This small but fairly representative group of intellectuals that was willing to collaborate with the Soviet authorities was soon joined by the leader of the
Calm down, friends, don’t burn the ships of your idealism only because the dreadnought of Lenin and his leftist friends have entered the same port as you. You’ll manage to coexist with them. Well, you’ll have to make some concessions, some changes; well, it’ll be less comfortable for you and, in any case, less familiar. But, first of all, life as a whole will not become worse, only better. And then is it so hard to part with a few things, if you are promised at the same time such great, maybe even absolute joy as the resurgence of purely human relations among people in general, if this kingdom of vileness, blood, and lies that is the war will end, if we will be able to think once more of the general well-being of the universe?
This eloquent but starry-eyed statement, which now seems so naive as to be almost touching, was actually a rather bold act in those days, because it went against common sense and public opinion, at least in the capital’s intellectual circles. Not surprisingly, the Soviet authorities first accepted Benois with open arms. He and Blok took on thousands of big and small responsibilities—in particular, they participated in the discussion of the fairly major changes in Russian orthography undertaken by the Bolsheviks.
This was one of the innumerable reforms of the new regime. According to another, the first day after January 31, 1918, would be not the first, but the fourteenth of February, “In order to establish calculation of time in Russia that is the same as in all the civilized nations.” Thus the country shifted from the Julian calendar, which had been used since 1699, to the Western (Gregorian) one.
This innovation was applauded even by monarchists. Count Dmitri Tolstoy, the director of the Hermitage Museum, wrote to his wife, “On the Bolsheviks’ orders we have skipped fourteen days of life—this is the sole reasonable thing the Bolshevik rule will leave to Russia.” The conservatives resisted orthographic changes and, for one, Igor Stravinsky (as did many other Russian émigrés) continued to write in the old orthography to the end of his days.
Life in Bolshevik Petrograd plunged into chaos as frenzied crowds looted everything from warehouses to wine cellars. In response the government started to destroy the wine supplies. Akhmatova recalled with a shudder how she was driving through Petrograd with Mandelstam and saw huge brown chunks of frozen cognac, which smelled powerfully.
Shots rang out constantly in the city. Despite Lenin’s announced desire to sue for peace, the Germans pressed their advance and on February 20, 1918, they approached Petrograd. Blok wrote in his diary in his usual mystical style,
On February 21 at the meeting of the Soviet of People’s Commissars, Lenin promulgated an appeal. “The German generals want to establish their Order’ in Petrograd…. The socialist republic of Soviets is in the greatest danger.” The Bolsheviks appealed to the “laboring populace”: “All corrupt elements, hooligans, marauders, and cowards must be expelled ruthlessly from the ranks of the army, and if they attempt to resist—they must be wiped from the face of the earth…. In Petrograd, as in all other centers of revolution, order must be maintained with an iron hand.”116
Rumors spread in Petrograd that the government headed by Lenin was prepared to flee to Moscow. The Bolsheviks announced officially that the rumors were lies; yet on the very day of this categorical denial, Lenin had approved the resolution to move the seat of government and reestablish Moscow as the country’s capital.
At first this evacuation was euphemistically called an “unloading” of Petrograd. The intended flight from Petrograd of almost the entire Bolshevik leadership and the government apparatus was kept secret for fear of terrorist acts. Just recently, on January 1, 1918, Lenin’s car had been attacked while he was returning from an army rally at the Mikhailovsky Manege.
