"So funny I was afraid to laugh": the dire fate and final vindication of satire under Communism

"No other kinds of jokes impersonated their targets with the same precision of Communist jokes, or used the logic of the State to discredit its ideology. This was a unique collective satirical project."—from Hammer and Tickle: A Cultural History of Communism. 
Right: Poster from the documentary that inspired the book.

"The kid's got ideas! Just like the Academy of Architecture." Cartoonist Harald Kretschmar mocked East German housing projects in 1967

From the Revolution onward, gallows humor was the order of the day. As in "Who built the White Sea canal [Stalin's horrific slave-labour project]?" "The left bank was built by those who told the jokes, and the right bank by those who listened." Or this one: "How do you deal with mice in the Kremlin?" "Put up a sign saying 'collective farm'. Then half the mice will starve and the others will run away."
Even after Khrushchev's "thaw" of the 1950s, citizens were still imprisoned in droves for ridiculing the Soviet Union's policies and leaders. As Lewis recounts:

One file from 1957 concerns a citizen of Voronoj, who got drunk, went to the main street of the town and started shouting obscenities and 'speculating about the sex life' of Khrushchev and other members of the Politboro. He was immediately arrested and taken to the police station, where, still drunk, he told all present what he thought of the Soviet regime. He was sentenced to two years for anti-Soviet propaganda and drunkenness. Released in early 1959, he was quiet for a year, but then he got drunk again, repeated the same behavior, and was sentenced to four years. He was released in 1964 but did the same thing again, and received another seven years.  

Interestingly, for the remaining period of Khrushchev's rule, only several hundred people a year were imprisoned for criticism of the regime (which was paltry compared to previous levels of incarceration). Some incorrigibles just never could suppress the urge to mock: several prisoners during this time received additional sentences for attaching insulting remarks about Khrushchev to the legs of pigeons they had caught.  
Later, Reagan got into the act and needled Gorbachev with this lampoon: "A man who goes to buy a car in Moscow, pays for it, and is told by the salesman that he can collect it on a particular date in 10 years' time. The buyer thinks for a moment and then asks: 'Morning or afternoon?' The salesman, astonished by the question, asks: 'What difference does it make?' And the buyer answers: 'Well, the plumber is coming in the morning.'"
A reviewer for Britain's Telegraph noted that the best jokes cited in Hammer & Tickle mined "the inherent absurdity of the official Soviet doctrine, rhetoric and propaganda - not just because it was absurd, but because it was official (in a way that no capitalist doctrine could be)":

—'What is the difference between communism and capitalism?' 'Capitalism is the exploitation of man by man; communism is the exact opposite.'
—'Capitalism stands on the brink of the abyss. It will soon be overtaken by communism.'
—'Is it true that Marxism-Leninism is scientific?' 'No, surely not. If it were, they would have tested it on animals first.'
Here, perhaps, we find at long last the jokes that only communism could produce. And while they may not have brought it down, they can still tell us something important about why it fell."

Further reading 
K Blows Top: A Cold War Comic Interlude, Starring Nikita Khrushchev, America's Most Unlikely Tourist;
Bridge of Spies: A True Story of the Cold War;
The Lost Spy: An American in Stalin's Secret Service. 

The Lone Ranger comes to Washington D.C.

"Return with us now to those thrilling days of yesteryear, when from out of the past come the thundering hoofbeats of the great horse Silver! The Lone Ranger rides again!"
The Lone Ranger as played by Clayton Moore was an incomparably mythical, iconic figure to the baby boomer generation. The cadre of them assembled at the Washington Monument for 1958's kickoff of the "Peace Patrol" must have been delirious with excitement when The Lone Ranger in full regalia (dig the skin-tight suit!) came galloping down the aisle on Silver, later punctuating his speech with some spiffy gun tricks.

Made to to inaugurate a U.S. Savings Stamp and Bond program, the feature below is one of the more kicky ones posted by the U.S. Archives on youtube. (Fittingly, Moore was honored in 2009 with a stamp of his own as part of a collection called "Early tv Memories.") Yes, Vice-President Nixon was involved (he told the LR that his two daughters were "eager followers" of the show. Moore, who died in 1999, was still around to see him resign in disgrace.

America's love affair with the Old West as captured on film receives an historical overview in the collection Saddles, Saloons & Six-Shooters; while the four-title set TCM Greatest Classic Films Collection—Western Adventures has my personal favorite, Robert Altman's McCabe & Mrs Miller.

The Lone Ranger character originated in radio and came to film serialdom in 1938. His and Tonto's latest incarnation is coming next month via Johnny Depp and Disney, so stay tuned! (Looks like quite the reboot.)

A cat-centric post

This tale of wonder is told for children; with which view, it has been carefully designed and very nicely printed. For some time past, it has arrived at the dignity of a popular Nursery Tale in the Author’s family ; and it is hoped it will merit the same good fortune elsewhere. It will be worth while explaining, that the circle in each page is made to represent some object in connection with the story ; and, that as some of them have proved rather puzzling, to Juvenile admirers has been left the task of ” finding them out.” - See more at: http://publicdomainreview.org/2013/01/10/the-nine-lives-of-a-cat-1860/#sthash.MbE6gtlc.dpuf

"You have a  problem with that?"

Below are the title page and several images from The Nine Lives of a Cat by Charles Bennett; 1860; Griffith and Farran, London. As he explains in the preface,
This tale of wonder is told for children; with which view, it has been carefully designed and very nicely printed. For some time past, it has arrived at the dignity of a popular Nursery Tale in the Author’s family; and it is hoped it will merit the same good fortune elsewhere. It will be worth while explaining, that the circle in each page is made to represent some object in connection with the story; and, that as some of them have proved rather puzzling, to Juvenile admirers has been left the task of  finding them out.

 This last stratagem reminds me of a Warner Brothers cartoon! I've embedded the book after the jump; or you can flip through the entire thing here. Now a pause for a reading.

Edward Gorey was the perfect illustrator for Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats, don't you think?
We currently have 107 items relating to cats, so they should not feel neglected. To help you find that special cat-related book, box of notecards, or whatnot, this news bulletin from our IT guru re Daedalus Books online's new search box may be of interest:
By popular demand, we have a new search feature. When you use the "Search" box, you'll see other relevant searches, as well as some products that match your search terms. You can click on those, or press the "Go" button to complete your original search. You'll also notice that our search results page has changed a little. Results are now sorted by relevance (although you can still sort by title, price, publisher, or itemcode). You can also filter by media type by selecting the Books, Music, or DVD tab. Please feel free to send us feedback, via email to custserv@daedalusbooks.com.

Finally, Flavorwire's recent list of "10 great books starring cats" references Carroll's Cheshire Cat while also including big cats such as  Life of Pi's tiger and Narnia's Aslan. Grrrrrr!

Free website provides access to digitized papers of Washington, Franklin, Adams, Jefferson, Hamilton, and Madison

Today the University of Virginia Press is launching “Founders Online,” a website offering free access to the papers of six of the most important figures from America’s founding era: George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams (and family), Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton (right), and James Madison. Two of those personages have direct links to the Charlottesville, VA region. Jefferson, of course, is the founder of the University, and both it and his nearby residence, Monticello, are UNESCO world heritage sites. Madison's house is a ways up the road north in historic Orange County. Both the papers of Washington and those of Madison are housed at the University.

Franklin, Washington, Madison, Adams

The Rotunda at UVA, designed by Jefferson

 The site, developed by the press’ electronic imprint, Rotunda, is being launched today at a ceremony at the National Archives in Washington, D.C. Here's how the University's press release describes the project:

For the past 50 years, the National Archives, through the National Historical Publications and Records Commission, has invested in documentary editions of the original historical records of the founding era. These projects, led by dedicated historians and expert editors, draw from archives across the country and around the world. The editors have collected copies of the original 18th- and 19th-century documents, transcribed and annotated them, and produced hundreds of individual print volumes.
In February 2008, inspired by the Capitol Hill testimony of historians, including David McCullough and others, Congress directed the U.S. archivist to expedite public access to these founding documents through online publication. In 2010, it provided funding to the commission to make the project possible.
Founders Online will include thousands of documents, replicating the contents of 242 volumes drawn from the published print editions. As each new print volume is completed, it will be added to the database..... Students and others will be able to view transcribed, unpublished letters as they are being researched and annotated by the documentary project editors and staff. Together, some 175,000 documents are projected to be on the Founders Online site.

This video also gives an overview. Let us know if you turn up anything interesting! If there's one thing we know about Daedalus customers, it's that a goodly percentage of you are history buffs. So here are some of our books relating to the FFs you might want to know about.
We have John Ferling's biography of John Adams from Oxford in both paper and hardback; more than a dozen intriguing books on George Washington—as sage, political genius, symbol, mason and more; The Forgotten Founding Father: Noah Webster's Obsession and the Creation of an American Culture; Twilight at Monticello: The Final Years of Thomas Jefferson; A Brilliant Solution: Inventing the American Constitution; Historic Houses of Virginia: Great Plantation Houses, Mansions, and Country Places; and Infamous Scribblers: The Founding Fathers and the Rowdy Beginnings of American Journalism.

This is a new arrival that looks particularly interesting.

Listening booth 2: Benjamin Britten's Requiem, Earl Wild's rhapsodic piano

This coming Saturday, June 15, Sir Simon Rattle celebrates Benjamin Britten’s 100th anniversary with a performance of the War Requiem. His orchestra is the great Berlin Philharmonic, and they’re joined by the Rundfunkchor Berlin. You can hear it all free in real time or archived by using this link. Gramophone describes the work as follows:

Britten’s War Requiem was commissioned for the consecration of the new cathedral in Coventry and premiered in the cathedral on May 30, 1962. The work is scored for a full orchestra as well as chamber orchestra, chorus, boys’ choir, organ and three soloists which Britten conceived as being Russian (Galina Vishnevskaya), British (Peter Pears) and German (Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau) – the Berlin performance employs a British tenor and a German baritone. When Decca recorded the War Requiem in 1963 under Britten’s baton, it sold over 200,000 copies in its first five months of release. Since then there have been at least a dozen recordings of the work, and during the 2012-13 concert season, it will be heard in over 60 live performances around the world.

Photo by Karsh.

Britten is one of the premier British composers of the 20th century, and a very interesting person to boot. I would like to direct you to several relevant items on our virtual bookshelves: Letters From a Life: Volume Two 1939–45: Selected Letters and Diaries of Benjamin Britten and his anti-war opera Owen Wingrave, based on a short story by Henry James, on DVD.
I have just finished blurbing a boatload of CDs by the late, great pianist Earl Wild. At this very minute I'm listening to a 2-CD Liszt extravaganza, and it's exquisite. I highly recommend poking around amongst the Wild offerings, because he's just fantastic, and there is something for everyone.

I just have to share a little coda on Gramophone's reviewing style, which is more than a little acerbic. Here's one of their number on Tchaikovsky's First Piano Concerto:

Personally, I should call it Tchaikovsky's greatest work. It never conveys an impression of exacerbated nerves, and while it is full of lovely melodies, it never degenerates into sentimentality, or into that odious whining to which the composer became so prone.