Soviet Processions and Parades

Some two years after the October Revolution of 1917 the new, Soviet, authorities began staging large-scale mass celebrations. The Soviet leader Vladimir Lenin considered them to be a powerful form of propaganda, stressing their significance in a decree issued in August 1919. The government went to enormous expense to stimulate popular enthusiasm, involving hundreds of thousands of employees, Red Army soldiers and officers, athletes and artists in processions and parades. The Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945 needed parades of a different kind. The parades held after the war were never like those in the thirties. They became less and less exciting and finally degraded into a monotonous obligatory ritual. When the Soviet Union ceased to exist they became a thing of the past.

The columns moved slowly through all of Moscow, making short stops for mini-performances. The most important point was Red Square, where the marchers were greeted by Stalin and other Soviet leaders, standing on the Mausoleum.

As the years passed, the slogan "Glory to the Great Stalin!" sounded ever louder, and pictures of Stalin loomed larger than ever in the human sea. Now such leaders of the world proletariat as Marx, Engels and Lenin faded into the background and at the peak of Stalin's personality cult in 1937 were reduced to no more than walk-on roles.

The first celebrations in the 1920s in St. Petersburg (called Petrograd in those years) included multihour stage versions of the events of the October Revolution. The city's palaces and other buildings were used as natural sets, armies of costumed workers and sailors stormed the Winter Palace, gun smoke shrouded the makeshift stands where spectators sat. Thousands of people participated in processions with banners, slogans, and poster cartoons depicting fat and bald bankers sitting on bags of money. Effigies of such western politicians as Chamberlain, Macdonald and Wilson were especially popular. At the end of the celebrations they were burned in a special ceremony by rejoicing crowds.

Every new procession was more picturesque and ingenious than the last. The vast staff of Soviet artists and theatre producers worked diligently. Imaginative use of colours, stage sets and costumes and improvised mini shows made these events little short of carnivals. The authorities even called them "political carnivals". In 1929 a large-scale anti-imperialism carnival was held in Moscow. The procession was divided into several columns, each with a theme of its own but all satirizing politics in the imperialist nations most opposed to the Soviet Union. Colonial India was depicted in the form of a huge elephant in chains. Imperialist France was a beauty with a parasol dancing on the backs of black slaves and surrounded by small servile dogs, a hint at the smaller countries of Europe.

Other popular compositions focussed on imperialism and its colonies, fascism and the Ku Klux Klan. One was even called "Wedding of Mussolini and the Pope".

The new Soviet celebrations stirred the imagination of foreign viewers. The German stage director Erwin Piscator said they had inspired him to stage similar performances in Germany in the twenties.

In the thirties, the years of the first five year plans and the cult of Joseph Stalin, the celebrations became gigantic in scale. The authorities made every effort to improve organization and enhance political content. The Soviet journal Art for the Masses recommended in 1929: "Moscow's streets and squares must be decorated with giant posters and maps depicting the scale of the five-year plan, the enthusiasm of industrialization, and the sweeping dimensions of socialist construction." The authorities felt the need for powerful methods to impress viewers and participants alike. So Moscow's main streets and squares blossomed out with Soviet industrial achievements. When the 15th anniversary of the October Revolution was marked in 1932, a cast-iron bucket four metres in diameter was fixed on the roof of a 25-metre building, and a complicated system of 6,500 light bulbs produced the impression of an endless stream of metal pouring and splashing. A slogan pledging to supply the country with all the metal it needed flashed six-metre letters on the facade.

During May Day celebrations in 1932 the square in front of the Bolshoi Theatre was taken up by a 16-metre model of a blast furnace and four 12-metre buckets symbolizing Magnitogorsk, city of the iron and steel industry. To this was added a huge model of the electric power plant on the Dnieper River, with portraits of Lenin and Stalin on either side, each 10 metres wide and 25 metres high (in fact, as high as nearby Hotel Metropol).

This mania for the gigantic was reflected in the processions of as many as one million people. The men and women came in columns from places of work, each column accompanied by orchestra and chorus and all moving toward Red Square from every corner of the city. Countless hands held high colourful posters with pictures of factories and figures indicating achievements in output.

A leading newspaper described the celebrations of the 13th anniversary of the October Revolution in 1930 in these words: "First came school boys and girls, then adolescents from factory schools, then men and women from the factories. Leading workers carried rifles at the ready, piercing with bayonets the dummies of saboteurs, bureaucrats, idlers, and Party members who betrayed Communist principles. Workers of the Ryazan tram depot displayed a huge model of a tramcar labeled "Next stop — Communism!" And, overhead, aeroplanes rolled over like pigeons as Soviet pilots showed the art of stunt flying."

The columns moved slowly through all of Moscow, making short stops for miniperformances. The most important point was Red Square, where the marchers were greeted by Stalin and other Soviet leaders, standing on the Mausoleum. A documentary from those days shows the marchers playing up to Stalin and Stalin encouraging them by pretending to play an accordion. As the years passed, the slogan "Glory to the Great Stalin!" sounded ever louder, and pictures of Stalin loomed larger than ever in the human sea. Now such leaders of the world proletariat as Marx, Engels and Lenin faded into the background and at the peak of Stalin's personality cult in 1937 were reduced to no more than walk-on roles.

In 1937 the leading Communist daily Pravda included in its description of the May Day celebrations these words: "High in the dark sky hung a gigantic portrait of Comrade Stalin. It could be seen from any point in Moscow. Past this shining portrait, over the rejoicing capital, silver dirigibles sailed like ships in a vast ocean, carrying portraits of Marx, Engels and Lenin illuminated with spotlights."

Performances by athletes came to be regarded as the best gifts for Stalin and were soon an indispensable feature of every celebration. The summer of 1936 even saw a special march-past of athletes on Red Square, a truly spectacular event. 110,000 men and girls in shorts and T-shirts advanced with a quick step, heads held high, rank after rank, 20 in each. The march was followed by exhibition performances: boxers met in short bouts, gymnasts jumped with ribbons, and men and girls did exercises lying on small rugs. The most spectacular shows were staged by the celebrated choreographer Igor Moiseyev, then the leader of a folk dance company. Stalin enjoyed his dances and once asked Moiseyev to prepare a number specially for athletes. The number was called "If War Begins Tomorrow".

Igor Moiseyev recalled later: "Athletes carrying boards ran out onto the square. They put the boards on their shoulders, then other athletes climbed on top and still others climbed on top of them. Each of the resulting three-level pyramids was crowned by an athlete depicting some sport. One posed as a swimmer ready to dive, another as a discus thrower about to hurl the discus. Suddenly a poster with the words "If War Begins Tomorrow" appeared in front of the pyramids and the pyramids collapsed. The next moment viewers saw a bridge of boards on the athletes' shoulders stretching across the square. Motorcycles raced across the bridge and battle scenes followed."

From Red Square athletic shows shifted to parks and stadiums, where racing in bags, racing with an egg on a spoon held between the teeth, motorcycle soccer and other amusing competitions lasted late into the night. When the shows ended, there were enthusiasts who said they'd like to see the whole city drawn into such merrymaking. But this never happened.

The Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945 needed parades of a different kind. The parades held after the war were never like those in the thirties. They became less and less exciting and finally degraded into a monotonous obligatory ritual. When the Soviet Union ceased to exist they became a thing of the past.