ANDRÉ GIDE’S RETOUR DE L’U.R.S.S. AND ITS PUBLICATION HISTORY: A VIEW FROM THE KREMLIN
Journal Title: Studia Litterarum - Year 2016, Vol 1, Issue 3
Abstract
The article discusses the publication history of André Gide’s book Return from the USSR written after his trip to the Soviet Union. It explains how the Kremlin gathered information about the book and how ofcial Soviet reaction to this publication was developed. Since Gide’s decision to join in the camp of the “friends of the USSR,” information about it had been deliberately mispresented, that is why at the end of 1936 communist ideologues had to reap the fruits of their shortsightedness. Immediately after the Congress in the Defense of Culture, which took place in 1935 in Paris, Gide converged with the anti-Stalinist opposition in France and Belgium and welcomed a campaign in support of Victor Serge, politician and writer who had passed in the case of the so called Zinoviev group and had been exiled to Orenburg. Soviet authorities knew about Gide’s conversion but accepted Mikhail Koltsov’s position who vouched Gide’s absolute loyalty. When Gide began preparing his manuscript for publication, the Kremlin was immediately informed about it. Among the informers were I. Ehrenburg, F. Masereel, and E. Ratmanova. Attempts to dissuade Gide from publication failed. The book was translated into Russian for the leaders of the Communist party and Gide was condemned in the Soviet press. The history of the book’s publication and attention that the Kremlin paid to this question, however, demonstrates that the State control of the literary and cultural feld was circumscribed within the Soviet borders. The Soviets failed to implement their program in the West. The case of Gide’s Return from the USSR shows the obvious failure of Soviet cultural diplomacy and its strategies.
Authors and Affiliations
Natalia Yu. Kharitonova
Keywords
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- EP ID EP26112
- DOI 10.22455/2500-4247-2016-1-3-4-184-192
- Views 410
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