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ÿþ10-05:issue2 4/14/10 12:19 PM Page 21 the Serpukhov Kremlin than just using its stone in the design of the Metro s Serpukhovskaya Station.* The fact that people from all sorts of ethnic groups were involved in tear- ing down the ancient buildings and churches was somehow forgotten. The Metro is increasingly a target for criticism  the crowds, the grime, the age of the train cars  although Transforming Nature everyone understands that it is still Ivan Michurin: 1855-1935 Moscow s most reliable form of transportation. There are also count- less urban legends surrounding the Metro, such as the one about the mysterious underground Metro-2 city, controlled by special forces, or about monsters who inhabit Metro tunnels, threatening brave tunnel explorers. Metro-2033, a book and video game by Dmitry Glukhovsky, in which the Moscow Metropolitan is transformed into a world populat- ed by survivors of a nuclear war, has reinforced our image of the amazing world under our feet. The recent decision to restore a poem with a line about Stalin at Kurskaya station has revived one of the real monsters slumbering in the Metro s dark tun- nels, and probably not the last. Of course none of this is as scary as the real-life threat of terrorist bombs, as we were reminded just as this issue was going to press. And given the Metro s role as arteries and veins in and out of the country s heart, we can expect some serious security clampdowns. Today I live next to the Metro s 1932 deepest station, Victory Park (0@: >154K), and every time I descend GIVEN HIS SOCIAL ORIGINS, one would not have expected the Soviet on the crowded escalator I am still authorities to recognize the horticulturalist Ivan Vladimirovich Michurin, transported into another world. It and one certainly would not have expected them to place him on the might not seem as enchanting as it exalted pedestal this father of Soviet Darwinism occupied by the end of was when I was a child, but there is his life. still something wondrous here. And First, there were the noble ancestors, and even though they were from every time I pass through Revolution the lower nobility and not particularly wealthy, they were still members Square (;>I04L  52>;NF88) sta- of the  exploiting class. Second, there was the familial estate, and tion I am amazed by the number of although it was relatively small and acquired with tremendous effort, it serious and harried adults who never- was nevertheless  private property. Third, there was the Order of St. theless take the opportunity to touch Anna awarded to Michurin by the tsarist government. Finally, there was the nose of the bronze dog, some- his maniacal focus on simple fruit growing  not heavy industry, not thing that is supposed to bring good building factories or even increasing wheat yields, simply the cultivation luck. The magic continues. of orchards and the breeding of new sorts of fruits and berries. Given all russian calendar 21 russianlife.com | Russian Life * Actually, this is most likely an urban myth. ITAR-TASS 10-05:issue2 4/14/10 12:19 PM Page 22 of the above, one might have But these traits were not unique out after his death states:  I.V. expected that, at best, the Soviets to Michurin. What set him apart? Michurin laid the foundation for a would ignore Michurin, and, at The first thing that comes to mind new science, the science of manag- worst, they would destroy him along are his famous words,  We should ing the development of plants with his countless seedlings and not wait for nature to do us favors; through breeding. In his scientific apple varieties. our task is to take from it what we career, Michurin followed complete- Michurin, born in 1855, was 62 need. It is a line that sums up the ly new paths unknown to science at the time of the Bolshevik revolu- essence of Michurin s experiments. before him. He used cultivation tion, and he welcomed it from the This strange self-taught horticultur- breeding methods to create new start, immediately expressing a alist channeled his lifelong enthusi- forms of fruit-bearing plants. desire to serve the workers and peas- asm into breeding new, more suc- Michurin took a scientific approach ants state through his experiments. cessful varieties of fruits and berries. to the cultivation of hybrid But there were hordes of such naïve For the sake of this cause, he and his seedlings, eliminating undesirable family almost starved to death, lived features and developing desirable first in a hut, then in a shed, then in ones. a tiny house they built with their Here is what the government  We should not wait for nature own hands. For the sake of this liked most  the notion that plants cause, they spent virtually all their can be cultivated and forced to grow to do us favors; our task is to time in the company of other horti- in accordance with the needs of peo- culturists. ple, the needs of the government. take from it what we need. Michurin relentlessly researched What a prospect! The author of the selection, believing that the cross- introduction continues: breeding of different plants  even idealists and most of them were plants that were not necessarily This is the most important thing swept away by the very government close to one another but, in some that Michurin taught us. And it is not they pledged to serve. But not cases, were  distant relatives  surprising that this was the thing most Michurin. With every year he grew could lead to amazing break- fiercely resisted by the bourgeois, more respected, received more and throughs in horticulture. Today it is reactionary Weismannist-Morganist more Soviet medals to go with his clear that, while some of Michurin s school of biology.* Weismannists and tsarist order, and was increasingly experiments were very successful Morganists deny that the features and quoted and held up as an example. and others were dead ends, he made properties acquired by plants or ani- A Michurinist movement was creat- significant contributions to the sci- mals in the process of their lives can ed, cities and villages were named ence of selection. be passed down through inheritance. after him, and in the end he became During his early career in horti- Reactionary science claims that you a truly iconic figure. culture he expressed disdain for the cannot change and improve plants and Michurin s biography reveals experiments of a strange German animals to suit the needs of humans. traits that must have appealed to the monk by the name of Mendel who Such assertions are pseudo-science. new authorities: a fanatical devotion had discovered some obscure laws They are based on belief in a divine to his work; a desire to overcome governing the transmission of traits principle in the development of the any obstacle in developing Russian through inheritance. He was later world, on the idea of man s passive agriculture; years of poverty, during convinced by the great biologist adaptation to the laws of nature. This which he expended all his strength, Nikolai Vavilov that the laws of belief disarms scientists and practi- all his energy, on working his land; genetics could not be ignored and tioners in their struggle to change the conflict with the church; and his he began to factor them into his nature of plants and animals and decision not to accept any of the experiments. But what the Soviets inhibits the development of science numerous invitations from scientific saw in Michurin had nothing to do and agriculture. This cannot be called colleagues in America, including with real science. science. Michurin s teachings open up before the revolution, to continue The introduction to a collection unlimited vistas for biology, especially his work there. of articles by Michurin that came given the conditions of our Soviet 22 russian calendar * A reference to American embryologist Thomas Hunt Morgan and German evolutionary biologist August Weismann Russian Life | May/June 2010 who, together with Mendel, were held up by Soviet propaganda as epitomizing  reactionary genetics. 10-05:issue2 4/14/10 12:19 PM Page 23 country, given the conditions of the Bolshevik credentials could there nally bountiful earth. But such a collective farming system. be? Michurin had challenged reli- dreamy and handsome Michurin gion! In fact, there is no evidence was of little use to the powers that The Bolsheviks, who were them- that Michurin had the slightest be. The film had to be almost total- selves conducting a vast experiment inclination of doing anything of the ly redone, with the insertion of on the entire country, could not fail sort. He simply believed that  Using apocryphal episodes depicting to appreciate the boldness of plants in the form in which they Michurin s  relentless fight Michurin s attempts to alter the fruit exist in nature can bring little bene- against genetics, a pseudo-science varieties created by nature itself. fit. They have to be improved, and the corrupt handmaiden of Like all utopian fanatics, the remade, endowed with useful quali- capitalism (as opposed to Michu- Bolsheviks associated the transfor- ties, and their negative properties rin s own hybridization theories). mation of society with changing the have to be eliminated. Even the title was considered too very essence of man and nature. Who would argue with this? If romantic. In 1948, the film opened Even in the 19th century, the social- plants had not been improved over under the simple title Michurin. Its ist Charles Fourier rapturously pre- the course of centuries, we would creator was recovering from a heart dicted that under communism the not today have bread, olive oil, or attack at the time, experienced after seas would turn to lemonade and wine. But how wonderful it was to the stresses of seeing his film harmless anti-lions and anti-whales transform a rather eccentric old man butchered by the censors. It would appear on earth. into a hero of atheism who, with the seemed that Michurin, the oppo- A quarter century after Michu- help of the Soviet government, nent of genetics and transformer of rin s death, the Communist Party would bring nature to its knees. This nature, held a secure place in the adopted a program predicting the image took hold after Michurin s communist iconostasis. But some- transformation of human personali- death, when the crazy theories of thing about it rang false. This must ty and the elimination of any dis- Trofim Lysenko gained ascendance, be why so many jokes appeared tinction between city and country the great Vavilov was sent to prison mocking the  great horticultural- or physical and mental labor. A (where he starved to death), and an ist. decade and a half later, a new pro- entire generation of serious biolo- Michurin is asked a question. ject emerged: to change the course gists were deprived of the ability to  You say that if you cut off a horse s of northern rivers in order to irrigate practice their science. It was then tail and then cut off the tails of his off- the deserts of Central Asia. Nobody that the image of the  great spring and so forth, this will create a stopped to ponder the damage this Michurin was implanted in the new breed of tailless horse? would do to the ecology of public consciousness. He was por-  Yes, of course. Northern Russia, it was just so trayed as someone who had discov-  Then why are women still born thrilling to turn rivers around and ered what wonders human reason virgins? make them flow to the south. How could achieve, especially if that rea- Or: better to demonstrate the greatness son was armed with a knowledge of A drunk is walking home one of humankind? Marxism-Leninism. evening and reaches a bus stop. The mild-mannered horticultur- In 1944, when film director Leaning against a tree he looks up and alist  a person completely devoted Alexander Dovzhenko began to sees a streetlight swaying amidst its to his orchards and biology experi- write the script for Life in Bloom upper branches. Impressed, the drunk ments  started to be placed among (87=L 2 F25BC ), he intended to exclaims,  Wow, Michurin. That s such great transformers of the plan- produce a film about a dreamer liv- really something. Who woulda et, creators of heaven on earth. To ing amidst splendid orchards and thought? help him fit the right mold, biogra- bringing beauty and joy into peo- And finally, a joke that loses phy after biography repeated the ple s lives. The film was produced something in translation, but is per- tale of how, before the revolution, a in color, a rarity at the time, and its haps the most telling: priest in the town of Kozlov had exquisite camera work turned out It was apparently Michurin who accused Michurin of  turning God s striking images of flowering invented barbed wire, since he crossed a garden into a brothel. What better orchards, bright fruits, and an eter- grass-snake (C6) with a hedgehog (Q6). russian calendar 23 russianlife.com | Russian Life Copyright of Russian Life is the property of Russian Information Services and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. 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