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title: author: publisher: isbn10 | asin: 2/1394 print isbn13: ebook isbn13: language: subject publication date: lcc: ddc: subject: Page i Bolshevik Festivals, 19171920 Page ii Studies on the History of Society and Culture Victoria E. Bonnell and Lynn Hunt, Editors 1. Politics, Culture, and Class in the French Re- volution, by Lynn Hunt 2. The People of Paris: An Essay in Popular Culture in the Eighteenth Century, by Daniel Roche 3. Pont-St-Pierre, 13981789: Lordship, Com- munity, and Capitalism in Early Modern France, by Jonathan Dewald 4. The Wedding of the Dead: Ritual, Poetics, and Popular Culture in Transylvania, by Gail Kligman 5. Students, Professors, and the State in Tsarist Russia, by Samuel D. Kassow 5/1394 6. The New Cultural History, edited by Lynn Hunt 7. Art Nouveau in Fin-de-Siècle France: Polit- ics, Psychology, and Style, by Debora L. Silverman 8. Histories of a Plague Year: The Social and the Imaginary in Baroque Florence, by Giulia Calvi 9. Culture of the Future: The Proletkult Move- ment in Revolutionary Russia, by Lynn Mally 10. Bread and Authority in Russia, 19141921, by Lars T. Lih 11. Territories of Grace: Cultural Change in the Seventeenth-Century Diocese of Grenoble, by Keith P. Luria 12. Publishing and Cultural Politics in Revolu- tionary Paris, 17891810, by Carla Hesse 6/1394 13. Limited Livelihoods: Gender and Class in Nineteenth-Century England, by Sonya O. Rose 14. Moral Communities: The Culture of Class Relations in the Russian Printing Industry 18671907, by Mark Steinberg 15. Bolshevik Festivals, 19171920, by James von Geldern Page iii Bolshevik Festivals, 19171920 James von Geldern UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS Berkeley / Los Angeles / London Page iv University of California Press Berkeley and Los Angeles, California University of California Press, Ltd. London, England ©1993 by The Regents of the University of California Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Von Geldern, James. Bolshevik festivals, 19171920 / James von Geldern. p. cm. (Studies on the history of society and culture ; 15) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-520-07690-7 (alk. paper) 1. TheaterSoviet UnionHistory20th century. 2. Soviet UnionHistoryRevolution, 19171921Theater and the revolution. 3. FestivalsSoviet Union. I. Title. II. Series. PN2724.V636 1993 792'.0947'09041dc20 92-9074 CIP 9/1394 Printed in the United States of America 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American Na- tional Standard for Information SciencesPermanence of Paper for Printed Library Ma- terials, ANSI Z39.481984. Page v To Anita, with love and affection Page vii O hushed October morning mild, Thy leaves have ripened to the fall; Tomorrow's wind, if it be wild, Shall waste them all. Robert Frost, October Page ix Contents List of Illustrations xi Acknowledgments xiii Introduction 1 1 15 The Precursors: Tsars, Socialists, and Poets 2 40 Revolution and Festivity 3 72 The Politics of Meaning and Style 4 103 New Uses for Popular Culture 13/1394 5 134 Transformation by Festival: Mass Festivals as Performance 6 175 Marking the Center: Festivals and Legitimacy Epilogue 208 List of Abbreviations 221 Notes 223 Bibliography 259 Index 305 Page xi List of Illustrations Figures 1. L. Petukhov, poster, May Day 1917. 19 2. E. Kruglikova, poster, Liberty Bond Campaign, May 1917. 20 3. Circus arena-stage for a production of Macbeth in Petrograd, 1918. 24 4. Cover of Kerzhentsev's Creative Theater, 1923. 29 5. V. Fidman, Smolny, engraving. 47 6. Poster for Meyerhold's production of Mystery-Bouffe, 1918. 67 7. Mayakovsky's costume sketches for the "clean" and the "unclean," Mystery-Bouffe, 69 1918. 15/1394 8. Monument to Taras Shevchenko, Moscow, built as part of Lenin's monumental 87 plan. 9. Grigory Zinoviev addressing the May Day 1918 parade on the Field of Mars, 92 Petrograd. 10. Emblem of the Mobile-Popular Theater, Petrograd. 120 11. Mikhail Blokh, The Metalworker, monumental sculpture, Petrograd, July 1920. 170 12. Amphitheater, Rock Island, Petrograd. 171 13. Stereotypical Polish nobleman of Civil War posters. 173 Page xii 14. Poster claiming the heritage of the Paris Commune for the Bolsheviks, 1921. 179 15. Graphic representations of the Third International, 1919 and 1920. 182 16. Maria Lebedeva, commemorative plate for the Second Congress of the Third 184 International. 17. Layout of Palace Square, Petrograd, for the November 1920 mass spectacle. 202 Plates 1. Holiday fireworks display, Moscow, 1744. Following page 133 2. Lithograph of the carnival on St. Petersburg's Field of Mars, 1825. 3. Mariinsky Palace, Petrograd, November 7, 1918. 4. Demonstration in Red Square, November 7, 1918. 5. Decoration of Hunters' Row, Moscow, November 1918. 17/1394 6. Tribune covering Pavel Trubetskoi's equestrian statue, Uprising Square, Petrograd, May Day 1919. 7. Boris Kustodiev, Celebration for the Second Congress of the Third Interna- tional, Petrograd, July 1920. 8. Toward a World Commune, mass spectacle, Stock Exchange, Petrograd, July 1920. 9. Vladimir Tatlin, Monument to the Third International, Petrograd, 1920. 10. The Red stage, Storming of the Winter Palace, mass spectacle, Petrograd, November 1920. 11. Liubov Popov and Alexander Vesnin, design for a theatricalized mass maneuver in honor of the Third International, Moscow, 1921. Page xiii Acknowledgments 19/1394 I have been gratified during the writing of this book by the interest I have met with on the part of my colleagues. Studying mass festivals nudged me into new and unanticipated fields, where my knowledge and skills were often min- imal; and I cannot thank enough those scholars whose advice has guided my first steps. My ap- preciation goes to Victor Terras, Sam Driver, and Patricia Arant, who encouraged me when I chose an untraditional dissertation topic and continued to support my work. I would also like to thank Albin Konechnyi, Lewis Siegelbaum, Lynn Mally, and Hubertus Jahn for lending me their knowledge of topics beyond my ken. Alma Law gave me great joy by showing me the film of a mass spectacle, one that I had given up for lost, finally allowing me to see this thing I had studied so many years in print. Richard Stites offered essential assistance throughout the writ- ing period, ranging from simple encouragement and fertile brainstorming to suggestions for the 20/1394 more mundane matter of bibliography. Victoria Bonnell and others who remain anonymous read the manuscript several timesfortitude enough alreadyand offered me far-reaching guidance and criticism. I thank them particularly for their commitment and diplomacy. Important institutional support has come from IREX, the U.S. Department of Education in the form of a Fulbright-Hayes grant, a Mellon Fel- lowship from Stanford University's Center for Soviet and East European Studies, and a sum- mer grant from the University of Illinois's Center for Russian and East European Studies. I would also like to thank my anonymous friends, advisors, and aides in Russia, particularly Page xiv those in Leningrad's Theater Institute and the Lunacharsky Theater Library and Theater Museum. Most of all, I thank my wife, Anita, who read the manuscript more times than anyone should have to, provided persistent and conscientious criticism, and endured a year in Russia. This book, which would never have been completed without her help, is dedicated to her. Page 1 Introduction Finding a Focus for Memory and Experience The people's army takes up position. Orders are telephoned. Movement in the streets. The Red Army encloses the Winter Palace in a ring of steel. A demand for surrender to avoid bloodshed is written and carried to the Winter Palace by messengers with a white flag. A wo- man soldier receives it and passes it into the building. Waiting. 23/1394 Agitators from Smolny penetrate into the Winter Palace. They enter through cellars, past electric cables, up stairways, along elaborate galleries with chandeliers. The agitators reach the Cossacks in the inner courtyard and begin talk- ing to them. A sailor in the gallery of the Winter Palace throws a grenade among the ca- dets. The Cossack artillery gallops out of the Palace, deserting the Government. But still no answer to the ultimatum. The envoys with the white flag return from the Palace and firing begins. The cruiser Aurora opens fire on the Winter Palace. The Mayor of Petrograd at the head of the bourgeois Commit- tee of Salvation crosses a bridge to parley with the workers and is held up by pickets of sailors. While the Mensheviks are still protesting, midnight strikes, and the Bolsheviks set the people's army on the attack of the Winter Palace. The attack begins. 24/1394 The people pour up through the palace . and drive out the women soldiers, who surrender with the other troops. The Ministers are ar- rested in their council room. By 2 a.m. the Provisional Government is overthrown and Len- in announces the news. 1 Many of us know the storming of the Winter Palace from the enactment in Sergei Eisenstein's Ten Days That Shook the World, which is sum- marized above. The great event began with a salvo from the battleship Aurorathe shot heard round the worldand by the time it was over the world had been transformed by revolution. The account, Page 2 which is filled with a human drama and historic- al sweep that have fired the imaginations of gen- erations, is no less gripping for its being impre- cise. The historical storming was something of a letdown. The palace housed a powerless and in- effectual cabinet; it was seized a day after the Bolsheviks had taken power; and it was never really stormed. Eisenstein was not in Petrograd for the October Revolution and can be excused for the embellishments. Far from detracting from the event, he improved on it, focused it, and, for many contemporaries, made it seem more truthful than before.