15
Propaganda Trains and Ships
One of the organizations that was most highly praised by the communists of our acquaintance, concerning which they spoke with almost religious fervor and to which they attributed almost miraculous virtues, was the institution devoted to propaganda.
“This organization,” they told us, “will sooner or later (although we hope it may be sooner) penetrate the hearts of the masses, the amorphous masses without ideals, with the almost divine breath of Communism.”
“This is why our Party will be strong and indestructible; it will make the great Russian people understand the meaning of the revolution; it will rid them of the pernicious influences of the past, showing them the wide road to the future.”
“We have done much in the schools,” they told us, “but we have hardly even begun. Besides, the school is only the initiation. The children attend school to complete their education and become men; for the adult this is not possible. Once he gets to know the basics, he has to leave school.”
“Society needs his productive force and therefore cannot allow him to devote his time exclusively to study.”
“And while we have, with the schools, opened up to the adult the broad horizons that the old regime had systematically closed to him to keep him in ignorance, we cannot abandon him when we have only begun to teach him how to negotiate the ways of life.”
“We pin our hopes on these organizations. We expect great results from them.”
“Since your arrival in Russia you are sure to have noticed at one station or another the propaganda trains, the trains that are reserved for bringing the voice of communism to the countryside.”
“They are magnificent instruments of popular education. The impression they produce in the peasant, with his naïve soul that is however thirsty for knowledge, defies description. You must see for yourselves to really get a sense of it; mingle with the peasants when they come to admire these trains. Behold the admiration that shows on their faces as they contemplate the symbolism of the painted images on the canvas that covers the train! And see how they understand it!”
“You will have to visit one of these trains; unfortunately, however, there are none in Moscow at the present time. In any event, it would not be easy to visit one here, because they almost never stop for more than a few hours, just long enough to load the communist literature they have to distribute on their itinerary.”
“It would be interesting, very interesting. If you visit one, it will give you a most pleasant impression.”
***
We first saw a propaganda train at the Petrograd station the day we arrived in Petrograd.
As we were boarding our train, we noticed another train had stopped on a sidetrack, and that its cars were covered with canvas that was painted with symbolic figures accompanied by Russian words.
We did not take a closer look at this train due to a lack of time; but we did make some inquiries about it. They told us it was one of the propaganda trains.
A few days later, in Moscow, we were able to inspect one up close, and were struck particularly by the symbolism of its painted figures and the bright colors in which they were painted.
These trains were composed of various numbers of cars. Some had four, others five, and yet others six. The one we saw in Moscow had six cars. It was one of the largest and best equipped.
The personnel who traveled in this train, both those who were involved in the propaganda function and the railroad employees, lived a life in common in the passenger coaches. They were well supplied with food and other needs; they were also supplied with a considerable quantity of communist propaganda leaflets and books for distribution, crisscrossing the immense spaces of Russia in every direction.
Both sides of the car along its entire length were covered with the symbolic painted figures. On some, although not all, the canvas sheets covered the whole side of the car from top to bottom, and sometimes extended a meter higher than the roof of the car.
The painted scenes depicted various themes that referred to the different causes of the class struggle.
There were pictures of groups of workers in aggressive and threatening postures confronting other groups of people who represented the bourgeoisie.
There was no lack of scenes that depicted the victory of the revolution in which, on the piles of rubble that remained of the old world, a worker stood with the red flag and the Soviet insignia, waving the flag and calling upon the workers of the world to revolt.
One scene depicted the industrial workers, shaking hands with and embracing the muzhiks, representing the fraternity of the workers and the peasants under the Soviet flag and insignia and Communist Power.
All of these scenes were painted with backgrounds of vivid and bright colors, rife with symbolism, cubism and impressionism.
The propaganda methods of the Bolshevik propaganda train were as simple as they were effective.
Having arrived at some locality, the peasants were invited to attend the Conferences and events organized by the Propaganda Commission on the train.
Communist literature was distributed to those who attended.
The local Soviet was responsible for publicizing the event and making sure the peasants of the village attended.
We toured the interior of the train and spoke with the propagandists, and saw one of the steamships used for propaganda purposes among the towns on the Volga.
In one of the towns we visited, one of these steamships docked and we went to take a look at it.
The hold of the ship had been converted into a common area and dining hall for the ship’s crew and the propaganda team, and an auditorium for plays and meetings.
Conferences, meetings, lectures, courses in scientific Marxism and motion picture shows were held on the ship, all of which, as one would assume, was carried out within the framework of the purest Marxist orthodoxy.
We spoke with the leader of the propaganda team, and asked him regarding some details of the team’s work.
He told us of the enthusiasm with which the peasants and the workers greeted the arrival of the propaganda ship.
“But what they most admire,” he said, “are the cinema shows, since these give them a more flexible sensation of the reality and the materiality of things than literature.”
“They are eager to learn and to ask questions. All their questions have the impertinence of a child’s questions. They are constantly asking questions, without pause or rest, in their insatiable zeal to find out about everything.”
“They happily accept the literature; although at this point we cannot really say if they read the literature with the same enthusiasm that they display when they listen to speeches or watch the images on the screen.”
“As for the sessions we devote to films, our auditorium is always, without exceptions, filled with spectators. And what is most interesting is the fact that they follow the progress of the episodes with the simplicity and earnest attention of a child.”
“This attention can be explained,” we were told, “by the fact that under the old regime, spectacles of this kind were hardly ever staged in the rural areas. For the Russian peasant this is the vision of a new world, one that he could not even have imagined in his ignorance.”
“The films we show,” he added, in response to our inquiries, “represent all the episodes of the revolutionary struggle against the white armies and the former bourgeoisie. We thus impress the peasant, and this works in favor of communist policy, while it weakens our enemies. We want to penetrate to the deepest corner of the peasant’s soul, and rid him of his prejudices and errors by leading him towards Marxist communism.”
“We are convinced that this is a task that will take a long time and a great deal of patience and perseverance; but we have devoted a great deal of effort to achieve this goal and we are ready to devote even more. We will do whatever is necessary to help bring about the definitive victory of our ideas.”
“We regret,” he continued, “that we do not have enough time to allow you to get a closer look and see for yourselves regarding the truth of our claims. If we could schedule a cinema show for tonight you would see the crowds of spectators and the interest and attention shown by the audience in the scenes portrayed.”
“Before the films are shown to the people they first have to pass through censorship by the Party,” he answered in response to our question. “Since the production of these films is paid for by the State, one must assume that only content that the State authorizes can be produced.”
“All the films consist of communist propaganda. To produce films of any other kind would be a serious mistake at this time. The struggle we must wage against the enemies of Soviet Russia does not allow for any relaxation or weakness. We need a strong hand to impose communism, and we need severity to prevent deviations.”
We left. Our curiosity was satisfied. We cast one more look at the sides of the steamship, covered in symbolic images and exhortations to the class struggle.
The Bolsheviks want to make the muzhiks understand Marxist dogma not by means of study and the intellect, but by means of the faculty of sight and emotional excitement. The method utilized to achieve this goal could not be more appropriate. Will they succeed? That is the enigma.
Comments