Stalinism as a Way of Life: A Narrative in Documents (Annals of Communism Series)

What was life like for ordinary Russian citizens in the 1930s? How did they feel about socialism and the acts committed in its name? This unique book provides English-speaking readers with the responses of those who experienced firsthand the events of the middle-Stalinist period. The book contains 157 documents -- mostly letters to authorities from Soviet citizens, but also reports compiled by the secret police and Communist Party functionaries, internal government and party memoranda, and correspondence among party officials. Selected from recently opened Soviet archives, these previously unknown documents illuminate in new ways both the complex social roots of Stalinism and the texture of daily life during a highly traumatic decade of Soviet history.Accompanied by introductory and linking commentary the documents are organized around such themes as the impact of terror on the citizenry, the childhood experience, the countryside after collectivization, and the role of cadres that were directed to "decide everything". In their own words, peasants and workers, intellectuals and the uneducated, adults and children, men and women, Russians and people from other national groups tell their stories. Their writings reveal how individual lives influenced -- and were affected by -- the larger events of Soviet history. What was life like for ordinary Russian citizens in the 1930s? How did they feel about socialism and the acts committed in its name? This unique book provides English-speaking readers with the responses of those who experienced firsthand the events of the middle-Stalinist period. The book contains 157 documents—mostly letters to authorities from Soviet citizens, but also reports compiled by the secret police and Communist Party functionaries, internal government and party memoranda, and correspondence among party officials. Selected from recently opened Soviet archives, these previously unknown documents illuminate in new ways both the complex social roots of Stalinism and the texture of daily life during a highly traumatic decade of Soviet history.

Accompanied by introductory and linking commentary, the documents are organized around such themes as the impact of terror on the citizenry, the childhood experience, the countryside after collectivization, and the role of cadres that were directed to "decide everything." In their own words, peasants and workers, intellectuals and the uneducated, adults and children, men and women, Russians and people from other national groups tell their stories. Their writings reveal how individual lives influenced—and were affected by—the larger events of Soviet history.

About the Author:
Lewis Siegelbaum is professor and chairman of the Department of History at Michigan State University. Andrei Sokolov is main researcher and department head of the Institute of Russian History at the Russian Academy of Sciences.

In this unique book, we hear the poignant voices of those who experienced firsthand the 1930s in the Soviet Union. The book's 157 documents, selected from newly opened Soviet archives, include primarily letters from ordinary citizens to authorities but also various official reports and correspondence. The documents illuminate in new ways the complex social roots of Stalinism and the texture of daily life during a highly traumatic decade."Maybe some people are shy about writing, but I will write the real truth. . . . Is it really possible that people at the newspaper haven't heard this. . . that we don't want to be on the kolkhoz [collective farm], we work and work, and there's nothing to eat. Really, how can we live?"-A farmer's letter, 1936, from Stalinism as a Way of Life. Annals of Communism series "What is life like for ordinary Russian citizens in the 1930s? How did they feel about socialism and the acts committed in its name? This unique book provides English-speaking readers with the responses of those who have experienced first-hand the events of the middle-Stalinist period. The book contains 157 documents - mostly letters to authorities from Soviet citizens, but also reports compiled by the secret police and Communist Party functionaries, internal government and party memoranda, and correspondence among party officials. Selected from recently opened Soviet archives, these previously unknown documents illuminate in new ways both the complex social roots of Stalinism and the texture of daily life during a highly traumatic decade of Soviet history."--BOOK JACKET. Contents 8 Illustrations 226 Acknowledgements 10 Notes on Transliteration and Terminology 12 A Note on the Documents 13 Glossary and Abbreviations 15 Introduction 20 CHAPTER ONE The Socialist Offensive 47 CHAPTER TWO “Cadres Decide Everything!” 122 CHAPTER THREE Stalin’s Constitution 177 CHAPTER FOUR Love and Plenty 242 CHAPTER FIVE Bolshevik Order on the Kolkhoz 317 CHAPTER SIX Happy Childhoods 391 Conclusion 456 Notes 460 Index of Documents 476 General Index 484 The lifestyles of ordinary Russians living under Stalinism in the 1930s are related through this unique collection of 157 documents from recently opened Soviet archives. Comprised mostly of letters to authorities from Soviet citizens, these documents relate stories in the words of Russian people from all walks of life. 29 illustrations. SEVERAL YEARS AGO, the Russian Museum in St. Petersburg assembled an exhibition on the art of the Stalin era.