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[LENIN, ZINOVIEV, RADEK, KERZHENTSEV] Intelligentsiya i sovetskaya vlast' [i.e. Inteligentsia and the Soviet Rule].

Item #2694

Moscow: Zadruga, 1919. 63 pp. 17 × 13 cm. In original wrappers decorated with frame. Wrapper is slightly rubbed. Otherwise in very good condition.

First and only edition. Rare.
A collection includes articles by senior Bolsheviks and the main ideologists of the socialist revolution: N. Lenin [V. Lenin], G. Zinoviev, M. Gorky, K. Radek, V. Kerzhentsev. The relationship between the intelligentsia and the Soviet government is perhaps the most dramatic episode in the history of the Russian intelligentsia. Some representatives welcomed the revolution and participated in its events, for various reasons. The revolution was supported by V. Mayakovsky, V. Meyerhold, K. Tsiolkovsky, A. Blok, et al. Alexander Blok was one of those who agreed to work for the Bolsheviks. In 1918, he was asked “Can the intelligentsia work with the Bolsheviks?” and he answered: “Can and obliged”. Throughout 1918—1920, Alexander Blok was appointed to various positions in organizations, committees, commissions. The constantly growing volume of work terribly exhausted the poet and blocked his writing, the difficult living conditions and official refusals in his requests to go to a sanatorium led to the death of the poet in 1921. Many educated people hadn’t accepted the revolution and hoped for the rapid fall of the Communists. The third part of intellectuals preferred not to interfere in politics, focusing on their research and developments.

The collection was supposed to push intellectuals to an idea that it was impossible to maintain neutrality between the Soviet government and the bourgeois. Lenin claimed “it would be ridiculous to refuse terror and suppression in relation to the landowners and capitalists with their henchmen”. It outlined two options for the future for the Whites and those who haven’t chosen any of the parties in the Civil war.
As an example of “recuperated ones”, a well-known socialist revolutionary Pitirim Sorokin is cited. Trying to avoid execution in late 1918, he begged the secret police who arrested him to write a letter to Lenin, which was later published in periodicals and also rewritten by Lenin in this book. Sorokin renounced political activity and asked for a pardon. For several years, he was engaged in scientific and teaching activities. In 1922, Lenin raised the question of strict ideological control over education. The authorities decided to remove “bourgeois professors” from teaching and from the management of science. Arrests of scientific and creative intelligentsia took place and then five or more “philosopher’s steamers” forcibly transported lots of opposing intellectuals and their families from the country. Pitirim Sorokin was among those who were sent abroad by trains.
Cover design was created by artist Georgy Pashkov (1887—1925), best known as the designer of the earliest postage stamps of the USSR. He was born into a family of icon painters. He graduated from the Imperial Stroganov Central School of Industrial Art. In the pre-revolutionary period, he collaborated with the publisher of high-quality editions Golike and Vilborg, and was engaged in painting murals for churches. In 1918 he contributed to the periodical “Flag of Labor”. In 1923, Georgy Pashkov designed postage stamps dedicated to the First All-Russian Agricultural and Handicraft Exhibition.

The only paper copy is located in University of North Carolina.

Status: On Hold