Western Intellectuals and the Soviet Union, 1920-40: From Red Square to the Left Bank. BASEES/Routledge Series on Russian and East European Studies, 31 by Ludmila Stern (review)

Abstract

378 SEER, 87, 2, APRIL 200g oftheextreme-right IronGuardmovement whichcametopowerinSeptember 1940,and then,shortly after Romania'sattackalongsideNazi Germany on the Soviet Union in June 1941,to deportation. Safranand Wilhelm Filderman, thehead oftheFederation oftheUnionofJewish Communities, intervened ceaselessly withRomania'spro-Nazidictator, Ion Antonescu, to alleviatethesufferings oftheirpeople and werebothinstrumental, amongst others, inpersuading theRomanianleadertohaltthedeportation ofJewsto Transnistria and to renouncehisintention to accede to Germanwishesthat he deportRomania'ssurviving Jewsto thedeath-camps in Poland. Carol Iancu,in thisbiography ofSafran- thefirst in a majorEuropean language - tracesSafran'sconflicts withtheRomanianauthorities from the timeof his inauguration as chiefrabbi,conflicts whichdid not cease with thetragedy of the Shoah, but extendedto theperiodof Communist rule. The creation bytheRomanianCommunist PartyoftheJewishDemocratic Committee (CDE) as an instrument ofitspolicies,and therefusal ofSafran - and Filderman - to serveon it,brought upon themthehostility ofthe regime. Denied accesstohisoffice, and unabletocarry outhisduties, Safran leftthe country in December 1947,just a fewdaysbeforeKing Michael's abdication.Duringthe six remaining decades of his life,Safrandedicated himself, after hiselectionas chiefrabbiofGeneva in 1948,to reconciliation betweenJews and Christians. He was also a prolificcontributor to the Kabbalah,a bodyofmystical teachings offering interpretations oftheHebrew Scriptures. Iancu'sadmiration forhissubject adornsmanyofthepagesofthisfascinatingbook .The emphasisis upon factualnarrative and thecomplexrelationship betweenSafran,Fildermanand othermembersof Romania'sJewish community duringthewar remainstantalizingly beyondthereader'sgrasp, yetthepagesdedicatedto Safran'saddresses on reconciliation (pp. 185-297) givethereadera senseoftherabbi'sprofoundly humanistic message. UCL SSEES DennisDeletant Stern,Ludmila. Western Intellectuals andthe Soviet Union, 1920-4.0:From RedSquare tothe Left Bank.BASEES /RoutledgeSerieson Russianand East European Studies, 31.Routledge, Londonand NewYork,2007.xii+ 269 pp. Notes.Bibliography. Index.£75.00. Ludmila Stern (not to be confusedwithLiudmilaShtern,the authorof monographs on IosifBrodskiiand SergeiDovlatov)has produceda very readableand clearly written accountofsomeoftheWestern (mainly, butnot exclusively, French)intellectuals who actively supported the 'Great Experiment 'conducted bytheSovietleaderson their subjects. As thetitlesuggests, insomecasesthissupport predated thecomingtopowerand appeasement of Hitler, andso itcannotalways be regarded as an evenslightly reluctant choice ofthelesserevil.In 1920,forinstance, themilitant pacifist HenriBarbusse wroteoftheleadersofSovietRussia:'Not onlyare theyright in their orthodoxy ,theyare also right to imposetheirauthoritarian means.The men in Moscowwereright, ifindeedtheydid so, to maintain byforce, forthepast reviews 379 threeyears,the dictatorship of Reason' (p. 13).What is disturbing is that dictatorship stillhas itsadmirers - and notonlyamongtheusual suspects - eventoday,whether itis thedictatorship ofReason,or oftheproletariat or,as now,ofthelaw,withtheensuingarbitrariness and lack ofrulesand regulations applicableto all. Of course,mostof the intellectuals - JeanRichardBloch ,TheodoreDreiser,GeorgesFriedmann, AndréMalraux,Paul Nizan,GeorgeBernardShaw,Paul Vaillant-Couturier and othersdiscussed inthisvolume- knewlittle aboutpre-revolutionary Russiaand werefartoo busyto learnRussianor any of theotherlanguagesspokenin theUSSR. Hence thecompletely seriousbut unintentionally ludicrousaccountsof the almostunbelievable progress supposedly beingmade,suchas this:'Imagine thephenomena we see,suchas a youngSamoyedwomanwho,tenyearsago, was a cannibaland nowis doctorofphilosophy at theLeningrad University. There is a Samoyed woman at the Central Committee.And theyalso translate SwiftintoMordovian,whichhas the mostbackwardpopulation amongst all theSovietrepublics' (p. 20).To judge from thisbook,thesewellintentioned visitors paid no attention at all to whattheRussianemigration was sayingand publishing and did not botherto read the easilyavailable French,Germanor English-language tamizdat ofthe1920sand 1930s.There isnothing surprising aboutthis, ofcourse,and Stern'sbookisofconsiderable relevancetoday.For example,ignoranceof Arabicand Arab and Islamic cultureis no barrier forsomeverycleverpeoplewhentheytakeimportant decisionsaffecting Westernfraternal aid to our brothers and sisters in the Greater MiddleEast.AtleastStalinwas neverinvited tostayinBuckingham Palace,unlikesomemorerecentcriminal politicians. This monographis distinguished from earlier books (e.g., by Paul Hollanderand David Caute)on thesamesubjectbyStern'sable use ofthree important Moscowarchives (GARF,RGALI and RGASPI). Thisenablesher toquotefrom theinternal correspondence ofofficials working inMORP (the International Association of Revolutionary Writers), VOKS (theAll-Union Societyfor CulturalRelationswith ForeignCountries)and the Foreign Commission oftheUnionofSovietWriters. Allvisits to theUSSR thatwere controlled bythesebodieswerecarefully prepared, and theinterpreters were obligedtowrite detaileddailyreports on howtheir foreign chargesreactedto thevariousplaces (often modern-day equivalents of Potemkin villages)and meetings towhichtheywereinvited. Thus we can nowreadaccountsofthe visits totheUSSR ofsuchpeopleas thepainter Albert Marquet(pp. 146-49), thepublisher VictorGollancz(pp.158-62)andthenovelist LionFeuchtwanger (pp.162-73). The factthatthelatter's interpreter apparently vanished intothin air fourdays beforehis audience withStalin seems not to have worried Feuchtwanger, althoughit is perhapsjust possiblethathis subsequentless sceptical (toputitmildly) viewoftheLand oftheSovietswaspartly intended tosaveherfrom harm.Certainly, thefactthatRomainRolland(pp. 194-95), LouisAragon(pp. 123-24)andJacquesLipchitz(pp. 128-29)had relatives in theUSSR mighthave affected theirpublishedcomments on thatcountry's political system. Stern, whosegrandparents wereamongthemostdecentand well-meaning Sovietfellow-travellers, frankly admitshernaivety whenshewasjust beginningherresearch :'I also discovered - and thiscame as a surprise - that 380 SEER, 87, 2, APRIL 200g many sympathisers tended to publicise only positiveinformation while overlooking or...