The mood of the Romanian intelligentsia in the early 1960s through the eyes of a young Soviet writer

Abstract

The Russian State Archive of Literature and Art (RGALI) contains reports of Soviet writers and cultural figures who traveled in the 1950s-1980s on creative business trips to socialist countries. Not yet in high demand by researchers, they are at the same time of undoubted interest as a historical source, since they reflect information related to the establishment of bilateral and multilateral cultural ties, the development of literature and art in foreign (in particular, Eastern European) countries, as well as the mood of foreign intelligentsia. The article deals with the report on the trip to Romania in the spring of 1962 by the young playwright Mikhail Filippovich Shatrov (1932–2010). A sincere supporter of the genuine renewal and democratization of the Soviet system, M. Shatrov was pleased with the reception given to him in Romania and highly appreciated the state of theatrical performances in this country. At the same time, he got the impression based on communication with Romanian interlocutors (writers and theatrical figures) that the Romanian society was lagging behind the Soviet one in its readiness to break with the Stalinist legacy. In his view, those responsible for cultural policy preferred to play it safe when it came to staging the Soviet plays in Romania that were critical of Stalin's personality cult, as they might lead the public to undesirable parallels with the current situation in Romania. Moreover, according to M. Shatrov, an atmosphere of fear continued to flourish in Romania, “a terrible legacy of the era of the cult of personality”. On the other hand, he drew attention to the reluctance of some Romanian cultural figures to advertise their old Soviet connections in the face of public opinion, because they were afraid of being compromised in the eyes of their colleagues in the conditions when the Romanian communist regime began to keep distance from the USSR.