Polden’ (N. Gorbanevskaia)

Cover. Russian edition. Novoe Izdatel’stvo, 2017.

Title:
Polden’: delo o demonstratsii 25 avgusta 1968 goda na Krasnoi Ploshchadi [Red Square at noon: dossier on the demonstration of 25^th August 1968]

Author: Natal’ia Evgen’evna Gorbanevskaia (1936–2013)

Year/s of editing: 1968–1969

Year of first publication: 1970

Publisher: Posev

Place of publication: Frankfurt am Main

Description:
Natal’ia Gorbanevskaia was a poet, translator, journalist and human rights activist in the 1960s, a key figure for underground literature and culture and a direct witness of the suppression of dissidence in the Soviet Union during the 50s, 60s and 70s. She was the founder and editorial director of the “Khronika tekushchikh sobytii” magazine (“Chronicle of current events”), a bulletin published periodically and circulated through the samizdat, in which political and juridical events concerning Soviet intellectuals, activists and dissidents were collected and reported. Until her exile to Paris, in 1973, Gorbanevskaia actively participated in the defence of human rights, especially after the “Prague Spring” and the consequent armed repression by the Soviet regime in Czechoslovakia. On 25^th August 1968 she organized a demonstration in support of the Czechoslovakian people and against Soviet military action in Red Square. As a result, she and the other six activists who took part were arrested and experienced first-hand the horrors of the Soviet ‘re-education’ system.
Polden’. Delo o demonstratsii 25 avgusta 1968 goda na Krasnoi ploshchadi (Red Square at noon: dossier on the demonstration of 25^th August 1968) collects documents, newspaper articles, letters, stories and records of the trials of activists related to the events that took place between the day of the demonstration and the day of Gorbanevskaia’s arrest, almost two years after the other demonstrators. Polden’ can be placed within the genre defined as “dokumental’naia kniga” or “dokumental’naia proza”, which translate as “documentary prose” or “literary investigation”^1,, and includes works that although very different from each other describe real events and condemn the injustices often experienced first-hand by the authors.  These works present the realities experienced by dissenters in the Soviet Union and its satellite countries and are not limited to the specific case of the demonstration against military action in Czechoslovakia.  Polden’ is a partially autobiographical work, since the author is both witness and victim: Gorbanevskaia combined her story with statements of those who, like her, experienced first-hand the dark side of the regime or, as the friends and relatives of victims, were direct witnesses.
The work’s original title was simply Polden’, and it was spread through unofficial channels, in fragments or small booklets. It was first published in 1970 in Frankfurt, by the emigration publishing house Posev, in both German and Russian. There followed editions in English, published in 1972 in London and New York. It was not until 2007 that Polden’ was published in Russia, by the Moscow-based publishing company Novoe Izdatel’stvo. In 2012, Polden’ was also translated into Czech, in honour of the author who visited Prague that same year.
Natal’ia Gorbanevskaia died the following year, in Paris.

Notes:
¹ The first reference to this definition, given by the author himself to his own work, regards The Gulag Archipelago (1973) by A. Solzhenitsyn.

Alice Bucelli
[30th June 2021]

Russian versions

• Gorbanevskaia N., Polden’, Leningrad 1969 [samizdat].
• Gorbanevskaia N., Polden’: delo o demonstratsii 25 avgusta 1968 goda na Krasnoi ploshchadi, Posev, Frankfurt-na-Majne 1970, https://www.sakharov-center.ru/asfcd/auth/?t=book&num=907, online (last accessed: 30/06/2021).
• Gorbanevskaia N., Polden’: delo o demonstratsii 25 avgusta 1968 goda na Krasnoi ploshchadi, Novoe Izdatel’stvo, Moskva 2007 [first official edition in Russia], https://imwerden.de/pdf/gorbanevskaya_polden_2007.pdf, online (last accessed: 30/06/2021).
• Gorbanevskaia N., Polden’: delo o demonstratsii 25 avgusta 1968 goda na Krasnoi ploshchadi, Novoe Izdatel’stvo, Moskva 2016 [edited by L. Ulitskaia, first complete edition].
• Gorbanevskaia N., Polden’: delo o demonstratsii 25 avgusta 1968 goda na Krasnoi ploshchadi, Novoe Izdatel’stvo, Moskva 2017.

Translations

• Gorbanevskaia N., Place Rouge. Dossier de la manifestation du 25 août sur la place Rouge, Robert Laffont, Paris 1970.
• Gorbanevskaia N., Roter Platz am Mittag, Andre Deutsch, London 1972.
• Gorbanevskaa N., Red Square at Noon, Andre Deutsch, London 1972.
• Gorbanevskaa N., Red Square at Noon, Holt, Rinehart & Winston, New York 1972.
• Gorbanĕvská N., Poledne, Prague 2012.

Bibliography

• Bucelli A., Testimonianze letterarie sul ’68 in Unione Sovietica: Polden’ (1969) di N. Gorbanevskaja. Una lettura critica. Master’s Degree Thesis. Università degli Studi di Firenze. Academic Year 2018/2019, 21^st February 2020, advisor: Prof. Claudia Pieralli, 2021.
• Criveller C., Gli studi sui generi auto-biografici e memorialistici in Russia, “AvtobiografiЯ”, 2021: 21-48.
• De Luca S., Il ’68 in Unione Sovietica. La manifestazione dei sette sulla Piazza Rossa, 2006, http://www.instoria.it/home/68_unione_sovietica.htm, online (last accessed: 30/06/2021).
• Gorbanevskaia N., Polden’ – Delo o demonstratsii 25 avgusta 1968 goda na Krasnoi ploshchadi, Novoe izdatel’stvo, Moskva 2017.
• Progetto Repubblica Ceca, 2014, https://issuu.com/progettorepubblicaceca/docs/01_2014, online (last accessed: 30/06/2021).
• Roginskij A., Il mondo di Nataša, 2013, http://www.memorialitalia.it/ricordo-di-natalja-gorbanevskaja-di-arsenij-roginskij/, online (last accessed: 30/06/2021).
• Scarpino C., Anni Trenta alla sbarra. Giustizia e letteratura nella Grande Depressione, Ledizioni, Milano 2016.
• The Arrest of Natalya Gorbanevskaya, 24 December 1969, “Chronicle of Current Events”, 11 (1969), https://chronicle-of-current-events.com/2013/10/07/11-9-the-arrest-of-natalya-gorbanevskaya/, online (last accessed: 30/06/2021).
• Ulitskaia L., Poètka. Kniga o pamjati: Natal’ia Gorbanevskaia, Izdatel’stvo AST, Moskva 2014.