Sofia Petrova by Lydia Chukovskaya

Show Notes:

This week, Cameron (finally) dives into Lydia Chukovskaya's Sofia Petrovna. A novel about the Great Terror written during the Great Terror, Chukovskaya's eponymous character lives a fairly comfortable Soviet life -- until her son is arrested for an unspecified crime.

Splitting its time between prison lines and a workplace growing rife with denunciations and arrests, Sofia Petrovna memorializes a moment most people would rather forget. It turns a mirror on the people who lived through the Great Terror and asks, too, "Who were you?"

Some works referenced in this episode:

Stalin, Vol. II, Waiting for Hitler, 1928-1941 by Stephen Kotkin

"Did Stalin Kill Kirov and Does It Matter?" by Matt Lenoe: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/343411

On Stalin's Team: The Years of Living Dangerously in Soviet Politics by Sheila Fitzpatrick

Fear and Belief in the USSR's 'Great Terror': Response to Arrest, 1935-1939 by Robert W. Thurston: https://www.jstor.org/stable/2499175

The music used in this episode was “Старое Кино / Staroye Kino,” by Перемотка / Peremotka. You can find more of their work on Bandcamp and Youtube. 

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