Russian and Soviet culture during the First World War

The First World War exacerbated all internal contradictions in the warring states. Revolutions have occurred in a number of countries. Russia turned out to be the weakest link "in the chain of imperialism." First, the February Revolution shocked the state in 1917, as a result of which the autocracy was overthrown, and then, largely due to the complete inaction of the Provisional Government, the October Revolution. The Bolsheviks who came to power declared that the country would henceforth develop along the socialist path. But not everyone in Russia accepted the new world order. The Civil War began (1918-1920) - the armed confrontation of the new, Soviet state and supporters of the old regime. The ideological confrontation has affected millions of citizens of our state. Very painfully these problems were experienced by representatives of the artistic and scientific intelligentsia. Not everyone was able and willing to accept and recognize the Soviet regime. 1917 led to a split in Russian culture, emigration began.

The construction of a socialist state presupposed the formation of a new mentality among Soviet citizens. To solve this crucial task, it was first necessary to turn Russia into a country of universal literacy. The societies “Down with illiteracy!” (ONE) and Likbez arose. Already in 1919, the Council of People’s Commissars adopted a resolution, the main provision of which turned into the slogan: “Competent! Train the illiterate! ” A wide network of educational institutions has been created: reading houses, literacy schools, etc. Teaching was conducted in more than 70 languages. Since the end of the 1920s, the state began to create schools for collective farm youth in the countryside, which enabled students to gain knowledge not only in general subjects, but also in agronomy, veterinary medicine, etc. In cities, besides schools, craft schools and technical schools were opened that trained professional workers. According to the decisions of the CG (1925) and XV (1927) congresses of the CPSU (b), compulsory universal primary education was introduced. Since the 1930s steadily (at first in the cities) compulsory universal seven-year education began to be introduced. The network of universities expanded. Already in the years of the second five-year plan (1933-1937) restrictions on admission to universities related to social origin were lifted. Forbidden early releases, brigade forms of training. In 1937, a unified certification of scientific personnel was introduced, and a system for the defense of candidate and doctoral dissertations was established.

The Soviet government took the most valuable monuments of Russian culture under the protection of the state: museums, art galleries, palaces and estates, parks, theaters, libraries, etc. The export of cultural property was forbidden.

The war with fascist Germany caused great damage to Russian culture. According to official statistics, during the war years, 1710 cities and 70 thousand villages were destroyed, 427 museums and 43 thousand libraries were destroyed and looted, not to mention the loss of life for the USSR, which amounts to 27 million dead. The Nazis plundered and desecrated the house-museums of A.S. Pushkin in Mikhailovsky, L.N. Tolstoy in Yasnaya Polyana, P.I. Tchaikovsky in Klin… The number of masterpieces and monuments of architecture suffered from bombing and shelling. Many of them were lost forever.

In the postwar years, the Soviet people found the strength to accomplish a labor feat. He not only was able to restore the national economy in the shortest possible time (by 1948), but he also took all appropriate measures to build and resume work of centers of culture and education. Since 1949, the transition to universal seven-year education began to take place, since this process was interrupted by the war. Since the beginning of the 60s. the transition to compulsory universal secondary education of youth begins. In the 1950s there were more students in the USSR than in all Western European countries combined. The number of engineers alone during this period increased by 7 times compared with the pre-war period. Of course, the enormous achievements of the Soviet government were the real implementation of the system of compulsory universal secondary education and the general accessibility of higher education, with free tuition at any level of school, including graduate school and doctoral studies.

The development of science in the USSR was so impressive that it allowed for a civilizational breakthrough and to bring the Soviet state to the forefront. Soviet authority was recognized and continued to work in Soviet Russia K.A. Timiryazev, K.E. Tsiolkovsky, N.E. Zhukovsky and many other scientists. A major contribution to genetics and selection was made by N.I. Vavilov (1887-1943). He was the founder of the modern doctrine of the biological foundations of breeding and the doctrine of the centers of origin of cultivated plants. I.V. Michurin was engaged in biology and selection. He bred more than 300 varieties of fruit crops. I.V. Kurchatov (1902 - 1960) - an outstanding Soviet physicist was the organizer and leader of work on atomic science and technology in the USSR. Under his leadership, the first cyclotron in our country was created, and then the first nuclear reactor in Europe, the first atomic bomb in the USSR and the first thermonuclear bomb in the world, the first nuclear power plant (NPP). V.I. Vernadsky (1863 - 1945), an encyclopedic scientist, wrote works on the philosophy of natural science and developed the idea of the noosphere. The scientist believed that there is a space around the Earth, which is one of the characteristics of the biosphere. The noosphere is the sphere of the mind, or the spiritual shell of the Earth. Noosphere - the exchange of substances and energy of society with nature can be controlled and regulated in nature, acting as a reasonably coordinated transformation of nature with the data of science. The doctrine of the noosphere also laid the foundations of environmental science. I.M.Gubkin made a significant contribution to the development of geology and petrochemistry, having developed the foundations of the theory of the origin of oil, the conditions for the formation of its deposits. The founder of the Soviet scientific school of physical optics was S. I. Vavilov. The Institute of Physical Problems was led by P.L. Kapitsa. N.D. Zelinsky and A.E. Favorsky created scientific schools and conducted basic research in chemistry.

For many years wooden windows serve as an indispensable part of the interior of an apartment, house or any other room, while maintaining warmth and comfort. Modern technologies make it possible to produce windows in such a way that their functions expand from isolation of the external environment to the functions of decor and decoration.

The theoretical works of A.E. Favorsky became the basis for the creation of the most important industries, including synthetic rubber. N.N. Burdenko, A.N. Bakulev, A.V. Vishnevsky developed new methods of treatment, in particular neurosurgery, and created new drugs. Talented historians have come forward, such as B.D. Grekov, I.A. Orbeli, E.V. Tarle, A.M. Pankratova and others. Fundamental discoveries of N.N. Semenov, P.A. Cherenkov, I.E..Tamma, L.D. Landau, I.M. Frank, N.G. Basova, A.M. Prokhorova were awarded the Nobel Prizes. It is not possible to list all the achievements of Soviet scientists.

In parallel with world-class achievements, the opening of hundreds of research institutes (NII), negative trends were also observed. The emphasis on Russian national traditions quickly took ugly forms in the postwar years. A campaign was launched against "cringing before the West." Initially, its main object was the creative intelligentsia: in the literature - humorist M. M. Zoshchenko and poetess A. A. Akhmatov, in cinematography - directors S. M. Eisenstein, V. I. Pudovkin, A. P. Dovzhenko, in music - D.D.Shostakovich, V.I. Muradeli, S.S. Prokofiev, A.I. Khachaturian. The campaign began with the adoption of the Decree of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks “On the magazines Zvezda and Leningrad” (1946), which was followed by a series of similar documents in various fields of art, up to the decree “On the opera by V. Muradeli Great Friendship” in 1948.

To establish “discipline” among the scientists, “courts of honor” were created, which were designed to condemn those who maintained scientific relations with Western colleagues. A session of the Academy of Agricultural Sciences in August 1948 struck a blow at Soviet geneticists, accusing them of borrowing the "anti-scientific" methods of the "bourgeois scientists" T.X. Morgan and G.I. Mendel. In contrast, the charlatan T.D. Lysenko was raised to the shield. The anniversary session of the USSR Academy of Sciences, convened in connection with the 225th anniversary of the Academy in 1949, was entirely devoted to the "evidence" of the historical priority of Russian scientists over Western scientists in various fields of science and technology.