Роман в письмах: механизм диалога власти и общества в эпистолярном жанре
An Epistolary Novel: The Interaction Between Government and Civil Society through Letters

Summary/Abstract: The article investigates citizens’ letters addressed to officials in the second half of the 20th century. The authors show that people perceived the government as a multicomponent structure. People addressed their letters to the leaders of the Soviet State, to the central government and local authorities, to various social institutions, as well as to journals and newspapers. Soviet citizens often addressed their letters both to the central newspapers such as Trud (Labour), Izvestiia (News), Krokodil (Crocodile) and to local ones. Soviet citizens wrote their letters hoping to solve their everyday problems as well as in response to propaganda and agitation. To understand the specifics of this epistolary discourse, one should investigate both the issues discussed in a letter and its format: politeness formulas, emotions, arguments, etc. The research shows that Soviet citizens treated authorities through the prism of social and political guidelines and patterns. The chronological analysis enables the researchers to explore the evolution of the interaction between citizens and authorities and the dynamics of citizens’ confidence in the actions of the government. The research shows that in the second half of the 20th century citizens viewed the actions of the government with growing criticism. In their letters, citizens did not express requests, they criticized. The ideology experienced a crisis, the gap between common people and authorities was growing, letter writers were more demanding, social trust was gradually declining to increase during the Era of Perestroika. The authors conclude that social transformations had a great impact on the interaction between society and authorities.

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