Lenin's embalming

[Andrey Shcherbenok]

I cannot think of a single comprehensive study of the issue, but from what I
have read it was not a single momentous decision. After Lenin died his body
was displayed publically to allow people bid him farewell (you can see this
ceremony in Dziga Vertov's documentary "Three Songs of Lenin"). Then, since
there were a lot of people who wanted to do so and since it took many a long
time to travel to Moscow, the decision was made to embalm the body. Then, a
temporary mausoleum was built to display it. Thus, initial embalmment was
merely to prolong the farewell ceremony which just never ended, so "the
decision" is, in a way, the lack of decision to end the public mourning,
which may explain the absence of a particular agency behind it.

----
Dr. Andrey Shcherbenok
Royal Society Newton International Fellow
 
Department of Russian and Slavonic Studies
University of Sheffield, Jessop West
1 Upper Hanover St, Sheffield S3 7RA
United Kingdom
Tel: (+44) (0)114 222 7404 
Tel: (+44) (0)793 014 3021
E-mail: shcherbenok at gmail.com
 
 
-----Original Message-----
From: SEELANGS: Slavic & East European Languages and Literatures list
[mailto:SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu] On Behalf Of ameliede at EARTHLINK.NET
Sent: Monday, March 01, 2010 10:08 PM
To: SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu
Subject: Re: [SEELANGS] Mr. Mayakovsky too died in the gulag,

At 05:20 AM 3/1/2010, you wrote:

>Is there a decent historical study of how the decision to embalm 
>Lenin's corpse was arrived at?
>
>Grover Furr
>Montclair State U.

This may be legendary/apocryphal, but I read that the process 
specifically of shaping the cult was in the hands of a former
Orthodox seminarian and a Yeshiva "graduate".  I've always thought 
that the formula "Lenin lived, Lenin lives, Lenin will live for ever" 
comes from the Hebrew prayer book (not about Lenin of course) and is 
recited daily.
Jules Levin
Los Angeles 

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