IMAGES, CONCEPTS and HISTORY of a BORDERLAND This Book

INTRODUCTION IMAGES, CONCEPTS AND HISTORY OF A BORDERLAND Th is book focuses on one peculiar aspect of post-Soviet Belarusian soci- ety: its stubborn adherence to the patterns and institutions that hearken back to the Soviet era. Th is phenomenon transcends political structures and encompasses economic system as well as broad patterns of social interaction. It cannot be dismissed as merely a temporary glitch on the road to democracy or explained solely by the effi cient ruthlessness of the current political regime. In this book I try to explain the current peculiarities of Belarus’s social and political landscape by investigating the country’s long history as a borderland between Russia and Poland. Specifi c attention is paid to the impact of the borderland position on Belarus’s development toward modernity. While Europe might think of itself largely in post-modern and post-national terms, for Belarus modernity and nationality still provide the main frame of reference. Th e book is about the Belarusian national idea that found its realization in modern national institutions only from 1920s onwards, as a part of the Soviet project. When the latter unraveled in 1991, Belarus retained the only type of nationhood it was familiar with: a set of national institutions inherited from the Soviet era that could only survive in a symbiosis with Russia. In Belarus, borderland is not an abstract category. At a roadside mar- ketplace, an old peasant selling apples would tell you that his orchard was planted “in Polish times” and lament, albeit not too vociferously, the dispossession of his family “when the Soviets came”. In a large city or a small town, a Russian Orthodox church may stand close to a Roman Catholic church; both would attract equally steady streams of worshipers on Sundays. A conversation with an educated Belarusian will reveal that his attitudes toward government offi cials vary in part according to their regional roots. Th ose who come from the west of the country are thought to be more subtle, urbane, sophisticated than their uncouth counterparts born and bred in the east. He would, how- ever, stop short of saying that the former were “of Belarusian descent, of Polish nation” or, in Latin, “Gente Lithuani, natione Poloni”. Th at’s how local gentry in the Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth tended to style themselves, emphasizing both local roots and affi nity with Polish 2 introduction culture. Belarusian politicians, from the conspicuously authoritarian President Lukashenka to the liberal democratic opposition leaders, would talk about Belarus as a part of Europe and then extol its ability to serve as a bridge between Europe and Russia, defi ning the latter as a fraternal nation with strong ties to Belarus. Patterns of everyday life, collective and individual memory, personal attitudes and political aspirations are shaped by the borderland position of the country. Th e bewildering array of names used to identify the same nation (ancestors of today’s Belarusians were referred to as Kryvichans, Russians, Lithu- anians, Poles) illustrates that historical roots of Belarus’s borderland status are not only tangled but also very deep. Yet perhaps nothing refl ects this status with greater detail and clarity than the enduring features of Belarus’s urban landscape. Few cities in Belarus give visual clues that unequivocally identify them as Belarusian. In the west, Grodno’s skyline is dominated by magnifi cent baroque cathedrals where Roman Catholic Mass has been celebrated for centuries. Th e 16th century palace on the top of the hill overlooking the Nieman river was the residence of Stephan Bathory, a Transylvanian prince elected Polish king who shortly before his death in 1586 chose to live in the city which straddled both parts of his realm, the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. Narrow streets lined by eighteenth century buildings have not been completely replaced by the functional ugliness of late Soviet era apartment com- plexes. Th e view has all the hallmarks of the cities west of the border, in Poland. Two hundred miles to the south on the low fl at bank of the Pina river, Pinsk displays baroque cathedrals and monasteries of similar style and history. In eastern Belarus, the provincial center of Mogilev has few visible signs of being Belarusian. Rationed grandeur of post- war Stalinist provincial architecture shapes the central part, while a bland monstrosity of gray concrete blocks spreads out to the city limits. Mogilev, together with other two provincial centers, Vitebsk to the north and Gomel to the south, would not be out of place hundreds of miles east, in Russia. Perhaps Belarus’s capital city, Minsk, is the archetypal Belarusian city, the one where the country’s peculiar history found its enduring visual representation. Severely damaged in the second World War, Minsk had not been restored. Instead, it was built anew, an example of Soviet urban renewal of the 1950s. Most buildings that survived the war were torn down, so as to completely obliterate the existing street grid and create a space for a totally new city. Th e result is still there: wide avenues, green .

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