![\"stanek\"](\"http:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/hst-journeys\/files\/2016\/12\/stanek-205x300.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
By Luke Stanek<\/p>\n
DK254.L26 F3 1937<\/p>\n
Fadeev, Aleksandr. Kak pogib Serge\u012d Lazo<\/em>. Moskva: Izd-vo detsko\u012d lit-ry, 1937. Miami University Special Collections.<\/p>\n \u201cThey were stuffed into bags and cast into the furnace.\u201d[1]<\/a>\u00a0 With this legendary act, Sergei Lazo, hero of the Red Guard in Siberia, resistor of Kolchak, and martyr of the Russian Civil War, was etched into Soviet memory.\u00a0 His life story\u2014and in particular this depiction of his death\u2014transformed Lazo into a mythical figure whose story became known throughout the Soviet Union.\u00a0 In the young adult book Kak pogib Serge\u012d Lazo<\/em>, which translates as The Death of Sergei Lazo<\/em>, the martyrdom of Lazo serves as a prime example of what might be termed the Soviet memory project that, since the fall of the Soviet Union, has come under increasing academic and popular scrutiny.\u00a0 By examining this document, Lazo\u2019s popularity in the Soviet Union, and the Soviet memory project itself, we can better understand how the Communist Party worked to create uniquely-Soviet histories and how Russians today continue to come to terms with the legacy of Soviet memory.<\/p>\n Kak pogib Serge\u012d Lazo<\/em> was written by Aleksandr Fadeev, a preeminent Soviet novelist, and exists as one of his lesser-known works.\u00a0 It was published for children and young adults and recounts first the struggle of the Red Army at large in Siberia and the Far East during the Russian Civil War, and then details the events of Lazo\u2019s life and ultimately his death.\u00a0 Fadeev uses flowery language to paint Lazo as a larger-than-life hero of the Red Army, who defeated Kolchak\u2019s forces in a number of battles, despite being greatly outnumbered, and struggled to his last breath against the \u201cwicked killers\u201d of the Japanese Intervention.[2]<\/a>\u00a0 The book includes photos and illustrations from the Civil War in the Far East, as well as illustrations of the events of Lazo that are narrated in the latter half of the work.\u00a0 Most significantly, the novel describes in detail the events of Lazo\u2019s death, where he was captured by the Japanese, turned over to the White Army remnants under Kolchak, forced into a bag, then stuffed into the furnace of a steam train and burned alive.[3]<\/a>\u00a0 It is precisely such a description of his death for which Lazo became a famous figure of the Red Army and the Soviet cause.<\/p>\n Sergei Lazo and his death are part of a larger historical trend, the Soviet memory project. This trend, which Thomas Sherlock terms \u201cSoviet mythology,\u201d encompasses the various efforts by the Communist Party and Soviet state to generate a history that not only supported the ideology of the party, but also reimagined the past for the purposes of creating a new Soviet world.[4]<\/a>\u00a0 Old figures of historical importance in Russian history associated with the Imperial state or Orthodoxy were replaced by new figures associated with the revolutionary struggle in an effort to provide Russians with a truly \u201cSoviet\u201d heritage.\u00a0 These figures do not represent a complete break with earlier conceptions of Russia\u2019s past, however, as Lazo is referred to in Kak pogib Serge\u012d Lazo<\/em> as a \u201cbogatyr\u201d\u2014a medieval demigod-like figure of strength and nobility\u2014and thus Fadeev reimagines a traditional figure of Russian folk memory through a new Soviet lens in the life and death of Sergei Lazo.[5]<\/a>\u00a0 Lazo stands among other figures of new legend, including the most famous, Vasily Chapaev, whose heroism was portrayed in print and on screen and whose name became synonymous with Revolutionary heroism.[6]<\/a>\u00a0 In time, Lazo went from being a story of Soviet heroism and martyrdom to being the figure of Soviet statuary, namesake of streets, eponymous topic of plays and films, and even the namesake of a ship in the Soviet Far East Fleet.[7]<\/a><\/p>\n Curiously, however, Lazo was mentioned only once during his lifetime in the Soviet newspaper Pravda<\/em>, and not for any battlefield heroics, but rather as one of a list of officers of the Railroad Red Guard elected honorary member of the Railroad Red Guard committee in 1918.[8]<\/a>\u00a0 It was not until 1935, or 15 years after his death, that his name appeared in Pravda<\/em> again, in an article explaining the events of his death, supposedly recovered in a previously-lost telegram.[9]<\/a>\u00a0 After this first post-mortem mention, his name and story began to appear throughout Pravda<\/em> and throughout Soviet daily life in poems, songs, and articles in the media, in literature like Kak pogib Serge\u012d Lazo<\/em>, on stage in various plays, and even later on screen in the 1967 film Sergei Lazo<\/em>.[10]<\/a>\u00a0 It is in these developments of popular image that we see the Soviet memory project transform Lazo from ordinary officer of the Railroad Red Guard to symbolic figure of revolutionary struggle.\u00a0 While Lazo never became a pop cultural sensation to the same degree as Chapaev, the project surrounding Lazo shared numerous similarities in the way his life (and death) events were constructed as heroic deeds of great sacrifice.\u00a0 Significantly, just as Chapaev\u2019s birthplace became a historical site of Soviet memory, the supposed steam engine in which Lazo fought his final legendary battle against the Whites and Interventionists was put on display north of Vladivostok by the Stalinist regime as a commemoration of Lazo\u2019s martyrdom for the Communist cause, where it remains on display today.<\/p>\n However, with the Soviet Union dissolved, the histories of mythical figures like Sergei Lazo, memorialized throughout Soviet popular culture in works like Kak pogib Serge\u012d Lazo<\/em> and the larger Soviet memory project, are now being openly-questioned by Russians and non-Russians alike in popular and alternative media.\u00a0 There is no dispute that Lazo was an officer of the Railroad Red Guard in the Far East and Vladivostok, but the details of his life and death, which are central to his legend, have been recently called into question.\u00a0 Blog posts by authors conducting independent research on Lazo have noted that the train engine on display in Vladivostok into which Lazo was supposedly stuffed is actually an American steam engine not introduced to Russia until 1940.[11]<\/a>\u00a0 Additionally, a news report in Vladivostok has raised the same concern, and while not stating outright that the myth was fabricated, the reporter in the piece suggested at least the possibility that the death of Lazo has been exaggerated.[12]<\/a>\u00a0 Perhaps most telling, Krokodil<\/em>, formerly a state-sanctioned Soviet-era satire magazine, satirized Lazo in 2008 in \u201c500 Russian Greats,\u201d its final issue of publication.\u00a0 In the issue, Lazo is classified among Russia\u2019s \u201cGreat Victims.\u201d \u00a0In the short synopsis of Lazo, entitled \u201cVictim of [His Own] Convictions,\u201d Lazo is described as a \u201cfiery\u201d revolutionary who was \u201cburned by Japanese interventionists in an American steam engine,\u201d leaning humorously on skepticism over both the myth and the ways in which it has been produced and put on display to the public.[13]<\/a><\/p>\n We see in these acts an opening up of Soviet-era history beyond merely the academic histories that emerged after the collapse of the Soviet Union to include public and collective historical memory as well.\u00a0 The literal archives of the past may have opened in the 1990s with the collapse of the Soviet Union, but so too did the archives of memory open up, previously sealed by the Soviet system of historical construction and remaking of Russian mythology. To understand the mythmaking process of the Soviet state is to better understand the process of perpetual revolution proposed by the Bolsheviks in the interwar period.\u00a0 The myth of Sergei Lazo, as represented in this particular work of young adult literature, serves as one of the many pieces of post-Soviet memory being brought back into question by non-Russians, Russians, and other post-Soviets alike.\u00a0 By examining further the ways in which the Soviet state constructed memory and the Russian past through sources such as Kak pogib Serge\u012d Lazo,<\/em> historians and the larger public will better understand the ways in which the Soviet Union managed historical memory and further how Russians must reckon with historical memory once again.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Bibliography<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/u><\/p>\n Secondary Sources<\/u><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Brandenberger, David. Propaganda State in Crisis: Soviet Ideology, Indoctrination, and Terror <\/em><\/p>\n Under Stalin, 1927-1941<\/em>. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2011.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cDeystvitel’no li Sergeya Lazo sozhgli v topke parovoza?\u201d Youtube. Uploaded February 27,<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Mozzhechov, Mikhail. \u201cKto takoy Lazo i zachem Yapontsy sozhgli yego v topke parovoza….\u201d<\/p>\n September 12, 2011. http:\/\/mishajp.livejournal.com\/46659.html. Accessed December 6, 2016.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Sherlock, Thomas. Historical Narratives in the Soviet Union and Post-Soviet Russia: Destroying <\/em><\/p>\n the Settled Past, Creating an Uncertain Future<\/em>. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u00a0<\/u><\/p>\n Primary Documents<\/u><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Fadeev, Aleksandr. Kak pogib Serge\u012d Lazo<\/em>. Moskva: Izd-vo detsko\u012d lit-ry, 1937.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cGrazhdanskim voyna na Dal’nem Vostoke.\u201d Pravda<\/em> (Moskva), February 8, 1935.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cIz Kiyeva Vyshli Parokhody.\u201d Pravda<\/em> (Moskva), March 24, 1939.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Mostovshchikov, Sergei, ed. \u201cvelikiye zhertvy.\u201d Krokodil<\/em> no. 6 (Moskva), 2008.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cProvints\u00edya. Sibir’ i Dal’n\u00edy Vostok. Po pryamomu provodu. Perevybory Sovdepa.\u201d Pravda<\/em><\/p>\n (Moskva), April 24, 1918.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Zhdanov, Nik. \u201cTheater: Plays About Sergei Lazo.\u201d Current Digest of the Russian Press<\/em> 5, no. 8<\/p>\n (Minneapolis), April 4, 1953.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u00a0<\/u><\/p>\n For Further Research<\/u><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Current Digest of the Russian Press<\/em> issues are available online through East View at:<\/p>\n https:\/\/dlib.eastview.com\/browse\/publication\/6765<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n Krokodil<\/em> issues are available online through East View\u2019s Krokodil Digital Archive at:<\/p>\n http:\/\/dlib.eastview.com\/browse\/udb\/2230<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n Pravda<\/em> issues are available online through East View\u2019s Pravda Digital Archive at: https:\/\/dlib.eastview.com\/browse\/publication\/9305<\/p>\n [1]<\/a> Aleksandr Fadeev, Kak pogib Serge\u012d Lazo<\/em> (Moskva: Izd-vo detsko\u012d lit-ry, 1937), 30.<\/p>\n [2]<\/a> Ibid., 28.<\/p>\n [3]<\/a> Ibid.<\/p>\n [4]<\/a> Thomas Sherlock, Historical Narratives in the Soviet Union and Post-Soviet Russia: Destroying the Settled Past, Creating an Uncertain Future<\/em> (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), 146.\u00a0 In this paper, I use the term \u201cSoviet Memory project\u201d to describe this process, a term which I have adopted from Stephen Norris.<\/p>\n [5]<\/a> Fadeev, Serge\u012d Lazo<\/em>, 28.<\/p>\n [6]<\/a> David Brandenberger, Propaganda State in Crisis: Soviet Ideology, Indoctrination, and Terror Under Stalin, 1927-1941<\/em> (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2011), 85-90.\u00a0 See also Brett Coleman\u2019s paper for this project.<\/p>\n [7]<\/a> \u201cIz Kiyeva Vyshli Parokhody,\u201d Pravda<\/em> (Moskva), March 24, 1939, 6.<\/p>\n [8]<\/a> \u201cProvints\u00edya. Sibir’ i Dal’n\u00edy Vostok. Po pryamomu provodu. Perevybory Sovdepa,\u201d Pravda<\/em> (Moskva), April 24, 1918, 4.<\/p>\n [9]<\/a> \u201cGrazhdanskim voyna na Dal’nem Vostoke,\u201d Pravda<\/em> (Moskva), February 8, 1935, 4.<\/p>\n [10]<\/a> Nik. Zhdanov, \u201cTheater: Plays About Sergei Lazo,\u201d Current Digest of the Russian Press<\/em> 5, no. 8 (Minneapolis), April 4, 1953, 35.<\/p>\n [11]<\/a> Mikhail Mozzhechov, \u201cKto takoy Lazo i zachem Yapontsy sozhgli yego v topke parovoza….\u201d (September 12, 2011), http:\/\/mishajp.livejournal.com\/46659.html. Accessed Dec. 6, 2016.<\/p>\n\n