THE SHOSTAKOVICH DEBATE

The Question of Dissidence



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Part 1
  • From the "Testimony view" to the "dissident" conception
  • The "dissident" conception versus "open" meaning
  • The culture of dissidence
  • Does the "dissident" conception trivialise Shostakovich?
  • The dissident experience

  • Part 2
  • Anti-revisionism versus the "dissident" conception
  • Did the Soviets know that Shostakovich was a dissident?
  • The concept of "secret dissidence"
  • Dissident or intelligent?
  • Anti-revisionism as anti-contextualism

  • Part 3
  • Rejecting the dissident conception: simple denial
  • Rejecting the dissident conception: specific works
  • Dissidence or "bearing witness"?
  • Rejecting the dissident conception: misrepresentation
  • "Unreliable" evidence -- anti-revisionism attacks witnesses

  • Part 4
  • Rejecting the dissident conception: motives
  • Shostakovich in tears
  • Why did Shostakovich weep?
  • Introspection and the impact of modernity
  • Beyond introspection: the communal response

  • Part 5
  • "Trivial specificity"
  • Alternatives to the dissident conception
  • The hagiographical accusation


  • Back to Was He A Dissident? Back to The Shostakovich Debate. Back to Shostakovichiana.