Etty - Graphic Satire in the Soviet Union

GRAPHIC SATIRE IN THE

SOVIET UNION

GRAPHIC SATIRE IN THE SOVIET UNION

Krokodils Political Cartoons

John Etty

University Press of Mississippi / Jackson

Publication of this book was made possible, in part, by a grant from the First Book Subvention Program of the Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies.

The University Press of Mississippi is the scholarly publishing agency of the Mississippi Institutions of Higher Learning: Alcorn State University, Delta State University, Jackson State University, Mississippi State University, Mississippi University for Women, Mississippi Valley State University, University of Mississippi, and University of Southern Mississippi.

www.upress.state.ms.us

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Copyright 2019 by University Press of Mississippi

All rights reserved

Manufactured in the United States of America

First printing 2019

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Etty, John, 1979 author.

Title: Graphic satire in the Soviet Union : Krokodils political cartoons / John Etty.

Description: Jackson : University Press of Mississippi, [2019] | Includes bibliographical references and index. |

Identifiers: LCCN 2018025167 (print) | LCCN 2018029399 (ebook) | ISBN 9781496820532 (epub single) | ISBN 9781496820549 (epub institutional) | ISBN 9781496820556 (pdf single) | ISBN 9781496820563 (pdf institutional) | ISBN 9781496820525 (hardcover : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781496821089 (pbk. : alk. paper)

Subjects: LCSH: Krokodil. | Political satire, Russian20th centuryHistory and criticism. | Soviet UnionPolitics and governmentCaricatures and cartoons. | Russian wit and humor, Pictorial.

Classification: LCC NC1578.K7 (ebook) | LCC NC1578.K7 E88 2019 (print) | DDC 741.5/6947dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018025167

British Library Cataloging-in-Publication Data available

CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Many people supported me in the writing of this book. The greatest debt is to Vlad Strukov, whose inspirational advice and encouragement saw me through years of research and writing. Paul Cookes assistance was precise and reassuring, and his feedback on numerous drafts shaped the way I saw my work. Sarah Hudspith and Mike OMahoney also provided generous encouragement. My panel colleagues at the ASEEES Convention in Boston in 2013, Annie Grin and Stephen M. Norris, both provided motivation without realizing. Our discussant, Helena Goscilo, was as entertaining and encouraging as she was insightfully critical in her commentary, and she has continued to provide guidance ever since. Thanks also to Jonathan Waterlow, Simon Huxtable, Maria Popova, Tim OConnor, Barbara McGowan, Svetlana Loukine, and Nellie and Doug Paul. Dima Frangulov granted me access to the database of digitized copies of Krokodil, which allowed me to broaden the scope of my analysis.

Thanks also go to my parents and my sister, whose examples I continue to follow, for their help and encouragement. Most of all, Kim has been a constant and patient supporter: her belief made me brave enough. Finally, this book is for Ivy and Sam: may it somehow enrich your lives, as it has done mine.

GRAPHIC SATIRE IN THE

SOVIET UNION

I.1. Kukryniksy. Through rose-colored spectacles (Skvoz rozovye ochki). Krokodil 1953: 7/16.

INTRODUCTION

The back page of Krokodil no. 7, 1953 (the first issue published after Josef Stalins death), features a cartoon warning against naivete, trustfulness, and overeagerness to forget the past (see ). Coming after six pages of tributes to Stalin, this image visualizes a bureaucrat welcoming a visitor into his office. As readers, we enjoy a privileged gaze; we appreciate the effect of a giant pair of rose-colored spectacles, while retaining our unimpeded vision of the scene. The figure approaching the desk appears either friendly or sinister, depending on which view we opt to take. As was typical of the magazines style, especially under the editorship of Dmitrii Beliaev (19481953), a degree of naturalism in the rose-tinted view is contrasted with a more grotesque image, to provide instruction on how to interpret the cartoon.

For regular readers of Krokodil, this image would have seemed familiar. Binary compositions, juxtaposing representatives of opposing ideologies, frequently feature in Stalin-era poster and cartoon art. Opposing pairs of ideasus/them, good/evil, communism/capitalism, now/then, here/there, either/or contrastswere staples in the visual language of Stalinism (Bird, Heuer, Jackson, Mosaka and Smith 2011: 25). This visitor, who wears swastika spectacles and carries a briefcase embossed with US, is constructed in graphic terms that echo the discourses of cosmopolitanism in the postwar Stalin years, as well as those invoking Soviet patriotism in the 1930s, and the Nazification of the US that occurred in postwar Soviet graphic satire. His hunched shoulders, stooping gait, pallid skin, and unsmiling countenance contrast dramatically with the benevolent figures seen through the rose-tinted lenses. Ostensibly, echoing Stalinist rhetoric, this cartoon employs the glasses as a visual metaphor for ideological illusions or lack of vigilance: looking through rose-tinted spectacles blinds us to potential dangers. The glasses form the figurative and compositional center of the image, apparently dividing the image of the old man in two. The cartoon thus functions as a lesson in seeing and the power of ideology to act as a barrier to true recognition.

Like many cartoons published in Krokodil, this image, didactic and monologic though it seems, warrants more careful consideration. Rather than a binary visioncontrasting obstructed and unobstructed viewsthis cartoon presents three different versions of the old man. As if constructing a critique of Stalinisms binarism, and preceding the pluralism that distinguished the post-Stalin era, this cartoon multiplies the visions of its object. Moreover, in doing so it draws attention to its own act of doubling. The two lenses offer different views of the visitors spectacles, smile, head angle, and clothing folds. We expect spectacles to correct or improve our vision, but these pink lenses distort. The cartoon thus creates and disrupts our understanding of this binary view: bi-ocularism multiplies and complicates.

The Kukryniksy collective, producers of this cartoon, frequently jointly created images, but the discrepancies are not the results of poor technique. The Chinese cartoonist Jack Chen, who knew many Soviet cartoonists, noted that the trios caricature of him was perfect though they drew me from three separate corners of the room [and it was] impossible to say where ones line ended and anothers began (Chen 1944: 38).1 Skepticism about the veracity of appearances and the importance of mastery of ones own vision are recommended by this image. Here, Krokodil presents seeing as a habit to be learnedMichel Foucault calls such practices technologies of the self (1988: 18)and, furthermore, one through which individuals may perform their own psychological shifts. Krokodil cartoons suggest that satirical vision might be considered one such technology or technique for altering the self. As this book argues, Krokodil repeatedly performed seeing for its readers benefit. Its satire taught a kind of X-ray vision, and was a thinking tool for rationalizing divergences between rhetoric and visual experience. While cautioning against naivete, this cartoon also interrogates the power of images, offering alternative visions.