Famous Journalists in the Newspaper "for Janitors and Lackeys"

For citation: Shmagun O.V. (2016) Izvestnye zhurnalisty v gazete «dlya dvornikov i lakeev» [Famous Journalists in the Newspaper "for Janitors and Lackeys"]. Mediaskop 3. Available at: http://www.mediascope.ru/node/2140

© Olesya V. Shmagun

PhD student at the Chair of History of Russian Journalism and Literature, Faculty of Journalism, Lomonosov Moscow State University, correspondent at the newspaper Novaya Gazeta, (Moscow, Russia), olesya.shmagun@gmail.com

Abstract

The article tells how in 1918 after the Bolsheviks took the power, some well-known and high quality journalists were forced to work for mass newspaper "Petrogradskiy Listok". The core audience of that newspaper were urban poor − semi-literate audience. Almost all other media in Petrograd were closed by new the government as "bourgeois" and intellectuals faced a new audience with which they were unable to communicate.

Brilliant satirist Aleksandr Amphiteatrov in the devastated city of Petrograd in 1918 complains about piano or bath taxes. Bolsheviks charged people who had such luxury. But obviously core audience of "Petrogradskiy Listok"was not among them.

Famous poet Fyodor Sologub devoted all his columns to pains of intellectuals and blamed urban poor for everything that had happened to Russia after the revolution. Sologub maybe had a point, but he probably forgot that he was writing for the same people he blamed. And probably to confront and to accuse is not the best strategy to communicate with your audience.

Russian intellectuals were waiting for Russian Revolution for many years. They tended to believe that Russian people – the wide audience – would share its values. But had that intellectuals ever talked to soldiers, peasantries? Had they ever thought of what matters for that people? The short period when Amphiteatrov and Sologub were working in "Petrogradskiy Listok" shows that they were not really able to talk to such audience. And didn`t understand it`s values and concerns.

Keywords: tabloid, Aleksandr Amphiteatrov, Fyodor Sologub, Aleksandr Kuprin, "Petrogradskiy Listok", urban poor.

Notes

Amfiteatrov A. (1918) Kukol'niki i Bubnovy [Puppeteers and Bubnovs]. Petrogradskiy golos, no. 15.

Amfiteatrov A. (1918) O skromneyshem iz nasekomykh [About the Most Modest of the Insects]. Petrogradskiy golos, no. 18.

Amfiteatrov A. (1918) Trotskiy velikoross [Trotsky a Great Russian]. Petrogradskiy golos, no. 10.

Amfiteatrov A.V. (2004) Zhizn' cheloveka, neudobnogo dlya sebya i dlya mnogikh: v 2 t. [A Life of a Man Inconvenient for Himself and for the Many: in 2 volumes]. Moscow: Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie Publ., vol. 2.

Bez karandasha [Without a Pencil]. 1918. Petrogradskiy golos, no. 6.

Leskov N.S. (1957) Sobr. soch.: v 11 t. [Collected Works in 11 Volumes]. Moscow: Gosudarstvennoe izdatel'stvo khudozhestvennoy literatury Publ., vol. 1, p. 472.

Masanov I.F. (1960) Slovar' psevdonimov russkikh pisateley, uchenykh i obshchestvennykh deyateley: v 4 t. [Dictionary of Pseudonyms of Russian Writers, Scientists and Public Figures: in 4 Volumes]. Moscow: Izdatel'stvo Vsesoyuznoy knizhnoy palaty Publ., vol. 4,

Peshekhonov A. (1901) Russkaya politicheskaya gazeta (Statisticheskiy ocherk) [Russian Political Newspaper (Statistical Essay)]. Russkoe bogatstvo 3: 2−21.

Sokolova A.I. (1913) Vstrechi i znakomstva [Meetings and acquaintances]. Istoricheskiy vestnik 3.

Sologub F. (1918) Na rasput'e [At the crossroads]. Petrogradskiy golos, no. 49.

Sologub F. (1918) Ne ya [Not me]. Petrogradskiy golos, no. 10.

Sologub F. (1918) Oskolki zhizni [Shards of Life]. Petrogradskiy golos, no. 9.

Sologub F. (1918) Spasibo [Thank You]. Petrogradskiy golos, no. 29.

Zarin A. (1917) V trevoge [In Alarm]. Petrogradskiy listok, no. 251.

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