How St. Petersburg Learned to Study Itself: The Russian Idea of Kraevedenie (Studies of the Harriman Institute)

321 Pages·2006·5.98 MB·English

by  Emily D. Johnson

how
st. petersburg
learned to
study itself
The Russian Idea of Kraevedenie
emily d. johnson
how
st. petersburg
learned to
study itself
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studies of the harriman institute:
selected titles in russian literature and history
the pennsylvania state university press
university park, pennsylvania
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how
st. petersburg
learned to
study itself
The Russian
Idea of
Kraevedenie
emily d. johnson
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Disclaimer:
Some images in the original version of this book are not
available for inclusion in the eBook.
Studies of the Harriman Institute, Columbia University
The Harriman Institute, Columbia University, sponsors the Studies of the Harriman
Institute in the belief that their publication contributes to scholarly research and
public understanding. In this way, the Institute, while not necessarily endorsing their
conclusions, is pleased to make available the results of some of the research conducted
under its auspices.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Johnson, Emily D., 1966–
How St. Petersburg learned to study itself : the Russian idea
of kraevedenie / Emily D. Johnson.
p. cm. — (Studies of the Harriman Institute)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn 0-271-02872-6 (cloth : alk. paper)
1. Saint Petersburg (Russia)—History—Study and teaching—History.
2. Saint Petersburg (Russia)—Historiography—History.
3. Local history—Study and teaching—Russia (Federation)—Saint Petersburg.
4. Saint Petersburg (Russia)—Civilization.
I. Title.
II. Title: How Saint Petersburg learned to study itself.
III. Series.
DK561.J647 2006
947’.210072047—dc22
2005037526
Copyright © 2006 The Pennsylvania State University
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
Published by The Pennsylvania State University Press,
University Park, PA 16802-1003
The Pennsylvania State University Press is a member of the Association of American
University Presses.
It is the policy of The Pennsylvania State University Press to use acid-free paper.
This book is printed on Natures Natural, containing 50% post-consumer waste, and
meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information
Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Material, ansi z39.48–1992.
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contents
List of Illustrations vii
Preface and Acknowledgments ix
A Note on Transliteration and Translations xiv
List of Abbreviations xv
Introduction
Ways of Knowing: Russian Local Studies as an
Identity Discipline 1

1 The Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century
Tradition 17
2 The Art Journals of the Silver Age, St. Petersburg
Preservationism, and the Guidebook 45
3 Old Petersburg After the Revolution 73
4 The Excursion Movement and Excursion
Methodology 97
5 Excursion Primers and Literary Tours 125
6 Kraevedenie in St. Petersburg 155
7 Literary Kraevedenie 183
Conclusion 215
Notes 229
Selected Bibliography 273
Index 288
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illustrations
1. Map of St. Petersburg, from Karl Baedeker, Russia with Teheran, Port Arthur,
and Peking: Handbook for Travelers (Leipzig: Karl Baedeker, 1914) viii
2. A view of St. Isaac’s bridge and the area of St. Petersburg from the Admiralty
to Senate Square. Engraving from a drawing by Paterssen (1794), from
M. Pyliaev, Staryi Petersburg: Rasskazy iz byloi zhizni stolitsy, 2nd ed. (St.
Petersburg: Izdanie A. S. Suvorina, 1889) 42
3. A procession featuring elephants given to the Russian tsar by the Persian
shah. Engraving from a watercolor by Vorobiev, from M. Pyliaev, Staryi
Peterburg: Rasskazy iz byloi zhizni stolitsy, 2nd ed. (St. Petersburg: Izdanie A.
S. Suvorina, 1889) 44
4. The opening of Étienne-Maurice Falconet’s monument to Peter I, The
Bronze Horseman, in 1782. Engraving by Melnikov, made from a drawing by
Davidov, from M. Pyliaev, Staryi Peterburg: Rasskazy iz byloi zhizni stolitsy,
2nd ed. (St. Petersburg: Izdanie A. S. Suvorina, 1889) 48
5. Evgeny Lanceray, frontispiece for World of Art, no. 1 (1902), a special issue
commemorating St. Petersburg’s bicentennial 55
6. Anna Ostroumova-Lebedeva, view of the river Fontanka, from Petersburg:
Avtolitografii A. P. Ostroumovoi (St. Petersburg: Komitet populiarizatsii
khudozhestvennykh izdanii, 1922) 195
7. Erikh Gollerbakh, frontispiece to Erikh Gollerbakh, Gorod muz, 2nd ed.
(Leningrad, 1930) 205
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fig. 1 Map of St. Petersburg from Karl Baedeker’s 1914 guide to Russia.
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preface and acknowledgments
In the early 1990s, I spent several years working for the Academy of Sciences
in St. Petersburg, Russia, as a translator and interpreter. I arrived in country
a month after the August 1991 abortive coup, witnessed the collapse of the
Soviet Union firsthand, and had the disconcerting experience of living amidst
hyperinflation. For a while, as I recall, food prices doubled every week. As they
rose, the shelves of official grocery stores, which at one point had contained
little except powdered cake mix and canned seaweed, slowly filled again.
Paper money, in the volatile new economy, suddenly emerged as the chief
deficit good. As prices shot up, the banks ran out of currency. Organizations,
even if they theoretically had funds in their accounts, often could not meet their
payroll. Salary delays of six months to a year were not uncommon, particularly
in the public sector. Given the rate at which the ruble was losing its value, by
the time Russian employees received the money they were owed, it was often
almost worthless.
In this economic climate, everyone began to look for extra sources
of income. Russian scholars with international reputations, curators and
restoration experts from major museums, well-known poets, the editors of
important literary journals, and local political figures all agreed with alacrity to
speak to groups of foreign undergraduates in exchange for very modest sums
of hard currency. For a while, I spent much of my time providing consecutive
interpreting for prestige lectures and guided tours: multi-week courses on pre-
Revolutionary history, the development of Russian architecture, or post-Soviet
political culture; back-corridor visits to architectural monuments that for one
reason or another remained closed to the public; tours of the Petersburg of
Brodsky and Mandelstam led by prominent literary historians.
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