Revolutionary Acts: Amateur Theater and the Soviet State, 1917-1938

Lynn Mally

Published by Cornell University Press 2016

Revolutionary Acts

Amateur Theater and the Soviet State, 1917-1938

Lynn Mally
Funded by: National Endowment for the Humanities Open Book Program

https://doi.org/10.7591/9781501706981

Overview
Contents

About this book

During the Russian Revolution and Civil War, amateur theater groups sprang up in cities across the country. Workers, peasants, students, soldiers, and sailors provided entertainment ranging from improvisations to gymnastics and from propaganda sketches to the plays of Chekhov. In Revolutionary Acts, Lynn Mally reconstructs the history of the amateur stage in Soviet Russia from 1917 to the height of the Stalinist purges. Her book illustrates in fascinating detail how Soviet culture was transformed during the new regime's first two decades in power.

Of all the arts, theater had a special appeal for mass audiences in Russia, and with the coming of the revolution it took on an important role in the dissemination of the new socialist culture. Mally's analysis of amateur theater as a space where performers, their audiences, and the political authorities came into contact enables her to explore whether this culture emerged spontaneously "from below" or was imposed by the revolutionary elite. She shows that by the late 1920s, Soviet leaders had come to distrust the initiatives of the lower classes, and the amateur theaters fell increasingly under the guidance of artistic professionals. Within a few years, state agencies intervened to homogenize repertoire and performance style, and with the institutionalization of Socialist Realist principles, only those works in a unified Soviet canon were presented.

Author / Editor information

Lynn Mally is Professor Emerita of History at the University of California, Irvine. She is author of Culture of the Future: The Proletkult Movement in Revolutionary Russia.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Preface Open Access Download PDF	ix
Introduction Open Access Download PDF	1
1. The Revolution Loves the Theater Open Access Download PDF	17
2. Small Forms on Small Stages Open Access Download PDF	47
3. From "Club Plays" to the Classics Open Access Download PDF	81
4. TRAM: The Vanguard of Amateur Art Open Access Download PDF	109
5. Shock Workers on the Cultural Front Open Access Download PDF	146
6. Amateurs in the Spectacle State Open Access Download PDF	181
Conclusion Open Access Download PDF	213
Glossary Open Access Download PDF	223
Bibliography Open Access Download PDF	225
Index Open Access Download PDF	243

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Audience: General/trade;
Pages
- Main content: 272
Illustrations
- Other: 14 halftones
Keywords: Russia; arts; performance; amateur theater groups; new socialist culture; cultural revolution; elite culture; mass culture; propaganda; Stalinist

eBook

Published: November 1, 2016
ISBN: 9781501706981