Omsk University Bulletin: “The Great Patriotic War in the Human Dimension”

Omsk University Bulletin. Historical Sciences series
Academic journal. Published four times a year. Founded in 2014.
Print ISSN 2312-1300; online ISSN 3034-3852.

Omsk University Bulletin

Y. V. Dunaeva

THE GREAT PATRIOTIC WAR IN THE HUMAN DIMENSION

(Review of: Budnitsky, O. V. People at War. Moscow: NLO, 2021. 400 pp., ill. (“What Is Russia” series))

Academic article in the field of History and Archaeology.

Despite the thousands of volumes that have been written, the Second World War remains a focus of historians’ attention. The anthropological turn prompted scholars to address new, little-studied or previously unexplored fields of research and to use new kinds of sources, including ego-documents.

The anthropological turn drew attention to the human being in history: to a person’s role in historical events, assessments of what was happening, and the preservation and transmission of memory about past events. Its principal significance lies in the fact that it redirected attention toward the role of the individual in history and toward human existence under different conditions — “that special mode of existence which makes a human being human” [1, p. 32].

The term “ego-documents” was introduced by University of Amsterdam professor J. Presser in the 1950s. At first it did not gain currency; historians began using it only in the 1980s. As Presser wrote, these are “those historical sources in which the researcher encounters an ‘I’ — or sometimes (Caesar, Henry Adams) a ‘he’ — as a subject who is simultaneously writing and present in the text being described” (quoted in [2, p. 185]). The “archival revolution,” which opened previously inaccessible documents and materials, also made an important contribution.

All these changes affected approaches to studying the Great Patriotic War. Alongside scholarly research and documentary publications, works appeared that placed the person at war in the foreground and showed war through the prism of human experience.

Ego-documents are subjective by definition. Yet precisely this subjectivity, together with their emotional character and partiality, has come to be valued as something unique and individual. Ego-documents from wars and periods of social and political upheaval play a special role. Testimony by the “ordinary person,” or the “person in the background,” as such a figure is also called, supplements traditional historical approaches and reveals things that “traditional history” might have silenced or assessed in a biased way.

O. V. Budnitsky’s study — by a Doctor of Historical Sciences, professor, and director of the HSE International Center for the History and Sociology of World War II and Its Consequences — is based on letters, diaries, and memoirs. The book consists of an introduction and fourteen short but informative essays.

It should be noted that the book’s contents are broader than its title. At the beginning, Budnitsky analyzes two of the most important diplomatic events of the prewar period: the signing of the Munich Agreement and the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. The author describes in detail the preparation and signing of the documents.

The essay devoted to British Prime Minister W. Churchill gives a brief biography. Among the ego-documents used are the memoirs and letters of H. Hopkins, the personal representative of U.S. President F. Roosevelt.

Budnitsky singles out two aspects of Churchill’s policy: his uncompromising attitude toward fascist Germany — “Churchill began his personal war against Nazi Germany as early as 1933” (p. 43) — and his sharply negative attitude toward the Soviet Union. Yet, as a genuine politician, Churchill knew how to change his position at the right moment. “Churchill regarded the German threat as the most dangerous one for his country and therefore, while remaining a consistent anti-communist, he did not hesitate to seek contacts with the Soviet side” (pp. 68–69).

The author then turns to the problem of historical memory and shows how the history of the Patriotic War of 1812 was used in wartime propaganda. In the speech by head of state J. V. Stalin on July 3, 1941, “the war was characterized as ‘great,’ ‘a nationwide Patriotic war,’ and a ‘Patriotic war of liberation’” (p. 81). Historians and publicists began devoting increased attention to the Patriotic War of 1812; books and brochures about that event were published, with a special place assigned to partisan warfare and the people’s militia. Historians M. V. Nechkina and E. V. Tarle responded quickly to the outbreak of the war; only a few days after Stalin’s speech, Tarle published the article “A Patriotic War, a People’s War.”

This is followed by material on repression against believers and religious ministers. The author emphasizes that attitudes toward believers and religious institutions changed together with the political situation. Of particular interest in this essay are brief descriptions of specific cases involving repressed parishioners and clergy.

The next essay deals with foreign aid to the Soviet Union — Lend-Lease. The question of assistance to the country at war was resolved fairly quickly: by early November 1941 the financial issues connected with foreign supplies and the delivery of cargo had been settled. Lend-Lease supplied both humanitarian goods (food, footwear, clothing) and military goods (aircraft, radar equipment, and so on).

The author then moves directly to frontline diaries. Budnitsky writes that frontline diaries, which until recently were considered a unique phenomenon, can in his view be placed in a different category: an extremely rare, but not unique, phenomenon. “A feature of sources of this kind is that they were rarely deposited in state archives. ‘Private memory’ was generally preserved privately — among family papers” (p. 188).

Diary entries differed greatly and were generally written during pauses in the fighting. Descriptions of attacks and military operations are no less valuable. One example is B. Komsky’s diary describing the Battle of Kursk. Budnitsky quotes extensive passages from it.

“Men and Women in the Red Army (1941–1945)” discusses changes in male and female behavior during the war, fleeting wartime romances, and long-term love relationships. The author uses not only wartime ego-documents but also wartime folklore that has survived to the present day.

Budnitsky writes that the change in gender relations was caused by various factors and was largely external in character. He compares war to a catastrophe that, among other things, destroyed the traditional way of life and accepted norms of behavior. After the war, a period of “normalization” of relations between the sexes began. The Party, he continues, assumed among its functions that of guarantor of public morality. Laws strengthening the family were adopted, as were laws making divorce more difficult.

The next essay concerns the capture of Field Marshal F. Paulus. Soviet Lieutenant Colonel L. Vinokur left memoirs about what happened. Budnitsky quotes extensive excerpts from Vinokur’s recollections and from those of other participants in the event.

Battalion commander Major G. Slavgorodsky is the subject of the next essay. He kept a wartime diary from August 1941 to January 1945. In Budnitsky’s view, his entries are of unquestionable interest and contribute to the social history of Soviet society in the 1940s. The diary entries testify to his courage, resourcefulness, and ingenuity. He rose from sergeant to major and battalion commander. A teacher by training, he read extensively whenever possible and shared his impressions of what he read. Budnitsky characterizes him as follows: “Somehow, self-confidence, even overconfidence, coexisted in him with doubts, hesitation, and painful self-analysis. At times it seems to be the diary of an adolescent rather than an adult man” (p. 270).

The next essay is devoted to the diary of Lieutenant V. Gelfand. His diary is a unique document: it covers not only wartime but also the postwar years up to the beginning of the 1980s. It presents the life story of an ordinary Soviet person. Budnitsky emphasizes that the diary is of unquestionable value as a personal source for the history of the USSR.

The historian also pays attention to works of fiction about the war. The writer E. Kazakevich — a captain and chief of divisional reconnaissance — is one such figure. The historian quotes from Kazakevich’s letters to his wife and sister and from the recollections of fellow servicemen. The events he experienced during the war formed the basis of the novella The Star, which occupied a special place in Soviet literature.

The reflection of everyday life in besieged Leningrad in the work of O. Bergholz is the subject of the next essay. It discusses the “February Diary” and poems written in besieged Leningrad. Budnitsky highly values Bergholz’s work and writes of her diary: “Bergholz… continued keeping her diary with unprecedented, almost unimaginable frankness. And with ruthlessness toward herself. Her text differs from the hundreds of blockade diaries known to us in its wealth of information and sharpness of observation, both regarding everyday life under the blockade and literary and general politics, literary life and customs” (p. 353).

The book ends with the essay “Hitler’s Teeth,” devoted to the forensic examination of his remains. The author quotes from the autopsy report on Hitler and Eva Braun prepared by Soviet physician A. Marats.

Budnitsky’s book is the result of painstaking and large-scale work with ego-documents. The use of “history from below” allowed the author to convey the atmosphere of the era and its details. A succession of people who fought in the war passes before us — chiefly soldiers, yesterday’s schoolchildren, ordinary people. Ego-documents help clarify the very different fates of servicemen and of those who experienced the war in besieged Leningrad.

The narrative is logically and structurally organized. The author pays attention to details and reveals them against the historical background. Written in a literary style and supplied with illustrative material, the narrative holds the reader’s attention from the first lines. This work undoubtedly contributes to the historiography of the Great Patriotic War.

Omsk University Bulletin. Historical Sciences series. 2024. Vol. 11, No. 2 (42). Pp. 181–184.
UDC 94(47).084.8
DOI 10.24147/2312-1300.2024.11(2).181-184

References

1. Smirnov S. A. “The Anthropological Turn: Its Meaning and Lessons.” Philosophy and Culture. 2017. No. 2. Pp. 23–34. DOI: 10.7256/1999-2793.2017.2.22058.

2. Zaretsky Yu. P. “Ego-documents of the Soviet Period: Terms, Historiography, Methodology.” Neprikosnovennyi zapas. Debates on Politics and Culture. 2021. No. 3 (137). Pp. 184–199.

About the author

Dunaeva Yulia Vyacheslavovna
Candidate of Historical Sciences, Senior Research Fellow, Department of History, INION RAS.

© F. M. Dostoevsky Omsk State University