Being Soviet: Identity, Rumour, and Everyday Life Under Stalin 1939-1953 (33 page)

Hollywood-made movies for ten years.
Mission to Moscow
, a docudrama about the former American diplomat in the USSR Joseph E. Davies, was presented to the Soviet leadership at the Tehran Conference. To the Americans’ surprise, it was accepted for screening throughout the USSR.
^{8
Following the success of}
Mission to Moscow
, a movie exchange programme was set up, and over twenty Hollywood films went on

^3
Brooks,
Thank You, Comrade Stalin! Soviet Public Culture from Revolution to Cold
War (Princeton, 2000), 193; McKenna,
All the Views Fit to Print: Changing Images of the

U.S. in Pravda Political Cartoons, 1917–1991
(New York, 2001), 4.

^{4
Krasnaia Zvezda}
, 07.11.1941, p. 4; 07.12.1941, p. 4.

^{5
RGASPI f. 17, op. 125, d. 219, l. 107; Wettlin,}
Fifty Russian Winters: An American
Woman’s Life in the Soviet Union (New York, 1992), 240.

^{6
For a discussion see: Barghoorn,}
The Soviet Image of the United States: A Study in

Distortion
(New York, 1950), 78.

^{7
Drobashenko and Kenez, ‘Film Propaganda in the Soviet Union, 1941–1945: Two}
Views’,in K. Short, ed.,
Filmand Radio Propagandain World War II
(London, 1983), 96–121.

^{8
T. Bennett, ‘Culture, Power, and Mission to Moscow: Film and Soviet-American}

Relations during World War II’,
The Journal of American History
, 88. 2 (2001), 489–518.

86
Being Soviet

general release.
^9
Edison
,
Sun Valley Serenade
, and
Charley’s Aunt
were cheerful advertisements for the American way of life and their screening reflected the more positive attitude of the Soviet regime towards the cultural products of their wartime Allies.

‘American’ jazz music also moved back into the mainstream during
the war. Romantic songs that longed for hearth and home, such as
Wait for Me
or
Blue Kerchief
, were enormously successful after 1941. How- ever, jazz artists such as Leonid Utesov, Eddie Rosner, and Boris Renskii, who had played nothing but nationalist folk music during the Pact Period, swung their way to musical stardom after 1941. Jazz ensembles suddenly sprung up in huge numbers performing ‘hot’ ver- sions of Soviet tunes and also direct imports such as
Chatanooga Choo-

Choo
and
In the Mood
.
^{10
Utesov recollects that ‘jazz was being played in}

the factories and the mines, on the ships, and amongst the army func-
tionaries on the Kalinin front.’ The Baltic Fleet Band became one of the unofficial markers of resistance in Leningrad, performing throughout the siege. Utesov himself was bombarded by an endless stream of letters from jazz bands, often at the front line, requesting the scores to his more popular tunes.
^{11
His 1943 show included the popular}
Jazzinformburo
, which involved a supposed dramatized radio link-up between Moscow, New York, and London during which the popular tunes of each allied nation were performed.
^{12
Jazz and swing, like Hollywood movies, were}
legitimate diversions for Soviet citizens as the place of Anglo-American culture shifted within Official Soviet Identity.

This new-found openness to capitalist culture culminated in the
launch of two foreign embassy-run journals during the war:
Britanskii Soiuznik
(British Ally) and
Amerika
.
Britanskii Soiuznik
was launched in 1942 as a weekly journal informing Soviet citizens about British life and society. By the end of 1942 it had thousands of subscribers and its circulation peaked at about 50,000 copies.
^13
Amerika
, a monthly

^{9
See: Parks,}
Culture, Conflict and Coexistence
:
American-Soviet Cultural Relations,
1917–1958 (London, 1983), 84–5.

^10
Starr,
Red and Hot: The Fate of Jazz in the Soviet Union 1917–1980
(Oxford,

1983), 186–94; Stites, ‘Frontline Entertainment’, in Stites,
Culture and Entertainment in
Wartime Russia (Indianapolis,1995), 134.

^{11
Let. RGALI f. 3005, op. 1, d. 82, l. 236; d. 750, ll. 1, 17, 20, 21, 33, 44, 47, 69;}

Uvarova,
Russkaia Sovetskaia estrada 1930–45
:
Ocherki istorii
(Moscow, 1977) 328.

^{12
Let. RGALI f. 3005, op. 1, d. 82. pp. 244–5.}

^{13
V. O. Pechatnov, ‘The Rise and Fall of}
Britanskii Soiuznik
: A Case Study in Soviet Response to British Propaganda in the Mid-1940s’,
The Historical Journal
, 41.1 (1989), 293–301.

Patrons or Predators? 1941–45
87

journal modelled on
Life Magazine
followed in 1944. The publication of the journals generated some controversy. In October 1943 the head of Glavlit launched an attack on
Britanskii Soiuznik
for claiming that ‘Great Britain is allegedly carrying the great burden of the struggle with German fascism on its shoulders, that the material and spiritual supplies of the population of Great Britain are better and of a higher level than other countries, including the Soviet Union.’ An internal review admit- ted that there were some ‘undesirable statements’ in the journal but that its publication should continue in order to avoid offending the Allies.
^{14
There were limits to the wartime positivity about Anglo-American}
culture, but the publication of an uncensored, foreign-embassy authored, journal demonstrated how far Soviet official attitudes towards the outside world had shifted.

The wartime shift within Official Soviet Identity also paved the
way for a fresh embrace of Anglo-American scientific achievements.
Ogon¨ek
’s ‘Technology Overseas’ section was full of features about innovations in the allied states, particularly American-made trucks and planes, such as the Flying Fortress.
^{15
In May 1942}
Pravda
carried a letter to the scientists of the whole world which praised Britain as the ‘country of Newton, Maxwell, and Darwin, the home of technical revolutions’ and noted that ‘Russian researchers have always and with great attention studied the achievements of American scientists’.
^16
The
Academy of Scientists began electing foreign members again during the war and Soviet researchers were able to publish their results overseas for the first time in a decade.
^{17
Meanwhile Soviet scientists travelled to the}
USA on purchasing missions. In just one example, G. Lebedenko, the head of the Soviet Red Cross mission in the United States bought 600 X-ray machines, 20,000 pairs of forceps, and 500 anaesthesia sets.
¹⁸

The body of sources that shed light on how Soviet citizens engaged
with this new narrative of Sovietness is much narrower than that for the wartime diplomatic identity of the USSR. However, what evidence there is suggests that Hollywood films were extremely popular during the war. Respondents to HIP remembered that they had greatly admired
Mission to Moscow
,
The Great Waltz,
or the British-made

^{14
RGASPI f. 17, op. 125, d. 185, ll. 67–75.}

^15
e.g.,
Ogon¨ek
, 05.1942: 19, p. 13; 10.09.1944: 32, p. 15.

^16
Pravda
, 11.05.1942, p. 1.

^{17
N. Krementsov,}
The Cure: A Story of Cancer and Politics from the Annals of the Cold
War (London, 2000), 66;
Stalinist Science
(Princeton 1997), 115.

^{18
Inf. GARF f. R9501, op. 7, d. 14, ll. 2–5; d. 26, ll. 74–8.}

88
Being Soviet

1940 adventure film
The Thief of Bagdad
.
^{19
Frank Capra’s romantic}
comedy
It Happened One Night
ran continuously for two years from 1943 to 1945 in Moscow and Leningrad.
^{20
The staff of the US}
Embassy, at least, were convinced that there was a great ‘craving’ for foreign-made movies at this time.
^{21
Some Soviet citizens, such as the}
university students of Arkhangel’sk creatively deployed the ‘tactics of the habitat’ in order to watch British and American films. They re-

sponded in droves to appeals for volunteer staff at the International
Club for foreign sailors. Their behaviour was a classic case of reappro- priation; many of them seemed less interested in their work and more concerned with watching Hollywood movies in the cinema.
²²

The enthusiasm with which Soviet citizens embraced jazz music is
unquestionable. The barrage of letters received by Utesov and the vast number of amateur jazz bands that sprung up throughout the USSR testify to the popularity of the revived ‘hot’ sound during wartime. According to the respondents to HIP, Utesov exemplified the excellence of Soviet jazz.
^{23
Stites argues that the jazz revival reflected the desires of}
the frontline soldiers, but club administrators in the rear also struggled to get their audience to dance Russian folk dances rather than the massively popular jazzy foxtrot.
^{24
As V. A. Alexandrov pointed out in}
a letter to other Soviet leaders in October 1941, in the dark days of wartime, the people wanted ‘cheerful . . . upbeat’ music. Jazz fitted this bill exactly.
²⁵

It is also clear that, at the very least, the Central Committee’s Agitprop
department was worried about the popularity of the new foreign journals. A 1943 report on
Britanskii Soiuznik
complained that, ‘Amongst the “lieutenants” of the paper are academics, professors, engineers, techni- cians, artists, painters, writers, journalists, etc.’
^{26
Svetlana Ivanovna}

^{19
HIP. A. 3, 25, 40; 18, 343, 27.}

^20
Ball,
Imagining America: Influence and Images in Twentieth-Century Russia

(Oxford, 2003), 179.

^{21
Bennett, ‘Culture, Power and Mission to Moscow’.}

^{22
Inf. GAOPDiFAO f. 296, op. 1, d. 2097, l. 48b.}

^{23
HIP. A. 15, 310, 26. It should be noted that some others also told their inter-}
viewers that Soviet people did not like jazz and it should not be broadcast to the USSR: A. 32, 91, 47.