Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dlnhk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-28T23:44:31.542Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Revolt of the Communist Intellectuals

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 August 2009

Edward Taborsky
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

It is well-known that the teachings of Marx and Lenin struck a response among those generally referred to as intellectuals. Among their most enthusiastic supporters in the countries which subsequently fell to communism may be found a long list of prominent writers, artists, scientists, even educators. Some of them, to be sure, were guided by sheer opportunism, jumping on what they took to be a band-wagon, but more joined because of misguided idealism. Some succumbed to the professed communist concern for the underdog and the inflated promises of better social justice; others wanted to register their protest against real or imaginary defects in the system under which they lived. Still others thought to uncover in the deterministic messianism and the apodictic claims of the Marxian Weltanschauung a safe-conduct through a world made uncertain by the awe-inspiring impact of modern technology with which liberal democracy seemed to be unable to cope.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Review of Politics , Volume 19 , Issue 3 , July 1957 , pp. 308 - 329
Copyright
Copyright © University of Notre Dame 1957

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Cf., for instance, Berggolc, Olga, “Razgovor o lirike,” Literaturnaya Gazeta, 04 16, 1953Google Scholar; Borgun, Samed, “Prava Poeta,”Google Scholaribid., May 12, 1953.

2 Pravda, 09 29, 1953.Google Scholar

3 No. 10, pp. 160 ff. A condensed English translation in the Current Digest of Soviet Press (further referred to as Digest), Vol. V, No. 52, pp. 4 ff.Google Scholar

4 “Ob iskrennosti v literature,” Novy Mir, No. 12, 12 1953, pp. 218 ff.Google Scholar

5 Condensed English text in the Digest, Vol. V, No. 41, pp. 42 ff.Google Scholar

6 No. 11, November, 1953, pp. 7 ff. English text in the Digest, Vol. V, No. 46, pp. 3 ff.Google Scholar

7 No. 1, January 1954. Condensed English translation in the Digest, Vol. V, No. 52, pp. 3 ff.Google Scholar

8 News from behind the Iron Curtain (further referred to as News), Vol. 3, No. 1, p. 28.Google Scholar

9 July 3, 1953.

10 For a fuller discussion of such trends see “Art Under the New Course” in News, Vol. 4, No. 1, pp. 23 ff.Google Scholar

11 Editorial in Rudé Právo, 12 8, 1953.Google Scholar

12 Jozef Grsuda's article in the Polish Youth Periodical Sztandar Mlodykh, 08 14, 1954Google Scholar. Cf. News, Vol. 4, No. 1, p. 23.Google Scholar

13 Milosz, Czeslaw, “Poland: Voices of Disillusion,” Problems of Communism, Vol. V, No. 3, p. 26.Google Scholar

14 Rudé Právo, 12 13, 1953.Google Scholar

15 Reports in Pravda, 12 13, 1953Google Scholar, and Izvestia, 12 17, 1953.Google Scholar

16 Izvestia, 02 2, 1954.Google Scholar

17 V. Vasilevsky's article in Literaturnaya Gazeta, 01 30, 1954Google Scholar. However, as late as March 1954 several postgraduate students defended Pomerantsev's stand in a letter to the Editor published in Komsomolskaya Pravda, 03 17, 1954Google Scholar. English text in the Digest, Vol. VI, No. 7, p. 13.Google Scholar

18 V. Kochetov's article, Pravda, 05 27, 1954.Google Scholar

19 Izvestia, 03 28, 1954.Google Scholar

20 Sovetskaya Kultura, 06 5, 1954Google Scholar. English text in the Digest, Vol. VI, No. 24, pp. 5 ff.Google Scholar

21 June 9, 1954.

22 Published in May 1954 issue of Znamya.

23 “Novaya povest Ilyi Erenburga,” Literaturnaya Gazeta, 07 17 and 20, 1954Google Scholar. Ehrenburg was allowed, however, to answer the criticism in the same magazine on August 3, 1954: “O Statie K. Simonova.”

24 Pravda, 05 6, 1954Google Scholar. The other three were: A. Surov, T. Galsanov, and L. Korobov.

25 “Ob oshibkakh zhurnala Novyi Mir,” Literaturnaya Gazeta, 08 17, 1954.Google Scholar

26 See the items, “Vyshe uroven ideino-vospitatelnoi raboty sredi pisatelei” and “Uluchshit ideino-vospitatelnuyu rabotu sredi pisatelei” Literaturnaya Gazeta, 07 17 and 15, 1954.Google Scholar

27 Izvestia and Pravda, 12 16, 1954.Google Scholar

28 “Maximum profit” was stated to be the basic economic law of capitalism in Stalin's last work, The Economic Problems of Socialism in the USSR.

29 “Oz izuchenii novoi i noveishei istorii kapitalisticheskikh stran,” Voprosy Istorii, No. 7, 07, 1954, pp. 3 ff.Google Scholar

30 “O diskussiakh v nauchnykh zhurnalakh,” Kommunist, No. 7, 05 1955, pp. 157 ff.Google Scholar

31 For a good selection of documentary evidence on the satellite anti-New-Course drive in literature see “Art Under the New Course,” News, Vol. 4, No. 1, pp. 23 ff.Google Scholar

32 Milosz, Czeslaw, op. cit., note on p. 26.Google Scholar

33 Znamya, 04 1956Google Scholar. For an analysis cf. Burmeister, Alfred, “Tauwetter mit Nachtfrostgefahr,” Ost-Probleme, Vol. 8, No. 29, pp. 999–1000.Google Scholar

34 A review and analysis of the Second Writers' Congress may be found in World Today, Vol. 11, No. 4Google Scholar: “The Dilemma of Soviet Writers.” Cf. also Struve, Gleb, “The Second Congress of Soviet Writers,” Problems of Communism, Vol. 6, No. 2, pp. 3 ff.Google Scholar

35 “K voprosu o tipicheskom v literature i isskustve,” Kommunist, No. 18, 12 1955, pp. 12 ff.Google Scholar

36 Cf., for instance: Dudintsev, V., Ne khlebom edinymGoogle Scholar; Panova, Vera, SerezhaGoogle Scholar; Pogodin, N., V troem poekhali na tselinuGoogle Scholar; Granin, D., Sobstvennoe MnenieGoogle Scholar; Evtushenko, E., I drugieGoogle Scholar; Kirsanov, S., Sem dnei nedeliGoogle Scholar, etc. Some of these works and others were hotly discussed at various writers' meetings. Cf., Literaturnaya Gazeta, 10 27, 11 24, 12 15, 1956, and 01 26, 1957.Google Scholar

37 Voprosy filosofii No. 5, 1956Google Scholar. English text in the Digest, Vol. VIII, No. 45, pp. 3 ff.Google Scholar

38 “Obsuzhdenie ocherkov istorii istoricheskoi nauki v SSSR,” Voprosy Istorii, No. 12, 1955, pp. 188 ff.Google Scholar

39 Pikman, A., “O borbe kavkazskikh gortsev s tsarskimi kolonizatorami,” Voprosy Istorii, No. 3, 1956Google Scholar. Oslikovskaya, J. S. and Snegov, A. V., “Za pravdivoe osveschenie istorii proletarskoi revolutsii,”Google Scholaribid.

40 “Velikyi Russkyi Pisatel—k 75letiu so dnia smerti F. M. Dostoyevskogo,” Pravda, 02 6, 1956Google Scholar; Sidorov, M., “O filosofskom nasledii G. V. Plekhanova,” Kommunist, No. 6, 04 1956, pp. 120Google Scholar ff. According to Pravda, 12 8, 1956Google Scholar, a fifteen volume edition of Plekhanov's works is now being prepared.

41 An article by Sokolov-Skalya, P. in Izvestia, 10 13, 1956Google Scholar, and Pravda, 10 15, 1956.Google Scholar

42 Izvestia, 01 8, 1957Google Scholar. Gerasimov's article, “Put nashego iskusstva,” appeared in Souetskaya Kultura on 03 27, 1956.Google Scholar

43 Among them were: P. Markish, A. Isbakh, M. D. Danin, I. Sheinin, P. G. Antokolsky, G. Brovman, I. Babel.

44 Cf. Fainsod, Merle, “What Russian students think,” Atlantic, Vol. 199, No. 2, 02 1957Google Scholar; Hangen, Welles, “Hungarian crisis felt in Soviet,” New York Times, 12 7, 1956Google Scholar; Salisbury, H. E., “Soviet students press for replies,” New York Times, 02 1, 1957.Google Scholar

45 Reports of student unrest in various Soviet university cities, such as Moscow, Leningrad, Sverdlovsk, Kharkov, appeared in Pravda, 12 16 and 27, 1956Google Scholar, Komsomolskaya Pravda, 12 4, 15, and 22, 1956Google Scholar, Sovetskaya Rossia, 12 22, 1956Google Scholar. Cf. also Digest, Vol. IX, No. 1, pp. 11–14.Google Scholar

46 For a few samples of the Partly offensive cf.: Diachenko, V., “O zadachakh nauchno-issledovatelskoi raboty v oblasti ekonomii,” Voprosy ekonomiki, No. 10, 10 1955, pp. 3 ffGoogle Scholar.; “Sviaz teorii s praktikoi apartiinaya propaganda,” Kommunist, No. 14, 09 1955, pp. 3 ff.Google Scholar; “O printsipialnosti v nauchnoi rabote,” Partiinaya Zhizn, No. 9, 1956Google Scholar; “Kommunisticheskaya partia pobezhdala i pobezhdaet vernostiu leninizmu,” Pravda, 04 5, 1956Google Scholar; “Zhizn i literatura,” Literaturnaya Gazeta, 05 8, 1956Google Scholar; “Ob izuchenii istorii istoricheskoi nauki,” Voprosy Istorii, No. 1, 1956, etc.Google Scholar

47 Molotov's new function became apparent from a report on his prominent appearance at the Soviet Artists' Conference in Sovetskaya Kultura, 11 20, 1956Google Scholar. Cf. Digest, Vol. VIII, No. 48, p. 1.Google Scholar

48 Pravda, 01 4, 22, and 27, 1957Google Scholar; Izvestia, 01 16, 1957.Google Scholar

49 On the developments in Poland cf. Milosz, Czeslaw, op. cit., Problems of Communism, Vol. V, No. 3, pp. 24Google Scholar ff.; “Upheaval in Poland” in News, Vol. 5, No. 11, 1956, pp. 3Google Scholar ff.; “Poland's October Revolution,” East Europe, Vol. 6, No. 1 and 2, 1957, pp. 3ffGoogle Scholar. On the developments in Hungary cf. Kormendi, Ferenc, “Hungary's Rebellious Muse,” Problems of Communism, Vol. V, No. 3, 1956, pp. 31Google Scholar ff.; “Hungarian Youth in Revolt,” East Europe, Vol. 6, No. 1, 1957, pp. 26 ff.Google Scholar

50 Hendrych, J., Zivot strany, 12 1955Google Scholar, cf. Prehled, III, No. 2, p. 31.Google Scholar

51 Kosík, Karel, Literární noviny, 12 10, 1955.Google Scholar

52 Prehled, III, No. 2, p. 3.Google Scholar

53 News, Vol. 5, No. 7Google Scholar, especially a speech by Hrubín, F., Literární noviny, 04 28, 1956Google Scholar, and by J. Seifert, ibid., April 29, 1956.

54 News, Vol. 5, No. 7, pp. 42 ff.Google Scholar

55 “Studenten -Mitstreiter für den Sozialismus,” Neues Deutschland, 12 14, 1956.Google Scholar

56 Ulbricht, Walter, “Was wir wollen und was wir nicht wollen,” Neues Deutschland, 12 30, 1956.Google Scholar

57 Wollweber, Ernst, “Schutz der Arbeiter-und-Bauern-Macht Sache all Burger der DDR,”Google Scholaribid., December 21, 1956.

58 Especially articles by Vezhinov, P., 04 5, 1956Google Scholar, and Gochev, Gocho, 09 15, 1955Google Scholar, cf. News Vol. 5, No. 7, pp. 10 ff.Google Scholar

59 Cf. Marinoff, Stefan, “Literary Ferment in Bulgaria,” Problems of Communism, Vol. V, No. 3, pp. 37 ff.Google Scholar

60 News, Vol. 5, No. 7, p. 14.Google Scholar

61 Rabotnichesko Delo, 12 2, 1956Google Scholar. Cf. Ost-Probleme, Vol. 9, No. 3, pp. 87–88.Google Scholar

62 News, Vol. 5, No. 7, pp. 54–55.Google Scholar

63 Ibid., Vol. 5, No. 8, p. 43.

64 Cf. Ost-Probleme, Vol. 9, No. 3, p. 89Google Scholar. Also Khrushchev's speech published in Pravda, 11 10, 1956Google Scholar, where he cited what the Rumanian workers did about the students' attitude.

65 Problems of Communism, Vol. V, No. 3, p. 39.Google Scholar

66 Ibid.