BK: Some of us were very critical. Solidarity never formulated an ideology. It tried to dissociate itself from the labour movement traditions of Poland. It was quite ignorant about Marxism, and inside the organization there were a lot of anti-intellectual tendencies. Solidarity, of course, became a symbol, and in Western Europe it was thought tasteless to criticize it after the imposition of martial law. But for us it was not a matter of bad or good taste but rather a matter of studying the experience of others and learning how to avoid the same result: intellectual bankruptcy and self-destruction. Even left-wing intellectuals like Michnik and Kuron failed in their role, because the point is not just to follow a movement, explaining what it is doing but to have real intellectual input. Left-wing intellectuals in Poland mostly commented on the actions of the workers.
AC:
BK: Often we are disappointed with the Western Left. It is pragmatic and de-ideologized, whereas Russian culture is ideological and value-oriented. We’re interested in the history of the New Left, also in the present peace groupings and the Green movement, because they are also value-oriented. Of course, to those Western value-oriented movements the Soviet left-wing groups must seem rather pragmatic, since we must necessarily avoid demagogy and formulate concepts engaging seriously with economic shortcomings and contradictions. Value-oriented groups in the West sometimes forget about practical contradictions. In principle we’re open to dialogue with the Western Left.
Abramov, F. 104, 140, 302
‘The Active Essence of Man’ (Batishchev) 275
Afghanistan 330
Agursky, Mikhail 7, 28
nationalism in literature 218
New Right indifference to politics 235-6
on
Aitmatov,
Akhmatova,
alienation 85, 273, 274-5, 280-1
intellectuals and 101, 208-9
analytic tendency 262-71
Anastas'ev, A., anti-Semitism 227
Andropov, Yuri 317
anti-Semitism 34
nationalism 227, 233,
Stalinist anti-intellectualism 108, 128-9, 135
Zionism 225-6
‘Aquarium’ 330, 331
architecture 120
Arendt, Hannah 42
Armenia 132
arrests and punishment ix, xi, 24, 48, 53, 153
Stalinist 142-3
youth movement 147, 148
art (creativity)
art (painting and painters) 4, 16, 100, 115
censorship of 105, 107, 116
Futurists 49, 167
Khrushchev and 175-6
patriotism 133-4
Asiatic influence autocracy 10–12, 76-7
mode of production 275-6, 286, 297–304
Astaf'ev 337
autocracy 10–14, 76-7
Bakhtin, M.M., philosophy of culture 95, 278-80
theory of dialogue 233-4
Bakunin, Mikhail 359
Baron, Samuel 15
Batishchev, G., ‘The Active Essence of Man’ 275
Batkin, L., philosophy of culture 218, 280-2
on nationalism 222, 228
Beatles 331
Belinsky, Vissarion 20, 227
Western influences 228, 233
Bely, Andrei 49
Bence
Berdyaev, Nikolai 14, 17,
Slavophilism 19, 225, 227, 232
Soviet state 50, 79
western influence 12, 13, 255
Besançon, A. 236
Bettelheim, Charles 84
Bibler, V.S.,
Birman, A. 191-2, 198
Black Hundreds 229, 230-1
‘Black Square’ (Malevich) 49
Bloch, Ernst 313
Bloch, Marc 279
Blok, Alexander 49–50, 57
Bodkhovsky, M. 21
Boffa, Giuseppe 61, 90
Bolsheviks in power 43, 48, 60
on 22nd Congress 172-3
Bolsheviks anti-democratic 42-51
attempt to establish unified order 38–42
attitudes towards culture 56-60
foster intelligentsia 51-5
lose battle against bureaucracy 64-7 1
neo- movement 146, 148
religion and 28
split with Mensheviks 22-3, 25
step to socialism 23, 35n56, 80
Brezhnev, Leonid x, 113
rise of dissidents 211-51
stability xi, 181, 191, 312, 317
stagnation under 209-12, 357-8
Britain 132
Bronstein, Lev
Brus, Wlodzimierz 77, 80, 359
Brym, Robert 25
Bulgakov, S. 31
Bukharin, Nikolai 36
hopes for maturing working class 68-9
intelligentsia and 49, 56, 59, 92-3
rehabilitation 333, 354-5, 357
Shatrov makes film about 320-1
Bukovsky, Volodya 136, 145, 196, 240-1, 256
against censorship 147-8, 190
Bulgakov, Mikhail ix, 93, 1 19, 204
