Alexander Rasumovsky
THE SOVIET LITERARY PURGE
The purge of the Soviet Authors' Union, which started in
the middle of August, 1946, is continuing. By now one can say that
it by far surpasses any similar measures taken during the past decade.
The offensive has been launched against a conglomeration of writers
whose only common characteristic is their deviation (in any direc–
tion) from the post-war party line, but they may be divided into six
groups (though we are quite willing to admit that one may even
subdivide them into further categories) :
( 1) Those who were too much influenced by the West: former
"Serapion Brethren." Journalists who visited Central Europe
and whose reports did not treat conditions there with the
required disdain.
( 2) Satire at the expense of bureaucracy and the government:
Zoshenko.
(3) "Pure poetry"; Akhmatova, Pasternak, Ilya Selvinsky.
(4) "Pessimism,"
Weltschmerz:
Knorre.
(5) Demands for more freedom: Panferov, Panch, Grossman.
(6) Nationalism (non-Russian): Ukraine, Tatar Republic, and
one case of Russian nationalism: Sergeyev Zensky.
Let us consider these different groups.
( 1) In the resolution of the Soviet Authors' Union
(Pravda)
22.8.46), we read: "Zoshenko, who worked during the first few years
of Soviet power in the group of 'Serapion Brethren,' a group alien
to the Soviet people and to Soviet literature...."
The "Serapion Brethren" were a group of young writers centered
in Leningrad around 1920, and among them were such outstanding
figures of Soviet literature as Tikhonov, Fedin, Vsevolod Ivanov, Sej–
fulina, Kaverin, Nikitin, etc. Their ideological leader was Leo Luntz,
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