Author Archives: Alison Smith
Comedy to tragedy
In 1860, a freed serf recently become a meshchanka in Riazan’ named Nastas’ia Pavlova had to deal with some extra paperwork to get her children properly registered according to the laws. She had three children, born in 1854, 1856, and 1858, but … Continue reading
Northern spaces
Last year around this time, one of my colleagues was asked to be a special commenter on a showing of a documentary on campus. The film, Passage, focuses on a 19th century failed search for the Northwest Passage (the Franklin … Continue reading
Most unexpected appearance of an anarchist EVER
Here’s a quick link to the blog of a former colleague of mine, Sarah Young. In this one, she’s discovered what has to be the strangest appearance of an anarchist, ever, in the pages of a magazine aimed at British … Continue reading
Completeness or lack thereof
I’m thrilled to see John’s post, because he brings up a point that I’ve been thinking about a lot, too–the incompleteness of the supposedly complete. I also came to think about it through the 18th century, and through RGADA (the … Continue reading
TASS Posters
On a recent trip to Chicago, I spent several hours wandering around a current exhibit at the Art Institute: “Windows on the War: Soviet TASS Posters at Home and Abroad.” It was, in a word, fascinating. The story behind the … Continue reading
How an article came to be
At the risk of seeming shamelessly self-promoting, here I am blogging about the article that I just had published in the Journal of Modern History, in part because I think the story of how I came to the topic and … Continue reading
Radicals or graft, revisited
So, the Senate returned to this question of what was going on in the Archive of Old Business (and elsewhere) a year and a half later (PSZ I, vol. 31, no. 24258 (June 13, 1810)). The initial investigation called for … Continue reading
Radicals in the archives? (Or probably just graft.)
When you start reading through the Polnoe sobranie zakonov (Complete Collection of the Laws) on various subjects, you see ukase after ukase saying virtually the same thing (and often quoting the earlier laws). This is, it seems, necessary for making … Continue reading
Moscow and St. Petersburg in 1909
Although I’d hoped to post something more substantive for my second post, instead, here’s a drive-by link to two photo albums that include some amazing images of Moscow and St. Petersburg in 1909. To me, they bring home how much … Continue reading
Catherine on Memory and Forgetting
Hi, all–I’m the newest blogger here. In principle, I’m supposed to add in more Imperial-era coverage. And, well, in practice, that is what I’m doing. I thought I’d start with something I’ve recently come across in passing that keeps making … Continue reading
