Perhaps somewhat beside the point but Mark Tauger, a legitimate academic and specialist in Soviet agriculture, doesn't think the 1932 famine was purposeful. He thinks it resulted from a crop failure. Nothing special in Russian history. And not just Ukrainians died.
Yes, I'm aware of his argument; I do disagree, however. I follow Conquest & Snyder on this, although even there I suspect there are errors - Conquest's death toll estimate is too high, and Snyder's too low.
I'm also aware of the high death rates among Kazakhs and Kalmyks; it's a plot-point in my novel.
I'd urge you to read Tauger's article before simply dismissing it. And others of his, easily obtainable on the internet after a brief search.
Invoking "experts" without citing proof is OK here, but unacceptable in a true debate.
About Conquest: "Robert Conquest’s Harvest of Sorrow, a key book for the Holodomor interpretation, admits that Soviet famine relief ended the famine in a few months. He did not cite any of these publications in his book."
About Snyder, whose game is to equate a documented historical atrocity with natural disaster and incompetence:
"Snyder’s claims that the USSR maintained large exports and withheld reserves are central to his book’s argument, which views the 1933 famine as essentially the same as the Holocaust. If the regime reduced exports and distributed millions of tons of food from reserves as famine relief, then the image of the Soviet man-made famine is not correct."
I admit that I'm pushing a barrow here and will not engage further, as such exchanges become tiresome.
Thanks for the opportunity to speak up on your Substack.
Well, I read the paper, most of which is about Lysenko and his opponents. The most obvious problems with the paper is the Holodomor is not remotely the only collectivisation famine, that collectivisation was ideologically driven and was persevered with even as people were starving, that targeting “kulaks” targeted the most successful farmers, that information about the famine was systematically suppressed and that active expropriation did take place while people were starving.
May I draw your attention to An Incomplete History of the Art of Funerary Violin. I am, if I am anything, an artist, a painter, a re-arranger. If you think lit is up for a bit of a leg pull you should take a look at the art world. In all the world there is no set of people who take themselves as seriously as art people. It is the world of fakes, bluffs and double bluffs. I think Banksy got it in a one when he publicly shredded his picture at auction, seconds after the hammer fell. I was at once a supreme act of artistic piss taking and also a commercial coup. It was obvious to me that the shredded item was going to be worth a lot more and indeed this proved to be true when it was later sold at a massive profit. Banksy of course, knew this. He is just another Warhol, a chap who see the way the wind is blowing and weaponises it. It's not art, it is the South Sea Bubble, it's Alpacas, it's Bitcoin, it's Dolce and Gabbana and Rolexes. It's whatever people will pay more for than it's worth, either intrinsically or extrinsically.
In the world of publishing it's pretty much the same; If I were to call myself Jo Obochacheba and send in a manuscript about a trans lawyer trying to make it in the world of rock music whilst attempting to build a haven for badgers in Essex the agents would be fighting to sign me.
But as always, hope lies with the proles. Like it or not, people stand like sardines with their little selfie phones to see the Mona Lisa in the Louvre. They take a clever forced perspective picture of their loved one holding up the leaning tower of Pisa. They get eaten by sharks in Australia. They crave reality when those who are better than they are believe in anything but. Keep at it. I once pretended to be German and I always tell people at parties (those who say, "and what do you do?" - a question I hate with a vengeance) that I was a lion tamer with Ringling Bros and Barnum and Bailey's Circus and have a well rehearsed back story to make it seem authentic.
I am glad you enjoyed it. I have bitten the bullet and started my own substack. If I could take the liberty of putting the link here, somebody might read it. If this is bad form, please delete it and accept my sincere contrafibulations. https://titusarrius.substack.com/p/im-a-nonentity-get-me-out-of-here
A very interesting story, however there is something which you don't seem to have addressed, and that is the charge of plagiarism against you at the time. I wonder how that has affected you personally and professionally.
Your comment illustrates why it has to be covered separately - you're referring (accurately, by the way) to the 2017 incident, which of course is the only one the internet remembers. Kenn, however, is referring to something that actually happened in 1995 (and which would have had serious consequences had it been true).
However, the internet has forgotten that one, despite it genuinely being a more important story.
That's going to be the subject of a separate post, as there's an entirely unrelated 2017 incident that needs to be discussed as part of it that I can't reasonably address in a piece focussed on 1995-6.
“Reasoning will never make a man correct an ill opinion, which by reasoning he never acquired.” Jonathan Swift
I love your two recommendations from your dad. Those are great to remember!
Perhaps somewhat beside the point but Mark Tauger, a legitimate academic and specialist in Soviet agriculture, doesn't think the 1932 famine was purposeful. He thinks it resulted from a crop failure. Nothing special in Russian history. And not just Ukrainians died.
https://agrarianstudies.macmillan.yale.edu/sites/default/files/files/papers/TaugerAgrarianStudies.pdf
Yes, I'm aware of his argument; I do disagree, however. I follow Conquest & Snyder on this, although even there I suspect there are errors - Conquest's death toll estimate is too high, and Snyder's too low.
I'm also aware of the high death rates among Kazakhs and Kalmyks; it's a plot-point in my novel.
I'd urge you to read Tauger's article before simply dismissing it. And others of his, easily obtainable on the internet after a brief search.
Invoking "experts" without citing proof is OK here, but unacceptable in a true debate.
About Conquest: "Robert Conquest’s Harvest of Sorrow, a key book for the Holodomor interpretation, admits that Soviet famine relief ended the famine in a few months. He did not cite any of these publications in his book."
About Snyder, whose game is to equate a documented historical atrocity with natural disaster and incompetence:
"Snyder’s claims that the USSR maintained large exports and withheld reserves are central to his book’s argument, which views the 1933 famine as essentially the same as the Holocaust. If the regime reduced exports and distributed millions of tons of food from reserves as famine relief, then the image of the Soviet man-made famine is not correct."
I admit that I'm pushing a barrow here and will not engage further, as such exchanges become tiresome.
Thanks for the opportunity to speak up on your Substack.
Well, I read the paper, most of which is about Lysenko and his opponents. The most obvious problems with the paper is the Holodomor is not remotely the only collectivisation famine, that collectivisation was ideologically driven and was persevered with even as people were starving, that targeting “kulaks” targeted the most successful farmers, that information about the famine was systematically suppressed and that active expropriation did take place while people were starving.
May I draw your attention to An Incomplete History of the Art of Funerary Violin. I am, if I am anything, an artist, a painter, a re-arranger. If you think lit is up for a bit of a leg pull you should take a look at the art world. In all the world there is no set of people who take themselves as seriously as art people. It is the world of fakes, bluffs and double bluffs. I think Banksy got it in a one when he publicly shredded his picture at auction, seconds after the hammer fell. I was at once a supreme act of artistic piss taking and also a commercial coup. It was obvious to me that the shredded item was going to be worth a lot more and indeed this proved to be true when it was later sold at a massive profit. Banksy of course, knew this. He is just another Warhol, a chap who see the way the wind is blowing and weaponises it. It's not art, it is the South Sea Bubble, it's Alpacas, it's Bitcoin, it's Dolce and Gabbana and Rolexes. It's whatever people will pay more for than it's worth, either intrinsically or extrinsically.
In the world of publishing it's pretty much the same; If I were to call myself Jo Obochacheba and send in a manuscript about a trans lawyer trying to make it in the world of rock music whilst attempting to build a haven for badgers in Essex the agents would be fighting to sign me.
But as always, hope lies with the proles. Like it or not, people stand like sardines with their little selfie phones to see the Mona Lisa in the Louvre. They take a clever forced perspective picture of their loved one holding up the leaning tower of Pisa. They get eaten by sharks in Australia. They crave reality when those who are better than they are believe in anything but. Keep at it. I once pretended to be German and I always tell people at parties (those who say, "and what do you do?" - a question I hate with a vengeance) that I was a lion tamer with Ringling Bros and Barnum and Bailey's Circus and have a well rehearsed back story to make it seem authentic.
Titter.
I am glad you enjoyed it. I have bitten the bullet and started my own substack. If I could take the liberty of putting the link here, somebody might read it. If this is bad form, please delete it and accept my sincere contrafibulations. https://titusarrius.substack.com/p/im-a-nonentity-get-me-out-of-here
This was such an amusing and thoughtful piece that I feel quite bad for bringing down the tone, but I have to ask - whose unmentionables were they?!
Nicked from the Vinnies donation bin (St Vincent de Paul, an Australian Catholic charity). Yes, I was a naughty shit of a child.
So hard to believe, and yet, I do.
A very interesting story, however there is something which you don't seem to have addressed, and that is the charge of plagiarism against you at the time. I wonder how that has affected you personally and professionally.
Your comment illustrates why it has to be covered separately - you're referring (accurately, by the way) to the 2017 incident, which of course is the only one the internet remembers. Kenn, however, is referring to something that actually happened in 1995 (and which would have had serious consequences had it been true).
However, the internet has forgotten that one, despite it genuinely being a more important story.
That's going to be the subject of a separate post, as there's an entirely unrelated 2017 incident that needs to be discussed as part of it that I can't reasonably address in a piece focussed on 1995-6.
It will all be in there eventually!
Please keep writing Helen!