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True, they say euphemistically, he made difficult decisions, but on the other hand, it was a time that called for tough measures. And at least in those days, they often add, Russia was powerful.
Others go further. "The personality of Stalin is covered with lies and slander. There is tremendous injustice done to this person," said Leonid Zhura, a former government bureaucrat who spearheaded the lawsuit against Yablokov.
Like other "Stalinists," Zhura regards the leadership of the Georgian-born dictator as a time of prosperity and power for the Russian people.
"The cynical position of the Stalinphobes is that only innocent people were kept in the gulag," he said. "Criminals who violated the law were kept in the gulag. And let the Western reader ask himself, should criminals be kept in spas or resort hotels?"
Meanwhile, Stalin's image and name, systematically bleached out as the waning Soviet empire began to grapple with its bloody past, are creeping back into Russian life. His name was restored this fall to a Moscow metro station. His unmistakable mustached face beams from the wall of Soviet Meatpies, a kitschy diner downtown.
"This place is popular among those who are driven by nostalgia," said manager Sergei Mogilo, 39. "And, of course, Soviet times were better."
And yet the trend isn't clear-cut. Even as Stalin's image is burnished, many Russians are reconsidering cultural icons who were shunned by the Soviets.
Anti-Bolshevik White forces commander Aleksandr Kolchak, for example, is the subject of a popular Russian biopic currently being serialized on prime time state television. Kolchak was reviled by the Soviet government, and attempts to rehabilitate him posthumously had been rebuffed repeatedly.
This fall, excerpts from "The Gulag Archipelago" were introduced into the curriculum of Russian schools. The masterwork by dissident Alexander Solzhenitsyn had been banned during Soviet times, the author himself hounded out of the country. The book remains among the most scathing depictions of Soviet prison camps.
But Solzhenitsyn had come home to Russia, and in his old age emerged as an improbable supporter of Putin. When he died last summer, his body lay in state -- and the government changed the name of Big Communist Street in Moscow to Alexander Solzhenitsyn Street.
megan.stack@latimes.com
Others go further. "The personality of Stalin is covered with lies and slander. There is tremendous injustice done to this person," said Leonid Zhura, a former government bureaucrat who spearheaded the lawsuit against Yablokov.
Like other "Stalinists," Zhura regards the leadership of the Georgian-born dictator as a time of prosperity and power for the Russian people.
"The cynical position of the Stalinphobes is that only innocent people were kept in the gulag," he said. "Criminals who violated the law were kept in the gulag. And let the Western reader ask himself, should criminals be kept in spas or resort hotels?"
Meanwhile, Stalin's image and name, systematically bleached out as the waning Soviet empire began to grapple with its bloody past, are creeping back into Russian life. His name was restored this fall to a Moscow metro station. His unmistakable mustached face beams from the wall of Soviet Meatpies, a kitschy diner downtown.
"This place is popular among those who are driven by nostalgia," said manager Sergei Mogilo, 39. "And, of course, Soviet times were better."
And yet the trend isn't clear-cut. Even as Stalin's image is burnished, many Russians are reconsidering cultural icons who were shunned by the Soviets.
Anti-Bolshevik White forces commander Aleksandr Kolchak, for example, is the subject of a popular Russian biopic currently being serialized on prime time state television. Kolchak was reviled by the Soviet government, and attempts to rehabilitate him posthumously had been rebuffed repeatedly.
This fall, excerpts from "The Gulag Archipelago" were introduced into the curriculum of Russian schools. The masterwork by dissident Alexander Solzhenitsyn had been banned during Soviet times, the author himself hounded out of the country. The book remains among the most scathing depictions of Soviet prison camps.
But Solzhenitsyn had come home to Russia, and in his old age emerged as an improbable supporter of Putin. When he died last summer, his body lay in state -- and the government changed the name of Big Communist Street in Moscow to Alexander Solzhenitsyn Street.
megan.stack@latimes.com
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