Staff Articles
I. Yasha Barth- Memories: Reflections on my time at W&M
II. Sarah Lage- Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s Letter to Madame N.D. Fonvizina: Translation and Analysis
III. Alina Uzak- Fall in Post-Soviet Countries
IV. Carina Shalkivski- Holodomor Remembrance Day
V. Will Walton- Interview: US-Ukraine Veterans Bridge
VI. Logan Weilacher- Russian Dialects in Alaska
Memories: Reflections on my time at W&M
Yasha Barth
“Успевает всюду тот, кто никуда не торопится” -Михаил Булгаков (Собачье сердце)
To say my time at William & Mary was short and uneventful would be an understatement. Brief, perhaps, yet vibrant. When I entered college, COVID-19 was at its peak and the questions I then asked related to how my college experience would change due to the ongoing pandemic. What seemed like an endless voyage across a turbulent sea full of uncertainty and fear quickly transformed into a grand tour of discovery, opportunity, and quaint charm.
Entering college, I knew I wanted to major in International Relations and maintain my cultural ties through Russian studies. The initial nerves of entering a new and demanding environment transformed into a hunger for creativity. Russian Media Culture with Professor Sasha Prokhorov helped me realize the limits of using a language, whether it be one that you grew up with, as in my case, or not; there are no limits. Sitting in a class full of upperclassmen felt intimidating, yet their openness and friendliness to welcome me into their already-established friend groups reflected the close-knit family that is the Russian department. The RPSS program thereafter became my home on campus.
Whether I was expanding my vocabulary and knowledge of Eastern European culture or incorporating my technological experimentalism into coursework for Russian Media Culture or in Professor Bella Feliksovna’s Russian Cultural History, there was never a dull moment where I wasn’t trying something new. More importantly, these captivating courses directed my attention to different parts of the department and what could be achieved there.
In the fall of my Freshman year, I joined the Melodia: Eastern European Instrument & Vocal Ensemble, then known as the Russian Music Ensemble. Surrounding myself with fellow students who had a passion for music, regardless of whether they had previous experience, was fascinating and energizing. The most captivating thing was watching the glittering eyes of excitement never fade from the first moment someone touched an instrument to the final concert. Not only did this become an avenue for musical creativity, but it became a place where some of my most meaningful connections were made. Performing songs that my relatives would sing to me and hearing how friends never envisioned themselves as performers on a big stage before joining the ensemble made me realize how special this group was. Every rehearsal became an unforgettable memory and every musician’s dream became a reality. Everyone with whom I have had the pleasure of sharing the stage will always have a special place reserved in my heart. I wholeheartedly recommend joining the ensemble, even if it is just for a semester, to experience firsthand what it is like to be surrounded by students with a similar passion for Eastern European culture and expressive creativity.
In my second year, I became involved in the student-run RPSS Film Series and newspaper, Gazeta. These opportunities offered new and innovative ways to showcase my interests and collaborate with other students with similar interests. Working closely with Lena and Sasha Prokhorov, and Bella Feliksovna also allowed me to expand my knowledge outside of the classroom and led to many meaningful conversations on film, literature, and life. It amazes me every semester how much stories, written or visual, can say about life and yet be so idiosyncratic.
The most vibrant event of the year, of course, is the Russian Language Olympics. Experiencing the contestant side in 2021 and then the organizing side the following year allowed me to combine everything I have learned into one big show alongside my peers. The most memorable moments always come from seeing how creative every participating team can get given their topic! Best of all are the everlasting memories that stick with everyone in the department. Hearing references to past Olympic skits and debates always brings a smile to my face.
Lastly, I wanted to highlight the Vilnius Study Abroad program. At first, I was hesitant to apply as I had no idea whether it would be affordable, but the Reves Center helped make the trip possible. Be sure to apply to the many scholarships that the Reves Center offers! During the trip, I made some of my closest friends and favorite memories. Learning is never limited to the walls of the classroom, and Professor Galmarini made sure to emphasize that through her many engaging activities.
As I check off the final days of my time here at W&M, I wish to leave you with these final words: Value yourself, get out of your comfort zone, be as experimental and creative as possible, don’t get caught up in your mistakes but learn from them, and most importantly, surround yourself with those who matter the most to you. Cheers.
Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s Letter to Madame N.D. Fonvizina: Translation and Analysis
Sarah Lage
Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s Letter to Madame N.D. Fonvizina: Translation and Analysis
It can– and often has been– argued that Fyodor Dostoyevsky remains the greatest writer of all time. Though often poor and plagued with a gambling addiction, Dostoyevsky composed stories that question and explore the parameters of countless philosophies and the human condition itself, and his work continues to resonate with Russians and non-Russians alike. English actor, broadcaster, and writer Stephen Fry lucidly explained the world’s longstanding adoration of Dostoyevsky’s writing: “Great writers, I discovered, were not to be bowed down before and worshipped, but embraced and befriended. Their names resounded through history not because they had massive brows and thought deep incomprehensible thoughts, but because they opened windows in the mind, they put their arms ‘round you and showed you things you always knew but never dared to believe. Even if their names were terrifyingly foreign and intellectual sounding, Dostoevsky, Baudelaire or Cavafy, they turned out to be charming and wonderful and quite unalarming after all.”
A friend of mine once summed up his thoughts about Dostoyevsky’s Notes from Underground, a short novel that follows a chronically inert and spiteful modern St. Petersburg man, with a single question: “What was [Dostoyevsky] thinking?” This may sound snarky, but it is actually an important question. In many ways, Dostoyevsky’s writings were heavily influenced by his life and experience as a 19th-century St. Petersburg man– things he himself experienced, read in the crime section of the newspaper, or overheard. In the late 1840s, Dostoyevsky joined the Petrashevksy Circle, which was a group of utopian socialists who aligned themselves with Western liberal philosophies rather than traditional Slavic values. Dostoyevsky often features Petrashevksy Circle-esque characters in his books, such as Pyotor Petrovich Luzhin from Crime and Punishment and Pyotor Aleksandrovich Miusov from The Brothers Karamazov.
However, in 1849, the members of the Petrashevsky Circle were arrested, and Dostoyevsky was sent to Siberia for four years and was exiled from St. Petersburg for an additional four years afterward. During his time in Siberia, Dostoyevsky’s philosophy underwent a complete transformation. His mind and heart exited the Petrashevksy Circle and instead shifted to profound religiosity and belief in traditional Russian values. In his novels, loving and religious characters are often juxtaposed with Westernized liberals, and a consistent philosophical “debate” unfolds at the turn of every page.
The following letter offers a unique perspective into Dostoyevsky’s personal philosophy and faith. He sent this note to Nataliya Dmitrievna Fonvizina, the wife of a Decembrist revolutionary who followed her husband into exile. Dostoyevsky met multiple Decembrists while in exile in Siberia and felt great admiration for them. Fonvizina’s willingness to live in exile by her husband’s side also serves as an example of the “active love” that Christian leader Elder Zosima promotes in his novel The Brothers Karamazov. An excerpt of the letter in both Russian and English may be found below.
In Russian:
Я слышал от многих, что Вы очень религиозны, Наталия Дмитриевна. Не потому, что Вы религиозны, но потому, что сам пережил и прочувствовал это, скажу Вам, что в такие минуты жаждешь, как «трава иссохшая», веры, и находишь ее, собственно, потому, что в несчастье яснеет истина. Я скажу Вам про себя, что я — дитя века, дитя неверия и сомнения до сих пор и даже (я знаю это) до гробовой крышки. Каких страшных мучений стоила и стоит мне теперь эта жажда верить, которая тем сильнее в душе моей, чем более во мне доводов противных. И, однако же, Бог посылает мне иногда минуты, в которые я совершенно спокоен; в эти минуты я люблю и нахожу, что другими любим, и в такие-то минуты я сложил в себе символ веры, в котором всё для меня ясно и свято. Этот символ очень прост, вот он: верить, что нет ничего прекраснее, глубже, симпатичнее, разумнее, мужественнее и совершеннее Христа, и не только нет, но с ревнивою любовью говорю себе, что и не может быть. Мало того, если б кто мне доказал, что Христос вне истины, и действительно было бы, что истина вне Христа, то мне лучше хотелось бы оставаться со Христом, нежели с истиной.
In English:
I’ve heard from many people that you are very religious, Nataliya Dmitrievna. Not because you are religious, but because I experienced this myself and felt this, I will tell you that in such moments you thirst like “withered grass” for faith, and you find it, actually, because in misfortune the truth becomes clearer. I’ll tell you about myself, that I– a child of this century, a child of unbelief and doubt until even now (I know it), to the lid of a casket. What horrible torment this thirst to believe has cost me and is now costing me, which is stronger in my soul the more counterarguments I have. And yet, God sometimes sends me moments in which I’m completely calm; in these moments I love and I feel loved by others, and in such minutes I’ve formed a symbol of faith within myself, in which everything is clear and sacred to me. This symbol is very simple, here it is: to believe that there is nothing more beautiful, deeper, sweeter, reasonable, courageous, and perfect than Christ, and not only does such a thing not exist, but I tell myself with jealous love that it is also impossible for such a thing to. Moreover, if someone could prove to me that Christ is outside the truth, and indeed this was so, then I would rather remain with Christ than with the truth.
Sources
Dostoyevsky, Fyodor. 39. Н.Д. Фонвизиной. 20 Feb. 1854, https://rvb.ru/dostoevski/01text/vol15/01text/383.htm.
Perov, Vasily. Vasily Perov - Портрет Ф.М. Достоевского - Google Art Project. Oil on canvas, 1872, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Vasily_Perov_-_%D0%9F%D0%BE%D1%80%D1%82%D1%80%D0%B5%D1%82_%D0%A4.%D0%9C.%D0%94%D0%BE%D1%81%D1%82%D0%BE%D0%B5%D0%B2%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%B3%D0%BE_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg.
Rosengrant, Sandra, and Elena Lifschitz. The Golden Age. John Wiley & Sons, 1996.
The Reading Agency. The Library Book. Profile Books, 2012.
Znamenskiy, M. S. Fonvizina Natal. 1840.
Portraits of Fyodor Dostoyevsky and Natalia Fonvizina
Fall in Post-Soviet Countries
Alina Uzak
Fall is one of the coziest and pleasant times of year regarding where you are in the world. Fall starts on September 1st in the Post-Soviet countries and lasts until November 30th. All of the seasons start on the 1st of the corresponding months as opposed to the 23rd like they do in the US.
Growing up in Kazakhstan, fall was not the longest lasting season in terms of temperatures due to the northern location of the country; however, it was beautiful while it lasted. The leaves would turn yellow, sweaters would come out, and more people started spending time outdoors due to decreasing temperatures of the hot summers. Coffee shops and cafes got filled with people all around town. One of my favorite coffee shops in my hometown is called CoffeeDelia, where I have tasted my favorite cappuccino to date. The coffee shop specializes in cakes and my favorite is always Medovic, which is Russian for honey cake. That cafe is actually where my parents got married, back when it was a restaurant and not a coffee shop.
School was one of the less exciting aspects of the fall season. Beginning of fall meant the beginning of school for all children. Every school held a big parade on September 1st to celebrate the beginning of the new academic year, but a large focus was made on the first-graders, who were entering the school for the first time ever. Pre-K is not a concept in most schools in Post-Soviet countries, so first grade truly is a big deal for six and seven-year-olds there. I remember my first day of school very vividly. All of my extended family came to the parade: my grandmother came directly from the emergency room, where they removed a huge splinter from her forehead that spliced her eyebrow. She was cutting wood for her fireplace and a big chunk ended up flying into her forehead. Even with gauze on her face, she showed up for my first day of school, which can help you gauge the importance of September 1st for children in Post-Soviet countries.
While I do miss Kazakhstan in the fall, I love being able to experience it here in Williamsburg. It is a great town to enjoy the season and the warm weather on walks through all around Colonial Williamsburg.
Holodomor Remembrance Day
Carina Shalkivski
Every fourth Saturday of November is the official Day of Memory for Victims of the Holodomor. The Holodomor is the genocide of the Ukrainian people that consisted of artificial famines deliberately organized by the Soviet forces to stop Ukrainian resistance to the Soviet Regime and eliminate all attempts to build an independent Ukrainian State. Ukraine showed fierce resistance movements with slogans such as “Down with the Soviet regime!” “Long live independent Ukraine” echoing during rallies. Growing fearful of losing Ukraine, Joseph Stalin established a new extreme policy of requisition and started seizing grain from Ukraine through The Law of Five Ears of Grain. Although there were three famines on the territory of Ukraine throughout the 20th century, the most devastating famine occurred from 1932-1933. The USSR tried to hide and censor the famine, denying its existence and even used legal means such as prohibiting doctors from recording the true causes of death. Since it was so difficult to keep records at the time, the exact number of deaths is unknown but it is estimated that anywhere from 4 million to 10 million Ukrainians died due to these famines. Families were robbed of every last grain in their household and deemed as “socialist property” and if they were caught taking even a single stalk of wheat from the field, they were faced with severe punishment such as deportation, arrest, or execution. Farmers, known as the kulaks, were especially targeted for their land ownership and were subject to execution and confiscation of their land and harvest by the Soviet State as they were considered “class enemies”. In order to survive the famines, people tried to eat anything they could find such as tree bark, dirt, and paper, and unfortunately, there were even cases of cannibalism. So many Ukrainians feel generational trauma because of Holodomor, including me and my family. Even though I never lived through the famine, it is still talked about to this day in my family. Food is so significant for us, throwing away food is something that's unthinkable. For generations, the phrase "їж, бо охлянеш" (eat or you will faint from starvation) was passed down all the way to me. My great-grandmother (on my mom's side) survived only because she stole stalks of wheat, hid them in her sleeve, and made bread from it. Obviously, my mom says the phrase in a joking way today to me to make me eat my food, but this saying came all the way back from Holodomor when my great-grandmother had to survive the famine. This November, people light candles in their windows to commemorate the tragedy that was Holodomor. More than 20 countries now formally recognize the Holodomor as a genocide of the Ukrainian people including the US. At the same time, Russia denies Holodomor just as the Soviet authorities did, and continues to try to destroy Ukrainian resistance to Russian influence by waging their full-scale war. It is important to remember and understand history so that it will never repeat again.
Interview: US-Ukraine Veterans Bridge
Will Walton
Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine has provoked a range of responses on the international stage from national governments and private organizations to provide military and economic aid. The US-Ukraine Veterans Bridge is an NGO formed by US military combat veterans to share veterans’ affairs expertise with the Ukrainian government and private organizations to offer aid and support to the expanding Ukrainian veteran population. I had the opportunity to speak with DJ Skelton, a family friend and wounded warrior involved with the organization, about the US-Ukraine Veterans Bridge mission and the group’s recent visit to Ukraine to participate in the International Veterans Forum hosted last August in Kyiv.
What are the main goals of the US-Ukraine Veterans Bridge?
[After the invasion] Ukraine was looking for knowledge from the world that could help them understand and create effective frameworks to help their veterans integrate back into their communities, get the healthcare they need, get jobs, and help with the economic reconstruction post-war. . . The United States was at the top of their list, because we’ve spent two decades producing the largest volume of veterans in the world, with resources dedicated to meeting the needs of that population. Ukraine hopes to apply lessons learned from America to streamline building their veterans’ system as fast as possible from the ground up. The US-Ukraine Veterans Bridge is founded on the principles that no one understands the needs and problems of combat vets better than other combat vets, and secondly as an intellectual bridge that is helping Ukrainian veterans that want to start businesses with American veterans that have done so successfully to share that knowledge.
Do you think your trip was successful in affecting Ukrainian policy toward veterans?
The goal was not to directly influence policy. Any relationship takes a long time to reach the point of building trust—one of the most effective ways to build that trust is to be physically present. A main goal of going to Ukraine was to demonstrate our commitment and advance the relationship to the point of becoming a trusted ally.
The second purpose was to participate in the annual International Veterans Forum, hosted by the Ministry of Veterans Affairs to bring world leaders together to show support in helping Ukraine to build the capacity to take care of their veterans coming off the front line, including physical and mental healthcare, teaching technical skills for reintegration into the workforce and civilian society, and fostering a lifelong veterans’ community. For any country at war, resources need to be dedicated to meet these needs for returning veterans. Failure to do so will result in a disaster, as we have seen in the United States, with unacceptable rates of veteran suicide and homelessness.
For Ukraine, the challenge is unique, since the home front is actively under attack, with a lot of damage to civilian infrastructure, so many veterans don’t have a home or job to return to. The forum is the first time that the Minister publicly laid out a plan of action to coordinate support and foster supporting NGOs to help veterans, like how the American Legion functions in the United States, since the government lacks sufficient resources to meet demands for veterans on its own, with priorities remaining on winning the war. The forum allowed us to understand where Ukraine stands on this issue, both at the state level and outside of government, so we can better understand our own place in the Ukraine veterans affairs ecosystem.
What does the road forward for the US-Ukraine Veterans Bridge look like?
We have formed a nonprofit organization in the US and have set goals and a framework for acquiring the resources required, while in Ukraine, we now have partnerships with established organizations in Ukraine. Our partner organizations have identified the top three problems facing the veteran population. We are building brain trust teams to create action plans to address these immediate problems and will assist a Ukrainian delegation to the US in November to contact American partner organizations such as the Chamber of Commerce to assist on issues relating to healthcare and employment. Going forward, we plan to involve more countries with active veteran communities to build a foundation for aid to Ukraine.
What was your journey to Ukraine like?
Airspace is restricted, so the primary way to get to Ukraine is by car or train through the Polish border. The old Soviet rail network is more difficult to navigate for Westerners, and the whole process of travel from the United States takes over 36 hours.
What stood out the most to you on your trip?
There was a very noticeable difference between Kyiv and Warsaw. Kyiv was a very clean and well-preserved city, thanks, I think, to Ukrainian national pride and a desire to keep society and the economy functioning despite the wartime conditions. At the same time, the whole country is invested in the war effort, with destroyed Russian equipment proudly on display for citizens to see.
DJ Skelton served in the US Army for 21 years in the Infantry and as a Foreign Area Officer. He remains active in the veteran community and works as a businessman and athlete.
Russian Dialects in Alaska
Logan Weilacher
When I was in middle school, I traveled on an Alaska cruise. One of our stops was in the small remote town of Hoonah, which featured an Eastern Orthodox church, which reminded me of Alaska’s Russian heritage. Even though Alaska was only admitted as a state to the U.S. in 1959, its history in relation to the United States began in 1867, when it was purchased from the Russian Empire for $7.2 million dollars. Interestingly, even though the former Russian colony has been disconnected from the mainland for nearly 160 years, traces of the state’s Russian ancestry remain present, albeit in limited ways. One such way the legacy remains is in the surviving Russian dialects of certain Alaskan settlements.
The small town of Ninilchik on Alaska’s Kenai peninsula is perhaps the most famous example of imperial Russia’s linguistic legacy. Some Russian settlers remained in Alaska following the territory’s acquisition by the U.S., and information from the Russian mainland seldom made the journey across the Bering Strait. As a result, the version of Russian spoken in Ninilchik retains archaic features of the language of the Tsarist times in Russia, unaltered by the language reforms that occurred following the Russian Revolution.
However, as time went on and gold was discovered in Alaska, the number of English-speaking American settlers in the area eventually began to dwarf the number of the descendants of Russian settlers, and the prevalence of the dialect has unfortunately continued to dwindle to the present day. The number of remaining speakers has been estimated to be in the single digits as of 2022. The decline has been worsened by the younger generations’ preference of English over the town’s historic tongue. Fortunately, some efforts have been made to preserve the endangered dialect. In the 1990s, Russian linguists from Moscow led an expedition to the town in order to record some of the unique dialect’s features and syntax. A total of six expeditions were conducted between 1997 and 2019, which have culminated in the creation of a Ninilchik Russian dictionary featuring over 2600 entries. An electronic version of the dictionary, in addition to some recordings of the spoken language may be found at: https://www.ninilchikrussian.com/index.html
Citations:
https://www.loc.gov/item/today-in-history/march-30/
https://www.rbth.com/arts/332679-ninilchik-russian-language-alaska