Red July

This summer Finland's YLE Radio 1 will hold a Punainen heinäkuu (Red July). From July 4 through August 1 it will broadcast features on the history, culture, literature, sociology, science, political reality and daily life of the Soviet Union from 1917 until 1991. Advertised programming includes a discussion of the concept of homo sovieticus (Soviet man), a feature on Soviet schools and education, and broadcasts of material from Finnish state radio archives, interspersed with such musical rarities as the 1945 recording of the Sibelius 80th birthday concert in Moscow. While it all sounds as though it could merely be the pretext for a long month of unhealthy nostalgia (and the fake Cyrillic lettering on the web page arouses one's worst suspicions), one should remember that until quite recently critical discussion of the Soviet Union was officially discouraged in Finland. Only since the publication of books like Esko Salminen's Vaikeneva valtiomahti? (The Silent Estate?) [1996], with its searching historical study of Finlandization, has it been possible for the many complex issues raised by Finland's relations with its giant neighbour to be aired in public. The series of programmes will also include work by younger Finnish writers born in the 1970s, and will feature a radio play by Sofi Oksanen (born 1977), Siniposkiset tytöt (The Girls With Blue Cheeks), about Estonia in the postwar years. Other items on offer, such as the feature on the poet Mayakovsky and his significance in Soviet life, look distinctly less promising, though it's hard to tell in advance. But for all the apparent tedium of some of the contributions to this month-long "carnival", in which the country will relive a large chunk of its recent past (independence was, after all, only achieved in 1917, when Soviet recognition was granted), the fact that such material can be re-broadcast at all in this way, and especially with an editorial commentary, is encouraging. As a footnote to the advertised items, it's amusing now to read a Finnish radio listener's exasperated comments, reproduced from 1979:

"Tämä on jo toinen ohjelma Neuvostoliitosta tänään! Se on liikaa! Kohtuus pitää sentään olla kaikessa!"

"I mean, this is the second programme about the Soviet Union today! That is too much! There really should be moderation in all things!"