Thread by @akoz33

Time for another giant thread 😏 @moutet

Nowadays before sleeping I listen to Edward Radzinsky’s YouTube talks. I can’t even begin to describe how interesting and well delivered they are. Radzinsky talks about some of the most tragic and bloody events of history yet often

he seems to have difficulty retrain laughter , especially when he is talking about intellectuals, which he usually is. It just reminds you that human naivety and folly, especially that of intellectuals, no bounds.

When he in one of his talks he mentioned that Stalin had Trotsky’s son executed, he apologised to the viewers: “I am sorry for telling you such obvious things”. Sometimes his voice acquires pathos, he recites great poetry.

Sometimes he quotes the Russian proverbs, such as: “Glas naroda Khrista razpyal” (“The voice of the people crucified Christ”).

Radzinsky is a famous historian, author of a huge number of history books, which read like the best novels and of historical novels, which could be history books. His book on Stalin was based on Soviet secret documents not seen by anyone before him, he authored book on Napoleon

and Nicholas II, Rasputin and Mozart. Many have been translated into English.

But Radzinsky is more than a historian, he is also a celebrated playwright.

His plays are usually based on major celebrated historical figures and events, and have been performed in many countries and translated into many languages.

The ones that he seems to most value himself are his plays about Socrates, about Nero and Seneca and about the Russian Decembrist Mikhail Lunin. In one of his videos he talks about the famous performance of his play about Socrates

(“Besedy s Sokratom” - “Conversations with Socrates”) which was performed in the Mayakovsky Theater in , after being held back for 6 years by censorship.

Radzinsky says he sent his play to the Mayakovsky Theater. Before that he sent a number of plays to Anatoly Efros (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatoly_E… ) but they were always either taken down or Efros had lots of troubles (he left USSR in 1984).

Feeling sorry for him Radzinsky sent it to the Mayakovsky theatre, where everyone became very excited about it. The chief stage director if the theatre Andrei Goncharov was in a hurry: he wanted the great Armen Dzigarkhanyan

who recently joined the theatre, to play Socrates, although at this time he was too young for this role. But since, there is always make up, they already put large posters in front of the theatre. Everyone was celebrating but they forgot that they were in the USSR.

What happened than was that it took 6 years for the censorship to decide to whether to pass the play. For 6 years Dzigarkhanyan rehearsed the role so that he knew it so well he could recite his lines if he was waken up suddenly at night. And then the unbelievable happened:

Radzinsky was called to to Moscow Government office.

He was met by the Chief himself (who had one earlier instucted his staff never to allow Radzinsky into his presence). He was standing there holding the manuscript in his hands. He told Radzinsky that his play had been accepted and that it was Comrade Suslov himself

(the chief Soviet ideologist and at that time the second person in the USSR, after Brezhnev) who made the decision. But there were changes to be made, he said. They were marked in colored pencils. Everything in red had to be removed - that was marked by Sulsov.

But there were also other parts marked in blue - by the Moscow chief himself. It was not not obligatory to remove that, but it was recommended. If it was not done there could be unpleasantness.

So the very excited theatre began to prepare for the play. Everybody in Moscow wanted to see it; naturally the mor etrouble something had with censorship the more people wanted to see it (as is now being discovered in America). So there was enormous demand for tickets.

One day on the way to the theatre Radzinsky met the writer Anatoly Gladilin (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatoly_G… ). Gladilin was already intending to leave the Soviet fatherland as all his works (with one important exception) were meeting the same fate as Radzinsky’s “Socrates”.

They started talking and Radzinsky mentioned that his play was now approved. He said that it was said it was held back because of Solzhenitsyn, because it was generally assumed that Socrates really represented Solzhenitsyn, but after Solzhenitsyn’s expulsion from Russia

everyone was saying that Socrates is Sakharov. But somehow thay permitted it. Then Gladilin had an idea: “You are entitled to some tickets. Why don’t you invite Sakharov? I can deliver the tickets to him.”

Radzinsky thought it a great idea. It was exactly the person because of whom they had not allowed the play to be performed that was now going to attend the premiere. So Radzinsky quickly went to the theatre and demanded his tickets.

He went to the very Mount Olympus, that it to Goncharov’s secretary, who said “there are only two tickets for you”. Radzinsky said “I need a lot more” and she answered, “you cant have them because haven’t got any - the Central Committee has taken all”.

He took the two tickets - in the third row. (in fact, the secretary by mistake, gave him the tickets Goncharov wanted for himself). So Radzinsky went back and gave the two tickets, in the middle of the third row, to Gladilin to pass to Sakharov.

"I understood, Radzinsky says, it was not simply giving a couple of tickets, it was going to be “Socrates on stage and and Socrates in the audience, and not only will he be in the audience but it was the peak of the anti-Sakharov campaign -

at this point the whole country was condemning him as an agent of all the imperialists. The whole country was demanding that something should be done about this Sakharov.

Writers and scientists were writing collective letters (how much they would give now to have their signatures removed from them. But they were there.)

The premiere was in two or three days after that. Radzinsky checked with Gladilin, who confirmed that Sakharov would come.

Radzinsky was hesitating whether to inform Goncharov and the rest of the theatre that this play, that was not allowed for 6 years will now be attended by the most denounced figure in the country, Academician Sakharov.

He says, ”I was wondering whether to tell the director, that is kill him, or not? I am a humane person, I didn’t want to kill him.” So he said nothing. There was a colossal queue in front of the theatre. (Today this is would not be possible for any such highbrow play.

This such were the premiers of plays that had been forbidden in those days).

Radzinsky went to the theatre, and met the director.
The director said, I don’t know what to do, they are all here. “Who” says Radzinsky. “In the third row there is going to be Minister of the Interior Shchelokov, the Chief Prosector Rudenko, the Head of Television Lapin,

and the Minister of Finance Garbuzov. The whole third row is full of dignitaries. What have you done with your tickets?” Radzinsky said “I gave them to my doctor”, in order not to kill the director, and quickly left.

Radzinsky realised that he would witness a fantastic spectacle: he would see Socrates passing through a narrow passage over the feet of the oppressors of Socrates”.

In order to see this clearly and not to miss anything, Radzinsky took a seat in the director's lodge, which at the corner of the building above all the stage and the audience, and from where everything can be seen.

It was exceptionally hot, although it was May. There was air conditioning, but it was Soviet one, that is, worked partly. So nobody was wearing jackets, although in those days people took theatre seriously and many wore ties.

In the middle of the third row there were two empty seats.
Sakharov was still not there. Already the third ring rang, soon they will turn off the lights. And Radzinsky say a tall man whom he easily recognised, although they had never met.

He wore trouser braces. Trouser braces had long gone out of fashion, they were now symbols of those who had not kept up with the modern age.

The tall with trouser braces was holdidng his jacket on his arm. He was alone, so the second ticket was not going to be used. This tall man started moving towards the center of the third row, passing over the feet of the already seated dignitaries.

And then what to you think happened? What was the reaction when they saw the man whom they were supposed to oppress? The one they would soon exile to Gorky? The main dissident in the country?

“Well, I expected everything but not that. I don’t think k he expected it.” They stood up, some jumped up, I particularly remember Sholokov who got up and clapped and called “Hello, Anderi Dmitrevich!” and they stretched out their arms towards him.

You see, they were with their families. They wanted to show that they were independent. They wanted to show they could do anything they liked. And he shook their hands, and passed between them and then Radzinsky thought: “wait a second, there is nothing so special about it.

It is not a prisoner or dissident who they are cheering. It is a great Academician, Twice Hero of Socialist Labour, Father of the Hydrogen Bomb, Academician Sakharov.

Dzigarkhanyan’s famus performance is mentioned in the Wikipedia article en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armen_Dzh…
Here is a photo:

Interior Minister Shchelokov, close friend of Brezhnev was a rival and enemy of Andropov, with whom he was involved in a bitter power struggle. After Brezhnev’s death he was accused of corruption, dismissed from the party and committed suicide.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikolai_S…