Postgraduate Studies in the USSR: Lunches in the Ulyanovsk Regional Committee
Graduate school - a direct road to science. One of the leadership features of Professor Medvedev was that he usually invited graduate students to your home. His apartment was large, "stalinka", and in it he had a separate office. Purely professorial: bookcases with books to the ceiling on both walls from the door and a large desk with a beautiful (it was then fashionable) ink device. Since he didn’t have one hand, he put down a very original paperweight on open books so as not to hold the pages. All this was very unusual, like what he was talking about. Each meeting, in addition to discussing the progress of work on the dissertation, was devoted to some kind of historical topic. For example, once he started a talk about collectivization and talked about his work in the party bodies of Moldova and how he documented that after joining the USSR 10000 peasants and landowners were dispossessed there illegally, and how many were dispossessed, according to which there were simply no documents preserved ... Why did he say this, I didn’t understand then, and only then I realized that he wanted to share his knowledge, so that “no one, nothing”.
At one of the meetings he showed me a table laid by books of documents of congresses and decisions of the Central Committee of the CPSU. And he showed, and very clearly, how the negative assessments of both the leaders of the past and the texts with the decisions of the party on certain negative aspects decreased from publication to publication. In one edition - three paragraphs, in the next ... only one. Then he pointedly raised his finger and said: “See what it means? And what does this mean? ”
"Well, uh ..."
“The consequences can be very bad!” He added meaningfully. And again, I did not understand anything then, but I understand very well now.
From me as a researcher, he demanded, first of all, to clearly understand the essence and tasks of the party leadership, which included: recruitment and placement of personnel, setting the task, monitoring its implementation, summing up and evaluating the results. That is, for successful work it was necessary to find the appropriate people. Put on the appropriate place for their knowledge, experience and character. Specify the goal and identify ways to achieve it, periodically monitoring the progress of execution. In the end, it was necessary to find out what was possible and what was not, why it was not possible, and what should be done so that failures would not follow in the future. All stages of this work should be reflected in the dissertation and find out whether the party leadership of the SRWS in the Volga region was effective (and how much!) During the time studied, and what was required for this very efficiency to increase. At the same time I was told: “Criticize in moderation! Not a single dissertation on the negative alone was successfully defended! ”
It should be noted that the place in which he was then located was rather ... "vile." In the sense, there were streets built up with wooden houses of the most "sovkovy" type, that is, from different boards, roofing material and slate, laid in a checkerboard pattern. The streets were not asphalted and in the center of each were ruts filled with green disgusting slush. I really hope that now all this “catcher” has been demolished.
Gradually, during the course of the work, it became clear that there, at the top, in the Central Committee, a resolution was really adopted at that time to increase the effectiveness of the leadership of the NIRS, that party meetings of teachers of the region’s communist teachers were gathering, and they said that efforts should be intensified in this area and thereby raising both the quality of education at universities and the economic return from higher education. This was discussed at the cathedral party meetings, and at general universities. And, of course, everyone was in favor. But what's next? People talked and parted! Yes, student circles worked somewhere, somewhere whole student bureaus. But the proportion of students participating in this work fluctuated at the level of 2-5% and only in KUAI (Kuibyshevsky aviation Institute) reached 15. The teachers, in fact, whether they were communists or not, had no particular interest in working more with students and attracting them to science. Well, they will give you another letter and where is it?
That is, the party leadership in the Higher School of Education most often duplicated and supplemented the administration and leadership of specialized departments. In fact, it was, in Leninist words, “the fifth wheel in the cart”, which did not interfere with the work of universities, but did not help much. What was the most effective in guiding university science was ... moral control! As soon as some professor started stroking students by the pen and secluded himself in his office, or the dean of the physical education coach began photographing naked student-swimmers, his wife or someone from well-wishers wrote the corresponding letter at once in the party committee and ... poor professor was sneezed in the tail and mane , threatening to reprimand the entry in the registration card, or even expulsion from the party in general. And if this was not so scary for employees of technical departments, for the same teachers of scientific communism and the history of the CPSU it meant dismissal, since it was not the Communists who could teach these disciplines. Always in case of what it was possible to say loudly: “We have the same party membership card!” To get into a pose and ... eventually get what you want. But what was this of fundamental importance in the sense of attracting students to SRWS?
And all this was required in the work to somehow demonstrate, to bring the evidentiary base in the form of documents under its allegations, which required a lot of strength and resourcefulness of the mind. Most importantly, it was impossible to lie. All graduate students remembered the “black opponent” who could request the archive to check any of your links and if you gave a link to a non-existent document or there was one, and you yourself wrote another, you could not count on mercy. Already protected work declared invalid and all! However, inventing nothing was required. There was enough information in the archives. And often very interesting. So, in the archives of the Komsomol Central Committee in Moscow, I came across a reference document sent from the Komsomol Central Committee to the Central Committee of the CPSU about attracting students of universities of Central Asian republics to NIRS, and according to it it turned out that there were more than 100% there! Moreover, the data on the Volga region were completely different - 5-10% of students maximum! It was a huge discrepancy and I was not the only one to notice it, because the document had a funny addition: “We need to take into account the specifics of the East” or something like that. But after all the state money was spent on NIRS! And that means they were sent ... to the "foremost" in this area, but in the same Volga region they simply were not enough. And this is how the knowledge came that “not everything is all right in the Danish kingdom,” but ... everyone wanted to believe that in time everything will be formed, that we are “on the right path”. And, by the way, if everyone in the Central Committee saw all this, knew, understood and ... did nothing, what could an ordinary graduate student do here?
In general, Kuibyshev at the end of the last century's 80 made a strange impression on me. Here are quite decent high-rises and ... right there on the contrary - wooden wrecks, from the courtyards of which bleached toilets flowed directly to the street the grace of the womb. There were many old merchant houses, but they were all shabby ... And these were the descents to the Volga. No wonder then in the novel "Pareto's Law" many of my events took place in Samara 1918 of the year. Since that time, nothing has changed there - I compared the photo. Is that lampposts have changed.
And, among other things, the process of working with large volumes of information required internal mobilization, self-control and good organization of work, otherwise it was possible to “get sick” of one of the purely “postgraduate diseases”. No ... not syphilis and not AIDS. Having simply learned to work well in the archive, the graduate student “fell ill” with a “mania of hoarding” and continued to collect materials, even if he was no longer needed. The head said: “Write! It's time to write! ”But ... nobody canceled the fear of a clean sheet of paper either, and many were trying to at least distance this familiarity with him. Another disease was the “passion for publications.” For protection, it was required then to publish all 3 articles, and only one in the VAK publication, and at the beginning everyone was afraid that they would not have time to “accumulate” the necessary amount. But then the collected material allowed to write articles one by one and some published both 7 and 8, and even 10 articles, again just not to write the text itself! That is, we had to struggle all the time with our own brain, which, as we know, lives in our body, it seems, as if by itself, and also according to the law of least resistance. What is the least energy-consuming, to which he bends you, and it takes a lot of willpower to make him obey you!
But gradually all these “pitfalls” were overcome, and the dissertation began to overgrow with “meat”. In the first year of business trips we were not allowed, but in the second you could go to the archives of Moscow and to neighboring Ulyanovsk. In the hometown, of course, business trips were not given. And, by the way, I would like to tell you about one such trip to Ulyanovsk. We went there together with graduate student Zharkov in June 1987 of the year and immediately went to the regional committee of the CPSU, where we showed our certificates and asked for assistance in housing and food. And they got both, and more - coupons to the dining room OK and the direction to the hostel hostel drivers OK CPSU. The building was completely inconspicuous, without a sign, but inside ... spacious bright rooms with carpets and fashionable polished furniture. It is now these lacquered coffins are perceived as the top Durnovkusii. And then it was the very thing. In the kitchen, the ZIL refrigerator is the dream of every Soviet housewife. In a word, the drivers sent with their bosses lived well, and if, by the way, simple drivers lived like that, then what kind of “hostel” did the district secretaries of the RK have?
They came to the dining room, and there was marble, Finnish plumbing (oh my god, Mama Do not Cry - that is what happens!) And the menu is like in a restaurant! We stood in a democratic place and decided to eat properly for the sake of arrival, therefore, in addition to the main courses, we also took strawberries with cream. And I paid - I 1,20 rub., And Zharkov - 1,21 rub. And everything was not only cheap, but also very tasty!
Returned to the "hotel", rested and went to the market. And there early strawberries on 4,50 rub. kilogram! It surprised us, and how surprised it was that the menu wasn't on the menu the next day. Ask - where? And to us - “it does not use demand, because it is expensive, and we buy it in the market! "But how ... if we paid for lunch with her on 1,20?" In response, the cook only shrugged her shoulders.
"The collision of the Volga-Don-12 cargo ship with the bridge over Samarka happened on May 15 of the year 1971." What is good society total deficit? And the fact that ... it was possible to come with the box of chocolates to the OK CPSU archive, give it to the "girl" in the reading room and ... get access to personal matters that you would not otherwise see, and to classified materials about accidents, accidents and explosions about which simple Soviet citizens had no idea. All this was interesting to read and ... exalted in his own eyes, which was also nice!
At that time, the dinner cost us 1 ruble with kopecks. And then graduate student Zharkov offered me a funny bet: try every day to eat more than 1,10 rub. (if without a berry!), and who “pereest” whom, he feeds the loser with a dessert with nuts in a cafe on the banks of the Volga. There were delicious desserts and we both really liked it. And the view is beautiful! We began to take two salads, herring with onion ... chop ... and so on ... all of the meat, and still no one has surpassed that amount during the whole of our stay there. And only then, having raised the documents of the 1928 of the year, we learned that the prices in the obkomovsky canteens were frozen at this level and with all the reforms on it remained the same! That is, everything was like later in George Orwell: “All animals are equal. But some are more equal than others. ”
So the second year passed, and at the end of this year the second version of the thesis was ready. The chief read it and said: “You did everything as it should! But ... do you see how it all turned? So go and write everything as it is, only without an areal battle with the CPSU. Still, she started restructuring from herself! ”I said“ is ”and ... went to rewrite the work for the third time!
To be continued ...
was KSU (Kuibyshev State University) in 1985 year
Study at home
At one of the meetings he showed me a table laid by books of documents of congresses and decisions of the Central Committee of the CPSU. And he showed, and very clearly, how the negative assessments of both the leaders of the past and the texts with the decisions of the party on certain negative aspects decreased from publication to publication. In one edition - three paragraphs, in the next ... only one. Then he pointedly raised his finger and said: “See what it means? And what does this mean? ”
"Well, uh ..."
“The consequences can be very bad!” He added meaningfully. And again, I did not understand anything then, but I understand very well now.
From me as a researcher, he demanded, first of all, to clearly understand the essence and tasks of the party leadership, which included: recruitment and placement of personnel, setting the task, monitoring its implementation, summing up and evaluating the results. That is, for successful work it was necessary to find the appropriate people. Put on the appropriate place for their knowledge, experience and character. Specify the goal and identify ways to achieve it, periodically monitoring the progress of execution. In the end, it was necessary to find out what was possible and what was not, why it was not possible, and what should be done so that failures would not follow in the future. All stages of this work should be reflected in the dissertation and find out whether the party leadership of the SRWS in the Volga region was effective (and how much!) During the time studied, and what was required for this very efficiency to increase. At the same time I was told: “Criticize in moderation! Not a single dissertation on the negative alone was successfully defended! ”
It should be noted that the place in which he was then located was rather ... "vile." In the sense, there were streets built up with wooden houses of the most "sovkovy" type, that is, from different boards, roofing material and slate, laid in a checkerboard pattern. The streets were not asphalted and in the center of each were ruts filled with green disgusting slush. I really hope that now all this “catcher” has been demolished.
So what was the essence of the party leadership of the High School?
Gradually, during the course of the work, it became clear that there, at the top, in the Central Committee, a resolution was really adopted at that time to increase the effectiveness of the leadership of the NIRS, that party meetings of teachers of the region’s communist teachers were gathering, and they said that efforts should be intensified in this area and thereby raising both the quality of education at universities and the economic return from higher education. This was discussed at the cathedral party meetings, and at general universities. And, of course, everyone was in favor. But what's next? People talked and parted! Yes, student circles worked somewhere, somewhere whole student bureaus. But the proportion of students participating in this work fluctuated at the level of 2-5% and only in KUAI (Kuibyshevsky aviation Institute) reached 15. The teachers, in fact, whether they were communists or not, had no particular interest in working more with students and attracting them to science. Well, they will give you another letter and where is it?
That is, the party leadership in the Higher School of Education most often duplicated and supplemented the administration and leadership of specialized departments. In fact, it was, in Leninist words, “the fifth wheel in the cart”, which did not interfere with the work of universities, but did not help much. What was the most effective in guiding university science was ... moral control! As soon as some professor started stroking students by the pen and secluded himself in his office, or the dean of the physical education coach began photographing naked student-swimmers, his wife or someone from well-wishers wrote the corresponding letter at once in the party committee and ... poor professor was sneezed in the tail and mane , threatening to reprimand the entry in the registration card, or even expulsion from the party in general. And if this was not so scary for employees of technical departments, for the same teachers of scientific communism and the history of the CPSU it meant dismissal, since it was not the Communists who could teach these disciplines. Always in case of what it was possible to say loudly: “We have the same party membership card!” To get into a pose and ... eventually get what you want. But what was this of fundamental importance in the sense of attracting students to SRWS?
By the way, this place was called “The Ravine of the Underground Workers” and, apparently, since their times it has remained unchanged. Directly behind the university, there was a meadow where goats grazed, and then a smelly stream flowed, behind which was an abandoned botanical garden.
"Specificity of the East"
And all this was required in the work to somehow demonstrate, to bring the evidentiary base in the form of documents under its allegations, which required a lot of strength and resourcefulness of the mind. Most importantly, it was impossible to lie. All graduate students remembered the “black opponent” who could request the archive to check any of your links and if you gave a link to a non-existent document or there was one, and you yourself wrote another, you could not count on mercy. Already protected work declared invalid and all! However, inventing nothing was required. There was enough information in the archives. And often very interesting. So, in the archives of the Komsomol Central Committee in Moscow, I came across a reference document sent from the Komsomol Central Committee to the Central Committee of the CPSU about attracting students of universities of Central Asian republics to NIRS, and according to it it turned out that there were more than 100% there! Moreover, the data on the Volga region were completely different - 5-10% of students maximum! It was a huge discrepancy and I was not the only one to notice it, because the document had a funny addition: “We need to take into account the specifics of the East” or something like that. But after all the state money was spent on NIRS! And that means they were sent ... to the "foremost" in this area, but in the same Volga region they simply were not enough. And this is how the knowledge came that “not everything is all right in the Danish kingdom,” but ... everyone wanted to believe that in time everything will be formed, that we are “on the right path”. And, by the way, if everyone in the Central Committee saw all this, knew, understood and ... did nothing, what could an ordinary graduate student do here?
In general, Kuibyshev at the end of the last century's 80 made a strange impression on me. Here are quite decent high-rises and ... right there on the contrary - wooden wrecks, from the courtyards of which bleached toilets flowed directly to the street the grace of the womb. There were many old merchant houses, but they were all shabby ... And these were the descents to the Volga. No wonder then in the novel "Pareto's Law" many of my events took place in Samara 1918 of the year. Since that time, nothing has changed there - I compared the photo. Is that lampposts have changed.
"The specifics of the work of graduate students"
And, among other things, the process of working with large volumes of information required internal mobilization, self-control and good organization of work, otherwise it was possible to “get sick” of one of the purely “postgraduate diseases”. No ... not syphilis and not AIDS. Having simply learned to work well in the archive, the graduate student “fell ill” with a “mania of hoarding” and continued to collect materials, even if he was no longer needed. The head said: “Write! It's time to write! ”But ... nobody canceled the fear of a clean sheet of paper either, and many were trying to at least distance this familiarity with him. Another disease was the “passion for publications.” For protection, it was required then to publish all 3 articles, and only one in the VAK publication, and at the beginning everyone was afraid that they would not have time to “accumulate” the necessary amount. But then the collected material allowed to write articles one by one and some published both 7 and 8, and even 10 articles, again just not to write the text itself! That is, we had to struggle all the time with our own brain, which, as we know, lives in our body, it seems, as if by itself, and also according to the law of least resistance. What is the least energy-consuming, to which he bends you, and it takes a lot of willpower to make him obey you!
In the hostel of the obkom drivers
But gradually all these “pitfalls” were overcome, and the dissertation began to overgrow with “meat”. In the first year of business trips we were not allowed, but in the second you could go to the archives of Moscow and to neighboring Ulyanovsk. In the hometown, of course, business trips were not given. And, by the way, I would like to tell you about one such trip to Ulyanovsk. We went there together with graduate student Zharkov in June 1987 of the year and immediately went to the regional committee of the CPSU, where we showed our certificates and asked for assistance in housing and food. And they got both, and more - coupons to the dining room OK and the direction to the hostel hostel drivers OK CPSU. The building was completely inconspicuous, without a sign, but inside ... spacious bright rooms with carpets and fashionable polished furniture. It is now these lacquered coffins are perceived as the top Durnovkusii. And then it was the very thing. In the kitchen, the ZIL refrigerator is the dream of every Soviet housewife. In a word, the drivers sent with their bosses lived well, and if, by the way, simple drivers lived like that, then what kind of “hostel” did the district secretaries of the RK have?
They came to the dining room, and there was marble, Finnish plumbing (oh my god, Mama Do not Cry - that is what happens!) And the menu is like in a restaurant! We stood in a democratic place and decided to eat properly for the sake of arrival, therefore, in addition to the main courses, we also took strawberries with cream. And I paid - I 1,20 rub., And Zharkov - 1,21 rub. And everything was not only cheap, but also very tasty!
Returned to the "hotel", rested and went to the market. And there early strawberries on 4,50 rub. kilogram! It surprised us, and how surprised it was that the menu wasn't on the menu the next day. Ask - where? And to us - “it does not use demand, because it is expensive, and we buy it in the market! "But how ... if we paid for lunch with her on 1,20?" In response, the cook only shrugged her shoulders.
"The collision of the Volga-Don-12 cargo ship with the bridge over Samarka happened on May 15 of the year 1971." What is good society total deficit? And the fact that ... it was possible to come with the box of chocolates to the OK CPSU archive, give it to the "girl" in the reading room and ... get access to personal matters that you would not otherwise see, and to classified materials about accidents, accidents and explosions about which simple Soviet citizens had no idea. All this was interesting to read and ... exalted in his own eyes, which was also nice!
The problem is in the spirit of J. Orwell
At that time, the dinner cost us 1 ruble with kopecks. And then graduate student Zharkov offered me a funny bet: try every day to eat more than 1,10 rub. (if without a berry!), and who “pereest” whom, he feeds the loser with a dessert with nuts in a cafe on the banks of the Volga. There were delicious desserts and we both really liked it. And the view is beautiful! We began to take two salads, herring with onion ... chop ... and so on ... all of the meat, and still no one has surpassed that amount during the whole of our stay there. And only then, having raised the documents of the 1928 of the year, we learned that the prices in the obkomovsky canteens were frozen at this level and with all the reforms on it remained the same! That is, everything was like later in George Orwell: “All animals are equal. But some are more equal than others. ”
So the second year passed, and at the end of this year the second version of the thesis was ready. The chief read it and said: “You did everything as it should! But ... do you see how it all turned? So go and write everything as it is, only without an areal battle with the CPSU. Still, she started restructuring from herself! ”I said“ is ”and ... went to rewrite the work for the third time!
To be continued ...
Information