Original taken from afanarizm in On the controversial and indisputable legacy of Vadim Kozhinov

Kozhinov and those who write about him have repeatedly said as a virtue that Vadim Valerianovich in Soviet times never quoted Stalin, Brezhnev, did not use the words “collective farm”, “party”, “socialism”, was an anti-communist ... I don’t understand what the quote is, say, from Stalin is worse or more shameful quotations from Lenin or Marx. The bottom line is what these quotes are and what their role is in the text. The same collectivization can and should be spoken of as a crime (remember V. Belov’s trilogy or M. Lobanov’s article “Liberation”), or as a justified necessity (see, for example, V. Kozhinov’s interview “The Price of the Experienced” // “Rossiyskaya Federation Today, 2000, No. 21). And whether the words "kolkhoz", "socialism", etc. are used in this case is of no importance.

Igor Shafarevich in the article “Strokes to the creative portrait of Vadim Valerianovich Kozhinov” (“Our Contemporary”, 1993, No. 9) mildly remarks: “In his works of the 60-70s, there are quotes from Marx, Engels and Lenin as references to authorities, the conclusions of which reinforce the thoughts of the author. That is, such quoting performs a protective function, and in this Shafarevich is right and wrong.

Indeed, Kozhinov has cases of formal, defensive citations, as, for example, in the second paragraph of the article "Knowledge and the Will of the Critic" (1975) about the book by Pyotr Palievskiy "Ways of Realism". Vadim Valerianovich brings together in this paragraph the idealist Hegel and the materialist Lenin, citing their ideologically harmless statements. They weigh down Kozhinov's views on the purpose of criticism and Palievskii's book. The emphatic place of these quotations in the composition of the article makes the critic's intention obvious, although apparently they could have been dispensed with.

However, in the articles of V. Kozhinov of the 60-80s there are many cases of informal quoting or references to Lenin, when a strong impression is created that the critic shares the ideas being broadcast. For example, in an article about Vasily Belov "In Search of Truth" (1979), Kozhinov proves the writer's modernity through an excursion into the history of literature: century.<…>It took the genius of Lenin ... to give a scientific and objective interpretation of Tolstoy's work. And this digression ends accordingly: “And we need to take into account the historical lesson that Felix Kuznetsov so appropriately recalled.”

So, it is not clear what prompted Vadim Valerianovich through F. Kuznetsov to look for an ally in Lenin, to refer to his experience of interpreting Leo Tolstoy, which cannot be called positive. Ulyanov's articles are a rare example of the poverty of thought and spirit, an example of Leo Tolstoy's screaming, absolute misunderstanding.

Vadim Valerianovich spoke more than once about his involvement (relatively early by Soviet standards) in Russian religious philosophy, which happened thanks to Mikhail Bakhtin. And Kozhinov himself, according to Vladislav Popov, already introduced him “to Russian religious philosophy (then officially banned): with N. Fedorov, V. Rozanov, N. Berdyaev, and then Slavophiles, Eurasians<…>"("Our Contemporary", 2003, No. 7).

But how then could Kozhinov, if not fed, then at least being in the field of attraction of Russian thought, could be in solidarity with Lenin on many issues? Solidarity with this geek, monster, Russophobe, cosmopolitan, Satanist, destroyer of traditional Russia. Moreover, first in the "lobbies", and then, from the second half of the 80s, in the press, Kozhinov broadcasts myths about the "good" Lenin.
One of them, the myth of Lenin the patriot, I first heard in May 1984 from Yuri Seleznev. He, with his characteristic burning, told me about the "hidden" heritage of Lenin ... Yuri Ivanovich did not hide the fact that the "unknown" Lenin was not his discovery. However, the name of the "discoverer" was not named, and I did not need it. With tremulous enthusiasm I believed in this myth, since Yuri Ivanovich was an indisputable authority for me.

When in the articles of V. Kozhinov “The Heart of the Motherland” (“Literaturnaya Gazeta”, 1985, No. 29), “The Lessons of History: On the Leninist Concept of National Culture” (“Moscow”, 1986, No. 11), “We Are Changing”?: Polemical notes on culture, life and "literary figures" ("Our Contemporary", 1987, No. 10), in his dialogue with B. Sarnov ("Literaturnaya Gazeta", 1989, No. 10-13), the Leninist theme sounded, the authorship of the myth heard from Seleznev became obvious to me, but that's not the point. Many people believed, and some, I think, continue to believe in beautiful fairy tales about Lenin ...

Over the past fifteen years or so, Vadim Valerianovich, for reasons unknown to me, has tried to Russify and partly ennoble V. Ulyanov. The opposition looks unconvincing: on the one hand, Lenin is a patriot, a supporter of the “solution: revolution for Russia”, on the other hand, all the rest, emigrants who “did not know and could not know Russia, and for them it was“ essentially indifferent material ” (Kozhinov V. - Sarnov B. Russia and the Revolution // Literaturnaya Gazeta, 1989, No. 11).

In order to prove the unprovable, V. Kozhinov has to show the height of ingenuity. It turns out that in the house of the Ulyanovs “the Russian-Orthodox atmosphere dominated,” as stated in the book “Russia. Century XXth (1901-1939) ”(M., 1991). Vadim Valerianovich, who is always so fundamental in proving this or that thesis, in this case refers only to Anna Ilyinichna's testimony about her father as a deeply religious person and Lenin's confession of his faith in God until the age of 16. These facts, even if we take them on faith, I think, do not prove anything, because a family in which a “Russian-Orthodox atmosphere” reigned could not give so many, and such Russophobes, misanthropes, cannibals.

To confirm the version of “Lenin the Patriot”, Ulyanov’s statement of the eighteenth year, which, in our opinion, does not testify to anything, is also suitable: “to achieve ... that Russia ... becomes in the full sense of the word powerful and plentiful ...”, and the lines from his will: “I I would strongly advise that a number of changes be made in our political system at this congress.” From the quoted words of the will, V. Kozhinov draws a completely unexpected, unreasonable conclusion: “Yes, neither more nor less - a change in the “political system”, but it is obvious that “a number of changes” is not identical with “a change in the political system itself”.

It is difficult to agree with the following version: as a result of the implementation of Lenin's will, the body of "supreme power would consist mainly of Russians." V. Kozhinov, like many authors of different directions, makes one logical and essential mistake. It is not clear how one can end up with Russians from workers and peasants, people with only a designated social status, people who have passed through the party sieve. The fact that Lenin determines the Russianness of 75 or 100 workers and peasants by blood is natural, but the fact that one of the best experts on the national question acts in this way is more than surprising.

V. Kozhinov's attitude towards Stalin changed throughout his life. He repeatedly recalled that in his school years he was a young man, far from politics. However, at Moscow State University, where Kozhinov studied at the philological faculty, the general atmosphere was such that in a short time he became a "sincere convinced Stalinist", joined the Komsomol ... In the 60-70s, judging by the articles and memoirs of Vadim Valerianovich, the cult of Stalin left behind, was positively overcome. During the years of perestroika, the theme of Stalin sounded in many of Kozhinov's publications.

The article “Truth and Truth” (“Our Contemporary”, 1988, No. 4) caused the greatest resonance. In it, the author, unlike Anatoly Rybakov (whose novel Children of the Arbat was subjected to conclusive and total criticism), speaks of Stalin as a product of the Russian and world revolutionary and “left” movements in general. These and other ideas of Kozhinov sounded like a screaming dissonance against the backdrop of a huge number of articles in which Stalin was debunked by opposing him to "worthy" communists: N. Bukharin, S. Kirov, F. Raskolnikov, M. Ryutin, M. Tukhachevsky, etc. .

Vadim Kozhinov's article was perceived by the "leftists" as a defense of Stalin, for which critics were reproached by authors from V. Lakshin to B. Sarnov. In a different context, this topic was voiced in an open letter from Ales Adamovich to Vadim Kozhinov “How to thin out a carrot” (“Spark”, 1989, No. 35). Kozhinov, in his response letter “The Fruit of an irritated fantasy” (“Spark”, 1989, No. 41), in particular, stated: “For example, unlike you, I never used the word “collective farms” at all, since I did not have the opportunity to say What do I think about "collective farms".

And the last. Since you, in essence, cannot object to me<…>, You, Alexander Mikhailovich, decided not to argue, but to create some kind of terrible "image of Vadim Kozhinov" - an apologist for terror, collectivization, repression. But this “image” is the fruit of only an irritated fantasy.”

The myth of the "left" about Stalin the villain, who in 1928-1929 carried out a counter-revolutionary coup, Kozhinov opposed the idea of ​​regularity, preparedness for the appearance of Stalin and Stalinism. So, in the article "The most great danger... "Vadim Valerianovich argued:" ... Stalinism was able to triumph because there were hundreds of thousands or even millions of absolutely sincere "Stalinists" who were absolutely convinced of their rightness in the country ("Nash Sovremennik", 1989, No. 1).

In this and such articles as “Truth and Truth” (“Our Contemporary”, 1988, No. 4), “1948-1988. Thoughts and partly memories of “changes” in literary positions” (“Literary Study”, 1988, No. 3), Kozhinov names and characterizes, first of all, those “Stalinists” who, during perestroika, were listed as “anti-Stalinists” in the lists of the “Left”. These are N. Bukharin, S. Kirov, B. Pasternak, A. Tvardovsky, A. Dementiev and others.

Vadim Kozhinov confirms his point of view with numerous examples. I will cite just one of his statements about Pasternak: “He not only unconditionally believed in Stalin in the 1930s (which is clear, for example, from the memoirs of the widow of Osip Mandelstam), but also largely retained this faith later. His poetic books, published in 1943, 1945 and 1948, in their general mood did not contradict the then literature as a whole, and in prose he wrote, for example, during the war: “As Comrade Stalin taught common sense and repeated for centuries, the right thing must sooner or later take over. That time has come. Truth has triumphed” (“Literary Studies”, 1988, No. 3).

In the article “On the Disputes about the “Russian National Consciousness” (1990), V. Kozhinov assesses Stalin from the point of view of his attitude to Russian history and literature. Stalin's statement of 1934 about Russia, which was “continuously beaten” throughout history, V. Kozhinov calls the most ridiculous and ironically comments ... Using the examples given, Vadim Valerianovich shows that Stalin's position on this issue was consonant with such Russophobes as L. Trotsky, N .Bukharin, I.Ehrenburg.

In this article, Kozhinov evaluates a version that will soon become very popular, the version about Stalin's turn to patriotism in the second half of the 1930s. This predominantly cosmetically new policy is explained by Vadim Valerianovich with tactical and strategic considerations: “... The clearly approaching military threat forced the authorities to think about what would protect the people. But the notion that the then authorities really “encouraged” genuine national consciousness is completely false.” Kozhinov quite often confirms this idea with information about repressed writers. Of the fifty "left", "far from the Russian idea" authors, two were repressed, of the twenty "neo-Slavophiles" only Pimen Karpov survived. Vadim Valerianovich's conclusion is quite logical and fair: "Those who believe that Stalin supported "nationally minded" Russian writers should either abandon this idea or come to the conclusion that it was not Stalin who carried out repressions against writers."

The controversy between Kozhinov and Lobanov, which arose in this regard six years later, is indicative. Vadim Valerianovich in "The Riddle of 1937" ("Our Contemporary", 1996, No. 8) comments on the main provisions of Mikhail Petrovich's article "Unity. On what?" (“Our Contemporary”, 1996, No. 7) and criticism addressed to him. V. Kozhinov, following Yu. Emelyanov, argues that the refusal to discredit everything Russian is due to the fact that this harmed the development of the world revolution. And the reliance on the glorious Russian history, the names of Dmitry Donskoy, Suvorov, Ushakov, etc., the policy that began after 1934, is caused not by "personal Stalinist ideas", but by "understanding the historical development of the country." Here, of course, from the point of view of logic, not everything is clear with Kozhinov: is understanding not included in Stalin's idea?

A very important addition to the topic is contained in Kozhinov's interview "Faces and Masks of History" ("Tomorrow", 2000, No. 27-28). Speaking again about the turn of the mid-1930s, Vadim Valerianovich emphasizes its limitations, which were also reflected in the fact that this process did not touch the religious and philosophical origins of Russian culture, "remaining banned until very recently."

In the works and interviews of V. Kozhinov of the 1990s, the topic of Stalin arises quite often, and Vadim Valerianovich, with the constancy of a convinced person, expresses, in fact, the same ideas that he liked, accompanying them periodically with new actual “support”, and sometimes ethical ratings. So, in a conversation with Viktor Kozhemyako, Kozhinov refutes the version of Stalin the patriot in a way that is not quite frequent for himself: “I can’t, say, forgive him that in 1946, when there was a terrible famine in the country, he threw a huge amount of bread into Germany to bribe the Germans. There is, of course, the concept of political expediency, but a real patriot, in my opinion, still could not do this ”(“ Pravda ”, 1996, March 21).

In an interview with Viktor Kozhemyako (Pravda, 1996, March 21) and a conversation with Alexei Zimenkov (Podmoskovnye Izvestiya, 1997, August 21), we are talking about the possible perception of Stalin in our country. In the interview, Stalin's justification is spoken of as an inevitable fact, only the degree of justification is the subject of discussion. V. Kozhinov states: “I am convinced that Stalin will never be justified in Russia to the same extent as Napoleon is justified in France, who became the greatest representative of the nation there.” In a conversation with Zimenkov, Vadim Valerianovich is not so categorical: "Let's hope that no one will force the Russian people to cancel the moral verdict on Ivan the Terrible and Stalin (otherwise we will cease to be Russian)."

Such ambivalence in relation to Stalin is characteristic of Kozhinov's articles of the 1990s. Through some of them, the leitmotif is the idea of ​​Stalin as an absolute, supreme evil that defeats ordinary, earthly evil, all these Radek, Zinoviev, "who have hands to the elbow, and legs were knee-deep in blood ...". And Vadim Kozhinov takes Alexander Pushkin and Mikhail Bulgakov as his “allies”, as, for example, in a conversation with Vyach. Morozov (“Our Contemporary”, 1999, No. 6).

Doubts arise both in terms of personalities, more precisely, in terms of Pushkin, and in general theoretical terms, because in this way a partial rehabilitation of absolute evil takes place. What this can lead to was demonstrated by Vadim Kozhinov in 2000. He argues that wealthy peasants who did not want to sell grain to the state were guilty of the pace of collectivization and dispossession. They really didn’t want to, only because of the low purchase price, and not because, according to V. Kozhinov, this small percentage of peasants “where secretly, and where openly, made it clear that, threatening general hunger, he was ready to demand from the authorities of concessions, including political ones” (“The Russian Federation Today”, 2000, No. 21).

Kozhinov, who in so many works brilliantly follows the precepts of his teacher Evald Ilyenkov (“one must think in facts”, “truth is concrete”), in this case violates his precepts. Where Vadim Valerianovich cites facts, they sound unconvincing, and there is no “feedback with reality” (what Kozhinov is striving for, as he admits) does not arise.

Trying to prove the inevitability of collectivization, Vadim Valerianovich recreates the atmosphere of life in the village in 1925-1928 as follows. He refers to the testimony of Nikolai Tryapkin, who was 7-10 years old at the indicated period. And then such reflections and Kozhinov's conclusion follow: “Why strain for the sake of some sort of expanded production, industrialization? But the peasants made up 80 percent of the country's population. If such a life lasted until 1941, we would have nothing to fight with.”

As you can see, Kozhinov is not original in interpreting this issue; he repeats the popular version of Soviet orthodox historians. It is sad that Vadim Valerianovich, who avoided Soviet time the words "collective farm" because of the inability to tell the truth about collectivization, at the end of his life he gave out such a version. It is no less sad and surprising that it became popular among some of the "right" in the second half of the 90s.

Pages: 34-58

Sergey Ananievich YAKOVLEV, writer, publicist, literary historian, publishing editor of the almanac Letters from Russia[Letter from Russia], member of the Writers' Union of Moscow and Russian PEN Centre. Academic interests include Russian literature and popular philosophical trends in the 19th-20th centuries. Author of numerous essays, articles and books on the aforementioned topics. Email: [email protected]

Name: non-public aspects of life. Igor Dedkov and Vadim Kozhinov: two views on truth and responsibility

Title: Nonpublic Sides of Life. Igor Dedkov and Vadim Kozhinov: Two Views on Truthfulness and Responsibility

Annotation: The controversy between literary critics I. Dedkov and V. Kozhinov outlines the field in which ideological battles took place in Russia in the 1970s-1990s. Interestingly, both did not accept both the Soviet and post-Soviet regimes. Their disagreements reveal ethical contradictions in Russian society that exist to this day.

Abstract: The dispute between the literary critics I. Dedkov and V. Kozhinov typifies the ideological battlefield in Russia in the 1970s-1990s. Neither of them a supporter of the Soviet or post-Soviet regime, the two critics clash over ethical controversies persistent in Russia to this day. The article explains how the contemporary reality derives from the 1980s-1990s radicalism driven, to a large extent, by Kozhinov’s conservative discourse. The germ of the present-day social inequality and humiliating hierarchy lies in the ‘excess, conceit and haughtiness’ of those members of Soviet intelligentsia supported by Kozhinov. His deviation from consistently true interpretation gave rise to contemporary relativism. Dedkov, a faithful follower and contributor of Russian classical criticism, typically avoided finite judgments and always encouraged the reader to make their own moral choice. A strong opponent of any kind of human hierarchy and violence, he took to heart every attempt to pigeonhole humanity, select the ‘elite’ and appoint a ‘drover’ for the rest.

Keythe words/ keywords: I. Dedkov, V. Kozhinov, O. Latsis, Stalinist repressions, Truth and Truth, democratic traditions, intelligentsia, truth, responsibility, relativism, I. Dedkov, V. Kozhinov, O. Latsis, Stalin repressions, Truth and Verity [Truth and truth], democratic traditions, intelligentsia, the truth, responsibility, relativism.

Fragment

1

You and I live in strange world where there is no truth. It is destroyed "as a class". Many different most influential (politically, socially and even culturally) forces are interested in the fact that the truth does not exist, or at least that no one is looking for it. The functioning of most public institutions, the activities of information resources, artistic creativity - everything seems to be aimed at instilling total distrust in society.

Surprisingly, the fact of the absence of truth is recognized and even propagated openly, including at the official level. The advantages are obvious: it allows politicians not to answer uncomfortable questions, cultists to rely on deep superstitions, criminals to evade responsibility, repressive bodies to persecute the innocent ... And what is even more surprising, this encounters almost no resistance in society.

This phenomenon is relatively new. Even some 30 years ago, this was hard to imagine. Moral relativism existed, of course, in philosophical and, quite widely, artistic discourses, but it did not dominate everyday life and did not infect the general population. People have always wanted the truth. And especially high demands in this regard were made to those from whom they hoped to hear it - state and public leaders, prominent scientists, writers and artists, "rulers of thoughts."

At one time I was deeply touched by the words of Tamara Fedorovna Dedkova, the widow of Igor Alexandrovich, relating to the fate of the literary heritage of the critic. She wrote about the criterion of truthfulness in literature, understood by Igor Dedkov “as a requirement, by and large, of fidelity to historical truth and loyalty to the interests of man,” and immediately noticed that in modern life, starting from the 1990s, this criterion “has been put in the position of a certain marginal exclusivity” [Dedkova: 24]. In other words, clarity of thought, truth, responsibility - this is today not fashionable.

What are the reasons - political, social, cultural, maybe even aesthetic - that underlie this phenomenon? Which of the relatively recent values ​​did Soviet Russia lose during its transition to a new quality, and what of the current values, on the contrary, did it accumulate in the bowels of “developed socialism”? Where have we been going in recent decades and continue to go? Finally, was the state of affairs in the time of Igor Dedkov really so different from the present one, was not even then the voice of this knight of truth “a voice crying in the wilderness” and is not what is happening just a revelation of the true nature of man and society?

In order to understand such issues, it is useful to take a look at Dedkov's contemporaries - both like-minded people and opponents who left a more or less significant mark on the history of Russian social thought in the second half of the 20th century. Of greatest interest are the interlocutors of the critic-thinker, in face-to-face and correspondence dialogues with whom his own position and disagreements emerged. Earlier, I happened to consider two such in-depth dialogues of Dedkov with people whom he certainly sympathized with and whose work was interesting to him as a critic - prose writer Sergei Zalygin and poet Vladimir Leonovich (see: [Yakovlev]). This time, the case is somewhat different.

2

Literary critic and publicist Vadim Valerianovich Kozhinov came from Moscow as part of a representative delegation of writers to the very first Dedkovo Readings in April 1995 in Kostroma. I don't remember his speech verbatim. , but still stands before his eyes a fierce skirmish right on the stage, in front of a crowded hall, with the publicist Otto Latsis. The dispute concerned the worldview platform of Dedkov, his activities and, most importantly, the assessment of the historical period in which this activity fell. Despite the bitterness of loss (not even four months had passed since the death of the critic), the atmosphere was red-hot, and other participants in the meeting also entered into controversy. Someone called Dedkov a “genuine democrat”, someone called him a “real communist” ... As for Latsis and Kozhinov, they represented opposing parties at that time: the first was listed as an inveterate Western liberal, “the foreman of perestroika”, the second adhered to conservative "patriotic" views and in liberal circles was considered an odious figure - as they would say now, "handshake". I emphasize that these were the prices of the times of the perestroika battles that had not yet cooled down, and today they may well cause bewilderment for an impartial reader. And then each of the parties pulled the late Dedkov to their side, in a hurry to use his name and legacy in their own interests.

Who was Dedkov really with?

The first mention of Kozhinov dates back to 1978 and, oddly enough, is connected not with the work of the then widely known critic and bright polemicist, whose literary interests directly intersected with Dedkov’s, but with the “Russian party” personified by him in the eyes of Dedkov:

Stasik, reproducing the sentiments common in Kozhinov's circle, said that Russia apparently needed a tsar. What is left for the poor Russian minds to do is to sort through everything, be disappointed in everything and return to the wretched idea of ​​autocracy. To health. Let them indulge themselves. This idea will never be revived among the people, it is unnatural, and the minds of the intelligentsia are the only place where it can be discussed. Kozhinov and Palievsky need to drive, but they hope that an exception will be made for them, and no one will drive them, but on the contrary, they will be undead [Dedkov. A diary... 196].

Kozhinov here appears almost as an evil spirit, seducing "Stasik" (Stanislav Lesnevsky). The preaching of the "poor idea of ​​autocracy" (with Lesnevsky, it must be said, is completely independent, in no way connected with Kozhinov) does not prevent Dedkov from continuing warm friendly relations with "Stasik"; but far away in every sense, Kozhinov is given almost demonic features. (But in the same, we note, and recognition of the scale and influence of the venerable critic.)

Another time, already in 1979, the iconic name of Kozhinov flashes in an annoyed description of contacts with completely different characters. Dedkov describes, in particular, a conversation in a bar with the writer Baigushev, who threatened criticism on behalf of certain “we” with trouble for his “life and literary position” and asked “quite in a friendly way” how much Dedkov received “silver pieces” for one of his articles. “And then I - also in a friendly way - told him that their entire notorious Russian party was itself permeated with the spirit of Jewry, like huckstering, that is, unprincipled, permeated with the desire for positions, careers, infected with buying and selling, friendship and other things. And as for the pieces of silver and all sorts of benefits, I am clean, and this party cannot cope with me” [Dedkov. A diary... 255]. Below, Dedkov will note that much in Baigushev betrayed his closeness to some secret "organization" (it must be understood - the KGB).

Let us remember this passionate monologue - it will lead us to another trail, not only ideological, but also ethical Dedkov's rejection of the then "Russian Party" and its practices. In a conversation about Kozhinov, this will be significant.

Literature

Dedkov I. A. The road is far to all ends: Literary-critical essays and articles. Yaroslavl: Upper Volga book. ed., 1981.

Dedkov I. In front of a mirror, or the suffering of an elderly hero // Questions of Literature. 1986. No. 7. S. 102-143.

Dedkov I. A. Be in love? Hate? What else?.. Notes on literature, history and our fleeting absurd life. M.: ITs "AIRO-XX", 1995.

Dedkov I. A diary. 1953-1994. M.: Progress-Pleyada, 2005.

Dedkov I. A. This earth and this sky: Essays. Notes. Interview. Diary entries about the culture of the province 1957-1994. Kostroma: Kostromaizdat LLC, 2005.

Dedkova T. F. A new look at the literature of the 60-90s. Does it exist? // Kostroma humanitarian bulletin. 2012. No. 2 (4) (Special issue). pp. 22-25.

Kozhinov V.V. Values ​​True and Imaginary (1967) // Kozhinov V.V. Articles about contemporary literature. M.: Sovremennik, 1982. S. 42-47.

Kozhinov V. Truth and truth // Our contemporary. 1988. No. 4. S. 160-175.

Kozhinov V. Spirituality is a broad concept // Literary Russia. 2001. February 2.

Kozhinov V. Reflections on art, literature and history. M.: Consent, 2001.

Kozhinov V.V. Sin and holiness of Russian history. Moscow: Eksmo, 2010.

Letter to the editors of the "Literaturnaya gazeta" // Questions of Literature. 1986. No. 9. S. 286.

Sidorevich A. Letters of a Russian intellectual // Neman. 2000. No. 11. S. 198-239.

Yakovlev S. The unity of the dissimilar. Correspondence of Vladimir Leonovich and Igor Dedkov // Questions of Literature. 2017. No. 4. S. 176-196.

Bibliography

Dedkov I.A. Vo vse kontsi doroga daleka: Literaturno-kriticheskie ocherki i statii. Yaroslavl: Verkhne-Volzh. kn. izd., 1981.

Dedkov I. Pered zerkalom, or Stradaniya nemolodogo heroya. Question literature. 1986. Issue 7. P. 102-143.

Dedkov I.A. Lovebit'? Hate? What eshche?.. Notes on literature, istorii i nashey bystrotekushchey absurdnoy zhyzni . Moscow: IC ‘AIRO-XX’, 1995.

Dedkov I. Dnevnik. 1953-1994. Moscow: Progress-Pleyada, 2005.

Dedkov I.A. Eta zemlya i eto nebo: Ocherki. Notes. Interview. Dnevnikovie zapisi o kulture provintsii 1957-1994 godov. Kostroma: Kostromaizdat, LLC, 2005.

Dedkova T.F. Noviy vzglyad na literaturu 60-90-kh. Sushchestvuet li on? // Kostroma Bulletin of the Humanities. 2012. Issue 2 (4) (Special Issue). P. 22-25.

Kozhinov V.V. Tsennosti istinnie i mnimie (1967) // Kozhinov V.V. Statii o modern literature. Moscow: Sovremennik, 1982. P. 42-47.

Kozhinov V.V. Problema avtora i put’ pisatelya: Na materiale dvukh povestey Yuriya Trifonova (1976) // Kozhinov V.V. Statii o modern literature. P. 212-234.

Kozhinov V. Pravda i istina // Nash sovremennik. 1988. Issue 4. P. 160-175.

Kozhinov V. Dukhovnost' - ponyatie shirokoe // Literaturnaya Rossiya. February 2, 2001.

Kozhinov V. Razmyshleniya ob iskusstve, literature i istorii. Moscow: Soglasie, 2001.

Kozhinov V.V. Grekh i svyatost' russkoy istorii. Moscow: Eksmo, 2010.

Pis’mo v redaktsiyu ‘Literaturnoy gazety’ // Voprosy literatury. 1986. Issue 9. P. 286.

Sidorevich A. Pis'mo russkogo intelligenta // Neman. 2000. Issue 11. P. 198-239.

Yakovlev S. Edinstvo nepokhozhikh. Perepiska Vladimira Leonovicha i Igorya Dedkova // Voprosy literatury. 2017. Issue 4. P. 176-196.

A small Central Asian town, the end of the 60s, the battles of “physicists” and “lyricists” have not yet died down, they are still playing Jamaica in a park nearby. Childhood memories are always the most vivid.

The second shift at school is over, it's evening outside, it's frosty. Batteries creak softly, sleepy. However, we continue to sit in the classroom - we have "extracurricular readings." History teacher, "Bukhara" Jewess Emma Zakharovna talks about Hannibal. Today, thank God, nothing happened. From time to time, our “Emka” begins to carry, and it is once again, we have already lost count, which time, it can start a “bodyagu” about Jewish pogroms. Dear, kind "Emka", who never even puts deuces to anyone, is transformed at such moments. A spark of madness begins to rush in her eyes, her voice begins to ring. The story of a Jewish family having a peaceful dinner, to which the rioters, rabid from blood, rush in, shakes the child's imagination. It invariably ends with a description of the three-month-old Yoshik, who, having been pulled out of the cradle, is torn in two. Where she got this "Yoshik" from is still a mystery. Grandmother, an old Cossack woman, having once heard a description of this action in my retelling, briefly, as she cut off, said: "He's lying, slut." A few years later, our Emma Zakharovna will end up in a "psychiatric hospital". Schizophrenia is common among Jews.

Ask me why I hit the memories, there is nothing more to do? No, just a beautiful illustration. First, the Jewish worldview turned inside out; secondly, whether the Jews have their own curators. A person who was born thousands of kilometers from the places of the pogroms themselves, a person born much later than the pogroms themselves, perceives them as something that happened to him. Say - an example of an uncharacteristic, unhealthy person and all that, but try to talk to any Jew yourself. If he's honest enough, you'll hear the same thing. This is instilled in them from early childhood.

Since the tales of the school “teacher” fit perfectly into the then version of our history, I didn’t particularly “bother”. For the first time, the “pattern break” happened already in the fourth year. On one of the subbotniks, the teacher of history and mathematics, the dearest Sergey Anatolyevich, sorted out a little, just a little, and told a “terrible” secret - it turns out that some hierarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church were also Black Hundreds. If a small hole appears in the dam, then it's just a matter of time.

Let's start from the end, namely the Civil War. This is the only really terrible time for ordinary shtetl Jewry. Jews were robbed and killed by all and sundry - red, white, green, brown speckled. "Unbelievers" I recommend reading the book of Gusev-Orenburgsky "Crimson book. Pogroms of 1919-1920 in Ukraine" (Harbin, edition of the Far Eastern Jewish Public Committee for Assistance to Orphans Victims of Pogroms ("DEKOPO"), 1922.). But, excuse me, didn't they rob and kill everyone else? The dead Jews are only a small fraction of all those who perished in the flames of the fratricidal war. In this regard, I would like to quote the words of one of the founders of Zionism, Mr. Zhabotinsky: “When the Jews rushed in masses to create Russian politics, we predicted to them that nothing good would come of it either for Russian politics or for Jewry” (Zhabotinsky, soch., p. 73). Remember the prophet Hosea: “Because they sowed the wind, they will also reap the whirlwind” (Hosea 8:7) . The Jews, however, understood nothing and learned nothing. And now, in our days, a certain Samson Madievsky on the website lechaim.ru in an article "Jews and the Russian Revolution: Was There a Choice" asks a question and answers it himself: “How and why Soviet communism subsequently turned from a force that condemned anti-Semitism and fought against it into the most significant of the anti-Jewish forces of the post-war world is a special topic that requires a separate discussion. But even if the millions of Russian Jews who lived in the pre-revolutionary era, during the years of the revolution and civil war, had been given the opportunity to foresee this metamorphosis, their behavior would still be determined by the situation and conditions of the current, and not the future time. They would still have to solve the problems that were relevant then. Could it be otherwise? The conclusion is telling and I must say very sad. What then is "crying" about?

“In general, one can hardly dispute the fact that religious and other ideological “arguments” have always acted as a means of “justifying” pogroms, and not as their cause. This was unequivocally shown by the prominent Jewish scholar D.S. who plundered Jewish property, sheltered fleeing Jews." By the way, at that time, during the Russian pogroms, EE states, "only a few spoke of tribal and racial hatred: the rest believed that the pogrom movement arose on economic grounds" (ibid., p. 634). This was invented later, or, in extreme cases, some hatred towards Jews as such, allegedly characteristic of the Russian population, was unreasonably inflated. (V. Kozhinov, "The Truth about Pogroms")

Let's move on to massacres Russian Empire before the revolution of the 17th year. Anyone, be it a Jew or just a “Judaizer”, speaking about the pogroms, will definitely mention the so-called Odessa “pogroms”. Excuse me, can you really call the “dismantling” of large organized crime groups in the early 90s a pogrom? And in 1821, 1859 and 1871, it was precisely “showdowns” between two Russian organized crime groups - Jewish and Greek - that took place in Odessa. Pogroms as a phenomenon, perhaps, can be discussed since 1881, after the assassination of Emperor Alexander II. Beginning in Elisavetgrad, pogroms raged throughout Russia until 1884. Now pay attention to the results of these pogroms - 2 Jews were killed, 19 Russian peasants, the latter were killed by the troops that put things in order. This is me to the question that the government indulged the pogromists. The Jewish historian Yu. I. Gessen wrote that the main culprits of those pogroms were Narodnaya Volya revolutionaries, who believed that the pogroms corresponded to the plans of the revolutionaries.

One of the bloodiest pogroms is the Chisinau pogrom of 1903. Data on the dead vary, but according to official figures, there were 42 people who died, of which 38 were Jews. 1350 housing constructions were destroyed, 500 of them were Jewish shops. It is worth talking about this pogrom in more detail, and here's why. Almost immediately after the pogrom, the St. Petersburg Bureau for the Defense of the Jews declared: “As soon as we learned the conditions under which the Chisinau massacre took place, it became clear to us that this diabolical idea would never have taken place ... if it had not been conceived in the Police Department and carried out on orders from there.” Their main target, of course, was the Minister of the Interior Plehve, later killed by the Socialist-Revolutionary Sozonov. Lawyer Zarudny, who is instructed by the Jewish community to deal with this case, has repeatedly stated that he has materials testifying to the involvement in the pogroms of the head of the Chisinau Security Department, Levendal. I can only note that no one has ever seen “evidence”, we are still waiting, sir. At one time, a certain message allegedly sent to Plehve Levendal appeared as “evidence”, it was even published in the Times newspaper. But, bad luck, in the Jewish Encyclopedia (1996) we read: "The text of Plehve's telegram published in the London newspaper The Times ... is considered by most researchers to be forged." It is worth adding that lies are the main weapon of the Jews.

A little about ethnic composition the then Chisinau. In 1903, 50 thousand Moldovans, 50 thousand Jews, 8 thousand Russians lived in Chisinau, most of whom were Little Russians. The figures are, of course, approximate, but it is better than nothing at all, especially when it is the Russians who are blamed for the pogroms.

The reason for the pogrom was an article about the ritual murder of a Christian boy in Dubossary, published in the newspaper Bessarabets. The pogroms themselves began on April 6, but April 7 became fatal for the Jews, on this day the teenager Ostanov was killed by Jews with a revolver shot. From about 5 p.m., the pogroms of shops turned into murders of Jews. And here's another oddity, when one of the main organizers of the pogroms is called, for some reason his name is always pronounced in the Russian way - Pavel Aleksandrovich Krushevan (?). In fact, it was a certain Pavolaki Krushevan - a Moldavian.

And again I return to the topic of government inaction. When pacifying the pogrom, 7 soldiers and 68 policemen were injured, by the morning of April 9, 816 people were arrested, the governor von Raaben and several more officials after the Chisinau pogrom, they were immediately dismissed - this is all the result of "inaction".

According to the results of the judicial investigation, out of 816 arrested persons, 250 were released from the investigation and trial due to the lack of evidence of the charge, 466 people received judgments for petty crimes, 37 people were accused of murder and violence, 12 of them were acquitted, 25 were found guilty and sentenced to deprivation of all rights of the state and hard labor or prison companies. There were no Jews among the convicts, although only they used firearms.

Even such a Russophobe as Mr. Solzhenitsyn was outraged by the lies around the Kishinev pogrom: “The Chisinau pogrom was used to stigmatize and permanently stigmatize Russia. And today any honest historical work on this subject demands to distinguish the terrible truth about Chisinau from the insidious untruth about it. (A.I. Solzhenitsyn, "Two hundred years together")

After the publication on October 17, 1905 of the "Manifesto on the improvement of the state order" (http://www.hist.msu.ru/ER/Etex... new wave pogroms. Emperor Nicholas II in his letter to his mother dated October 27, 1905 writes: “... the people were indignant at the arrogance and audacity of the revolutionaries and socialists, and since 9/10 of them are Jews, all the anger fell on them - hence the Jewish pogroms ... But it was not only the Jews who had a bad time, Russian agitators also got it: engineers, lawyers and other bad people." And this is true, just look at the facts - During the October pogroms, 1622 people died. (of which 711 Jews, i.e. 43%), and 3544 people were injured. (of which 1207 Jews, i.e. 34%). (data from S. A. Stepanov) As you can see, even these pogroms cannot be called purely Jewish, the number of victims among the Jews, albeit not by much, is still less than the victims among the Russians.

And yet, according to the calculations of the US historian Anna Geifman, revolutionaries of various stripes killed about 17 thousand people in the 1900s (“Rodina”, 1994, No. 1, p. 25). This is me for comparison...

We will talk about the “Black Hundreds” in another article, now I’ll just say that their participation in organizing the pogroms themselves has always been either minimal or completely absent. This is another big lie of the Jews.

The article used the works of Kozhinov, Solzhenitsyn and some other authors, I mentioned them in the article itself. As an illustration, a lithograph was used, issued in 1905 in the USA "Tsar, stop the cruel oppression of the Jews!"

Until we meet again, friends.

Vadim Kozhinov

"The truth of Stalin's repressions"

Publisher: Eksmo, Algorithm
Year: 2005
ISBN 5-699-13825-0
Circulation: 4100 copies.
Format: 84x108/32
Hardcover, 448 pages.

Publisher's abstract

This book by Vadim Kozhinov, like his other works, is distinguished by extraordinary judgments and unexpected conclusions. With facts and figures in hand, he set about researching topics that are still subject to democratic "taboo": the role of Jews in the history of the Soviet Union, the true springs of Stalin's repressions. At the same time, one of the main advantages of his research is historical objectivity.

Below we present a part of Chapter 1 from V. Kozhinov's book (abridged; footnotes removed).

What really happened in 1917?

This question has been given the most varied, even diametrically opposed answers over eighty years, and today they are more or less familiar to attentive readers. But the point of view of the Black Hundreds, their answer to this difficult question, remains almost unknown or is presented in an extremely distorted form.

The Black Hundreds, not blinded by the illusory idea of ​​progress, clearly foresaw the real fruits of the victory of the Revolution long before 1917, far surpassing any other ideologists in this respect (for example, a member of the Main Council of the Union of the Russian People P.F. in 1916 to the liberals: "You are preparing the grave for yourself and for millions of innocent citizens"). It is natural to assume that both directly in 1917 and in subsequent years, the "Black Hundreds" understood what was happening deeper and more clearly than anyone else, and therefore their judgments are of paramount importance.

It is appropriate to start with the fact that today the opinion clearly prevails about the Bolshevik coup on October 25 (November 7), 1917, as a fatal act of destruction of the Russian state, which, in turn, led to a variety of grave consequences, starting with the collapse of the country. But this is a deliberate lie, although many influential ideologists have been and are broadcasting about it. The death of the Russian state became an irreversible fact already on March 2 (15), 1917, when the so-called "Order No. 1" was published. It came from the Central Executive Committee (TsIK) of Petrograd - essentially the All-Russian Soviet of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies, where the Bolsheviks until September 1917 in no way played a leading role; the direct compiler of the "order" was the secretary of the CEC, the then famous lawyer N.D. Sokolov (1870-1928), who made a brilliant career back in the 1900s in numerous political trials, where he mainly defended all kinds of terrorists. Sokolov acted as a "non-factional social democrat."

“Order No. 1,” addressed to the army, demanded, in particular, “to immediately select committees from elected representatives (the hasty drafting of the text led to the annoying repetition: “choose ... from elected ones.” – VC.) from the lower ranks ... All kinds of weapons ... should be at the disposal of ... committees and in no case be issued to officers ... Soldiers can in no way be diminished in those rights that all citizens enjoy .. ." etc.

If you think about these categorical phrases, it becomes clear that it was about the complete destruction of the army created over the centuries - the backbone of the state; one already demagogic proposition that the “freedom” of a soldier cannot be limited “in anything” meant the liquidation of the institution of the army itself. It should not be forgotten, moreover, that the "order" was given under conditions great world war and there were about eleven million people under arms in Russia; By the way, the last Minister of War of the Provisional Government A.I. Verkhovsky testified that "Order No. 1" was printed "in nine million copies"!

For a better understanding of the situation, it is necessary to describe the circumstances of the appearance of the "order". On March 2, Sokolov appeared with his text—which had already been published in the morning edition of Izvestia of the Petrograd Soviet—to the newly formed Provisional Government. One of its members, V.N. Lvov, spoke about this in his memoir, published soon after, in 1918:

"... N.D. Sokolov comes up to our table with quick steps and asks us to get acquainted with the contents of the paper he brought ... It was the famous order number one ... After reading it, Guchkov (Minister of War. - VC.) immediately declared that the order was... unthinkable, and left the room. Milyukov (Minister of Foreign Affairs. - VC.) began to convince Sokolov of the complete impossibility of publishing this order (he did not know that the newspaper with its text had already begun to be distributed. - VC.)... Finally, exhausted, Milyukov got up and walked away from the table ... I (that is, V.N. Lvov, Chief Procurator of the Synod. - VC.) jumped up from his chair and, with my characteristic vehemence, shouted to Sokolov that this paper brought by him was a crime against the motherland ... Kerensky (then Minister of Justice, from May 5 - Minister of War, and from July 8 - Head of Government. - VC.) ran up to me and shouted: "Vladimir Nikolayevich, be silent, be silent!", then grabbed Sokolov by the arm, led him quickly into another room and locked the door behind him..."

And having become Minister of War on May 5, Kerensky issued his “Order on the Army and Navy” just four days later, very close in content to Sokolovsky; it became known as the "declaration of the rights of the soldier." Subsequently, General A.I. Denikin wrote that "this 'declaration of rights' ... finally undermined all the foundations of the army." However, as early as July 16, 1917, speaking in the presence of Kerensky (then already prime minister), Denikin, not without impudence, declared: “When they repeat at every step (this, by the way, is also typical of our days. – VC.), that the Bolsheviks were the reason for the collapse of the army, I protest. This is not true. The army was ruined by others..." Not considering it apparently "tactful" to directly name the perpetrators, the general said further: "The military legislation of recent months has ruined the army"; those present clearly understood that Sokolov and Kerensky himself were the "military legislators" ( By the way, there is incorrect information in the literature that Denikin allegedly named Kerensky's name at that time).

But one cannot fail to say that Denikin's "enlightenment" was fatally belated. After all, he agreed on April 5 (that is, more than a month after the publication of Order No. 1) to become the chief of staff of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, and on May 31 (that is, after the appearance of the "declaration of the rights of a soldier") - the commander-in-chief of the Western Front. Only on August 27 did the general break with Kerensky, but by that time there was, in fact, no army ...

It is necessary to peer into the figure of Sokolov. Few people know about him now. It is characteristic that in the biographical dictionary "Politicians of Russia. 1917" published in 1993, there is no article about Sokolov, although there are more than 300 persons who played one role or another in 1917 (most of them are significantly inferior to Sokolov from this point of view). However, even in 1917, his imperious influence on the course of events seemed not entirely explicable. So, the author of the most detailed story about 1917, created in hot pursuit and the most active figure of that time, N.N. Sukhanov-Gimmer was clearly surprised, as he wrote, "to N. D. Sokolov, who was everywhere and knew everything, one of the main workers of the first period of the revolution." Only much later did it become known that Sokolov, like Kerensky, was one of the leaders of Russian Freemasonry in those years, a member of its small "Supreme Council" (Sukhanov, by the way, also belonged to Freemasonry, but occupied a much lower level in it). It should also be noted that Sokolov at one time laid the foundation for political career Kerensky (he was eleven years younger), arranging for him an invitation to a high-profile trial of Baltic terrorists in 1906, after which this then unknown lawyer became an overnight celebrity.

Putting forward "Order No. 1", Sokolov, of course, did not foresee that his offspring in less than four months in literally hit his own head. In June, Sokolov led a delegation from the Central Executive Committee to the front. “In response to the conviction not to violate discipline, the soldiers attacked the delegation and brutally beat it,” said the same Sukhanov; Sokolov was sent to the hospital, where he "lay ... without regaining consciousness for several days ... For a long, long time, three months after that, he wore a white bandage - a" turban "- on his head."

By the way, the poet Alexander Blok responded to this event. On May 29, he met with Sokolov and wrote about him: "... the frenzied N.D. Sokolov, rumored to be the author of Order No. 1," and on June 24 - perhaps not without irony - noted: "In the newspapers: "dark soldiers "They beat N.D. Sokolov." Later, on July 23, Blok makes a note about the interrogation in the "Extraordinary Investigation Commission" under the Provisional Government of the most prominent Black Hundreds N.E. Markova: "Against Markov ... Sokolov is sitting with his head bandaged ... barking questions ... Markov is very angry ..."

Sokolov, as we see, was unusually energetic, and the range of his activities was exceptionally wide. And there were quite a lot of such people in the Russian Freemasonry of that time. In general, speaking of the February Revolution and the subsequent course of events, it is in no way possible to do without the "Masonic theme". This topic is especially important because about Freemasonry before 1917 the Black Hundreds wrote and spoke a lot; in this, as in many other things, expressed their superiority over any then ideologists who "did not notice" any signs of the existence of Freemasonry in Russia or even strongly disputed the opinions of the Black Hundreds on this matter, moreover, ridiculed them.

Only much later, already in exile, did materials begin to appear about Russian Freemasonry - sparse confessions of its leaders and observations of persons close to them; subsequently, in 1960-1980, a number of works by emigre and foreign historians were written on their basis. In the USSR, this topic was, in fact, not studied until the 1970s (although as early as 1930, very significant - albeit extremely laconic - statements of the well-informed V.D. Bonch-Bruevich were published).

It is necessary to talk about the study of Russian Freemasonry of the 20th century, among other things, because many today know about it, but this knowledge is usually extremely vague or simply false, representing a mixture of facts torn out of the general picture and idle fictions.

Meanwhile, over the past two decades, this Freemasonry has been studied quite successfully and quite objectively.

The first work in which the question of this Freemasonry was seriously raised was the book by N.N. Yakovlev "August 1, 1914", published in 1974. In particular, it cited the confession of a prominent Freemason, a Cadet deputy of the Duma, and then the Commissioner of the Provisional Government in Odessa, L.A. Velikhova: "In the 4th State Duma (elected in 1912. - VC.) I joined the so-called Masonic Association, which included representatives from the Left Progressives (Efremov), the Left Cadets (Nekrasov, Volkov, Stepanov), the Trudoviks (Kerensky), the Social-Democrats. Mensheviks (Chkheidze, Skobelev) and which set as its goal a bloc of all opposition parties in the Duma in order to overthrow the autocracy.

And by now it has been irrefutably proven that Russian Freemasonry of the 20th century, which began its history as early as 1906, was the decisive force of February, primarily precisely because it merged into one influential figures of various parties and movements who appeared on the political stage more or less scattered. Bonded with an oath before their own and at the same time highly developed Western European Freemasonry (which will be discussed later), these very different, sometimes seemingly completely incompatible figures - from the Octobrists to the Mensheviks - began to discipline and purposefully carry out a single task. As a result, a kind of powerful fist was created, which destroyed the state and the army.

The historian V.I. Startsev, who at the same time is one of the the best researchers events of 1917 in general. In a number of his works, the first of which was published in 1978, the argument revealed the true role of Freemasonry. The pages devoted to Russian Freemasonry of the 20th century in the book by L.P. Zamoysky are also informative (see bibliography in the notes).

Later, in 1986, a book by an emigrant N.N. Berberova "People and Lodges. Russian Masons of the 20th Century", based, in particular, on the research of V.I. Startseva (N.N. Berberova herself said this on pages 265-266 of her book - without, however, naming V.I. Startsev, so as not to "compromise" him). On the other hand, in this book, Western archives and various materials of emigrants, which were in fact inaccessible to Russian historians at that time, are widely used. But it must be said directly that many of the provisions of N.N. Berberova are based on notes and rumors that are not really reliable, and quite reliable information is mixed with at least dubious ones (some of which will be discussed later).

Works by V.I. Startsev, as well as the book of N.K. Yakovlev, from the very moment of their appearance and until recently, were subjected to very sharp attacks; Historians were mainly accused of resurrecting the Black Hundred myth about Masons (the "academician I.I. Mints" was especially zealous). Meanwhile, historians, with indisputable facts in their hands, proved (willingly or unwillingly) that the "Black Hundreds" were certainly right when they spoke of the existence of the most active Freemasonry in Russia and its enormous influence on events, although for all that, V.I. Startsev - and it is quite understandable why he did this - more than once "dissociated himself" from the damned Black Hundreds.

It is impossible, however, not to mention that in the writings of the Black Hundreds about Freemasonry there are a lot of incorrect and even fantastic moments. However, in those days, the Masons were the most carefully conspiratorial; Russian political police, which P.A. Stolypin instructed to investigate the activities of Freemasonry, but could not obtain any significant information about him. Therefore, it would be strange to expect accurate and consistent information about the Masons from the Black Hundreds. The fact that the "Black Hundreds" were aware of the presence and powerful influence of Freemasonry in Russia is truly significant in itself. .

Its decisive role in February was revealed with all obviousness, when - already in our time - it was precisely clarified that out of 11 members of the Provisional Government of the first composition, 9 (except A.I. Guchkov and P.N. Milyukov) were Freemasons. In total, during the almost eight months of the existence of the Provisional Government, 29 people held the posts of ministers, and 23 of them belonged to Freemasonry!

No less important is the fact that in the then "second power" - the Central Executive Committee of the Petrograd Soviet - all three members of the presidium were Freemasons: A.F. Kerensky, M.I. Skobelev and N.S. Chkheidze - and two of the four members of the Secretariat: K.A. Gvozdev and already known to us N.D. Sokolov (two other secretaries of the Council - K.S. Grinevich-Shekhter and G.G. Pankov - did not play a primary role). Therefore, the so-called dual power after February was very relative, in fact, even ostentatious: both in the government and in the Soviet people were in charge of "one team" ...

Of particular interest is the fact that three of the six members of the Provisional Government who did not belong to Freemasonry (in any case, there is no indisputable information about such an affiliation) were the most generally recognized, "main" leaders of their parties: these are A.I. Guchkov (Octobrist), P.N. Milyukov (cadet) and V.M. Chernov (SR). Nor was the "main" leader of the Mensheviks L. Martov (Yu.O. Zederbaum) a Freemason. Meanwhile, a number of other most influential - although not the most popular - leaders of these parties occupied a high position in Freemasonry, for example, the Octobrist S.I. Shidlovsky, cadet V.A. Maklakov, Social Revolutionary N.D. Avksentiev, Menshevik N.S. Chkheidze (and, of course, many others).

This is explained, in my opinion, by the fact that such persons as Guchkov or Milyukov, who were under the closest attention of society and the government even before 1917, could easily be exposed, and they were not included in the Masonic "cadres" (though some authors explain their non-participation in Freemasonry by the fact that the same Milyukov, for example, did not want to submit to Masonic discipline). N.N. Berberova tried to prove that Guchkov still belonged to Freemasonry, but her arguments were not convincing enough. However, at the same time, V.I. Startsev rightly says that Guchkov "was surrounded by Freemasons on all sides" and that, in particular, the conspiracy against the Tsar, which had been prepared since 1915, was carried out by "Guchkov's group, which included the most prominent and influential leaders of Russian political Freemasonry Tereshchenko and Nekrasov .. . and this conspiracy was still Masonic" ("Questions of History", 1989, No. 6, p. 44).

Summing up, I will say about the special role of Kerensky and Sokolov, as I understand it. And for both, belonging to Freemasonry was much more important than membership in any parties. So, in 1917 Kerensky suddenly switched from the Trudovik party to the Socialist-Revolutionaries. Sokolov, as already mentioned, presented himself as a "non-factional" Social Democrat. And secondly, for Kerensky, who concentrated his activities in the Provisional Government, Sokolov was, apparently, the main associate in the "second" power - the Council. The later (1927) confessions of N.D. Sokolov about the need for Freemasonry in revolutionary Russia: "...radical elements from the working and bourgeois classes will not be able to agree with themselves on any common acts that are beneficial to both sides ... Therefore ... the creation of bodies where representatives of such radical elements from working and non-working classes could meet on neutral ground... very, very useful...” And he, Sokolov, “long ago, even before 1905, tried to play the role of an intermediary between the Social Democrats and the liberals.”

The Masons in February managed to quickly destroy the state, but then they turned out to be completely powerless and in less than eight months they lost power, unable to offer, in fact, absolutely no resistance to the new, October, coup. Before talking about the reason for the impotence of the heroes of February, one cannot help but touch on the version prevailing in Soviet historiography, according to which the coup in February 1917 was allegedly the work of the Petrograd workers and soldiers of the capital's garrison, allegedly led, moreover, mainly by the Bolsheviks.

I'll start with the last point. During the coup there were almost no Bolsheviks of any importance in Petrograd. Because they advocated defeat in war, they caused general condemnation and by February 1917 they were either in exile in Europe and the USA, or in a distant exile, without having any strong connection with Petrograd. Of the 29 members and candidate members of the Bolshevik Central Committee, elected at the VI Congress (in August 1917), no one was not in the February days in Petrograd! And Lenin himself, as is well known, not only did not know anything about the impending coup, but in no way assumed that it was possible at all.

As for the mass workers' strikes and demonstrations that began on February 23, they were caused by the lack and unprecedented high cost of food, especially bread, in Petrograd. But the shortage of bread in the capital was, as follows from the facts, artificially organized. In the study of T.M. Kitanina "War, bread, revolution (the food problem in Russia. 1914 - October 1917)", published in 1985 in Leningrad, shows that "the surplus of bread (minus the volume of consumption and allied supplies) in 1916 amounted to 197 million tons. pud." (p. 219); the researcher refers, in particular, to the conclusion of A.M. Anfimov, according to which "European Russia, together with the army, until the very harvest of 1917 could be supplied with its own grain, without exhausting all the remnants of the harvests of past years" (p. 338). And in the already mentioned book by N.N. Yakovlev "August 1, 1914" thoroughly states that the ringleaders of the February Revolution "contributed to the creation of a serious food crisis by the beginning of 1917 ... Isn't there a synchronicity - from the beginning of November there were sharp attacks (on the authorities. - VC.) in the Duma and immediately the collapse of the food supply!".

In other words, the "bread riot" in Petrograd, which was soon joined by the soldiers of the "reserve regiments" in the capital, was specially organized and used by the leaders of the coup.

Another thing is no less important. At the front, there was a constant shortage of shells. However, by 1917, there were 30 million (!) Shells in the warehouses - about the same as it was Total spent during the 1914-1916s (by the way, without this reserve, artillery during the Civil War of 1918-1920, when the factories almost did not work, would have been forced to do nothing ...). Considering that the head of the Main Artillery Directorate in 1915 - February 1917, A.A. Manikovsky was a Freemason and a close associate of Kerensky, the situation becomes clear; these facts are stated in the mentioned book by N.N. Yakovlev (see pp. 195-201).

That is, both the sharp discontent in the army and the grain riot in Petrograd, in essence, were the work of the "revolutionaries". But this is not enough. The chief of staff of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief (that is, Nicholas II), General M.V., who actually led the army. Alekseev not only did nothing to send troops to Petrograd on February 23-27 in order to establish order, but, for his part, used the unrest in Petrograd to exert the most severe pressure on the tsar and, moreover, made him believe that the entire army - on the side of the revolution.

N.N. Berberova in her book claims that Alekseev himself belonged to Freemasonry. This is hardly true (if only because for military personnel, joining secret organizations was, in essence, a criminal act). But at the same time, the military historian D.N. Dubensky testified in his memoir diary published back in 1922: “General Alekseev enjoyed ... the widest popularity in the circles of the State Duma, with which he was in full connection ... The Sovereign deeply believed him ... General Alekseev could and should have take a number of necessary measures to prevent a revolution ... He had all the power (over the army. - VC.)... To the greatest surprise ... from the very first hours of the revolution, his criminal inactivity was revealed ... "(quoted from the book: Renunciation of Nicholas II. Memoirs of eyewitnesses. - L., 1927, p. 43).

Further D.N. Dubensky told how the commander of the Northern Front, General N.V. Ruzsky (N.N. Berberova also not quite reasonably considers him a Freemason) "with cynicism and rough certainty" declared already on March 1: "..we must surrender to the mercy of the winner." This phrase, wrote D.N. Dubensky, "clarified everything and unequivocally pointed out that not only the Duma, Petrograd, but also the high command at the front were acting in complete agreement and decided to carry out a coup" (p. 61). And the historian recalled how already on March 2, adjutant general K.D. Nilov called Alekseev a "traitor" and drew the following conclusion: "... the Masonic party seized power." For many years such assertions were qualified as Black Hundred inventions, but now it is by no means Black Hundred historians that have proved the correctness of this conclusion.

However, we will return to the figure of General Alekseev. First, it is necessary to realize that the Russian Freemasons were Westerners to the marrow of their bones. At the same time, they not only saw all their social ideals in Western Europe, but also obeyed the mighty Freemasonry there. G.Ya. Aronson wrote: "Russian Freemasons, as it were, shone with a borrowed light from the West." And they completely measured Russia by purely Western standards.

According to A.I. Guchkov, the heroes of February believed that "after the wild spontaneous anarchy, the street (meaning the February riots in Petrograd. - VC.), falls, after that people of state experience, state mind, like us, will be called to power. Obviously, in remembrance of the fact that ... it was 1848 (that is, the revolution in France. - VC.): the workers dumped, and then some reasonable people staged the power" ("Questions of History", 1991, No. 7, p. 204).

Guchkov defined this "plan" by the word "mistake". However, what we have before us is not so much a specific "mistake" as the result of a complete misunderstanding of Russia. And Guchkov, moreover, clearly mischaracterized the very course of events. After all, according to him, "spontaneous anarchy" is the strikes and demonstrations that took place from February 23 to 27 in Petrograd; On February 27, the "Provisional Committee of the Members of the State Duma" was formed, and on March 2, the Provisional Government. But after all, it was it that carried out the complete destruction of the former state. That is, a real "spontaneous anarchy" that ultimately engulfed the entire country and the entire army (and not just several tens of thousands people in Petrograd, whose actions were cleverly used by the heroes of February), broke out only later, when these same "reasonable people" came to power ...

In a word, the Russian Masons imagined the coup they were carrying out as something quite similar to the revolutions in France or England, but at the same time they forgot about the truly unique Russian freedom - "freedom of spirit and life", which was constantly reflected, in particular, by the "philosopher of freedom" N.A. Berdyaev. In Western European countries, even the highest degree of freedom in political and economic activity cannot lead to fatal destructive consequences, because the majority of the population will under no circumstances go beyond the established "limits" of freedom, they will always "play by the rules." Meanwhile, in Russia there is unconditional, unrestricted freedom of consciousness and behavior - that is, to be more precise, in essence, not freedom (which implies certain boundaries, the framework of the "law"), but actually Russian will broke out into the open almost at every significant weakening of state power and gave rise to unrestrained Russian "freemen" unknown to the West - Bolotnikovism (during the Time of Troubles), Razinism, Pugachevism, Makhnovshchina, Antonovshchina, etc.

Pushkin, in whom the Russian national genius was most fully and completely embodied, starting at least from 1824, experienced the deepest and keenest interest in these phenomena, most of all, naturally, in the recent Pugachevism, to which he devoted his main creations in the field of fiction ("The Captain's Daughter", 1836) and historiography ("The History of Pugachev", published at the end of 1834 under the title - at the suggestion of Nicholas I, who financed the publication - "The History of the Pugachev Riot"). At the same time, Pushkin undertook very time-consuming archival research, and in 1833 he traveled around the "Pugachev places" for a month, asking, in particular, elderly eyewitnesses of the events of 1773-1775.

But the point, of course, is not simply the thoroughness of the study of the subject; Pushkin recreated Pugachevism with his inherent and, without exaggeration, only him understanding. Later interpretations, in comparison with Pushkin's, are one-sided and subjective. Moreover: just as one-sided and subjective are the interpretations of Pushkin's own creations dedicated to Pugachevism (a vivid example is Marina Tsvetaeva's essay "Pushkin and Pugachev"). The only exception is, perhaps, the recent work of V.N. Katasonov ("Our Contemporary", 1994, No. 1), where Pushkin's image of Pugachev is comprehended in its multidimensionality. To put it simply, Pugachevism after Pushkin was either praised or cursed. This is especially characteristic of the era of the Revolution, when almost all ideologists and writers of that time recalled Pugachevism (as well as Razinschina, etc.).

Nowadays, Pushkin's words are constantly quoted: "God forbid to see a Russian rebellion, senseless and merciless," and they are usually interpreted as a purely negative, even destructive characteristic. But these are not so simple words. By the way, they somehow resonate with the amazing words of Pugachev himself cited by Pushkin (they were reported by the investigator who was the first to interrogate the chieftain issued by his associates, Captain-Lieutenant Mavrin): "God was pleased to punish Russia through my wretchedness." In both statements "Russian rebellion" - that is, willfulness- somehow associated with will God, who "led" to see or "punished" - and in the holistic context of Pushkin's recreation of Pugachevism, this is so.

In addition, by putting the definitions "senseless and merciless" after defined word, Pushkin thus gave them a special capacity and weight; we are, as it were, urged to peer, to listen attentively to these definitions and to realize their ambiguity. "Senseless" - it also means aimless, end in itself and, therefore, disinterested. And the special emphasis on the final word "merciless" - of course, in connection with Pushkin's recreation of Pugachevism as a whole - carries the meaning of unrestricted ruthlessness, which naturally appeals to the rebels themselves and on their leader, who in the end was handed over for reprisal by "his own". This is more of God's punishment than actually human cruelty.

Pushkin drew attention to a kind of mystery. He said that at the end of July 1774, that is, just a few weeks before his arrest, Pugachev, "surrounded from everywhere by government troops, not trusting his accomplices ... was already thinking about his salvation; his goal was: to get beyond the Kuban or into Persia ". But, oddly enough, "the rebellion never raged with such force. Indignation passed from one village to another, from province to province ... Separate gangs were formed ... and each had its own Pugachev ..." In a word, "Russian rebellion" is essentially not someone's specific action, but a kind of condition, suddenly captured the whole people - an element that obeys nothing and no one, like a forest fire ...

The unrestrained "Russian revolt" caused and causes completely different "assessments". Some see it as a manifestation of unprecedented freedom, eternally inherent (although not always obvious) in Russia, while others, on the contrary, are an expression of its "slave" nature: the "senselessness" of a rebellion is characteristic, they say, of notorious slaves who, even in an uprising, are not able to achieve satisfaction of specific practical interests (as, say, Western European insurgents do) and rebel, in essence, only for the sake of rebellion itself ...

But such one-color assessments of such grandiose national-historical phenomena generally do not deserve serious attention, because they characterize only the mood of those who express these assessments, and not the assessed "subject" itself. Events that in one way or another capture the people as a whole necessarily carry evil, and good, and falsehood, and truth, and sin, and holiness ...

It is necessary to be clear that both unconditional curses and the same praises of the "Russian rebellion" are inextricably linked with the obviously primitive and simply false perception of the very "originality" of Russia and, on the other hand, of the West: in the first case, Russia is perceived as something unconditionally "worst" in comparison with the West, in the second - as unconditionally "better". But both perceptions do not really have a serious meaning: the argument about what is "better" - Russia or the West, is quite similar, say, to disputes about where it is better to live - in a forest or steppe area, and even who is better to be - a woman or a man...etc. Trying to put forward consistent "assessments" of the thousand-year existence of both Russia and the West is an occupation for ideologists who have not grown up to mature thinking.

However, it is time to turn directly to 1917. As already mentioned, Pugachevism and Razinschina were constantly remembered at that time, which was quite natural. At the same time, this time the consequences were completely different than under Pugachev, because the rebellion was captured and completely decomposed by the new rulers army(which was still preserved during the Pugachevshchina - even if there were many cases of soldiers and even officers moving into the ranks of the rebels). Moreover, the millions of soldiers who arbitrarily left the army - often with weapons in their hands - were the most effective leaven for a general revolt.

Soviet historiography tried to prove that the bulk of the "rebels" - including soldiers - fought in 1917 against the "bourgeois" Provisional Government for the victory of the Bolsheviks, for socialism-communism. But this is clearly not true. General Denikin, who knew the facts thoroughly, speaking in his fundamental "Essays on the Russian Troubles" about the widest distribution of the Bolshevik press in the army, at the same time asserted: "It would, however, be wrong to talk about the direct influence of the press on the soldier mass. It was not. .. The press had an influence mainly on the semi-intellectual (very insignificant quantitatively. - VC.) part army personnel". As for the millions of ordinary soldiers, then in their minds, the general stated, "straight-line denial prevailed: "Down with!" Down with ... in general, everything that is disgusting, boring, interfering with uterine instincts in one way or another and restricting "free will" - all down with it!

It is impossible not to note a direct contradiction in this text: Denikin defines the revolt of soldiers as a manifestation of "uterine instincts" - that is, as something base, bodily, animal, and at the same time as an impulse towards "free will" (to define this phenomenon, it turned out to be the words "freedom" and "will" taken separately would not be sufficient, and the general considered it necessary to combine them, clearly trying thereby to express something "unlimited"; cf. the popular phrase "free will"). But "uterine instincts" (for example, the animal fear of death) and the desire for limitless "will" are, of course, completely different phenomena; the second implies, in particular, the overcoming of mortal fear ... Thus, Denikin, hardly conscious of this, gave the soldier's rebellion a kind of "high" interpretation.

The objection is not ruled out that Denikin, they say, distorted the real picture, because he did not want to recognize the impressive role of the Bolsheviks he hated. However, in essence, the cavalry general (since 1912) A.A. said the same thing in his memoirs. Brusilov, who, unlike Denikin, went over to the side of the Bolsheviks. The masses of soldiers who rebelled in 1917, the general testified, "had absolutely no interest in the International, communism, and similar questions, they had only assimilated the beginnings of a future free life."

One more serious thinker should be cited, who, apparently, did not participate in the revolutionary events, was only a "suffering" person who eventually fled to the West. We are talking about the Russian German M.M. Gakkebusche (1875-1929), who published a book in Berlin in 1921 with the significant title "On the Rivers of Babylon: Notes of a Refugee"; at the same time, he published it under the same meaningful pseudonym M. Gorelov, clearly not wanting, even now, in exile, to interfere personally in political strife.

The book contains a lot of all kinds of emotional assessments of the "refugee", but there is also a fairly clear definition of what happened. Recalling, in particular, that Dostoevsky called the Russian people "God-bearer", Gakkebush-Gorelov wrote that in 1917 "a man took off his mask... "God-bearer" revealed his political ideals: he does not recognize any power, does not want to pay taxes and refuse to give recruits. The rest doesn't concern him."

Immediately, the "refugee" posed the notorious question "who is to blame?" in this muzhik's denial of power: "We are all to blame - the people themselves are least of all. The dynasty is to blame, which, it would seem, allowed it to dump the most expensive monarchical principle in manure; the bureaucracy, enslaving and corrupt, is to blame; the clergy, who forgot Christ and turned into cassock gendarmes; a school that castrated young souls; a family that corrupted children, an intelligentsia that spit on their homeland..." Old England". The Germans have "our Old Fritz". Only those who have passed the Russian gymnasium and university have "damned Russia". How surprised that every Russian from the age of 16 sticks to the party of "overthrowing" the state system ... ).

So, the joint actions of various forces (Hakkebusch blames the dynasty itself ...) debunked the Russian state, and in the end it was destroyed. And then the "muzhik" refused to submit to any authority, choosing an unrestricted "will". Gakkebusch was convinced that in this way the “muzhik” completely and completely exposed the imaginary idea of ​​him as a “god-bearer”. Although many of the most influential ideologues of the time passed a similar verdict along with this little-known author, the problem is still more complex. After all, one who does not recognize any earthly authority is thus open to the "authority" of God...

One of the most prominent word artists of that time, I.A. Bunin, wrote in his diary (in 1935 he published it under the title "Cursed Days") on June 11 (24), 1919, that "every Russian revolt (and especially the current one) first of all proves how old everything is in Russia and how she craves, above all, formlessness. For centuries there have been "robbers" ... runners, connecting rods, rebels against everyone and everything ... "(by the way, Bunin, in the title he chose for his diary, echoed - probably without realizing it - with Pushkin cited in the words of Pugachev: "God was pleased to punish Russia through my wretchedness"). In a complete misunderstanding of the eternal Russian "originality" Bunin sees a fatal miscalculation of politicians: "Klyuchevsky notes the extreme "repetition" of Russian history. Unfortunately, no one led an ear to this "repetition". , obligatory optimism ... ". Having become both a witness and a victim of the unrestrained "Russian rebellion", Bunin cursed him furiously. But, like a true artist who cannot fail to see the whole truth, he clearly spoke out - as if even against his will - about the extreme "ambiguity" (I will use the now popular word) of this rebellion. It would seem that he sharply distinguished two human "types", separating them even ethnically:

"There are two types among the people. In one, Russia prevails, in the other - Chud and Merya" (as if not wanting to completely and completely curse his painfully beloved Russia, the writer hardly at least a little thoroughly tries to attribute the rebellious initiative to "Finnish blood" ...). However, this thesis is immediately refuted by the course of Bunin's reflection: "But (look - Bunin unexpectedly objects to himself with this "but"! - VC.) in both (type. - VC.) there is a terrible changeability of moods, appearances, "shakyness", as they used to say in the old days. The people themselves said to themselves: "from us, as from a tree, is both a club and an icon" - depending on the circumstances, on who processes this tree: Sergius of Radonezh or Emelka Pugachev.

It turns out that the thesis about "two types" is incorrect: the same Russian people followed St. Sergius as the excommunicated Emelka, and the "look" of Russian people depends on historical "circumstances" (and not on the presence of two "types"). And in fact: it is obviously wrong to believe that in the people who followed Pugachev there was no inner unity with the people who followed St. basis was still the same...

It is remarkable that already after the cited diary entries, in 1921, Bunin created one of his most wonderful creations - "Mowers" - a truly unsurpassed hymn to the "Russian (specifically, Ryazan, Yesenin) peasant", where he nevertheless mentioned that so he was horrified: "... and around - boundless native Russia, disastrous for him, spoiled, except for his freedom, space and fabulous wealth" ("disastrous" is the exact word here).

So, in that boundless "will" that the people yearned after the collapse of the state and the army, there was, if you like, something "God-bearing" (contrary to the opinion of Gakkebusch-Gorelov), although very few ideologists had the courage to discern this in the "Russian rebellion" .

And yet, no matter how much the finale of the famous poem by Alexander Blok, created in January 1918, where none other than Christ appears in front of the twelve “robber-apostles”, the poet’s decision is unshakable in its own way: “I,” he wrote on March 10 1918, - only stated the fact: if you look into the pillars of a blizzard on this path, you will see "Jesus Christ" ... "

It is quite well known that the image of the "Russian rebellion" in Blok's poem was perceived by many (and is perceived now) as an image of Bolshevism. This naturally followed from the widespread, but nevertheless certainly false idea, according to which the "Russian rebellion" of the twentieth century was generally identified with Bolshevism (such an understanding is present, in particular, in Bunin's "Cursed Days", but the meaning of the book as a whole is in no way bring it down to this). In fact, what else will be discussed in detail, the "Russian rebellion" was the most powerful and most dangerous enemy Bolsheviks.

] Compiled by P.S. Ulyashov. Managing editor S.V. Marshkov. Artist M.A. Zosimova.
(Moscow: Algorithm, 2005)
Scan, processing, Djv format: Zed Exmann, 2011

• CONTENT:
  Vadim Kozhinov - writer and historian (5).
  Part one. CONVERSATIONS, DIALOGUES, INTERVIEWS
  Sower (9).
  Faces and masks of history (25).
  Intermittent path (52).
  "Only believe..." (59).
  Russia as a miracle (70).
  Two capitals (83).
  What can Russia hope for (94).
  My pain is Serbia (104).
  “It is absurd to negotiate with the Chechens within the framework of the norms of world democracy” (108).
  “Much of what happened can be explained by Russian maximalism...” (113).
  Will a sense of dignity help our Motherland? (119).
  Niglism is a bad adviser (126).
  The pure face of Victory (132).
  Fashion for common people (145).
  Who is guilty? (185).
  Statehood and culture (205).
  Russia surrounded by neighbors (217).
  Dual power (230).
  "Russian culture began in the squad" (238).
  "The patriotic idea does not oppose socialism" (242).
  Russian man: in search of truth (249).
  “I ask you to consider me a countryman” (258).
  "Socialism in Russia is inevitable" (272).
  Invincibility of Russia (275).
  Person and character (287).
  “We are neither better nor worse than others. We are different” (301).
  “We have a different beginning” (306).
  Who and why is escalating the topic of anti-Semitism? (311).
  Riddle of the 37th (321).
  The Riddle of the Cosmopolitans (337).
  Solzhenitsyn vs. Solzhenitsyn (353).
  "Judgment" (368).
  War... literature... history. Letters from Abkhaz writers to Vadim Kozhinov (373).
  Part two. MEMORIES OF V.V. KOZHINOVE
  Careless and necessary (386).
  Alexey Puzitsky. Brother (388).
  Helium Protasov. At the walls of the Donskoy Monastery (392).
  Georgy Gachev. Vadim - needed (401).
  Lev Anninsky. Only Vadim (406).
  Sergei Semanov. Vadim Kozhinov and his comrades in the Russian anti-Masonic lodge (416).
  Stanislav Lesnevsky. Artist (423).
  Taisiya Napolova. "... And again the soul and nature become orphans" (427).
  Mikhail Grozovsky. Russian enlightener (437).
  Viktor Kozhemyako. His word in Pravda and Soviet Russia, as well as in my life (443).
  Sergey Kara-Murza. Staff Giver in the Mist (451).
  Evgeny Potupov. He carried in his heart the victories and troubles of Russia (457).
  Alexander Vasin. Anti-obituary (459).
  Stanislav Kunyaev. "Beyond the horizon, old friends..." (469).
  Vladislav Popov. Vadim Kozhinov as my teacher (507).
  Stanislav Kunyaev. This fearless man (521).
  Sergei Nebolsin. Kozhinov, Arbat and Russia (535).
  “If it weren’t for Zyuganov, I wouldn’t vote for anyone” (551).
  Pavel Ulyashov. Well-wisher (557).
  Russian poets - Vadim Kozhinov. Poems of different years (564).

Publisher's note: Books by V.V. Kozhinov (1930-2001), writer, historian, connoisseur of Russian culture, have long been desktop for millions of readers. An outstanding educator of the past century, on whose ideas "two generations of the Russian nationally thinking intelligentsia" grew up, Vadim Valerianovich was extremely responsive to requests for an interview, write a review, and a recommendation. And in these works of his - a lot of subtle thoughts, observations, assessments.
This publication, which includes interviews, conversations, dialogues by Vadim Kozhinov and memoirs of his contemporaries, has been prepared for his 75th birthday.