This article was originally published in Danish on April 12, 2024.
By Povl H. Riis-Knudsen
BOOK REVIEW:
Swetlana Alexijewitsch
Secondhand-Zeit, Leben auf den Trümmern des Sozialismus
Suhrkamp 2013
Original title:
Светла́на Алекса́ндровна Алексие́вич
Время секонд хэнд – Конец красного человека
Время, Москва 2013.
Belarusian title (for language geeks who immediately see Belarusian between Polish and Russian…)
Святлана Аляксандраўна Алекссіевіч
Час second-hand – Канец чырвонага чалавека
English edition:
Svetlana Alexievich
Second-Hand Time
Fitzcarraldo Editions
It was a bit of a coincidence that I bought this book. There was a stack at Dussmann in Friedrichstraße in Berlin, along with other books about Russia, and I thought maybe I should read it. I don’t regret that I did. It’s actually a great book if you want to understand Russia and the Russians, and it’s based on the period I remember so clearly: The horrible misery of the Yeltsin era.
The author was born in what is now Ivano-Frankivsk in Ukraine in 1948. Her mother was Ukrainian, her father Belarusian. It is said that she speaks Belarusian, but writes in Russian, because that is where she reaches by far the largest audience. She herself considers Belarusian to be a literarily immature peasant language. Others say it’s because she doesn’t speak it well enough. Belarusian is, unfortunately, a dying language. I would be surprised if she doesn’t also speak some Ukrainian. In that way, she is the typical Soviet person. She currently lives in Minsk, the capital of Belarus, but she is definitely more popular in the West than in Russia and Belarus, where her books are also available in bookstores, if only online – and where this one was first published. The book has also been published in Belarusian in Minsk, although she is quite critical of Lukashenko. Some countries take freedom of speech more literally than others. She has been showered with awards, including the Nobel Prize in Literature – not necessarily the best way to enter the Russian market in these times. Perhaps the reason the author is not so popular in Russia is because she is so brutally honest. She tries to tell the story as it was, not as we would like to see it today.
This book is the last in a series of five about the “Red Man”. The book consists of a large number of interviews with ordinary people in Russia, young and old, communist and anti-communist, poor and relatively wealthy among each other. It can almost be considered an autopsy report covering the last 100 years of Russian history. My generation remembers much of this history – and Russians also remember it through their parents’ accounts. Few countries have had such a horrific recent history as Russia – but we should not forget that the past century has not only been horrific. It has been a history that has been rich in sorrow, joy, fear, excitement, suffering, defeat, victory, poverty and progress. A century that has covered the full spectrum of human emotions and experiences to a degree hardly seen in any other country – with the possible exception of Germany. You need to know and understand this history in order to understand the Russian man and Russian society. Danish politicians and so-called intellectuals only know Russia from Hollywood productions and the American-inspired mass media’s caricature of Russia, and that is why today they only make the wrong decisions when it comes to relations with this large and important European country. In general, the United States is characterized by not understanding people, peoples, languages and cultures other than their own; in fact, Americans do not even understand their own country, because their frame of reference is just as distorted when it comes to the United States as it is when it comes to Russia. Here, it is just the false positive myths spread among an uneducated, ignorant and spiritually narrow-minded population, which in terms of culture and education does not reach the Russian people.
In the 20th century, Russia has undergone 2 colossal upheavals. The Russian Revolution and Lenin’s subsequent coup d’état, which at a stroke destroyed the entire old order and threw the country into lawless chaos. Everything had to be dissolved: art, the family, property, power structures – everything. The plan, of course, was to build an entirely new society based on the free worker and artist. It was easier in theory than in practice. The ensuing civil wars on multiple fronts only made things worse.
This was largely Lenin’s legacy to Stalin – along with countless mass graves. Where Lenin was a relatively educated man who spoke – or at least read and understood – 9 languages, Stalin was the typical proletarian who socially came from absolutely nothing. People from the Caucasus are generally not known to possess any kind of velvet gloves, and Stalin’s wardrobe didn’t include them either. For him, it was a matter of maintaining power, stabilizing society – and transforming a backward feudal peasant society into a modern industrial society in record time, all based on clear ideological principles that stood in the way of this development. However, this was not to stop Stalin. The first step, however, was to create enthusiasm – especially among young people. The image of the coming ideal society contributed greatly to this, along with the thorough organization of society. Everyone was a member of one association or another, holding educational meetings and raising the red flag at demonstrations on every conceivable occasion. Children in children’s organizations, young people in youth organizations, the various professional groups in their organizations, etc. And make no mistake: Stalin was loved. Not by everyone, of course. The collectivization of agriculture was a costly and utterly failed experiment on an ideological basis, and it created both hunger and resistance, but resistance was cracked down with a heavy hand. Repentance was systematized. Family members and neighbors turned each other in for non-existent offenses. People disappeared into labor camps for years for nothing. My wife’s grandfather accidentally stepped on a Stalin picture that had fallen off the wall during a dance in the community center. Labor camp for 6 years. Torture was systematic and brutal. Everyone knew it, but they saw it as necessary for the creation of the utopian society of the future. Even innocent prisoners in the Gulag loved Stalin – because what would the alternative to Stalin be.
Finally, we shouldn’t forget that the Gulag camps were also meant as a way to provide labor for unpopular tasks. There weren’t many volunteers flocking to work in the coal mines or cut down trees in Vorkuta, Norilsk, Karaganda, Magadan or other similar places. There were also railroads to be built, dams to be constructed, new farmland to be reclaimed. But many projects were actually carried out by young volunteer pioneers, without whom they would not have been realized. These young people were driven by enthusiasm. Russia is different from anything we know. The vast expanses, the harsh climate – both summer and winter – the sparse population in Siberia. It places completely different demands on the state and its people than our densely populated little country, which is spoiled by the warm waters of the Gulf Stream – and it cannot be compared to the USA, only to some extent to Alaska. Russia’s history is fundamentally different from that of any other European country.
In the book, we hear from executioners and prisoners, family members, soldiers, workers and academics. We hear just about everyone, winners and losers. And we can only conclude that life as such went on. It was arduous and poor – unless you belonged to the ruling elite – but you worked for the great future you had been promised.
Then came the war and with it hunger, 27 million deaths and endless suffering – but it was followed by victory, and its importance in Russian self-image cannot be overestimated. The victory of the Western Allies was won very cheaply – and would not have been possible without the disproportionate Russian sacrifices.
A system like Stalin’s requires enemies to remind you that you must constantly fight for your cause. Stalin provided the population with plenty of enemies. Among other things, through the show trials, which had a thoroughly educational function, and when Stalin finally dies, the country is in mourning. People flocked to Red Square and wept in torrents. The father of the country, the victor of the Great Patriotic War, is gone, now what?
But his work is not gone. He took over a primitive society, but left behind a literate people, a strong infrastructure, good housing – at least in the cities, an electrified society, a productive industry and a fairly robust healthcare system. The heretical question now is: Couldn’t this have been achieved more cheaply in other ways – without so much suffering? Yes, you probably could, and more. The communist utopia cannot be realized, but belief in it creates the enthusiasm a society needs to survive in the long term. Think about how little enthusiasm capitalism creates. It only creates selfishness, overconsumption and spiritual numbing – and immense wealth for 1% of the world’s population. It does not create society – it dissolves it!
After Stalin’s death, the Soviet Union decays. It has its triumphs: the first man in space was not American, he was Russian, Yuri Gagarin. But the time had come when people wanted to experience a little prosperity in their own personal lives. The flow of information also reached the Soviet Union. People sat in their kitchens in their black jeans from the black market, complaining, singing Beatles songs and discussing politics – while normal life outside the kitchen went on. The communist system was unable to deliver the desired personal prosperity to a sufficient degree. Many people today take this to mean that state ownership of the means of production is not working, but it wasn’t so much the ownership as the management that was wrong. A planned economy can work to a certain extent – but not the detailed planning that took place in the Soviet Union, where unrealistic production targets were set for all companies, those who failed to meet these targets were penalized and it was seriously believed that demand in Vladivostok could be micromanaged from an office in Moscow 5 years into the future. Of course, this doesn’t work – and it gives rise to fraud and deception – and the rise of a black economy. Then there was the war in Afghanistan, which the Russians saw no point in. It was bound to go wrong – but it didn’t have to end so badly.
Now comes the second great upheaval. Gorbachev saw the problem, but he didn’t see – or didn’t want to see – that it was the underlying foundation that was wrong. He believed that the only way to solve the problems was by tinkering with the lid, introducing glasnost (openness) and perestroika (restructuring), satisfying some of the materialistic demands of the citizens. He underestimated the problems and came across as a weak leader, and his dissolution of the Soviet Union and withdrawal from Eastern Europe (especially the GDR) earned him a legacy as a traitor. In hindsight, there is undeniably some truth to this. Gorbachev gave up the Soviet Union’s position of power and left Russia open to its enemies.
The generals’ revolt brought Yeltsin to power. The provincial party soldier from Sverdlovsk (today again Yekaterinburg) was a brave man and a more determined man than Gorbachev, but he was absolutely useless at the task he had set himself. Together with Yegor Gaidar, he initiated the privatization of state property, i.e. the property of the Russian people. He was aided by Western experts, American moneymen with non-American names, who plundered Russia and inflicted two state bankruptcies, hyperinflation, unemployment, shortages of money and goods and general misery. Apart from a good deal of ill will, the foreign experts had no prerequisites for this task. They did not understand how the communist economy worked and how much this restructuring – which went far beyond what Gorbachev had imagined – affected the daily lives of ordinary people. It was a terrible time! I lived through it, and it was more horrible than anyone in the West can imagine.
Recovery came first with Vladimir Putin, a brilliant leader with a plan. Slowly but surely, he transformed Yeltsin’s bankrupt nest into a modern, functioning state. He’s not finished, but despite America’s war with Russia, the reconstruction program continues unabated. As with any other social upheaval, it is the old who have had to pay the price. The social security that did exist under Communism is gone. It’s heartbreaking to see old wives begging on the streets in a snowstorm. However, there are far fewer of them now than under Yeltsin. The real victims are those without families, because in Russia, family – and friends – are your social safety net. But a reasonable welfare state requires society and production to function. It has come to that, and the West’s sanctions have done Russia a great service by forcing the country to produce its own goods instead of importing them. The West likes to compare the war in Afghanistan with the operation in Ukraine. This is a false comparison. The Russians had no relationship with Afghanistan. It was, of course, an attempt to protect the weak underbelly of the Soviet Union, but there was no popular support for it. Ukraine, on the other hand, is not foreign to the Russians. It is their family that is being oppressed and their family’s property that is being sold to Zelensky’s racial brethren in the US. It is this family relationship that means that Russia has not long since razed Ukraine to the ground. The war is of course costly, but Russia had built up enormous reserves so that normal development can continue anyway. That’s why the Russians love Putin!
Of course, this is not a retelling of the book’s content. Interviews are by nature scattered fencing. I have tried to erect a skeleton that helps in the understanding of these interviews. For the Russian reader, such a skeleton is a given. For a spoiled Westerner, it is not.
The book ends in Minsk, where a young girl recounts her participation in the demonstrations against Lukashenko and her subsequent arrest, which lands her in prison for a month. In Belarus, they still use Stalin’s rulebook – so it was not nice. It was humiliating and horrible, and that was the point. It’s a better safeguard against recidivism than endless conversations with the probation service. Finally, in the middle of the night and without money, she is driven outside the city and let out. A taxi driver takes her home and tries to reason with her. There is money to be made. His wife needs new boots and his daughters need new jackets. He is an engineer, but now he works as a taxi driver because he needs the money. What the girl has going on are luxury problems. They don’t interest anyone. And he’s right. She is expelled from university and kicked out of the dormitory, her family distances themselves from her, her friend leaves her. When she flees to the village where her family is from, she is met with the same picture. These rebellious youths, in the opinion of one resident, should simply be lined up against a wall and shot. 30,000 participated in these demonstrations, perhaps another 30,000 would have liked to participate but didn’t dare. Perhaps another 30,000 might have sympathized with them. Minsk has 2 million inhabitants…
Perhaps we should think about this when we hear in the media about large demonstrations against this or that government! Except that such demonstrations are usually organized and paid for from Washington – as were the demonstrations in Minsk…
I have never been a big supporter of Lukashenko. I think he has given too much away on Belarusian culture, language and nationality, but most Belarusian citizens probably feel like Russians – so maybe it’s a bit of a luxury problem. However, Lukashenko has spared Belarus from Gaidar’s capitalist experiments. Much works in Belarus as it did in the Soviet Union. There are probably fewer super-rich – and certainly fewer very poor. Reforms are being implemented slowly, and that’s probably not a bad thing! The prerequisite for such slow development is stability, which in Belarus means Lukashenko! Ukraine is a lesson that should deter the Belarusians from similar experiments!
A recommendable book title:
Pieter Waterdrinker
The Long Song of Tchaikovsky Street: a Russian adventure
Scribe 2022
Also available in Dutch and German! It is a novel, but as the subtitle says: An autobiographical tale from Russia. It depicts life during the collapse of the Soviet Union, and it does so masterfully. Some may find it exaggerated, but sometimes reality truly does surpass fiction!