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Kirov and Death in The Great Citizen: The Fatal Consequences of Linguistic Mediation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2017

Julie A. Cassiday
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Abstract

A fictional account of the life and death of Sergei Kirov, Fridrikh Ermler’s two-part film The Great Citizen (1937 and 1939) appears unusual due to its lack of action and its fetishization of the spoken word. As an instance of what Ermler called “conversational cinema,” the film defines the outer limit of verbosity and immobility in socialist realist film. The movie’s hero Shakhov mediates between Stalin and the Soviet masses; as a result, the conflict between Shakhov and the Trotskyist opposition represents a struggle between authentic and corrupt linguistic mediation in the film. By appropriating the myth of the Russian writer's martyrdom, The Great Citizen depicts Shakhov’s demise, not merely as the result of a Trotskyist conspiracy, but more importantly as the necessary guarantor of the truth of Shakhov’s words. Ermler's film reconfigures the writer’s role in Russian society by inverting the hierarchy of the written and the spoken word, thus subjugating the myth of the martyred writer to the aesthetic and ideological goals of socialist realism. The Great Citizen demonstrates the importance of Kirov's martyrdom within Stalinist mythology and figures as a paradigmatic work of socialist realist film.

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Articles
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Slavic Review , Volume 64 , Issue 4 , Winter 2005 , pp. 799 - 822
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Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies. 2005

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References

An earlier version of this article, titled “The Myth of the Great Citizen: Kirov, Ermler, and Assassination on Film,” was presented as part of a panel devoted to Sergei Kirov at the 2003 AAASS National Convention in Toronto. I would like to thank Cynthia Ruder, whose comments as panel discussant helped me to rework my original paper into its present form, Dana Goldstein, Emily Johnson, and Alexandar Mihailovic, who provided insightful commentary on a draft of this article, and the anonymous readers of Slavic Review, whose reviews provided invaluable food for thought. In addition, I extend my heartfelt gratitude to Allison O’Grady of interlibrary loan and Bruce Wheat of multimedia services at Williams College for their assistance in gathering materials essential to my research. All translations from Russian are my own.

1 My analysis of The Great Citizen does not explore the much disputed circumstances of Kirov’s murder; rather it is concerned with the representation of Kirov as an exemplary and mythic figure in Stalinist culture of the 1930s. For this reason, I do not treat the substantial scholarly literature devoted to Kirov’s life, death, and subsequent canonization within the Soviet Union. For insightful discussions of this topic, see Kirilina, Alia, Rikoshet, Hi, Skol'ko chelovek bylo ubito vystrelom v Smol'nom. (St. Petersburg, 1993)Google Scholar, and Knight, Amy, Who Killed Kirov? The Kremlins Greatest Mystery (New York, 1999).Google Scholar

2 M. Bleiman, M. Bol'shintsov, and F. Ermler, “Zhizn'—v bor'be,” Iskusstvo i zhizn', 1938, no. 11–12 (November-December): 8; Bleiman, M., Bol'shintsov, M., and Ermler, F., “Rabota nad kartinoi,” in Velikii grazhdanin: Sbornik materialov k kinofil'mu (Leningrad, 1940), 5.Google Scholar

3 Critics wrote: “The pure springs of Kirov’s life nourished the film” (S. Tregub, “Velikii grazhdanin,” Pravda, 29 October 1939); “The authors [of the film] deliberately do not provide the names of the dramatis personae or of the place of action, but every viewer understands perfectly and senses the realistic, the almost newsreel accuracy of the action … at times he forgets that before him is a movie film; it seems to him that this is a document, a record of concrete facts” (I. Trauberg, “Kartina o velikom grazhdanine,” Iskusstvo i zhizn', 1938, no. 2 [February]: 24); “And when we, the viewers, see Shakhov on the screen, it seems to us that we are watching a documentary film about the great citizen of the country of socialism, about the fiery Bolshevik Sergei Mironovich Kirov” (V. Ustinov, “Obraz velikogo grazhdanina,” Sovetskoe iskusstvo, 1 December 1939, 3); “You see not photographs of events, but genuine, living reality, a participant in which you yourself have often been. The film is your contemporary; it is close to your feelings, thoughts, and moods” (A. Kovalev, “Velikii grazhdanin,” Izvestiia, 30 November 1939); “In it is the breath of our epoch. It is one of the documents with which the future generation will begin to reconstruct for itself a picture of our life” (M. Kozakov, “Velikii grazhdanin,” Iskusstvo kino, 1938, no. 4–5 [April-May]: 24).

4 “Pamiati S. M. Kirova,” Vecherniaia Moskva, 1 December 1938, 1; “Pamiati S. M. Kirova,” Pravda, 30 November 1939.

5 For example, see Oksana Bulgakova’s treatment of the blending of fictional and documentary film in “Sovetskoe kino v poiskakh ‘obshchei modeli,'” in Khans Giunter (Hans Gunther) and Evgenii Dobrenko, eds., Sotsrealisticheskii kanon (St. Petersburg, 2000), 148; Emily Johnson’s analysis of the documentary short story and novel (dokumental'naia povest’ and dokumental'nyi roman) as prototypical genres of socialist realist fiction in “Mal'chik iz Urzhuma: The Kirov Museum and the Kirov Myth” (paper, American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies, Toronto, 2003); and Dariusz Tolczyk’s discussion of the literary anthology Belomorkanal, published in 1934, the same year as Kirov’s assassination, in See No Evil: Literary Cover-Ups and Discoveries of the Soviet Camp Experience (New Haven, 1999), 122, 179–80.

6 As one critic noted, “It is easy to notice that the image of Shakhov essentially does not develop at all [and] does not change during the entire film… .Just as Shakhov enters the film, so does he exit it.” P. Gromov, “O khudozhestvennom metode fil'ma Ermlera ‘Velikii grazhdanin,’” Zvezda, 1940, no. 1:168.

7 Katerina Clark, The Soviet Novel: History as Ritual, 3rded. (Bloomington, 2000), 170, 180–81. See 114–24 for a detailed description and analysis of the paradigmatic roles of “son” or “initiate” and “father” or “elder.“

8 As one reviewer commented, “In no other picture representing the enemies of our people—the Trotskyite murderers, provocateurs, adventurers, wreckers—have we seen such a penetration by the actors into the psychology of the repulsive ‘depths’ as in this film.” Tregub, “Velikii grazhdanin.“

9 M. Bleiman, M. Bol'shintsov, and F. Ermler, “Rabota nad stsenariem,” Iskusstvo kino, 1938, no. 4–5 (April-May): 30. This article is reprinted in abridged form in Sepman, I. V. and Bakun, V. A., eds., Fridrikh Ermler: Dokumenty, stat'i, vospominaniia (Leningrad, 1974), 135–48.Google Scholar

10 My transcription of this and other conversations in The Great Citizen is based on a videotape of the film released in 2000 as part of the “Zolotaia fil'moteka” series (Fridrikh Ermler, director, Velikii grazhdanin, videocassette [1937 and 1939; Moscow: Lenfil'm, 2000]). I have also used the published screenplay of the film and a frame-by-frame description ﹛montazhnaia zapis’) of the second film in the series to determine what some characters are saying, due to the uneven quality of the sound on the videotape. Interestingly, the videotape in die “Zolotaia fil'moteka” series eliminates the third component—great love for Stalin—from the end of Kats’s eulogy. For the published screenplay, see M. Bleiman, M. Bol'shintsov, F. Ermler, Velikii grazhdanin: Kinostsenarii (Moscow, 1939); or “Velikii grazhdanin,” in Izbrannye slsenarii sovetskogo kino, vol. 2 (Moscow, 1949), 369–482. For the frame-by-frame description of the second film in the series, see Bleiman, M., Bol'shintsov, M., Ermler, F., Velikii grazhdanin: Vtoraia seriia; Montazhnaia zapis'zvukovogofil'ma (Moscow, 1940).Google Scholar

11 In their official account of Ermler’s work in the late 1930s, D. S. Pisarevskii and S. 1. Freilikh all but state that Ermler reversed the cinematographic experimentation diat earned Soviet cinema of the 1920s its fame in movies such as Peasants and The Great Citizen. Pisarevskii, D. S. and Freilikh, S. I., “Sovremennaia zhizn’ sovetskogo obshchestva v fil'makh vtoroi poloviny 30-kh godov,” in Kalashnikov, lu. S., ed., Ocherki istorii sovetskogo kino, vol. 2 (Moscow, 1956), 87, 104–5.Google Scholar

12 One critic commented on the directness of the film’s development: “The changing of episodes [and] their sequence are so straightforward, the basic line of the struggle is so ‘in one’s face,’ that this might create an impression of simplicity and coarseness, if it were not for the complete appropriateness of this simplicity in the given artistic context.“ Gromov, “O khudozhestvennom metode,” 171.

13 Bleiman, Bol'shintsov, and Ermler, “Rabota nad stsenariem,” 30. Reprinted in Sepman and Bakun, Fridrikh Ermler, 136.

14 Abul-Kasymova, K., ed.,lstoriiasovetskogokino, 1917–1967, vol.2, 1931-1941 (Moscow, 1973), 179–80.Google Scholar

15 A. Milovidov, “Velikii grazhdanin,” Pravda, 17 February 1938. Another reviewer commented, “Perhaps the only shortcoming of this very brilliant work is a certain excess of the meetings we see” (Izvestiia, 17 February 1938). Yet another critic remarked, “A characteristic detail in The Great Citizen is that there are many meetings, speeches, political arguments, discussions, and so on. They all impart a certain monotony to the picture, it would seem, and could make it ostensibly too dry and one-sided” (S. Tsimbal, “Partiinyi fil'm,” Iskusstvo kino, 1938, no. 4 - 5 [April-May]: 27). For positive remarks on the film's dependence on dialogue, see I. Grinberg, “Velikii grazhdanin,” Zvezda, 1938, no. 5:224; I. Grinberg, “Priamo na predmet,” Teatr, 1940, no. 3:47; and Shklovskii, V., “Velikii grazhdanin,“ in Za sorok let: Stat'i o kino (Moscow, 1965), 213.Google Scholar One reviewer goes so far as to state, “It would be possible to characterize the specific manner of Ermler’s first film [in the series] as the discovery of the aesthetics of the party meeting [and] of party life.” Gromov, “O khudozhestvennom metode,” 167.

16 Bulgakova, “Sovetskoe kino,” 149–50.

17 Ibid., 155.

18 Ibid., 152. Interestingly enough, the screenwriters of The Great Citizen describe the difficulty they had with “the wrecking but now unmasked leadership of the Lenfil'm studio“ while making the film. Bleiman, Bol'shintsov, and Ermler, “Rabota nad stsenariem,“ 31. This information has been edited from the version of this article that appears in Ermler’s collected works.

19 Kenez, Peter, Cinema and Soviet Society from the Revolution to theDealh of Stalin (London, 2001), 133.Google Scholar For Russian versions of Stalin’s remarks regarding the original screenplay of The Great Citizen, see Latyshev, A., “Vzgliad skvoz’ gody: ‘Velikii grazhdanin,'” Sovetskii ekran, 1989, no. 14:18–19;Google Scholar and Mar'iamov, G., Kremlevskii Tsenzor: Stalin smotrit kino (Moscow, 1992), 33–34.Google Scholar

20 Latyshev, “Vzgliad skvoz' gody,” 18; Mar'iamov, Kremlevskii Tsenzor, 34. As Mar'iamov points out, Stalin’s comments to Ermler were written only three days before Georgii Piatakov and other defendants in this particular show trial were executed (35). In addition, in two different articles, Ermler states that the ongoing show trials of the time compelled him to make revisions to the script of The Great Citizen during the filming process. For these comments, see F. Ermler, M. Bleiman, and M. Bol'shintsov, “Velikii grazhdanin,“ Komsomolskaia pravda, 5 January 1938, 4; and Mikh. Dolgopolov, ‘Velikii grazhdanin: Novaia kartina studii ‘LennTm,’” Komsomol!;skaia pravda, 15 September 1938, 4. Many critics of the day also responded to this connection by interweaving their discussion of the film with names, phrases, and even lengthy quotations from the coverage of show trials of the era. Perhaps the most vivid example of this trend can be seen in N. Kovarskii, “Velikii grazhdanin: Stat'ia pervaia,” Iskusstvo kino, 1939, no. 11:30–39. Kovarskii’s article was later reprinted as part of a short, book-length study of Ermler’s work titled Fridrikh Ermler (Moscow, 1941), whose rough draft appeared as “Fridrikh Ermler,” in Bleiman, Bol'shintsov, and Ermler, Velikii grazhdanin: Sbornik materialov k kinqfil'mu, 17–41.

21 Bleiman, Bol'shintsov, and Ermler, “Rabota nad stsenariem,” 31; Kozakov, ‘Velikii grazhdanin,” 24.

22 Tsimbal, “Partiinyi fil'm,” 27. Later Soviet critics also noted the film's pivotal role in bolstering Stalin’s Great Terror; rather than praising diis aspect of the film, however, they denounced it as artless political propaganda. For diis point of view, see Latyshev, ‘Vzgliad skvoz’ gody,” and Maks Bremener, “Ispytanie pravdoi: Razmyshleniia o fil'me F. Ermlera ‘Velikii grazhdanin,'” Iskusstvo kino, 1988, no. 9:91–106.

23 B. Sarnov in afterword to Bremener, “Ispytanie pravdoi,” 107.

24 Trauberg, L., “O glavnom v nashei zhizni,” in Izbrannye proizvedeniia v 2-kh lomakh (Moscow, 1988), 1:436–37.Google Scholar See also Grinberg, “Prianio na predmet,” 44, 46; Pisarevskii and Freilikh, “Sovremennaia zhizn’ sovetskogo obshchestva,” 85, 94; Trauberg, “Kartina o velikom grazhdanine,” 24; and L. Trauberg, “Fil'm nachinaetsia,” in Izbrannye proizvedeniia v 2-kh lomakh, 1:58–59. One viewer even went so far as to state, “Our entire country should watch this remarkable film.” O. G. Barshak, “Fil'm—agitator,” in “Velikii grazhdanin: Zritel' o novoi kartine,” Vecherniaia Moskva, 2 March 1938, 3.

25 Many reviews of the film bear witness to the costumed Bogoliubov’s resemblance to Kirov, in spite of the fact that the film’s screenwriters stated that there is no “outward resemblance“ or “similarity of biographies” between Shakhov and Kirov. Bleiman, Bol'shintsov, and Ermler, “Zhizn'—v bor'be,” 8. In addition, in their official history of films from the late 1930s, Pisarevskii and Freilikh claim that both of Ermler’s important films from this era, Peasants and The Great Citizen, “are saturated by the image of S. M. Kirov, [and] the central roles in them are played by the actor Nikolai Bogoliubov” (“Sovremennaia zhizn' sovetskogo obshchestva,” 86). Whether these writers’ impression of Bogoliubov’s depiction of Kirov in the earlier film is a product of historical hindsight or not is impossible to determine. Nonetheless, they describe a clear line of development from Peasants’ hero Nikolai Mironovich, whom they call “a sketch of the image of Shakhov” (92), to The Great Citizen. Like the screenwriters, these authors are also careful to state that “Bogoliubov does not resemble Kirov [physically]” (99), as does the actor Bogoliubov in memoirs written about developing the role of Shakhov. Bogoliubov, N. I., “Biografiia geroiia,” in Rudnitskii, K., ed., Obraz moego sovremennika: Sbornik statei masterov sovetskoi stseny (Moscow, 1951), 57.Google Scholar

26 Iurenev, R. N., Sovetskoe kinoiskusstvo tridtsatykh godov (Moscow, 1997), 77.Google Scholar

27 F. Ermler, “I. Bersenev v ‘Velikom grazhdanine,“’ in Sepman and Bakun, Fridrikh Ermler, 142–48. The notes in this volume state that this article “is published in abridged form according to the text of: Ivan Nikolaevich Bersenev: Sbornik statei. M., 1961” (335). However, the 1974 version of this article contains new information on the film’s connection to Kirov and the actors’ process of preparation that is entirely absent from the 1961 publication and helps to illuminate the problems Ermler and his actors encountered.

28 N. Bogoliubov, “Velikii grazhdanin” in “Obraz Kirova v iskusstve,” Pravda, 30 November 1939. For detailed descriptions of Bogoliubov’s understanding of the relationship between the role of Shakhov and the life of Kirov, see N. Bogoliubov, “Nash sovremennik,“ Literaturnaia gazeta, 5 December 1939; N. Bogoliubov, “Proshchanie s rol'iu,” Sovetskoe iskusstvo, 1 December 1939, 3; and Bogoliubov, “Biografiia geroia,” 57–62.

29 P. Maiskii, “Velikii grazhdanin (Na prosmotre vtoroi serii),” fzvestiia, 16 September 1939.

30 According to one critic, Ermler overcame and improved upon the inherent psychological limitations of Stanislavskii’s system in The Great Citizen by shifting the actors' work from passive experience (pereihivanie) to active passion (strast’). Gromov, “O khudozhestvennom metode,” 170.

31 The critic Gromov believed “it is impossible to reveal an artistically motivated image of the enemy by acting according to [Stanislavskii’s] system of feeling.” Ibid., 170.

32 A. Lander, “Vtoraia seriia ‘Velikogo grazhdanina': V gostiakh u kinoaktera O. Zhakova,” Komsomol'skaia pravda, 26 August 1938, 4.

33 I. Bersenev, “Obraz vraga,” Iskusstvo kino, 1938, no. 4 – 5 (April-May): 33. Zhakov echoed this sentiment, as one interviewer reported: “Zhakov understands that by creating a negative image he is helping the people to unmask enemies of all stripes [and] to raise vigilance.” Lander, “Vtoraia seriia ‘Velikogo grazhdanina,’” 4.

34 Ermler, “I. Bersenev v ‘Velikom grazhdanine,'” 145. Among the documents Bersenev was allowed to examine, Ermler mentions the writings of N. V Ustrialov, a prominent member of the “Changing Signposts” movement in the Russian emigration, and the movement’s best-known publication, Smena vekh: Sbornik statei (Prague, 1922).

35 Ermler, “I. Bersenev v ‘Velikom grazhdanine,'” 145.

36 Kovarskii, “Velikii grazhdanin,” 32.

37 Grinberg, “Velikii grazhdanin,” 221. Grinberg restates this idea in “Priamo na predmet,” 48. See also Dolgopolov, “Velikii grazhdanin,” 4.

38 Ermler himself uses the phrase “high falsetto” in his description of Bersenev’s manner of delivering his lines in the film. Ermler, F., “I. N. Bersenev v Velikom grazhdanine,” in Eskin, A. M., ed., Ivan Nikolaevich Bersenev: Sbornik statei (Moscow, 1961), 235, 237.Google Scholar

39 Turovskaia, Maiia, “Kino totalitarnoi epokhi,” in Mamatova, L. Kh., ed., Kino: Politika i liudi (30-e gody) (Moscow, 1995), 49.Google Scholar

40 Trauberg, “Kartina o velikom grazhdanine,” 27. The screenwriters echo this sentiment in their evaluation of the actors’ efforts in the film, which they were confident would “help millions of viewers to unmask even better the enemies of the people [and] teach [them] to hate [the enemies] even more strongly.” Ermler, Bleiman, and Bol'shintsov, “Velikii grazhdanin,” 4. See also, Dolgopolov, “Velikii grazhdanin,” 4, and Kovarskii, “Velikii grazhdanin,” 31. Another reviewer describes the film’s agitational value clearly: “The film The Great Citizen teaches [us] to recognize the methods and devices of the work of Trotskyite-Zinov'evite-Bukharinite vermin and provokes a feeling of anger and hatred for this human waste. The film teaches the necessity of raising vigilance, teaches [us] to be steadfast, firm, and vigilant. The agitator should watch this film, organize collective viewings of it, and tell his viewers about the deep meaning of this movie picture.” M. Mikhailov, “Velikii grazhdanin,” Sputnik agitatora, 1938, no. 6:45-46. The critic Milovidov states, “This picture will also be quite a good aid for studying the history of the party. The Great Citizen teaches vigilance, teaches the ability to discern enemy from friend and friend from enemy.” Milovidov, “Velikii grazhdanin.“

41 The only exception to this avoidance of foreign phrases occurs early in the second film in The Great Citizen series, when Shakhov practices speaking German while relaxing by a campfire after hunting. But Shakhov’s halting attempts to remember individual words and phrases in German emphasize his relative ignorance of foreign languages in contrast to Kartashov’s mastery.

42 The possible reference to Blok’s “The Twelve” in Kartashov's use of the word tolstozadaia was brought to my attention by one of Slavic Review’s anonymous reviewers, whom I would like to thank for this observation.

43 Several reviewers comment on Shakhov’s intuitive ability to unmask the enemy, describing it as “clmt'e” (feeling), including Grinberg, “Priamo na predmet,” 52; Kovarskii, “Velikii grazhdanin,” 34; and Trauberg, “Kartina o velikom grazhdanine,” 26.

44 The published screenplay has neither of these substandard forms, but they are clearly audible in the film’s soundtrack. Bleiman, Bol'shintsov, and Ermler, Velikii grazlidanin: Kinostsenarii, 30.

45 For examples of the phrase “plamennyi tribun revoliutsii,” see Bleiman, Bol'shintsov, and Ermler, “Zhizn'—v bor'be,” 8; “Pamiati S. M. Kirova,” Vecherniaia Moskva, 1 December 1938, 1; Evg. Semenov, “Muzei S. M. Kirova,” Iskusstvo i zhizn', 1938, no. 11-12 (November-December), 6; “S. M. Kirov—v kolkhozakh Kazakhstana,” Vecherniaia Moskva, 1 December 1938, 1; and V. Zverev, “Nezabyvaemye vstrechi,” Sovetskoe iskusstvo, 1 December 1939, 3.

46 Trauberg, “Kartina o velikom grazhdanine,” 25; Grinberg, “Velikii grazhdanin,“ 221. Grinberg repeats this sentence verbatim in “Priamo na predmet,” 48.

47 Gorham, Michael S., Speaking in Soviet Tongues: Language Culture and the Politics of Voice in Revolutionary Russia (DeKalb, 2003), 121.Google Scholar

48 Ibid., 123, 122.

49 Clark, Katerina, “Socialist Realism and the Sacralizing of Space,” in Dobrenko, Evgeny and Naiman, Eric, eds., The Landscape of Stalinism: The Art and Ideology of Soviet Space (Seattle, 2003), 3–4.Google Scholar E. A. Rees makes a similar point in his discussion of the Stalin cult when he writes, “The relations between leader and led need to be mediated, they need to be distanced from each. The [leader] cult can only really develop where it has functionaries in charge of controlling this intermediation.” Rees, E. A., “Leader Cults: Varieties, Preconditions and Functions,” in Apor, Balazs, Behrends, Jan C., Jones, Polly, and Rees, E. A., eds., The Leader Cult in Communist Dictatorships: Stalin and the Eastern Bloc (Basingstoke, Eng., 2004), 8–9.Google Scholar

50 Latyshev, “Vzgliad skvoz'gody,” 18, and Mar'iamov, Kremlevskii Tsenzor, 34.

51 Kozakov, “Velikii grazhdanin,” 26. Bulgakova also makes this point. “Sovetskoe kino,” 155.

52 Clark, “Socialist Realism and the Sacralizing of Space,” 12–13. See also Bazin, Andre, “The Myth of Stalin in the Soviet Cinema” in Bazin at Work: Major Essays and Reviews from the Forties and Fifties (New York, 1997), 23–40.Google Scholar

53 Clark, “Socialist Realism and the Sacralizing of Space,” 11. For a discussion of the representation of Stalin using concentric circles within portraiture of the era, see Jan Plamper, “The Spatial Poetics of the Personality Cult,” in Dobrenko and Naiman, Landscape of Stalinism, 19–50.

54 Bazin, “The Myth of Stalin in the Soviet Cinema,” 29. Emphasis mine.

55 Geldern, James von, “The Centre and the Periphery: Cultural and Social Geography in the Mass Culture of the 1930s,” in White, Stephen, ed., New Directions in Soviet History (Cambridge, Eng., 1992), 70.Google Scholar

56 The film’s printed screenplay correctly quotes the opening line of Tiutchev’s poem, suggesting that Bersenev either improvised or misquoted Tiutchev’s poem during filming. Bleiman, Bol'shintsov, and Ermler, Velikii grazhdanin: Kinostsenarii, 7.

57 F. Ermler, “I. N. Bersenev v Velikom gmzhdanine,” in Ivan Nikolaevich Bersenev, 227.

58 Soviet film scholars also articulated this problem: “All of the devices of dialogic speech in the film come, in essence, to one thing: the word is action, [and] it is always tied to a concrete deed in a given concrete situation; it reveals the person's motives that stimulate the deed.” Pisarevskii and Freilikh, “Sovremennaia zhizn’ sovetskogo obshchestva,“ 98.

59 Lotman, Iu. M., “Arkhaisty—prosvetiteli,” in Chudakova, M. O., Tynianovshii sbornik: Vtorye Tynianovskie chteniia (Riga, 1986), 199.Google Scholar

60 Ibid., 200.

61 Viewers of the film readily recognized that “Shakhov is a genuine Bolshevik ready to give up his entire life for the cause of the party of Lenin-Stalin.“K. I. Bubenkov, “Prizyv k bditel'nosti” in “Velikii grazhdanin: Zritel’ o novoi kartine,” Vecherniaia Moskva, 2 March 1938,3.

62 Tregub, “Velikii grazhdanin,” 4. In an article titled “Traits of the New Man in Film Images,” Shakhov is described as the prototype of the new man “who risks his own life” for his fellow citizens. M. Kritsman, “Cherty novogo cheloveka v obrazakh kino,” Jskusstvo kino, 1939, no. 11:22.

63 For a detailed and insightful analysis of the return to a more traditional understanding of authorship as a key aspect of socialist realism, see Dobrenko, Evgeny, The Making of the Stale Writer: Social and Aesthetic Origins of Soviet Literary Culture, trans. Savage, Jesse M. (Stanford, 2001).Google Scholar

64 Mar'iamov, Kremlevskii Tsenzor, 36. Stalin’s directive states, “The murder of Shakhov should not serve as the center and high point of the screenplay: this or that terrorist act pales before those facts uncovered by the Piatakov-Radek trial.” Latyshev, “Vzgliad skvoz'gody,” 18, and Mar'iamov, Kremlevskii Tsenzor, 34.

65 “Fridrikh Ermler,” in Protazanov, Ia. A., ed., Kak ia stal rezhisserom (Riga, 1946), 308.Google Scholar Unfortunately, Ermler’s memoirs do not indicate the proposed contents of a third film in The Great Citizen series, even though he claims that the screenplay was already completed before the start of the war.

66 Although Lenin died due to natural causes, he “took on the persona of posthumous martyr victim, despoiled by a series of villains who threatened to undermine the truth and rightness of his legacy. The full martyrdom denied him in life was granted to him in death, a fitting post mortem.” Smith, Michael G., “Stalin’s Martyrs: The Tragic Romance of the Russian Revolution,” in Shukman, Harold, ed., Redefining Stalinism (London, 2003), 107.Google Scholar

67 Johnson, “Mal'chik iz Urzhuma,” 5.