The Art and Science of Making the New Man in Early 20th-Century Russia

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The idea that morally, mentally, and physically superior new men might replace the currently existing mankind has periodically seized the imagination of intellectuals, leaders, and reformers throughout history. This volume offers a multidisciplinary investigation into how the new man was made in Russia and the early Soviet Union in the first third of the 20th century. The traditional narrative of the Soviet new man as a creature forged by propaganda is challenged by the strikingly new and varied case studies presented here. The book focuses on the interplay between the rapidly developing experimental life sciences, such as biology, medicine, and psychology, and countless cultural products, ranging from film and fiction, dolls and museum exhibits to pedagogical projects, sculptures, and exemplary agricultural fairs. With contributions from scholars based in the United States, Canada, the UK, Germany and Russia, the picture that emerges is emphatically more complex, contradictory, and suggestive of strong parallels with other new man visions in Europe and elsewhere. In contrast to previous interpretations that focused largely on the apparent disconnect between utopian new man rhetoric and the harsh realities of everyday life in the Soviet Union, this volume brings to light the surprising historical trajectories of new man visions, their often obscure origins, acclaimed and forgotten champions, unexpected and complicated results, and mutual interrelations. In short, the volume is a timely examination of a recurring theme in modern history, when dramatic advancements in science and technology conjoin with anxieties about the future to fuel dreams of a new and improved mankind.

Reviews

Krementsov and Howell have assembled a host of original pieces of research from a range of humanities subfields to illuminate the multiplicity of ways in which Russians negotiated, envisioned, and performed the fantasies of humankinds renovation across the first four decades of the twentieth century. * Andy Byford, Director of Studies in the School of Modern Languages and Cultures, Durham University, UK *
The New Man has long been recognized as a crucial topic by those who study revolutionary Russia, the early Soviet Union, and Stalinism. Its study takes a big step forward in this wide-ranging and thought-provoking volume. Delving into science, philosophy, ideology, education, literature, film, exhibitions, and more, the works gathered here aim to recover actors meanings and intent when invoking the New Man in specific contexts. These investigations, taken together, bring us closer to understanding why the New Man became so central to the Soviet century. * Michael David-Fox, Historian of modern Russia and the USSR, Georgetown University, USA *

Author Bio

Yvonne Howell is Professor of Russian and Global Studies at University of Richmond, USA. She has published extensively on Russian and Soviet science fiction and is the editor of Red Star Tales (2015). Nikolai Krementsov is Professor at the Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology, University of Toronto, Canada. He is the author of many publications, including Revolutionary Experiments (2014) and With and Without Galton (2018).