Speaking Blockade Bolshevik: Civilian Letters to Smolny in the Blockade of Leningrad

• In Event: Hearing Voices: An Accountant, Blokadniki, and Uzbek Kolkhozniki

Abstract

This essay analyzes Leningraders’ letters to authorities to explore how war, specifically the Blockade of Leningrad, affected resilience and the nature of power. The Blockade is a particular interesting case because duress and survival compelled civilians to act as agents of their own dignity. Writers of such letters used one or more of three basic strategies to appeal to the authorities. The first was to argue for that a person’s qualities and utility meant that the person deserved more food or other help from the authorities to survive. The second strategy was appeals to justice, in part holding the authorities to account by reminding them of the promises of socialism and the basis for their legitimacy. Some letters using this strategy used critical, even acerbic, language, when making pleas for aid. A third strategy was providing information about reality on the and practical advice, suggesting a degree of stakeholding. Overall, Smol’ny (Leningrad’s governing elite) took these letters seriously, did not refer them for NKVD investigations, and subtly let civilians be junior partners in governance. This also suggests an evolving pragmatic logic of power and governance that ultimately was crushed by high Stalinism and the Leningrad Affair.

Author

• Jeffrey Kenneth Hass, U of Richmond