Ab Imperio

420 Рецензии/Reviews the history of Soviet Jewry at the local, republican, and state levels (P. 6). Previous research on Soviet Jewish history lacked an objective approach and focused mainly on the poor fate of Soviet Jews under Soviet rule. The social, economic, and political transformation of the Soviet province during the 1920s–1930s positively influenced provincial Jews and helped them to successfully integrate into the new Soviet multinational community. Thus, many of them saw in Soviet power the only opportunity to realize their hopes for a better life. This rapid integration process destroyed traditional Jewish communities and led to their disappearance as ethnicreligious subgroups. The chronological frame of the present research is the period between 1917 and 1941. This period of twenty years is sufficient for an investigation of the first visible results of Soviet power reforms in the Jewish communities and their process of transformation from Jewish shtetels to modern Soviet towns. During World War II, all remnants of traditional Jewish life in Byelorussia were wiped out, including the Jews themselves, but with the 1945 victory came a new era in the history of Byelorussian Jewry. Zel’tser’s bibliographical records are very impressive. He made broad use of archival materials from local Byelorussian and Israeli Irena VLADIMIRSKY Аркадий Зельцер. Евреи со- ветской провинции: Витебск и местечки, 1917–1941. Москва: “РОССПЭН”, 2006. 478 с. Би- блиография, словарь терминов и понятий, тематический указатель, именной указатель, географиче- ский указатель. ISBN: 5-82430781 -4. The present book is an impressive scholarly work that gives an erudite account of the modernization processes of Byelorussian Jewry under the changing conditions of new political realities. Studies of Soviet Jewry have made serious progress in the past 30 years, especially since the collapse of the Soviet Union. On the one hand, new historical sources to which Western scholars previously had no access have become available, and, on the other hand, Russian research on Jewish history has become an integral part of the international research community, thus enriching it with new methodology from studies of Russian Jewry. Arkadii Zel’tser’s research concentrates on the history of the Jewish population of Vitebsk and its surroundings, making this book a combination of Jewish history and regional studies – a new conceptual approach to the history of Jews in the Soviet Union. Moreover, the author provides a comparative analysis of 421 Ab Imperio, 2/2009 local Jews who preferred to wait for better times. In the second chapter, “TheYears of War Communism,” Zel’tser thoroughly describes the transition of Jewish political parties and organizations from complete rejection by and confrontation with Soviet power to cooperation with and support of the Bolsheviks. These specific details are very important in providing a way to trace the process of recognition of the new power among the Jewish population. Increasing activity of Jewish political parties and movements and their cooperation with Soviet bodies had practical realization in the economic support of Jewish educational and community structures and led to the strengthening of their position on the “Jewish street” (Pp. 42-43). The New Economic Policy (NEP) stimulated further political and social changes and deepened the gaps between different social groups within Soviet society (addressed in the third chapter, “NEP, the Economy, and Social Status”). The main characteristic of the Jewish population was its nonproletarian character: only a small proportion of them can be defined as proletarians or peasants. Jews were for the most part city dwellers, and thus belonged to independent or semiproletarian elements. This ambivalent position influenced their social status as taxpayers and deprived them of archives, press publications in Yiddish , Russian, and Byelorussian, including letters and recollections of members of Bund, Poalei Tzion, Tzeirei Tzion, and other national parties and movements (Pp. 428430 ). The book is composed of eight chapters: five chronological and three subject chapters. The first chapter, “From Rise to Apathy (March 1917 – Summer 1918),” analyzes the most critical period of strengthening of Soviet power in the provinces. In traditional Soviet historiography this period is described as the “triumphant movement of Soviet power,” but everyday reality contradicts the official version and can be characterized instead as the destroyed hopes and unrealized expectations at the hands of the new political regime. Bolshevik political agitation gave rise to fruitless hopes for quick social and political changes based on the idealistic philosophy of a just social order (P...