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2. The Political Masquerade: Impersonation, National Identity, and Power
- University of Wisconsin Press
- Chapter
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62 2 The Po lit i cal Mas que rade Im per so na tion, Na tional Iden tity, and Power In Rec ol lec tions of a Ter ror ist (1909), Boris Sa vin kov de scribes how Yevno Azef, leader of the Com bat Or gan iza tion of the Party of So cial Rev o lu tion ar ies (PSR), to which both be longed, des ig nated a night time mas que rade at the Saint Pe ters burg Merchant’s Club as the venue for their clan des tine meet ing. Sa vin kov writes, “Azef ar ranged for us to meet at none other than the mas que rade out of, as he put it, con spir a to rial con sid er a tions.”1 Azef’s fore most “con spir a to rial con sid er a tion” at this meet ing to plot Min is ter of the Inter ior Vi a ches lav Kon stan tin o vich von Plehve’s as sas si na tion was dis cre tion: he in sisted that Or gan iza tion mem bers take max i mal pre cau tions to avert sus pi cion, in clud ing the up keep of in con spic u ous ap pear ance. In this re gard the mas que rade was an ideal back drop for their se cre tive prep ar a tions. Abuzz with petty in trigues and sen sory pleas ures that oc cu pied the at ten tion of the masked guests, the pub lic mas que rade was a mael strom of com mo tion, din, and un rec og niz able faces that ef fec tively shielded the ter ror ists from scru tiny. At the mas que rade, the cos tum ing and role-playing that Azef, Sa vin kov, and fel low ac ti vists em braced as part of their de fen sive and of fen sive com bat strat e gies were com mon prac tice among all those present. Through their lit eral and meta phor i cal mas que rades, the The Political Masquerade 63 ter ror ists dem on strated the po lit i cal agency de rived from prac tices of con struct ing so cial iden tity. The meet ing between Sa vin kov and Azef at the Merchant’s Club mas que rade high lights the inter lac ing of dis guise and per for mance with acts aimed at sub vert ing po lit i cal order. Such late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century works of Rus sian lit er a ture as Dostoevsky’s De mons (1872), Savinkov’s The Pale Horse (1909), and Bely’s Pe ters burg (1913) re flect this re al ity and the theat ri cal ity of dis si dent grass roots po lit i cal ac tion. This chap ter ex am ines the theme of mas que rade to re veal the dif fer ences between the waves of ter ror ism in the 1860s and early years of the twen ti eth cen tury. Whereas Dos toev sky used the cos tumed quad rille in De mons as part of his at tempt to dis credit the po lit i cal rad i cal ism of his day, Sa vin kov and com pany de lib er ately as so ciated them selves with the mas que rade as part of their covert op er a tions. Within the his tor i cal con text of po lit i cal im per so na tions, as well as the sovereign ’s use of mas que rade balls and cos tumes to af firm or chal lenge Rus sian state hood, the present chap ter dem on strates the inter con nect ed ness of na tional iden tity con struc tions in the pub lic sphere and the strug gle over po lit i cal ideol ogy around the year 1905. Tsar ist Mas que rades In Han nah Arendt’s phil o soph i cal work On Rev o lu tion she pre sented the idea of a pub lic per sona as a con structed mask, which she deemed “le git i mate ar ti fice.” For Arendt, the po lit i cal player’s mask serves an es sen tial func tion: it presents a sta bi lized pub lic rep re sen ta tion...