Metahistorical Scepticism in Aleksei Goldenveizer’s Chronicle of Everyday Life in Kyiv, 1917–1921

Authors

  • Serhy Yekelchyk

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.15826/qr.2018.3.326

Keywords:

Aleksei Goldenveizer; metahistorical skepticism; revolution; Ukraine; Kyiv; memoirs

Abstract

This article analyzes the memoir of a Russian-speaking Jewish lawyer, Aleksei Goldenveiser (1890–1979), as a source on the history of Kyiv during the revolutionary period (1917–1921). His work stands out among other reminiscences about the Revolution in Ukraine because of the author’s unprecedented attention to details of everyday life, along with his self-identification as simply an apolitical resident of Kyiv. Especially striking is the author’s satirical, even acerbic, tone in the description of all the political regimes that came to power in Kyiv during the Revolution: Ukrainian, White, and Bolshevik. This article proposes to conceptualize Goldenveizer’s position as metahistorical skepticism or as a strategy of conscious resistance to grand narratives, which is grounded in identification with the local and a focus on everydayness. It argues the Goldenveizer developed this narrative strategy following the failure, in the summer of 1917, of the political project of a civic, multinational, and urban identity. Although Goldenveizer served on the Executive Committee of United Civic Organizations in Kyiv and, briefly, on the Small Rada of the Ukrainian Central Rada, he felt like an outsider in politics of the day and described it as an astute bystander rather than participant. Because of this position, he was the first to note the reversal of imperial hierarchies and the creation of a new category: “national minorities.” At the same time, Goldenveizer consistently attempted in his memoir to check his own political and cultural biases, as one can see in his ambiguous treatment of the Ukrainian language and the Ukrainian national movement.

Author Biography

Serhy Yekelchyk

PhD, Professor, University of Victoria.

3800, Finnerty Road, V8P 5C2, Victoria BC, Canada.

serhy@uvic.ca

References

Abramson, H. (1999). A Prayer for the Government : Ukrainians and Jews in Revolutionary Times, 1917–1920. Cambridge, MA, Harvard Univ. Press. XVI + 258 p.

Boiko, O. (2009). Vlada і mіsto : Narisi zhittya Kiєva za Direktorії UNR (gruden’ 1918–sіchen’ 1919) [Power and the City. Essays on the Life in Kyiv during the Directorate of the UNR (December 1918 – January 1919)]. In Problemi vivchennya іstorії Ukraїns’koї revolyutsії 1917–1921 rr. Kiїv, Іnstitut іstorії Ukraїni NANU. Iss. 9, pp. 191–202.

Budnitskii, O., Polyan, A. (2013). Russko-evreiskii Berlin (1920–1941) [The Russo-Jewish Berlin (1920–1941)]. Moscow, Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie. 496 p.

Chikalenko, E. (1932). Urivok z moїkh spominіv za 1917 r. [Fragment from my Recollections about 1917]. Prague, Ukraїns’kii akademіchnii komіtet. 56 p.

Chikalenko, E. (2004). Shchodennik v 2 t. [Diary. 2 Vols.]. Kiїv : Tempora, 2004. T. 2. 464 p.

Goldenveizer, A. A. (1922). Iz kievskikh vospominanii (1917–1921 gg.) [From my Recollections about Kyiv (1917–1921)]. In Arkhiv Russkoi revolyutsii / ed. by I. V. Gessen. 22 Vols. Berlin, Slovo. Vol. 6, pp. 161–303.

Goldenveizer, A. A. (1930). Iz kievskikh vospominanii [From my Recollections about Kyiv]. In Alekseev, S. A. Revolyutsiya na Ukraine po memuaram belykh. Moscow, Gosudarstvennoe izdatel’stvo, pp. 1–63.

Grinevich, V. A., Grinevich, L. V. (Eds.). (2001). Slіdcha sprava M. A. Muraviova : Dokumentovana іstorіya [The Investigative File of M. A. Muraviev: A History in Documents]. Kiїv, Іnstitut іstorії Ukraїni NANU. 338 p.

Hagen, M. von. (2013). Pavlo Khrystiuk’s History and the Politics of Ukrainian Anti-Colonialism. 36 p. (Unpublished paper)

Lyotard, J.-F. (1984). The Postmodern Condition : A Report on Knowledge. Minneapolis, Univ. of Minnesota Press. 110 p.

Oberuchev, K. M. (1930). Vospominaniya [Memoirs]. N. Y., Izdanie gruppy pochitatelei pamyati K. M. Oberucheva. 446 p.

Panchenko, V. (2017). Kiїvs’kі «tabunki»1919–1920 rokіv : Rozdіl іz maibutn’oї knigi pro Mikolu Zerova [Kyiv’s Literary Groupings in 1919–1920: A Chapter from the Upcoming Book about Mykola Zerov]. In Kur’єr Krivbasu. No. 326–328. Sіchen’-Lyutii-Berezen’, pp. 151–187.

Pirіg, R. Ya. (2009). Memuari suchasnikіv yak dzherelo z іstorії Ukraїns’koї revolyutsії 1917‒1921 [Memoirs of Contemporaries as a Source on the History of the Ukrainian Revolution of 1917–1921]. In Problemi vichennya іstorії Ukraїns’koї revolyutsії 1917–1921 rr. Kiїv, Іnstitut іstorії Ukraїni NANU. Iss. 4, pp. 31–58.

Skal’s’kii, V. (2016). Revolyutsіya ta povіn’: rіvnobіzhnі protsesi u Kiєvі navesnі 1917 roku In Zhivuchi v modernomu mіstі: Kiїv kіntsya XIX–seredini XX stolіt’ [The Revolution and the Flood: Parallel Processes in Kyiv in the Spring of 1917] / ed. by O. Betlіi, K. Dis, O. Martinyuk. Kiїv, Dukh і lіtera, pp. 197–211.

Sukhanov, N. (1919–1923). Zapiski o revolyutsii v 7 kn. [Notes on the Revolution. 7 Books]. Petrograd, Izdatel’stvo Z. I. Grzhebina. Book 1. 260 p.

Tsereteli, I. S. (1963). Vospominaniya o Fevral’skoi revolyutsii v 2 t. [Reminiscences about the February Revolution. 2 Vols.]. Paris, Mouton. Vol. 1. 493 p.

Velychenko, St. (2011). State Building in Revolutionary Ukraine : A Comparative Study of Governments and Bureaucrats, 1917–1922. Toronto, Univ. of Toronto Press. XIV + 434 p.

White, H. (1975). Metahistory : The Historical Imagination in Nineteenth-Century Europe. Baltimore, Johns Hopkins Univ. Press. XII + 448 p.

Yekelchyk, S. (2011). Bridging the Past and the Future : Ukrainian History Writing since Independence. In Canadian Slavonic Papers. Vol. 53. No. 2–4, pp. 559–573.

Zeide, A. (2005). Bez imperii: teksty i konteksty zhizni russkogo evreya Alekseya Aleksandrovicha Gol’denveizera [Without an Empire. Texts and Contexts from the Life of a Russian Jew A. A. Goldenveizer]. In Ab Imperio. No. 3, pp. 331–346.

Published

2018-09-30

How to Cite

Yekelchyk, S. (2018). Metahistorical Scepticism in Aleksei Goldenveizer’s Chronicle of Everyday Life in Kyiv, 1917–1921. Quaestio Rossica, 6(3), 757–770. https://doi.org/10.15826/qr.2018.3.326

Issue

Section

Problema voluminis