A Story I Can't Put on the Internet; Seth Update; A Story I Can Put on the Internet (About Lenin)

Well, my days of flying under the radar registrationwise caught up to me and over the last week I was led into the Kafkaesque world of Russian justice, if only a for a day or so. On a side note, when I described to a friend the situation at the local police/registration office as кафкаский [kafkaskii], (which isn't a word) I mispronounced the word and it came out as какаский [kakaskii] which sounds more like poopy (also not quite a real word).

In other news, I signed away my life for the next five or so years to the University of Toronto's History department. I think most people knew who read this knew that but I confirmed it recently so why not post it.

The last story is related to my start as a professional historian. While digging through some 1920s Rostov Party documents I found an important missing piece of Soviet history. That Joseph Stalin and Leon Trotsky struggled for power and that the former benefited from Lenin's demise before Trotsky could fully establish himself in power is quite well known. Some "conspiracy theorists" have even supposed that Stalin went as far as to kill Lenin for political benefit. This theory was unsubstantiated...until now.

Stalin was well aware that he could not kill Lenin in a way that would leave evidence. This precluded most conventional means of murder. At the Tenth Party Conference in March, 1921, Stalin overheard Trotsky tell Marshal Tukhachevsky that Lenin had "laughed himself silly" that night and would be in no condition to speak the next day. Stalin deduced, correctly, that if he could tell a stunningly hilarious joke, or several very funny jokes, Lenin would laugh himself to death.

Perhaps the most intriguing facet of Stalin's plot is that it forced both Stalin and Trotsky to play to their weaknesses. Stalin, a noted and ruthless political tactician, was dour with a very dark sense of humor. (Funny hmm rather than ha ha .) Trotsky, on the other had, was known as "the original Marxist brother" and Lenin himself frequently called Trotsky "the funniest Jew I know." This coming from a man who knew a lot of Jews in his lifetime.

Stalin's first attacks (the self-deprecating and avant-garde "Black Ass Series," largely written by up-and-coming Georgian Party member Anastas Mikoyan) came as a complete surprise to Trotsky and sent Lenin to the hospital several times. Trotsky's first attempt to foil these assaults was to calm Lenin by saying "that's not funny" or "respect the solemnity of the Kremlin." Lenin, however, frequently mistook these remarks as deadpan follow-up jokes, inducing even more laughter.

Eventually Trotsky gained the upper hand by ensuring that Lenin's wife, who had no taste for racial humor, (even if it was true) was always in the room when Stalin was around. By 1923, Trotsky had practically defeated Stalin's plot by introducing the Lenin's Little Interns program, for which a rotating group of 11 year-olds followed Lenin around the clock. (Stalin had practically defeated himself with the self-written bomb, "You Might Be a Communist If..." which Lenin dismissed as "hokey" and "too populist" for his taste.) In fact, Soviet history may have taken an entirely different path if not for the Donskoi Oblast Union of Municipal Service Workers.

On March 23, 1923, the Union named Lenin an honorary pipe fitter--just the weapon that Stalin needed. At that point in Russian humor the technology of inuendo was underdeveloped. (To this day, most Russian humor is relatively crude.) Yet a young Vyacheslav Molotov was cracking sides with the insinuation that Lenin's honorary pipe was located in his pants. Stalin managed to spirit Molotov to his Moscow dacha before Trotsky had heard of the new weapon. Over the next three months, Molotov developed a routine hilarious to adults yet undetectable to children.

In a final affront to what he thought was a defeated opponent, Trotsky invited Stalin to speak at the Lenin's Little Interns' alumni meeting in August, 1923. Stalin's act ("If the Pipe Fit, Get to It") proved a fatal blow to Lenin and sent several of the Little Interns--the oldest of whom were 14-- to the hospital. Particularly damaging were the bits about "Comrade Lenin laying more pipe in Buriatia than railroads," followed by the slanty eye face, and the one about Lenin's expertise, or lack thereof, in dealing with Mrs. Lenin's plumbing.

For the next five months, Lenin languished in the hospital, occasionally showing improvements but falling to pieces every time Stalin's name was mentioned. On January 21, 1924, Stalin bribed a busty nurse to serve Lenin, along with his lunch, a wrench, and suggest that she was leaking. This was more than Lenin's fragile health could stand. His last words, barely discernable through violent laughter, were, "Stalin, you are the king!"