Literaturnaya Gazeta

founded January 1830

“in russia, a poet is more than a poet,” Yevgeny Yevtushenko wrote in 1964. Ever since, this phrase has been tossed about whenever poets are discussed in our country. In fact, until recently literature in Russia was surrounded by such an aura of sanctity that, like it or not, all writers — whether they wrote poetry or prose — had a certain reputation to live up to. In truth, no one had to be forced, since everyone, with varying degrees of success, sooner or later stepped beyond the bounds of being “just writers.”

In January 1830, two poets — Alexander Pushkin and his Lyceum classmate Anton Delvig — began to publish the descriptively named newspaper, the Literary Gazette (Literaturnaya Gazeta). The name suggested that it would be a newspaper about literature, and that was certainly the basic idea. Throughout 1830, Pushkin zealously threw himself into journalism. He wrote for the newspaper, helped assemble each issue, and contributed his poetry, excerpts from Eugene Onegin, and a chapter from his novel The Negro of Peter the Great. Literary Gazette was indeed looking rather literary.

The poet, however, was being more than a poet, writing articles on  a broad range of issues. During the first nine weeks of the newspaper’s existence (it came out every five days) there were 20 articles by Pushkin. For the most part, of course, they were devoted to the latest books or to literary polemics, but almost every issue featured discussion not only of literature, but of something else — economics, the state of the Russian nobility, the relationship between Russian and European culture, as well as other topical issues. Thaddeus Bulgarin, one of Pushkin and his friends’ main literary and political foes, became a constant object of ridicule. One day an article was published that, on the surface, appeared to be a review of the renowned French detective Vidocq’s recently published memoirs. But everyone who read it could see that what Pushkin was writing about Vidocq actually applied to Bulgarin, who had worked with the secret police and had published essays that were extravagantly patriotic.

This was the context for Pushkin’s assertion that “the writings of the spy Vidocq, of Sanson the executioner, etc., insult neither the prevailing religion nor the government, nor even morality in the general sense of this word; nevertheless one cannot fail to see them as extremely offensive to public decency.” The great poet’s mockery was so offensive and pointed that Bulgarin appealed to the authorities for assistance. He did not have a particularly hard time persuading them to act, since Literary Gazette made no effort to contain its liberalism. In the end, the censor, outraged by the publication of French poetry about the French Revolution, closed the publication down. The impressionable Delvig was subjected to such a dressing-down by Benckendorf, the chief of the Gendarmes (the branch of imperial law enforcement in charge of state security), that he died a few days later, unable to endure the humiliation. Soon after Delvig’s demise, Literary Gazette followed, done in both by pressure from the authorities and by the conditions of the literary marketplace.

Ten years later a completely different set of people attempted to revive Literary Gazette. This time the publishers focused exclusively on problems of literature and, whether for this reason or perhaps because none of them especially shone with talent, this new Literary Gazette attracted little attention and lasted less than a decade.

Almost a century later, in 1929, the indefatigable Maxim Gorky, still hoping to enlighten and “cultivate” the revolutionary proletariat, decided to put out a newspaper that he also called Literary Gazette, although Pushkin was not much on the minds of its creators as they prepared the first issue.

The newspaper appeared just when the authorities were starting to take culture under firm control and establish “creative unions” — associations of writers, artists, and musicians whose members had to “create” in accordance with the party line. Literary Gazette was a useful tool in this effort, as it diligently told its readers just what the party line was when it came to literature. Decades passed — the Stalin era, Khrushchev’s Thaw — and Literary Gazette continued to come out several times a week and be read by a narrow circle of literary professionals.

Suddenly, in 1967, something amazing happened. Alexander Chakovsky, a Soviet writer, or, more to the point, a member of the literary nomenklatura and a party boss who had written long novels about the achievements of the Soviet people, suddenly changed the paper completely. First, it increased in size to 16 pages — a number unheard of in the Soviet era. The newspaper began to come out once a week rather than three times, but it made up for this by becoming significantly more substantial and varied.

Literaturka, as it was fondly known, assembled a unique journalistic collective. And all of a sudden it became the favorite reading of the Russian intelligentsia. It would be safe to say that this was more or less the sort of newspaper of which Pushkin had dreamt. It combined the liberal views of journalists, who felt they could safely express themselves under the wing of an editor-in-chief whose party credentials were impeccable, with coverage of a broad range of issues: several pages were devoted specifically to literature, while elsewhere there were articles (far more in-depth than people were used to seeing) about economics, scientific advances, sensational criminal trials, and problems of everyday life. At the time, it was like nothing else in Russian journalism.

Wednesday, the day the paper came out, was awaited with eager anticipation. Some articles were discussed for weeks on end. There was a standup comedian at the time who had a routine entitled “Call from the Drunk Tank,” where a husband who still has some sobering up to do places a call to his wife and, slurring his words, asks, “Did they bring Literaturka? So, what’s the latest from Greece?”

I remember how exciting it was to leaf through the 16 oversized pages when I was growing up, usually starting from the back — page 16 was devoted to humor, and even the humor here was unlike anything you saw in other publications. The jokes managed to be both funny and culturally savvy; the cartoons did not target “imperialist politicians” as in Pravda, but human foibles in general, and the parodies were both funny and unsparing. After it returned to the Pushkin model and began covering much more than literature, Literary Gazette became incredibly successful. And even though the official year of its founding was 1929, the portrait of Gorky at the top of the front page was joined by one of Pushkin, who, even if he was not technically the paper’s founder, was certainly its inspiration.

Then came perestroika, which marked the end for Literary Gazette. Chakovsky, who was getting on in years and clearly was not in tune with the spirit of the times, stepped down as editor-in-chief. New publications kept appearing, some of which outdid Literaturka with their liberalism, and others which were better able to navigate the demands of a rapidly changing marketplace. At one point the newspaper ran out of money, at another it became hard to find paper for printing.

Literary Gazette put up a good fight. As soon as it was legally possible, the staff registered the newspaper as an independent, non-governmental publication. The outdated Gorky was removed from the front page while Pushkin stayed behind and was proclaimed on the masthead to be the paper’s founder (the date of founding was correspondingly moved back to 1830). Editors-in-chief came and went, but print runs kept dropping. Meanwhile, other Russian newspapers and magazines were also changing. Some were becoming more highbrow and were aimed at an ever-narrowing circle of readers. Others were moving in the opposite direction and printing stories about the lives of prostitutes or pop-star divorces.

The unique situation that had existed under Brezhnev, when liberalism just barely within the bounds of the permissible was commercially viable, was now a thing of the past. In 2001 the newspaper got yet another new editor-in-chief, Yuri Polyakov, author of some short stories exposing the lives of Komsomol organizers that had caused a sensation during perestroika. By now, however, he had changed quite a bit. The newspaper, which for many years had been considered liberal, turned into a bastion of conservatism that published knee-jerk patriotic articles and condemned Harry Potter for its favorable treatment of black magic.

Once again, Literaturka is only being read by a handful of enthusiasts. Meanwhile, Gorky has been returned to his place on the masthead. And we will just have to wait and see how long Pushkin — known for excessive partiality toward the West and a distinct lack of religiosity — will remain by his side.