Nikolaj Kljuev (1884-1937) est l’une des figures les plus fascinantes de l’« Âge d’argent » russe et du modernisme. Longtemps interdite après son exécution, son œuvre n’a été redécouverte qu’à la faveur du « boom » éditorial de la perestroïka, la publication de poèmes épiques tardifs suscitant un vif intérêt pour son œuvre témoignage de la violence de la collectivisation. Né dans le Nord russe, engagé pour la cause paysanne, correspondant d’Alexandre Blok entre 1907 et 1915, idéologue du néo-populisme dans les années 1910, bolchevik en 1919, Kljuev est devenu, dans les années 1920, une référence pour la génération des jeunes poètes soviétiques (Harms, Vvedenskij, etc.), un conservateur de la culture russe ancienne et un modèle d’anti-comportement, dans le contexte d’un champ littéraire en pleine reconfiguration. Attirant un public très divers, modulant sa personnalité littéraire et sa voix en fonction de son auditoire, Kljuev s’épanouit sur scène comme dans le cadre privé du cercle et du couple. Alors qu’il a trouvé, au cours des années 1910, un matériau esthétique de choix dans le folklore russe, la vieille foi et les chants populaires, c’est le « je » qui demeure au centre de son univers poétique, sous la forme d’un héros lyrique évoluant au sein des cycles. Ceux des années 1917-1932 occupent une place cruciale dans sa trajectoire poétique, dans la mesure où c’est en leur sein que s’élabore le « cosmos de l’Isba », au cœur de l’univers poétique kljuevien. Éminemment charnel et homoérotique, le «je» est aussi désincarné dans un Verbe qui devient le vecteur de l’intentionnalité du texte poétique, au même titre que les masques du poète se font le véhicule de son identité narrative. / Nikolai Klyuev (1884-1937) is one of the most fascinating figures of the Russian «Silver age» and modernism. Forbidden for half a century after the poet’s execution, his work was almost fully recovered only at the end of the 1980’s, and the publication of the late epic poems sparked an intense interest in those poetic testimonies of the violence of collectivization. Born in the Russian North, committed to the peasant revolution, Alexander Blok’s penpal between 1907 and 1915, ideologist of neo-populism in the 1910’s, bolshevik in 1919, Klyuev became in the 1920’s a reference for the young generation of soviet poets (Harms, Vvedenski, etc.), a keeper of Russian folk culture and an example of anti-behavior whithin the frame of a mutating literary field. Attracting a diverse crown and modifying his literary persona as well as his voice regarding his audience, Klyuev thrives on stage as well as within the private circle and couple. Whilst he has found during the 1910’s a valuable aesthetic material in Russian folklore, old belief and popular songs, his poetic universe gravitates around his «self» in an egocentric manner. The utopian formula of the «isba cosmos» is formulated precisely within the lyric cycles of the 1920’s that correspond to the intimate intention of his verse. Carnal and homoerotic, the «lyric hero» is also disembodied in the Word that carries the poetic intention, the same way the mask Klyuev dons in public becomes the vehicle of his narrative identity in perpetual representation

The conclusion of the First World War brought the resumption of a struggle of a different sort: a battle between government and labor. Throughout 1919, government and labor squared off in a struggle over hours, wages, and nationalization. The Russian Revolution introduced the danger of the bolshevik contagion into the struggle. The first to enter into this conflict with the government were the shop stewards of Belfast and Glasgow. The struggle continued with the continued threats of the Triple Alliance and the police to destroy the power of the government through industrial action. This thesis examines the British labor movement during this revolutionary year in Europe, as well as the government's response to this new danger.

L’objectif de ce mémoire consiste à proposer un nouveau cadre de référence conceptuel pour aborder le marxisme et, a fortiori, son interprétation léniniste. Nous retraçons dans l’œuvre de Karl Marx (1818-1883) deux paradigmes élaborés successivement : le paradigme anthropo-métaphysique, compris à la fois en tant que continuité et rupture avec la philosophie classique allemande, et le paradigme économico-historique, qui supporte la théorie du matérialisme historique. Nous démontrons que le paradigme économico-historique s’est consolidé sur la base du paradigme anthropo-métaphysique de manière à lui conférer une systématicité scientifique. Pour saisir les fondements du léninisme, nous décidons de circonscrire notre investigation à trois notions clefs à partir desquelles il sera possible d’évaluer l’apport original de Lénine comparativement aux écrits de Marx: (1) l’alliance du prolétariat et de la paysannerie, (2) le rôle d’avant-garde du parti et (3) la dictature du prolétariat et la violence politique. Nous constatons que l’interprétation léniniste de chacune de ces trois notions s’appuie sur un certain nombre de concepts ou de textes présents dans le corpus marxiste. De ce constat, notre tâche consiste à déterminer à partir de quelle grille de lecture paradigmatique du marxisme le léninisme a pu s’édifier en tant que doctrine. / The aim of this paper is to offer a new conceptual framework within which to study Marxism and, a fortiori, its Leninist interpretation. We retrace in the works of Karl Marx (1818-1883) two paradigms elaborated consecutively: anthropo-metaphysical paradigm, understood as both in continuity and in rupture with German classical philosophy, and economico-historical paradigm, which conveys the theory of historical materialism. We demonstrate how economico-historical paradigm consolidates itself on the basis of anthropo-metaphysical paradigm in order that the latter yield scientific systematicity. To grasp the foundations of Leninism, we restrain our investigation to three key notions from which to evaluate Lenin’s original contribution to the writings of Marx: (1) the alliance of the proletariat and the peasantry, (2) the vanguard role of the party, and (3) the dictatorship of the proletariat and political violence. We note that the Leninist interpretation of each of these notions rests on a certain amount of concepts or positions present in the Marxist corpus. From this ascertainment, our task is to establish from which paradigmatic framework Leninism has established itself as a doctrine.

<p>In 1917, the Romanov dynasty in Russia came to an end as Tsar Nicholas II abdicated during the February Revolution and the First World War. The Romanovs ruled Russia for over three-hundred years as absolute monarchs and until 1917, Nicholas II and his wife Tsarina Alexandra Feodorovna fervently clung to their autocratic rule and projected an image of power and stability. Yet, their choices not only shaped Russia itself but also dictated Russia’s diplomatic and cultural relationship with their future allies in the First World War: Great Britain, France, and the United States of America. From 1896 to 1917, Tsar Nicholas II floundered amid a series of crisis and this dissertation considers five key moments in his reign that illustrate the complex relationship between Russia and the allies of the First World War. These events are: the Coronation of Nicholas II in 1896; Bloody Sunday and the Treaty of Portsmouth in 1905; the Romanov Tercentenary in 1913; the role of Tsarina Alexandra in the First World War from 1914-1917; and the abdication of Nicholas II and asylum request by the Romanovs in 1917. All of these events showcase the diplomatic and media representations of the Romanovs among allied nations and how Nicholas performed and presented his view of himself to the rest of the world. Each Tsar of Russia fashioned himself into a mythic and ceremonial figure to the Russian people and this dissertation argues that the governments of Great Britain, France, and the United States accepted Nicholas’ self-representations for many years and ignored his autocratic rule in favor of their own military and financial interests. In 1917, after years of excusing his behavior, they finally rejected him. Ultimately, the Romanovs held great power at home and abroad and were major players in international events in the early twentieth century but they were unable to reconcile their autocratic regime with modern democracies. In the end, Nicholas’ and Alexandra’s failure to adapt and perform their roles effectively cost them their throne and left Russia in a state of war and disarray.</p>

This Master’s thesis explores Jewish masculinity and identity within early twentieth-century literature (1903-1925), using texts written by Jewish authors in late imperial Russia and the early Soviet Union. This was a period of change for Russia’s Jewish community, involving increased secularization and reform, massive pogroms such as in Kishinev in 1903, newfound leadership within the 1905 and 1917 Revolutions, and a rise in both Zionist and Revolutionary ideology. Subsequently, Jewish literary masculinity experienced a significant shift in characterization. Historically, a praised Jewish man had been portrayed as gentle, scholarly, and faithful, yet early twentieth century Jewish male literary figures were asked to be physically strong, hypermasculine, and secular. This thesis first uses H.N. Bialik’s “In the City of Slaughter” (1903) and Sholem Aleichem’s “Tevye Goes to Palestine” (1914) to introduce a concept of “Jewish shame,” or a sentiment that historical Jewish masculinity was insufficient for a contemporary Russian world. It then creates two models for these new men to follow. The Assimilatory Jew, seen in Isaac Babel’s Red Cavalry cycle (published throughout the 1920s), held that perpetual outsider Jewish men should imitate the behaviour of a secular whole in order to be accepted. The Jewish Superman is depicted in Vladimir Jabotinsky’s “In Memory of Herzl” (1904) and Ilya Selvinsky’s “Bar Kokhba” (1920), and argues that masculine glory is entirely compatible with a proud Jewish identity, without an external standard needed. Judith Butler’s theories on gender performativity are used to analyze these diverse works, published in Hebrew, Yiddish, and Russian by authors of varying political alignments, to establish commonalities among these literary canons and plot a new spectrum of desired identities for Jewish men. / Graduate / 2020-04-10

This thesis investigates the formation of power structures in a revolutionary setting. It takes as a case study the central Siberian city of Krasnoiarsk, in which a powerful Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies emerged during the period March-October 1917. The Krasnoiarsk Soviet was an elective council established during the overthrow of Tsarist authorities. Throughout 1917, it became a vital component of an emerging local and regional power structure, assuming growing responsibility for a number of core state tasks. As well as providing a new empirical case study to English-language literature on 1917, the thesis employs a nuanced analytical approach which challenges existing conceptualisations of state power in revolution and the role played by local soviets. State power in revolutionary Russia has often been viewed as something to be contested between different political groupings and organisations seeking to assert their own outright control. This view is captured neatly by the formulation of “dual power”, in which soviets and Provisional Government organisations constructed alternative power bases in an attempt to wield outright control. Accordingly, the soviets’ growing political strength indicated an ability to marginalise other groups and organisations seeking to wield power. By contrast, this thesis does not seek to explain how power in revolutionary Krasnoiarsk was “captured” or otherwise controlled by the Soviet alone. Instead, it applies a critical interpretation of state power proposed by Bob Jessop and other theorists, who view the state as a site of interaction and negotiation between multiple autonomous organisations and social actors, all of which have a stake in the way it operates in practice. It focuses on the emergence of a “soviet power” writ small, in which the Krasnoiarsk Soviet became an authoritative organisation within a broader constellation of revolutionary actors. Without denying the Soviet’s centrality within this power structure, the thesis does not explain its role simply as the monopolisation of authority over other would-be contenders. Rather, it sees the Soviet’s importance in its ability to establish itself as a focal point for interactions between multiple actors which, collectively, shaped state power at a local and regional level. It considers how the forms and practices of revolutionary power developed through these interactions and how these interactions in turn transformed the roles of actors and organisations engaging them. In order to unpick the complex and dynamic processes of revolutionary power, the thesis employs three core methodological concepts: institutions, mobilisation, and ideology. It makes several important and original arguments. Firstly, it emphasises the autonomy of social actors which supported the Soviet and engaged in its politics, demonstrating the extent to which they were able to shape its political functions and structures according to their own concerns. Secondly, it reveals the importance of skilled administrative personnel to Soviet work, highlighting the invaluable practical roles they played in the regulation of provisions and their ability to influence Soviet policy measures on this issue. Thirdly, it demonstrates the close cooperation between the Soviet and other local governmental and administrative bodies, including the city Duma and provisions regulatory organisations, which remained vital to fulfilling state functions throughout 1917. Finally, it discusses how the Soviet and socialist activists challenged established power relationships between Krasnoiarsk, as a locality, and all-Russian state authorities, revealing the growing importance they attached to securing greater local autonomy in revolution and the changing ways local actors viewed their role in wider all-Russian politics.