Why do ideas taken from the Soviet past, which seemed to have sunk into oblivion, take root so easily? Svetlana Aleksievich’s documentary prose helps to understand many amazing phenomena that happen to us today. She believes that the Soviet people have not gone away.
“For more than seventy years, a separate human type has been bred in the laboratory of Marxism-Leninism – homo soveticus. Some believe that this is a tragic character, others call him a “scoop”. It seems to me that I know this person, he is well known to me, I am next to him, I have lived side by side for many years. He is me. These are my acquaintances, friends, parents…”
This is how the book of the Belarusian writer, journalist Svetlana Aleksievich begins. Perestroika, which put an end to the history of developed socialism, simultaneously threw a huge number of people overboard. They never managed to adjust to their new life. In an instant, having lost a great country, an empire, they did not understand – for what, why? What did the wind of change bring with it, the freedom you dreamed of? Full stalls, abundance, unbridled consumption?.. “Everything was exchanged for sausage” – offended intonation comes through in many stories of this book.
Read more:
- The problem of transfer of experience
“The generation that, at an active age, found perestroika, turmoil, unpredictability, earned a huge stress for the psyche,” comments Jungian analyst Tatyana Rebeko. – People felt like billiard balls, which someone rolls against their will and desire. In order to somehow survive their own failure, it was easier for many to accept and reduce activity. Someone managed to build their own world, where they could predict something, and get ahead. But many remained to live with the flow, in an environment where everything is given to the will of some unknown forces – come what may, someday something will fall from somewhere. Maybe an apple, or maybe a bomb – we have no power over anything. They can no longer act, be active. And not because they don’t want to or someone forbids them. No, the mechanism is completely different. As if a person had a callus on the heel – then he would prefer to walk less so as not to burden the leg.
Reading the book, you feel the confusion of the narrators, their uncertainty. They praise the past and then seem to catch on, remembering something else – something that, alas, cannot be praised. But even the present times seem terrible to them. The stories collected in the book help to realize many amazing phenomena that are happening to us today. For example, why do ideas taken “from there” take root so easily: about a special path, great power, readiness to tighten their belts … “Socialism is over. And we stayed,” says one of the heroines of the book. The Soviet man has not gone anywhere and is miraculously growing in other generations who never had to live a single day in the USSR.
Read more:
- Feelings of patriotism
Two views
“The world crumbled into dozens of colorful pieces. How we wished that the gray Soviet everyday life would soon turn into sweet pictures from American cinema! Few people remember how we stood at the White House… Those three days shocked the world, but they didn’t shock us… Two thousand people rally, and the rest drive by and look at them like they are idiots. They drank a lot, we always drink a lot, but then they drank especially a lot. Society is frozen: where are we going? Will there be capitalism, or will there be good socialism? The capitalists are fat, scary – we were inspired from childhood …
The country was covered with banks and trading tents. There were completely different things. Not clumsy boots and old lady’s dresses, but things that we have always dreamed of: jeans, sheepskin coats, lingerie and good dishes … Everything is colorful, beautiful. Our Soviet things were grey. Ascetic, they looked like military men. Libraries and theaters were empty. They were replaced by bazaars and commercial shops. Everyone wanted to be happy, to get happiness now. Like children, they discovered a new world for themselves… We stopped fainting in the supermarket… Let’s sometimes start remembering with friends, so we die with laughter… Savages! The people were completely poor. Everything had to be learned… In Soviet times, it was allowed to have a lot of books, but not an expensive car and at home. And we learned to dress well, cook delicious food, drink juice and yogurt in the morning… Before that, I despised money because I didn’t know what it was. In our family it was not allowed to talk about money. Ashamed. We grew up in a country in which money, one might say, was absent. I, like everyone else, received my 120 rubles – and that was enough for me … Money became a symbol of freedom. This worried everyone, the strongest and most aggressive went into business. They forgot about Lenin and Stalin… Life! We chose a beautiful life. Nobody wanted to die beautifully, everyone wanted to live beautifully. Another thing is that there were not enough gingerbread for everyone … “
Read more:
- Do children need to play war?
“But I love and will never stop loving the word “comrade”. Good word! Scoop? Bite your tongue! The Soviet man was a very good man, he could go beyond the Urals, into the desert – for the sake of an idea: and not for dollars. Not for other people’s green papers. DneproGES, the Battle of Stalingrad, spacewalks – that’s all it is. Great Scoop! I still enjoy writing – the USSR. This was my country, and now I live in a country other than my own. I live in a foreign country…
I grew up as a serious girl, a true pioneer. Now everyone has the opinion that they used to drive them into the pioneer organization. They didn’t drive anywhere. All children dreamed of being pioneers. Walking together, with a drum, a bugle, singing pioneer songs… Destroyed such a country! Sold at bargain prices. Our Motherland… So that someone could scold Marx and travel around Europe. The time is as terrible as under Stalin. There are no more district committees or regional committees. Separated from the Soviet government. And what did you get? The ring, the jungle… They tried on an American suit, listened to Uncle Sam. And the American suit will not fit. Crooked sitting. Here! They didn’t run for freedom, but for jeans … for supermarkets … bought into bright packaging … Now our stores are full of everything. Abundance. But mountains of sausage have nothing to do with happiness. With glory. There were great people! They made him traders and marauders … storekeepers and managers.
* S. Aleksievich “Second hand time” (Time, 2013).