The simple hero of this tale has a rich ancestry in the popular fables and satirical literature of Great Russia; but he also has ancestors in Yiddish humor, with its idealized Peter Schlemihl and his life-affirming laughter at human foibles and pretense. This joke is, in fact, a variant of an age-old
Jewish joke about waiting for the Messiah-pointing up, perhaps, a subtle way in which the indigenous Yiddish culture of Russia seeks hidden revenge on its latest persecutor. Forced both to assimilate into the atomized society of the USSR and to endure the continuing indignities of anti-Semitism, the Jewish community continues to assert itself anonymously by providing fresh satirical resources to Russian culture as a whole.
The comic contribution of the emigrating Jewish community to the American melting pot in the late nineteenth and the early twentieth century is thus being in some ways duplicated by this inner emigration and assimilation of Yiddish humor in the USSR of the mid-twentieth century. The satirical playwright who has become the posthumous idol of the young generation, Eugene Schwarz, and the man that championed the production of his works, Akimov, are both Jews. The philo-Semitism of the young generation is a mark of gratitude for the Jewish contribution to the new cultural ferment as well as an expression of new-found identity with the long-endured persecutions of Jewry. It is entirely fitting that, of all the half-heretical literary works of the post-Stalin era, Eugene Evtushenko's simple poetic tribute to Jewish suffering, 'Babi Yar,' should become probably the most important single symbol of fresh feeling and aspiration among the younger generation.30
The revival of Russian humor has also benefited from the increasing assimilation of other minority groups, such as the Armenians, who, like the Jews, have an age-old Near Eastern civilization, with folklore accumulated from long centuries of persecution, wandering, and commercial adventure. An imaginary 'radio Armenia' is frequently cited by bemused Russians as the source of humorous comment on internal Soviet affairs. Georgians and Armenians played leading roles in developing the art of humorous and satirical folk singing in the early 1960's.
Many of the deeper, positive ideals of the new generation are expressed in the third aspect of ferment: the revival of Russian literature. In the late imperial period literature was, after all, the main medium for developing new ideas about man and society. The revival in the decade since Stalin of this search for ideas in literature is a phenomenon of great importance for Russian development (though not necessarily for world literature).31
In part, the new literature seems impressive because of the extreme sterility of that which preceded it. One is repeatedly reminded that there are no Tolstoys or Dostoevskies even in potentia. Indeed, the closest present approximation to the epic style of the former and to the psychological religious preoccupations of the latter among Soviet writers of today can be found in the novels of Michael Sholokhov and Leonid Leonov respectively:
two elderly and idiosyncratic figures with little apparent influence on the rising generation. Yet this new literary production has a freshness and vitality of its own. Ever since the publication just after Stalin's death of Pomerantsev's much-discussed essay, 'On Sincerity in Literature,' which, among other things, contrasted the honesty and resourcefulness of a Siberian peasant woman with the mechanical falsehoods of authority, there had been a rising tide of what might be called neo-populist literature. Stories like Yashin's 'Levers' and Nagibin's 'Light in the Window' emphasized the contrast between corrupt officialdom and the uncorrupted people.32 Sometimes an idealistic scientific worker is substituted for a simple muzhik as the contrasting force to Communist bureaucracy, as in Granin's 'My Own Opinion' or Dudintsev's much-discussed novel, Not by Bread Alone. Sometimes the editorial point is made quite bluntly, as in the poem 'Careful People,' whose title is an ironic comment on the omnipresent 'Careful Pigeons' signs which Stalin scattered through Russia at -the very heights of his Neronian bloodbaths.33
The literature of protest in 1956 proved to be only the harbinger of still more blunt and pointed social criticism which came late in 1962, with the publication of Alexander Solzhenitsyn's portrayal of a Soviet concentration camp in One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich and Fedor Abramov's scathing depiction of collective farm life in One Day in the 'New Life.' All in all, a remarkable amount of stylistically conventional but ideologically exciting fiction has been produced in the USSR since the death of Stalin. At the same time, traces have begun to appear of that even more daring literature which is written 'for the drawer' or 'for the soul' and circulates in manuscript or typewritten copies within the USSR (along with innumerable bootlegged copies of proscribed Western publications and private translations thereof). Some of this literature appears in the leaflet-sized papers that are illegally produced and distributed in the USSR, and some of it has found its way to publication in the West.
Even more important than the novels and short stories of the new generation is the extraordinary revival of two of the most public and yet most personal of all literary forms: poetry readings and the theater. These media-in which Soviet men and women communicate directly with fellow Russians about problems of common concern-have done much to create such sense of communal purpose and aspiration as has come to animate the young generation.
The poetry readings have attracted considerable public attention because of the magnetic appeal of Evtushenko and the causes celebres that have grown up around his name-the first in T960 following the publication
of 'Babi-Yar,' and the second in 1963, following the publication while abroad of autobiographical sketches and reflections.
It is doubtful if anything written by Evtushenko will find its way into the anthologies of the world's great poetry. Yet well before he was thirty, he was assured an important niche in Russian cultural history, as the recognized spokesman of his generation. His direct and easily understood poems of protest and self-affirmation, his handsome appearance, his simple love of travel and of love itself-all made him a kind of romantic idol. His exploits in forcing open previously closed doors and weaving his way in and out of official favor were followed vicariously by thousands; and he, in turn, shared with the thousands who flocked to his poetry readings verses, comments, and innuendos that he did not dare commit to print.
'Each man has his secret personal world,' he wrote in the first poem of a Soviet edition of his printed works;34 and Evtushenko appeared as the defender of that colorful, uninhibited world against the drab and stereotyped world of 'Stalin's heirs.' His poem 'The Nihilist' tells how someone derisively labeled a nihilist in official circles was capable of more noble human actions than his more conformist contemporaries. His ode 'To Humor' praises this quality for its power to scourge tyranny.
The appeal of Evtushenko was, however, based on more than youthful exuberance and a general spirit of protest. For Evtushenko played-even if crudely and perhaps unconsciously-some chords with sympathetic resonance in earlier Russian tradition. For the decade after Stalin he represented a reincarnation-however pale-of Belinsky, the 'furious' moral hero of the original 'remarkable decade.' Evtushenko seems close to Belinsky not only in his effect on contemporaries, but in his refusal to accept rationalizations for human suffering. In 'Babi-Yar,' particularly when recited by Evtushenko, the emotional climax comes with the mention of Anne Frank and the image of innocent suffering childhood, after which he moves on to naturalistic imagery and a moralistic conclusion. His sense of outrage began-according to his officially criticized autobiography-when he saw a helpless ten-year-old girl crushed to death at the funeral of Stalin simply because no one had the proper authorization to prevent the thoughtless mob from surging forth.35 At this point Evtushenko returned the ticket of admission to the Stalinist establishment, which a man of his talents could so easily have gained. The motivation is that of Belinsky in rejecting Hegel's ideal world order, and of Belinsky's echo, Ivan Karamazov, in rejecting his ticket of admission to heaven because of the innocent suffering of children. It may be that the most enduring legacy of the Old Russian intelligentsia lies not in any of its Utopian dreams, but in this passionate desire 'that no
