Serfdom, Society, and the Arts in Imperial Russia: The Pleasure and the Power by Richard Stites (review)

415 Ab Imperio, 4/2006 Самым большим вопросом останется для читателя опре- деление “имперского” или “по- стимперского” города. Автор (возможно, намеренно) не дает четкого определения этого фено- мена. Однако по прочтении книги у читателя появляется достаточно поводов для рефлексии на эту тему. Итак, что такое имперский город? Это “stranger”, чужак, фантастический, загадочный и подчас враждебный для его жите- лей, озабоченный взглядом извне, работающий на урегулирование внешних по отношению к самому городу проблем. Имперский город – это символ. Он символизирует, воплощает империю. В этом каче- стве он может служить, даже когда империи не будет. Архитектура, мифы, история создадут основу для создания туристического центра... Постимперский город живет воспоминаниями о былом величии. Это могут быть или воспоминания об утраченном величии империи в целом, или об утрате столичного статуса самим этим городом. В случае Петербур- га присутствуют оба эти элемента. Поэтому он и является идеальным объектом для такого исследования. Хеллберг-Хирн отмечает в “Неубедительном заключении” к книге, что видит свою задачу в том, чтобы не столько дать опре- деленные ответы, сколько открыть дискуссию. И это ей определенно удаётся. В российской социологии ощущается острая нехватка кри- тического анализа современной ситуации, очень мало исследо- ваний, выполненных в традиции современных “urban studies”, и сама эта традиция по-прежнему мало известна в российском гу- манитарном пространстве. По- этому ценность этой книги для российских читателей в том, что она осваивает новое поле иссле- дований и намечает темы и про- блемы, требующие дальнейшего углубленного изучения. Louise McREYNOLDS Richard Stites, Serfdom, Society, and the Arts in Imperial Russia: The Pleasure and the Power (New Haven:Yale University Press, 2005). xii+586 pp. ISBN: 0-300-10889-3 (hardback edition). Already so well known for his work in Soviet popular culture, Richard Stites brings his massive erudition, sensitive ear for the good story, and the light touch of his narrative skills to this study of Russian culture in the first half of the nineteenth century. Framing his study between the westerniza- 416 Рецензии/Reviews tion that came with the eighteenth century and the emancipation of the serfs in 1861, Stites uses the pivotal importance of these events to explore their combined influences on the formative years of the Russian arts that would themselves be exported into in the second half of the century. He might have subtitled his book “the pleasure and the pain,” given his attention to the distresses, physical as well as mental and emotional, that those who aspired to produce culture suffered at the hands the repressive government and abusive serf owners. Yet these years included the “Golden Age” of Russian culture, and the story Stites tells is not a rehash of accomplishments despite oppression. The originality of Stites’s thesis is that he considers westernization, the autocracy, and serfdom as a complex of forces that shaped culture, without a qualification of “despite” that has been invoked against all of these influences at one time or another. Because of this, his work will be of interest to cultural historians in general. Russianists, though, will take special delight in the plethora of vivid vignettes. Stites positions his stories around the argument that the history of Russian culture in first half of the century, with the exception of the canonical authors from the golden age, has been dismissed as uninspiring or static primarily because of how it compares with that which followed. In this, cultural history parallels political history, characterized most conveniently as a conservative lull before the revolutionary elan of the Great Reforms. Preferring to elucidate the “unrolling” of the story, telling of “the lives lived, the arts created and experienced” without a judgmental eye on its “denouement” (P. 426), Stites recreates Russian society through its cultural production and reception. Specifically, he focuses on the visual and performative arts as opposed to the literature; his choice is sound because not only these have received comparatively less attention, but also the paltry degree of literacy limited the reach of literature in ways that painting or performing did not. Moreover, he ranges his character from royal patrons to serf violinists, weaving them all together to portray the complex interactions of social groups that are usually treated as discrete from each other. If the master/serf is the dominant trope of oppression in prereform Russia, Stites reminds readers that all social categories found themselves enmeshed in nonegalitarian relationships. The West casts a shadow, but not one that obscures Russians’cultural attempts to define themselves categorically in relationship to each other as well as to it. The book is divided into five, self-explanatory parts: “Cultural and Social Terrains”; “Music of the 417 Ab Imperio, 4/2006 Spheres;” “Empire of Performance;” “Pictures at an Exhibition;” and “Finale and Overture.” The first and last are significantly shorter than those in between, as appropriate for an introduction and conclusion. Although the most significant geographical focus is on life in the two capitals, Moscow and St. Petersburg, Stites pays special attention to the provinces, which like the era itself remain culturally neglected. This is also noteworthy because of the importance of amateurs, given that society was not yet wealthy enough to support an extensive commercial performative culture, especially on the provincial estates. His source base is encyclopedic if not exhaustive ; he has worked in numerous archives and mastered the secondary literature, and all within a framework that keeps Russian accomplishments within the comparative context of analogous developments in western countries. What made Russia especially unique, however, was the persistence of serfdom. The Russian serf here receives the opportunity to play center stage. As fictional characters written for the stage, serfs were unidimensional foils whose function...