“Tashkent Has Gained Sad Glory”: The Death of Vera Komissarzhevskaya and the Limits of Russian Culture in Late Imperial Turkestan

Abstract

The unexpected death of the famous actress Vera Fedorovna Komissarzhevskaya while on tour in Tashkent was both a major event for Russian speakers in Turkestan and an empire-wide media sensation. This article examines coverage of the death of Kommissarzhevskaуa from smallpox in 1910 in the Russian-language periodical press in both Turkestan and leading urban centers in the Russian Empire. The actions of mourners in Tashkent and coverage of these events locally and in the capital press reveal that Kommissarzhevskaуa’s death was an imperial event that magnified the tensions within Russian claims to represent a civilizing force in Central Asia. For educated Russian speakers in Turkestan Kommissarzhevskaуa’s death was an opportunity to self-consciously assert their status as bearers of Russian culture in a press environment in which local acts of commemoration swiftly attracted an empire-wide audience. In the face of racialized and Orientalist depictions of Turkestan in the capital press, local journalists and members of educated society sought to demonstrate their belonging in, and dedication to, Russian culture in ways that blurred the boundaries between the imperial center and its peripheries, revealing Kommissarzhevskaуa’s death to be at the center of an ambiguous empire-wide discourse of death, disease, and the limits of Russian modernity. While educated Russian society in Tashkent sought to demonstrate their membership in a greater imperial civilization, the circumstances of Kommissarzhevskaуa’s death and the discourse of smallpox called into question Russian claims of civilizational superiority and laid bare key anxieties at the heart of Russia’s colonial presence in Central Asia.