Curating the cultural canon

Parallel to the creation of a historical canon, IR also shapes a distinct émigré cultural canon by focusing on particular aspects of prerevolutionary Russian art and culture.

Again it can be argued that IR’s cultural canon is a curated form of prerevolutionary culture, consisting of a selection of aspects which IR deems worthy of preserving (or, put differently, thinks its public deems worthy of preserving). In the case of IR’s cultural canon, the notion of culture coincides with Raeff’s conception of culture as creative production. Hence, in this chapter the term culture will always refer to creative culture. Which elements of prerevolutionary Russian art and culture form part of this émigré canon, and what does IR have to say about them?

When looking at prerevolutionary culture in IR, three things clearly stand out. First of all, prerevolutionary culture in IR is predominantly literary. Second, however, among prerevolutionary culture items – either literary or non-literary – the focus is far more on the lives and surrounding context of writers and artists than on their actual work. As such, this corresponds with IR’s historical canon, which revolves more around personal experiences with history, than facts. Thirdly, IR’s prerevolutionary culture items, it can be argued, convey the image that prerevolutionary culture is but part of the continuum of past-present-future. IR deems it important – self-evident even – that its readers know the prerevolutionary cultural canon. But at the same time, IR acknowledges that Russian art and culture did not die with the 1917 and also covers émigré art; I will discuss this more fully in 2.2. Furthermore, it should be noted that IR does not prefer either aspect of Russian culture.

Arguably one of the most – if not the most – cherished element of Russian culture in general is literature. Russian culture is considered a logocentric culture, centered around the word and literature (Huttunen 2005: 1-2). Because of strict censorship in 19^th-Century Russia, literature became a crucial – if not the only – forum for developing and spreading ideas (Grillaert 2011: 8). The significance of literature in Russian culture is certainly reflected in IR’s pages, as the newsmagazine weekly devotes a significant portion of its content to literature and literary reviews. From IR’s very inception, literature has been a fixed value. Each issue opens with a short story, and most issues contain several other prose stories and occasionally also poems. IR, however, displays a clear predilection for contemporary middlebrow literature, based on everyday life in both the émigré community and Soviet Russia (more on this in 4 and 5.1.6). As such, its literary section fits well within its overall focus on contemporary life.

Of all 736 literary items published in IR under Mironov, only four were written before the Revolution. As IR clarifies in short introductions to those stories, these

items are published mainly because they are ‘peculiar cases’ and not canonical items of Russian prerevolutionary literature. Three of them are by Anton Chekhov: the short story “Fish love” (“Rybya lyubov’”¹⁰⁶), originally published under the pseudonym

“Man without a spleen” (Chelovek bez selezyonki); an untitled fable in rhyme – according to IR “perhaps his only poetic work”¹⁰⁷; and “Jubilee” (“Yubiley”), according to IR “one of his unpublished stories”, written under the pseudonym Chekhonte and

“for the first time reprinted in the Russian émigré press”¹⁰⁸. The fourth item, then, is a short story by Nikolay Nekrasov, entitled “The story of a poor supplicant” (“Rasskaz o bednom prositele”). At the time of its publication in IR, the magazine indicates, the story had been newly discovered in Nekrasov’s personal documents. What binds these four stories is the fact that they are, above all, literary discoveries for IR’s readers. The rest of the literature in IR is written by contemporary authors – émigré, Soviet, and foreign. This focus on postrevolutionary literature fits well with IR’s identity as a newsmagazine with a strong focus on everything contemporary. Hence, the only four reprints of prerevolutionary literature in IR fit well within this strategy, as they are most likely unknown to the readers and thus hold a certain news value.

The fact that IR only rarely publishes prerevolutionary literature, however, does not mean that it considers prerevolutionary literature to be insignificant. Quite the contrary. From 1929 onwards, IR launches the initiative of accompanying every other issue with literary supplements. Throughout the year, IR offers its subscribers a package of twenty-four works for an additional price in order to compile their own

“library of the best Russian and foreign writers”¹⁰⁹. The list below indicates the books IR provides to its readers in 1929:

1. I. A. Bunin – The Gentleman from San Francisco (Gospodin iz San-Frantsisko, 1916)

2. 1. I. A. Bunin – The Village (Derevnya, 1910)

3. 1. I. A .Bunin – The Cup of Life (Chasha zhizni, 1915) 4. K. D. Balmont – A Gift to Earth (Dar zemle, 1921) 5. Z. N. Gippius – Heavenly words (Nebesnye slova, 1906) 6. V. K. Zaytsev – Travelers (Putniki, 1921)

7. A. I. Kuprin – Sulamith (Sulamif, 1908)

8. A. I. Kuprin – Gambrinus (1907)

9. A. I. Kuprin – Stories for children (Rasskazy dlya detey)

10. D. S. Merezhkovsky – December the fourteenth (14^oe dekabrya, 1918) 11. N. A. Teffi – The Quiet Backwater (Tikhaya zavod, 1921)

12. B. V. Savinkov – The Black Horse (Kon voronoy, 1923)

13. I. S. Shmelyov – Inexhaustible Chalice (Neupivayemaya chasha, 1921) 14. Don Aminado – Smoke Without Fatherland (Dym bez otechestva, 1921) 15. Collection of Russian writers (Kapnist, Fonvizin, Griboedov), edited by I. A.

Bunin (Sbornik russkikh pisateley pod red. ak. I. A. Bunina) 16. M. Zoshchenko – The Tsar’s Boots (Tsarskye sapogi, 1927) 17. L. Leonov – The Badgers (Barsuki, 1924)

18. P. Romanov – Stories (Rasskazy, 1926) 19. A. Tolstoy – Obsession (Navazhdeniye, 1919)

20. A. Tolstoy – The Lame Prince (Khromoy barin, 1912)

21. Children’s tales with illustrations (Detskiye skazki s kartinkami) 22. Claude Farrère – Le dernier Dieu (1926)

23. William Locke – Pirella (1926)

24. Marcel Prévost – Sa maîtresse et moi (1925)

The date between brackets is the original publication date. As this list includes prerevolutionary, Soviet (in geographical terms, at least, as Zoshchenko did not really adhere to Soviet ideology) and émigré works, it is clear that when referring to the best

‘Russian’ writers, IR uses this word in the broadest sense. Interestingly, the prerevolutionary works in this list are not by ‘classic’ prerevolutionary authors, such as Pushkin or (Lev Nikolayevich) Tolstoy. Instead, IR prints prerevolutionary works of renowned authors now living and working in emigration, such as Bunin, Kuprin and Balmont. Also a prerevolutionary work of Aleksey Tolstoy – who used to be an émigré in Berlin but has returned to Soviet Russia – is included. The only exception is the book containing works of 18^th and early-19^th century writers such as Kapnist, Fonvizin and Griboyedov. Furthermore, IR also includes the works of three French authors, as well as a collection of illustrated fairytales for children; it is not specified whether or not these are Russian fairytales, nor was I able to verify this. With the exception of Leonov, Farrère and Prévost, all of the authors listed above have already been printed inside IR’s pages before appearing in the literary supplements. In its first set of literary supplements, IR thus provides a very diverse set of literature; but canonical prerevolutionary literature is clearly absent.

It is only in its second set of literary supplements, provided in 1930, that IR starts including truly canonical Russian writers. What is more, the focus of this second set of supplements is almost exclusively on prerevolutionary Russia, as the following list shows:

1-6. A. S. Pushkin – The complete collected works (Polnoye sobranniye sochineniya)

7-10. M. Yu. Lermontov – The complete collected works (Polnoye sobranniye sochineniya)

11. Dostoyevsky for children (Dostoyesky dlya detey)

12. I. S. Turgenev – Selected works (Izbrannye proizvedeniya) 13. F. I. Tyutchev – Poems (Stikhotvoreniya)

14. I. S. Turgenev – First love, with illustrations in color (Pervaya lyubov, 1860) 15. A. A .Blok – Theatre works (Teatr)

16-18. S. S. Yushkevich – Leon Drey (volume 1, 2 & 3 – 1911, 1923, 1928) 19. Tolstoy for children (Tolstoy dlya detey)

20. The Diary of [Tsar] Nikolay II (Dnevnik Nikolaya II) 21. Maurice Paléologue – Roman de l’impérateur¹¹⁰

22. Petersburg in poetry by Russian poets. Edited by Gleb Alekseyev, with engravings in color and black (“Peterburg” Alekseyeva. Gravyuri v kraskakh i chern.)

23. E. Molokhovets – A Gift to Young Housewives (Podarok molodym khozyaykam, 1861)

24. M. M. Zoshchenko – Nervous people (Nervnye lyudi, 1927)

In accordance with the previous year, IR claims, it wants to “not only give its readers good entertaining reading and first-class illustrative material from the life of Russia and the whole world, but also provide them with the opportunity to supplement their library with a valuable Russian book”¹¹¹. This time around, the emphasis is clearly on the prerevolutionary canon, including works by Pushkin, Lermontov, Turgenev and Tyutchev, as well as children’s literature by Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky. As I was not able to study those literary supplements, it is unclear whether the stories by Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky were originally for children, or were adapted by IR. With Zoshchenko’s Nervous people, IR includes only one postrevolutionary, and more particularly Soviet literary work – although, again, only geographically Soviet and not ideologically.

Furthermore, as contrasted with the literary supplements of 1929, in 1930 no émigré or Western literature is included. Additionally, also new is IR’s inclusion of non-fiction

110 IR refers to this book as Roman de l’Impératrice (Roman imperatritsy). This is a mistake, as IR incorporates Paléologue’s Le roman tragique de l'Empereur Alexandre II (1923).

111 “[…] не только дать своим читателям хорошее занимательное чтение и первоклассный иллюстрационный материал из жизни России и всего мира, но предоставить им также возможность

works as well. These works cover prerevolutionary Russia in various ways, as there is the diary of Tsar Nikolay II, the historical work on emperor Aleksandr II by renowned French diplomat and historian Maurice Paléologue, and even Molokhovets’s prerevolutionary cookbook. IR thus brings prerevolutionary Russia into the émigrés’

homes not only through literature, but also through non-fiction works, reflecting both highbrow and more everyday cultures.

It is clear that for its literary supplements in 1930, IR aims at bringing prerevolutionary Russia to émigré households, a strategy that is applauded by renowned émigré writer and critic Georgy Adamovich. From mid-1929 onwards, Adamovich leads IR’s literary criticism section Literaturnaya nedelya (Literary week).

As such, IR thus provides a significant platform to the critic. In Literaturnaya nedelya, Adamovich praises the magazine’s initiative of providing its readers with Russian literature in supplements. But, more importantly, Adamovich is especially delighted about IR’s focus on the classical literary canon:

I think that IR is doing a very necessary thing by providing Pushkin and Lermontov as annexes to the magazine. This is the same as what [Adolf] Marks’s Niva once did. But now we have to start all over again and instead of searching for authors who have not yet reached the ‘general public’, we have to reintroduce Pushkin and Lermontov to this ‘general public’. This is like a ‘forced gift’, the value of which, perhaps, not everyone will immediately understand, but over time, everyone will recognize. Even he who thinks that he remembers all the

‘classics’ perfectly, although ‘he has not reread them for a long time’ – let him try, let him discover Onegin or A Hero of Our Time: he will see how much he has forgotten, or what he simply did not notice before. And he will agree that such books at home are ‘objects of first necessity’.¹¹²

By offering these books in annex, Adamovich clarifies, IR puts the prerevolutionary practice of Niva into the émigré context, with the aim of allowing its readers to stay familiar with prerevolutionary Russian literary classics. And, according to Adamovich, these literary classics are almost a basic need for émigrés. On other occasions, Adamovich urges IR’s readers to reread Russian classics. When advising on summertime reading, for instance, he suggests

[t]o reread the ‘old’ but not outdated Tolstoy, Gogol, Dostoyevsky, or even Pisemsky, or at least Turgenev... The nomadic life and the complete lack of books among most of us have led to the fact that War and Peace or Demons are half-forgotten here. It cannot be otherwise. We read them in Russia, but here we do not have them ‘at hand’. In libraries they sign up for ‘new products’ of course, and not for Tolstoy and Gogol.¹¹³

Apart from Adamovich’s remarks on the necessity of canonical Russian literature in exile, IR itself never explicitly indicates why it deems it so important to read Russian classics. Every time a new book appears in annex, IR announces it at the top of the issue’s first page, but IR never speaks out on the significance of the work provided.

Above all, it seems self-evident that the émigrés know their literary canon. In this light, it thus is crucial that IR provides its readers with copies of those prerevolutionary Russian works, as they are not physically available abroad, not even in libraries, as Adamovich indicates.

Until the final volume, IR’s literary supplements continue in the same vein, allowing readers to further complete their (predominantly prerevolutionary Russian) library.

Until 1932, IR offers twenty-four books per year, but in honor of IR’s tenth anniversary in 1933, it doubles the amount and offers forty-eight books in the series “Biblioteka

‘Illyustrirovannaya Rossiya’” (The ‘IR’ library), published by its own printing house.

From 1933 until 1937 the amount of literary supplements varies from forty-four to fifty-two, but eventually reverts to fourteen books in 1938 and eighteen in 1939, though readers have the possibility of ordering previous supplements. In total, more than half of all the yearly supplements are works by prerevolutionary authors (such as Pushkin, Lermontov, Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, Gogol and Turgenev) or

113 “Перечитать ‘старье’ не старящее Толстого, Гоголя, Достоевского, или даже Писемского или хотя бы Тургенева... Кочевая жизнь и полное отсутствие книг у большинства из нас привели к тому, что

‘Война и Мир’ или ‘Беси’ здесь полузабыты. Иначе и быть не может. Их мы читали в России, а здесь их у нас нет ‘под рукой’. В библиотеки же подписываются для ‘новинок’ конечно а не для Толстого с

prerevolutionary works by then émigré authors (like Bunin, Gippius and Kuprin). The second place is taken by works written in emigration (by writers like Zaytsev, Teffi and Don-Aminado) and the remaining works belong to – again, geographical, not ideological – Soviet writers (mainly Zoshchenko, but also Bulgakov, Leonov, Shishkov, Yakovlev, and Pilnyak). Over the entire course of the literary supplements, only seventeen of the total 368 works are written by Western writers (including quite renowned authors such as Claude Farrère, Marcel Prévost, William John Locke and Thomas Mayne Reid), with a flare-up in 1939: that year seven of the eighteen books are by French authors. Finally, while the vast majority of IR’s supplements are literary works, historical works and memoirs on the prerevolutionary Russian past are also included – ranging generally from 5 to 12% of the total amount, with peaks in 1935 and 1937 of, respectively, 68% and 31% of the total amount of books.

Interestingly, thus, when it comes to prerevolutionary literature, IR adopts a two-track policy. On the one hand, within its own pages IR publishes almost exclusively contemporary literature, not only by émigré writers, but also by Soviet and Western authors. This contemporary literature is predominantly, but not exclusively, middlebrow and can be seen as an extension of news items and reports, offering a glimpse into the everyday life of those respective societies (I will come back on this when discussing Soviet literature in 5.1.6). On the other hand, IR emphasizes the importance of not forgetting the prerevolutionary Russian classics. However, as IR hardly publishes prerevolutionary literature inside the magazine, it can be argued that IR feels it is the individual responsibility of every émigré to regularly reread those canonical works. It is only in order to overcome the practical obstacle of not having those works available in libraries or book stores that IR provides those work as supplements to its issues.

Apart from providing its readers with prerevolutionary literature in annex, IR also publishes theme issues, dedicated to canonical prerevolutionary Russian writers, such as Tolstoy, Chekhov and Turgenev. IR publishes those theme issues on the occasion of these authors’ birth or death anniversaries. The most commemorated author (and person in general) in IR undoubtedly is poet Aleksandr Pushkin. This fondness for Pushkin is characteristic not only of IR, but of the émigré community as a whole. In fact, Raeff (1990: 96) even speaks of a true “Pushkin cult” in the interwar émigré community. Since 1925, Russia Abroad has been organizing the yearly Day of Russian Culture (Den russkoy kultury) on the poet’s birthday (June 8). The aim of this day, IR states in a short article on the very first Day of the Russian Culture, is to “unite Russian émigrés and strengthen their national resilience”¹¹⁴. IR’s coverage of Pushkin and

114 “Организация дня русской культуры является одним из способов объединения русских

prerevolutionary culture in general thus surpasses the mere act of preserving the past, it can be argued, though it is used as a means to create coherence in the émigré community and boost the émigrés’ moral strength.

From 1926 until 1929, on the occasion of this cultural holiday IR publishes an annual Pushkin issue (Pushkinsky nomer¹¹⁵, figures 44-47) with various photographs and journalist portraits on the life and work of the poet, as well as more general depictions of (cultural) life during Pushkin’s time. However, other, non-themed issues of IR also occasionally include Pushkin. Remarkably, the Pushkin issues (and literary themed issues devoted to other authors) focus not so much on the actual works of those writers. Instead, IR’s articles focus on sensational, intriguing or newly discovered details of these writers’ lives – a choice undoubtedly dictated by IR’s nature as a newsmagazine, as well as the Zeitgeist’s predilection for anything spectacular and extravagant. A great number of these articles are written by émigré Pushkin expert Modest Gofman, but, remarkably, the work of Soviet scholars is printed, such as Pavel Shchyogolev, Nikolay Ashukin and Mstislav Tsyavlovsky, is also printed. This suggests that IR deems the subject of its articles and the expertise of the people who wrote them more important than their geographical (and maybe even ideological) provenance.

A favorite subject of the Pushkin articles is the poet’s infamous duel with French military officer Georges d’Anthès, during which Pushkin was fatally wounded, leading to his death two days later. Among such articles are “Pushkin’s duel”¹¹⁶; “Who was Pushkin’s murderer?”¹¹⁷; “Who wrote the anonymous letters to Pushkin?”¹¹⁸; “Who is Pushkin’s murderer?”¹¹⁹ and “Nikolay I and the duel of Pushkin”¹²⁰. With their sensational details on the dramatic death of an iconic Russian cultural figure, these articles all inform and entertain IR’s readers, instead of glorifying and preserving – or even just printing or making accessible – prerevolutionary literature.

Apart from Pushkin’s much-discussed death, other aspects of the poet’s life are also presented. It could be argued that most of these topics are above all trivialities, especially when compared to Pushkin’s enormous literary and cultural significance.

“Pushkin’s relics”¹²¹, for instance, comments on a number of the poet’s personal

115 IR 1925-23(32), 1926-23(56), 1927-23(108), 1928-23(160) and 1929-23(212).

116 “Дуэль Пушкина.” IR 1927-23(108), p. 8-11.

117 “Кто же был убийцею Пушкина?”. IR (1927-23(108), p. 2-5.

118 “Кто писал анонимные письма Пушкину?”. IR 1927-50(135), p. 8. These letters spread the rumor that Pushkin’s wife Natalya Goncharova was having an affair with d’Anthès, and caused Pushkin to challenge him to a duel.

119 “Кто убийца Пушкина?”. IR 1928-7(144), p. 4-6.

120 “Николай I и дуэль Пушкина”. IR 1929-23(212), p. 4-5.

121 “Пушкинские реликвии”. IR 1927-9(94), p. 12-13.

objects, such as his pipe, his writing desk and inkwell, and his pocket watch. In “The poet’s father”¹²², then, IR integrally prints a short biography of Pushkin, written by his father Sergey and never published before, with an introductory note by Modest Gofman. In “Pushkin’s first love”¹²³, Gofman discusses the poet’s first amorous explorations when he was a sixteen-year-old student at the lyceum. The article

“Different things about Pushkin”¹²⁴ lives up to its title as IR not only provides a view of the books in Pushkin’s personal library and his financial circumstances, but also includes a letter from a personal acquaintance of Pushkin’s, Pavel Bestuzhev, to his brother on the subject of the poet’s death. Furthermore, IR also focuses on significant places from Pushkin’s lifetime (“In Pushkin’s places”¹²⁵; “Pushkin’s Petersburg”¹²⁶) and portrays everyday life from his time (“How people lived in the Pushkin era”¹²⁷).

Finally, IR also publishes articles on Pushkin on the occasion of newly discovered works in Soviet archives, such as “The tale that Pushkin did not finish writing”¹²⁸ and

“New Pushkin”¹²⁹. IR, however, never publishes the actual works, in its literary section, for example; it only includes a few excerpts in these articles. The focus, thus, is, once more, not on the literature itself, but on the discovery and everything surrounding it.

As such, Pushkin is mainly commemorated as an icon of Russian prerevolutionary

As such, Pushkin is mainly commemorated as an icon of Russian prerevolutionary