 1903 and 1908, emigr.: 1917; 227, 523, 550, 585 Kryuchkov, Vladimir, head of Soviet Ministry of Internal Affairs; 613 Kryukov, A., publisher in Harbin; 219, 222
684
JOHN GLAD
K ryzhanovskaya, V era Ivanovna [W . I. R ochester] (1857-1924), prose writer, lived abroad in 1880s and 1890s, emigr.: shortly after October 1917 coup; 63, 201, 518 K seniya A leksandrovna (1875-?), Grand Duchess, sister of Tsar Nikolai I; 213 K syunln, A leksei Ivanovich (1880-1938), First-W ave prose writer; 538 [K torova, A lla], see: K ochurova-S handor, V lkto rlya Ivanovna [K ubansky, Fedor], see: G orb K ublanovsky, Y u ry M ikhailovich (b. 1947), poet, emigr.: 1982; 440, 468, 469, 597, 598 K üchelbecker (K yukhel’beker), W ilhelm K arlovich (1797-1846), poet and prose writer, travelled to W estern Europe in 1820-1821, exiled to Siberia in 1825; 71, 72, 495, 497 K udirka, Sim as, Lithuanian seaman who attempted to jump ship in 1970 and w as handed over by the Americans to the Soviets; 586 K uibyshev, V alerian V ladim irovich (1888-1935), revolutionär and m em ber of Central Committee; 302 K ukol'nlk, N estor V a s ile v ic h (1809-1868), dramatist and novelist; 486 K ulisher, A leksandr M ikhailovich (1890-1942), First-W ave emigrant; 160 K ul'm an, N ikolai K arlovich (1871-1940), First-W ave literary scholar; 560 Kun, B éla (1887-1937 or 1939), communist leader and journalist, conducted a purge in Crim ea, in Russia: 1916-1918, 1920 til his death, apparently died in Soviet prison; 67, 150 K unyaev S tanislav Y u r'evich (b. 1932), non-émigré poet; 611 K upershtok, A ron Il'ich [A ndrei Klënov] (b. 1920), poet, emigr.: 1973; 588 K uprin, A leksandr Ivanovich (1870-1938), prose writer, emig.: 1919, returned to Russia: 1937; 170, 204, 205, 249, 257, 273, 275, 483, 524, 547, 551, 556, 558 K urbanovskaya [È k], E katerina M ikhailovna (1861-1930), First-W ave prose writer, biographer, playwright; 547 K urbsky, A ndrei M ikhailovich (1528-1583), writer and historian, alleged author of correspondence with Ivan the Terrible, fled Russia in 1564; 26, 76, 77, 206, 289, 336, 489, 491, 492, 505 K urbsky, A . S ., writer, emigrated to America in the second half of the nineteenth century, was a common laborer and published his impressions in Russia; 104 K ushev, Evgeny Igorevich (b. 1947), poet, emigr.: 1974; 589 [K usikov], see: K usikyan, A leksandr Borisovich K usikyan (K usikov), A leksandr B orisovich (1896-1970), poet, emigr.: 1921; 533, 540, 586 K uskova (n ée E sipova), E katerina D m itrievna (1869-1958), revolutionary and journalist, abroad 1896-1899, deported from the Soviet Union: 1922; 149, 535 K ustanovich, D ora B orisovna (b. 1911), poet, emigr.: 1968; 585
RUSSIA ABROAD
685
[K ustarëv, O leg] (b. 1938), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1981; 596 K utepov, A leksandr Pavlovich (1882-1930?), W hite general, emigr.: 1920, kidnapped by Soviet agents in Paris; 131, 136-138, 151, 266, 308, 544-546, 548 K u tyrin, I., émigré publisher in Paris in interwar period; 170 K uz'm in, M. A ., head of Petropolis Publishers in Berlin in the 1920s; 157 K u z'm ina-K aravaeva, E lizaveta Y ur'evna (née Pilenko, name of second husband: Skobtsov, took holy orders in 1932 under the name Mariya, known as M other M ariya, 1891-1945), poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1920, died in gas chamber in Ravensbrück; 250, 325, 524, 556, 563, 567 K uz'm lnsky, K onstantin K onstantinovich (b. 1940), poet, prose writer, and editor, emigr.: 1975; 441, 475, 590, 597 K uznetsov, A n ato ly V asll'evlch [A . A natoly] (1929-1979), prose writer, emigr.: 1969; 373, 454, 585, 595 K uznetsov, Èduard S am uilovich (b. 1939), prose writer, emigr.: 1979; 394, 412, 431, 432, 435, 438, 484, 586, 594, 595, 603 K uznetsov, Feliks Feodos’evich (b. 1931), non-émigré critic and literary scholar; 604 K uznetsova, G alina N ikolaevna (1900-1976), First-W ave poet and memoirist, emigr.: 1920; 227, 250, 527, 550, 556, 562, 571, 581, 592, 602 Ladinsky, A ntonin Petrovich (1896-1961), First-W ave poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1920 or 1921, returned to Russia: 1955; 143, 250, 255, 256, 260, 341, 530, 540, 548, 556, 567, 572, 577, 580 Ladov, A; 593 Ladyzhensky, V ladim ir N ikolaevich (1859-1932), poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1919; 524, 549 Ladyzhnlkov, Ivan Pavlovich (1874-1945), publisher, returned to Russia; 157, 158, 536, 540, 567 Lagarides, P aisios (16097-1678), Patriarch of Jerusalem; 493 Lagovsky, Ivan A rkad'evich (1889-1941), director of Russian Student Christian Movement in Estonia, deported to U .S.S.R . in 1940 and executed the following year; 200 Lakhm an, G izella S lglzm undovna (1895-1969), poet, emigr.: 1919; 5 2 4 ,5 8 3 , 585 Lam pe, A leksei A leksandrovich von (1885-1967), White general, journalist, memoirist, First-W ave émigré; 313 la n d a u , G rigory A leksandrovich (A dol'fovich? ) (1877-1940), First-W ave philosopher and critic; 140, 307 la n d a u , M ark A leksandrovich [M ark A ldanov] (1886-1957), First-W ave prose writer, travelled extensively abroad before October 1917 coup, emigr.: 1919; 138, 150, 168, 170, 237, 249, 250, 275, 284, 285, 325, 339, 359, 434, 486, 524, 535, 548, 551, 554, 558, 561, 563, 569, 570, 578
686
JOHN GLAD
Landburg, Moshe (b. 1938), prose writer, emigr.: 1972; 414, 588 Lande, Aleksandr (Aron) Solomonovich [Aleksandr Izgoev] (1872-1935), political thinker and journalist, abroad 1894-1896, deported from the Soviet Union: 1922; 509, 554 Lang, Mariya Nikolaevna [Mariya Vega] (1898 or 1900-1980), First-W ave poet, prose writer, playwright, returned to Russia: 1975; 590 Laplkln, Pëtr Petrovich (d. 1983), prose writer, mentioned in Pereleshin's memoirs on Harbin/Shanghai 1930-1950; 599 Laplrov, ll'ya Efimovich (b. 1930), poet, emigr.: 1981; 596 Lapko, Igor’ Vladimirovich (1913-1931), First-W ave poet; 548 Lappo-Danilevskaya (née Lytkevich), Nadezhda Aleksandrovna (1874, 1875, or 1876-1951), prose writer and actress, lived in Italy for a number of years during her youth, emigr.: 1921 (?); 537 Lapshin, Ivan Ivanovich (1870-1952), First-W ave émigré in Czechoslovakia, professor; 178, 576 Larionov, Mikhail Fëdorovich (1881-1964), one of first abstractionist artists, emigr.: 1915; 168, 521 Lashkov, Vasily Lukich (1861-1932), poet, playwright, and journalist in Moldavia; 507, 520, 549 Lashkova, Vera, dissident; 584 Lautenberg, Frank (b. 1936), U.S. senator; 404, 611, 615 Lavoisier, Antoine Laurent (1743-1794), French chemist, ordered guillotined by the Revolutionary Tribunal; 368 Lavrent'ev, A. D., m ember of literary discussion group in Shanghai during the interwar period; 222 Lavrov, Pëtr Lavrovich (1823-1900), philosopher, sociologist, editor, literary critic and theoretician, poet, emigr.: 1870; 8 7 ,1 0 0 , 502-506, 509, 512, 547 Lawrence, David Herbert (D. H.) (1885-1930), English writer; 23 Lazarev, Egor Egorovich (1855-1937), journalist and populist who fled Siberian exile in 1890; 508, 510, 516-518, 522, 524, 553 Lazarevsky, Boris Aleksandrovich (1871-1936), Russian and Ukrainian prose writer, emigr.: 1920; 527, 555, 592 Lazaris, Vladimir Semënovich (b. 1947), poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1977; 592 Lazhechnikov, Ivan Ivanovich (1790-1869), novelist, memoirist, playwright; 57 Lazukhin, Mikhail Sergeevich (b. 1923) poet and artist, emigr.: 1943; 563 Lazukhin, Viktor Sergeevich (b. 1927), poet and artist, emigr.: 1943; 563 [L’dov, Konstantin], see: Rozenblyum, Vttol'd-Konstantln Lebedev, M. N., émigré literary critic; 345 Lebedev, Pavel Ivanovich [Valerian Polyansky] (1882-1948), literary scholar, critic, and editor, head of Glavlit (Censorship), abroad 1908-1917; 141, 533
RUSSIA ABROAD
687
Lebedev, Sem ën K haritonovich (1895-1941 or 1943), poet, fought in civil w ar and returned to Latvia in 1921, arrested in 1941; 564 Lebedev, V lad im ir Ivanovich (1883-1956), political figure, literary scholar, translator; 187 Lebedev, V yacheslav M ikhailovich [V ikto r Lyapi] (1896-1969), First-W ave poet and prose writer; 176, 177, 237, 250 [Lebed ev-P olyansky], see: Lebedev, Pavel Lebedeva, E vgeniya, stripped of Soviet citizenship in 1980; 394, 595 Lebedeva, Lidiya Petrovna (1869-1938), poet and translator, emigr.: 1902; 513, 558 Leconte de Lisle, C harles M arie (1818-1894), French poet; 170 [Lëgkaya, Iraid a Ivanovna], see: Iraida V andellos Lehrm an, E dgar (1926-1985), American Slavist; 447 [Lekht, Y u ry], see: Lekhtgol'ts, Y u ry Lazarevich Lekhtg ol'ts, Y u ry Lazarevich [Y ury Lekht] (b. 1937), poet, emigr.: 1977; 592 Lem bich, émigré publisher in China; 221 Lem khin, M ikhail A bram ovich (b. 1949), prose writer and photographer, emigr.: 1983; 598 Lenin, V lad im ir Il'ich (original name: U l'yanov) (1870-1924), abroad: 1895, 1900-1917; 89, 91-93, 112, 121, 124, 127, 138, 140, 141, 186, 203, 208, 212, 239, 2 4 1 ,2 4 6 , 276, 278, 288-290, 300, 303, 304, 4 4 1 ,4 4 6 , 511, 513-517, 520, 522-525, 528, 531, 536, 558, 607 Lenitsky, V arlaam , made a pilgrimage to Palestine in 1712 and was imprisoned in Cyprus; 39, 49, 494 Leonidas off Tarentum (c. 290-c. 220), Greek epigrammatic poet; 104 Leonidov, Pavel Leonidovich (1927-1984), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1973; 588, 600 Leont'ev, K onstantin N ikolaevich (1831-1891), prose writer, literary critic, abroad as diplomat 1863-1873, year on Mount Athos 1871-1872; 51, 53, 126, 501-505, 520 [Lern, see: K lopotovsky Lerm ontov, M ikhail Y u r’evich (1814-41), poet; 20, 67, 70, 71, 80, 366, 495, 496 Leroux, P ierre (1797-1871), French social philosopher; 82 Leuchtenberg (Leikhten b erg ), G ., First-W ave émigré; evidently this is Georgy Nikolaevich (1872-?); 529 Leventon [N azim ova], A lla A leksandrovna
(Y akovlevna?)
(1879-1945),
actress, performed abroad as of 1906; 292 Leventon [N azim ov], V. Y a (1872-1940), First-W ave émigré; 160 Levi, M ark A bram ovich [M . A geev] (1898-1936), prose writer, emigr.: 1920?, returned to U SSR in 1942; 250, 555 Levin, D avid Y u l'evich [D. D alin] (1889-1962), Men'shevik editor, deported from the Soviet Union in 1921 or 1922; 120
688
JOHN GLAD
Levin, Gerasim Aleksandrovich [G. Lugin] (1900-1942), First-W ave poet and prose writer; 198, 563 Levin, Il'ya Davidovich (b. 1948), emigr.: 1977, radio journalist and literary scholar; 438 Levin, Iosif Mikhailovich (b. 1894), poet and prose writer; 566 Levin, Veniamin Mikhailovich (1892-1953), First-W ave poet; 250, 576 Levina, Evgeniya Romanovna (b. 1967), poet, emigr.: 1978; 593 Levinzon, Rina Semënovna (b. 1949), poet, emigr.: 1976; 414, 591, 615 Levitan, Isaak Il'ich (1860-1900), artist; 238, 277 Levitsky, Anatoly (1901-1942), writer and ethnographer, executed by the Germans; 563 Levitsky, Dmitry Aleksandrovich (b. 1907), family left Russia in 1918, left Riga in 1944; 17 Levitsky, Sergei Aleksandrovich (1908-1983), philosopher, family moved to Estonia in 1913; 599 [Lidln, Vladimir], see: Gomberg Llfant'ev, A., published in a 1934 California almanac; 227 Ufar', Sergei Mikhailovich (Serge) (1905-1986), First-W ave ballet dancer and choreographer; 322 Ukhachëv, Dmitry Sergeevich (b. 1906), non-émigré literary scholar and historian; 604 [Limonov], see: Savenko Usheva-Zhirkova [Elisheva], émigré writer in Palestine who switched to Hebrew; 225 Utvln, N., First-W ave émigré, secretary of W riters’ League in Constantinople; 152 [Litvin, Savely], see: Èfron Litvinov, Maksim Maksimovich (original name: Meer Genokh Moiseevich Vallakh) (1876-1951), revolutionary and later senior Soviet diplomat, fled Russia in 1902, returning briefly in 1905-06, returned to Russia in 1918; 310 Litvinov, Pavel Mikhailovich (b. 1940), writer, physicist, and dissident, internal exile, emigr.: 1974; 444, 597 Locke, John (1632-1704), English philosopher; 494 Loginov, Vasily Stepanovich (1891-before 1945), First-W ave poet and prose writer, returned to Soviet Union from China toward end of World W ar
II; 219, 220 Lokhvltskaya, Nadezhda, see: Buchlnskaya Lokshln, Arnold and Lauren, American family which received political asylum in the USSR in 1986; 601
Lomonosov, Mikhail (Mikhailo) Vasll'evich (1711-1765), physicist, inventor, poet, literary theoretician, abroad 1736-1741; 42, 255, 494 London, John [Jack] Griffith (1876-1916), American author; 65
RUSSIA ABROAD
689
Lopatin, G . A ., together with Ivan Turgenev established Russian reading room in Paris in 1875; 504, 527 [Lopatin, M .], see; Lopatto Lopatina, E katerina M ikhailovna [K. E l'tsova] (1865-1935), novelist, emigr.: after 1917; 554 Lop atto, M ikhail O sipovich (Io sifovich) [M . Lopatin] (1892-1981), poet, prose writer, critic, emigr.: 1920; 527, 596 Losev (L lfsh lts), Lev V ladim irovich (b. 1937), poet and critic, emigr. 1976; 438, 447, 476, 590, 591, 600 Lossky, N ikolai O nufrievlch (1870-1965), philosopher, deported from the Soviet Union; 1922; 178, 241, 531, 583 Lotarëv, Ig o r’ V asll'evich [Severyanin] (1887-1941), First-W ave poet and translator, spent considerable time in Estonia before revolution, emigr.: 1918, took Estonian citizenship and adopted name Severyanin; 201, 249, 262, 269, 270, 523, 524, 561, 604, 605 Louis P h illip e (1773-1850), French king; 164 Lozansky, Èduard D m itrievich (b. 1941), physicist and dissident, emigr.: 1976; 432 Lozinsky, G rig o ry Leonidovich (1889-1942), literary critic and translator; 157 Lubin, P eter S cott (b. 1957), American journalist Luganov, A ndrei, First-W ave writer [Lugin, G .], see: Levin, G erasim Lukâcs, G eorg (1885-1971), Hungarian philosopher and literary critic; 310 Lukanlna, A d elaida N ikolaevna (1843-1908), prose writer and memoirist, emigr.: 1872, returned to Russia: 1885; 503 Lukash, Ivan S ozontovich (1892-1940), First-W ave prose writer, journalist, and historian, emigr.: 1920; 15, 126, 250, 527, 560 Luk'yanov, Ioann, Old-Believer pilgrim to Palestine in early eighteenth century; 38, 39, 49, 494 Luk'yanov, S erg ei S ergeevich (1888-1938), First-W ave Change of Landmarks writer, returned to Russia in 1932; 124, 126 Lunacharsky, A n ato ly V asll'evich (1875-1933), literary critic, prose writer, playwright, politician, abroad: 1895-1898, 1904-1905, 1906-1917; 92, 93, 121, 137, 141, 166, 258, 259, 299, 510, 511, 513-517, 520, 522, 530, 546, 550 Lundberg, Evgeny G rigor'evich (1887-1965), prose writer and book publisher in Berlin, studied abroad before revolution, returned to Russia in 1924; 243, 538, 583 Lundel', I. A ., Russian émigré publisher in Stockholm in interwar period; 206 Lunin, M ikhail Sergeevich (1787-1845), writer on social topics and military officer, abroad 1805, 1807, 1812-1814, 1816-17, in internal exile for participation in Decembrist rebellion, died in prison; 74, 495 Lur’e, V era O sipovna (b. 1901), poet, critic, memoirist, emigr.: 1921; 250
690
JOHN GLAD
Lusk, C layton R. (1872-1959), New York State Senator who headed a committee that raided leftist organization in the 1920s; 526 Lutokhin, D alm at A leksandrovich (1885-1942), First-W ave critic and editor, 178 Lutsky, Sem ën A bram ovich (1891-1977), poet, emigr.: 1913?; 254 [Luzhsky], see: K aluzhsky L'vov, A rkady L'vovich (b. 1927), prose writer, emigr.: 1976; 462, 591, 596, 612, 613 L'vov, Lolly Ivanovich (1888-1958 or 1968), First-W ave poet, critic, and literary scholar; 335, 585 L'vov, N ikolai N ikolaevich (1867-1944), member of third and fourth Dumas, monarchist, emigr.: 1920; 527 Lyatsky, Evgeny A leksandrovich (1868-1942), literary scholar, translator, novelist, emigr.: 1917; 205, 206, 522, 526, 532, 539, 563 Lysy, B oris [N orll'sky, B oris] (1922-1976), prose writer, emigr.: 1973; 588 Lyshchinsky-Troekurov, Lev V ., First-W ave prose writer and.poet; 188 Lyubarsky, K ronid A rkad'evich (1934-1996), essayist and editor, emigr.: 1977, returned to Russia after collapse of U .S .S .R .; 438, 439, 440, 444, 592, 613 Lyubim ov, Lev D m itrievich (1902-1976), prose writer, emigr.: 1919, deported from France to Soviet Union: 1947; 110, 342, 580, 592 Lyubim ov, Y u ry Petrovich (b. 1917), actor and theater director, defected 1983, citizenship returned in 1989; 394, 4 3 1 ,4 3 8 , 598-600, 603, 606, 607, 610 Lyubln, Evgeny M ikhailovich (b. 1934), prose writer, emigr.: 1978; 594 Lyuksem burg, Ellakhu [È II] M ordekhaevich (b. 1940), prose and poet, emigr.: 1972; 414, 588 Lyuksem burg, G rigory M atveevich (b. 1944), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1972; 414, 588 M acG ahan (n ée E lagina), Varvara Nikolaevna (1850-1904), journalist, prose writer, translator, emigr.: 1880; 506, 508, 514 M ach, E rnst (1838-1916), Austrian physicist and philosopher; 222 M achtet, G eorgy A leksandrovich (1852-1901), prose writer, poet, journalist, abroad: 1872-1873, 1874-1875; 104, 503-505, 512, 513 M aevsky, V ladim ir (V ladislav?) A l'binovich (1893-1975), First-W ave poet, prose writer, historian. 213 M agerovsky, Lev Florianovich (1896-1986), curator of Bakhmetev Archive at Columbia University; 592, 602 M agidov, R obert Zakharovich (1905-1970), poet and literary scholar; 586 M agil'nitsky, A leksandr, First-W ave poet; 197 M agula, D m itry A ntonovich (1880-?), First-W ave poet, emigr.: 1918; 265, 522, 524, 539, 548, 563
RUSSIA ABROAD
691
Maikov, Apollon Nikolaevich (1821-1897), poet, travelled to W estern Europe; 502
Maiskaya, Tamara Grigor'evna (b. 1927), playwright, emigr.: 1974; 589, 607 Maizel', émigré publisher in New York; 231 de Malzlère, Lothar, head of state of East Germany, negotiated reunification pact with W est Germany, forced to resign in 1990 as Minister without portfolio in W est German government because his ties with East Germ an State Security (Stasi) w ere revealed; 417 Mak, Lev (Leonid) Semënovlch (b. 1939), poet, emigr.: 1974; 467, 589, 591 Makarlos (d. 1585), Archbishop of Mount Sinai; 48 Makary, monk who made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land in 1704; 39, 494 Makary (1482-1563), Metropolitan of Russian Church; 491 Maklakov, Vasily Alekseevich (1870-1957), diplomat, poet, statesmen, memoirist, editor, Russian ambassador to France when revolution broke out; 166, 167, 309, 336, 536, 538, 541, 545, 565, 578 Makovsky, Sergei Konstantinovich (1877-1962), poet, art historian, editor, memoirist, emigr.: between 1918 and 1920; 176, 236, 249, 527, 561, 574, 581 [Maksim, Lev], see: Aas, Maksim Maksimov, Sergei Sergeevich [Sergei Shirokov] (1916-1967), Second-W ave ém igré prose writer, poet, and playwright, emigr.: 1943; 3 6 3 ,3 6 5 , 561, 563, 571, 572, 575, 584 [Maksimov, Vladimir Emel'yanovlch], see: Samsonov, Lev Alekseevich Malakhovskaya, Natal'ya L'vovna (b. 1947), Third-W ave dissident; 394, 595
Maler, Izrail’ Èrakhmll'evich [I. Derbenev, M. Grazhdanin, Dr. MelamedReish] (b. 1943), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1978; 414, 594 Mallnkovich, Vladimir Dmitrievich [Mikhail German; V. M.] (b. 1940), essayist, emigr.: 1980, returned to Ukraine in 1991; 438, 595 Malinovskaya, Elena Konstantinova (1875-1942), theatrical director; 549 Malinovsky, Aleksandr Aleksandrovich [Bogdanov] (1873-1928), physician, revolutionary, prose writer, abroad: 1904, 1906, 1907-1913; 92, 515, 520, 545 Malkin, Dmitry Grigor'evich (b. 1938), poet and playwright, emigr.: 1 9 7 9 ,5 9 5 Mal'tsev, Yury Vladimirovich (b. 1932), prose writer and essayist, emigr.: 1974; 589
Mal'tsov, Ivan Sergeevich (1807-1880), diplomat and prose writer; 52 Malyshkln, Vasily Fëdorovlch (1890-1946), Russian major general, arrrested and tortured during purges, released, captured by the Germans, Vlasov's closest aide; 317, 563 Mamchenko, Viktor Andreevich (1901-1982), First-W ave poet, emigr.: 1920; 250, 527, 597
Mamleev, Yury Vital'evich (b. 1931), prose writer and essayist, emigr.: 1974; 464, 589, 597, 598, 602
692
JOHN GLAD
Mamonova, Tatyana Valentinova (b. 1943), poet and essayist, emigr.: 1980; 595
Mandel', Naum Moiseevich [Naum Korzhavin] (b. 1925), emigr.: 1973; 470, 481, 588, 596, 607, 610
Mandel'shtam, Nadezhda Yakovlevna (1899-1980), memoirist, wife of Osip Mandel'shtam; 395, 588
Mandel'shtam, Osip Èmil'evlch (1891-1938), poet; 1 4 0 ,1 4 9 ,1 6 4 , 184, 249, 260, 289, 325, 366, 374, 376, 383, 453, 474
Mandel'shtam, Yury Vladimirovich (1908-1943), First-W ave poet and critic, family emigrated.: 1920, died in Nazi concentration camp; 250, 252
Manenkov, Sergei M., prose writer and poet, published abroad as early as 1918; 230
Mann, Heinrich (1871-1950), German writer; 310, 354 Mann, Thomas (1875-1955), German writer; 245, 422, 423, 424 Mannerhelm, Carl Gustav (1867-1951), baron and Finnish head of state and marshal, served in Russian army prior to 1917, general in Finnish arm y during 1939-40 Russo-Finnish war; 203 Manova, Tat'yana, Third-W ave dissident, stripped of Soviet citizenship in
1980; 394 [Mansfield, Katherine], see: Murry, Kathleen Mansvetov, Vladimir Fedorovich (1904-1974), First-W ave poet and journalist; 176, 250, 590 Mao Zedong (1893-1976), Chinese leader; 583 Manukhlna, Tat'yana Ivanovna [T. Tamanin] (1886-1962), First-W ave prose writer; 581 Maramzin, Vladimir Rafailovich (b. 1934), prose writer and playwright, emigr.: 1975; 438, 458, 461, 590, 594 Marchenko, A., deported from France to Soviet Union in 1947; 342 Marchenko, Nikolai Nikolaevich [N. Morshen] (b. 1917), poet, em.: 1944; 364, 368, 565 Marchenko, Nikolai Vladimirovich [N. Narokov] (1887-1969), prose writer, emigr.: 1944; 364, 575, 585 Marcuse, Ludwig (1894-1971), German philosopher and sociologist; 424 Margolin, Yuly Borisovich (1900-1971), prose writer; 225, 286 Margulles, Manull Sergeevich (1868 or 1869-1939), historian, physician, lawyer; 523 Mariengof, Anatoly Borisovich (1897-1962), non-émigré poet, playwright, and prose writer; 158, 532 Mariya Fedorovna (née Louise Sophia Frederlkke Dagmar) (1847-1928), daughter of Danish King Christian IX, widow of Tsar Aleksandr III, emigr.: after 1917; 206 [Mariya S.], First-W ave poet; 345
Markish, David Peretsovich (b. 1938), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1972; 379, 414, 588
RUSSIA ABROAD
693
Markish, Simon (Shimon) Peretsovich (b. 1931), writer, critic, translator, emigr.: 1970; 379, 586
Markov (Markov II), Nikolai Evgen'evich
(1866-1943 or 1945), highly conservative Monarchist political figure, emigr.: 1920; 113, 121-123, 206, 210, 247, 543
Markov, Vladimir Fédorovich (b. 1920), poet and literary scholar, emigrated during World W ar II, cam e to the U.S.A. in 1949; 570, 571
Mart, Venedikt Nikolaevich [Matveev] (1896 or 1899-1938), First-W ave poet, father of Ivan Elagin, returned to Russia: 1923, died in purges; 219, 367, 535, 556 [Martov], see: Tsederbaum Martsinkovsky, Vladimir Filimonovlch (1884-?), First-W ave poet and theologian; 188 Marvell, Andrew (1621-1678), English poet and satirist; 260, 346, 466 Marx, Karl (1818-1883); 76, 86, 93, 172 Masaryk, Tomâs Garrigue (1850-1937), Czechoslovak statesman and philosopher; 174, 178, 295, 538 Maslov, Sergei Semënovich (1887-1945), economist, member of Social Revolutionary Party, emigr.: 1921; 119, 540 Matich, Ol'ga (b.1940), American Slavist; 596 Matlin, Vladimir Grigor'evich (b. 1931), journalist and prose writer, emigr.: 1973; 588, 611 Matusevlch, Iosif Aleksandrovich (1879-after 1940), prose writer, deported from the Soviet Union in 1922; 227 Matveev, Georgy Ivanovich (1910-1966), First-W ave poet; 1 9 7 ,2 5 0 ,5 4 6 ,5 8 4 Matveev, Ivan Venediktovich [Ivan Elagin] (1918-1987), poet, emigr.: 1943; 346, 364, 365, 367, 564, 570, 571, 605 [Matveev, Venedikt], see: Mart Matveeva, Elena Ivanovna (b. 1945), poet; 572 Matveeva, Kapitolina Nikolaevna (1877-1944), First-W ave prose writer; 565 Mayakovsky, Vladimir Vladimirovich (1893-1930), Futurist poet; 19, 164, 176, 225, 231, 249, 256, 262, 273, 287, 366, 562, 605 Mazo, B., suggested persons responsible for trial of Joseph Brodsky be put on trial; 607 Mazurln, Konstantin Mitrofanovich (1866-1927), poet, musicologist, physician, emigr.: after 1917; 543 Mazurova, Aleksandra N., First-W ave prose writer, emigr.: 1918 or 1919; 227 McCarthy, Mary (1912-1989), American writer who spent much of her time in Paris; 418, 436 McCloy, John Jay (1895-1989), United States member of the three-power council exercising Allied authority from 1948 to 1952; 356 McKenna, Reginald (1863-1943), British Home Secretary in 1914; 520 Mechik, Donat Isaakovich (1909-1995), poet and playwright, emigr.: 1980; 595
694
JOHN GLAD
Medvedev, Feliks, non-émigré writer; 612 Medvedev, Roi Aleksandrovich (b. 1925), historian, political activist, writer, brother of Zhores Medvedev, did not emigrate; 587, 592 Medvedev, Vadim, head of Soviet Politbyuro; 607 Medvedev, Zhores Aleksandrovich (b. 1925), biologist and writer, brother of Roi Medvedev, emigr.: 1973; 393, 587
Medvedeva, Natal'ya Georgievna (b. 1958), poet, emigr.: 1975; 590 Melody, Archbishop of Harbin; 139 Meier, Georgy Andreevich (1894-1966), First-W ave poet and literary historian; 335
Melerkhol'd, Vsevolod Èmll'evich (1874-1940), Russian theatrical director and producer, victim of the purges; 93, 363 Melr (née Mabovlch, later Meyerson) Golda (1898-1978), Israeli political leader, family emigrated to the United States in 1906; 410 Meirson, Leonid Solomonovich (1893-1941), First-W ave journalist; 198 Meller-Zakomel'sky, A. V., First-W ave émigré, Tsarist general and adm irer of Hitler and Mussolini; 306 Mel'gunov, Sergei Petrovich (1879-1956), historian and editor, deported: 1922; 126, 137, 140, 337, 338, 533, 534, 578 Mel'nichenko, V., non-émigré historian; 604 Mel’nikov, Aleksandr Pavlovich (1867-1934), Tartu prose writer; 552 Mel'nlkova-Papoushek, Nadezhda Fllaretovna (Fëdorovna?), (1891-1978), First-W ave literary scholar; 178 Men'shikov, Aleksandr Danilovich (16727-1729), prince, field marshal, statesman; 50 Mercader, Jaime Ramon del Rio Hernandez (1914-7), Spanish assassin of Lev Trotsky; 301, 302, 559 Merezhkovsky, Dmitry Sergeevich (1865-1941), prose writer, abroad: 19061914, emigr.: 1919; 109, 149, 168-170, 186-189, 243, 249, 255-258, 273, 275, 285, 286, 286, 297, 320, 325, 353, 420, 515, 518, 520, 524, 525, 529, 539, 541, 543, 551, 560, 561, 574 Meshchersky, Aleksei, Russian prince who in 1842 authored a book on Belgium; 172, 213 Meshcheryakov, Nikolai Leonidovich (1865-1942), writer, publisher, and journalist, abroad 1893-1902; 140, 141 Mickiewicz, Adam (1798-1855), Polish romantic poet and playwright; 55, 56, 187, 188
Mlhajlov, Mihajlo (Mikhail Nikolaevich) (b. 1934) Yugoslav dissident-scholar of Russian ancestry; 259, 358, 438, 445, 599
Mikhail Pavlovich (Romanov) (1798-1848), Grand Prince; 71, 281 [Mikhailov, M.], see: Aas, Maksim Mikhailov, Oleg Nikolaevich (b. 1933), non-émigré chic and literary scholar; 601, 605, 606
RUSSIA ABROAD
695
M ikhailov, P. N. (7-1938), secretary of Ivan Solonevich, killed by mail bomb in Bulgaria; 557 M ikhailov, V . K., First-W ave prose writer; 188 M ikhailovsky, A . I., founding chairman of the League of Writers and Journalists in Munich in 1947; 568 M lkhalev, I., Soviet journalist; 428 M ikhalevich-K aplan, Ig o r’ M ikhailovich (b. 1943), poet, prose writer, publisher, emigr.: 1979; 488, 595 M ikhalkov, S ergei V ladim irovich (b. 1913), non-émigré prose writer; 4 2 9 ,4 4 4 M ikheev, D m itry Fëdorovich (b. 1941), prose writer, emigr.: 1979; 595 M iklashevskaya [B elavina], Nonna S ergeevna (b. 1915), poet; 564 M iklukho-M aklai, N ikolai N ikolaevich (1846-1888), explorer; 220 M ilety, Archbishop in Harbin; 220 M iller, H enry (1891-1980), American expatriate author; 297 M iller, June, wife of Henry Miller; 297 M iller, E vgeny K arlovich (1867-19377), W hite general, emigr.: 1920, kidnapped by Soviet agents in Paris and secretly taken to Moscow, where he was executed; 131, 266, 308, 554, 555, 558, 559 M iloslavsky, Y u ry G eorg'evich [M . Y ur'ev] (b. 1946), prose writer, emigr.: 1973; 389-391 M hosz, C ze s la w (b. 1911), Polish poet and essayist; 21 M il'rud, M ikhail Sem ënovich (1883-1942), editor; 195 M ilton, John (1608-1674), English poet; 391 M ityukov, Pavel N ikolaevich (1859-1943), politician, editor, historian, abroad 1897-1899, 1902-1905, 1916, emigr.: 1918; 112, 117-119, 121, 125, 128, 142, 170, 174, 180, 236, 237, 278, 2 8 1 ,3 1 2 , 376, 398, 523, 528, 531, 533, 540, 545, 564 [M insky, N ikolai], see: Vilenkin, Nikolai M intslov, S ergei R u d o lfo v ich (1870-1933), prose writer, abroad as of 1916; 197, 184, 196, 202, 207, 522, 523, 550 M iré, see: M oiseeva. M irolyubov, Y u ry (1892-1970), First-W ave poet; 586 M ironov, M ikhail M ironovich [Tsvik, M ikhail] (1893 or 1895-19417), FirstW ave poet and essayist; 197, 198 M irsky (S vyato p o lk-M irsky), D m itry P etrovich (1890-7), poet, critic and literary scholar, emigr.: 1920, returned to Russia in 1932, arrested in 1937; 126-128, 214, 266, 304, 530, 549, 552, 556 M itchell, M argaret (1900-49), American novelist; 365 M itropol'sky, A rseny Ivanovich [A rseny Nesm elov, N ikolai D ozorov, A n astigm at, Tëtya Rozga] (1889-1945), poet, prose writer, journalist, emigr.: 1924, forcibly repatriated in 1945, died in Soviet transit camp; 15, 219, 222, 250, 343, 535, 548, 567, 605 M natsakanova, E lizaveta A rkad'evna [Elisabeth N etskova] (b. 1922), poet and translator, emigr.: 1975; 597
696
JOHN GLAD
Mniszech, Marina (c. 1588-1644), wife of the first False Dmitry, crowned Empress in 1606, later claimed the second False Dmitry w as her “saved” husband, died in Russian prison; 77, 78 Mochul'sky, Konstantin Vasll'evich [K. Versllov] (1892-1948), literary scholar, emigr.: 1919 or 1920; 168, 193, 524, 571 Modrow, Hans (b. 1928), Prime Minister of East Germ any in 1988-1989, elected to Bundestag after national reunification; 417 Mogilyansky, Nikolai Mikhailovich (1871-1933), anthropologist and ethnographer, abroad 1894-1897, emigr.: 1920; 178 Moiseeva, Aleksandra Mikhailovna [Miré] (1874-1913), prose writer, playwright, and translator, emigr.: 1897-1903; 64, 510, 513, 514 Molo, Walter von (1880-1958), German writer; 422, 423 [Molotov], see: Skiyabin Mondadorl, Italian publisher; 286 Monkevich, Viktor, émigré poet; 345 Monoszon, Semen [Semen Shvarts], First-W ave Men'shevik^ editor; 120 Monroe, Marilyn (1926-1962); 296 [Moréas, Jean], see: Papadiamandopulos Morgan, John Pierpont (1867-1943), American financier; 292 Morgulis, Mikhail Zinov'evich (b. 1942), prose writer and editor, emigr.: 1977; 592 Morkovin, Vadim Vladimirovich (1906-1973), poet and literary historian; 250,
588 Moroz, Viktor Yakovlevich (b. 1936), non-émigré writer, poet, historian, Soviet dissident; 394, 595
Morozova, Ol'ga Aleksandrovna (née Kolesova) (1877-1968), prose writer, emigr.: 1919; 524, 585
Mortimer, Thomas (1785-1824), English writer; 312 Mozhaev, Boris Andreevich (b. 1923), non-émigré prose writer; 432 Mozhaiskaya, Ol'ga Nikolaevna (1896-1973), poet; 250, 527 Muratov, Pavel Pavlovich (1881-1950), prose writer and art historian, defected: 1922; 144, 160, 216, 236, 531, 533, 534, 542, 573
Murav'ëv, First-W ave army colonel and illustrator; 152 Muromets, ll'ya, heroic figure in Russian folklore; 38 Murry, Kathleen [Katherine Mansfield] (1888-1923), British short story writer and critic; 297 Mussolini, Benito (1883-1945); 130, 132, 133, 285, 286, 306 Myasoedov, Ivan Grigor'evich [Eugen Zotow], First-W ave painter and forger; 156
Myslinskaya, M., First-W ave prose writer; 177 Nabokov, Kirill Vladimirovich (1911-1964),
poet, brother of Vladim ir Vladimirovich Nabokov, emigr.: 1919; 524 Nabokov, Konstantin Dmitrievich (1874-1927), diplomat and writer (First W ave); 543
RUSSIA ABROAD
697
Nabokov, Vladimir Dmitrievich (1869-1922), political leader and publisher, father of writer Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov, emigr.: 1919, killed in assassination attempt on Pavel Milyukov; 117, 533, 554 Nabokov, Vladimir Vladimirovich, until 1940 [Sirin, V.] (1899-1977), prose writer, poet, playwright, literary scholar, emigr.: 1919; 15, 21, 30, 31, 126, 127, 133, 158, 159, 250, 251, 255, 262, 265, 270, 280-284, 296, 297, 307, 359, 363, 365, 4 3 1 ,4 3 3 , 434, 484, 524, 533, 541-543, 547, 549, 554, 556-558, 560, 561, 577, 579, 584, 585, 593, 601, 603-606 Nadezhdin, Daniil Semënovlch (b. 1926), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1977; 592 [Nadezhdin, Mikhail], see: Demushkln Nadezhdin, Nikolai Ivanovich (1804-1856), political and social commentator, literary critic, ethnographer, in internal exile 1837-1838; 74, 495, 499 Nadson, Semen Yakovlevich (1862-1887), poet; 605 Nagrodskaya, Evdokiya Apollonovna (née Golovacheva) (1866-1930), prose writer and salon hostess, emigr.: 1920; 527, 547 Naiman, Anatoly Genrikhovich (b. 1936), non-émigré poet; 472 [Nal'yanch, S.], see: Shovgenov Nansen, Fridtjof (1861-1930), Norwegian explorer, High Commissioner for Russian Refugees Affairs; 234, 235, 240, 278, 528 Napoleon I (1769-1821); 45, 72, 79, 172, 285 [Narokov], see: Morshen Nartsissov, Boris Anatol'evich (1906-1982), poet, family fled from Russia to Estonia with retreating Yudenich army, emigrated from Estonia in
1944; 201, 368, 561, 573, 575, 579, 597 Nartsissova, Ol’ga Anatol'evna, poet, sister of Boris Nartsissov; 201 Nathan, George Jean (1882-1958), American editor and dram a critic; 291 Nazarov, A. I., First-wave émigré; 265 Nazarov, Andrei Aleksandrovich (b. 1943), prose writer, emigr.: 1981; 596 Nazarov, Mikhail Viktorovich (b. ?), historian, emigr.: 1975; 311, 352 Nazhivin, Ivan Fëdorovich (1874-1940), prose writer, emigr.: 1920; 1 6 1 ,1 7 3 , 527, 540, 551, 554, 560 [Nazlmov, V. Ya], see: Leventon [Nazi mova], see: Leventon Nechaev, Matvei Gavrilovich, made pilgrimage to Palestine in 1721; 4 0 ,4 9 4 Nechaev, Sergei Gennadievich (1847-1882), revolutionary terrorist and publisher, fled Russia in 1869, handed over to Russian authorities by Swiss police in 1872; 85-87, 90, 104, 503, 507
Nechaev, Vadim, see: Bakinsky Nechaev, Vyacheslav Yakovlevich (1905-1960), poet, emigr.: 1944, left for U.S.A. in 1950; 438, 580
Nedel'skaya, Elena Nikolaevna (1910-1980), First-W ave poet, returned to Soviet Union from China at end of World W ar II; 220, 596
698
JOHN GLAD
N edzel'sky, Evgeny Leopol'dovich, First-W ave poet, prose writer, and critic;
211 N efedov, N ikolai A ., émigré; 259, 358, 439 N elm irok, A leksandr N ikolaevich [A . N elm lrov, N. A l., N. A . N.] (19111973), First-W ave poet and prose writer; 570 N eizvestny, È m st Iosifovich (b. 1925), scultpor and artist, emigr.: 1976; 431, 438, 455, 603 N ejedly, Zdenek, Czech Minister of Education in 1945; 339 N ekrasov, V ikto r Platonovich (1911-1987), novelist, emigr.: 1974; 26, 391, 394, 435, 438, 569, 589, 594, 597, 602, 604, 605, 609 [N em irov, A .], see: Nelm irok, A leksandr N ikolaevich N em irovich-D anchenko, V asily Ivanovich (1845-1936), First-W ave prose writer; 177, 183, 294, 295, 555, 560 N em irovich-D anchenko, V ladim ir Ivanovich (1858-1943), non-émigré theater director and prose writer; 138, 177, 320, 552 N entsinsky, A p ollln ary D ionisievich, First-W ave prose w rite/; 222 N eplyuev, Ivan (1693-1773), diplomat and memoirist; 51 [N esm elov, A rseny], see: M itropol'sky, A rseny Ivanovich N etanyahu, Binyam in (b. 1949), Prime Minister of Israel; 411 [N etskova, E lisabeth], see: M natskanova, Elizaveta A rkad'evna N eusner, Jacob, American professor of religious studies; 404 N ezhlnskaya, R ozina Yasevna (b. 1961), poet, family emigrated: 1976; 591 N ezhny, A ., journalist; 388 N eznansky, Fridrikh Evseevich (b. 1932), prose writer, emigr.: 1977; 592 N ibur, K. N., First-W ave émigré in Prague; 178 N ietzsche, Friedrich (1844-1900), German philosopher; 242, 275, 279 N ikifo ro v-V olgin, V asily A kim ovich (loaklm ovlch) (1901-1941), journalist, prose writer, editor, taken to Estonia shortly after birth, executed in Soviet Union; 201, 561 N ikitin, A fanasy, fifteenth-century Russian traveler to India; 19, 41, 491 N ikolaev, A leksandr (A leksei?) Fëdorovich (1898-1938), First-W ave poet and prose writer; 558 N ikolaevsky, B oris Ivanovich (1887-1966), Men'shevik historian, deported from the Soviet Union: 1922; 88, 160, 317, 318, 350 N ikolai (N icholas) I (1796-1855), Tsar; 52, 54, 60, 69, 72, 79-82, 84, 172, 185, 211, 281, 497-499 N ikolai (N ich o las) II (1868-1918), last Tsar; 9 7 ,1 2 1 , 1 2 3 ,1 3 6 , 1 7 3 ,1 8 2 , 202, 299, 322, 345, 362, 446, 513, 536, 540, 549, 599 N ikolai N ikolaevich (1856-1929), pretender to the throne, emigr.: 1919; 15, 121, 122, 109, 528, 536, 540, 546 N ikol'sky, Y u ry A leksandrovich (1893-1922), First-W ave poet and literary historian; 533 Nikon
(secular name: Nikon M inov) (1605-1681), Patriarch of Russian Orthodox Church, sent into internal exile; 37, 67, 68, 493
RUSSIA ABROAD
699
N ilus, E. K h., professor in Harbin in interwar period; 219, 576 N ixon, R ichard M ilhous (1913-1994), U.S. President; 377 N ol'de, B oris Èm m anuilovich (1876-1948), historian, emigr.: 1919 or 1920; 247 [N o rll'sky, B oris], see: Lysy, B oris [N ovalis], see: H ardenburg, Friedrich von [N ovg o ro d -S eversky], see: Plyashkevich, Yan N ovikov, A vraam I., contemporary Russian scholar writing about the Russian emigration; 425 [N ovosadov], see: Taggo N udel'm an, R afail (b. 1932), prose writer, emigr.: 1975; 414, 590, 600 N ussberg, Lev V ol'dem arovich (b. 1937), prose writer, emigr.: 1976; 591 O bolensky, V ladim ir A ndreevich (P rin ce) (1869-1951), First-W ave writer; 540 O bukhov, V asily K onstantinovich, prose writer, returned to Soviet Union from China at end of World W ar II; 220 O cheretyansky, A leksandr Iosifovich (b. 1946), poet, emig.: 1979; 5 9 5 ,6 1 5 O darchenko, Y u ly Pavlovich (1903-1960), First-W ave poet and prose writer, committed suicide; 250, 572, 580 O dlnets, D m itry M ikhailovich, First-W ave lawyer, historian, editor, deported to Russia in the late 1940s; 335, 338 O doevsky, V lad im ir Fedorovich (1804-1869), writer and music critic; 51 [O doevtseva, Irin a], see: Ivanova, Iraida O frosim ov, Y u ry V iktorovich [G . Rosim ov] (1894 or 1895-1967), First-W ave poet, stage director and theater critic; 160, 250, 584 O garëv, N ikolai P latonovich (1813-1877), poet and revolutionary, abroad 1841-1846, emigr.: 1856; 12, 83-86, 496, 499-501, 503, 505, 514 O kudzhava, B ulat Shalvovich (1924-1997), non-émigré “bard,” poet, prose writer; 390, 458, 603, 607 O kunev, N. L , First-W ave émigré, professor; 178 O kuntsov, Ivan K uz'm lch (1874-1939), First-W ave historian and writer; 229, 559 O lbrich (vo n ), Pavel A leksandrovich [Pavel Severny], First-W ave prose writer; 222, 343 O leg V eshchii ("who knows the future") (?-912), Russian prince; 32, 33, 490 O lenin, K onstantin Ivanovich (1881-?), First-W ave poet; 177 O lesha, Y u ry K arlovich (1899-1960), non-émigré prose writer and playwright; 373 O l'g a (Christian name: Elena) (c. 890-969), Russian ruler who converted to Christianity; 33 O l'shansky, D avid M oiseevich (b. 1928), prose writer, emigr.: 1972; 588 O penkhovsky, S tan islav Frantsevich [Sarm atov] (7-1938), First-W ave poet; 558
700
JOHN GLAD
Orechkin, Boris Semënovich (1888-1943), First-W ave journalist Orekhov, V., émigré editor; 553 Org, Albert, Estonian Counsel in Petrograd and founder of Russian publishing house in Tallinn in the 1920s; 201
[Orlenev, Pavel], see: Orlov Orlov [Orlenev], Pavel Nikolaevich (1869-1932), actor, toured abroad widely; 292
Orlov, Yury Fëdorovich (b. 1924), essayist, physicist, dissident, emigr.: 1986; 431, 603 O rlova, Izidora Tom ashevna, ["Izida,” K shizhanna Z o ro astra], First-W ave poet; 345 Orlova, Raisa Davydovna (1918-1989), literary critic, memoirist, translator, wife of Lev Kopelev, emigr.: 1980; 394, 438, 596 [Orlovsky, S.], see: Shll* [Osorgln, Mikhail], see: ll'in, Mikhail Andreevich [Ostroumova, Tat'yana], see: Nensberg, Tat’yana Ostrovsky, Aleksandr Nikolaevich (1823-1886), playwright; 291, 293, 448 Ostrovsky [Romanov], Evgeny Romanovich, NTS leader; 350, 602 Otsup, Aleksandr-Mark Avdeevlch [Sergei Gorny] (1880 or 1882-1949), First-W ave poet, prose writer, and editor, studied abroad 1913-1914; 126, 138, 160, 227, 572, 579 Otsup, Georgy Avdeevlch [Georgy Raevsky] (1897-1963), poet, emigr.: 1923; 250, 252, 535, 582 Otsup, Nikolai Avdeevlch (1894-1958), poet and critic, studied in Paris 191314, emigr.: 1923; 250, 252, 260, 541, 580, 605 Ottwalt, Ernst, German author; 248 Ourin, Viktor Arkad'evich, see: Urin, Viktor Arkad'evich Ovanesyan, Evgeny, Soviet critic who attacked Vladimir Voinovich; 614 Ovcharenko, Evgeny Ivanovich (1922-199?), Stalinist literary critic; 430 Overbury, Thomas (1581-1613), English author and courtier; 206 Ovid (Publius Ovldlus Naso) (43 B.C.-A.D. 18), Latin poet; 13, 14, 70 Oz (original name: Klausner), Amos (b. 1934), Israeli prose writer and essayist; 379 Pachmuss, Ternira Andreevna (b. 1927), literary scholar; 21, 31, 286 Palslos, see: Lagarides, Palsios Paleolog, Æ, deported from France to Soviet Union in Novem ber 1947; 342 Panin, Dmitry Mikhailovich (1911-1987), memoirist, essayist, engineer, emigr.: 1972; 438 Panin, Gennady Gennad'evich (b. 1895), poet; 572 Panteleimonov, Boris Grigor'evich (1880 or 1888-1950), First-W ave prose writer and chemist, studied in Germ any before revolution, defected while in W estern Europe, accepted Soviet citizenship in 1945; 246,
247, 573
RUSSIA ABROAD
701
Papadiamandopulos [Moréas], Yannis (1856-1910), French poet of G reek descent; 170 Paramonov, Sergei Yakovlevich [Sergei Lesnoi] (1898-1968), poet; 438 Parkau (married name: Nilus), Aleksandra Petrovna (7-1954), First-W ave poet and prose writer, returned to Russia from China in late 1940s; 219, 576
Parnakh, Valentin Yakovlevich (1891-1951), First-W ave poet, returned to Russia: 1922; 160, 532, 574
Parnok, Sofiya (1885-1993), First-W ave poet; 263 Parvus-Gel'fand [Helphand], Aleksandr-lzrall’
(1867-1924), Jewish revolutionary who convinced Lenin to accept offer to be smuggled back into Russia by Germ an train; 446, 522 Pasmannik, David Samoilovich (1869-1930), editor and memoirist; 140 Pasternak, Boris Leonidovich (1890-1960), poet and prose writer, forced to decline Nobel Prize after Khrushchëv threatened him with exile; 148, 158, 249, 255, 256, 262, 274, 366, 383, 4 3 1 ,4 4 3 , 475, 535, 552, 562, 579 Pastukhov, Vsevolod Leonidovich (1896-1967), prose writer and musician, cam e to the U.S.A. during World W ar II; 360, 584 Patlas, Grigory Mikhailovich (b. 1950), poet, emigr.: 1979; 595 Patrus, A., writer in Mukachevo before World W ar II; 211 Pavel (Paul) I (1754-1801), Tsar; 69, 95, 187, 281, 285 Pavlov, Nikolai A., First-W ave prose writer; 56 Pavlova, Karolina Karlovna (1807-1893), poet, emigr.: 1856; 55 ,56,498,509 [Pavlova, Tat'yana], see: Zeitman Pavlovskaya, Evgeniya Moiseevna, prose writer, emigr.: 1987; 605 Pecherin, Vladimir Sergeevich (1807-1885), poet and prose writer, studied abroad 1833-1835, emigr.: 1836; 61, 216, 495, 500, 501, 507, 549 Peil, V. A., First-W ave supporter of Eurasianism, arrested in Estonia shortly after the Soviet occupation; 313 Pelletier-Zamoiska, Hélène, daugher of French military attaché in Moscow; 451, 452
Pell, Eugene (b. 1937), Director of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty in 1980s; 462, 615
Pen, Aleksandr, émigré writer in Palestine who switched to Hebrew; 225 Perchlkov, Aleksandr Anatol'evlch (b. 1955), poet, emigr.: 1990; 613 [Pereleshln, Valery], see: Salatko-Petrishchev, Valery Frantsevich Perel'man, Iosif Isidorovich [Osip Dymov] (1878-1959), First-W ave prose writer and playwright, lived widely abroad before emigrating in 1913; 104, 520, 580
Perel'man, Simon (b. 1923), poet, emigr.: 1978; 593 Perel'man, Viktor Borisovich (b. 1929), prose writer and editor, emigr.: 1973; 414, 441, 588, 599
702
JOHN GLAD
Perfil'ev, Aleksandr Mikhailovich
[Aleksandr Li, Sherri-Brendi] (18951973), First-W ave poet and prose writer, left Riga in 1944; 197, 562 Peron, Juan Domingo (1895-1974), Argentine soldier and politician; 344 Perov, Anatoly Kozmich (1907-1977), First-W ave journalist; 198 Persius (full name: Aulus Persius Flaccus), Roman satirist; 208 Perry, Matthew C., American admiral who used gunboat diplomacy to open Japan to the W est in 1853; 233 Pervukhin, Mikhail Konstantinovich (1870-1928), First-W ave prose writer; 545 Peshekhonov, Aleksei Vasil'evich (1867-1933), political figure, deported: 1922, Soviet citizenship restored in 1927, received permission to move to Riga as economic consultant; 142 Peshekhonov-Kamsky, V., First-W ave prose writer in China; 227 Peshkov, Aleksei Maksimovich [Maksim Gor'ky] (1868-1936), prose writer, abroad: 1906-1913, emigr.: 1921, returned to Russia: 1931; 6 4 -6 6 ,8 8 , 92, 114, 143, 158, 200, 238-240, 251, 257, 266, 2 7 0 ,2 7 3 -2 7 7 , 287, 291, 293, 294, 302, 372, 448, 512, 515, 517-520, 524, 528, 530, 535, 538-540, 543, 544, 548, 552, 555, 581 Peskov, Georgy, see: Deisha, Elena Pestrovo, Klavdiya Prokof'evna, Russian émigré poet in Australia; 582 Pétain, Henri-Phlllppe (1856-1951), French army officer and head of state of Vichy government; 131 Peterets, Nikolai Vladimirovich (7-1944), poet and prose writer, returned to Soviet Union from China at end of World W ar II; 220, 565 Petlyura, Simon Vasil'evich (1879-1926), journalist, Ukrainian nationalist political leader, emigr.: 1920, assassinated for participation in Jewish pogroms; 136 Pétr I ("The Great") (1672-1725), Russian Tsar; 43,49, 54, 95 ,1 0 5 ,1 2 6 ,1 7 2 , 212, 285, 340, 493, 494 Petrashevsky, see: Butashevich-Petrashevsky Petrochenkov, Valery Vasil'evich (b. 1940), poet, novelist, and literary scholar, emigr.: 1974; 469, 589, 598 Petronlus (d. A.D. 66), Roman satirist; 234 [Petrov, Evgeny], see: Kataev, Evgeny Petrov, I., First-W ave émigré; 177 Petrov, Sergei [Sergei Sergln] (d. either 1 9 3 3 ,1 9 3 4 or 1935), poet and prose writer; 219, 550, 552 Petrov, Stepan Gavrilovich [Stepan Skftalets] (1869-1941), prose writer, prose writer, memoirist, emigr.: 1921 or 1922, returned to Russia.: 1934; 219, 220, 533, 551, 561 Petrov, Viktor Porfir'evich (b. 1907 [Harbin]), cam e to the U.S.A. in 1940, prose writer; 17, 222, 550 Petrovskaya, Nina Ivanovna (1884-1928), prose writer, critic, and translator, emigr.: 1908, committed suicide; 516, 545
RUSSIA ABROAD
703
Petrukhln, D. A., émigré in China in inter-war period; 222 Petrunls, Sergei Vasll'evich (b. 1944), poet, emigr.: 1978; 593, 602 Pllipenko, Valery, Soviet reader who protested publication of works by Ivan Shmelev; 605, 606 [PH'nyak], see: Vogau Pil'sky, Pëtr Moiseevich [P. Stogov, P. Khrushchëv, Petrony, P. Trubnikov, R. Vel'sky] (1876 or 1878 or 1881-1941), First-W ave prose writer and critic; 15, 195, 197, 198, 563 Pltsudskl, Jôseff (1867-1935), Polish Prime Minister; 186, 187, 285 Pimen, fourteenth-century Metropolitan of Moscow; 35, 495 Piotrovsky, see: Korvin-Piotrovsky Pirozhkova, Vera Aleksandrovna (b. 1921), essayist, editor, translator, fled to Riga in 1941, taken to German labor camp in 1944; 402, 441 Pisarev, Dmitry Ivanovich (1840-1868), journalist and nihilist critic; 6 2 ,7 6 ,8 6 , 89 Piskunov, V. M., Russian literary scholar; 19 Plsemsky, Aleksei Feofilaktovich (1821-1881), prose writer and playwright; 500 PKoeva, Kseniya, opened Russian theater in Paris in 1943; 322 Pius XII (Eugenio Marla Giuseppe Giovanni Pacelll) (1876-1958), Pope; 332 Plato (428/427-348/347); 249, 275 Platon, Russian Archbishop in New York in 1910s; 516 Plekhanov, Georgy Valentinovich (1856-1918), revolutionary and literary theoretician, emigr.: 1880-1917; 87, 89, 92, 100, 208, 212, 276, 505, 506, 514, 518, 524 Pletnëv, Dr., physician who treated Maksim Gor'ky; 276 Pletnëv, Rostislav Vladimirovich (1903-1985), First-W ave émigré literary scholar; 184, 601 Pleve (Plehve), Vyacheslav Konstantinovich (1846-1904), conservative Minister of Internal Affairs, assassinated; 91, 513 [Plevitskaya, Nadezhda], see: Vinnikova Pllkhta, V., deported from France to Soviet Union in November 1947; 342 Plutarch (c. 46-C.120), G reek historian; 76, 403, 542
Plyashkevich, Ivan Ivanovich (Jan) [Ivan Novgorod-Seversky] (1893-1969), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1920; 527, 530, 572, 585 Plyushch, Ada, dissident; 394, 595 Plyushch, Leonid Ivanovich (b. 1939), writer, essayist, and mathematician, emigr.: 1975; 431, 432, 438, 591, 603 Pobegailo, Ignat (1899-1960), First-W ave poet; 580
Poe, Edgar Allan (1809-1849), American poet, critic, and short-story writer; 225
Pogodin, Aleksandr L'vovlch (1872-1947), historian, critic, emigr.: 1920; 570
704
JOHN GLAD
Pogodin, Mikhail Petrovich (1800-1875), historian and journalist, supporter of Slavophilism and Panslavism; 58, 61, 496 Pogréb, Sara Abramovna (b. 1921), poet, emigr.: 1990; 613 Pokrass, Gennady Samuilovich (b. 1933), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1976; 591 Pokrovskaya, Rimma Ivanovna [Marianna Ivanovna Kolosova, Elena Insarova, Dzhungar] (1903-1964), First-W ave poet; 135, 219, 582 Pokrovsky, A. N., husband of Rimma Pokrovskaya [Marianna Kolosova], involved in fascist movement in China; 135 Polchanlnov, Rostislav Vladimirovich (b. 1919), First-W ave historian; 17 Polevoi, Nikolai Alekseevich (1796-1846), writer, journalist, and historian; 486 Polgar, Alfred (1875-1955), Austrian writer and literary critic, abroad 1938-49; 245 Polner, Tikhon Ivanovich (1864-1935), First-W ave literary historian; 554 Polovets, Aleksandr Borisovich (b. 1935), journalist, emigre 1976; 407 Polozov, Vasily Vasil'evich, seventeenth-century Russian sold into slavery to the Turkish sultan; 38, 493 Poltoratsky, Nikolai Petrovich (1921-1990), literary scholar; 17, 577, 588,
613 Polyak, Boris Yul'evich (1889-?), publisher of newspaper Segodnya, left Latvia in 1939; 198 Polyakov, Boris Samuilovich (1940-1985), poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1976; 591, 600, 601 Polyakov, O., Third-W ave émigré; 398, 600 Polyakov-Litovtsev, Solomon L'vovich (1875-1945), First-W ave prose writer and editor; 567
Polyansky, Dmitry Stepanovich (b. 1917), senior Soviet government official; 477
Pomerantsev,
Igor’ Yakovlevich
(b. 1948),
radio journalist,
poet,
and
translator, emigr.: 1978; 594
Pomerantsev,
Kirill
Dmitrievich
(1907-1991),
poet
and
prose
writer,
emigr.: 1920; 538, 527
Pomerantsev, Vladimir, poet, returned to Soviet Union from China at end of World W ar II; 220, 222, 343
Pope, Alexander (1688-1744), English poet; 212, 232, 286, 494 Poplavsky, Boris Yulianovich [Apollon Bezobrazov] (1903-1935), poet and diarist, briefly in Constantinople in 1919, emigrated: 1920; 168, 170, 250, 252, 253, 255, 256, 265, 268, 269, 297, 485, 486, 527, 528, 554, 555 Popov, A. V., First-W ave prose writer and editor; 211
Popov [Serafimovich], Aleksandr Serafimovich (1863-1949), non-émigré prose writer; 581
RUSSIA ABROAD
705
Popova, N. A., author of 1881 book, published in St. Petersburg, critical of Russian expatriates in France; 506 Popovsky, Mark Aleksandrovich (b. 1922), prose writer and journalist, emigr.: 1977; 402, 406 Poremsky, Vladimir Dmitrievich, NTS political leader; 350, 427, 576 Poretsky [Reiss], Ignaty (7-1937), defected Soviet agent, assassinated on Stalin's orders; 266, 308, 556 Portugais, Semën Osipovich [Stepan Ivanovich] (1880 or 1881-1944), FirstW ave political and social commentator; 120, 248, 253 Posazhny, Aleksei Vasil'evich (1887-1964), First-W ave poet; 582 Postnikov, Sergei Porflr'evich (1883-1965), historian and bibliographer, deported from the Soviet Union: 1922; 175, 177, 345, 527, 583 Postovsky, deported from France to Soviet Union in 1947; 342 Potapenko, Nataliya Ignat'evna (7-1974), First-W ave prose writer, emigr.: shortly after October revolution; 590 Potekhin, Yury Nikolaevich (1888-1938), First-W ave Change of Landmarks writer, returned to Russia; 124 Potêmkin, Pêtr Petrovich (1886-1926), prose writer, poet, playwright, translator, secretary of Arkady Averchenko, abroad: 1900-1905, emigr.: 1920; 178, 345, 527, 541 Potresov, Aleksandr Nikolaevich (1869-1934), Men'shevik political leader, abroad before revolution, emigr.: 1925; 120, 212 Potresov, Sergei Viktorovich [Sergei Yablonovsky] (1870-1953 or 1954), First-W ave poet, journalist, and theater critic; 540, 576 Pound, Ezra (Loomis) (1870-1964), Amerian expatriate poet; 343 Povolotsky, Ya., published Russian-language books in W estern Europe beginning in 1910; 165 Pozhedaev, Georgy Antol'evlch (1899-1971), artist, emigr.: 1921; 530 Pozner, Solomon Vladimirovich (1876-1946), secretary of Society to Assist Russian W riters in France, emigr.: 1921 or 1922; 568 Poznyakov, Vasily, sixteenth-century Moscow merchant who visited the Holy Land and wrote travel account; 49, 491, 492 Pravdln, Boris Vasil'evich (1887-1960), poet and literary scholar, grew up in Riga, later lived in Estonia; 200, 201, 580 Pregel', Sofiya Yul'evna (1897-1972), poet and editor, emigr.: 1922; 250,357, 360, 533, 575, 588 Primrose, Archibald Philip (1847-1929), English statesman and author; 117 Prismanova, Anna Semënovna (1892-1960), poet, wife of Aleksandr Ginger, emigr.: 1922; 169, 250, 341, 533, 567, 568, 572 Pristavkin, Anatoly Ignat'evich (b. 1931), non-émigré prose writer; 607 Prisyazhnikov, Valentin [Valya VaP] (1903-7), prose writer and poet; 222 Proffer, Carl (1938-1984), American Slavist and publisher; 29, 30, 441, 442, 586, 600
706
JOHN GLAD
P ro ffer, E llendea (1944), American Slavist and publisher, wife of Carl Proffer; 441, 442, 586 P ro k o fe v , O leg S ergeevich (1928-1998), poet and artist, son of composer Sergei Prokofev, brought back to Russia by parents in 1936, emigr.: 1971; 587 P ro k o fe v , S ergei S ergeevich (1891-1953), composer, abroad 1918-1933; 145, 523, 543, 555, 557, 575 P rokotilov, A ., deported from France to Soviet Union in Novem ber 1947; 342 Pronlkov, A leksandr V asll'evlch, Director of the Russian Theater in Tallinn between the W ars; 296 P roudhon, P ierre Joseph (1809-1865), French social theorist; 82 P roust, M arcel (1871-1922), French novelist; 287, 453 Pryanlshnikov, B oris V ital'evich (b. 1902), NTS leader and historian; 308, 309, 346, 556 Pskovityanin, Y ury, émigré poet; 328 Puni, Ivan A l'b erto vich (1894-1956), artist, aborad 1912-1913, emigr.: 1920; 526 [Pushchin, Lev], see: G lppius, Z. N. Pushkarév, S ergei G erm anovich (1888-1984), historian, emigr.: 1920; 599 Pushkarëva, V era, First-W ave memoirist; 193 P ushkarsky, N ikolai Y ulianovich, directed cultural group in Los Angeles in 1970s; 408 Pushkin, A leksandr A leksandrovich, poet, emigr.: 1986; 602 Pushkin, A leksandr S ergeevich (1799-1837), Russia's most renowned poet; 19, 23, 51, 52, 69-72, 74, 80, 82, 105, 133, 146, 149, 176, 185, 189, 209, 227, 283, 284, 366, 376, 3 8 1 ,4 3 1 ,4 7 9 , 482, 487, 495, 541, 543, 605 P u tyatin, Efim (E fim y) V asll'evlch (1804-1883), statesman, diplomat, admiral; 53 P uzitsky, S ergei V asll'evlch, commissar in the Soviet secret police, participated both in the arrest of Savinkov and the kidnapping of Kutepov; 138 Pyatakov, G eorgy Leonidovich (1890-1937), revolutionary, abroad: 1914-17, executed after show trial; 304, 605 P yatnttsky, N ikolai P yatn itsky, First-W ave editor; 335, 567 R abin, O skar Yakovlevich (b. 1928), memoirist and artist, emigr.: 1978; 394 R abiner, Y akov V ladim irovich [R. Y akovlev] (b. 1943), poet, emigr.: 1979; 595 R abinovich, E vgeny Isaakovich [E vgeny R aich], poet and translator; 527, 551, 557 R abinovich, R lvka, Third-W ave poet; 414 R abinovich, Solom on Nokhum ovich [Sholom A lelkhem ] (1859-1916), Yiddish writer, emigr.: 1905; 225, 408, 462
RUSSIA ABROAD
707
Rachko, Marina Mikhailovna
[Efimova] (b. 1937), prose writer, poet, journalist, emigr.: 1978; 442, 464, 594 Radashkevlch, Aleksandr Pavlovich (b. 1950), poet and essayist, emigr.: 1978; 594 [Radek], see: Sobel'son Radishchev, Aleksandr Nikolaevich (1749-1802), prose writer. 68, 69, 514 Radlova, Anna Dmitrievna (1891-1949), poet, critic, and translator, was in Pyatigorsk in 1942 when the city was captured by the Germans, returned to Russia after end of World W ar II; 562, 572 Radomysl'sky [Zinov'ev, Apfel'baum], Grigory Evseevich (1883-1936), revolutionary and Soviet political figure, abroad much of 1902-1905, emigr.: 1908-1917, executed in purges; 1 2 6 ,1 4 0 , 289, 300, 303-305, 537, 555, 605 Radovsky, Aleksandr Moiseevich (b. 1936), prose writer and playwright, emigr.: 1973; 588
Raevsky, Nikolai Alekseevich
(1894-1982), memoirist, literary and art scholar, emigr.: 1920?; 597 Rafalovich, Sergei L'vovlch (1875-1943), First-W ave poet; 160, 564 Rafal'sky, Sergei Millch (1896-1981), émigré poet and prose writer; 1 7 6 ,2 5 4 , 596 [Raich, Evgeny], see: Rabinovich, Evgeny Raiz, Lyudmila, Third-W ave writer; 588 Rakhmanlnov, Sergei Vasll'evlch (1873-1943), composer, pianist, orchestra director; 355, 557, 611 Rakltln, E., signed 1986 collective letter critical of NTS, wife of Vasily Rakitin?; 438 Rakitin, Vasily Ivanovich (b. 1939), art critic, emigr.: 1985; 438 [Rakitin, Yury], see: lonln Rakovsky, Aleksandr; 414 Rand, Ayn (née Alisa Rozenbaum) (1905-1982), American writer from Russia, emigr.: 1926; 21 Rannit, Aleksis (1914-1985), Estonian émigré writer and scholar; 257 Raoul V (11th century), French count of Crépy en Valois, husband of Anna, daughter of Yaroslav the Wise; 33 Raphael Santi or Raphail Sanzio (1483-1520), Renaissance painter; 43 Rapoport, Shlolme Zelnvll [Semen Akimovich An-sky] (1863-1920), prose writer and playwright, emigr.: 1891, returned to Russia: 1905; 87, 509, 514
Rapoport, Vitaly Nakhlmovich (b. 1937), economist and dissident, emigr.: 1980; 432
Rasputin (real name: Novykh), Grigory Yefimovich (1872-1916), monk and confidant of Empress Aleksandra Fëdorovna; 121, 213, 452 Ratgauz, Daniil Maksimovich (1868 or 1869-1937), First-W ave poet; 556 Ratgauz, Tat’yana Danilovna (b. 1909), poet; 176
708
JOHN GLAD
Ratnikova, Larisa Leonidovna (b. 1945), poet, emigr.: 1987; 605 Ratushlnskaya, Irina Borisovna (b. 1954), poet, emigr.: 1986; 602, 610, 613 Razumovsky, Andreas; 592 Reagan, Ronald (b. 1911); 405, 411, 595, 602 Reed, John (1887-1920), American journalist; 240 Reilly, Sidney, see: Rozenblyum, Zlgmund Rein, Evgeny Borisovich (b. 1935), non-émigré poet; 472 Rein, Rafail Abramovich [R. Abramovich] (1880-1963), First-W ave Men'shevik publisher, deported from U .S.S.R .; 120
[Reinhardt, Max], see: Goldman [Reiss], see: Poretsky Remlzov, Aleksei Mikhailovich (1877-1957), prose writer, emigr.: 1921; 144, 145, 158, 168, 170, 249, 254, 273, 325, 341, 526, 530, 531, 535, 570, 578, 604 [Rennikov, A]., see: Selitrennlkov, Andrei Rerikh (Roerich), Nikolai Konstantinovich (1874-1947), painter, prose writer, and poet, abroad 1900-1901, emigr.: 1918; 178, 179, 205, 523 Rerikh, Yury Nikolaevich (1902-1960), First-W ave prose writer, returned to Russia: 1957; 578, 580 Reshetovskaya, Natal'ya (b. 1919), memoirist and former wife of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn; 609 Rezanov, Nikolai Petrovich (1764-1807), founder of the Russian-American Company; 95
Reznlkova, Nataliya Semënovna (b. 1908), prose writer, poet, journalist, emigr.: 1921, returned to Soviet Union from China at end of World W ar II; 219, 220 Ribbentropp, Joachim von (1893-1946), Nazi diplomat, executed at Nürnberg; 133, 190, 310, 318, 371 Rice, Timothy Miles Bindon (b. 1944), composer; 223 Richelieu, Armand Jean du Plessis de (1585-1642), French prelate and statesman; 246 Rimbaud, Jean Nicolas Arthur (1854-1891), French poet and prose writer; 268 Rimscha, Hans von, 20th century German historian; 113 Rittenberg, Sergei Aleksandrovich (1899-1975), critic; 205 Rochester, John Wilmot, 2nd earl of (1647-1680), English poet and courtier; 201 Rode, Gunars, Latvian dissident, emigrated after fifteen-year imprisonment; 394, 595 Rodshteln, L Z., émigré publisher in Paris in interwar period; 170 Rodzaevsky, Konstantin Vladimirovich (1907-1946), First-W ave “fascist” political figure, forcibly returned to Soviet Union at end of World W ar II and executed; 134, 135, 316, 343, 547, 554, 557 Romanovs, see first name and patronymic
RUSSIA ABROAD
709
[Romanov, Evgeny], see: Ostrovsky, Evgeny "R om anova, A nastasiya Franzisca
N ikolaevna,"
pretender,
see: Schanzkow ska,
Romanova de Saratov, Anastasiya-lngrld, claimed to be niece of Nikolai II; 345
Romanovsky, Ivan Pavlovich (7-1920), Tsarist general and second-in-charge to Denikin in W hite Army, assassinated; 109
[Romlos, Valentin] (b. 1931), prose writer, emigr.: 1983; 598 Roos, Elizaveta, see: Bazilevskaya Roos, Meta Al'fredovna (1904-1989), prose writer and poet; 201, 612 Roosevelt, Eleanore (1884-1962); 384, 578 Roosevelt, Franklin Delano (1882-1945); 330, 410 Roosevelt, Theodore (1858-1919); 516 [Ropshin, V ], see: Savinkov, Boris [Roschln, N.], see: Nikolai Fëdorov Rosenberg, Alfred (1893-1946), Baltic German theoretician of the Nazi party; 311, 315, 317, 330, 558, 565 [Roshchln, N.], see: Fëdorov, Nikolai Rostopchlna, Evdoklya Petrovna (1811-1858), poet, prose writer, dramatist, abroad: 1845-1847; 497 Rostovsky, Aleksandr, see: Saltavets Rostovtsev, N. Æ, m ember of literary circle in Prague in 1920s Rostropovich, Mstislav Leopol'dovlch (b. 1927), cellist and orchestra conductor, emigr.: 1974; 394, 593 Rousseau, Jean-Jacques (1712-1778), Swiss-French writer who lived frequently abroad; 76, 443 Rovner, Arkady Borisovich (b. 1940), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1974; 441, 589, 590, 595 Rozanov, Vasily Vasil'evich (1856-1919), non-émigré prose writer and philosopher; 168, 451 Rozanova, Mariya Vasil'evna (b. 1930), editor and essayist, emigr.: 1973; 76, 400, 402, 439, 440, 588, 593, 610 Rozen, Aleksandr (b.1929); 414
Rozenberg (née KutKonskaya, name in first marriage: Perfll'eva), Irina Evgen'evna [Irina Saburova] (1907-1979), poet and prose writer, left Riga 1943 or 1944; 197, 364-366, 568, 570, 588, 595 Rozenberg [Bakst], Lev Samollovich (1866-1924), artist, abroad as of 1909; 501, 517 Rozenberg, V. A., editor, deported from the Soviet Union: 1922; 235 Rozenblyum, Vltol’d-Konstantln Nikolaevich [Konstantin L'dov] (18621937), poet, prose writer, translator, composer, art collector, emigr.: 1914, in Russia 1914-1915; 520, 521, 556 Rozenblyum [Sidney Reilly], Zlgmund (Sigmund) Grigor'evich (1874-1925), First-W ave counter-revolutionary agent; 136, 204
710
JOHN GLAD
Rozenfel'd, Lev Borisovich [Kamenev] (1883-1936), statesman, journalist, literary critic, emigr.: 1902-1903, 1908-1914, diplomat abroad: 19171919, 1926-1927, executed after show trial; 140, 289, 300, 303, 513, 516, 520, 523, 538, 540, 555, 605 Rozenkopf, T., deported from France to Soviet Union in Novem ber 1947; 342 Roziner, Feliks Yakovlevich (1936-1997), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1978; 414, 594, 599 Rubakln, Nikolai Aleksandrovich (1862-1946), cultural historian and “bibliopsychologist,” emigr.: 1906; 208, 515, 568, 571 Rubin, ll'ya Davydovich (1941-1977), poet, emigr.: 1976; 591 Rubinshtein, Natal'ya Naumovna (b.1938), literary and theater critic, essayist, emigr.: 1974; 414 Rubinshtein, R. G. [Evgeny L’vovlch Shklyar] (1894-1941 or 1942), FirstW ave poet and journalist; 198 Rubisova, Elena Fëdorovna (1897-1988), poet; 250, 568 Rudinsky, Vladimir Andreevich (b. 1919?), Second-W ave crjtic; 441 Rudnev, Vadim Viktorovich (1874 or 1879-1940), former mayor of Moscow, abroad 1901, early 1910s, one of editors of Sovrem ennye zapiski, emigr.: 1919; 149, 169, 236, 523, 560 Rudyak, ll'ya Ézrovich (b. 1939), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1981; 407, 475 Rumyantsev, A., First-W ave émigré; 177 Runge, claimed to be the illegitimate son of Nikolai II; 345 Rushdie, Salmon (b. 1947), Indian-Bom British novelist; 381 Ruskin, John (1819-1900), English critic and social theorist; 275 Rutman, Roman, Third-W ave journalist; 410 Ryabushkina, Mariya, First-W ave poet; 201
Ryadlnin, Roman; 207 Ryazanov, Èl'dar Aleksandrovich (b. 1927), non-émigré film producer; 24, 606, 610, 611
Ryazanovskaya, Antonina Fëdorovna [Nina Fedorova] (1895-1985), FirstW ave prose writer and playwright; 601
Rybakov, editor; 357 Rybakov, Vladimir Mechislavovich
[Malashin, Shchetinsky] (b. 1947), prose writer, lived with parents in France until 1956, emigr.: 1972; 588 Rygalov, N., deported from France in November 1947; 342 Rykov, Aleksei Ivanovich (1881-1938), senior Soviet official in a number of posts, abroad 1910-11, executed after show trial; 121, 140, 305, 605 Ryndzyun [Vetlugin], Vladimir Il'ich (1897-1950s), First-W ave poet; 220 Ryshkov, Evgeny Viktorovich [E. Tarussky], First-W ave prose writer; 323, 335 Ryss, Pëtr Yakovlevich (c. 1875 or 1885-c. 1948), First-W ave journalist and historian; 540
RUSSIA ABROAD
711
Ryurik, 9th century Viking prince, possibly from Denmark, who becam e prince of Novgorod; 32
Ryvkin,
David
Yakovlevich
[David
Dar]
(1910-1980),
prose
writer,
emigr.: 1977; 414, 592, 595
Rzhevskaya, Agniya Sergeevna [Aglaya Shishkova] (b. 1923), poet, emigr.: 1943 or 1944; 581
Rzhevsky, Leonid Denisovich (former name: Surazhevsky) [N. Tan, L Tan] (1905-1986), prose writer and literary scholar, prisoner of w ar as of 1941; 351, 363, 365, 561, 572, 575, 581, 602 Rzhevsky, Yury Sergeevich (1901-1967), journalist and publisher, emigr.: 1930; 196 Sablin, Evgeny V., former chargé d'affaires of the tsarist embassy who opened his London home for Russian cultural events in the interwar period; 214 [Saburova, Irina], see: Rozenberg Sagalovsky, Naum Iosifovich (b. 1935), poet, emigr.: 1979; 595 Sagotov, Bogdan Ivanovich [Leonid Bogdanov] (1918-1961), emigre prose writer; 580 Sakharov, Andrei Dmitrievich (1921-1989), physicist and dissident; 379,439,
459, 590 Sakovich, E., First-W ave publisher; 189 Salatko-Petrishchev, Valery Frantsevich [Valery Aleksandrovich, Valery Pereleshln, Mariya Kareeva, Dalëky] (1913-1992), poet, translator, critic, emigr.: 1920, took orders as monk in 1938, arrived in Brazil from China in 1953; 219, 343, 527, 556, 563, 572, 574 Salazar, Antônlo de Oliveira (1889-1970), Portuguese statesman and dictator; 132 Salhlas-de-Tournemfr, Elizaveta Vasll'evna [Elizaveta Tur] (1815-1892), Russian prose writer, critic, editor, in France: 1861-1872; 500, 503 Salimon, Vladimir, non-émigré poet; 612 Salisbury, British Foreign Secretary in 1890s; 213 Saltavets [Rostovsky], Aleksandr Nikolaevich (1909-1987), poet, emigr.: sometime during World W ar II; 605 Samsonova, Tamara Vasll'evna (b. 1927), essayist and philosopher, emigr.: 1980; 438
[Sand, George], see: Dupln Sanderov, A., First-W ave poet; 230 Sapgir, Kira Aleksandrovna [T. Gurvich, I. Sadovsky] (b. 1941), poet, emigr.: 1978; 438, 593
Saprykin, Georgy [Georgy Granin; also I. M.-ov] (d. either 1933, 1934, or 1935) poet and prose writer; 220 Savel'ev, Igor’ Aleksandrovich (b. 1955), poet, emigr.: 1985; 601
712
JOHN GLAD
Savenko, Èduard Veniaminovich [Èduard Limonov] (b. 1943), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1974; 20, 390, 397, 403, 427, 428, 435, 441, 458, 459, 484, 589, 594, 598, 614 Savich, Jessica, American television journalist; 386 [Savin, I.], see: Savolalnen, I Savinkov, Boris Viktorovich [V. Ropshin] (1879-1925), prose writer, studied in Germany: 7-1899, fled to Switzerland: 1904, abroad 1909 (1911?)1917, 1918-1924, clandestinely reentered the U .S.S.R . and w as arrested, died in prison, possibly murdered; 15, 90, 9 1 ,1 1 8 ,1 3 7 ,1 3 8 , 165, 186-189, 259, 512, 513, 517, 519, 523, 525, 529, 536, 537, 539, 613 Savitsky, Aleksandr Mikhailovich [Innokenty Charov] (7-1937), First-W ave prose writer and poet; 556 Savitsky, Dmitry Petrovich [Aleksandr Dimov] (b. 1944), poet, emigr.: 1978; 593 Savitsky, Petr Nikolaevich [Petrony Vostokov] (1895-1968), First-W ave economist, geographer, poet, arrested in Prague in 1945 and imprisoned in Mordovia until 1956, when he returned to Czechoslovakia, under arrest: 1960-1961; 126, 529, 556, 580, 585 Savolalnen, Juhanl (Ivan Ivanovich) [Ivan Savin] (1899-1927), poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1922; 15, 205, 250, 533, 543 Sazonov, Nikolai Ivanovich (1815-1862), writer on social topics, emigr.: late 1830s; 47, 80, 81, 495, 497, 499, 500 Sazonov, Rostislav Dmitrievich (b. 1906), emigr.: 1920; 527 Scammell, Michael (b. 1935), W estern Slavist; 421 Schanzkowska, Franzlsca (Anna Anderson) (d. 1984), Polish wom an who claimed to be Grand Duchess Anastasiya, daughter of Nikolai II; 525, 599 Schelllng, Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph von (1775-1854), Germ an philosopher; 58 Scheubner-Richter, Max Erwin von (1884-1923), Riga Germ an, monarchist;
122 Schiller, Friedrich von (1759-1805), German dramatist, poet, and historian; 57
Schopenhauer, Arthur (1788-1860), German philosopher; 256, 275 Shultz, George Pratt (b. 1920), U.S. Secretary of State; 411 Schwarzschild, Leopold, German writer; 248 Scott, Sir Walter (1771-1832), Scottish poet and novelist; 73, 357 Sedov, Lev L'vovich (1906-1938), eldest son and collaborator of Lev Trotsky, emigr.: 1938, rumoured to have been poisoned; 266, 308, 555-557 Sedova, Natal’ya, widow of Lev Trotsky; 302 [Sedykh, Andrei], see: Tsvibak, Yakov Moiseevich Seitmuratova, Aishe, Third-W ave émigré, foreign representative of the Crimean Tartars; 444, 597
RUSSIA ABROAD
713
Selborne, British Lord and British Minister for Economic W arfare during World W ar II; 329
Selltrennlkov, Andrei Mitrofanovich [ÆRennlkov] (1882-1957), prose writer and playwright, emigr.: 1920; 527, 575, 578 Semashko, Nikolai Aleksandrovich (1874-1949), revolutionary and first People's Commissar of Health, emigr.: 1906-17; 246 Semënov, Boris Konstantinovich (1874-1940?), First-W ave poet; 176, 201, 313 Semënov, Grigory Mikhailovich (1890-1946), Cossack military leader who headed an anti-Bol'shevik group in the Far East, executed by Soviet troops in Manchuria; 547 Semichov, B. Ya., émigré publisher in China; 222 [Serafimovich], see: Popov, Aleksandr Serebrennikov, Ivan Innokent'evich (1882-1953), First-W ave historian, economist, book dealer, and publisher, emigr.: 1920; 527 Serebrennlkova, Aleksandra Nikolaevna (1883-?), First-W ave poet and translator, wife of Ivan Serebrennikov, emigr.: 1920; 527 Serebryakov, Aleksandr Borisovich (1907-1995), artist, emigr.: 1924; 538 Sergeev, Artëm, pre-revolutionary Russian émigré in Australia who returned to Russia after the Russian revolution; 233 Sergei Aleksandrovich (1857-1905), Grand Duke; 91, 509, 513, 514 Sergievsky, Nikolai Nikolaevich (1875-1955?), prose writer, abroad in 1917 and did not return to Russia; 561 Sergin, Sergei, returned to Soviet Union from China at end of World W ar II; 219, 220, 550, 552 Sergy, seventeenth-century pilgrim abducted by the Crimean tartars and sold into slavery; 492 Sergy (before taking monastic vows in 1890: Stragorodsky, Ivan Nikolaevich) (1867-1944), Patriarch of Moscow Orthodox Church; 115, 116, 242, 541 Serno-Solov'evlch, Aleksandr (1838-1869), revolutionary, emigr.: 1862; 85, 501, 503 Sevela, Èfralm Evelevich (b. 1928), prose writer, emigr.: 1971; 3 7 6 ,3 8 5 , 587, 592, 593
[Severny, Pavel], see: Olbrich, Pavel Aleksandrovich (von) [Severyanin, Igor'], see: Lotarëv, Igor' Vasll'evlch Shabel'sky-Bork, Pëtr Nikolaevich (1893-1952), emigr.: 1919, one of assassins of Vladimir Nabokov's father in 1922; 139, 281, 307, 533, 554 Shafarevlch, Igor' Rostislavovich (b. 1923), non-émigré mathematician, historian; 380, 381, 610 Shagal (Segal, Marc Chagall), Mark Zakharovich (1887-1985), artist, abroad 1910-14, emigr.: 1922; 168 Shaglnyan, Marlètta Sergeevna (1888-1982), non-émigré writer; 444
714
JOHN GLAD
Shakespeare, William (1564-1616); 32, 44, 126, 133, 150, 224, 234, 242, 249, 305
Shakhmatov, Mstislav V. (1888-?), First-W ave historian; 178 Shakhnovlch, Genrikh L'vovlch (b. 1929), prose writer
and
poet,
emigr.: 1973; 588, 592
Shakhovskaya, Zinaida Alekseevna (b. 1906), poet, prose writer, and editor, emigr.: 1920; 250, 379, 527, 561, 612
Shakhovskol, Dmitry (Archbishop Ioann) [Strannik] (1902-1989), poet, emigr.: 1920; 115, 315, 527, 580, 585 Shalamov, Varlam Tikhonovich (1907-1982), non-émigré short story writer and poet; 76, 305, 426, 464 Shalyapin, Fédor Ivanovich (1873-1938), opera singer, emigr.: 1922; 168, 611 Shamir, Israel (b. 1947), prose writer, emigr.: 1969; 401, 402, 414, 585 Shamir, Yitzhak (b. 1915), Prime Minister of Israel; 411 Shammas, Anton (b. 1950), Palestinian writer; 483 Shapiro, Boris Izrailevich (b. 1944), poet, emigr.: 1975; 590 ' Shapiro, Isaak Zinov'evich [I. Zinov'ev] (b. 1934), prose writer, emigr.: 1971; 587 Shcharansky, Natan (b. 1948), Soviet dissident and Minister of Trade and Industry of Israel; 411 Sharett, Moshe (1894-1965), Israel Prime Minister 1953-1955; 384, 576 Shargorodsky, Aleksandr Pavlovich (b. 1943), prose writer, emigr.: 1979;
595, 598 Shargorodsky, Lev Pavlovich (1934-1995), prose writer, emigr.: 1979; 595, 598
Sharnipol'sky, Solomon Petrovich (1901-1929), First-W ave artist and poet; 546
Sharshun, Sergei Ivanovich (1888-1975), prose writer and painter, emigr.: 1912; 160, 250, 528, 573, 591
Shatalov, Vladimir Mikhailovich (b. 1917), poet, emigr.: 1943, left for U.S.A. in 1951; 563, 573 [Shatov (Schatoff)], see: Kashtanov Shaufus, Tat'yana Alekseevna (1891-1986), emigr.: m id-1920s, helped Aleksandra Tolstaya establish the Tolstoi Fund in New York; 558
Shaw, George Bernard (1856-1950); 108, 124, 191 Shcheglovitov, Ivan Grigor'evich (1861-1918), conservative political figure in tsarist government, executed by Revolutionary Tribunal; 65
Shchëgolev, Nikolai (1910-?), poet and literary critic, returned to Soviet Union from China at end of World W ar II; 219, 220, 343
Shchepkin, Mikhail Semënovich (1788-1863), actor; 496 Shcherbakov, Mikhail Vasil'evich, First-W ave prose writer and journalist; 222 Sheffer, Igor' (1902-1934), First-W ave poet; 201 Shelekhova-Benke, Mariya, émigré poet; 345
RUSSIA ABROAD S h elikhov (S helekh ov), merchant; 95
G rigory
Ivanovich
(1747-1795),
explorer
715 and
S helley, P ercy B ysshe (1792-1822), English poet; 23 Shem yakln, M ikhail M ikhailovich (b. 1943), artist and poet, emigr.: 1971; 438, 587, 592 S henker, Larisa, Third-W ave editor; 406 S henbrunn, S vetlana P avlovna (b. 1939), prose writer, emigr.: 1975; 414 Shepelev, M ikhail (b. 1935), prose writer, emigr.: 1977; 592 S hepievker, A n ato ly Yakovlevich (b. 1928), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1979; 595 S h erem et'ev, B oris Petrovich (1652-1719), Russian Field Marshal; 39 S h erem et'ev, V. V ., cavalry officer, early 19th century; 51 [S hestov, Lev Isaakovich], see: S hvartsm an S hevich, S erg ei, Russian journalist who ran for mayor of New York in 1886;
100 S hevyrëv, S tepan Petrovich (1806-1864), literary historian, critic, poet; 58 Shim anov, G ennady M ikhailovich, non-émigré nationalist writer; 399, 400 Shim anskaya, A glalda S ergeevna (b. 1903), poet, prose writer and literary critic, family moved to Switzerland some time before the beginning of World W ar I; 250 S hlm kin, V ikto r (7-1967), newspaper publisher and editor; 526, 584 [S hipovnikov], see: K achurovsky S h irinsky-S h lkh m atov, Yu. A ., ideologue of the National Maximalist Party; 135 S hirovskaya, E. I., writer living in Harbin in the 1920s; 219 S h iryaev, B oris N ikolaevich [A lym ov, Æ ] (1889-1959), prose writer, studied in Germ any before Revolution, emigr.: 1943; 363, 562, 575, 580 S hishkin, M ikhail, First-W ave novelist and priest; 193 [S hishko va], see: R zhevskaya S h ishm arëv, S ergei Rom anovich (7-1954), First-W ave prose writer; 2 5 0 ,5 7 6 S h lukashvlli (S h iu k), B ella Iosifovna (b. 1935), musician, emigr.: 1978; 409 S h iukashvili (S hiu k), O tary G eorgievich (b. 1921), Georgian painter, emigr.: 1978; 409 S h karenkov, Leonid K onstantinovich, non-émigré historian; 596 S hklovsky, Isaak V ladim irovich [D ioneo] (1864-1935), First-W ave prose writer and journalist; 510, 554 S hklovsky, V ikto r B orisovich (1893-1984), prose writer and literary scholar, emigr.: 1922, returned to Russia: 1923; 9 2 ,1 4 3 ,1 5 8 ,1 6 0 , 161, 236, 286, 287, 371, 533, 535 [S hklyar, E vgeny L 'vovlchj, see: Rubinshtein, R. G. S h ko tt, Ivan A ndreevich [Ivan B oldyrev] (1903-1933), prose writer; 250, 550 S hlyapnikov, A leksandr G avrilovich (1885-1937), old Bol'shevik, labor leader, historian, abroad 1908-17, executed in a Soviet prison; 304
716
JOHN GLAD
Shmakov,
Gennady
Grigor'evich
(1940-88),
poet
and
translator,
emigr.: 1975; 590
Shmeisser (Shmeiser), Mikhail Petrovich (1909-1986), First-W ave poet, journalist, playwright, returned to Soviet Union from China at end of World W ar II; 219, 220, 343, 602 Shmelëv, Ivan Sergeevich (1873-1950), First-W ave prose writer, emigr.: 1922; 150, 170, 184, 236, 249, 257, 275, 325, 335, 533, 541, 551, 573, 606 Shmeling, Tamara Georgievna (née Mezhak) (1916-1982), poet; 197 Shmukler, Yuliya (b. 1936), writer, essayist, mathematician, emigr.: 1972; 414 Shmurlo, Evgeny Frantsevich (1853-1934), First-W ave poet, prose writer and literary historian; 552 Shnaider, Moisei Gershovlch (b. 1915), prose writer, emigr.: 1973; 588 Shokhln, Zinovy; 414 Sholokhov, Mikhail Aleksandrovich (1905-1984), Stalinist novelist and Nobel-Prize laureate; 363, 443, 581 [Sholom Alelkhem], see: Rabinovich, Solomon Shovgenov, Sergei I. [S. Nal'yanch] (1902-?), First-W ave poet; 188 Shpolyansky, Amlnad Petrovich (Pelsakhovich) [Don-Aminado] (18881957), poet, emigr.: 1920; 527, 530, 578 Shraer, Maksim Davidovich (b. 1967), poet and Slavist, son of David ShraerPetrov, emigr.: 1987; 613 Shraer-Petrov, David Petrovich (b. 1936), poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1987; 386, 605 Shragln, Boris Iosifovich (1926-1990), writer, philosopher, journalist, emigr.:
1974; 381 Shteiger, Alla, see: Golovina Shteiger, Anatoly Sergeevich (1907-1944), poet, emigr.: 1919, returned to Russia and remigrated: 1920; 250, 263, 265, 328, 524, 527, 554, 555, 565, 573 Shtein (Sztein), Èmanuil Alekseevich (b. 1934), historian, literary scholar, book dealer, emigrated from Poland in 1966; 584, 599 Shteinberg, Aron Zakharovich (1891-1975), First-W ave literary scholar; 591 Shtern, Lyudmila Yakovlevna (b. 1937), prose writer, emigr.: 1975; 590 Shturman, Dora Moiseevna (b. 1923), prose writer, poet, historian, political commentator, emigr.: 1977; 414 Shulsky, Vasily Ivanovich (1552-1612), Tsar; 77 Shul'gin, Vasily Vital'evich (1878-1976), prose writer and prominent tsarist and émigré political figure, emigr.: 1918, travelled clandestinely to Russia, arrested in Yugoslavia at end of World W ar II and returned to Russia; 136, 238, 362, 480, 523, 538, 540, 564, 577, 580, 592 Shul'man, Mikhail, First-W ave émigré; 153 Shul'man Mikhail Borisovich (b. 1907), prose writer, emigr.: 1973; 414, 588 Shumakov, Yury Dmitrievich (1912 or 1914-?), First-W ave poet; 201
RUSSIA ABROAD
717
Shuvalov, Pëtr, First-W ave émigré; 109 Shveitser, Viktorlya Aleksandrovna (b. 1932), Third-W ave critic, emigr.: 1978; 268
Shvarts [Aleksandrova], Vera Aleksandrova (1895-1966), First-W ave critic; 120, 359, 575 Shvarts-Bostunich, Grigory [Gregor], Vil'gel'movlch [Gregolre-le-Nolr] (1883-?), playwright, poet, journalist, and Nazi officer, abroad before World W ar I, emigr.: 1920?; 139, 334, 521 [Shvarts, Semën], see: Monoszon Shvartsman, Lev Isaakovich [Lev Shestov] (1866-1938), philosopher and critic, lived frequently abroad before the revolution, emigr.: 1920; 162, 168, 233, 242, 243, 558 Shverubovich [Kachalov], Vasily Ivanovich (1875-1948), actor, emigr.: 1919, returned to Russia: 1922; 293 Sidorov, O. Æ, First-W ave poet; 321 Sigismund III (1566-1632), King of Poland; 77 Slllov, V., poet in Harbin in early 1920s; 219 Sii'vestr, monk who made pilgrimage to Palestine in 1704; 39 Simonides of Ceos (556-468? B.C .), G reek lyric poet; 129 Simonov, Konstantin (Kirill) Mikhailovich (1915-1979), Soviet writer, journalist, poet; 246, 274, 444, 568, 583 Slnkevlch, Valentina Alekseevna (b. 1926), poet, taken to Germ any for forced labor in 1942; 408, 562, 572, 593, 607 Slnyavsky, Andrei Donatovich [Abram Terts] (1925-1997), prose writer and essayist, emigr.: 1973; 76, 279, 381, 390, 400, 401, 402, 421, 422, 425, 435, 439, 440, 444, 450, 4 5 1 ,4 5 2 , 460, 485, 579, 582, 583, 584, 586, 588, 590, 593, 594, 597, 599, 600, 608, 609, 610 Sirin, S., deported from France to Soviet Union in November 1947; 342 [Sirin, Vladimir], see: Nabokov, Vladimir Sirotin, Aleksandr Efimovich [E. Aleksandrov, A. Minsky] (b. 1945), prose writer and journalist, emigr.: 1978; 594 Skachinsky, Aleksandr Sergeevich (b. 1920), prose writer, emigr.: 1977; 592 [Skitalets], see: Petrov, Stepan Skoblin, Nikolai Vladimirovich (1893-?), former W hite Army general who betrayed General Miller to Soviet agents; 308, 541, 555, 558, 559 Skobtsev-Kondrat'ev, Dmitry, émigré writer; 585 Skobtsova, see: Kuz'mina-Karavaeva Skoplchenko, Ol'ga Alekseevna (b. 1908), First-W ave prose writer and poet; 222, 343
Skorodumov, Mikhail Fëdorovlch, W hite general and émigré political figure; 313, 319, 320, 560
Skorov, Valery Vasil'evich (b. 1941), poet, emigr.: 1980; 595, 615
718
JOHN GLAD
Skryabln [Molotov], Vyacheslav Mikhailovich
(1890-1986), Minister of Foreign Affairs, Deputy head of state, expelled from Communist Party; 133, 190, 310, 318, 329, 371, 564 Skryabina, Ariadna Aleksandrovna (1905-1944), daughter of the composer Aleksandr Skrjabin and wife of Dovid Knut; 271 Slavina, Kira Markovna (b. 1911), poet, emigr.: 1927; 544, 565 Slezlnger, Emiliya, poet, emigr.: 1976; 591 Slobodchlkov, Vladimir Aleksandrovich, poet, returned to Soviet Union from China at end of World W ar II; 220, 343 Slonlm, Mark L'vovich (1894-1976), First-W ave critic; 138, 149, 159, 177, 178, 237, 248, 250-252, 267, 360, 592 Stowackl; 12 Smidovich [Veresaev], Vikenty Vikentievich (1867-1945), writer and scholar;
289 Smirnov, tsarist admiral and First-W ave émigré; 213 Smirnova, Aleksandra Osipovna (1809-1882), memoirist, after frequent trips to W estern Europe settled abroad in 1876; 505
Smirnova (Smirnova-Maksheeva), Tat'yana Alekseevna (Aleksandrovna?) (1890-1982), poet and prose writer, went to France in 1913 for medical reasons and never returned; 519, 597 Smith, Gerald S., British Slavist; 603 Smolensky, Vladimir Alekseevich (1901-1961), poet, emigr.: 1920 or 1921;
250, 255, 256, 527, 580, 581 Sobel'son [Radek], Karl Berngardovich (1885-1939), revolutionary and m ember of Central Committee, deported in 1905, returned to Russia in 1917, testified against fellow prisoners in the show trials and was imprisoned rather than executed, rumored killed by a convict in the forced-labor camps; 304, 605 Soboleva, Galina Sergeevna (b. 1907), poet; 539, 583 Soffronov, Anatoly Vladimirovich (1911-1990), Soviet playwright and poet;
373 Sokhanevich, Oleg Viktorovich, artist and poet, fled U .S.S.R . in 1967; 391, 584
Sokolov, Aleksandr Vsevolodovich (Sasha Sokolov) (b. 1943), novelist, emigr.: 1975; 20, 435, 438, 452, 453, 469, 484, 590, 591, 604, 609
Sokolov, Nikolai (7-1889), Russian anarchist who helped found a Russian library in Paris in the 1870s and 1880s; 508
Sokolov, Sergei Alekseevich [Sergei Krechetov] (1878-1936), poet and prose writer, 1914-1918 in Western Europe first as soldier and then as Germ an prisoner of w ar, emigr.: 1920; 316, 521, 527, 529, 555 Sokolov, Viktor, dissident, stripped of Soviet citizenship in 1976; 393 Sokolov-Mikitov, Ivan Sergeevich (1892-1975), prose writer, emigr.: 1920, returned to Russia: 1922; 143, 160, 527, 532, 533 Sokolova, T., First-W ave émigré; 177
RUSSIA ABROAD
719
Sokolovskaya, A leksandra, first wife of Lev Trotsky; 230, 552 S o ldatov, S ergei Ivanovich (b. 1933); 612 Solodln, V ladim ir, head of Soviet committee to review library books not available for general circulation; 606 [S ologub], see: Teternlkov S olonevich, B oris Luk'yanovich (1898-1989), brother of Ivan Solonevich; 295, 551, 554-556 S olonevich, Ivan Luk'yanovich (1891-1953), prose writer and journalist, escapes Russia in 1934; 193, 205, 223, 308, 310, 344, 3 5 1 ,3 5 8 , 550, 552, 554-557, 572, 573, 576 S olonevich, Tam ara V ladim irovna (7-1938), wife of Ivan Solonevich, killed by mail bomb in Bulgaria; 557 S oloukhin, V lad im ir A lekseevich (b. 1924), non-émigré writer; 604 S o lov'ëv, M ikhail S tepanovich (b. 1908), prose writer; 575 S o lov'ev, V ladim ir S ergeevich (1853-1900), philosopher, writer, poet; 127, 275, 279 S olozhev, D aniil A ndreevich (1907-1994), poet, emigr.: 1920; 527 S olzhenitsyn, A leksandr Isaevich (b. 1918), prose writer, deported from Russia in 1974, returned to Russia in 1994; 2 4 ,3 1 ,7 6 ,1 4 8 , 223, 273, 274, 360, 361, 379-381, 386, 388, 393, 397402, 421, 422, 443, 445447, 451, 455, 459-461, 485, 489, 585-587, 589-592, 594, 597, 598, 601, 603, 604, 607, 609, 610, 613, 614 S o lzhenitsyna (S vetlo va), N ataliya (b. 1937), wife and assistant of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, emigr.: 1974 or 1975, returned to Russia together with him; 393, 591, 607 S orgonln, G eorgy K onstantinovich (1904-7), First-W ave poet and playwright; 177 S o ro kin , V yacheslav (b. 1942), prose writer, emigr.: 1965; 438, 582 S orokina, S., signed 1986 collective letter critical of NTS, wife of Vyacheslav Sorokin?; 438 S o sin sky (n é O bolensky), V ladim ir (B ronislav) B ronislavovich (19001987), prose writer and critic, emigr.: 1920, returned to Russia: 1960; 15, 580, 595, 599 Sosnovsky, V asily, dissident; 394, 595 S osunov, G rigory N ikolaevich (1890-7), journalist, prose writer, poet, emigr.: 1919, returned to Russia in 1926, evidently perished in Soviet prison; 199, 524, 540 S ove, B oris, Russian writer in Finland; 205 Sozonov, Egor Sergeevich (1879-1910), revolutionary, arrested but escaped abroad in 1903, returned to Russia in 1904 and killed Minister of Internal Affairs Vyacheslav Pleve, took poison in protest against physical punishment of prisoners; 91 S p ark, M uriel (b. 1918), Scottish novelist; 23
720
JOHN GLAD
Spektorsky, Evgeny Vasll’evlch (1875-1951), professor of law, philosopher, born and grew up in Poland, emigrated from Russia in 1920; 109, 574 Spender, Stephen (1909-1995), English poet and literary critic; 466 Spengler, Oswald (1880-1936), German historian; 53 Splnadel', Raisa, First-W ave author; 254 Springer, Axel (1912-1985), German publisher; 439, 589 Spurgot, Mikhail Tsesarevich (1902-1993), First-W ave poet and journalist, his family relocated from Vladivostok in m id-1910s, returned to Russia in 1947; 222, 569 Staël, Germaine de (1766-1817), French-Swiss woman of letters; 12 [Stalin], see: Dzhugashvili Stambolisky, Aleksandr Stolmenov (1879-1923), head of Bulgarian state 1920-1923, killed during coup d'état; 192, 193, 288, 534 Stanislavsky, Konstantin Sergeevich (1863-1938), theater director and actor; 294, 295, 552 Stankevlch, Vladimir Benedlktovich (1884-1968), political - activist and historian, emigr.: 1919; 62, 86 Stavrov, Perlkl Stavrovich (1895-1955), poet and translator; 250, 338, 568, 577 Stefan, fourteenth-century pilgrim to Constantinople from Novgorod; 35, 490 Steifon, Boris Aleksandrovich von (1881-1945), W hite general who led Russian military in Yugoslavia fighting in alliance with the Germans;
320 Stein, Gertrude (1874-1946), American author, an expatriate as of 1902; 23 Stein, Heinrich Friedrich Karl (1757-1831), German statesman; 79 Steiner, Rudolph (1861-1925), founder of Anthroposophism; 280, 519 [Stepan Ivanovich], see: Portugels Stepun, Fedor Avgustovich (1884-1965), philosopher, studied abroad 19021910, deported 1922; 135, 144, 241, 351, 531, 552, 556, 583 Stevenson, Robert Louis (1850-1894), Scottish novelist, poet, and essayist; 41 Stoleshnikov, Vladimir (7-1907), author of verse and political satires, evidently emigrated in the 1870s; 104 Stolitsa, Lyubov’ Nikitichna (1884-1934), first-W ave poet and dramatist; 193, 552 Stolypin, Pëtr Arkad'evich (1862-1911), Russian head of state, bom in Germ any, assassinated; 88, 445, 518 Stoyanov, Aleksandr, First-W ave poet; 193 Stoyunlna, Mariya Nikolaevna, émigré who wrote memoirs about the Dostoevsky family; 178
Strakhov, Nikolai Nikolaevich (1828-1896), social commentator and literary critic; 501
Strakhovsky, Leonid Ivanovich [Chatsky] (1898-1963), First-W ave prose writer, poet, critic; 582
RUSSIA ABROAD
721
Strannik, see: Shakhovskoi, Dmitry Strashinsky, Valery L'vovlch (b. 1947), poet, emigr.: 1979; 595 Stratonov, V. V., First-W ave émigré in Prague during inter-war period; 178 Straus, Roger, American publisher; 607 Stravinsky, Igor’ Fedorovich (1882-1971), composer, emigr.: 1910; 518 Strubbe, Serafima, dissident; 394, 596 Strugatsky, Arkady Natanovich (1925-1991), non-émigré science-fiction writer, wrote together with brother Boris; 587
Strugatsky, Boris Natanovich (b. 1933), non-émigré science-fiction writer, wrote together with brother Arkady; 587
Struve, Gleb Petrovich (1898-1985), literary scholar and poet, emigr.: 1918; 21, 149, 214, 250, 395, 428, 523, 577, 583, 601 Struve, Mikhail Aleksandrovich (1890-1948?), poet; 160, 571 Struve, Nikita Alekseevich (b. 1931), editor; 259 Struve, Petr Berngardovich (1870-1944), economist, philosopher, historian, politician, emigr.: 1920; 113, 121, 124, 142, 170, 175, 528, 540, 570 Strzeznitski [Boleslavsky], Richard Valentinovich (1887-1937), PolishRussian actor, emigr.: 1920; 295 Stupnikov, Aleksandr Yur’evich (b. 1953), poet, em igr.:1985; 601 Stupnitsky, Arseny Fédorovich (1893-1951), lawyer, journalist, editor of proSoviet newspaper in Paris in the late 1940s and early 1950s; 342, 338 Sudeikin, Sergei Yur'evich (1882-1946), artist, emigr.: 1920; 526 Suganov [Talyzin], Mikhail Arkhipovich (1893-?), First-W ave prose writer; 219 Sukhanov, Arseny, seventeenth-century pilgrim; 37, 38, 493 Sukhomlin, Vasily Vasil'evlch (1885-1963), political activist, journalist, and essayist, fled abroad in 1907, returned to Russia in 1917, emigr.: 1918, returned to the U .S.S.R. in 1954; 237 Sukhomlinov, Vladimir Aleksandrovich (1848-1926), tsarist general, memoirist, historian; 109, 205 Sukhotina-Tolstaya, Tat'yana L'vovna (1864-1950), memoirist, eldest daughter of Lev Tolstoi, emigr.: mid-1920s; 573 Sukonik, Aleksandr Yul'evich (b. 1932), prose writer, emigr.: 1973; 588 Sumarokov, Aleksandr Petrovich (1717-1777), poet and playwright; 291 Sumbatov, Vasily Aleksandrovich (1893-1977), First-W ave poet; 527, 578, 593
Sumerkin, Aleksandr Evgen'evich (b. 1943), editor, emigr.: 1977; 592, 597 [Sumsky], see: Kaplun Surguchëv, Il'ya Dmitrievich (1881-1956), prose writer, playwright, journalist, emigr.: 1920; 152, 236, 322, 335
Suslov, Aleksandr Vasil'evlch (b. 1950), prose writer, emigr.: 1975; 4 5 7 ,4 5 8 , 590, 602
Suslov, Il’ya Petrovich (b. 1933), prose writer, emigr.: 1974; 21, 376, 589, 597
722
JOHN GLAD
Sutter, Johann Augustus (1803-1880), German-born sawmill owner in the Sacram ento Valley who discovered gold on his property; 226, 494 Suvchinsky, Petr Petrovich (1892-1985), philosopher, literary and music critic, Eurasianist, emigr.: 1920; 126, 529 Suvorln, Boris Alekseevich (1879-1940), First-W ave prose writer; 559 Suvorin, Mikhail Alekseevich (1860-1936), First-W ave book and newspaper editor; 183 Svetlov, Nikolai, returned to Soviet Union from China at end of World W ar II; 219, 220, 222, 343 Svetozarov, Andrei, First-W ave imitator of Hitler; 306 Sveshnikov, E. P., member of literary group in Czechoslovakia during inter w ar period; 178 Svlrsky, Grigory Tsezarevich (b. 1921), prose writer and critic, emigr.: 1968; 588, 589 Svyatopolk-Mirsky, see: Mirsky Svyatoslav Igorevich (?-972 or 973), prince of Kiev; 33, 490 . Syrkin, A., émigré publisher in Berlin in early 1920s; 157 Sytln, Ivan Dmitrievich (1851-1934), First-W ave book seller; 184 Tabachnik, Garry Davydovich (b. 1938), prose writer and editor, emigr.: 1973; 376, 588 Tabakov, Oleg, non-émigré theater director; 610 Taborltsky, Sergei V., emigr.: 1919, one of assassins of Vladim ir Nabokov's father in 1922; 139, 281, 307, 308, 533, 554 Tacitus (c. 55-117), Roman historian; 76, 291 Taggo, Boris Khristlanovich [Novosadov] (1907-1945?), poet, family emigrated to Estonia in 1920, arrested in 1944 by NK VD , died in Soviet prison hospital; 201, 250 Talne, Hippolyte Adolphe (1828-1893), French critic and philosopher; 275 Talov, Mark-Lyudovlk-Mariya (1892-1969), poet, emigr.: 1913, returned to Russia: 1922; 160, 519, 532, 585 [Talyzln, Mikhail], see: Suganov Tamartsev, Nikolai [Boris Bashilov], 19107-1975?, novelist; 344, 345 Taneeva-Vyrubova, Anna Aleksandrovna (1884-1964), memoirist in Finland;
205 Taranov, Mikhail Evseevich [Mikhail Yupp] (b. 1938), poet, emigr.: 1980; 595
Taranovsky, Kirill Fëdorovich (1911-1993), First-W ave émigré and Slavist; 184 Tarasova, Natal’ya Borisovna, émigré editor, 581 Tarkovsky, Andrei Arsen'evich (1932-1986), non-émigré film director; 438 Tarsis, Valery Yakovlevich (1906-1983), prose writer, emigr.: 1966; 2 5 ,3 7 1 , 393, 580, 581, 583-585, 599, 613 Tartakover, Savely Grigor'evich (1887-1954), First-W ave writer; 576 Tartakovskaya, Sofya; 414
RUSSIA ABROAD
723
[Tarussky, Evgeny], see: Ryshkov, Evgeny Taube, Soffya Ivanovna (née Anichkova) (1888-1957), prose writer, poet, editor, emigr.: 1926; 178, 541, 578 Tauber, Ekaterina Leonidovna (1903-1987), poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1920; 184, 250, 527, 553, 554 [Tèffi], see: Buchinskaya, Nadezhda Telesin, Yulius Zinov'evich (b. 1933), poet, emigr.: 1970; 414 Temiryazev, see: Annenkov, Yury Tëmkina (Temkina?), Marina Zalmanovna (b. 1948), poet, emigr.: 1978; 593 Tennyson, Alfred Lord (1809-1892), English poet; 202 Teraplano, Yury Konstantinovich (1892-1980), poet and literary critic, emigr.: 1920?; 138, 250, 254, 260, 268, 365, 366, 527, 568, 579, 596, 602 Terletsky, Nikolai N., prose writer; 178, 211, 323 Termen, R., director of Russian school in Sofia in the inter-war period; 129 Terras, Victor (b. 1921), literary scholar of Russian extracation, emigrated from Estonia in 1944; 594, 601 Ternovsky, Evgeny Samuilovich (b. 1941), prose writer, emigr.: 1974; 589 Teskovä, Anna, Czech friend of Marina Tsvetaeva; 145, 267 Tetënov, Nikolai Ivanovich (b. 1937), émigré editor, emigr.: 1974; 383 Teternikov [Sologub], Fëdor Kuz’mlch (1863-1927), prose writer and poet, denied permission to emigrate in 1921; 147, 158, 168, 529, 531 Themlstocles (c. 525-462 B.C.), Athenian statesman; 403 Thless, Frank (1890-1977), German writer; 422, 423 Thompson, Francis (1859-1907), English poet; 148, 398 Thoreau, Henry David (1817-1862), American author and naturalist; 216 Tiberius (Tiberius Julius Caesar Augustus) (42 B.C.-A.D. 37), second Roman emperor; 434 Tideman, 1.1., First-W ave prose writer; 176 Tikhon (secular name: Belavin, Vasily Ivanovich) (1865-1925), Patriarch of Russian Orthodox Church; 114-116, 523, 530 Tlmashev, Nikolai Sergeevich (1886-1970), sociologist and legal scholar, emigr.: 1921; 178 Tlmasheva, Tat'yana Nikolaevna [S. Gorlova] (1891-1950), poet; 250, 573 Tinsky, Yakov Sergeevich (1862-1922), non-émigré actor; 103 Tito, Josip Broz (1892-1980); 313, 326-328, 342 Tkachëv, Petr Nikitich (1844-1886), revolutionary and editor, emigr.: 1873; 87, 104, 504, 507
Tkhorzhevsky, Ivan Ivanovich (1878-1951), First-W ave poet and literary scholar; 205, 555, 574
Tödtll, Boris (1901-?), Swiss Nazi of Russian-German descent; 554 Toi', Sergei, Second-W ave poet; 564, 578 Tolll, V., deported from France to Soviet Union in November 1947; 342 Tolmachëv, Vladislav Maratovich (1962), poet, emigr.: 1981; 596
724
JOHN GLAD
T o lstaya, A leksandra L'vovna (1884-1979), prose writer and memoirist, defected: 1929; 548, 558 T o lstaya, M ariya A ndreevna (b. 1908), First-W ave prose writer and poet; 250 Tolstoi, A leksei K onstantinovich (1817-1875), poet, playwright, and novelist; 51, 56, 292 Tolsto i, A leksei N ikolaevich (1883-1945), prose writer, emigr.: 1918, returned to Russia: 1923; 24, 9 3 ,1 2 5 , 143, 147, 160, 237, 249, 341, 371, 523, 526, 529, 531, 533, 535, 557, 560, 562, 567, 582 Tolsto i, Fêdor Petrovich (1783-1873), sculptor and painter; 57 Tolsto i, ll'ya, Mladoross activist, grandson of Lev Tolstoi, First-W ave émigré, returned to Russia in 1945; 183, 231 Tolsto i, Lev L'vovlch ((7-1945), prose writer, son of Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoi; 567 Tolsto i, Lev N ikolaevich (1828-1910); 46, 51, 56, 64, 89, 94, 114, 183, 226, 262, 274, 275, 284, 293, 376, 447, 456, 511, 518, 533, 548, 554, 558, 567, 573 Tolsto i, M ikhail N lkltovlch (b. 1940), non-émigré chair of Moscow convention of Russians abroad; 614 T olstoi, P ëtr A ndreevich (1645-1729), diplomat, memoirist, translator, abroad: 1697-1699; 39, 49, 50, 493, 494 [To lsty], see: K otlyarov T o l'ts, V era S ergeevna (b. 1959), historian, emigr.: 1982; 438 Tom in, G eorgy, émigré prose writer; 345 Top ol', Èduard K haim ovich (b. 1938), prose writer and playwright, emigr.: 1978; 594, 604 Top ol'sky, A ., writer in W arsaw in 1920's; 190 Traikovich, O sip (7-1927), Russian émigré shot to death in Soviet Mission in W arsaw; 188, 542 T ranze, N atal'ya, First-W ave poet; 201 Tredlakovsky, V asily K irillovich (1703-1768), Russian poet literary theoretician, abroad 1726-1730; 42, 494 Tregubov, Y u ry A ndreevich (b. 1913), prose writer, with his mother when she defected in Berlin in 1926, kidnapped in 1947 by MGB as former lieutenant in the Vlasov army, permitted to return to W est Germ any in 1955; 569, 577 Trepov, A leksandr Fèdorovlch (1862-1928), high Tsarist government official and First-W ave émigré; 203 Trepov, Fêdor Fëdorovich (1812-1889), cavalry general and mayor of St. Petersburg, wounded by Vera Zasulich; 505 Tret'yako v, S ergei N ikolaevich, First-W ave émigré and grandson of founder of Tret'yakov Gallery in Moscow; 561, 564 Tret'yako v, V ikto r, First-W ave poet; 197, 580 T rifon ov, G eorgy E vgen'evich [M ikhail Dem in] (1926-1984), poet, born in France, grew up in Moscow, defected in 1968; 585, 600
RUSSIA ABROAD
725
Trlp o l'sky, V ladim ir N ikolaevich [V ladim ir A nt] (1908-1980), poet, fled U .S.S.R . in 1943, left Germ any for U.S.A. in 1951; 564, 573, 582 T ro ltsky, I. M ., First-W ave émigré; 160 T ro tskaya-Z il'b erkvelt, Zinaida Sam eevna (Sem enovna?) (1902-1968?), First-W ave poet; 550, 561, 565 [Tro tsky], see: B ronshtein T rubetskoi, G rigory, wealthy First-W ave émigré in France; 171 T ru betskoi, N ikolai S ergeevich (1890-1938), philosopher, deported from the Soviet Union: 1922; 126, 128, 213, 524, 529, 540, 558 T ru betskoi, Y u ry Pavlovich (1902-?), émigré poet; 568 Trum an, H arry (1884-1972); 566, 574 Tsederbaum [M artov], Y u ly O sipovich (1873-1923), First-W ave Men'shevik editor, abroad 1901-1905, 1906-1917, emigr.: 1920; 120, 121, 212 Tsegoeva, see: C hegrintseva T sel'm s (C elm s), R., arrested by Soviet troops in Riga in 1941; 198 Tsepliovich, G rigory Efim ovich (b. 1908), prose writer, emigr.: 1966; 414, 584 Tserebzhei, A ., deported from France to Soviet Union in November 1947; 342 T setlin , M ikhail (M ark) O sipovich [A m ari] (1882-1945), poet, prose writer, editor, and critic, fled abroad in 1907?, returned to Russia in 1917, remigrated in 1919; 168-170, 236, 325, 359, 519, 553, 559, 561, 567 Tsetlln a, M ariya Sam ollovna (1882-1976), First-W ave writer and editor, abroad 1907-1917, remigrated: 1919; 169, 170 Tsivlnsky, S ergei A ntonovich [C ivls] (1895-1941), First-W ave journalist; 198 Tsu rikov, N ikolai A leksandrovich [I. B elenikhin] (1886-1957), First-W ave prose writer; 578 Tsveibakh, V ladim ir; 615 T svetaeva, M arina Ivanovna (1892-1941), poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1922, returned to Russia: 1939; 20-23, 128, 145, 161, 170, 178, 250, 256, 262, 263, 265-267, 273, 308, 366, 370, 487, 533, 539, 541, 545, 550, 552, 556, 559, 560-562, 575, 577, 578, 597, 611 T svetkov, A leksei Petrovich (b. 1947), poet, emigr.: 1975; 435, 438, 472, 484, 590, 600 T svetkov, E vgeny P etrovich (b. 1940), prose writer, emigr.: 1976; 591 Tsvlbak, Y akov M oiseevich (M ikhailovich) [A ndrei Sedykh] (1902-1994), emigr.: 1920, prose writer and editor; 250, 527, 562, 588 [Tsvik, M ikhail], see: M ironov, M ikhail Tup itsyn, V ikto r G rigor'evich (b. 1943), poet, emigr.: 1975; 475, 590 [Tur, E lizaveta], see: S alhias-de-Tournem fr Turgenev, Ivan S ergeevich (1818-1883), novelist, expatriate, on-and-off expatriate as of 1845; 19, 26, 46, 55, 58, 60-62, 86, 87, 172, 184, 243, 254, 456, 495, 497-499, 502-504, 506, 507, 549
726
JOHN GLAD
Turgenev, Nikolai Ivanovich (1789-1871), liberal social thinker, abroad 18081811, 1812; abroad again 1824, defected in 1825; visits to Russia: 1857, 1859, 1864; 79, 80, 499-501, 503, 516 Turintsev, Aleksandr, First-W ave writer; 176, 250, 254 Turkova [Vizi], Mariya Genrikhovna (b. 1904), poet, bom in New York, taken as baby to St. Petersburg, family emigrated in 1917; 220, 222, 343, 546, 558 Turkul, Andrei V., W hite general and leader of Vlasov movement; 307, 309, 349 Turoverov, Nikolai Nikolaevich (1899-1972), First-W ave poet; 250, 556, 566,
588 Turovsky, Anatoly Saulovich
[Ya. Zemiyanin] (b. 1926), prose writer,
emigr.: 1979; 595
Tutankhamon (mid 14th century B .C .), king of Egypt; 285 Tutkovsky, Pavel Pavlovich (1889-?), First-W ave prose writer, studied in Rome before the revolution, emigr.: 1920; 227
Tuwlm, Julian (1894-1953), Polish émigré poet; 21 Tvardovsky, Aleksandr Trlfonovlch (1910-1971), non-émigré poet and editor; 443, 449
Tverskoi, Evgeny, émigré prose writer; 346, 571 [TWain, Mark] (Samuel Langhorne Clemens) (1835-1910), American author; 289
Tylkln, Mikhail Efimovich [Deza] (b. 1939), poet, emigr.: 1972; 588 Tyntarev, Kirill Alekseevich (b. 1956), prose writer, emigr.: 1979; 595 Tynyanov, Yury Nikolaevich (1894-1943), literary scholar and novelist; 19, 373, 489
Tyrkova-Wllliams,
Ariadna Vladimirovna (1869-1962), prose writer and
journalist, fled abroad 1904-1905, 1911 in Constantinople, emigr.: 1918, back in Russia together with husband as members of English legation 1919-?; 581 Tyutchev, Fëdor Ivanovich (1803-1873), poet, m ember of Russian diplomatic mission in Munich 1822-1837; 51-54, 62, 73, 74, 256, 257, 366, 445, 497, 498, 504 Ugrlmov, A., deported from France to Soviet Union in Novem ber 1947; 342 Ulmanls, Karlis (1877-1942), President of Latvia, 1934-1940; 197 Ul'yanov, Aleksandr Il'ich (1866-1887), terrorist and elder brother of Vladim ir Lenin, hanged; 91 Ul'yanov, Nikolai Ivanovich [N. Burnazel'sky, Shvarts-Omonsky] (19051985), novelist, historian, and literary critic, sent to Germ any as forced labor in 1943; 586, 601 Unbegaun, Boris Genrikhovich (1898-1973), linguist, emigr.: 1920?; 1 8 0 ,5 8 8 Unkovsky, Vladimir Nikolaevich (1888-196?), First-W ave prose writer; 335 Unruh, Fritz von (1885-1970), German writer; 424
RUSSIA ABROAD Unshlikht, loslv Stanislavovich
727
(1879-1938), senior communist official,
executed; 141
Upshinsky, Arkady, poet and prose writer, mentioned in Pereleshin's memoirs on Harbin/Shanghai 1930-1950; 220 Urln (Ourin), Viktor Arkad'evich (b. 1924), poet, emigr.: 1977; 592 Urltsky, Moisei Solomonovich (1873-1918), as head of the Petrograd CH EK A conducted a policy of terror, assassinated; 276 Urnov, Dmitry Mikhailovich (b. 1936), literary scholar and critic; 604 Urvantsov, Lev Nikolaevich (1865-1929), First-W ave prose writer; 546 Uspensky [Kostsinsky], Kirill (1915-1984), prose writer, emigr.: 1978; 594, 600 Ustinova, Ol'ga (b. 1942), prose writer, emigr.: 1978; 594 Ustryalov, Nikolai Vasil'evich (1890-1937), historian, emigr.: 1920, returned to Russia in 1935, executed; 124-126, 218, 219, 556 Utln, Nikolai Isaakovich (1840 or 1841-1883), revolutionary and engineer, fled Russia in 1863, permitted to return 1880, again abroad 1878-1881 ; 85 Vail', Irina L'vovna (b. 1941), poet, emigr.: 1982; 599 Vail', Pëtr L'vovich (b. 1949), journalist and essayist, emigr.: 1977; 4 2 2 ,4 2 5 , 426, 441, 459, 467, 478, 592, 597, 605 Vaiman, Naum Isaakovich (b. 1947), poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1978; 414, 594 [Vainer, R.], see: Kopel'man, Simon Vainerman, ÈIII (b. 1948), poet, emigr.: 1979; 595 Vainshtein, Leonid; 414 Vaintrob, Mark Danilovich (1895-1941?), First-W ave philosopher; 198 Vakhtangov, Evgeny Bagrationovich (1883-1922), non-émigré theater director and actor; 547 [Val', Valya], see: Prisyazhnikov, Valentin Val'dberg, Gennady Yur’evich (b. 1947); 611 [Valentinov], see: Vol'sky Valéry, Paul (1871-1945), French poet; 297 Vandellos, Iraida Ivanovna [Iraida Lëgkaya] (b. 1932), poet and journalist, family left for Riga in 1936; 571, 585 Vanik, Charles Albert (b. 1913), U.S. senator; 375, 385, 387, 589, 609 Varshavsky, Grigory Abramovich (b. 1921), poet, emigr.: 1974; 589 Varshavsky, S. I., one of founders of League of Russian Writers and Journalists in Constantinople in 1920; 153 Varshavsky, Vladimir Sergeevich (1906-1978), prose writer, emigr.: 1920; 168, 250, 253, 266, 338, 527, 554, 568, 578, 594 V arsonofy, fifteenth-century monk who made pilgrimage to the Holy Land; 39, 491
Vasil'ev, Vasily Vladimirovich [V. V. Gadalln] (1892-1959), prose writer and journalist, emigr.: 1920; 197
728
JOHN GLAD
V asil'eva, K lavdiya N ikolaevna (1886-1970), wife of Andrei Bely and author of memoirs about him; 145 V asily, fifteenth-century merchant who travelled to Hebron, Cairo, and Bethlehem; 41, 491 V asily III Ivanovich (1479-1533), Prince of Moscow; 212 V asily M ikhailovich (U dalyl) (1460-1495), Russian prince; 206, 207 [Vask, Inno], see: B elyaev, Ivan V asnetsov, M. V ., member of literary circle in Czechoslovakia during inter-war period; 178 Vasserm an, M ikhail Izrall'evich (b. 1942), poet, playwright, prose writer, emigr.: 1972; 476, 588 V eber, E. S., member of literary society in Poland during inter-war period; 188 [V ega, M ariya], see: Lang V egin, P ëtr V iktorovich (b. 1939), poet, emigr.: 1989; 611 V eid le (W eldle), V ladim ir V asll'elch (1895-1979), literary scholar, emigr.: 1924; 252, 538578, 595 Veinbaum , M ark Efim ovich (1890-1973), newspaper editor; 5è8 Veltsm an, Y u ly S igizm undovich, First-W ave book collector and seller, emigr.: 1919; 529 V eksler, B oris, Third-W ave writer; 414 V el'b erg , B oris; 607 V elichkovskaya, Tam ara A ntonovna (1908-1990), poet, prose writer, essayist, and translator, emigr.: 1920; 250, 527, 575, 613 V elichkovsky, A n ato ly Evgen'evich (1901-1981), poet and prose writer, emigr.: early 1920s; 250, 596 V enclova, Tom as A . (b. 1937), poet, essayist, translator, emigr.: 1977; 393, 438 V engerova, Zinaida A fanas'evna (1867-1941), literary historian and translator, lived abroad for a long tim e before the revolution, emigr.: 1921; 530, 561 V entslova, see: Venclova [V eresaev, V iken ty], see: Sm idovich V erg un, D m itry N ikolaevich (1871 or 1874-1951 or 1952), poet and prose writer; 212 Vergun, K., leader of Solidarist Party; 131 V erlain e, Paul (1844-1896), French poet; 256, 257 V ernadsky, G eorgy V ladim irovich (1887-1973), historian and literary scholar, emigr.: 1921; 126, 178, 232, 530, 588 Vernarrt, Jacques, demographer; 334 V ern ik, A leksandr Leonidovich (b. 1947), poet, emigr.: 1978; 414, 594 V ertepo v, D. P., émigré historian; 151 V ertin sky, A leksandr N ikolaevich (1889-1957), poet, emigr.: 1919, returned to Russia: 1943; 142, 209, 210, 222, 270-273, 316, 326, 341, 419, 524, 553, 563, 578
RUSSIA ABROAD Vesnin, Semën Avdlevlch (1814-1853), poet, [Vetlugln, A.], see: Ryndzyun, Vladimir Il'ich [Vetlugin, Viktor], see: Salatko-Petrishchev, Vetrov, Boris Solomonovich (b. 1937), poet, Vlardot-Garcia, Pauline (1821-1910), opera
729
emigr.: 1843; 232
Viktor Frantsevich emigr.: 1979; 595 singer, close friend of Ivan
Turgenev; 60 Vidal, Gore (b. 1919), American writer; 23
Vigel', Filipp Filippov (1786-1856), diplomat and memoirist, travelled to Europe and China; 209 Vlktorlya, German-born wife of Kirill Vladimirovich; 122 Vil'chur, Mark, author of 1918 book on Russians in America; 100 Vll'de, Boris Vladimirovich [Boris Dikol] (1903-1942), prose writer and poet; 201, 250, 326, 563 Vllenkaya-Mlnskaya, Lyudmila Nikolaevna [Lyudmila Vil'kina, Nikita Bobrinsky] born: Izabella Nikolaevna Vll'ken) (1873-1920), poet and prose writer, abroad: 1906-1913, 1914-1920; 515, 519, 520, 527 Vilenkin, Nikolai Maksimovich [Nikolai Minsky] (1855-1937), poet, emigr.: 1906; 515, 517, 520, 533, 556 [Vil'kina], see: Vllenkaya-Mlnskaya Villiam, Georgy Yakovlevich (1874-1926), poet, prose writer, memoirist, emigr.: 1920; 527, 541 Vinaver, Maksim Moiseevich (1862 or 1863-1926), editor, philosopher, memoirist, emigr.: 1919; 541 Vlnberg, Fëdor Viktorovich (1869-?), emigr.: 1919, right-wing editor of Luch svefa; 139 Vinnikova, Nadezhda Vasil'evna [Nadezhda Plevltskaya] (1884-1941), singer, emigr.: 1920; 308, 541, 555, 559 Vln’kovetsky, Yakov Aronovich (1938-1984), essayist and artist, emigr.: 1975; 600 Vins, Georgy Petrovich (b. 1928), religious dissident; 394, 444, 594, 597 Vlshensky, Ippolit, eighteenth-century monk who made pilgrimage to the Holy Land; 39, 49, 494 Vishnevskaya, Galina Pavlovna (b. 1927), singer and memoirist, wife of Mstislav Rostropovich, emigr.: 1974; 394, 438, 593 Vishnevskaya, Yuliya Iosifovna (b. 1949), poet and radio journalist, emigr.: 1971; 18, 425, 436, 440, 587 Vishnyak, Abram, First-W ave émigré publisher; 158 Vishnyak, Mark(Mordukh) Veniaminovich (1883-1976), Socialist activist and editor, abroad 1900, 1903-1904, 1908-1910, emigr.: 1918; 109, 166, 167, 169, 236, 524, 560, 560 Vishtak, Sergei Grigor'evich, businessman and patron of N ovyi zhurnat, 437 Vitaly (Vasily Ioannovich Maksimenko) (1873-1960), Archbishop, First-W ave émigré; 572
[Vltyazevsky, Semën], see: Yur'ev, Panteleimon
730
JOHN GLAD
[Vizi], see: Turkova Vladi (Polyakova), Marina, actress and wife of Vladimir Vysotsky; 583 Vladimir Kirillovich (1918-1992), Grand Duke and Pretender to the Throne; 557, 571, 581, 614
Vladimir Vsedolovich Monomakh (1052-1125), Grand Price of Kiev; 212 [Vladimirov, Leonid], see: Finkel'shtein Vladimirov, Petr, First-W ave ballet dancer; 272 Vladimirov, V. Kh., First-W ave actor; 138, 177 [Vladimirova, Liya], see: Khromchenko, Yuliya Vladimirovna [Vladimov, Georgy], see: Volosevich, Georgy Nikolaevich Vlasov, Andrei Andreevich (1900-1946), Soviet and émigré general, taken prisoner by Germ ans in 1941; 317, 318, 327, 330, 333, 355, 363-365, 367, 369 Voevodin, Aleksandr Aleksandrovich (1889-1944?), First-W ave prose writer and editor; 177, 178 Vogau [Pll'nyak], Boris Andreevich (1894-1938), prose writer and journalist, perished during the purges; 140, 157, 249, 262, 273, 545 Volkov, Pavel Lazarevich (1888-1927), Soviet am bassador to Poland, participant in the murder of the Russian royal family, killed by Russian émigré; 188, 541, 542 Voinov, 19th century tsarist general; 71 Voinov, Igor’ Vladimirovich (1898-1970), First-W ave poet; 2 0 5 ,3 2 5 ,5 3 5 ,5 8 6 Voinov, Oleg, First-W ave poet; 190 Voinov, Yaroslav Vladimirovich, First-W ave prose writer and poet; 201 Voinovich, Vladimir Nikolaevich (b. 1932), prose writer, emigr.: 1980; 2 4 ,2 6 , 390, 421, 429, 30, 434, 460, 461, 479, 589, 590, 595, 596, 603, 604, 607, 609-611, 613, 614 Voitinsky, Vladimir Savel'evich (1885-1960), First-W ave prose writer; 553. 580 Voitsekhovsky, Yury (d. 1984), First-W ave historian, attempted to assassinate the head of the Soviet trade mission in W arsaw in 1928; 188, 5 4 1 ,5 6 4 Volkhovsky, Feliks Vadimovich (1846-1914), poet and prose writer, internal exile 1878-1881, fled Russia in 1889; 90, 508, 521 Volkonskaya, Zinaida Aleksandrovna (1789-1862), poet and prose writer, salon hostess, emigr.: 1829, two visits to Russia thereafter; 55, 216, 500, 501 Volkonsky, Sergei Mikhailovich (1860-1937), prose writer, emigr.: 1921; 556 Volkov, tsarist admiral and First-W ave émigré; 213 Volkov, Boris Nikolaevich (1894-1953 or 1954), First-W ave prose writer and poet; 227, 250, 552, 576 Volkova (Èngel'berger), Mariya Vyacheslavovna (1902-1983), First-W ave poet and prose writer; 564, 599 Volkova, Marianna, Third-W ave émigré writer; 609
RUSSIA ABROAD
731
V olokhonsky, A nri (H en ri) G irshevich (b. 1936), poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1973; 414, 475, 588, 598, 599 V o losevich, G eorgy N ikolaevich [G eorgy Vladlm ov] (b. 1931), prose writer, emigr.: 1983; 437, 438, 440, 449, 590, 598, 599, 601, 602, 604, 612 [V o loshin], see: K irienko-V oloshin V o lovik,
A leksandr M ikhailovich (b. 1931), emigr.: 1976; 414, 519 V o l'sky [V alentin ov], N ikolai V ladislavovich historian; 338, 582
prose
writer
(1878-1964),
and
poet,
First-W ave
V onsyatsky, A n astasy A ndreevich (1898-1965), self-styled leader of Russian fascist faction, emigr.: 1920; 134, 343 V o rm s, N ikolai A leksandrovich (1845-1870), poet, emigr.: 1866; 8 5 ,5 0 2 ,5 0 3 V o ro n el’, N ina A bram ovna (b. 1932), poet and playwright, emigr.: 1974; 414, 589, 592 V o ro nsky, see: W oronski V o ro tnikov, A n ato ly (A nton?) Pavlovich (1857-1937), First-W ave prose writer and playwright; 556 V o rovsky, V atslav Vatslavovich (W actaw W orow ski, 1871-1923), literary critic and Soviet censor, emigr.: 1902, returned to Russia in 1905, assassinated by W hite émigré in Lausanne; 92, 299, 512, 524, 535 V oslensky, M ikhail Sergeevich (1920-1977), historian, defected in 1972; 432 V oznesenskaya-O kulova, Y u liya N ikolaevna (b. 1940), prose writer, poet, and journalist, emigr.: 1980; 595, 604 V oznesensky, A ndrei A ndreevich (b. 1933), poet, never emigrated but frequently w as permitted to travel abroad as of the mid-1960s; 430, 601, 604 V ran g el’ (W ran gel), P ëtr N ikolaevich (1878-1928), general in W hite army, emigr.: 1920; 105, 122, 131, 136, 142, 148, 191, 192, 213, 228, 230, 234, 525, 528, 529, 531, 536, 541, 546 V sevolozhsky, N ikita Vsevolodovich (1799-1862), wealthy but extravagant Russian who founded first Green Lamp Society in 1819, much of childhood spent abroad until 1816, fled abroad to escape debts toward end of life, died in debtors’ prison; 47, 168 Vudka, Y u ry (A r'e ) Veniam inovich (b. 1947), prose writer and poet, emigr.: 1976; 591 V urm , A ., known to have written in 1920s; 176 Vyazem sky, P ëtr A ndreevich (1792-1878), poet and literary critic, established perm anent residence abroad in 1863; 501, 506 V yru bov, G rigory N ikolaevich (1843-1913), philosopher, memoirist, editor, chemist, emigr.: 1865; 502, 505, 508 V ysh eslavtsev, B oris Petrovich (1877-1954), lawyer, literary scholar, and philosopher, deported: 1922; 144, 160, 241, 540 V yshinsky, A ndrei Y anuar'evich (1883-1954), Soviet prosecutor who conducted the show trials; 303
732
JOHN GLAD
Vysotsky, Abram L'vovlch (1883-1949), prose writer; 225, 572 Vysotsky, Vladimir Semenovich (1938-1980), actor and “bard"; 583 Vystavkina, Ekaterina Vladimirovna (1877-1957), First-W ave prose writer; 578
Wagner, Richard (1813-1883), German composer; 598 Walter, Hans Albert, German critic; 598 [Ward, Artemus], see: Browne Weber, Alfred (1868-1958), Germ an economist and sociologist; 127 Weissbort, Daniel (b. 1935), British poet and editor; 468, 472, 593 Weidle, see: Veidle Whistler, James Abbott McNeill (1834-1903), American painter; 465 Whitney, Thomas; 437 Wlckliff (W ycllffe), John (c. 1320-1384), English religious reformer; 341 Wilde, Oscar (1854-1900), Irish author and wit; 340, 450 Wllmost, John, see: Rochester Wilson, Margaret, daughter of President Woodrow Wilson, patron of Russian Philharmonic Orchestra in New York City; 515 Wilson, (Thomas) Woodrow (1856-1924), U.S. president; 515 Wolfskehl, Karl (1869-1948), German writer, emigrated from Germ any in 1933; 245 Wordsworth, Elizabeth (1840-1932), poet; 136 Wordsworth, William (1770-1850), English poet; 351 Woronski (Voronsky), Aleksandr Konstantinovich (1884-1937), critic, prose writer, editor; 111 Worowskl, Wactaw, see: Vorovsky Yablonovskaya, Dina Mikhailovna (b. 1915), prose writer, emigr.: 1981; 596 Yagoda, Genrikh Grigor'evich (1891-1938), head of Soviet secret police, internal exile 1911-13, executed; 140, 303, 310, 551 Yakhontov, Viktor Aleksandrovich (1881-1978), White Army general and editor of New York pro-Soviet newspaper R usskii golos, emigr.: 1918, returned to Russia: 1975; 590 Yakobi, Pëtr Nikolaevich (1876-1941), Russian poet in Latvia; 561 Yakobson, Anatoly Aleksandrovich (1935-1978), translator of poetry, emigr.: 1973, committed suicide; 588, 594 Yakobson, Elena Aleksandrovna (b. 1912), Russian teacher and director of Washington, D .C., chapter of the Literary Fund; 409 Yakobson, Mikhail L'vovlch (b. 1939), poet and prose writer, emigr.: 1971; 587 Yakobson (Jakobson), Roman Osipovich (1896-1982), linguist and literary scholar, left Russia in 1920 (did not immediately declare himself to be an émigré); 178, 527, 540, 547, 559, 561, 597 Yakovlev, Aleksandr, Soviet legal expert; 609 Yakubovich, A. I.; 51, 52 Yakubovskaya, Elena, First-W ave writer; 176
RUSSIA ABROAD
733
Y anchevsky, N. D., chaired a Russian cultural circle in Paris in the 1920s; 169 Y anin , R ichard, émigré poet; 602 Y anov, A leksandr L'vovich (b. 1934), historian, emigr.: 1974; 381, 441, 612 Y ankovskaya, V iktorlya Y ur'evna (1909-1996), poet, 220, 553 Y anovsky, S tepan, physican and friend of Dostoevsky; 47 Y anovsky, V asily Sem ënovich [Ya. V. S.] (1906-1989), First-W ave prose writer; 359, 562, 598, 612 Y aro slav M udryl ("T he W ise") (c. 978-1054), prince of Kiev; 33, 490, 557 Y aro v, Rom en E frem ovich (b. 1933), prose writer, emigr.: 1977; 592 Y arym -A gaev, Y u ry N ikolaevich (b. 1949), phisicist and dissident, emigr.: 1980; 394, 432 Yashchenko, A leksandr Sem ënovich [S. A ., Ya. A .] (1877-1934), First-W ave editor and legal expert, abroad: 1903,1905-1907, defected: 1919; 125, 149, 159, 160, 232, 524, 532, 535, 552 pfassen , Irin a], see: C hekver Y avorskaya, Lidiya B orisovna (1871-1921), actress, performed abroad 1912, 1912, emigr.: 1918; 292 Y avorsky, Y ulian A ndreevich (1873 or 1892-1937), First-W ave Slavist and poet; 556 Y azykov, N ikolai, N., First-W ave prose writer and poet; 343 Y eats, W illiam B u tler (1865-1939), Irish poet and playwright; 34, 118 [Y ork, O l'g a], see: Yurkevich, O l'ga Y u denich, N ikolai N ikolaevich (1862-1933), W hite general; 6 5 ,1 9 9 ,2 0 3 ,3 1 3 Y u dovich, L , signed 1986 collective letter critical of the NTS; 438 [Y upp, M ikhail], see: Taranov [Yurasov, S .], see: Zhabinsky, V ladim ir Ivanovich Y u rkevich, O l'ga [O l'ga Y o rk], First-W ave prose writer; 584 Y u r'enen, S erg ei S ergeevich (b. 1948 in Germany), prose writer, defected: 1978; 440, 594, 602 Y u r'ev, P anteleim on [Sem ën V ltyazevsky], First-W ave poet; 189 Y ushkevlch , Sem ën Solom onovich (1868-1927), prose writer and playwright, studied in Paris in 1890s, emigr.: 1920; 277, 376, 509, 527, 529, 535, 543 Y usupov-S um arokov, È l'ston Feliks Feliksovich (1887-1967), First-W ave ém igré, wealthy prince, one of the murderers of Rasputin; 213, 294 Y uzhanln, D avid, First-W ave poet; 230 Zab olotsky, N ikolai A lekseevich (1903-1958), non-émigré poet; 366 Zaichik, M ark M eerovlch (b. 1947), prose writer, emigr.: 1973; 414, 588, 600 Zaitsev, B oris K onstantinovich (1881-1972), prose writer, critic, playwright, translator, emigr.: 1922; 15, 144, 160, 168, 170, 216, 236, 260, 275, 338, 339, 359, 373, 531, 533, 537, 540, 549, 576, 588, 605 Zaitsev, Ivan M atveevich (1878-1934), W hite general who returned to Russia under terms of amnesty, w as arrested and sent to Solovki, escaped
734
JOHN GLAD
Zaitsev, Zaitsev, Zaitsev, Zaitsev,
and published a book on the experience in Shanghai in 1931; 542, 548 Kirill Iosifovich (1886-1975), literary scholar and legal expert; 591 M. V., publisher in Harbin; 219 Pavel, editor of Russian newspaper in Shanghai; 221 Varfolomel Aleksandrovich (1842-1882), critic, emigr.: 1869; 85,
502, 505, 507 Zaltsevsky, Efim Petrovich (1799-1860 or 1861), poet and Tsarist diplomat, spent roughly thirty years in Italy, left Russia 1930 or 1931, returned to Russia from time to time; 495, 498 Zakharchenko-Shul'ts, Mariya Vladislavovna (1893-1927), head of the émigré League of National Terrorists; 137 Zakhavi, Aleksandra (b. 1939), prose writer, emigr.: 1974; 589 Zakovich, Boris Grigor'evich (1907-?), poet, emigr.: 1920; 250, 252 Zaks [Gladnev], Samuil Markovich (1884-1937), Soviet editor in Berlin; 158 Zalin, Sergei L'vovich (b. 1937), poet, emigr.: 1981; 596 Zalkind, see: Zemlyachka Zalygin, Sergei Pavlovich (b. 1913), non-émigré prose writer and editor; 426, 429, 430, 432, 603, 607, 610 Zamyatin, Evgeny Ivanovich (1884-1937), prose writer, abroad: 1916-1917, emigr.: 1932; 280, 371, 522, 537, 543, 549, 556 Zander, L , First-W ave émigré and member of literary society in Riga in the interwar period; 197 Zander, Lev Aleksandrovich (1893-1964), m ember of W riters' and Journalists' Society in Harbin; 219
Zarubin, V; 358 Zasulich, Vera Ivanovna (1849-1919), critic and revolutionary, 1878-1879 in Europe, emigr.: 1880, returned to Russia in 1905; 1 0 0 ,2 1 2 , 276, 505, 506, 511, 514, 525 Zavadovsky, A. P., Count, early 19th century; 51 Zavadsky, Sergei Vladislavovich (1871-1935), literary scholar; 178, 554 Zavadsky, Veniamin Valerianovich [Korsak], (1884-1944), First-W ave prose writer; 564 Zavzhalov, Dmitry Mikhailovich, Chairman of the Bulgarian branch of the Solidarist movement; 133, 559 Zdanevich, Il'ya Mikhailovich [ll'yazd] (1894-1975), prose writer, poet, editor, emigr.: 1920; 527, 591
Zeeler, Vladimir Feofilovich (1874-1954), memoirist and secretary of League of Russian W riters and Journalists; 309, 338
Zemlyachka (née Zalkind), Rozaliya Samoilovna (1876-1947), revolutionary and leader of purge in Crim ea, emigr.: early 1910s, returned to Russia during World W ar II; 67, 150 Zen'kovsky, Sergei Aleksandrovich (1907-1990), historian; 614
RUSSIA ABROAD
735
Zen'kovsky, Vasily Vasll'evlch (1881-1962), religious philosopher, emigr.: 1919; 241, 525, 581
Zenzlnov, Vladimir Mikhailovich (1880-1953), prose writer, editor, political figure, abroad 1899-1904, 1907-1909, deported by Kolchak government in 1918; 187, 339, 527, 576 Zernin, Aleksandr Vladimirovich (1890 or 1891-1962), First-W ave prose writer; 581
Zernova, R u f Aleksandrovna (b. 1919), prose writer, emigr.: 1976; 4 1 4 ,5 9 1 , 596
Zeromski, Stefan (1864-1925), Polish writer; 187 Zhaba, Sergei Pavlovich (1894-1982), First-W ave historian; 338 Zhabinsky, Vladimir Ivanovich [S. Yurasov, Vladimir Yurasov, Rudolph] (1914-1997), prose writer and poet, fled Russia in 1947, left for U.S.A. in 1951; 363, 569, 573, 575 Zhabotlnsky, Vladimir (Zeev) Evgen'evich [Altalena] (1880-1940), prose writer, poet and playwright, sent to Europe as newspaper correspondent in 1914 (?); 225, 271, 377, 520, 534, 542, 555, 560, 582 Zhakov, Kallistrat Faleleevich (1866-1926), prose writer and poet, emigr.:
1917; 523, 541 Zharintseva, Nadezhda Alekseevna (Nadine Jarinzov) (1870-1930?), prose writer and translator, emigr.: 1901; 512, 515, 547
Zhdanov, Andrei Aleksandrovich (1896-1948), high-placed Stalinist official who attacked Mikhail Zoshchenko and Anna Akhmatova after World W ar II; 135, 343, 568 Zhemchuzhnaya, Zinaida Nikolaevna (1887-1961), First-W ave prose writer and memoirist, emigr.: 1925; 539, 558, 580 Zhemchuzhnlkov, Vladimir Mikhailovich (1830-1884), humorous writer, one of creators of fictitious author Koz'ma Prutkov; 507 Zherebkov, Yury Sergeevich, Russian émigré and prominent political figure during the Second World W ar, collaborated with the Germans; 314, 315, 327, 342, 563 Zhlrkevich, Aleksandr Vladimirovich (1857-1927), prose writer; 543 Zholkovsky, Aleksandr Konstantinovich (b. 1937), emigr.: 1979; 595 Zhukov, Evgeny A., First-W ave writer; 538 Zhukov, Georgy Konstantinovich (1896-1974), Soviet general; 4 5 8 ,4 6 6 ,4 6 7 Zhukovsky, Nikolai Ivanovich (1833-1895), Russian revolutionary, emigr.: 1862; 85
Zhukovsky, Vasily Andreevich (1783-1852), expatriate poet and translator, settled permanently in Germ any in 1841 after frequent trips earlier abroad; 20, 57, 58, 69, 172, 496, 498 Zhupan, I., Russian-Carpathian writer; 211 Zhuravskaya, Elizaveta Mikhailovna (1890-1953), First-W ave poet; 556, 576 Zhurzhin, Aleksandr (b. 1953), prose writer, emigr.: 1980; 595
736
JOHN GLAD
[Zlnik, Zinovy], see: Gluzberg, Zinovy Efimovich Zinov'ev, Aleksandr Aleksandrovich (b. 1922), prose writer, emigr.: 1978; 108, 381, 389, 391, 394, 420, 4 3 1 ,4 3 2 , 435, 4 4 1 ,4 5 4 , 455, 484, 591593, 597, 599, 603, 607, 609-613 [Zinov'ev, Grigory], see: Radomysl'sky Zinov’ev, Ol’ga, wife of Aleksandr Zinov’ev; 431, 603 Zinov'eva-Annlbal, Lidiya Dmitrievna (1866-1907), prose writer, dramatist, and critic, wife of Vyacheslav Ivanov, emigr.: early 1890s-1905; 513, 514, 516 Zlobin, Vladimir Anan'evlch (1894-1967), poet, critic, and memoirist, emigr.:
1919; 169, 255, 256, 286, 525, 574, 584 Zmora, Izrail’, Third-W ave writer; 414 Zola, Émile (1840-1902), French novelist; 60, 62 Zon, I. S., émigré publisher in Paris in interwar period; 170 Zorin; 276 Zoshchenko, Mikhail Mikhailovich (1895-1958), Russian humorist writer who w as persecuted in the Soviet Union in the late 1940s; 568 Zosima, fifteenth-century monk who traveled to the Holy Land and endured shipwreck; 36, 41, 491 [Zotow, Eugen], see: Myasoedov, Ivan Zubarev, Sergei Fedorovich, poet, German prisoner of w ar in 1943, returned to U .S.S.R . in early 1980s; 563 Zubov, Nikolai Georg'evich (1898-1925), First-W ave poet; 539 Zurov, Leonid Fëdorovlch (1902-1971), First-W ave prose writer, emigr.: (from Latvia to France): 1929, published in Sovetskii patriot in the 1940s; 197, 250, 338, 568 Zvezdich, Petr Isaevich (1868-1944), First-W ave journalist, 160