#russian emigre literature

[mioritic]

Yiddish writers, Warsaw, 1922

From left to right, with short biographies:

Esther (Esye) Elkin (?–?) was the wife of Mendl Elkin.

Mendl Elkin (1874–1962) was born to a family of Jewish farmers in Belarus. Though working as a dentist for six years, he was more interested in arts and culture, and would spend his spare time writing for socialist newspapers and acting in an amateur Russian-Yiddish theatre group. He spent the 1910s–1920s between Bobruisk and Siberia before moving to Vilna and founding a theatre group, as well as editing literary journals and writing poetry. He would later move to New York, where he served as Chief Librarian for YIVO.

Peretz Hirschbein (1880–1948) was born near Grodno; his father operated a water mill. He studied at a yeshiva before becoming a Hebrew teacher. In his 20s he began to write poetry and plays in both Hebrew and Yiddish, and would soon move to Odessa to stage his plays. After his theatre troupe disbanded in 1910, he spent the remainder of his life travelling, finally moving with his wife Esther Shumiatcher to Los Angeles.

Uri Zvi Grinberg (1896–1981) was a Yiddish writer before moving into Hebrew. Born into a Hasidic family in what is today Ukraine, he served in the Austro-Hungarian army. Radicalized by the November 1918 pogrom in Lwów, he spent the interwar period between Palestine and Europe. He co-founded the self-proclaimed fascist group Brit HaBirionim and later served as a Member of Knesset for Herut. He was awarded the Bialik Prize three times, as well as the Israel Prize for his contributions to literature.

Khane Kacyzne (?–?) was the wife of Alter Kacyzne. Together they had a daughter, Shulamith, who survived the Holocaust by hiding as a non-Jew. Khane was murdered at Bełżec.

Alter Kacyzne (1885–1941) was a prolific photographer and writer, born to a bricklayer and a seamstress in Vilna. He took up photography early, at age 14, by which point he had also taught himself Hebrew, Polish, German, Russian, and French (alongside his native Yiddish) and had begun to write poetry. Through the interwar period he worked as a photojournalist, travelling extensively, as well as serving as editor for several literary magazines and writing for communist newspapers. He was beaten to death by Ukrainian fascists in 1941, and his wife Khane was murdered at Bełżec extermination camp.

Esther Shumiatcher (1896–1985) was born in Grodno, though her family emigrated to Alberta, Canada in 1911. Interested in poetry and screenwriting, she worked several jobs to make money: as a waitress, in a meat-packing plant, and helping her family run a boarding house out of their home. In the 1920s she went to Warsaw and worked extensively as a poet; her poem "Albatros" gave its name to a modernist Yiddish journal. She was married to Peretz Hirschbein, whom she met while he was taken ill in Calgary and nursed back to health in her family's home. After her husband's death in 1948, she moved to New York.

From the YIVO Archives.

[todaysjewishholiday]

17 Menachem Av 5784 (20-21 August 2024)

Many people are familiar with the stories of Ashkenazi Jewish mass migration to the United States, seeking refuge from pogroms, economic hardship, and drafts into the czar’s army. What is less well known is the story of extensive migration from the same Eastern European shtetls to the plains of Argentina.

That story begins on the seventeenth of Av in 5649, when 824 Russian Jews landed in Buenos Aires, eager to start a new life together free from the constant threat of violence they’d lived with in the pale of settlement. They had been given a fabulous vision of the wonders of life in the Argentine countryside by the Argentine immigration bureau in Paris. The reality proved rather less rosy, but the new arrivals were determined. Since the entire Jewish population of Argentina had been under 2000 persons at the time of their arrival, that initial group of 824 was a significant increase to the nation’s Jewish community.

Denied their first homesteading location when the landowner they’d purchased it from decided he could get a better price, and finding the second property they were promised utterly lacking in any of the housing or farm goods they’d been told it would have, the settlers reached out to the French Jewish railroad magnate and philanthropist Baron Maurice Moshe Hirsch for financial aid for their settlement.

Hirsch was not only happy to assist, he thought the idea of Russian Jewish immigration to Argentina was brilliant and created an expansive plan to fund Jewish emigrants seeking to establish new lives in agricultural communes in the Argentine grasslands. To this end, Hirsch established the Jewish Colonization Agency, which funded land purchases and the costs of emigration and farming equipment for Russian Jews seeking to follow in the footsteps of that initial group of 824 settlers. Within 30 years, the Jewish population of Argentina had swollen from under 2000 to over 150000.

The initial group named their farming settlement Moïsesville in honor of the Baron. The cooperative structure of the Jewish settlements, who pooled resources for purchases of seeds and farm equipment, made them resilient in the face of the challenges of rural living. They learned from the surrounding gentile farmers and ranchers, adopting to the gaucho lifestyle but with distinctly Jewish touches. It is this legacy of successful rural agricultural communities that differentiated Jewish immigration to Argentina from Jewish migration elsewhere in the Americas.

The success of Jewish settlement in the hinterlands also swelled the urban Jewish population, and Buenos Aires soon became a major hub of global Jewish life and literature, with three separate Yiddish language daily newspapers, numerous Yiddish publishers, and an active Yiddish theatrical scene. In addition to the large influx of Ashkenazim, Sephardi Jews from Morocco and the Ottoman Empire also came in large numbers, which meant that in addition to Yiddish a visitor to a synagogue in Buenos Aires in the late 5600s might also hear Haketia, Ladino, or Judeo-Arabic. Over time, the children and grandchildren of these immigrants became primarily Spanish speakers. Argentina now has the largest Jewish population in South America and the seventh largest in the world, but is no larger now than it was a hundred years ago and is approximately half the size of the Argentine Jewish population’s peak. For the most part, the Jewish gauchos are a thing of nostalgic memory rather than a contemporary reality, but the migration they spearheaded has grown into a community with deep roots in Argentine soil.

[stephensmithuk]

Antisemitism and Mr. Justice Raffles

Unfortunately, one problem you encounter a lot with Victorian/Edwardian/inter-war literature is antisemitism and it's particularly prevalent in this one - the content warnings contain no less than eight chapters for this with antisemitism warnings; which may not even be the complete number.

This was a time when Jewish people were becoming more prominent in Western European and American society. Three million Ashkenazi Jews, fleeing from pogroms and a lack of opportunity in the Russian Empire, emigrated to the United States. Others made their way to London, especially the East End. Those in the latter have since moved out to places like Finchley and Ilford.

With nearly all legal restrictions gone, some reached positions of very high status in the countries they were living in; Benjamin Disraeli had been British Prime Minister by this point, while Nathan Rothschild had become a Baron, the first peer in the Lords to enter without having previously converted to Christianity.

The arrival of "scientific racism" also saw a bunch of new attacks on Jews, most notably The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion, a forgery possibly from the Russian secret police. Fake news is nothing new, sadly.

Sadly, as we know, things were going to get worse, not better.

[russianprotesters]

Today's speech by Ilya Yashin in the Smolensk court: Dear Court! For almost two years my name has appeared on the list of foreign agents compiled by officials of the Ministry of Justice. The list is large - there are hundreds of citizens, many of whom are well known and brought glory to our country. Outstanding writers, musicians, actors, scientists, journalists, politicians... The fault of these people is only in open disagreement with the actions of the authorities. The fact is that they openly call Putin a dictator. They speak from anti-war and humanistic positions. They criticize the isolation and militarization of Russia, wishing it a free and peaceful future. This is enough to get the state charged with treason. Considering the authority and social weight of the accused, many of our compatriots would consider it an honor to be on the same list with Boris Akunin, Dmitry Bykov, Ekaterina Shulman, Sergei Guriev, Andrei Makarevich, Semyon Slepakov, Yuri Dud, Katerina Gordeeva, Asya Kazantseva, Zemfira, Boris Grebenshchikov and other so-called "foreign agents". But personally, I don’t see any honor in the fact that the authorities brand their public opponents like cattle. For me, the status of a foreign agent is insulting, since I have dedicated my life to defending the interests of Russia as I understand them. Yes, my understanding is radically different from President Putin’s vision. I believe that the main value is people, that the task of the state is to preserve and develop human capital. And he sends hundreds of thousands to slaughter in a senseless war and provokes mass emigration. I believe that Russia should be open to the world and gain allies, not enemies. He locks Russia up and threatens the world with a nuclear bomb. I am for freedom, but Putin grabbed onto power and imposed tyranny on us with a primitive cult of personality. When the Ministry of Justice calls me a foreign agent, it makes me smile. After all, the truth is that my values ​​are not rooted abroad at all, but in our culture and history. My spiritual roots are in the classics of Russian literature. Following Pushkin, I dream that “our names will be written on the ruins of autocracy.” Like Lermontov, I call on the sons of the Slavs to courage and predict the death of tyranny. Like Akhmatova, I stayed with my people - “where my people, unfortunately, were.” I am devoted to my country and love it with all my heart. Don't you dare call me a foreign agent.

https://t.me/yashin_russia/961

[uwmspeccoll]

Women Author of the Week

BABETTE DEUTSCH

I mentioned earlier that I  love a good fairy tale, so I started poking around to see if we had any fairy tales or fables that are written or compiled by women, and lo and behold, I came across More Tales of Faraway Folk published by Harper & Row in 1963. Chosen and retold by American poet, novelist, and translator Babette Deutsch (1895-1982), it was edited by her husband, a fellow author and translator, Avrahm Yarmolinsky (1890-1975), and illustrated by Polish artist and illustrator Janina Domańska (1913-1995).

The book consists of fifteen tales, some of which are animal tales and are accompanied by lovely black and white illustrations that range from half-page to full page throughout the book. The stories themselves have been compiled from all over, ranging from Finland, Central Asia, Russia, Ukraine, Siberia, Armenia, and Estonia. Each story begins with a brief paragraph about the origin of the story, which I find to be a lovely touch. It is always fascinating to see where stories originated and how far out they reached from their home, or what was changed if it was reimagined in another part of the world.

Babette Deutsch’s work is extensive and impressive. While her first published works were poetry, she also wrote four novels, six volumes of children’s literature, ending with ten collections of poetry, and a collection of essays on both poetry and poets. Being fluent in German, Deutsch also translated the works of Rainer Marie Rilke  into English and, with the help of her husband Yarmolinsky, translated Russian poetry which included Alexander Pushkin.

Janina Domańska, who was born and raised in Warsaw, Poland, also had an extensive art career. After leaving Poland, she studied painting in Italy where she supported herself by painting children’s portraits and emigrated to the United States six years later. After working for four years as a textile designer and marrying writer Jerzy Laskowsi, she began showing her artwork to various publishers. Because of this, she was encouraged to focus on illustrating children’s books. She has illustrated more than forty books, with many of them being written by herself.

-- Elizabeth V, Special Collections Undergraduate Writing Intern

[haggishlyhagging]

Mollie Steimer (1897-1980) … emigrated with her family from the Ukraine in 1912. One of six children, she described her life in a New York ghetto as typical of "most poor Jewish immigrants." Her father was a laborer, her mother took in boarders, and she worked in various factories. Her formal schooling having been limited by her poverty, Steimer, like Ganz and numerous others, received her education in the radical youth groups where literature and philosophy received almost as much attention as ideas for the creation of the new world. Inspired by Kropotkin's Conquest of Bread, she joined the anarchist group Freedom in 1917.

She could not have chosen a more unpropitious time to become an anarchist. The United States, having recently entered World War I, was increasingly intolerant of radicals. In August 1918, when Steimer and six of her comrades distributed leaflets supporting the Bolshevik Revolution and denouncing the Allied intervention in Russia, they were arrested for violation of the espionage act. While Marie Ganz had been sentenced to sixty days for brandishing a pistol in the offices of John D. Rockefeller, Mollie Steimer was sentenced to fifteen years for proclaiming: "The tyrants of the world fight each other until they see a common enemy—WORKING CLASS ENLIGHTENMENT. As soon as they find a common enemy they combine to crush it." One of her indicted comrades, who had not engaged in the leaflet distribution, was acquitted; one turned state's evidence and received a light sentence; a third died in prison as a result of injuries inflicted by interrogating officers; and the remaining three were given twenty-year sentences.

After the Supreme Court refused to overturn the decision of the lower courts, Steimer began her prison sentence. Refusing to participate in a pardon campaign that was initiated on behalf of her and the others, she explained to her lawyer that "aside from the fact that I am against petitioning a government official, I consider it against my principles to ask for the release of four individuals while thousands of other political prisoners are languishing in the U.S. jails." Despite her disapproval of the attempts to gain her release, Steimer and the others were removed from prison and deported to the Soviet Union in late 1921. At first welcomed by Soviet officials, Steimer soon earned the enmity of the Russian government. As an anarchist she had few illusions about her status among the Communists. Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman had already fled Russia at the time of her arrival, and Steimer understood that dissenters paid stiff penalties. Nevertheless, animated by her principles and by the support of the Russian dissidents who had managed to stay out of prison, she continued her anarchist activities. While in Russia she had met and grown to love Senya Fleshin, an anarcho-syndicalist active in the movement to free Russian political prisoners, many of whom were anarchists. She and Fleshin were jailed, beaten, and tortured; whenever out of prison they remained under constant police surveillance. In 1923 the Soviet Union deported both of them.

For the next two decades Steimer and Fleshin endured ill health, privation, and government persecution. During the twenties they lived in France and Germany. Having the misfortune to be German residents when Hitler came to power, they fled to France again in the 1930s. While living this rootless existence, they witnessed the crumbling of what had remained of the international anarchist movement, and the devastation of their remaining hopes for the vindication of anarchist principles when Franco triumphed in the Spanish Civil War. On the heels of that defeat came World War II and the German occupation of France. Steimer was arrested in May 1940 and sent to a concentration camp at Gurs; Fleshin had escaped detention. Steimer remained in the camp for six months, after which she escaped to the unoccupied part of France. From there she and Fleshin fled to Mexico, where she lived until her death.

It is difficult not to be overwhelmed by Mollie Steimer's fidelity to principle throughout decades of persecution. Whether such constancy is a virtue or a flaw may be argued; nevertheless, despite an almost identical sociocultural background to Marie Ganz, Steimer was inspired by intellectual, social, and psychological forces that profoundly distinguished her from the more changeable Ganz. Steimer's conversion to anarchism derived less from an emotional response to a crisis situation than from her acceptance of the basic tenets of anarchist ideology. As a disciple of Kropotkin, Steimer possessed an intellectual and moral vision of the future. Ganz, on the other hand, consistently disclaimed a constructive image, insisting that destruction of the old order was her only object. Further, Steimer's prison experiences hardened her against democratic society. Although Justice Holmes, in his dissent against the conviction of Steimer and the others, argued that "the defendants were deprived of their rights under the United States Constitution," the majority of the Supreme Court thought otherwise, and Steimer remained convinced that constitutional safeguards of freedom were a sham. Finally—and this is a much more elusive argument—having endured imprisonment, torture, and exile for a cause, not once but three times, Steimer may have chosen simply not to question anarchist ideology in her later years. Whatever her reasons, she did not abandon her faith in anarchism. In her eighth decade she wrote: "I hold fast to my convictions, being certain that only in a society where no human being will rule over another, can there be true freedom. "

-Margaret S. Marsh, Anarchist Women, 1870-1920

[dividedindiversity]

hi! wanted to submit a couple of songs for the eu competition. these are quite famous and problably not as interesting as more niche ones, but i still think they are amazing:

Danger Dan - Das ist alles von der Kunstfreiheit gedeckt (he's a cool german rapper who loves critisising the government and the police. i love his sense of irony)

Ren - Seven Sins (i know he sings in english, but technically he's welsch? and welsch is genetically closer to Breton language in France than to English, so... come on. and this particular song even starts with a verse in welsch, therefore i suggest it and not the more political ones. it's my favourite though: i adore the way he intricately merges his personal chronic pain with political and social problems. it just resonates deeply with me and i find it beautiful)

also, just in case: do you think you could accept songs of oppositional russian singers that had to leave the country because of the political beliefs they expressed in their art? russia is obviously not a part of eu, but it used to compete in eurovision - and most of the singers have emigrated to the countries of eu specifically. i will totally understand if you'd rather not allow their songs to participate. it's just that i know and deeply love so many of them - russian resistance culture is old and poetic; our literature has always been the main way of opposition, as all the other ones are closed. i guess i simply wish to contribute something from my homeland, if i'm permitted to. again, i don't have high hopes and will absolutely accept your reasoning should you refuse.

(hopefully i'm doing this right - was i supposed to give more/less information, provide the links? i'm sorry if so)

anyway, have a nice day! this competition is a great idea and i'm looking forward to it.

First of all, I want to be very clear about this: this answer is *nothing against the person who sent this ask*. I'm assuming they didn't check what all the artists they mention were up to in the past week.

I won't be including any submissions by Danger Dan or anyone else from Antilopengang. Yes, the song mentioned is a banger. However, Antilopengang has long been at least somewhat Antideutsch, and 5 days ago brought out the song 'Oktober in Europa'. The text of the song is mostly about the increase in antisemitism in Germany and Europe in general lately, a very justified and important complaint, and about antisemitism in the left in particular, which is something often dismissed and ignored and should be talked about more. However, some of the parts of the song that are specifically about the war in Gaza give the impression that the singers consider concern for the well-being of Palestinians to be antisemitism. That conflation muddies an otherwise good message. Which isn't surprising considering their antideutsch position, just disappointing. For this reason, it would be weird to include their songs in a bracket that calls for a boycott of Eurovision. I get the impression they wouldn't want to be.

To answer the question about Russian artists- sure, just make a case for their inclusion! But I ask everyone in *general* to please check the artists you submit- I happen to know this about Antilopengang but I don't know about *most* artists.

[mariacallous]

ROGACA, Serbia (AP) — When Elena Koposova signed an open letter against Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, she didn’t expect a backlash in her newly adopted home state of Serbia.

After all, Serbia is formally seeking to join the European Union while adopting all the democratic values that go along with the membership, she thought. Now, she sees she was wrong.

Two years after signing the letter, the 54-year-old Russian woman is appealing an expulsion order after she was declared a threat to the national security of Serbia and her residency permit was revoked. The beleaguered literature translator said the only reason she could think of is the anti-war petition that she had signed.

“I am not an activist, but I did sign an anti-war letter when the Russian aggression in Ukraine just started,” she said in an interview. “Even not being an activist, I couldn’t just be quiet about it. So, I just put my name on the open letter where it was said that the war is a crime, and we must all unite to stop it.”

Koposova is not alone. Serbia opened its borders in recent years to tens of thousands of Russians fleeing the government of President Vladimir Putin and the war in Ukraine. Russian pro-democracy activists in the Balkan country now say at least a dozen recently faced entry bans or had their residency permits revoked on grounds that they pose a threat to Serbia’s security.

At least eight others are afraid to speak publicly about their legal problems with the Serbian authorities, fearing it could only jeopardize their chance of remaining in the country together with their families, Russian anti-war campaigners say.

“It was very sudden, very shocking,” Koposova said of the moment she received the expulsion order, which did not explain the reason for the measure, only declaring that she poses “a threat to national security” and that she must leave the country within 30 days.

She and her husband have built a modern house on a piece of land in a remote village outside Belgrade where they live with two children, ages 6 and 14, who are attending local school and preschool classes.

Rights activists say the residency problems point to a close relation between Serbia’s increasingly autocratic president, Aleksandar Vučić, and Putin, despite Serbia’s formal EU bid. Vučić has refused to join Western sanctions against the traditional Slavic ally while allowing Moscow propaganda outlets such as RT and Sputnik to spread their narrative throughout the Balkans.

“The authorities in Belgrade and the authorities in Moscow are politically very close,” said Predrag Petrović, research coordinator at the Belgrade Centre for Security Policy, an independent think tank that has sought an explanation from the Interior Ministry about the measures against the Russians.

“People who are critical of Putin’s regime present a big threat to the regime in Moscow,” Petrović said. “This is why these people are being targeted by the Serbian authorities.”

Serbian officials so far haven’t commented about the reported cases involving Russian citizens, and Serbia’s Interior Ministry hasn’t responded to an email from The Associated Press requesting an interview or a comment on the issue.

Since the war in Ukraine started two years ago, many Russians came to Serbia because they don’t need visas to enter the friendly Balkan state, a potential stepping stone for possible future emigration to the West. Many were dodging the draft, while others, like the Koposova family, who came earlier, simply were fed up with Putin’s government and sought a better life somewhere outside of Russia.

Peter Nikitin, one of the founders of the pro-democracy Russian Democratic Society, himself spent two days at Belgrade airport last summer when his entry permit was revoked, although he has a Serbian wife and has lived in Serbia for seven years. Nikitin was later allowed into the country, but a legal procedure regarding his residency papers is ongoing.

“I have no doubt that this is being done on direct orders from Russia, either via the embassy or directly from Moscow,” insisted Nikitin, whose group has also organized protests against the war in Ukraine and demonstrations demanding freedom for political prisoners including Alexei Navalny, a Russian opposition leader and a Putin critic who died on Feb. 16 in an Arctic penal colony in Russia.

Nikitin said other anti-war activists who faced scrutiny by Serbian authorities include fellow founder of the RDS group, Vladimir Volokhonsky, who now lives in Germany.

Also under sanctions were Yevgeny Irzhansky, who organized concerts by anti-Putin bands in Serbia and who has since moved to Argentina with his wife, and Ilya Zernov, a young Russian who was banned from returning to Serbia after being attacked by a far-right Serbian nationalist when he tried to erase a wall painting calling for death to Ukraine in downtown Belgrade.

Nikitin said that the goal of these measures is to intimidate anti-war campaigners.

“The only explanation for that is that they want to scare everyone,” he said. “Because if you can’t sign an anti-war letter, then there’s really nothing you can do. And it does have a chilling effect.”

“The point is the anti-war Russians are not protesting here against anyone in Serbia,” Nikitin said. “We are only concerned with our own country and with our neighboring country, which is suffering from our country right now.”

Serbia’s close relations with Russia date back centuries and the two countries also share a common Slavic origin and Orthodox Christian religion. Russia has supported Serbia’s bid to retain its claim on Kosovo, a former province that declared independence in 2008 with Western backing.

Serbia and Russia also maintain close links between their security services.

Former Serbian state security chief Aleksandar Vulin, who was sanctioned by the U.S. for aiding Russia’s “malign” influence in the Balkan region, recently received a decoration from the Federal Security Service of Russia for close cooperation between the two spy agencies. Vulin reportedly was involved in wiretapping prominent Russian opposition activists who met in Belgrade on the eve of the war in Ukraine and who were later jailed in Russia.

For Koposova, the decision by Serbian authorities to kick her out of the country, means that she and her family could lose everything if her appeal is rejected.

The family can’t go back to Russia because they have sold all their property, are now labelled as anti-Putin and her husband could be drafted into the army to fight in Ukraine, Koposova said.

“This house is our only house, the only house that our kids have,” she said, with tears in her eyes.

[dandelionjack]

via this poll you are now being given the once in a lifetime opportunity to wield the ropes of fate for a random tumblr girl and decide what language they will be learning next (not through duolingo or something, but, like, hopefully, through their uni or a real tutor from next year), which could, by butterfly effect, determine the future of their life path. they’re fluent in russian and pretty decent at french, and, being a Humanities Guy they think it’s embarrassing that they don’t know at least one other language. here are the brief benefits and drawbacks of each

yiddish

as an ashkenazi jew growing up in a completely assimilated, secularised post-soviet family needless to say i’m disconnected from my heritage :)) this is all about reconnecting. it’s also about some fucking awesome songs and idioms and expressions and phrases and poems and stories that i want to know and understand so. cultural reasons. plus, it’s an endangered language that is slowly gaining more and more new learners so why not join the revival. afaik my great grandmother back in belarus spoke nothing but yiddish

hebrew

similar enough reasons, but this is specifically about rediscovering the religious side of judaism, which entails doing a lot of reading books and the torah and finding a synagogue to attend and a community to meet and a lot of googling and a lot of gathering information and also this, learning the holy language of the jewish people. my dad understands it quite well, as do my uncle and cousins, who are currently coloniser settlers in palestine. that’s the downside — learning hebrew may convince my zionist parents that it is now acceptable to begin hounding me once more to sign up for the Free Israel Youth Propaganda Trip (it is not acceptable nor welcome. leave me alone for the love of g-d i want no part in this)

spanish

almost (not going to risk upsetting brazilians) an entire continent and a couple of countries around the globe speak spanish — versatile that way and i wanna travel someday and not act like a Shitty British Tourist…it’s similar enough, being a romance language, to french, which i already know…i’m familiar with at least a couple dozen words and understand some of it quite well…there’s a lot of bomb ass literature written in it, and why read in translation when you are able to Not Do That…also some cool fuckin mexican goth bands that i found on a spotify playlist the lyrics of which i would like to Understand… and i am currently listening to the mabel podcast

german

same point with the bomb ass literature and bomb ass music, emphasis on the music this time, again, what if i ever decide i want to get into berghain and come to the entrance dragging my lousy brit accent along…my family emigrated to germany before england and lived there all through the late 90s…older brother is fluent in it because of that, and so is granny…studied it for about a year in year8 as an extra class but have forgotten almost everything by now, however, it would be quicker to pick up having the basics down

ukrainian

self explanatory, quite. almost feels like an obligation, considering nationality, considering having fled political repression from the country of the aggressor. similar enough to my mother tongue that i can understand around 40% when written/spoken by others. could be useful for joining volunteering initiatives, charity work, mutual aid, translation help for refugees. also, beautiful slavic culture, folk music, art and literature, though i haven't yet read much of it.

[noeticprayer]

July 20

Mother Maria Skobtsova, New-Martyr of France

July 20

Reading

Saint Maria Skobtsova of Paris lived a life devoted to serving the poor and the marginalized. She was born Elizaveta Pilenko in 1891 in Riga, Latvia to devout Russian Orthodox parents. Her father died when she was fourteen, and her grief led her to atheism. As a young teenager she became involved in the socialist and intellectual circles in St. Petersburg. By eighteen she was a published poet and married to a Bolshevik. Her desire to actively serve the needy - more than simply discuss social change - led her back to a faith in Christ. She then became the first woman accepted to study at the Theological Academy of the Alexander Nevsky Monastery in St. Petersburg.

After the Bolshevik Revolution, she was elected Mayor of Anapa but had to flee Russia for Paris in 1923. Elizaveta was inspired to devote her life completely to serving the poor after her daughter, Nastia, died of meningitis in 1926. After her second marriage ended in 1932, Metropolitan Evlogii of Paris tonsured her a nun with the name Maria and blessed her to live a "monasticism in the world" devoted to social service.

Initially devoted to the Russian emigres in Paris, she founded a sanatorium along with homes to serve single mothers, families, and single men. By 1937, 120 dinners were served each day. Much of the work she did herself: begging for food, cooking the soup, and even embroidering the icons for their chapel.

By 1942, Maria's work turned to assisting the Jewish population. She helped Father Dimitri Klepinin issue fake baptismal certificates for Jews that came to their aide. In a mass arrest in July of that year, 12,884 Jews were taken to a sports stadium before being transferred to Auschwitz. Maria spent three days visiting the prisoners, bringing them food, and even rescuing some of the children by smuggling them out in trash cans. She also aided Jews in escaping to Southern France which was unoccupied by the Nazis.

Maria was arrested in February, 1943, and was sent to Ravensbruck concentration camp in Germany. For two years, she raised the spirits of her fellow prisoners, helping them remember their human dignity. She led discussion groups on literature, history, and theology, despite her weakening health. On March 31, 1945, a short time before the camp was rescued, Saint Maria was taken to the gas chambers; some prisoners say she took the place of a fellow Jewish prisoner.

On January 18th, 2004, the Holy Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate recognized Mother Maria Skobtsova as a saint along with her three fellow workers who also died in German concentration camps: her son Yuri, Fr. Dimitri Klepinin, and Ilya Fondaminsky. They are all commemorated in the Orthodox Church on July 20th.

The reading is from St. James' Universal Letter 5:10-20

BRETHREN, take as an example of suffering and patience the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. Behold, we call those happy who were steadfast. You have heard of the steadfastness of Job, and you have seen the purpose of the Lord, how the Lord is compassionate and merciful. But above all, my brethren, do not swear, either by heaven or by earth or with any other oath, but let your yes be yes and your no be no, that you may not fall under condemnation. Is any one among you suffering? Let him pray. Is any cheerful? Let him sing praise. Is any among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord; and the prayer of faith will save the sick man, and the Lord will raise him up; and if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. Therefore confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man has great power in its effects. Elijah was a man of like nature with ourselves and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth. Then he prayed again and the heaven gave rain, and the earth brought forth its fruit. My brethren, if any one among you wanders from the truth and some one brings him back, let him know that whoever brings back a sinner from the error of his way will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins.

Gospel According to Luke 4:22-30

At that time, the crowd wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of the mouth of Jesus; and they said, "Is not this Joseph's son?" And he said to them, "Doubtless you will quote to me this proverb, 'Physician, heal yourself; what we have heard you did at Capernaum, do here also in your own country.'" And he said, "Truly, I say to you, no prophet is acceptable in his own country. But in truth, I tell you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years and six months, when there came a great famine over all the land; and Elijah was sent to none of them but only to Zarephath, in the land of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow. And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha; and none of them was cleansed but only Naaman the Syrian." When they heard this, all in the synagogue were filled with wrath. And they rose up and put him out of the city, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their city was built, that they might throw him down headlong. But passing through the midst of them he went away.

[the-chomsky-hash]

[II. Literary Analysis - cont'd]

B. I would now like to situate the current tendencies of structuralism to the extent that it is the form of literary analysis.

1. The use of structural concepts in literary analysis poses a curious historical problem.

a. Structural analysis in the literary field was invented exactly half a century ago in Russia.

It was around 1915 that Russian formalists, mainly in linguistics training, began to apply concepts that were basically structural concepts to literary analysis.

It was then in Prague, the U.S.A., and in England, where a number of Russian formalists had emigrated, that literary analysis, in a structural form, developed.

And finally, after the 1940-45 war, in France, we saw faintly something that was, say, literary structuralism

– Michel Foucault, Club Tahar Haddad Lectures: Structuralism and Literary Analysis,Tunis, 1967, from Madness, Language, Literature, edited by Fruchaud, Lorenzini, and Revel

[pleasantkidcolor]

I welcome all of you to my page. My name is Ksenia Rachinskaya. Now I'm trying to write a historical novel about Russian emigrants of the 1920s. I am fond of history (especially Russia, I thank everyone who is interested in it!), literature, cinema / theater and rock music. I will enter the College of Culture. I plan to become a writer, screenwriter and director. I hope you will be interested in me 💛💛💛

List: age – 16, INFP, zodiac sign – Capricorn.

#history #cinema #rock #teengirl #russia #romanovs

[kaggsy59]

"...he cast no shadow in the shimmering silver gloom." @Muireann @russianlife #WhiteMagic

“…he cast no shadow in the shimmering silver gloom.” @Muireann @russianlife #WhiteMagic

Back in 2015, when I was on the hunt for every bit of Bulgakov writing in translation that I could find, I stumbled across (and was presented with as Christmas gift!) the marvellous collection of short stories, “Red Spectres”. Translated from the Russian by Muireann Maguire, it’s a wonderful anthology which I loved to bits; so when I found out that she had a new collection out, entitled “White…

[dovlatov27]

Dovlatov (2018) 

(Directed by  Aleksey German Jr.)

[justforbooks]

The End of Communism in Russia Meant the End of Democracy in the West

Alexander Zinoviev, along with Solzhenitsyn and Sakharov, was one of the three great intellectual giants who became dissidents during the late Soviet period.  

This remarkable and prophetic interview was originally published in 1999 in the French Figaro Magazine.  Its original title was:  ”The West and Russia – A Controlled Catastrophe”

Alexander Zinoviev, a philosopher, sociologist and logician, was expelled from the USSR in 1978 after his brilliant satire on the Soviet system "Yawning Heights" was published in the West. In 1999, he returned to his homeland from Germany in protest against the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia. His harsh public criticism of Western aggression practically cost him the Nobel Prize in Literature.

“Just for Books” is pleased to reprint his last interview in the West before returning home. Pay attention - the forecasts given in 1999 came true almost to the details.

In 1999, Zinoviev gave an interview - it turned out to be prophetic not because of the mystical features of the philosopher, but because he knew the real state of affairs in programming technologies and how the transfer of revolutions works. “Social systems do not destroy themselves. Only an outside force can destroy them. It is like a ball rolling on the surface: only the presence of an external obstacle can stop it.”

West-Russia: a controlled disaster (Berlin interview with A. Zinoviev)

Our reader from Moscow, Viktor Innokentyevich Zakharov, sent to the editorial office the text of an interview with the outstanding philosopher Alexander Zinoviev, which he gave before his return from Germany to Russia. His conversation with journalist Victor Lupan took place in Berlin and was published by the French newspaper Le Figaro on July 24, 1999. However, little is known to the Russian reader about this interview. Meanwhile, more than a decade after its publication, both the accuracy of Zinoviev's assessments and their prophetic nature became especially evident.

The interview was translated into Russian by Chingiz Shamshiev, Doctor of Economics of the French Republic. Now he lives in his homeland, in Bishkek, is the director of the Center for Advanced Development of Kyrgyzstan, he is 32 years old. We contacted Shamshiev. In his opinion, many of the thoughts expressed by Alexander Zinoviev, with whom he had the opportunity to meet and talk personally, are of great interest to Russian-speaking readers throughout the post-Soviet space.

QUESTION. With what feelings do you return to your homeland after such a long exile?

ANSWER. With the feeling that he once left a strong, respected, even feared power, and when he returned, he found a defeated country, all in ruins. Unlike others, I would never have left the USSR if I had any choice. Emigration was a real punishment for me.

QUESTION. Nevertheless, you were received here (in Germany. - Approx. per.) With open arms! 

ANSWER. It's true... But despite the triumphant reception and worldwide success of my books, I always felt like a stranger here.

QUESTION. After the collapse of communism, the main subject of your research became the Western system. Why?

ANSWER. Because what I predicted happened: the fall of communism turned into the collapse of Russia.

QUESTION. It turns out that the fight against communism covered the desire to destroy Russia?

ANSWER. Quite right. I say this because at one time I was an unwitting accomplice to this shameful action for me. The Russian catastrophe was wanted and programmed here, in the West. I read documents, participated in studies that, under the guise of an ideological struggle, actually prepared the death of Russia. And it became so unbearable for me that I could no longer be in the camp of those who destroy my people and my country. The West is not a stranger to me, but I view it as an enemy power.

QUESTION. Have you become a patriot?

ANSWER. Patriotism does not concern me. I received an international upbringing and remain faithful to it. I can't even say whether I like Russians and Russia or not. However, I belong to this people and this country. I am part of them. The current suffering of my people is so terrible that I cannot calmly watch them from afar. The brutality of globalization reveals unacceptable things.

QUESTION. Nevertheless, today many former Soviet dissidents speak of their former homeland as a country of human rights and democracy. And now that this point of view has become generally accepted in the West, you are trying to refute it. Is there a contradiction here?

ANSWER. During the Cold War, democracy was a weapon in the fight against communist totalitarianism. Today we understand that the era of the Cold War was the culminating moment in the history of the West. At that time, everything was in the West: an unprecedented increase in prosperity, genuine freedom, incredible social progress, colossal scientific and technical discoveries! But at the same time, the West was imperceptibly changing. The timid integration of developed countries that began at that time was, in fact, the forerunner of the internationalization of the economy and the globalization of power, which we are witnessing today. Integration can serve the growth of common well-being and have positive consequences if, for example, it satisfies the legitimate desire of fraternal peoples to unite. However, the integration in question was conceived from the outset as a vertical structure, tightly controlled by supranational authorities. And without the successful implementation of the Russian counter-revolution against the Soviets, the West would not have been able to embark on globalization.

QUESTION. So, Gorbachev's role was not positive?

ANSWER. I look at things from a slightly different angle. Contrary to popular belief, Soviet communism did not collapse due to internal reasons. Its collapse is certainly the greatest victory in the history of the West. An unheard-of victory which, I repeat, makes possible the establishment of planetary power. The end of communism also marked the end of democracy. Today's era is not just post-communist, it is also post-democratic! Today we are witnessing the establishment of democratic totalitarianism, or, if you like, totalitarian democracy.

QUESTION. Doesn't this all sound a bit absurd?

ANSWER. Not at all. Democracy requires pluralism, and pluralism presupposes the presence of at least two more or less equal forces that fight and at the same time influence each other. During the Cold War, there was world democracy, global pluralism, within which two opposing systems coexisted: capitalist and communist. And also unclear, but still the structure of those countries that could not be attributed to the first two groups. Soviet totalitarianism was susceptible to criticism coming from the West. In turn, the West was under the influence of the USSR, especially through its own communist parties. Today we live in a world dominated by one single force, one ideology and one pro-globalization party. All this taken together began to take shape during the Cold War, when gradually, superstructures appeared in various forms: commercial, banking, political and information organizations. Despite different spheres of activity, these forces were united by their transnational essence. With the collapse of communism, they began to rule the world. Thus, the Western countries found themselves in a dominant position, but at the same time they are in a subordinate position, as they gradually lose their sovereignty in favor of what I call a super-society. The planetary super-society consists of commercial and non-commercial organizations whose influence goes far beyond the boundaries of individual states. Like other countries, Western countries are subject to the control of these supranational structures. And this despite the fact that the sovereignty of states was also an integral part of pluralism, and hence democracy on a planetary scale. The current ruling superpower is suppressing sovereign states. European integration, which is unfolding before our eyes, is also leading to the disappearance of pluralism within this new conglomerate in favor of a supranational power.

QUESTION. But don't you think that France or Germany continue to be democratic states?

ANSWER. Western countries experienced true democracy during the Cold War. The political parties had genuine ideological differences and different political agendas. The press organs were also very different from each other. All this had an impact on the lives of ordinary people, contributed to the growth of their well-being. Now this has come to an end. Democratic and prosperous capitalism, with socially oriented legislation and job security, owed much to the existence of fear of communism. After the fall of communism in the countries of Eastern Europe, a massive attack on the social rights of citizens began in the West. Today, the socialists who are in power in most European countries are pursuing a policy of dismantling the social security system, a policy that destroys everything socialist that existed in the capitalist countries. There is no longer a political force in the West capable of protecting ordinary citizens. The existence of political parties is a pure formality. Every day there will be less and less difference between them. The war in the Balkans was anything but democratic. Nevertheless, it was led by the socialists, who historically were against such adventures. Ecologists, also in power in some countries, hailed the environmental catastrophe caused by the NATO bombing. They even dared to claim that depleted uranium bombs do not pose a danger to the environment, although soldiers wear special protective overalls when they are loaded. So democracy is gradually disappearing from the social organization of Western countries. Totalitarianism is spreading everywhere because the supranational structure imposes its own laws on states. This undemocratic superstructure is issuing orders, imposing sanctions, organizing embargoes, dropping bombs, starving. Even Clinton obeys her. Financial totalitarianism subjugated political power. Cold financial totalitarianism is alien to emotions and a sense of pity. Compared to the financial dictatorship, the political dictatorship can be considered quite humane. Within the most brutal dictatorships, there was at least some resistance. It is impossible to rebel against banks. Compared to the financial dictatorship, the political dictatorship can be considered quite humane. Within the most brutal dictatorships, there was at least some resistance. It is impossible to rebel against banks. Compared to the financial dictatorship, the political dictatorship can be considered quite humane. Within the most brutal dictatorships, there was at least some resistance. It is impossible to rebel against banks.

QUESTION. What about revolution?

ANSWER. Democratic totalitarianism and financial dictatorship rule out the possibility of a social revolution.

QUESTION. Why?

ANSWER. Because they combine raw, all-powerful military power with global financial strangulation. All revolutionary upheavals once received support from outside. From now on, this is impossible, since there are no more sovereign states and there will be no more. Moreover, at the lowest social level, the class of workers is replaced by the class of the unemployed. What do the unemployed want? work. They are therefore in a less advantageous position than the working class in the past.

QUESTION. All totalitarian systems had their own ideology. What is the ideology of this new society, which you call post-democratic?

ANSWER. The most influential Western theorists and politicians believe that we have entered a post-ideological era. This is because by the word "ideology" they mean communism, fascism, Nazism, and so on. In fact, the ideology, the super-ideology of the Western world, which has developed over the past fifty years, is much stronger than communism or National Socialism. A Western citizen is much more duped than an ordinary Soviet person was once through communist propaganda. In the field of ideology, the main thing is not ideas, but the mechanisms for their dissemination. The power of the Western media, for example, is incomparably greater than the Vatican's most powerful propaganda tools at its height. And this is not all cinema, literature, philosophy - all levers of influence and means of spreading culture in the broadest sense of the word work in this direction. At the slightest impulse, all those working in this field react with such coherence that thoughts of orders coming from a single source of authority involuntarily arise. It was enough to make a decision to stigmatize General Karadzic, or President Milosevic, or someone else, for the entire planetary propaganda machine to work against them. As a result, instead of condemning NATO politicians and generals for violating all existing laws, the vast majority of Western citizens are convinced that the war against Serbia was necessary and just. Western ideology combines and mixes ideas according to its needs. One such idea is that Western values ​​and lifestyle are the best in the world! Although for most people on the planet these values ​​have disastrous consequences. Try to convince the Americans that that these values ​​will destroy Russia. You won't get anything. They will continue to assert the thesis of the universality of Western values, thus following one of the fundamental principles of ideological dogmatism. Western theorists, politicians and media are absolutely sure that their system is the best. That is why they, without any doubt and with a clear conscience, impose it on the whole world. Western man, the bearer of these highest values, is thus the new superman. The term is taboo, but it all boils down to that. Of course, this phenomenon must be studied scientifically. However, I dare say, in some areas of sociology and history it has become extremely difficult to conduct scientific research. A scientist who suddenly becomes inflamed with a desire to study the mechanisms of democratic totalitarianism will face incredible difficulties. They will make him an outcast. On the other hand, those whose research serves the dominant ideology are drowning in grants, and publishing houses and the media are fighting for the right to collaborate with these authors. I experienced this firsthand when I taught and worked as a researcher at foreign universities.

QUESTION. Isn't there in this super-ideology that you don't like the ideas of tolerance and respect for one's neighbor?

ANSWER. When you listen to the representatives of the Western elite, everything seems so pure, generous, respectful towards people. In doing so, they apply the classic rule of propaganda: cover up reality with sweet talk. However, it is enough to turn on the TV, go to the movies, open a bestseller or listen to popular music to see the opposite: an unprecedented spread of the cult of cruelty, sex and money. Noble speeches are meant to hide these three pillars (there are others) of totalitarian democracy.

QUESTION. And what about human rights? Aren't they the most respected in the West?

ANSWER. From now on, the idea of ​​human rights is also under more and more pressure. Even a purely ideological thesis, according to which these rights are innate, not alienable, today will not stand even the first rigorous analysis. I am ready to subject Western ideology to the same scientific analysis that I did with communism. But this is a long conversation, not for today's interview...

QUESTION. Does Western ideology have a key idea?

ANSWER. The idea of ​​globalization! In other words, world domination! And since this idea is rather unpleasant, it is covered up with lengthy phrases about planetary unity, about the transformation of the world into one integrated whole... In fact, the West has now begun structural changes on the scale of the entire planet. On the one hand, Western society dominates the entire world, on the other hand, it itself is being rebuilt vertically with supranational power at the very top of the pyramid.

QUESTION. World government?

ANSWER. Yes, if you like.

QUESTION. To believe in this - does not it mean to be a victim of delusional fantasies about a world conspiracy?

ANSWER. What conspiracy? There is no conspiracy. The world government is controlled by the leaders of well-known supranational commercial, financial and political structures. According to my calculations, this super-society that rules the world today already has about fifty million people. Its center is the USA. The countries of Western Europe and some former Asian "dragons" form its basis. Other countries are dominated by a rigid financial and economic gradation. Here is the reality. With regard to propaganda, she believes that the creation of a world government, controlled by a world parliament, is desirable, since the world is a big brotherhood. These are all tales meant for the crowd.

QUESTION. European Parliament too?

ANSWER. No, because the European Parliament exists. But it would be naïve to believe that the European Union was the result of the goodwill of the governments of its member countries. The European Union is a weapon for the destruction of national sovereignties. It is part of projects developed by supranational organisms.

QUESTION. The European Commonwealth changed its name after the collapse of the Soviet Union. As if to replace it, it became known as the European Union. After all, it could have been called something else. Like the Bolsheviks, EU leaders call themselves commissars. Like the Bolsheviks, they head commissions. The last president was "elected", being the only candidate...

ANSWER. We must not forget that the process of social organization is subject to certain laws. To organize a million people is one thing, to organize ten million is another thing, to organize a hundred million is a very difficult task. Organizing five hundred million people is a task of colossal proportions. It is necessary to create new administrative bodies, train the people who will manage them and ensure their smooth functioning. This is a top priority. In fact, the Soviet Union is a classic example of a multinational conglomerate led by a supranational management structure. The European Union wants to achieve better results than the Soviet Union! This is quite justified. Already twenty years ago I was amazed that the so-called defects of the Soviet system were even more developed in the West.

QUESTION. For example, what?

ANSWER. Planning! The Western economy is infinitely more planned than the economy of the USSR was once planned. Bureaucracy! In the Soviet Union, from 10 to 12% of the active population worked in the sphere of government and administration of the country. In the United States, there are about 16-20% of such workers. However, the USSR was criticized precisely for its planned economy and the severity of the bureaucracy. The Central Committee of the CPSU employed 2,000 people. The number of the apparatus of the Communist Party reached 150 thousand workers. Today in the West you will find dozens, even hundreds of industrial and banking companies that employ many more people. The bureaucracy of the Soviet Communist Party was negligible compared to the staff of the large multinational corporations in the West. In fact, we must admit: The USSR was poorly governed precisely because of the lack of administrative staff. It was necessary to have two or three times more administrative workers! The European Union is well aware of these problems and therefore takes them into account. Integration is impossible without an impressive administrative apparatus.

QUESTION. What you are talking about runs counter to the ideas of liberalism advertised by European leaders. Don't you think that their liberalism is just window dressing?

ANSWER. The administration tends to grow very large, which is dangerous for itself. She knows about it. Like any organism, it finds its own antidotes to continue normal functioning. Private initiative is one of them. Another antidote is public and individual morality. By applying them, the authorities, as it were, are struggling with tendencies towards self-destruction. So she invented liberalism to counterbalance her own heaviness. Today, however, being a liberal is absurd. There is no more liberal society. The liberal doctrine does not correspond in any way to the realities of the era of unprecedented concentration of capital in the history of mankind. The movement of colossal financial resources does not take into account the interests of individual states and peoples, consisting of individuals. Liberalism implies personal initiative and taking financial risks. Today, any business needs money provided by banks. These banks, whose number is gradually decreasing, are pursuing a policy that is dictatorial, orchestral in nature. The owners of enterprises are at their mercy, because everything is subject to credit, which means that it is under the control of financial institutions. The importance of the individual - the basis of liberalism - is diminishing day by day. Today it does not matter who manages this or that enterprise, this or that country: Bush or Clinton, Kohl or Schroeder, Chirac or Jospin, what's the difference? The owners of enterprises are at their mercy, because everything is subject to credit, which means that it is under the control of financial institutions. The importance of the individual - the basis of liberalism - is diminishing day by day. Today it does not matter who manages this or that enterprise, this or that country: Bush or Clinton, Kohl or Schroeder, Chirac or Jospin, what's the difference? The owners of enterprises are at their mercy, because everything is subject to credit, which means that it is under the control of financial institutions. The importance of the individual - the basis of liberalism - is diminishing day by day. Today it does not matter who manages this or that enterprise, this or that country: Bush or Clinton, Kohl or Schroeder, Chirac or Jospin, what's the difference?

QUESTION. The totalitarian regimes of the 20th century were extremely cruel, which cannot be said about Western democracy.

ANSWER. The main thing is not the methods, but the results. Give an example? In the fight against Nazi Germany, the USSR lost 20 million people and suffered enormous destruction. During the Cold War, a war without bombs and guns, there were much more losses in all respects! Over the past decade, the life expectancy of Russians has decreased by ten years! The death rate catastrophically exceeds the birth rate. Two million children do not sleep at home. Five million school-age children do not go to school. There are 12 million registered drug addicts. Alcoholism became common. 70% of young people are not fit for military service due to various physical disabilities. Here are the direct consequences of defeat in the Cold War, followed by a transition to a Western way of life. If this continues then the population of the country will first fall rapidly from 150 million to 100 million, and then to 50 million. Democratic totalitarianism will surpass all previous totalitarian regimes.

QUESTION. In violence?

ANSWER. Drugs, malnutrition, AIDS are much more effective than military violence. Although, after the colossal destruction of the Cold War, the West invented "peacekeeping war". The Iraqi and Yugoslav campaigns are two examples of collective punishment and retaliation on an exceptionally large scale, to which the propaganda machine gives the meaning of "good cause" or "humanist war." Directing victims' violence against themselves is another technology. An example of its use is the Russian counter-revolution of 1985. However, by unleashing the war in Yugoslavia, the countries of Western Europe waged war against themselves.

QUESTION. In your opinion, was the war against Serbia also a war against Europe?

ANSWER. Quite right. There are forces within Europe that can force it to act against itself. Serbia was chosen because it resisted the increasingly overwhelming globalization. Russia might be next on the list. Before China...

QUESTION. Despite its nuclear arsenal?

ANSWER. Russia's nuclear arsenal is huge, but it is outdated. In addition, the Russians are morally disarmed and ready to capitulate... It seems to me that the monstrosity of the 21st century will surpass everything that mankind has seen before. Just think of the coming global war against Chinese communism. To defeat such a densely populated country, it will be necessary to destroy not 10-20 million people, but somewhere around 500 million. Today it is quite possible, given the level of development of the achievements of the propaganda machine. Of course, in the name of freedom and human rights. Unless some PR organization comes up with a new, no less noble reason.

QUESTION. Don't you think that people can have their own opinion, that they can vote and thus express themselves?

ANSWER. Firstly, people are already voting a little, and later they will be even less. As for public opinion, in the West it is formed by the mass media. Suffice it to recall the universal approval of the war in Kosovo. Remember the Spanish War! Volunteers came from all over the world to fight on one side or the other. Remember the Vietnam War. From now on, people are so led that they react only in the way that the masters of propaganda want.

QUESTION. The USSR and Yugoslavia were the most multi-ethnic countries in the world, and despite this they were destroyed. Don't you see the connection between the destruction of multi-ethnic countries, on the one hand, and the propaganda of multi-ethnicity, on the other?

ANSWER. Soviet totalitarianism created a genuine multinational and multiethnic society. It was the Western democracies who made superhuman propaganda efforts to incite various types of nationalism, because the split of the USSR was considered by them as the best way to destroy it. The same mechanism worked in Yugoslavia. Germany has always sought to eliminate Yugoslavia. Once united, Yugoslavia could resist. The essence of the Western system is division in order to make it easier for all parties to establish their own laws at once, and to act as the supreme judge themselves. There is no reason to suppose that similar technology will not be applied to the dismemberment of China in the future.

QUESTION. India and China opposed the bombing of Yugoslavia. Can they form a pole of resistance if something happens? Still, 2 billion people is something!

ANSWER. The means of these countries cannot be compared with the military might and technology of the West.

QUESTION. Were you impressed by the effectiveness of the US military arsenal in Yugoslavia?

ANSWER. Not only in this matter. If an appropriate decision had been made, then Serbia would have ceased to exist within a few hours. Apparently, the leaders of the new world order have chosen a strategy of permanent violence. One after another, local conflicts will now flare up so that the “peacekeeping war” machine, which we have already seen in action, extinguishes them. In fact, it can be a technology for controlling the entire planet. The West controls most of the Earth's natural resources. Its intellectual resources are millions of times greater than those of the rest of the world. This overwhelming preponderance leads to Western hegemony in technology, the arts, the media, computer science, science, and from this follows dominance in all other areas. It would be too easy just to conquer the world. They still need to manage! It is this fundamental problem that the Americans are now trying to solve... Understand that at the time of Christ there were about 100 million people on Earth. Today, Nigeria alone has so many inhabitants! One billion Westernoids and the people assimilated by them will rule the whole world. However, this billion, in turn, also needs to be managed. It will probably take two hundred million people to govern the Western world. They need to be selected and trained. That is why China is doomed to lose in the fight against Western hegemony. This country lacks the governance and economic and intellectual resources to put in place an efficient administrative apparatus of some 300 million people. Only the West is able to solve the problems of world governance. He has already begun to do so. Hundreds of thousands of Westerners who are located in former communist countries, for example in Russia, as a rule, occupy leadership positions there. A totalitarian democracy will also be a colonial democracy.

QUESTION. According to Marx, colonization, in addition to violence and cruelty, brought with it the benefits of civilization. Maybe the history of mankind repeats itself on a new round?

ANSWER. Indeed, why not? But, alas, not for everyone. What contribution did the American Indians make to civilization? Practically none, since they were crushed, destroyed, wiped off the face of the Earth. Now look at the contribution of the Russians! And in general, I will make an important remark: the West feared not so much the military power of the USSR as its intellectual, artistic and sports potential. The West saw how full of life the USSR was! And this is the main thing that needs to be destroyed from the enemy. That is exactly what was done. Russian science today depends on American funding. It is in a sorry state, as the US is not interested in financing competitors. The Americans prefer to give Russian scientists a job in the United States. Soviet cinema was also destroyed and replaced by American. The same thing happened with literature. World domination is primarily manifested as an intellectual or, if you like, cultural dictate. That is why, in recent decades, Americans have been so eager to bring the cultural and intellectual level of the world down to their own level, which will allow them to exercise this dictate.

QUESTION. But won't this dominance eventually turn out to be a boon for all mankind?

ANSWER. Those who will live in ten generations will really be able to say that everything happened in the name of humanity, that is, for their good. But what about the Russian or Frenchman who lives today? Can he rejoice that the future of the Indians of America awaits his people? The term "humanity" is an abstraction. In reality, there are Russians, French, Serbs, etc. However, if the current trend continues, then the peoples who founded modern civilization (I mean the Latin peoples) will gradually disappear. Western Europe has already been flooded with foreigners. We have not talked about this yet, but this phenomenon is not an accident and not the consequences of allegedly uncontrolled human flows. The goal is to create a situation in Europe similar to the situation in the United States. It seems to me that the French will not be very happy to learn that humanity will be happy, but without the French. Finally, leaving a limited number of people on Earth who would live like in paradise could be a rational project. The remaining people would certainly believe that their happiness is the result of historical development ... No. What matters is the life that we and our loved ones live today.

QUESTION. The Soviet system was inefficient. Are all totalitarian societies doomed to inefficiency?

ANSWER. What is efficiency? In the United States, the cost of losing weight exceeds the state budget of Russia. And still the number of fat citizens is growing. There are dozens of such examples.

QUESTION. Can we say that the growing radicalization in the West will lead to its own destruction?

ANSWER. Nazism was destroyed in a total war. The Soviet system was young and strong. She would have continued to live if she had not been destroyed by forces from outside. Social systems do not destroy themselves. Only an outside force can destroy them. It is like a ball rolling on the surface: only the presence of an external obstacle can stop it. I can prove it like a theorem is proved. Today we are dominated by a country with colossal economic and military superiority. The new emerging world order is striving for unipolarity. If, having eliminated all external enemies, the supranational government achieves this, then a unified social system can exist until the end of time. Only a man can die from his own disease. But a group of people, even a small one, will already try to survive through reproduction. Imagine a social system of billions of people! Its ability to anticipate and prevent self-destructive phenomena will be unlimited. In the foreseeable future, the process of erasing differences in the world cannot be stopped, since democratic totalitarianism is the last phase of the development of Western society, which began in the Renaissance.

Biographical information about Alexander Zinoviev

The famous philosopher and writer Alexander Zinoviev was born in 1922 into a peasant family. After school, he entered the Moscow Institute of the History of Philosophy and Literature, from which he was expelled without the right to enter other universities in the country for speaking out against Stalin's personality cult. Soon he was arrested, fled, hiding from the state security agencies. He was saved from further trouble by military service, where he left in 1940 and served until 1946. He began the Great Patriotic War in a tank regiment, and completed it in attack aviation, he was awarded orders and medals for military merits.

After the war, he graduated from the Faculty of Philosophy of Moscow State University, while studying at the Faculty of Mechanics and Mathematics. In the second half of the fifties, for students of the philosophical faculty of Moscow State University named after Lomonosov, the name Zinoviev was a symbol of new ideas, the struggle against dogmatism.

In 1960, Zinoviev defended his doctoral dissertation, shortly after that he received the title of professor and became head of the department of logic at Moscow University. The reason for the expulsion of Alexander Zinoviev from the Soviet Union in 1978 was the sociological novel “Yawning Heights” published in the West, with which literary fame came to him. At home, Zinoviev was assigned the role of an anti-communist with all the ensuing consequences in those years: he was expelled from the party, expelled from work, expelled from the country, deprived of citizenship, all scientific degrees, titles, awards, including military ones. An atmosphere of silence was created around him. Everything was organized as if such a person did not exist at all.

In the West, Alexander Zinoviev published more than 40 novels translated into 20 languages, creating a new genre of sociological novel (sociological story) with his work, in which scientific and sociological results are presented in artistic form. Concepts, statements, and partly even the methods of sociology are used as means of fiction, and the latter, in turn, are used as means of science. Returning to his homeland, Alexander Alexandrovich continued his sociological research and lectured at Moscow State University, published essays on the new Russia.

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Data from Russia’s 2021 census showed a record decrease in the country’s Ukrainian population: according to the survey, the number of Ukrainians living in Russia dropped by half between 2010 and 2021. And while experts have cast doubt on the census’s accuracy, the same pattern has been found by multiple other surveys, demographers, and Ukrainian diaspora members themselves. The reasons might seem obvious — Russia first invaded Ukraine in 2014 — but Ukrainian activists in Russia say the decline is part of a story that goes back decades. The independent outlet iStories dug into how Vladimir Putin’s efforts to stamp out Ukrainian identity in Russia began long before his full-scale war. In English, Meduza summarizes what they learned.

A record decline

Ukrainians have historically been one of the most highly represented nationalities in Russia: just a decade ago, they were the third largest group (about two million people), after ethnic Russians and Tatars, according to census data. By 2021, however, they’d fallen to the eighth spot (about 884,000 people).

While Russia’s Ukrainian population has been gradually shrinking for decades, this sudden decline of more than half was unprecedented. Other data sources show the same pattern: according to the Russia Longitudinal Monitoring Survey conducted by Moscow’s Higher School of Economics, while Ukrainians made up almost 2 percent of Russia’s population in the 2000s, they made up less than 1 percent in 2021.

Demographer Alexey Raksha believes the most likely reason for the apparent decline in Russia’s Ukrainian population is that Ukrainians, especially young ones, tend to start self-identifying as Russians sooner after moving to Russia than people of other ethnicities do. It may also be the case that Ukrainians are leaving Russia faster than they’re immigrating there, Raksha said, though reliable data here are scarce.

According to members of Russia’s Ukrainian diaspora, the shift hasn’t been a natural process, regardless of whether the decrease is due to emigration or a change in how people self-identify. They say the Russian authorities have been working to reduce the country’s Ukrainian population for years, namely by discouraging expressions of Ukrainian identity and shutting down organizations that represent Ukrainians’ interests in Russia.

‘There was this euphoria. And then a switch flipped.’

“It’s become uncomfortable to be an ethnic Ukrainian in Russia,” said Viktor Girzhov, the former deputy chairman of the Association of Ukrainians in Russia. Though Girzhov lived in Russia for more than 20 years, in 2015, the Russian FSB banned him from entering the country for five years. The official reason was that he violated border-crossing procedures, but Girzhov believes the real reason was that he told the truth about Russia’s actions in Ukraine on Russian television.

In Girzhov’s view, the rapid decrease in Russia’s Ukrainian population is largely a result of Russian state policies intended to purge all things Ukrainian. He says this began in 2004, when Ukrainians launched the Orange Revolution in opposition to Putin-backed presidential candidate Viktor Yanukovych, and some Ukrainian organizations in Russia openly supported the uprising.

“After the collapse of the [Soviet] Union, Ukrainian organizations started popping up like mushrooms after a rainstorm. There was this euphoria, this feeling that under Gorbachev, under Yeltsin, we would have some freedoms,” Girzhov told iStories. “And then a switch flipped, and it all started to fall apart. That was under Putin.”

In 2010 and 2012, Girzhov recalls, two Ukrainian diaspora organizations that aimed to preserve and share Ukrainian culture in Russia were shut down. Then, in 2018, the Russian authorities closed the Moscow Library of Ukrainian Literature, claiming the director had “distributed extremist materials.” The following year, the largest association of Ukrainians outside of Ukraine, the Ukrainian World Congress, was banned as an “undesirable organization” in Russia.

By the mid-2000s, says Girzhov, it was effectively impossible to study the Ukrainian language in Russia:

In Ukraine [at that time], there were very many schools where Russian was taught. But in Russia, there wasn’t a single school, not even a single Ukrainian class, for the two-million-person Ukrainian diaspora. In Russia, there are no places where you can speak Ukrainian; there are neither schools nor libraries [of Ukrainian literature].

Girzhov and some other diaspora members tried to open Moscow’s first Ukrainian school, but the Russian authorities “continually made unrealistic demands, and [the project] petered out.” Today, according to Russia’s 2021 census, only 33 percent of ethnic Ukrainians living in Russia speak Ukrainian.

And while, on paper, there are still some organizations that support Ukrainian culture in Russia, Girzhov said they exist solely to promote what he calls “Ukrainian fakelore”: “They’re funded by the [Russian] state and by presidential grants. […] These organizations participate in city events and festivals, people dance and sing, but there’s no politics, no social activism, no rights for Ukrainians. The Russian government creates these caricatures of Ukrainians. But as soon as you start to support Ukraine — not even the Maidan [Revolution], just independence, culture, language — it’s over.”

According to Girzhov, the official decline in Russia’s Ukrainian population might be the result of ethnic Ukrainians in Russia self-identifying as Russians in official surveys:

People are afraid because it’s not safe to admit that you’re Ukrainian right now. For example, the [Federal Security Service] has questioned people who appeared on the Library of Ukrainian Literature’s list of readers. Older people are worried about their children and grandchildren. Younger people are worried about losing their jobs. Everybody who could leave left before the war. Now it’s difficult, because until the war ends, everybody who’s left is trying not to emphasize their “Ukrainianness.”

‘Why don’t you sing in Russian?’

Valery Semenenko moved from Ukraine to Moscow for graduate school in 1978, and he ended up settling down there. He’s one of the founders of the Association of Ukrainians in Russia, and he served as the organization’s co-chair until 2012, when the authorities shut it down:

At first, in the late 2000s and the 2010s, we would write letters, appeals to Putin: we called for mutual understanding [between Russia and Ukrainian]. […] They shut us down for that: after the Orange Revolution, the Russian authorities got nervous. And two months after closing us, they created a puppet federal organization of Ukrainians whose representatives now say on TV that [Ukrainians] are Russians.

Semenenko has since gone “underground”: he now leads an unregistered organization for Russia’s Ukrainian diaspora. “We know Russia’s laws: we can only write about the pain and suffering of Ukrainians. As far as military activities, let alone discussing the [Russian] army, that’s off the table.”

And politics isn’t the only realm that scares the Russian authorities:

We can’t even sing. In the fall of 2022, there was an annual concert in St. Petersburg. Each group — Kalmyks, Chuvash, [etc.] — performs one song. They invited Ukrainians as well. Then they thought better of it: “Actually, how about you sing in Russian?” But [the Ukrainians] insisted: “Either we sing in Ukrainian, or we don’t sing at all.”

Semenenko said he has little confidence in the 2021 census data, especially since he never received a survey. Still, he has no doubt Russia’s Ukrainian population is indeed shrinking.

“If the Russian state is still in one piece [after the war], and if all of these patterns continue, the number of Ukrainians here will fall to zero,” he said. Even he wants to leave, he adds: “But I have ties here: my home, my family. My wife is a native Muscovite. Where is she supposed to go? We should have left sooner. At least my children can go.”

‘Mom, I’m not going to fascist Russia’

Anna (whose name iStories changed at her request) is from the Ukrainian city of Chernihiv but has been living in Russia for more than two decades. She currently leads an organization for Ukrainian women living in Russia. Every time air raid sirens sound in Chernihiv, she told iStories, she “hears” it from her home outside Moscow. She says she keeps the notifications activated on her cell phone because her daughter still lives in the city.

When the February 2022 invasion began, Anna tried to convince her daughter to move to Russia. “I told her, ‘Come here.’ And she responded, ‘No, Mom, I’m not going to fascist Russia,’” she said.

According to Anna, things were “booming” for the Ukrainian community when she first moved to Russia in 2000; she and other diaspora leaders even met with government officials to discuss opening a Ukrainian school:

It seemed to us that Russia was so big, there was so much to be done, so much to create; our countries could communicate, there could be student exchanges, artist exchanges. We thought that’s how the future would be, but things turned out completely differently. The Ukrainian diaspora is in such a sorry state now. If you say what local authorities tell you to say, then of course they’ll support you. But I don’t know how you can say things that aren’t true.

Since the war began, some of Anna’s acquaintances in Ukraine have cut off contact with her simply because she lives in Russia. “But what can I do here alone?” she said. “Recently, some caring people left flowers at the monument to [Ukrainian writer] Lesya Ukrainka [in Moscow], and all of them were arrested. Now, there will probably be police stationed at all of the Ukrainian monuments.”

It’s difficult to live in Russia knowing Russians support the war in such large numbers, Anna reflected. “When you start talking about what’s happening [in Ukraine], you see the aggression; people’s eyes fill up with blood, they’re ready to devour you,” she says. “But there are some [Russians] who are just sympathetic, and they come up to me and say, ‘Tell us the truth, because, outside of what we see on TV, we don’t see anything. We don’t know anything.’”

Like Valery Semenenko, Anna doesn’t believe any Ukrainians will stay in Russia after the war ends. “I know a lot of people who are waiting for the end of the war to leave Russia, because it’s impossible to live here knowing what [Russia] did [in Ukraine]. My daughter is in Chernihiv; how could I keep living here in peace?” she says, worrying that it could even become unsafe to remain in Russia:

I lived there for 40 years, worked in a school; my students are there, my classmates, my relatives, and my parents’ graves. The “liberators” came and destroyed everything: 70 percent of Chernihiv is gone. How else am I supposed to view that? Morally, I just can’t live here. For now, it’s just “morally” impossible; later, it might reach the point of physical massacres [of Ukrainians in Russia]. I wouldn’t rule it out.