Showcasing the Great Experiment 00_DavidFox_FM.indd Sec1:i 10/24/2011 2:23:37 PM This page intentionally left blank Showcasing the Great Experiment Cultural Diplomacy and Western Visitors to the Soviet Union, 1921–1941 MICHAEL DAVID-FOX 1 00_DavidFox_FM.indd Sec1:iii 10/24/2011 2:23:37 PM 3 Oxford University Press, Inc., publishes works that further Oxford University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education. Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With offi ces in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Th ailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Copyright © 2012 by Oxford University Press, Inc. Published by Oxford University Press, Inc. 198 Madison Avenue, New York, New York 10016 www.oup.com Oxford is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitt ed, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of Oxford University Press. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data David-Fox, Michael, 1965– Showcasing the great experiment : cultural diplomacy and western visitors to Soviet Russia, 1921–1941 / Michael David-Fox. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978–0–19–979457–7 (hardcover: alk. paper) 1. Soviet Union—Relations—Western Countries. 2. Western Countries—Relations—Soviet Union. 3. Intellectuals—Travel—Soviet Union—History. 4. Visitors, Foreign—Soviet Union— History. 5. Propaganda—Soviet Union. 6. Soviet Union—Cultural policy. 7. Soviet Union—Foreign public opinion, American. 8. Soviet Union—Foreign public opinion, European. 9. Soviet Union—History—1917-1936. I. Title. DK268.5.D38 2011 303.48’2470182109041—dc22 2011006702 1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper 00_DavidFox_FM.indd Sec1:iv 10/24/2011 2:23:37 PM For Katja, Jacob, and Nico 00_DavidFox_FM.indd Sec1:v 10/24/2011 2:23:37 PM This page intentionally left blank CONTENTS Preface ix Introduction: “Russia and the West” in a Soviet Key 1 1. Cultural Diplomacy of a New Type 28 2. Going West: Soviet “Cultural” Operations Abroad 61 3. Th e Potemkin Village Dilemma 98 4. Gorky’s Gulag 142 5. Hard-Currency Foreigners and the Campaign Mode 175 6. Stalin and the Fellow-Travelers Revisited 207 7. Going East: Friends and Enemies 247 8. Rise of the Stalinist Superiority Complex 285 Epilogue: Toward the Cultural Cold War 312 Notes 325 Bibliography of Archival Collections 382 Index 385 vii 00_DavidFox_FM.indd Sec1:vii 10/24/2011 2:23:37 PM This page intentionally left blank PREFACE As I made my fi rst visits to the Soviet Union starting in the late 1980s, it was impossible not to become aware of the extraordinary stature foreigners, espe- cially visitors from the West, were accorded by almost everyone from the most humble to the most powerful. My own reception there, particularly as a partic- ipant in certain foreign “delegations” that still bore the imprint of earlier eras, gave me some personal insight, even if only on a small scale, into what foreign travelers experienced when the Soviet experiment was still young: lavish yet formulaic hospitality, evaluations on both sides, and, yet, also intense unof- fi cial exchange meaningful to visitors and hosts alike. Th e most recent turn— from the eff usive post-Soviet opening to the outside world, to a frequently anti-Western, Putin-era reaction against humiliating treatment as inferiors— fi ts with almost perfect logic into the long-term patt erns of the Russian histori- cal process. So did the initial post-Soviet infl ux of Western travelers, experts, and advisors. Th e idea for this book was born as I became increasingly aware of the need to analyze continuities in the long history of European and American interactions with Russia and the USSR that stretched across radical changes of regime. Looking back, I can see how my personal experiences as a frequent visitor and foreign resident in Russia contributed, in their own way, to the original interpretive framework I have developed: to approach the reception of foreign visitors through the prism of expressions of superiority and inferior- ity on both sides. In researching and writing this study, I received an extraordinary amount of support, which allowed me to make eight research trips to former Soviet archives lasting a total of about two years. Early on, a National Council for Eurasian and East European Research (NCEEER) grant gave me two semes- ters for research. American Councils for International Education (ACTR/ ACCELS) provided unparalleled logistical support during several research ix 00_DavidFox_FM.indd Sec1:ix 10/24/2011 2:23:37 PM