Overview

Discipline through Humiliation examines what it meant to live and work as a non Russian author in the post-war Soviet Union, tracing the experiences of Ukrainian writers caught up in Stalin’s literary purges of the 1940s and early 1950s, the so called Zhdanovite repressions. Being a successful Ukrainian writer under late Stalinism was a perilous balancing act. To survive, authors had to navigate an ideological minefield – scrutinizing every line they wrote while seizing rare openings in official discourse to advance their own cultural agendas. Focusing on both writers and institutions, the book exposes complex interactions between Ukrainian literary figures and Soviet authorities as they sought to bring Ukraine into conformance with Moscow’s cultural policies. It shows how the regime employed a wide array of instruments of control – from material rewards to public rituals of (self )humiliation – to discipline writers and control the boundaries of Ukrainian cultural expression. Historian Iuliia Kysla examines the complex connection between the arts and politics, revealing how the omnipotent dictator pacified Ukraine and purged its culture during this crucial period in Soviet history. Drawing on a wide array of archival documents, including materials from the Ukrainian secret police and party institutions, Kysla reconstructs the mechanisms through which cultural conformity was enforced and dissent contained.

Full Product Details

Author:   Iuliia Kysla
Publisher:   University of Toronto Press
Imprint:   University of Toronto Press
Dimensions:   Width: 15.20cm , Height: 2.50cm , Length: 22.90cm
Weight:   0.001kg
ISBN:  

9781049808123

ISBN 10:   1049808126
Pages:   376
Publication Date:   15 December 2025
Audience:   College/higher education ,  Professional and scholarly ,  Tertiary & Higher Education ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   In Print  
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Table of Contents

List of Illustrations Acknowledgments Note to the Reader on Transliteration Abbreviations Introduction: Stalin, Writers, and the Ukrainian Issue in the Aftermath of the Second World War 1. Literature with a Purpose: The Ukrainian Writer as State Agent, 1923–1953 2. Post-war Purges in Literature: The Ukrainian Zhdanovshchina as a Battlefield for the “Only Correct Understanding” of the Past 3. Kaganovich’s Redux, or the 1947 Unfinished Ideological Slaughter in Ukrainian Literature 4. Between Past and Present: Making of a Soviet Intelligentsia in the West 5. The State-Sponsored Pogrom in Ukrainian Literature, or Revisiting the “Black Years” of 1948–1953 6. War Memories, Counterinsurgency, and Bolshevik Spectacles of Reconstruction in the West: Court Trials as Means of Sovietization Epilogue: The Post-war Soviet Ukraine in the Making Notes Selected Bibliography Index

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Author Information

Iuliia Kysla is a historian of the Soviet Union, specializing in the cultural history of twentieth-century Ukraine with more than fifteen years of research experience in history and the humanities.

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