Reinterpretation of Bylina in the Soviet Context

• In Event: Empire, Identity, and Epic: Reimagining Poetry in the Slavic World

Abstract

The decline of the bylina in the early 20th century was shaped by the political and cultural shifts following the 1917 Revolution. While bylinas faded in Kyiv, they were preserved in the remote regions around Onega Lake and the White Sea, where isolated communities continued to perform the oral epic tradition.

In the 1920s and 1930s, the Bolshevik regime sought to reshape cultural heritage in alignment with socialist ideals. Performers got support from the state. Maria Krivopolenova was invited by Anatolij Lunacharsky to Moscow as a "state grandmother". Marfa Kryukova, another performer, was later tasked with reimagining the bylina, transforming it into noviny—new songs that celebrated Soviet leaders like Lenin, Stalin, and Voroshilov. By the late 1930s, traditional bylinas started to disappear, although some versions continued to be recorded in remote northern villages as late as the 1980s.

This paper, based on research conducted by the Arctic Art Institute in Euro-Arctic Russia from 2014 to 2025, delves into lesser-known cultural histories of Russia and Ukraine, examining the processes that led to the bylina's disappearance and how Soviet officials modernized and repurposed this ancient poetic form to serve ideological goals.

Note: I would like to participate in the panel The Trajectories of Culture in Early Soviet Russia, ca. 1917-1929, if possible. I have sent an email to Oleg Minin (Bard College) regarding this, but I have not received a reply yet. I am also open to joining other panels.

Author

• Ekaterina Sharova, Arctic Art Institute / APECS