The SCRSS organises a regular programme of lectures,
film shows, exhibitions, seminars and other events at its premises
in London. The Society is also involved in educational and commemorative
events associated with the Soviet War Memorial in London. Events
are open to both SCRSS members and non-members, unless otherwise
stated.
Venue and Tickets
Currently, due to the pandemic, all lecture and seminar events
are online Zoom meetings bookable via Eventbrite. One-day-per-week
library openings on Tuesdays for members re-started in September
2021 - until December 2021 initially. We hope to resume other
in-person events at the SCRSS once
it becomes safe to do so.
For our standard online Zoom lectures, we kindly ask you to make
a small donation to the SCRSS via Eventbrite when booking, as
we receive no external funding. Once in-person events resume in
our centre, as previously lecture and film tickets will cost £3.00
(SCRSS members) and £5.00 (non-members). All other events
or classes, Zoom or in person, are priced as indicated.
2021 Events Diary
January 2021
Current session until 28 January 2021, 18.00 - 20.00
Zoom Online Evening Class: Russian Language for Good Intermediate
Level
Rolling 10-week Zoom evening class, taught by Christine Barnard,
former lecturer in Russian at Westminster University. Fee for
10 weeks: £40.00 (SCRSS members only). For more information,
email the SCRSS.
Back to top
February 2021
From 4 February 2021 for 10 weeks (until 15 April 2021),
18.00 - 20.00
Zoom Online Evening Class: Russian Language for Good Intermediate
Level
Rolling 10-week Zoom evening class, taught by Christine Barnard,
former lecturer in Russian at Westminster University. Fee for
10 weeks: £40.00 (SCRSS members only). For more information,
email the SCRSS.
Tuesday 23 February 2021, 19.00
Zoom Online Lecture: Professor Jeremy Hicks on The Victory
Banner Over the Reichstag - Film, Document and Ritual in Russia's
Contested Memory of World War Two
Professor Jeremy Hicks discusses his book The Victory Banner
over the Reichstag: Film, Document and Ritual in Russia's Contested
Memory of World War Two. The red Soviet flag raised by the
Red Army over Berlin's Reichstag building on the evening of 30
April 1945 has become a key symbol of the Soviet and, more recently,
Russian defeat of Nazi Germany in World War Two. Known as 'The
Victory Banner', it has been celebrated in photography, documentary
and feature film, in memoirs and video games, but is also a physical
artefact. The actual flag is revered in a museum, but an exact
copy of it is paraded on Red Square in Moscow's annual 9 May Victory
Parade, and facsimiles are now used in local parades, demonstrations
and reconstructions in Russia and beyond, to symbolise Russia's
memory of World War Two, conceived as 'Victory', as glorious and
ritualised. Professor Hicks' book examines why and how this symbol
was created, the changing media of its expression, and the evolution
of its message, from association with the Stalin cult and Communism,
through attempts to de-stalinise it, to its acquisition of Russian
nationalist meaning.
The Zoom talk takes place on the Defender of the Fatherland Day,
a Russian national holiday. The day is also marked in several
other parts of the former USSR and commemorates the founding of
the Red Army. It is, along with 9 May, one of the official occasions
when The Victory Banner is publicly displayed in Russia.
Booking: The lecture will be held using the Zoom
online conferencing tool. Please book in advance via Eventbrite
- and consider making a donation to the SCRSS to support our work.
To view the event online, you'll also need to have set up a free
account with Eventbrite, using the same email address you use
to book the event. If you don't have an Eventbrite account yet,
you can set it up before or after booking this event. Once booked,
you'll receive a confirmation email from Eventbrite about the
events, and reminders with the link at two days, two hours and
ten minutes before the event starts.
Jeremy Hicks is Professor of Russian Culture and Film at Queen
Mary University of London where he teaches courses on Russian
film history and literature. He is the author of three books and
many articles on Russian and Soviet history, film, literature
and journalism. Prior to The Victory Banner over the Reichstag:
Film, Document and Ritual in Russia's Contested Memory of World
War Two, his publications include Dziga Vertov: Defining
Documentary Film (London and New York, 2007) and First
Films of the Holocaust: Soviet Cinema and the Genocide of the
Jews, 1938-46 (Pittsburgh, 2012). The latter book won the
2013 US Slavists' (ASEEES) Wayne Vucinich Prize "for the
most important contribution to Russian, Eurasian, and East European
studies in any discipline of the humanities or social sciences".
Professor Hicks has also been consultant on a number of TV documentary
films and the restoration of a film about the Holocaust. In addition,
he has translated the Russian satirical writer Mikhail Zoshchenko
(The Galosh: Selected Short Stories, London: Angel Books,
2000; New York: Overlook Press, 2006, 2009). He is a member of
ASEEES, the British Association for Slavonic and European Studies,
the Modern Humanities Research Association (UK), and a Trustee
of the SCRSS.
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March 2021
Tuesday 23 March 2021, 19.00
Zoom Online Lecture: Andrew Jameson on What's in a Name? More
Than You Think!
Russian language specialist Andrew Jameson continues his lecture
series, this time looking at the special status of names in language
and, especially, in Russian.
A name (in the sense of a unique identifier of a person of thing)
has a special status in language. People become very agitated
if you spell their name wrong. Wrong names can lead to all sorts
of conflicts and accidents. 'Calling people names' is a curious
phrase, meaning 'to insult'. Russian names are a constant problem
in translation. They are a little piece of Russian culture that
protrudes into a foreign language, is obliged to keep its original
(sound) form, and is non-negotiable. Domesticate or foreignise?
How to explain the resonance of a name in the original culture?
Names take us right back into history and Andrew will look into:
Slav pagan names; Viking / Russian names; why there are three
'Sofia' cathedrals; names and patronymics; months and seasons;
Mongols and fog; the emergence of surnames; Russian surnames and
those of other nationalities; Turkic names; town and street names
in the Mediaeval, Imperial and Soviet periods, and their uses
in politics.
Booking: The lecture will be held using the
Zoom online conferencing tool. Please book in advance via Eventbrite
- and consider making a donation to the SCRSS to support our work.
To view the event online, you'll also need to have set up a free
account with Eventbrite, using the same email address you use
to book the event. If you don't have an Eventbrite account yet,
you can set it up before or after booking this event. Once booked,
you'll receive a confirmation email from Eventbrite about the
events, and reminders with the link at two days, two hours and
ten minutes before the event starts.
Andrew Jameson came top of course in Russian language and radio
technology at the Joint Service Language School, and served in
signals intelligence at Flugplatz Gatow in Berlin. After Oxford,
he formed part of a group at Essex University that produced ground-breaking
BBC Russian courses, and simultaneously worked as a sound recordist
in Russia for the Nuffield-funded Russian Language Project, collecting
samples of different styles of Russian, and setting up a sound
archive of Russian recordings. While in Russia, he also met Russian
linguists and a number of well-known dissidents, and recorded
Russian bards and readings by prominent writers (Solzhenitsyn,
Akhmatova, Ginzburg and others) at a Russian literary salon. At
Portsmouth Polytechnic, he helped design a new degree in Russian.
Later at Lancaster University, together with colleague Mike Kirkwood,
he created a well-designed beginners intensive language course
to degree level, and developed interests in translation theory,
Russian lexicology and substandard Russian (slang). He also taught
regularly on adult language courses, weekends and summer schools.
On taking early retirement, he continued to run Russian course
for adults, also worked as a professional translator, and lectured
on English linguistics and English studies regularly in universities
in St Petersburg, Moscow and Khabarovsk / Birobidzhan.
Back to top
April 2020
Saturday 10 April 2021, 09.15 - 15.00
Zoom Online Event: SCRSS Advanced Russian Seminar (Day 1)
Our Advanced Russian Seminar returns, presented online via Zoom,
and aimed at teachers, translators and interpreters of Russian.
Focusing on aspects of contemporary Russian language, the seminar
is led by Dr Svetlana Bukreeva, Associate Professor, live from
St Petersburg. Each of the two days is bookable separately. Fee
per day: £20.00 (SCRSS members), £25.00 (non-members).
For full details, including lecture programmes, lecturer biography,
how to book, etc, visit our dedicated Russian
Seminar page. The seminar is organised by the SCRSS in
partnership with the St Petersburg Association for International
Co-operation.
Saturday 17 April 2021, 09.15 - 15.00
Zoom Online Event: SCRSS Advanced Russian Seminar (Day 2)
Our Advanced Russian Seminar returns, presented online via Zoom,
and aimed at teachers, translators and interpreters of Russian.
Focusing on aspects of contemporary Russian language, the seminar
is led by Dr Svetlana Bukreeva, Associate Professor, live from
St Petersburg. Each of the two days is bookable separately. Fee
per day: £20.00 (SCRSS members), £25.00 (non-members).
For full details, including lecture programmes, lecturer biography,
how to book, etc, visit our dedicated Russian
Seminar page. The seminar is organised by the SCRSS in
partnership with the St Petersburg Association for International
Co-operation.
Tuesday 27 April 2021, 19.00
Zoom Online Lecture: Andrew Jameson on The Riddle of the Two
Slavonic Alphabets
Russian language specialist Andrew Jameson continues his lecture
series.This time the subject is the Russian alphabet - or rather
alphabets.
Of course there is only one Russian alphabet, called Cyrillic?
Wrong! There were two, one of which was a perfect rendition of
a Slav language (although it wasn't Russian), and one which is
a mishmash only codified in the last century. Who was Cyril? He
wasn't called Cyril, he was called Constantine. Which alphabet
did he invent? The first one. Which alphabet did Russian end up
with? The second one. So why is it called Cyrillic? And how did
the monk Khrabr let the cat out of the bag?
Booking: The lecture will be held using the
Zoom online conferencing tool. Please book in advance via Eventbrite
- and consider making a donation to the SCRSS to support our work.
To view the event online, you'll also need to have set up a free
account with Eventbrite, using the same email address you use
to book the event. If you don't have an Eventbrite account yet,
you can set it up before or after booking this event. Once booked,
you'll receive a confirmation email from Eventbrite about the
events, and reminders with the link at two days, two hours and
ten minutes before the event starts.
Andrew Jameson came top of course in Russian language and radio
technology at the Joint Service Language School, and served in
signals intelligence at Flugplatz Gatow in Berlin. After Oxford,
he formed part of a group at Essex University that produced ground-breaking
BBC Russian courses, and simultaneously worked as a sound recordist
in Russia for the Nuffield-funded Russian Language Project, collecting
samples of different styles of Russian, and setting up a sound
archive of Russian recordings. While in Russia, he also met Russian
linguists and a number of well-known dissidents, and recorded
Russian bards and readings by prominent writers (Solzhenitsyn,
Akhmatova, Ginzburg and others) at a Russian literary salon. At
Portsmouth Polytechnic, he helped design a new degree in Russian.
Later at Lancaster University, together with colleague Mike Kirkwood,
he created a well-designed beginners intensive language course
to degree level, and developed interests in translation theory,
Russian lexicology and substandard Russian (slang). He also taught
regularly on adult language courses, weekends and summer schools.
On taking early retirement, he continued to run Russian course
for adults, also worked as a professional translator, and lectured
on English linguistics and English studies regularly in universities
in St Petersburg, Moscow and Khabarovsk / Birobidzhan.
From Thursday 29 April 2021 for
10 weeks, 18.00 - 20.00
Zoom Online Evening Class: Russian Language for Good Intermediate
Level
Rolling 10-week Zoom evening class, taught by Christine Barnard,
former lecturer in Russian at Westminster University. One hour
conversation, one hour reading. Fee for 10 weeks: £40.00
(SCRSS members only). For more information, email the SCRSS.
Back to top
May 2021
Saturday 15 May 2021, 11.00
Zoom Online Event: SCRSS Annual General Meeting
Open to SCRSS members only. Further information to follow
by email to members.
Tuesday 25 May 2021, 19.00
Zoom Online Lecture: Jack Robertson on The Hammer and the
Anvil: Dispatches from the Frontline of the Russian Civil War,
1918-1919
Jack Robertson discusses his new translation of the reports of
Bolshevik journalist and soldier Larissa Reisner, written during
the Russian Civil War. Larissa Reisner sent regular dispatches
from the frontline of the epic struggles that took place towards
the end of 1918 in Russia, when the fate of Revolution was hanging
by a thread. An embryonic Red Army was confronted on all sides
by a reactionary White coalition, which was backed enthusiastically
by the Western Powers. Her reports, written at the age of 23,
were first published in the bulletin of the Petrograd Soviet,
Izvestia. Some of these articles were later published
as The Front, in Volume One of her two-volume Collected
Works.
The articles included in the book focus on the events that took
place over a 9-month period in and around Kazan, the strategic
naval base on the River Volga taken over by the Whites. Trotsky
later described the Bolshevik retreat from Kazan as representing
the very low-point of the Revolution. Larissa Reisner was an eye-witness
to these events, including the subsequent last-gasp counter-offensive
that took place next to the rail junction at Sviyazhsk. These
first-hand accounts are written in a unique style, combining immediacy
with poetic flourishes.
The Hammer and the Anvil is published by Redwords, March
2021 (available from Bookmarks Bookshop, £10.00).
Booking: The lecture will be held using the
Zoom online conferencing tool. Please book in advance via Eventbrite
- and consider making a donation to the SCRSS to support our work.
To view the event online, you'll also need to have set up a free
account with Eventbrite, using the same email address you use
to book the event. If you don't have an Eventbrite account yet,
you can set it up before or after booking this event. Once booked,
you'll receive a confirmation email from Eventbrite about the
events, and reminders with the link at two days, two hours and
ten minutes before the event starts.
Jack Robertson spent his working life as a journalist. Since
retiring, he has written The Man Who Shook His Fist at the
Tsar, the story of Alexander Pushkin's epic poem The
Bronze Horseman (published by Redwords in 2019), and The
Hammer and The Anvil.
Back to top
June 2021
Tuesday 8 June 2021, 19.00
Zoom Online Lecture: Andrew Jameson on Russian Slang: Or the
Sociolinguistics of the Secret Languages of Russia
Russian language specialist Andrew Jameson continues his exploration
of the history and special characteristics of the Russian language
with a look at Russian slang.
People often think of slang as something ephemeral, spoken by
the underprivileged or used to spice up language. But language
is an untameable beast and there is always a reason for something
to exist. Andrew Jameson will look into the particular Russian
social conditions that allowed secret languages to evolve, their
history, and the lives of the people who used them, with plenty
of actual examples. Andrew Jameson has made a special study of
this subject and collected materials on it over many years.
Booking: The lecture will be held using the
Zoom online conferencing tool. Please book in advance via Eventbrite
- and consider making a donation to the SCRSS to support our work.
To view the event online, you'll also need to have set up a free
account with Eventbrite, using the same email address you use
to book the event. If you don't have an Eventbrite account yet,
you can set it up before or after booking this event. Once booked,
you'll receive a confirmation email from Eventbrite about the
events, and reminders with the link at two days, two hours and
ten minutes before the event starts.
Andrew Jameson came top of course in Russian language and radio
technology at the Joint Service Language School, and served in
signals intelligence at Flugplatz Gatow in Berlin. After Oxford,
he formed part of a group at Essex University that produced ground-breaking
BBC Russian courses, and simultaneously worked as a sound recordist
in Russia for the Nuffield-funded Russian Language Project, collecting
samples of different styles of Russian, and setting up a sound
archive of Russian recordings. While in Russia, he also met Russian
linguists and a number of well-known dissidents, and recorded
Russian bards and readings by prominent writers (Solzhenitsyn,
Akhmatova, Ginzburg and others) at a Russian literary salon. At
Portsmouth Polytechnic, he helped design a new degree in Russian.
Later at Lancaster University, together with colleague Mike Kirkwood,
he created a well-designed beginners intensive language course
to degree level, and developed interests in translation theory,
Russian lexicology and substandard Russian (slang). He also taught
regularly on adult language courses, weekends and summer schools.
On taking early retirement, he continued to run Russian course
for adults, also worked as a professional translator, and lectured
on English linguistics and English studies regularly in universities
in St Petersburg, Moscow and Khabarovsk / Birobidzhan.
Tuesday 22 June 2021, 19.00
Zoom Online Panel: Historical Memory and the Fight against Fascism,
Part III
Joint SCRSS - Marx Memorial Library (MML) event, marking the
80th anniversary of the Nazi invasion of the USSR in 1941. This
is the third of three online panels organised jointly by the SCRSS
and MML on the battle for historical memory. It addresses ongoing
attempts across Europe to rewrite the history of the 1930s-40s
anti-fascist alliance and present-day initiatives to combat them.
Chaired by Jonathan White, it brings together representatives
from Russia, Spain and Italy. These include:
- Dr Vladimir Vasilik, Associate Professor, Institute of History,
St Petersburg State University, Russia. Dr Vasilik has written
five books about the Great Patriotic War, and for many years
collaborated with Michael Frolov, a WWII veteran and founder
of the School for the History of the Leningrad Blockade.
- Dr Almudena Cros, President, Asociacion de Amigos de las Brigadas
Internacionales (Association of Friends of the International
Brigades), Spain.
Booking: The lecture will be held using the
Zoom online conferencing tool. Please book in advance via Eventbrite
- and consider making a donation.
Details of the two previous panels in this series:
- 22 June 2020: The first panel explored the role of the
Soviet Union and communism in the fight against Fascism in the
1930s and its defeat in the Second World War. Seventy-five years
since the Allied victory over Nazi Germany in 1945, the speakers
reflected on how and why this history was now under attack,
with particular reference to the resolution passed by the European
Parliament in September 2019: 'On the Importance of European
Remembrance for the Future of Europe'.
- 19 November 2020: The second panel featured speakers from
organisations involved in practical work to preserve historical
memory: the SCRSS, MML, International Brigade Memorial Trust
and Soviet War Memorial Trust.
Wednesday 30 June 2021, 19.00
Zoom Online Lecture: Colin Turbett on The Anglo-Soviet Alliance
- Comrades and Allies During WW2
Colin Turbett discusses his new book of the same name. June 2021
marks the 80th anniversary of the Soviet Union's entry into World
War II, following the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union. This
opportunity was seized upon eagerly by Churchill to forge an alliance
that would ultimately lead to the defeat of Fascism four years
later. Churchill had been a leading world adversary of the project
to build communism in the Soviet Union, and had tried to reduce
its influence in the UK. However, he was among the first to realise
that without unity against a common peril, the war in the West
might well go down to defeat as Britain stood almost alone in
1941. By this time, the small British Communist Party was well
established and the wartime alliance saw a rise in its membership
and influence, and the involvement of many of its members in the
armed forces. The alliance itself caught the popular imagination
and saw some tremendous solidarity efforts - on the Home Front,
as well as through the heroism of those who took part in operations
such as the Arctic Convoys. Everyone in Britain was aware that
the war's most crucial theatre, right through to its final conclusive
battles, was on the Eastern Front. As Allied victory neared, won
on the backs of huge sacrifice by the Soviet people, Western leaders,
prominent among them Churchill, quickly reverted to pre-war hatred
of communist ideals. Imagined Soviet aggression prompted a Cold
War for the next 45 years.
The Anglo-Soviet Alliance - Comrades and Allies During WWII
(Pen & Sword Books, March 2021) offers a history of the wartime
alliance and its expression: at government and military co-operation
level, and between two peoples who realised the interests they
held in common. The book also provides the background and some
analysis of the fortunes of communism in Britain in the period
described.
Booking: The lecture will be held using the
Zoom online conferencing tool. Please book in advance via Eventbrite
- and consider making a donation to the SCRSS to support our work.
To view the event online, you'll also need to have set up a free
account with Eventbrite, using the same email address you use
to book the event. If you don't have an Eventbrite account yet,
you can set it up before or after booking this event. Once booked,
you'll receive a confirmation email from Eventbrite about the
events, and reminders with the link at two days, two hours and
ten minutes before the event starts.
Colin Turbett was a career social worker and trade union activist
in the West of Scotland. Since retirement he has focused on various
writing projects, including several on the Soviet Union. He is
the author of The Anglo-Soviet Alliance: Comrades and Allies
During WW2 (Pen & Sword Books, 2021), Red Star at
War: Victory at All Costs (Pen & Sword Books, 2020),
and Motorcycles and Motorcycling in the USSR from 1939: A
Social and Technical History (Veloce 2019).
Back to top
July 2021
From Thursday 15 July 2021 for
10 weeks, 18.00 - 20.00
Zoom Online Evening Class: Russian Language for Good Intermediate
Level
Rolling 10-week Zoom evening class, taught by Christine Barnard,
former lecturer in Russian at Westminster University. One hour
conversation practice, one hour reading - current book is 'Stepnoe
solntse' by Petr Pavlenko. Fee for 10 weeks: £40.00 (SCRSS
members only). Currently availability for two new students
to join the class. For more information, email Christine
Barnard direct on rtstrans1@gmail.com.
Back to top
August 2021
Summer recess
Back to top
September 2021
Tuesday 14 September 2021, 11.00
- 16.00
Event: SCRSS Library Opening
SCRSS members only. Access the library collections and
borrow books from the Literature and Quick Loan sections. To help
the SCRSS manage numbers, we kindly suggest members email the
Society in advance if they plan to attend. On the day, members
may telephone the Society with any queries. Contact
the SCRSS.
Wednesday 15 September 2021, 19.00
Zoom Online Lecture: Caroline Walton on Those Who Survived the Siege of Leningrad
Talk (in English) to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the
start of the Siege of Leningrad.
The 900-day Siege of Leningrad during the Second World War was
not just a tragic event that happened long ago. It is relevant
to us all, now and in the future, for it invites us to ask ourselves:
how do we behave in extreme circumstances? During the Covid pandemic
we have seen a polarisation of behaviour. Some people seem intent
on asserting their spurious freedoms without consideration for
those around them. Others give their lives in the service of their
fellow human beings. During the Siege of Leningrad the polarisation
was extreme - from cannibalism (relatively rare) to acts of transcendent
heroism (very common). The mortality rate was 50 percent. Half
the city of 3 million died. What is astonishing is that so many
survived when they did not have enough food to sustain human life.
In 1999 Caroline Walton visited St Petersburg to research the
Siege of Leningrad. This consisted primarily of face-to-face interviews
with survivors, supplemented by material from books, letters and
diaries. The result was her book The Besieged: A Story of
Survival, published in the UK in 2011 by Biteback. In September
2021 a revised and translated version of this book will be published
in St Petersburg by Asterion, under the title Te, kto vyzhil
900 dney blokady. The book is launched on 8 September 2021,
the 80th anniversary of the start of the Siege of Leningrad.
In this talk Caroline Walton explores how the citizens of Leningrad
survived, and what made them particularly well-equipped to do
so.
Booking: The lecture will be held using the
Zoom online conferencing tool. Please book in advance via Eventbrite -
and consider making a donation to the SCRSS to support our work.
To view the event online, you'll also need to have set up a free
account with Eventbrite, using the same email address you use
to book the event. If you don't have an Eventbrite account yet,
you can set it up before or after booking this event. Once booked,
you'll receive a confirmation email from Eventbrite about the
events, and reminders with the link at two days, two hours and
ten minutes before the event starts.
SCRSS member Caroline Walton is an author of books on Russia
and the former Soviet Union. She is also a Russian to English
literary translator and editor: www.sirinbooks.com.
She lives in London with her husband, whose grandmother was one
of those who survived the Siege of Leningrad.
Tuesday 21 September 2021, 11.00
- 16.00
Event: SCRSS Library Opening
SCRSS members only. Access the library collections and
borrow books from the Literature and Quick Loan sections. To help
the SCRSS manage numbers, we kindly suggest members email the
Society in advance if they plan to attend. On the day, members
may telephone the Society with any queries. Contact
the SCRSS.
Tuesday 21 September 2021, 19.00
Zoom Online Lecture: Andrew Jameson on Russian Comes of Age
Russian language specialist Andrew Jameson continues his lecture
series with the third part of his introductory history of the
Russian language.
Historians refer to our Elizabethan age as the Early Modern period.
After Russia opened up to the West, it needed to catch up with
150 years of progress, much of which involved language. The Church
language needed to be integrated with the State language. The
languages of Politics, Philosophy and Science needed to be created.
Literature and Theatre, as we know them, were unknown. While the
countryside preserved old Russian culture, urban culture became
more and more separate and influenced by the West. The aristocracy
and the court gave up Russian and spoke French. But the Slavophiles
began to create the native Russian culture we know today.
Booking: The lecture will be held using the Zoom
online conferencing tool. Please book in advance via Eventbrite
- and consider making a donation to the SCRSS to support our work.
To view the event online, you'll also need to have set up a free
account with Eventbrite, using the same email address you use
to book the event. If you don't have an Eventbrite account yet,
you can set it up before or after booking this event. Once booked,
you'll receive a confirmation email from Eventbrite about the
events, and reminders with the link at two days, two hours and
ten minutes before the event starts.
Andrew Jameson came top of course in Russian language and radio
technology at the Joint Service Language School, and served in
signals intelligence at Flugplatz Gatow in Berlin. After Oxford,
he formed part of a group at Essex University that produced ground-breaking
BBC Russian courses, and simultaneously worked as a sound recordist
in Russia for the Nuffield-funded Russian Language Project, collecting
samples of different styles of Russian, and setting up a sound
archive of Russian recordings. While in Russia, he also met Russian
linguists and a number of well-known dissidents, and recorded
Russian bards and readings by prominent writers (Solzhenitsyn,
Akhmatova, Ginzburg and others) at a Russian literary salon. At
Portsmouth Polytechnic, he helped design a new degree in Russian.
Later at Lancaster University, together with colleague Mike Kirkwood,
he created a well-designed beginners intensive language course
to degree level, and developed interests in translation theory,
Russian lexicology and substandard Russian (slang). He also taught
regularly on adult language courses, weekends and summer schools.
On taking early retirement, he continued to run Russian course
for adults, also worked as a professional translator, and lectured
on English linguistics and English studies regularly in universities
in St Petersburg, Moscow and Khabarovsk / Birobidzhan.
Tuesday 28 September
2021, 11.00 - 16.00
Event: SCRSS Library Opening
SCRSS members only. Access the library collections and
borrow books from the Literature and Quick Loan sections. To help
the SCRSS manage numbers, we kindly suggest members email the
Society in advance if they plan to attend. On the day, members
may telephone the Society with any queries. Contact
the SCRSS.
Tuesday 28 September 2021, 19.00
Zoom Online Lecture: Cathy McAteer on Translating Great Russian
Literature: The Penguin Russian Classics
Dr Cathy McAteer will present her new, freely downloadable book
Translating Great Russian Literature. It draws on her
doctoral research of the Penguin archive to reveal key publishing
and translation practices behind Penguin's relaunch of the Russian
Classics during the mid-20th century. She will explore the ways
in which Penguin's founder Allen Lane, the series editor EV Rieu,
copy editor ASB Glover, and a new cohort of commissioned translators
(Gilbert Gardiner, Elisaveta Fen, David Magarshack, and Rosemary
Edmonds) brought classic Russian authors - Tolstoy, Dostoevsky,
Pushkin, Goncharov, Turgenev, Lermontov and more - to a self-improving,
inquisitive, post-war British reader, and subsequently paved the
way for Soviet literature in translation.
Booking: The lecture will be held using the
Zoom online conferencing tool. Please book in advance via Eventbrite -
and consider making a donation to the SCRSS to support our work.
To view the event online, you'll also need to have set up a free
account with Eventbrite, using the same email address you use
to book the event. If you don't have an Eventbrite account yet,
you can set it up before or after booking this event. Once booked,
you'll receive a confirmation email from Eventbrite about the
events, and reminders with the link at two days, two hours and
ten minutes before the event starts.
Dr Cathy McAteer is Postdoctoral Fellow on the 'Dark Side of
Translation' project (rustrans.exeter.ac.uk)
at the University of Exeter. Her main research interests lie in
the field of classic Russian literature in English translation
during the 20th century, using archival material to shed light
on the people and processes behind historical commissions, specifically
Penguin's Russian Classics. Her academic monograph, Translating
Great Russian Literature: The Penguin Russian Classics, was
published by Routledge as Open Access in 2021. Dr McAteer is currently
researching the private, archived papers of 20th-century female
translators of Russian literature as the basis for her next publication.
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October 2021
Tuesday 5 October 2021, 11.00 -
16.00
Event: SCRSS Library Opening
SCRSS members only. Access the library collections and
borrow books from the Literature and Quick Loan sections. To help
the SCRSS manage numbers, we kindly suggest members email the
Society in advance if they plan to attend. On the day, members
may telephone the Society with any queries. Contact
the SCRSS.
Tuesday 12 October 2021, 11.00
- 16.00
Event: SCRSS Library Opening
SCRSS members only. Access the library collections and
borrow books from the Literature and Quick Loan sections. To help
the SCRSS manage numbers, we kindly suggest members email the
Society in advance if they plan to attend. On the day, members
may telephone the Society with any queries. Contact
the SCRSS.
Tuesday 19 October 2021, 11.00
- 16.00
Event: SCRSS Library Opening
SCRSS members only. Access the library collections and
borrow books from the Literature and Quick Loan sections. To help
the SCRSS manage numbers, we kindly suggest members email the
Society in advance if they plan to attend. On the day, members
may telephone the Society with any queries. Contact
the SCRSS.
Tuesday 26 October 2021, 11.00
- 16.00
Event: SCRSS Library Opening
SCRSS members only. Access the library collections and
borrow books from the Literature and Quick Loan sections. To help
the SCRSS manage numbers, we kindly suggest members email the
Society in advance if they plan to attend. On the day, members
may telephone the Society with any queries. Contact
the SCRSS.
From Thursday 28 October 2021 for
10 weeks, 18.00 - 20.00
Zoom Online Evening Class: Russian Language for Good Intermediate
Level
Rolling 10-week Zoom evening class, taught by Christine Barnard,
former lecturer in Russian at Westminster University. One hour
conversation practice, one hour reading - current book is 'Stepnoe
solntse' by Petr Pavlenko (available online or via the tutor). Fee for 10 weeks: £40.00 (SCRSS
members only). Current availability for one new student
to join the class. For more information, email Christine
Barnard direct on rtstrans1@gmail.com.
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November 2021
Tuesday 2 November 2021, 11.00 - 16.00
Event: SCRSS Library Opening
SCRSS members only. Access the library collections and
borrow books from the Literature and Quick Loan sections. To help
the SCRSS manage numbers, we kindly suggest members email the
Society in advance if they plan to attend. On the day, members
may telephone the Society with any queries. Contact
the SCRSS.
Saturday 6 November 2021, 09.00 - 14.30
Zoom Online Event: SCRSS Advanced Russian Language Seminar - Contemporary
Russian Literature
Dr Svetlana Bukreeva, Associate Professor at the Leningrad Regional
Institute of Education Development, returns to give a one-day
seminar in Russian on contemporary Russian prose, poetry, and
literature for children and young adults. Dr Bukreeva lectured
on our 2-day Russian seminar in April 2021, and will appear live
from St Petersburg. The seminar is open to everyone with an advanced
comprehension of spoken Russian and an interest in Russian language
and culture. Fee: £20.00 (SCRSS members), £25.00 (standard
rate). Full seminar programme (timetable,
lecture titles and outlines, booking details). Booking now
open on Eventbrite. The seminar is organised by the SCRSS
in partnership with the St Petersburg Association for International
Co-operation.
Tuesday 9 November 2021, 11.00 - 16.00
Event: SCRSS Library Opening
SCRSS members only. Access the library collections and
borrow books from the Literature and Quick Loan sections. To help
the SCRSS manage numbers, we kindly suggest members email the
Society in advance if they plan to attend. On the day, members
may telephone the Society with any queries. Contact
the SCRSS.
Tuesday 16 November 2021, 11.00 - 16.00
Event: SCRSS Library Opening
SCRSS members only. Access the library collections and
borrow books from the Literature and Quick Loan sections. To help
the SCRSS manage numbers, we kindly suggest members email the
Society in advance if they plan to attend. On the day, members
may telephone the Society with any queries. Contact
the SCRSS.
Tuesday 23 November 2021, 11.00 - 16.00
Event: SCRSS Library Opening
SCRSS members only. Access the library collections and
borrow books from the Literature and Quick Loan sections. To help
the SCRSS manage numbers, we kindly suggest members email the
Society in advance if they plan to attend. On the day, members
may telephone the Society with any queries. Contact
the SCRSS.
Tuesday 30 November 2021, 11.00 - 16.00
Event: SCRSS Library Opening
SCRSS members only. Access the library collections and
borrow books from the Literature and Quick Loan sections. To help
the SCRSS manage numbers, we kindly suggest members email the
Society in advance if they plan to attend. On the day, members
may telephone the Society with any queries. Contact
the SCRSS.
Tuesday 30 November 2021, 19:00
Zoom Online Lecture: Dr Daniel Elphick on Formalistic
Freaks in Music: Socialist Realism, Shostakovich and Ilya Golovin
The spectre of Socialist Realism in Soviet music is something
frequently mentioned but rarely discussed. Theodor Adorno described
the aesthetic as 'music on a leash', though the actual experience
and application of Socialist Realism was complicated and uneven
across different periods.
The 1948 'Zhdanovshchina' at the Soviet Composers' Union perhaps
provides the best example, as a time when senior composers were
publicly humiliated for their supposed 'formalism'. The events
were, however, reported and narrativised through a distorted lens:
one notable example is the very public display of myth-making
that occurred in Sergei Mikhalkov's 1949 play Ilya Golovin.
This play satirised Shostakovich in the figure of Golovin, a Soviet
composer whose works are celebrated around the world.
The play opens with Golovin receiving a Pravda review
that criticises his works for their formalist content, similar
to the 1936 review for Shostakovich's Lady Macbeth: from
then on, the play follows the socialist-realist archetype, as
the composer is inspired to mend his ways and produce appropriately
populist music once more. The play was a triumph, with a sell-out
run that extended into the spring of 1950. Perhaps most bizarrely
of all, Aram Khachaturian provided the score for the production.
In this talk, Dr Elphick details the play's creation and reception,
highlights allusions to Shostakovich and Prokofiev in the script,
and examines excerpts from Khachaturian's score, which juxtaposed
parodies of Shostakovich and Prokofiev along with bombastic songs
and choruses that served as good examples of Socialist Realism
(for Golovin's rehabilitation at the end of the play). The play
has wider significance for our understanding of how Socialist
Realism was portrayed to the Soviet public, but also has ramifications
for how we think about Shostakovich and Khachaturian in this period.
Booking: The lecture will be held using the
Zoom online conferencing tool. Please book in advance via Eventbrite
- and consider making a donation to the SCRSS to support our work.
To view the event online, you'll also need to have set up a free
account with Eventbrite, using the same email address you use
to book the event. If you don't have an Eventbrite account yet,
you can set it up before or after booking this event. Once booked,
you'll receive a confirmation email from Eventbrite about the
events, and reminders with the link at two days, two hours and
ten minutes before the event starts.
Dr Daniel Elphick is a Musicologist and Teaching Fellow at Royal
Holloway, University of London, with research specialising in
the history and analysis of Russian and East-European music from
the 19th century to the present. He is a Fellow of the Centre
for Russian Music at Goldsmiths, a member of CRECEPS (Moscow /
Heidelberg), and a member of the editorial board for DSCH,
the Shostakovich Journal. His first book, Music Behind the
Iron Curtain: Weinberg and his Polish Contemporaries (2019)
is available from Cambridge University Press, and he is currently
working on a study of Socialist Realism, Music on a Leash.
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December 2021
Tuesday 7 December 2021, 11.00 - 16.00
Event: SCRSS Library Opening
SCRSS members only. Access the library collections and
borrow books from the Literature and Quick Loan sections. To help
the SCRSS manage numbers, we kindly suggest members email the
Society in advance if they plan to attend. On the day, members
may telephone the Society with any queries. Contact
the SCRSS.
Tuesday 14 December 2021, 11.00 - 16.00
Event: SCRSS Library Opening
SCRSS members only. Access the library collections and
borrow books from the Literature and Quick Loan sections. To help
the SCRSS manage numbers, we kindly suggest members email the
Society in advance if they plan to attend. On the day, members
may telephone the Society with any queries. Contact
the SCRSS.
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