Becoming Soviet: lost cultural alternatives in Ukraine, 1917-1933

This doctoral thesis investigates the complex and multi-faceted process of the cultural sovietisation of Ukraine. The study argues that different political and cultural projects of a Soviet Ukraine were put to the test during the 1920s. These projects were developed and executed by representatives of two ideological factions within the Communist Party of Bolsheviks of Ukraine: one originating in the pre-war Ukrainian socialist and communist movements, and another with a clear centripetal orientation towards Moscow. The representatives of these two ideological horizons endorsed different approaches to defining Soviet culture. The unified Soviet canon in Ukraine was an amalgamation of at least two different Soviet cultural projects: Soviet Ukrainian culture and Soviet culture in the Ukrainian language. These two visions of Soviet culture are examined through a biographical study of two literary protagonists: the Ukrainian poet Pavlo Tychyna (1891-1967) and the writer Mykola Khvyl'ovyi (1893-1933). Overall, three equally important components, contributing to Ukraine’s sovietisation, are discussed: the power struggle among the Ukrainian communist elites; the manipulation of the tastes and expectations of the audience; and the ideological and aesthetic evolution of Ukraine’s writers in view of the first two components. At the same time, the study explores those cultural, and often political, alternatives which Soviet Ukraine had lost once the interaction between local political actors and art creators was constrained by a strictly defined channel, fully determined by a centralist cultural strategy. It also examines the rationale for the Soviet nationalities policy and identifies the determinant role of the Ukrainian communists in implementing and adjusting all-Soviet policies within the republic. Ultimately, this study of cultural sovietisation significantly enhances our understanding of the complex process of establishing and consolidating the Soviet regime in Ukraine.