Free Being Soviet: Identity, Rumour, and Everyday Life Under Stalin 1939-1953 by Timothy Johnston Page B

1991).
145 A. Werth, Russia At War 1941–45 (London, 1964). This book draws on some of
Werth’s material but uses a far wider body of sources than were available to Werth at the time.
146 B. Bonwetsch, ‘War as a “Breathing Space”: Soviet Intellectuals and the “Great Patiotic War”’, in Thurston and Bonwetsch, The People’s War , 137–53.
147 Hessler, A Social History of Soviet Trade , 271–5; Stites, Culture and Entertain-
ment, 4–5; S. Merritt Miner, Stalin’s Holy War: Religion, Nationalism, and Alliance Politics, 1941–1945 (London, 2003).
148 J. Fu¨rst, ‘The Importance of Being Stylish: Youth, Culture and Identity in Late Stalinism,’ in Fu¨rst, ed., Late Stalinist Russia , 225; Zubkova, Russia After the War , 27–8.
149 T. Dunmore, Soviet Politics, 1945–53 (London, 1984); W. O. McCagg, Stalin Embattled: 1943–48 (Michigan, 1978); W. G. Hahn, Postwar Soviet Politics: The Fall of Zhdanov and the Defeat of Moderation 1946–1953 (London, 1982). For a summary of
recent research see: Fu¨rst, ed., Late Stalinist Russia . Recent monographs include:
Introduction li
dominated by Vera Dunham’s description of a ‘Big Deal’ between the Soviet leadership and the middle classes to shore up support after the war. 150 Dunham’s work reinforced the general conception that this was the era of ‘High Stalinism’ and that reconstruction was simply a matter of reanimating the tired models of the pre-war era. 151 However, Zubkova and others have begun to offer a different interpretation of these years as an era defined by stolen hopes and disappointed expecta- tions. They argue that the populace did not accept the reversion to statism but struggled, with varying degrees of success, to achieve some degree of autonomy and individual freedom. 152 Weiner has provided a different and distinctive viewpoint, arguing that the years 1945–53 were driven by an ‘undiminished impetus for revolutionary transformation’ rather than stultification. 153
Chapters 4 and 5 argue that in the arena of Official Soviet Identity, at least, there was no reversion to the pre-war era. Chapter 4 describes the evolution of Official Soviet Identity in diplomatic terms from war’s end to Stalin’s death. It argues that the Soviet regime continued to posture itself as an ally of the other, progressive Great Powers until the summer of 1947. By the summer of 1948, however, the USSR had realigned itself as a patron of the oppressed peoples and a defender of peace. Asia, and China in particular, assumed a new prominence within Soviet self- understanding in the last years of Stalin’s life. This new form of Soviet identity found its clearest expression in the ‘Struggle for Peace’. I argue
     
     
N. Ganson, The Soviet Famine of 1946–7 in Global and Historical Perspective (Basing- stoke, 2009); M Edele, Soviet Veterans of World War II (Oxford, 2009). See also J. Fu¨rst, Stalin’s Last Generation; Post-war Soviet Youth and the Emergence of Mature Socialism (Oxford, 2010). For some notable dissertations, see Magnusdottir, ‘Keeping up Appear- ances’, J. Smith, ‘The Soviet Farm Complex: Industrial Agriculture in a Socialist Context, 1945–65’, PhD Diss. MIT (2006).
150 Dunham, In Stalin’s Time . See also: J. E. Duskin, Stalinist Reconstruction and the Confirmation of a New Elite, 1945–53 (Basingstoke, 2001).
151 S. Fitzpatrick, ‘Postwar Soviet Society: The “Return to Normalcy” 1945–53’, in
S. J. Linz, ed., The Impact of World War II on the Soviet Union (Totowa, 1985), 129–56;
K. Boterbloem, Life and Death Under Stalin: Kalinin Province 1945–1953 (Montreal, 1999); Brooks, Thank You, Comrade Stalin!
152 E. Zubkova, Poslevoennoe sovetskoe Obshchestvo: Politicka i Povsednevnost’ 1945–53
(Moscow, 2000), 3–14; Russia After the War . See also: D. Filtzer, Soviet Workers and Late-Stalinism: Labour and the Restoration of the Stalinist System After World War II (Cambridge, 2002), 157; A. A. Danilov and A.V.