The House of governMent The House of governMent a saga of the russian rev olution yuri slezkine princeton university press princeton and Oxford Copyright © 2017 by Yuri Slezkine Requests for permission to reproduce material from this work should be sent to Permissions, Princeton University Press Published by Princeton University Press 41 William Street, Princeton, New Jersey 08540 In the United Kingdom: Princeton University Press 6 Oxford Street, Woodstock, Oxfordshire OX20 1TR press.princeton.edu Jacket illustration by Francesco Bongiorni / Marlena Agency Jacket design by Chris Ferrante Frontispiece: The House of Government. (Courtesy of the House on the Embankment Museum, Moscow.) Unless otherwise noted in the caption, all images are courtesy of the House on the Embankment Museum. All Rights Reserved Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Slezkine, Yuri, 1956- author. Title: The House of Government : a saga of the Russian Revolution / Yuri Slezkine. Description: Princeton : Princeton University Press, 2017. Identifiers: LCCN 2016049071 | ISBN 9780691176949 (hardcover : acid-free paper) Subjects: LCSH: Moscow (Russia)—Politics and government—20th century. | Communists— Russia (Federation)—Moscow—Biography. | Apartment dwellers—Russia (Federation)— Moscow—Biography. | Victims of state-sponsored terrorism—Russia (Federation)— Moscow—Biography. | Moscow (Russia)—Biography. | Apartment houses—Russia (Federation)—Moscow—History—20th century. | Moscow (Russia)—Buildings, structures, etc. | Political purges—Soviet Union—History. | State-sponsored terrorism—Soviet Union— History. | Soviet Union—Politics and government—1936–1953. | BISAC: HISTORY / Europe / Russia & the Former Soviet Union. | HISTORY / Revolutionary. | HISTORY / Social History. | POLITICAL SCIENCE / Political Ideologies / Communism & Socialism. Classification: LCC DK601 .S57 2017 | DDC 947.084/10922—dc23 LC record available at https:// lccn.loc.gov/2016049071 British Library Cataloging- in- Publication Data is available This book has been composed in Kazimir Text and Kremlin II Pro Printed on acid- free paper. ∞ Printed in the United States of America 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 This is a work of history. Any resemblance to fictional characters, dead or alive, is entirely coincidental. Sometimes it seemed to Valène that time had come to a stop, suspended and frozen around an expectation he could not define. The very idea of his projected tableau, whose exposed, fragmented images had begun to haunt every second of his life, furnishing his dreams and ordering his memories; the very idea of this eviscerated building laying bare the cracks of its past and the crumbling of its present; this haphazard piling up of stories grandiose and trivial, frivolous and pathetic, made him think of a grotesque mausoleum erected in memory of companions petrified in terminal poses equally insignificant in their solemnity and banality, as if he had wanted to both prevent and delay these slow or quick deaths that seemed to engulf the entire building, story by story: Monsieur Marcia, Madame Moreau, Madame de Beaumont, Bartlebooth, Rorschash, Mademoiselle Crespi, Madame Albin, Smautf. And him, of course, Valène himself, the house’s oldest inhabitant. GeorGes Perec, Life: A User’s MAnUAL Mephisto: There lies the body; if the soul would fly away, I shall confront it with the blood- signed scroll. Alas, they have so many means today To rob the Devil of a soul. Johann WolfGanG von Goethe, fAUst, trans. Walter Kaufmann Contents Preface xi Acknowledgments xvii book One | en route part I | anticipation 3 1. The Swamp 5 2. The Preachers 23 3. The Faith 73 part II | fulfillMent 119 4. The Real Day 121 5. The Last Battle 158 6. The New City 180 7. The Great Disappointment 220 8. The Party Line 272 book Two | at HoMe part III | The seconD CoMing 315 9. The Eternal House 317 1O. The New Tenants 377 11. The Economic Foundations 408 12. The Virgin Lands 421 13. The Ideological Substance 454 part IV | The reign of the saints 479 14. The New Life 481 15. The Days Off 508 16. The Houses of Rest 535 17. The Next of Kin 552 18. The Center of the World 582 19. The Pettiness of Existence 610 2O. The Thought of Death 623 21. The Happy Childhood 645 22. The New Men 665