“ Yes, I dreamed a dream, my dream of the third of November. They tease me now, telling me it was only a dream. But does it matter whether it was a dream or reality, if the dream made known to me the truth? […] Let it be a dream, so be it, but that real life of which you make so much I had meant to extinguish by suicide, and my dream, my dream—oh, it revealed to me a different life, renewed, grand and full of power!”
In September 2022, the Kremlin set out to draft around 300,000 men to continue the war in Ukraine. A few days later, a Russian named Ivan Losev was fined approximately $500 by his own city’s central district court for sharing one of his dreams on Instagram (the post was subsequently removed):
I had a dream today that I had been drafted and taken to a training camp, and then the Ukrainian armed forces led by Zelensky stormed in, everyone was captured, and they were ready to shoot us. At this moment, Zelensky walks past me and says, “Oh, I have seen your stories on Instagram, Glory to Ukraine!” I responded, “Glory to the Heroes!” Zelensky cheerfully pats me on the shoulder and says, “Release this one, shoot the rest.” So, me and him are standing there, looking at this, and I ask him, “Can I take a selfie with you for Instagram?” Zelensky says, “Sure.”
A few days later, in a bizarre mise en abyme, he was fined again (twice as much the second time) for speaking about the first fine in an interview with the BBC Russian Service.
Drawing by Nikita Kravtsov https://www.instagram.com/kravtsovnk/
Since March 2022, a Soviet-like martial law has been in effect punishing anti-war statements with up to 15 years in prison. The term “war” itself has been banned from public debate and replaced by “special military operation.” Society has been atomized and polarized as never before. Around one million people have fled Russia since the beginning of the war. Those who stayed are victims of totalitarian propaganda, resulting in either blind support to power or fearful silence. Those brave enough to speak the truth do it at their peril: in one year, around 20,000 Russians have been prosecuted for their anti-war positions.
In his 1990 book, Domination and the arts of resistance: hidden transcripts, J.C. Scott analyses how the oppressed can reverse official ideology through “hidden transcripts” which are shared in safe places: namely through gossip, or in folktales, songs and jokes. But even these sites seem out of reach for Russians today. Society is so divided that, in order to avoid conflict, people have stopped talking about politics with relatives and friends.
With no options left, deep feelings are partially confined to the last place that remains inaccessible to power: dream life.
Political terror is rarely studied through dreams, and yet if one looks for them, they can be found everywhere, from personal diaries to literature.
Dreams under Nazism and Communism
Dreams have the power to shed light on society’s collective unconscious, especially under politically oppressive regimes. Charlotte Beradt, author of The Third Reich of Dreams, collected people’s dreams in Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1939. Her project revealed how the number of oppressive laws, prohibitions and penalties generated terror and anxiety that were registered in people’s dreams.
A small shopkeeper from Vienna dreamed that the lamp in the corner of the room suddenly began to talk, repeating to the police every sentence he had ever uttered against the Government, every political joke he had told. He […] regarded himself as ruined.
In relation to the Soviet Union, Irina Paperno, Berkley professor and author of Stories of the Soviet Experience: Memoirs, Diaries, Dreams, assembled dreams she found in personal diaries written during Stalinism. And just as it happened in Nazi Germany, real-life terror haunted people in dreams. In the Soviet case, the dreams also reveal a sense of historical legitimacy: power was cruel, but it was for a great cause. This ambiguity between fear and a devotion to power is exemplified by the dream of a Russian peasant named Andrei Arzhilovskij, before he got shot. On December 18, 1936, he wrote in his diary:
Call it nonsense, but dreams are also a fact! I want to report an interesting dream. They told me that I could meet Stalin. He is a historical figure, it’s interesting to see [him]. And so…a small and simple room. Stalin is drunk “out of his skull” as they say. In the room there are only men – me and another one with a black beard. Without a word, Vissarionovich [Stalin’s patronymic] takes the man in another room and violently rapes him. “That’s what awaits me” I thought in terror, remembering his [Georgian] traditions. But after the thing, Stalin somehow sobered up and started having a conversation:
“Why are you interested in seeing me in person?”
“Well, portraits are portraits, but a living man, and a great one at that, is quite another matter," I said.
In an interview with Radio Liberty Podcast, Paperno suggests Arzhilovskij’s dream perfectly describes the ambivalent relationship Soviet people had towards Stalin’s terror. She puts herself in the shoes of a homo sovieticus, for which “[t]his is a wonderful moment, when we get to be in History, we are in the Kremlin, we meet Stalin, even if he rapes us; […] it is the moment when our life gets a meaning, in the perspective of world history. Losing this moment is also a nightmare. There is the nightmare of History but also the nightmare of being out of History.”
Another rare example of a dream recorded under Soviet terror comes from one of Stalin’s intimates. Nikolay Bucharin worked with the Soviet dictator since 1924 and was sentenced to death by the latter in 1937. In his last letter to Stalin, written shortly before his execution, Bucharin explicitly refers to a dream he had in his cell, in which Stalin’s wife personally came to rescue him, promising she would “tell Yosif [Stalin] to bail him out […].” Bucharin adds that the dream felt so real that “I almost got up to write to you to ask to…bail me out.” Further in the letter he refers to his dream as proof of his innocence and loyalty to the Soviet leader and the Party:
I know that N. S. [Stalin’s wife] would have never believed that I plotted against you, so it is no accident that the subconscious of my poor “I” came up with this nonsense. I talked to you for hours…God, if only there was some device allowing you to see my shredded and tortured soul! If only you could see how intimately attached I am to you…But this is all psychology, forgive me […] It’s vile to think about one single individual, compared to the historical responsibilities that lie on your shoulders […].
Both a Soviet high-ranking official and a powerless peasant feel compelled to share their dream and both attach to it a revelatory quality. Yet, in Soviet Russia, absolute power has no mercy for such truths.
Dreams under Putinism: silence, loneliness and sorrow
Since the beginning of the war, independent researcher Karolina Nugumanova has collected and analyzed around 1000 dreams of ordinary Russians. These dreams are voluntarily shared via a Google form. The researcher’s stated aim is to describe the range of images and themes emerging in Russian dream life. In February 2023, she published a paper called “Great Great Sorrow and Eternal Silence: an Experiment in Sociological Dream Interpretation after the 24th of February 2022,” in which the collected dreams are classified under two main themes: silence and speaking. Silence is a constituting element in contemporary Russia. In some dreams, official figures refuse to answer the dreamer’s questions, in others passive crowds silently accept the status quo, causing anger in the dreamer:
I dreamt of a beautiful cast-iron bridge and a crowd of people around it. It didn’t look like anything was going to happen, but suddenly a provocateur emerged from the crowd. Out of the blue, he started smashing everything around him, while people stood there and kept quiet. This made me very angry, and I responded very sharply, addressing the silent crowd and the destroyer while simultaneously trying to save fragile things from falling. The dream was abruptly cut short, and I woke up shattered with a sense of acute injustice over everything that was happening in this country where I no longer had a voice (25/03/2022, F, age 30).
On the other side, Nugumanova suggests “speaking is at the core of several [dreams], which can be designated as persuasion, warning, resisting, and seeking allies.” Dreamers often speak to their relatives to change their mind about a subject or voice their dissent to what is happening.
This is not the first time I’ve dreamt about trying to change my mother’s mind. I offer arguments, I show her news from independent sources, and show her [opposition politician and blogger] Maxim Katz’s videos. For each of her arguments for the war, I look for a counterargument, and this search looks very logical and rational for a dream. It is as if everything I think about during the day is visualized at night. In the dream, my mother still stands her ground, which saddens me, but I don’t reach the point of despair, because there is still something to say, ways to convince her, and the conversation doesn’t end’ (03/05/2022, F, age 20).
Putin is by far the most popular public figure in people’s dreams. Here a few examples from an article Nugumanova published in the Republic:
I dreamed that Putin stepped on my feet in some crowd on the street. I yell indignantly, ‘Mr. Putin, what on Earth are you doing?!” Only after I speak does he realize that I am standing next to him and he is trampling all over my feet. ‘Oh, silly me,’ he says, not even to me, to no one in particular, and turns and walks away. I follow him, not letting him get away. I ask, “Aren’t you going to apologize?” His tone changes completely, from indifferent to caustic and angry. “You’d stoop that low?! Go on, sell your story to the tabloids!” I don’t know what to say to him, and I wake up confused’ (17/04/22, F, age 27).
I dreamt of Putin. At first the dream was more abstract, consisting of some scattered objects, but then the picture became clearer, and I saw a grid (I clarify that it was not a prison, the type of room was impossible to determine, everything was in darkness), behind which there was Putin. He was frightened, depressed, and confused. He was standing one step away from the bars, and in front of the bars (with his back to me) stood a tall man dressed in dark clothes. I do not know who it was; he did not look familiar to me from the back. But he certainly looked familiar to Putin. And when this man wanted to leave, Putin rushed to the bars, stretched out his arms and tried to grab him, but the man recoiled and Putin failed. And the man told Putin that he would not help him. That was the end of the dream (F, no further data available).
What a difference from the Soviet past! Fear of being persecuted still plays a role—many dreams are about people erasing messages from their telephones because of police investigations—but for today’s Russians there is no sense of historical greatness and sheer terror is replaced by a lack of reason and a general impossibility to communicate with family members, fellow citizens, and political figures. This is arguably the result of the sudden end of Putin’s social contract: people were told that the only way to live a peaceful life was not to meddle with politics and now they are asked to die on the front. How can they make sense of that?
From Reality to Literature: Michail Bulgakov’s political dreams
Whether under Stalin or Putin, it seems that Russians elaborate the conflict between their personal convictions and oppressive power in their dream life. They also attribute a truth-revealing property to their dreams. Where do these shared ideas stem from? Can we find the same patterns in Russian literature?
Without attempting to be exhaustive, it must be said that Dostoyevsky is the main reference when dreams are discussed. They punctuate his novels, revealing the deep truth of his characters’ souls and thus helping them fight their inner evil. In his novels, dreams and nightmares encourage redemption, curb violent behaviors, and even save from planned suicide. Some novels are particularly rich with dreams, namely The Brothers Karamazov, Demons, Crime and Punishment and the short novel Dream of a Ridiculous Man. According to Alain Besançon, dreams in Russian literature are “the very rare moment when [Nature’s] deepest and most general laws are discovered by men who are worthy of it”: this “makes the dream to the novel what the miracle is to real life.”
Michail Bulgakov circa 1928
Setting aside the spiritual dimension for the political, I will turn to Michail Bulgakov’s work, and his politically charged dreams. Bulgakov lived and worked under Stalinist terror and in fact was unable to publish his masterpiece, The Master and Margarita, due to Soviet censorship.
The story follows a somehow good-intentioned Satan (calling himself Woland) appearing in Stalinist Moscow. He is curious to see “how Muscovites have changed” and eager to settle earthly matters, punishing or helping according to his judgment. The Master is a writer whose enormous talent is frustrated by Soviet censorship, while mediocre writers are acclaimed for their propagandistic works. Persecuted, depressed, and expropriated of his home, the Master is forced into a mental hospital and separated from his lover Margarita. Animated by boundless love and unwavering faith in the Master’s talent, Margarita sets out for justice. Through a series of magic vicissitudes Margarita gains Woland’s benevolence and protection. The Master is given back his home and can finally end his novel, with Margarita on his side. Bulgakov’s book is a poetic and ironic critique of Soviet society. Many of its characters have dreams or hallucinations, including two dreams that directly reference terror and power.
The dream of Nikanor Ivanovich: the terror of show trials
Chapter fifteen of The Master and Margarita is entirely dedicated to the dream of Nikanor Ivanovich Bosoi, the chairman of the “tenants' association” who oversees the Moscow apartment where Woland, disguised as a foreign interpreter, decides to settle. As the two discuss the rent price, Woland tricks Nikanor into taking a bribe. The man goes home and hides the money in the lavatory, thinking it a safe place. Yet the capricious and all-mighty Woland calls the infamous NKVD, the secret police, and tells them where Nikanor hid the money. Moreover, the money found by the police has magically turned from rubles to US dollars. Nikanor’s explanations are useless and he is arrested. That night:
Nikanor Ivanovich then had a dream, which was undoubtedly inspired by his recent experiences. It began with some people carrying golden trumpets leading him, with great solemnity, to a pair of huge painted doors, where they played a fanfare in Nikanor Ivanovich's honour. Then a bass voice somehow happily said from above :
'Welcome, Nikanor Ivanovich! Hand over your foreign currency! ' Amazed beyond words, Nikanor Ivanovich saw a black loudspeaker in front of him. Then, he somehow found himself in […] a small but luxurious theatre. […] On to the stage came an actor, dinner-jacketed, clean-shaven, his hair parted in the middle , with a young, charming face. The audience’s excitement grew and everybody looked at the stage. The actor advanced to the spotlights and rubbed his hands. “Are you sitting comfortably?” he enquired with his soft baritone and smiled at the audience.
”We are, we are” replied the tenors and basses from the audience. […]Then he changed the tone of his voice and announced happily :“So, the next number on our programme is Nikanor Ivanovich Bosoi, […] A warm welcome for Nikanor Ivanovich!”
At the sound of the friendly applause which greeted his name, Nikanor Ivanovich's eyes bulged with astonishment and the actor, protecting his eyes from the spotlights, found him in the audience and invited him to the stage. Without remembering how, Nikanor Ivanovich found himself on stage. […] “Now Nikanor Ivanovich, set us an example” said the young actor gently and surely “ and hand over the foreign currency.”
Silence. Nikanor Ivanovich took a deep breath and said in a low voice : “I swear to God, I . . .” Before he could finish, the whole audience had burst into shouts of disapproval. Nikanor Ivanovich felt lost and stopped talking.
“If I interpret you correctly' said the artist, ' you were about to swear by God that you had no foreign currency?” He gave Nikanov Ivanovich a sympathetic look.
“That's right. I haven't any”
“I see,” said the actor. “But ... if you'll forgive my indelicacy . . . where did those four hundred dollars come from, those found in the lavatory of your flat, of which you and your wife are the sole occupants?”
“They were magic ones!” said a sarcastic voice somewhere in the dark auditorium.
“That's right, they were magic ones” said Nikanor Ivanovich timidly, addressing no one in particular, nor the artist, not the public and added : “an evil spirit, that interpreter in a check suit planted them on me.” Again the audience roared in protest.
This nightmare could come out of a personal diary of a “show trial” victim in the 1930s. As in Nugumanova’s paper, silence is an element of alienation from the institutions (the judging actor in Nikanor’s dream) and the crowd. The individual, cherishing and defending his worthless truth – “I swear to God”—has no voice against the crushing force of the State.
All dreams mentioned so far, whether real or imaginary, belong to the oppressed. What about the dreams of the powerful? Do dictators and their functionaries dream of the political terror they impose on people?
What happens when Power dreams? Pontius Pilate’s eternal guilt
Using the device of a story within a story, Bulgakov dedicates several chapters to the Master’s unpublished manuscript, giving full space to his interpretation of the Gospels. Chapter two suddenly takes the reader from Stalinist Moscow to 1st Century Jerusalem where a certain Yeshua Ha Notzri stands in front of the Roman Governor of Judea Pontius Pilate, for a definitive condemnation or absolution (Yeshua Ha Notzri is the Aramaic version of Jesus of Nazareth). The parallel between the two Empires—Roman and Soviet—can be drawn on many levels: Yeshua is the innocent victim of Power; Pontius Pilate is the high fonctionnaire, forced to apply the unjust Law; Judas is the snitcher, a constant figure during Soviet Union’s purges.
After a long interrogation turned into a philosophical conversation, Pilate is fascinated by the wisdom and goodness of Yeshua and is about to set him free. Yet one last accusation rapidly puts an end to Yeshua’s hopes. He had preached to his followers the uselessness of power, including the Roman Empire “All authority is violence over people, and a time will come when there will be no power, nor Caesars […].”
Despite Pilate’s efforts to get him out of trouble, Yeshua refuses to retract this sentence. The Roman governor has no choice but to confirm the death sentence. Pilate acted out of loyalty to the Roman Emperor, but he is consumed by guilt: he condemned an innocent “philosopher who preached peace”. The night after the crucifixion, he has a dream. A moon ray lands on him, and he walks onto it toward the moon:
[N]ext to him walked the wandering philosopher. They were discussing something very complex and important, and neither of them could win over the other. They could not agree on any point, and this made their discussion particularly interesting and interminable. No doubt that the execution that day had been a mere misunderstanding: the philosopher who had come up with such an incredibly absurd thing as the universal goodness of men was walking beside him, so he was alive. And, of course, it would have been horrible even to think that such a man could be executed. The execution had not happened! It had not happened!
[…] Cowardice is undoubtedly one of the most terrible vices, said Yeshua. No, philosopher, I object: that is the most terrible vice of all! […] But for goodness sake, philosopher! How, with your intelligence, could you think that because of a man who committed a crime against Caesar, the prosecutor of Judea would ruin his career?
- Yes, Yes... - groaned and sobbed Pilate in his sleep.
Of course, he would ruin it. In the morning he would not, but now, at night, weighing everything, he was ready to ruin it. He was ready to do anything to save from execution that foolish dreamer!
-Yes, do not forget me, speak of me [as the] son of the astrologer - Pilate asked in his dream. And having been assured of this […] the cruel governor of Judea wept and laughed with joy in the dream.
This dream is the reverse of those dreamt by the oppressed. Pilate suffers for having exercised his power on a powerless man. He feels guilt and loneliness. He desperately needs to believe, as the “foolish” Yeshua, that men are good, that he himself can be good. Pilate asks Yeshua to remember of him as the son of the astrologer, not as the powerful governor of Judea. As to say: I am still my father’s child, I can do it all over again, and this time I will do it all differently. Nothing is more hateful and unbearable to him than his absolute power.
The current war has brought Russia back to Soviet-era terror. Repression is once again shaping people’s minds and has reached the most intimate domain of people’s lives: dreams. If fear and loneliness haunt the victims, one can only wonder about the perpetrators: do Russian high functionaries dream like Pontius Pilate?
Raimondo Lanza is an Italian researcher in Political Science and Sociology, currently based in Paris. After graduating from Saint Petersburg State University with a thesis on Russian humour and its political implications, he has focused his research on Russia’s popular culture. His main interests are identity, language, stereotypes, jokes and dream-life. He cooperates with think tanks such as Aspen Institute and Institut Français des Relations Internationales (IFRI).
Nikita Kravtsov is a Ukrainian artist born in Yalta in 1988. He graduated from the National Academy of Fine Arts and Architecture of Kyiv in 2010. Lives and works in Paris. Since 2015, he collaborates with his partner Camille Sagnes under the name TheTooth&TheRoot. The duo has conceived numerous exhibitions in France and abroad. Their videos, installations, paintings and embroideries constantly underline the fateful nonsense that our society seems to be heading towards. Very active since the beginning of the russian war against Ukraine, Kravtsov regularly intervenes in the street to raise public opinion through frescoes, stencils, wild posting and other creative means. Photo © Alexander Chekmenev