Stalin полностью

Stalin was in the company of Beria, who had erected a grandiose marble pavilion over the dictator’s wooden birth hovel in Gori and opened it to the public.¹⁹⁰ Beria also instigated approval for construction of a Stalin museum in Gori, next to which were supposed to be a cinema, drama theater, library, hotel, and House of the Collective Farmer. The low estimate for the total cost nearly equaled Gori’s annual budget (900,000 rubles).¹⁹¹ Keke was still living under Beria’s care, in the single room on the ground floor of the former tsarist viceroy’s palace, where Georgia’s Council of People’s Commissars had its offices. She ventured to the market dressed in black, a widow for more than a quarter century now, and shadowed by secret police. Beria’s wife, Nino, visited her regularly. In June 1935, Svetlana and Vasily had paid a visit. The children were staying with “Uncle Lavrenti” for a week and, according to Svetlana, saw their grandma for half an hour. Neither Svetlana nor Vasily understood Georgian; they communicated through their half brother, Yakov. Svetlana would recall being shocked at the sight of Keke’s spartan metal bed. Keke was ill (she received them while in bed, as demonstrated by photographs, which Stalin permitted to be published).¹⁹² Stalin’s own visit—a further indication that she was ill—took place on October 17. There is plausible hearsay from her attending physician that Stalin asked, “Mother, why did you beat me so hard?” and that she responded, “That’s why you turned out so well.”¹⁹³

Stalin’s Georgian origins had been muted over time, with his features softened in photographs (his long pointed nose was reduced, his arched left eyebrow lowered, his chin moved forward, his face made oval).¹⁹⁴ Three days after the visit, Pravda’s correspondent interviewed Keke, and on October 21 Poskryobyshev passed a draft of his article to the dictator with a request to publish it. “I won’t undertake to approve or reject,” Stalin answered. “It’s not my business.”¹⁹⁵ The article appeared in Pravda (October 23). “The 75-year-old Keke is affable, cheerful. . . . ‘He came unexpectedly, without warning. The door opens and he walks in. He kissed me a long time, and I reciprocated. How do you like our Tiflis? I asked him.’” The newspaper further quoted her as saying, “‘I worked each day and raised a son. It was hard. . . . We ate poorly. . . . An exemplary son! . . . I wish everyone such a son!’”¹⁹⁶

Pravda followed up (October 27) with additional details from Keke: “‘Our Lavrenti came and announced that Soso had arrived and that he was already here and coming in. . . . The door opened, and there he stood on the threshold: it’s him, my own. . . . I look and I can’t believe my eyes.’” She notices that he has gray hair. “‘What’s that, son, have you gone gray?’” Stalin answers: “‘It’s nothing, Mother, a little gray. It’s not important. I feel terrific, and you should not doubt it.’”¹⁹⁷ (The account omitted the part where she said, “What a shame that you didn’t become a priest,” which Stalin, according to Svetlana, liked to repeat.) Keke was quoted as revealing that Stalin’s father had removed him from school to apprentice him to a shoemaker, against her strenuous objections. On October 29, Stalin exploded. “I ask that you prohibit the vulgar rubbish that infiltrated our central and local press, publishing an ‘interview’ with my mother and sundry other promotional nonsense right up to portraits,” he wrote from Sochi to Molotov, Kaganovich, Andreyev, Zhdanov, and Boris Tal (head of publishing in the apparatus). “I ask that you spare me from the promotional hoopla of these scum.”¹⁹⁸

LIFE BECOMES MORE JOYOUS

Stalin’s first order of business back in Moscow, on November 2, 1935, was to receive Kandelaki, just returned from a meeting in Berlin with Schacht, who had revisited the proposal for a large new credit, now half a billion marks, while Kandelaki had again raised the need for political rapprochement and reemphasized Soviet interest in state-of-the-art military technology (automatic piloting of aircraft, remote control of vessels). France’s Laval, who had concurrently become prime minister, was also working all channels to secure rapprochement with Germany while delaying formal ratification of the Soviet alliance. Hitler perceived weakness.¹⁹⁹ Schulenburg, Germany’s ambassador, reported that at the dinner for the diplomatic corps on Revolution Day, Litvinov had raised his glass and loudly proclaimed, “I drink to the rebirth of our friendship!” Schulenburg added, “The British ambassador, who was sitting opposite, said: ‘Well, that’s a fine toast.’”²⁰⁰