The following article appeared in the Fall 1999 issue of The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies (Vol. 1, No. 1):  1-26.   For an introductory essay on how Chris Matthew Sciabarra discovered Ayn Rand's college transcript from the University of Leningrad, now St. Petersburg, see his article in the October 1999 issue of Liberty.  For reviews of this particular historical discussion, see essays by Scott Ryan and William Thomas.  (This article also cited by Don Parrish in his fascinating survey of "Ayn Rand Sites in Saint Petersburg.")  See also "In Search of the Rand Transcript" and "The Rand Transcript, Revisited."

THE RAND TRANSCRIPT

By Chris Matthew Sciabarra

 For many years, scholars have sought to understand Ayn Rand’s early education in an attempt to identify possible influences on her intellectual development. Regrettably, very little information has been available on one important phase of that education: her studies at the University of Leningrad in the years 1921-1924.

Having recovered Rand’s college transcript, I am now in a position to shed greater light on this subject.¹ I have investigated the nature and significance of the courses that it lists, and the orientation of the professors who probably taught those courses. This essay provides a brief discussion of the transcript’s contents and concludes with some reflections on one important pattern that I see in Rand's studies.

The official transcript copy is signed by the Director of the Central State Archive of St. Petersburg, T. Z. Zernova (30 October 1998).²  The transcript reports that Alissa Zinovievna Rosenbaum, born in 1905, entered the university on 2 October 1921 and graduated from the Social Pedagogical Division of the Faculty (or College) of the Social Sciences of Leningrad State University. This three-year course of the obshchestvenno - pedagogicheskoe otdelenie (Department of Social Pedagogy) was part of the new social science curriculum at the university, which had united the existing schools of history, philology, and law. The integration of the historical and philosophical disciplines sought to prepare students for careers as social science educators.

The transcript confirms all of those facts that I had previously uncovered in the official Rosenbaum dossier, dated 6 August 1992, as part of my research for Ayn Rand: The Russian Radical (1995). It also provides an additional piece of information: that Rosenbaum received her Certificate of Graduation (Diploma No. 1552) on 13 October 1924. Most importantly, it tells us that during her period of study, Rosenbaum passed--or "received credit for" or "fulfilled the requirements of"--twenty-six courses. These are important qualifications for no grades are recorded therein. Rand’s claim to Barbara Branden (1986, 54) that she had "graduated from the university with the highest honors" remains unconfirmed. In fact, during this period, Rand may have done well on her exams, but academic performance was assessed simply as pass or fail, with a "retake" option for those students who received failing grades (Konecny 1994, 201).

As I indicate in my Liberty article detailing the relentless search for the Rosenbaum transcript, it was the Ayn Rand Institute (ARI) that first discovered the document. When I had been in negotiations with the ARI to secure a copy of the transcript--a negotiation that eventually failed--its officials had noted that the signatures on the transcript were illegible. That fact was confirmed by the university archivists, who were unable to decipher any of the signatures on the document. However, the ARI officials had insisted that they could not detect the signature of Nicholas Onufrievich Lossky. Its presence, they believed, would have confirmed, once and for all, that he was, indeed, one of Rand's teachers--a question raised by my own work in Russian Radical.

At the time, neither I nor the ARI officials were aware that the signatures next to each listed course were not necessarily or ordinarily those of the teacher. In most, if not all, cases, the signatures were of the rector, or the vice rector, or the dean of the social sciences, or the department chair. (During the period in question, the school moved to unite the social sciences and the humanities.³  Prior to 1922, the Rector was V. M. Shimkevich, while the dean of the Social Sciences was N. S. Derzhavin. There were many other officials who would have acted as official signatories on the document.) Given this fact, even legible signatures, analyzed by handwriting experts, would not necessarily yield more information on the specific teacher of each course.

Nevertheless, a more detailed examination of the university archives might reveal additional information both about the courses offered and the professors who taught them. That investigation awaits the attention of future scholars. At this stage of our inquiry, we can identify the following twenty-six courses, listed chronologically, and taken by Rand between the Fall of 1921 and the Spring of 1924:⁴

1. General Theory of the State and the State Structure in the RSFSR (Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic) and the USSR (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics) ⁵

This course was a fairly straightforward rendering of the Bolshevik politics of the Soviet Union, presented in proletarian class-conscious, Marxist-Leninist terms. Konecny (1994) informs us that during this period "obligatory courses on topics such as political economy, the history of the Russian Communist Party, and the Soviet Constitution" were introduced into the university (111). These party courses did not become compulsory until 1925. While there were few bona fide communist professors in 1921, the courses were still highly recommended for all students (117).

2. History of the Development of Social Forms

This examined the development of human social relations from the perspective of both Marxist and non-Marxist political thinkers. It included a study of social formations--and their effects on the lives of individuals--as they emerged over time. Heavily infused with notions of historical materialism and evolutionary development, the course was probably taught by the Marxist, K. M. Takhtarev.

3. Psychology

Courses in psychology were actually courses in philosophical psychology, offered by the Department of Philosophy.⁶  Such coursework focused on the philosophy of mind, and on the nature of introspection, self-observation, and volition.⁷   The most likely teacher of this course was the celebrated neo-Kantian, Ivan Ivanovich Lapshin.⁸  Like Lossky, Lapshin stressed the importance of mutual immanence in his rejection of solipsism and its "‘false metaphysical dualism between things in themselves and the knowing subject'" (quoted in Zenkovsky 1953, v.2, 689). Lapshin had taught this course several times between 1897-98 and 1917-18.⁹ But as a critic of dialectical materialism, he was eventually exiled in 1922, along with many other intellectuals, including Lossky.

4. Logic

This Department of Philosophy course featured all the traditional discussions of the Aristotelian syllogism, deduction, and inductive inference, as well as an examination of typical logical fallacies. From 1889, it was usually taught by the chair of the department, Aleksandr Ivanovich Vvedensky, also a Russian Idealist philosopher and psychologist, and one of the most important representatives of the neo-Kantian movement in Russia. Vvedensky had served as the president of the St. Petersburg Philosophical Society in 1899. He taught the reality and efficacy of free will, and argued that "the function of logic is to verify what is known and not to reveal the unknown" (GSE 1974, v.4, 647). Despite his deep disagreements with the Marxists, he remained an active participant in the debates over materialism in the early 1920’s, until his death in 1925. He had been a mentor to Lapshin, Askoldov, and Lossky, and was an exceptionally gifted lecturer who attracted thousands of students during his tenure at the university.¹⁰

After 1923, the Marxist, Borichevsky, taught the course in logic--but his expertise was limited to Spinoza, Epicurus and materialism. Given that Rand took this course early in her academic career, probably in the fall of 1921, it seems certain that she studied with Vvedensky.¹¹  It is of some interest that this was not the only course on logic that Rand ever took. After graduating Leningrad University, she entered a two-year program at the State Institute for Cinematography, in Leningrad, as a means of honing her writing craft for the screen. Screenwriting was not offered in the first--and only--year of the program in which Rand enrolled. But she did take courses in art history, stage fencing, biodynamics, film make-up, social studies, dance, cinematography and logic (Rand 1999, 10).

5. French Language

Rand had been exposed to the French language from a very young age, as her mother had insisted, since this would enable her to read many of the classics of modern literature in their original language, including the works of her beloved Victor Hugo. To take this elective was hardly a surprising choice for the young Rand, who probably sought college credit for a language in which she was already fairly proficient.

6. Historical Materialism

A formal study of historical materialism was recommended for undergraduates. It was this course that probably led the mature Rand to reject "dialectics"--since the Soviets virtually identified the two concepts. For the Soviet Marxists of the period, dialectics was historical materialism, a study of the primacy of the economic forces in history and their predominating effects on other aspects of the social totality. The course would have examined the so-called "inexorable laws of historical development," with an emphasis on the resolution of internal contradictions that would propel the world toward the triumph of communism.

7. History of World-Views (Ancient Period)

In her interviews with Barbara Branden (1986), Rand claimed that she had taken "an elective course on the history of ancient philosophy" with the distinguished N. O. Lossky, wherein she studied the pre-Socratics, Plato, and Aristotle (42). In Russian Radical, I argued that the relationship between Rand and Lossky was "of paramount historical importance because it was probably Lossky who introduced Rand to dialectical methods of analysis" (41). But the book raised some doubts about Rand's claims. Because of these doubts, some critics dismissed my attempts to link Rand and Lossky, even though this dismissal damned the integrity of Rand's recollections.

When it first came to my awareness that the Estate of Ayn Rand had secured a copy of the transcript, it was the possibility of a full resolution of the Lossky puzzle that most interested me. In my failed negotiations to secure a copy of the transcript from the Estate, the ARI officials claimed that they could not identify any listed courses on the history of ancient philosophy. I had hypothesized originally that such a course might be untraceable, since it may have been offered as an elective through the university's annex, to which Lossky had been relegated in the 1921-22 academic year. But I was convinced that the ARI’s officials simply did not know what to look for in the transcript. When I finally received an official transcript copy from the Central State Archives, my suspicions were vindicated. The presence of this course--on the "History of World-Views" or Weltanschauungen in the "Ancient Period"--constitutes further evidence in support of Rand's memories of this period. Moreover, growing evidence since the publication of Russian Radical has lent greater credence to my case for a Lossky-Rand relationship. For instance, I had examined, in that book, Rand's discussion of the 1917-18 academic year, in which she befriended a classmate, Olga Vladimirovna, sister of the author, Vladimir Nabokov. I discovered that the Nabokov sisters, both Olga and Helene, had attended the Stoiunin Gymnasium during the period in question. The gymnasium was founded in 1881 by Maria Nikolaievna Stoiunina and Vladimir Stoiunin, the parents of Lossky's wife. Lossky actually taught classes in logic and psychology at the school from 1898 to 1922. It is now virtually certain that the young Rand learned of him while she studied at this famous school for young women.

At the time that I wrote my book, Helene Sikorski, Olga's surviving sister, did not recall ever having met Ayn Rand. She later asked my forgiveness: "I am now 90 years old," she said. It was only after the book was published that she "regret[ted] sincerely" the "delay" in her memory (personal correspondence, 3 January 1996). Before writing to me, she had corresponded directly with Boris Lossky, son of Nicholas Onufrievich. The Nabokov family had known the Losskys quite well, and remained in contact even after their departure from Russia in 1919. Boris explained to me that Helene remembered, quite "unexpectedly," that Alissa Rosenbaum had, indeed, "returned for many visits" to the Nabokov mansion on Morskaya Street in St. Petersburg. Alissa conversed endlessly with Olga; both girls were "enraptured by the February revolution" of 1917. Helene did not quite grasp all the implications of these political subjects, but she remembered them--finally.

In my book, I give voice to Boris's own doubts with regard to Rand's overall recollections. When he ultimately accepted that the young Alissa had been friends with Olga Nabokov, he "wanted to call [my] attention to this fact," since it was now "clear that the friendship of Rosenbaum and the Nabokov sisters [was] not an invention of Ayn Rand." These young women had all studied "in the high school of my grandmother Stoiunin," Boris concluded unequivocally. And by implication, since Rand's recollections of the Nabokovs were of an even earlier time period than her alleged studies with his father Nicholas, Boris seemed willing to give greater weight to the specific conclusions of my "creative work" on Rand's college education (personal correspondence, 21 November 1995).

Helene wrote to me to reinforce Boris's conclusions. She apologized again that she "did not recall in time that Ayn Rand was a dear friend of my sister Olga" (personal correspondence, 7 February 1996). She emphasized: "I remember A. Rosenbaum very dimly. It was in 1917 (I was just 11 years old). But both she and my sister were very excited and interested concerning the February revolution, which they both approved. But all these meetings ended in October 1917, when our family left St. Petersburg. I must confess that I never knew that this lady became a famous writer" (personal correspondence, 3 January 1996).¹²

Given the intimate relationship of the Nabokovs and the Losskys, and Rand's close friendship with Olga, it is, indeed, extremely likely that Rand learned of Lossky while in attendance at the school founded and operated by his in-laws, and in which he himself taught. That knowledge may have contributed to her selection of Lossky's course in the spring semester of her freshman year at Petrograd University.

The doubts that I raised concerning Rand's attendance in this specific course centered on two important facts: that Lossky had been removed from "official" university teaching duties prior to his house arrest in August 1922, and his exile in November 1922, and that during the 1921-22 academic year, especially in the Fall semester, he was ill with a gallbladder condition. I speculated that if Lossky taught any college-level courses in the 1921-22 academic year, it would have had to have been offered in the spring semester--since Lossky's health improved dramatically in the winter--and it would have been a course taught from the university annex, the Institute for Scientific Research, to which Lossky was reassigned. Indeed, when M. N. Pokrovsky, of Narkompros (the Commissariat of Enlightenment), had barred Lossky from the premises of the university proper, he did not bar him from teaching university courses from the premises of the annex. The record shows that Pokrovsky sought to remove Lossky from the slate of his regular university duties, since Lossky had been engaging in wholesale attacks on the Bolsheviks and the materialists in each of his courses. Konecny (1994) clarifies some of these issues.¹³  He tells us that Lossky had been quite angry at those boisterous radical students who, he claimed, "were from another planet" (48). Still, says Konecny, Lossky "argued that despite the 'revolutionary fanatics' who constantly corrected him during lectures, he was able to enrich the minds of many young students with the same material he had used for many years" (81).¹⁴   Lossky was even able to give adult education lectures at the Petrograd People’s University.¹⁵  These programs "were established at most universities in order to give the public an opportunity to attend free lectures by professors on a wide variety of topics" (82 n.74). So, while Lossky may have been in danger of forever "forfeiting" his "right to teach [his] own material," due to the demands of "the new Soviet curricula," he continued to lecture with characteristic conviction (92).¹⁶   Hence, though his Spring 1922 activities may have been "untraceable" in the Lossky family "red-book" of his official pedagogical activities, evidence of these activities exists somewhere in the university's archives. Even Boris Lossky, who organized the family "red-book," now believes that it is "perfectly possible" that his father taught this specific course on the history of ancient world-views (interview, 9 January 1999).¹⁷

In previous academic years, Lossky had offered courses on Fichte, Schelling, Hegel, Leibniz, the theory of judgment, free will, trans-subjectivity, contemporary epistemology, metaphysics, and logic. He also taught introductory philosophy classes, and lectured on materialism, hylozoism, and vitalism.¹⁸ None of his listed Petrograd courses in the family's records dealt specifically with Plato, Aristotle, or ancient philosophy--the very subjects that Rand said she studied with him.

Though Lossky had been barred from teaching courses where his anti-materialist, anti-Bolshevik stance would be most obvious, he was not prohibited from teaching survey courses, like the one on ancient world-views. Rand had probably studied (#3 and #4 above) with Lossky's closest intellectual colleagues. Her presumed knowledge of the great Lossky from her experiences at the Stoiunin gymnasium made it even more likely that she would have sought him out at the annex on the strength of recommendation and recollection. (As Lossky's mentor and the department chair, Vvedensky himself was known to recommend his colleague to students in their fulfilment of degree requirements.)

Any doubt that Rand actually studied ancient philosophy in college has now been erased. Given that this course on the history of world-views in the ancient period was sufficiently early in Rand's academic career to qualify as a spring 1922 class, and that the spring semester was the only period in which Lossky could have taught the class, I am convinced now more than ever of the accuracy of Rand's memory.¹⁹ That this course appears precisely where Rand said it would appear is further confirmation of the quality of her memory, which always impressed her biographer, Barbara Branden (1986) for its "range and exactitude" (13). Since we can now confirm Rand's recollections of the Nabokovs and of this specific course, it is no great stretch of the imagination to acknowledge the validity of her recollections of Lossky himself. The circumstances coalesce in time so distinctly that it is difficult to escape the natural conclusion: Rand knew Lossky and studied with him.

One very interesting clue concerning this case emerges from a perusal of Lossky's bibliography. Unbeknownst to me at the time of writing Russian Radical, Lossky published in 1924, in Prague, only a year and a half after this university course, an article entitled "Types of World-Views." This article was subsequently expanded to an 84-page monograph of the same title, published in Paris in 1931. These titles are the only ones bearing the phrase "World-Views" in the entire Lossky corpus. It is significant that they were published so close in time to a 1922 course that dealt with the same topic.²⁰  In these articles, Lossky examined metaphysics as the central philosophical discipline, and classified metaphysical systems from the ancients to the moderns according to their materialist, spiritualist, and panpsychic premises.  He ended with a critique of dualism, proposing an "organic ideal-realist" alternative as a "many-sided philosophical synthesis."   Lossky's textual surveys of the history of philosophy often ended with his dialectical pronouncements, a technique that was typical of his lecturing--which is why he got into such trouble with the authorities. Kline reports that, in his courses in New York in the early 1950’s, Lossky would present the systems of Plato or Kant or Hegel, and then, quite habitually, would add, "But I affirm that . . ."--a preface to his own perspective on the issues.

Ultimately, however, my insistence on the Lossky connection remains symbolic, for he was a paragon of all the dialectical tendencies in Russian thought, of the belief that "‘everything is immanent in everything’" (quoted in Scanlan 1998, 833).²¹   He presented a system in his lectures and books, developing interconnections among metaphysics, logic, philosophical psychology, epistemology, aesthetics, ethics, and philosophy of religion (834). This dialectical orientation was central to the Russian Silver Age, the period of Rand's youth--from its neo-Idealists to its Nietzschean Symbolist poets to its Marxists. It was expressed by every major Russian thinker--from Vladimir Solovyov, who saw the world in terms of universal interconnections, to Aleksandr Herzen, who saw philosophy as an instrument of action.²²   The Rosenbaum transcript makes clear that even if Rand had never met Lossky, she would have benefitted from a profoundly dialectical education. Indeed, this Lossky course was just the tip of the dialectical iceberg.

8. Biology

Prior to 1922, biology was taught by Sergei Nikolaevich Vinogradsky, who became an honorary member of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Vinogradsky left the Soviet Union in 1922, and went to France to direct the division of agricultural microbiology of the Pasteur Institute (GSE, v.5, 1974, 482). In the Spring of 1922, when Rand took biology, Lev Semenovich Berg was its most likely teacher. Berg was one of the organizers, in 1918, of the Geography Institute (GSE, v.3, 1973, 186). He worked in the area of Russian geography and biology. As the author of Theories of Evolution, he embraced an idealist and teleological approach, which emphasized the evolution of biological and social forms.

9. History of Greece

In Russian Radical, I suggested that Rand had enrolled in several literature courses. The transcript shows, however, that Rand did not register for such classes. But literary works were integrated into her history and philosophy studies. This was not unusual, considering the Russian penchant for synthesizing the literary arts with social critique. The State Academic Council had attempted to reduce "parallel" courses in the different departments so as to highlight the "organic" connections among disciplines. In a course on the "History of Greece," Rand studied such classic Marxist texts as A. I. Tiumenev's three-volume, Essays on the Socioeconomic History of Ancient Greece and his Did Capitalism Exist in Ancient Greece? (both of which I highlight in Russian Radical). The Tiumenev works were typical in their stress upon history as a developing unity of complementary "moments":   culture, politics, aesthetics, literature, art, economics, sociology, and philosophy. Such dialectical integrations were taught even by non-Marxist scholars, like Faddei Frantsevich Zelinsky, whose classes on ancient Greece stressed the works of Herodotus, Thucydides, and Greek mythology. Zelinsky focused too on the recovery of antiquity in the works of Friedrich Nietzsche.²³ Other teachers, such as the archaeologist Boris Vladimirovich Farmakovsky, stressed the Hellenistic period of Greek sculpture (GSE, v.27, 1981, 104).

10. History of Rome

Previously, Michail T. Rostovtsev had taught the history of Rome. He was praised by Anatoly V. Lunacharsky, the head of the Commissariat of Enlightenment, for his archeological expertise. Around the time of Rand's tenure, however, it was O. F. Val’dgauer, a 1903 graduate of the university and an historian of ancient art, who probably taught this course. Val’dgauer studied at the University of Munich (1900-03) with the classical archaeologist A. Furtwängler.²⁴  He was an expert in ancient artifacts and documents who "was among the first to introduce scientific methods of organizing museum exhibitions" (GSE, v.4, 1974, 478). Val’dgauer linked his studies of the ancients to crucial issues current in Soviet art studies of the period, including the problems of realism and the portrait. This course used such Marxist texts as V. S. Sergeev’s History of Rome (discussed in Russian Radical).

11. Russian History

It seems odd that in her studies of history, Rand did not focus extensively on the experiences of her native land. Yet, this course was essential for any history major. Taught until 1925 by Sergei Fyodorovich Platonov, a specialist in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Russian history, it used such texts as S. I. Kovalev's General History Course. A representative of the conservative-monarchist tendency in Russian historiography, Platonov was a renowned professor at St. Petersburg from 1899. He eventually became director of the Pushkin House, the Institute of Russian Literature in the Academy of Sciences, from 1925 to 1929. Platonov may have been the target of Marxist critics who doubted his ability to understand "class contradictions," but his work was highly respected. He surveyed the Time of Troubles and focused on social conflict in Russian society. As with Rand's study of ancient history, this course probably included some literary readings. Here, the emphasis would have been on the Golden Age of Russian literature, in which such writers as Tolstoy, Chekhov, and Dostoyevsky represented the "dialectical" conflict of ideas through the characters of their stories.

12. Medieval History

This was the first of five courses that Rand attended on European medieval history. It is no coincidence that Rand studied the Middle Ages so intensely. The Petrograd history department was an internationally acclaimed center of medieval scholarship.²⁵   "Medieval History" was probably the last course that Professor Lev Platonovich Karsavin taught prior to his exile at the end of 1922. A student of Ivan Mikhailovich Grevs, and brother of the Russian ballerina, Tamara Platonovna Karsavina, he earned his degree at St. Petersburg. He began teaching in 1912 at the St. Petersburg Institute of History and Philology, and was appointed professor of history at the University of St. Petersburg in 1916. He held the chair of the history department until his departure. Karsavin was a close intellectual associate of Lossky. Influenced by Solovyov, he sought to create a unified religious world-view. As the Great Soviet Encyclopedia puts it, Karsavin interpreted Solovyov’s concept of "total-unity"

as a dynamic principle of development, of "growth of being," and consequently as a fundamental category of the historical process: any existing thing does not so much "exist" as "become" and thus appears as one of the manifestations of total-unity. Interpreted in this manner, historicism becomes a universal principle in Karsavin's metaphysical system, rendering it in certain respects similar to Hegel's dialectical process. (GSE, v.11, 1976, 463)

As a specialist in the history of medieval religions and spiritual life, Karsavin stressed, in all his works and lectures, the interlocking coincidence of opposites in historical development. For Karsavin, as Zenkovsky (1953) puts it, "everything is connected in one whole" (v.2, 851). Historical science is a structured totality, an organic unity, in which different levels of generality--the person, the family, the nation--relate internally, with each constituting and expressing the other. Studying with Karsavin, Rand may have rejected his spiritualist monism--much as she had rejected the materialist monism of the Marxists. But she would have learned, yet again, the dialectical form of social and philosophical analysis. As a nonreductionist orientation, dialectics cautions against the reification of culture, politics, economics, ethics, ideology or language as wholes unto themselves. Each aspect is mutually implied in every other aspect, Karsavin declared, and all the aspects taken together are dynamically and systemically related in the constituted whole.

In "Medieval History," Rand would have also studied important historical works, including such pre-Marxist classics as P. Vinogradov's Book of Readings on the History of the Middle Ages and D. N. Egorov's The Middle Ages through Their Monuments.

13. History of Socialism

Among the standard Marxist social science courses that were recommended for study was this survey of the history of socialism (David-Fox 1997, 61). Part intellectual history, part social history, the course covered the gamut from ancient Platonic expressions of collectivism through the utopians, Marxists, and revisionists. Among the teachers of this course was Aleksandr Evgen’evich Presniakov, a 1907 graduate of the university who, despite his socialist politics, did not agree entirely with Marxist ideology. Presniakov began as a privatdocent at St. Petersburg, and was appointed professor in 1918. A member of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR from 1920, Presniakov taught also at the Institute of Red Professors. The Bolsheviks had "attempted to convert the existing higher education structure into a network of academic institutions training specialists for the demands of a socialist society" (Konecny 1994, 1). The Institute was a graduate-level Bolshevik training center for higher learning that sought to boost Marxist university scholarship in the social science programs, achieving a veritable "Revolution of the mind" (David-Fox 1997, 133, 23).

There was a marked change in the content of Presniakov’s scholarship over time. His prerevolutionary works expressed a "positivist" sociology that centered on such topics as the history of political relations and state formation in pre-sixteenth-century Russia, the sources of sixteenth-century Russian chronicles, and the history of nineteenth-century social thought (GSE v.20, 1977, 524). But after the 1917 revolution, Presniakov moved toward mastering Marxist dialectical methods, as reflected both in his writings and lectures. He focused primarily on socioeconomic questions and the history of revolutionary movements--the important and inseparable link between theory and practice, an omnipresent theme throughout Russian intellectual history.

14. Special Course: Social Movements in 14^th Century France

This was the first of several "special courses" that Rand attended. A special course, in which a half-dozen students participated, was similar in style to a seminar. Seminars, however, were usually open only to senior undergraduates majoring in history. During this period, more and more seminar-like courses, stressing "activity methods of teaching," were introduced into the university's social science curriculum. "Social Movements in 14^th Century France" was probably taught by the famous liberal historian, Nikolai Ivanovich Kareev, who, as an Idealist, was somewhat critical of Marxism. Like Lossky, Kareev stressed the "personalist" credo that "‘the individual is the supreme principle in the philosophy of history’" (quoted in Zenkovsky, v.1, 375). Stressing the role of ideas, he was, like the mature Rand, extremely critical of the monistic approach of Marxists who advocated "economic materialism" as the sole causal agent in social evolution. Moreover, he was adamantly opposed to censorship. In 1899, he had actually been expelled, along with the historian Grevs, by the Ministry of Education, following his demonstration against Tsarist police intervention at the university (Konecny 1994, 31). Kareev was an outstanding Russian sociologist and an expert in historiography. With Grevs, he lamented the post-revolutionary impediments to genuine democratization in higher education, and worked tirelessly to augment one-on-one personalized study between students and professors.²⁶

Kareev counted among his influences Nicholas G. Chernyshevsky (who had made a huge impact on Lenin), N. A. Dobroliubov, D. I. Pisarev, and the Populists, P. L. Lavrov and N. K. Mikhailovsky. But he was also affected by Marx's Capital--making him a rather eclectic intellectual. Though Kareev's work on the French peasantry exhibited certain "positivist" assumptions, Marx himself praised it as "first-rate." Kareev's The Peasants and the Peasant Question in the Last Quarter of the 18^th Century (1879) was among his many published books. Others included: Studies in the History of the French Peasants From Earliest Times to 1789 (1881); a 3-volume dissertation, Basic Questions of the Philosophy of History (1883-90); a seven-volume History of Western Europe in Modern Times (1892-1917); and a three-volume study of Historians of the French Revolution, praised by the Soviets as "the first composite survey--not only in Russian but anywhere in the historical literature--of the historiography of the Great French Revolution" (GSE, v.11, 1976, 441).

In a course such as this, Kareev would have stressed the interlocking political, economic, military, and religious dynamics of the period, during which France warred with England, and was internally divided by peasant restlessness and the spread of the "money economy." Kareev brought to his students the high quality of his scholarship.

15. Special Course: History of the Crusades

In this special course, Rand probably studied with the renowned historian, Ol'ga Antonovna Dobiash-Rozhdestvenskaia. "Dr. Dobiash," as she was known, was widely acknowledged for her work in medieval history and paleography. Of greater significance, perhaps, was her status as "the first woman in Russia to receive a master's degree (1915) and doctorate (1918) in general history." Her work, in scholarly descriptions and the printed catalogs of early Latin manuscripts, was central to her position, from 1922 to 1939, in the manuscript section of the Saltykov-Shchedrin State Public Library (GSE, v.8, 1975, 329). Dr. Dobiash was originally a teacher at the Bestuzhevskii Women's Courses, a higher or post-secondary school for women that by the turn of the century was granted university accreditation for most of its offered classes.²⁷  But as a Leningrad University professor, a member of the Academy of Sciences, and a model for women educators, Dr. Dobiash was first and foremost a cultural historian. Her lectures on the crusades focused on the importance of culture and its interconnections with religion, politics, and economics. Almedingen (1941) describes her as "thorough." In fact, Dr. Dobiash was known for grilling her students, especially those in "formal seminar studies" (209).

16. Modern History

This was the first in a series of courses that Rand took on "modern history."  It was probably taught by Evgenii V. Tarle, whose work in Marxist historiography was fast becoming even more important than the work of Kareev. A frequent lecturer at the Petrograd House of Scholars, he was decidedly "non-Marxist," however (Konecny 1994, 140). Tarle was a student of I. V. Luchitsky. He wrote many works, including those on Royer-Collard, G. Canning, C. Parnell, L. Gambetta, Lord Rosebery, an analysis of More's Utopia (his master's thesis), and a two-volume doctoral dissertation on The Working Class in France During the Revolutionary Epoch. In fact, he qualified as "the first historian of the Russian school to focus on the history of the working class" (GSE, v.25, 1978, 385). Tarle's prolific writing drew from his archival work in Paris, London, and the Hague. After defending his doctoral thesis in 1911, he went on to write such books as The Continental Blockade (1913) and The Economic Life of the Kingdom of Italy During the Reign of Napoleon I (1916). His later work centered on European imperialism, Napoleon, Talleyrand, the history of diplomacy, the French bourgeoisie, and the Crimean war. These works contributed to his receipt, in the 1940’s, of three State Prizes. He also authored textbooks on higher education.

In terms of his historiography, Tarle moved closer to the Marxists as he interpreted modern history from "a historical viewpoint" (GSE, v.25, 1978, 386). This process-oriented approach was reflected both in his books and lectures.²⁸

17. Modern History of the West

It seems likely that Rand studied with Kareev, who probably taught course #14 as well. Indeed, Kareev's work in Western history was unparalleled. The class probably used Kareev's own seven-volume work on The History of Western Europe in Modern Times, which, despite its "eclecticism," was praised by the Soviets, who cited "its wealth of factual material" in which "socioeconomic processes are accorded an important place" (GSE, v. 11, 1976, 441). He presented a general review of historical conflict from a Marxist perspective, as well as topical studies on the Reformation, the development of culture, and the English Revolution.

18. History of Modern Russia

N. Rozhkov taught "History of Modern Russia" in 1923. It was a survey course that included an examination of everything from the Great Reforms to the February and October Revolutions to the New Economic Policy. It was most likely skewed toward Marxist explanations in terms of economic forces, drawing from such works as M. N. Pokrovsky's Russian History in Briefest (1923).

19. History of Pedagogical Doctrines

In his tenure as head of Narkompros, Lunacharsky had stressed progressive pedagogy, influenced heavily by the teachings of John Dewey.  "Activity methods of learning," with increased pupil participation and student-teacher meetings, was the educational credo of the day. Dewey’s works on educational theory and practice were published in the Soviet Union. In fact, from 1918 to 1923, five of Dewey's books were translated.²⁹ As I argue in Russian Radical, it is entirely possible that Rand studied progressive pedagogy closely; this early exposure to Dewey's educational theories may have left an impression, since she remained deeply critical of the progressive approach.³⁰

"History of Pedagogical Doctrines" was probably taught by V. A. Zelenko.³¹ In addition to stressing progressive pedagogy, Zelenko incorporated crucial dialectical insights into his lectures, noting especially the links between education and socio-economic principles, and the integration of socialist culture, science, and art.

20. Methodology of the Social Sciences

Whether this course was actually taught by Tarle or Kareev or even Takhtarev, it centered on one essential theme: dialectical method as applied to the social sciences.³² Most certainly, this dialectical application was heavily infused with Marxist concepts steeped in historical materialism. It was this kind of "dialectic materialism" that Rand rejected unequivocally.³³  But the dialectical form of its presentation was crucial. It required that one view society as a developing system, that is, not as a random conglomeration of unrelated organizations and institutions, but as an integrated, evolving totality of related structures and processes. It stressed "reciprocity between things and the reciprocity of aspects and moments within a thing" (GSE, v.8, 1975, 190). It celebrated Lenin's "methodological conclusion," "one of the basic principles of the dialectic," that "in order to genuinely know an object, one must seize it and study it from all sides, with all its interconnections and [mediations]" (GSE, v.8, 1975, 186).³⁴

21. The Politics and Organization of Popular Education in the USSR

This course, which discussed the branches of Soviet education, was probably taught by Zelenko, who was the likely teacher of course #19. Given that Rand was enrolled in the Department of Social Pedagogy, both courses were probably part of the curriculum, which sought to increase the number of educators in the Soviet Union.

22. Special Course: History of Medieval Trade

This "special course" was most likely taught by Grevs, who was a specialist in medieval European history. He focused on the fathers of the Latin Church and on the medieval humanists, Dante and Petrarch, but was also well-known for his work on the development of socio-economic forms. Like N. D. Fustel de Coulanges, Grevs saw continuity between the social structure of the late Roman period and the early Middle Ages. He authored such works as Essays From the History of Roman Landownership and Essays on Florentine Culture (GSE, v.7, 1975, 418). Of greatest significance, perhaps, was Grevs's prominent advocacy of higher education for women. He was a pioneer of the seminar system and of university field trips, and it is likely that Rand would have benefited from his intense interest in promoting the intellectual success of his women students. Among the texts that would have been used by Grevs was D. M. Petrushevsky's Essays on the Economic and Social History of Medieval Europe, despite its decidedly non-Marxist tenor.

23. Political Economy

Part of the standard Marxist social science curriculum (David-Fox 1997, 61), this course may have been taught by the Marxist, N. A. Trebesnul, who also taught on the "Sociology of Labor." It entailed a study of contemporary Marxist concepts of economic analysis, including the labor theory of value, the exploitation theory, the critique of capitalism--and the communist alternative as exemplified by the new Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

24. Seminar in Modern History (16^th Century England)

In what was probably Rand's final semester at the university, she registered for senior-level seminars in history, the first of which was probably taught by Sergei Rozhdestvensky, who specialized in sixteenth-century landholding and lectured at the university throughout the 1920’s. He used important Marxist texts by N. M. Pakul and I. I. Semenov on the Dutch and English revolutions, which stressed the interconnections of economics, politics, culture, and ideology. He may have also surveyed some of the period’s great literary works of poetry and drama.

25. Seminar in Modern History (17^th Century France)

This seminar was probably taught by Tarle, who was the most likely teacher of course #16.

26. Seminar in the History of the Middle Ages (the Medieval Estate)

This seminar was probably taught by Grevs, who was the most likely teacher of course #22. Grevs used such texts as D. M. Petrushevsky's Essays on Medieval Society and State.

Ayn Rand: The Russian Radical proposed a daring idea--that Rand had absorbed a dialectical orientation from her teachers. Because there was not much archival information available at the time that I authored my book, I was compelled to "combine significant factual evidence with a certain degree of reasonable speculation" (Sciabarra 1995, 67). The recovered transcript provides more persuasive evidence of Rand’s exposure to some of the finest dialectically-oriented Russian scholars of the Silver Age. Many of these scholars I had previously identified and discussed in Russian Radical as among Rand’s most probable teachers. We now have a clearer picture of the high caliber of Rand’s education; indeed, the quality of her undergraduate coursework was on a par with current doctoral programs in the social sciences--minus the dissertation requirement.

Most importantly, the transcript strengthens the central historical argument of Russian Radical, a thesis quite apart from the question of whether Rand studied with Lossky, or with any other particular scholar. Ultimately, it is the content and method of her education that matters. Indeed, "[w]hether she was reading her Marxist texts or attending the lectures of her non-Marxist professors, Alissa Rosenbaum was fully exposed to the dialectical methods distinctive to Russian thought and scholarship" (81-82). We now have more credible evidence than ever in support of this contention.

Given the character of the subject-matter and of the teachers with whom she probably studied, it is clear that the dialectical motif was present quite explicitly in nearly three-quarters of the courses in which Rand enrolled. In those courses where that motif was distorted by Marxist propaganda, the young Rand still may have gleaned important lessons. For instance, in studying "Historical Materialism" (#6) or "Political Economy" (#23), Rand may have comprehended a key dialectical principle in terms quite different from its materialist monist exposition: that there are reciprocal interactions among the different aspects of society--economics, politics, aesthetics, culture, and psychology--and that these interactions are at the foundation of social change. And while Rand may have rejected the notion of "socialist" culture, science, and art, as put forth in such courses as "History of Pedagogical Doctrines" (#19), she may have learned to appreciate organic connections among seemingly disparate factors, branches of knowledge, and social practices. Even in "Biology" (#8), Rand would not have escaped the process-orientation of dialectical method, since this theme was present in the work of its most likely teacher, L. S. Berg.³⁵

In her full-bodied study of ancient, medieval, and modern history--in courses on Greece (#9), Rome (#10), France (#14, #25), the West (#17), Russia (#18), England (#24), among others--Rand would have been taught to view each society as a structured, dynamic totality of many interrelated aspects. The university historians of the period taught their students to grasp the whole from the vantage point of any part--be it literature, architecture, or social structures--and to synthesize these diverse perspectives into a coherent totality. Through the use of such techniques, Rand's professors provided her with an interdisciplinary, multitextured approach to history that highlighted the integration of theory and practice.

While we will never be completely sure just what Rand learned from her studies, we are now in a better position to understand, at the very least, what Rand studied. On the basis of the transcript, I reaffirm my deeply-held conviction that Rand was educated in the methods of dialectical inquiry, and that this sensibility informed her entire literary and philosophical corpus.

NOTES

1. I detail the discovery of the Rosenbaum transcript in Sciabarra 1999b.  Back.

2. The transcript was translated by George L. Kline on 15 November 1998, with additional translations made by Bernice Rosenthal.  Back.

3. Almedingen (1941) reports that "[b]y 1924 . . . humanities had no longer any room in the Soviet scheme" (333). This would not have affected Rand's studies at all, since she was a 1924 graduate.  Back.

4. I have enlisted the help of several scholars in reconstructing the contents and teachers of the courses herein mentioned. Special thanks to Michael David-Fox, George Kline, Peter Konecny, Bernice Rosenthal, and Philip Swoboda. In his investigation of courses from 1923, TsGa SPb (Central State Archives in St. Petersburg) f.2556, op.1. d.318, Konecny cites additional professors in the Petrograd College of the Social Sciences: M. I. Aranov (NOT course [nauchnaia organizatsiia truda, or scientific organization of labor, an organization set up to improve labor efficiency]); B. S. Martynov (Land Law in the USSR); A. Venediktov (Organization of Industry); V. A. Zelenko (Education and Politics); and Zhizhilenko's course on criminal law. Vladimir Vasilyevich Weidle also taught a course on the history of art.  Back.

5. The expression "obshchee uchenie o gosudarstve" can be translated as "general doctrine" or "general theory of the state." Thanks to both Bernice Rosenthal and George Kline for these varying translations.  Back.

6. George Kline (in a personal correspondence, 8 February 1999) finds it curious that, as a philosophy minor, Rand never took a course in "Introduction to Philosophy," taught by Lossky five times between 1907-08 and 1917-18, by Vvedensky in 1906-07, and by both Sergei Alekseevich Alekseev (who was known as Sergei Alekseev Askoldov) and Semyon Frank in 1916-17 (RP). Thanks to Philip Swoboda for bringing the RP volume to my attention, and to George Kline for translating its relevant pages.  Back.

7. This course may have incorporated some formal classes on the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche, a major influence on the Russian Silver Age. In Russian Radical, I speculated that Rand "was probably among the last students at the university to study Nietzsche’s philosophy formally," before Nietzsche’s works were banned by the Soviets. The transcript discloses no formal courses on Nietzsche’s philosophy, however. I speculated that Rand may have studied with Askoldov or Faddei Frantsevitch Zelinsky, both of whom used concepts from Nietzsche’s work on the nature of the will. Askoldov was also "captivated" by Lossky’s philosophy (Nikolai Starchenko in Kuvakin 1994, 658). In fact, these two thinkers shared a common intellectual heritage: Lossky had identified Askoldov’s father, A. A. Kozlov, the Leibnizian epistemologist, as one of his most important intellectual forebears. Both Askoldov and Lossky were part of the neo-Idealist tradition in Russian philosophy, as was I. I. Lapshin. However, according to RP, Askoldov did not teach psychology in 1916-17 or 1917-18 (though he did teach "Introduction to Philosophy" and "History of Ethics"). He moved to Kazan in 1918, and returned to Petrograd in 1920, where he resumed teaching at the Polytechnical Institute until the mid-1920’s (Alekseev 1995). He was exiled in 1928. Of course, even if she did not study with Askoldov or Zelinsky, Rand read much Nietzsche on her own, and was also enraptured by the writings of the Nietzschean Russian Symbolist, Aleksandr Blok, whom she characterized as her favorite poet. Blok gave regular readings of his work in Petrograd. In addition, one cannot discount the intellectual ties between Rand, Dostoyevsky (one of her favorite literary stylists), and Nietzsche. Nietzsche, in fact, wrote abstracts of many of Dostoyevsky’s works. Their common "existentialist" themes influenced the writings of E. I. Zamyatin, which were circulated in Petrograd literary circles in the early 1920’s. On the similarities between Rand’s Anthem and the "dialectic path" in Zamyatin’s We, see Gimpelevich 1997. Thanks to Richard Shedenhelm for bringing this article to my attention.  Back.

8. Aleksandr Ivanovich Vvedensky had also taught psychology between 1889 and 1912-13, but not between 1914-15 and 1917-18.  Back.

9. Lapshin taught psychology in 1897-98, 1909-10, 1910-11, 1915-16, 1917-18. He was one of the most important Russian philosophers of the period who also taught such courses as: "History of Pedagogical Theories" (1909-10); "History of Modern Philosophy" (1897-98, 1917-18); "History of 19^th Century Philosophy" (1905-06, 1906-07, 1907-08, 1911-12); "History of Noveishaia Philosophy" [presumably late 19^th and early 20^th century philosophy] (1912-13); "Kant's Critique of Pure Reason" (1905-06, 1912-13); "Avenarius" (1907-08); "Kant's Critique of Practical Reason"(a seminar, 1908-09); "Hegel" (1908-09); "Hegel's Logic"(1917-18); "Noveishaia Russian Philosophy" (1908-09); "Bergson and Solovyov" (1911-12); and "Rickert, Cassirer, Husserl" (1915-16). All of this information found in RP; thanks to George Kline for relevant translations.   Back.

10. Vvedensky also taught courses on the "History of Ancient Philosophy" (1896-97, 1907-08, 1909-10, 1911-12, 1915-16, and 1917-18), the "History of Modern Philosophy" (1898-99, 1908-09, 1910-11, 1912-13, 1915-16), the "History of Modern Philosophy Before Kant" (1907-08), and a special course on Plato and Aristotle (1905-06) (RP).   Back.

11. Lossky also taught five different courses in logic ("Logic," "Logical Exercises," a proseminar on "Logic," "Controversial Questions in Logic," and a seminar on Mill’s Logic) between 1905-06 and 1912-13. But there is no record of him teaching Petrograd University logic courses after 1912-13 (RP).  Back.

12. Further discussions with various principals suggests that Helene’s confusion may have derived from her focus on the name "Ayn Rand" rather than on "Alissa Rosenbaum."  Back.

13. Konecny’s work is extremely important. His forthcoming book deals with students at Leningrad University. In his dissertation, Konecny (1994, 31) provides a fine portrait of university life during the 1920’s, a period in which the school had senior scholars, junior faculty members (privat-dotsenty) and teachers (prepodavateli), all of whom were at odds with one another politically. Konecny also pays attention to the 1924 student purge. Those in the social science departments had higher expulsion rates since most of the students came from "white-collar" families. In his work, Konecny refers to Rand's account of student life, immortalized in We the Living (103 n.124).  Back.

14. Among those who were students and/or followers of Lossky, there were D. V. Boldyrev, who examined "knowledge and being" (Zenkovsky 1953, v.2, 918), L. Shein, and Wilhelm Goerdt. Konecny points out correctly (in a personal correspondence, 8 January 1999) that the introduction of curricular reforms in 1921 did not prevent students in 1922 from pursuing "‘non-Marxist’ topics with sympathetic professors, who paid lip service to party decrees but ignored them in private." Konecny admits, however, that "it won’t be possible to find out whether Rand had this kind of relationship" with Lossky or any of her other teachers.  Back.

15. Alekseev (1995) reports that Lossky gave courses at the so-called "People's University" from 1919-21.  Back.

16. It should be noted that while the Soviets exiled Lossky, their allowances for him in the 1921-22 year were extended somewhat even after his exile. When he settled in Czechoslovakia, which fell under Soviet domination after the fall of Nazi Germany, the Soviets allowed him to continue working. Toward the end of the 1940’s, they invited him to lecture on Dostoyevsky at the Society of Soviet Patriots in Paris. This lecture and other essays were published in Sovietsky Patriot, leading to Lossky's subsequent denunciation by the right wing emigré press--just as he had been denounced formerly by the left-wingers at Leningrad State University. In the face of such attacks, Lossky emigrated to the United States. See Starchenko's article, "Nikolai Lossky" in Kuvakin 1994, 663.  Back.

17. The interview was conducted for me, in French, by Jacqueline Balestier. Boris Lossky's memory, unfortunately, is "not what it once was," but, as he remarked, the "good will" remains. Thanks also to Philippe Chamy for speaking with Boris, and for arranging sessions with the interpreter.   Back.

18. Lossky's course offerings were quite diverse. They included: "Introduction to Philosophy"; "History of Modern Philosophy"; "Contemporary Epistemology"; "Kant's Critique of Judgment" (a seminar); "The Marburg School [of neo-Kantians]"; "Avenarius"; "Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel"; and "Leibniz's Ethics and Theodicy" (RP).   Back.

19. Michael Berliner (in Rand 1999) observes that when he found a series of "Russian-language booklets about movie stars" from the mid-1920’s, in Rand’s papers, he had assumed they were mere mementos. In preparing Rand’s lectures on non-fiction writing for publication, Robert Mayhew later told Berliner that Rand had referred to this series, and to her own monograph on Pola Negri (15). Her memory of the period was extraordinary. In discussing Rand’s movie diary (1922-29), Berliner observes too that the journal "provides information not only about her movie preferences but about other things as well. For example, it is the only means of determining where she was on certain dates, for she seemed to go to the movies whenever possible" (111). Given the intensity of her college education, it is interesting that Rand notes having seen only three movies in the 1922-24 period. It is in the last semester at the university, perhaps as her requisite courses dwindled, that Rand records having seen eighteen movies, from 1 March 1924 until her graduation on 15 July 1924. It appears that she went out to the movies the day before graduation, and the day after. See Rand 1999, 173-74. The volume (which I review in Sciabarra 1999a) includes facsimiles and translations of Pola Negri (originally published in 1925, in Leningrad and Moscow, under the name "A. Rosenbaum," by the Cinematographic Publishing House of the Russian Federation) and Hollywood: American City of Movies (originally published in Leningrad in 1926, without the author’s permission, by Cinema Printing, which printed 15,000 copies). Thanks to Mimi Reisel Gladstein for providing me with this original publication information.  Back.

20. As late as 1943, Lossky revisited this particular subject-matter, teaching "History of Ancient Philosophy" at Bratislava University in Czechoslovakia.  Back.

21. On this issue, Lester Hunt (1996) is among the most astute of the commentators on my Russian Radical theses. He argues, quite correctly, that my interpretation of Rand "is helped by an assumed connection with Lossky," even though "it does not require it. Sciabarra claims that dialectic had a strong and widespread effect on the culture around her in those years . . . In particular, it was widespread in the history department, in which Rand majored . . . This is really his main argument, or rather half of it. The other half is that we can find the dialectical approach in her own works, and that looking for it sheds light on them" (53). See also Bradford 1996, which sees my overall historical thesis as "thorough," "convincing," and "overpowering" (40-41).  Back.

22. On Russian intellectual history, see Lossky 1951; Kuvakian 1994. See also Zenkovsky 1953, which traces "the internal unity and dialectical connectedness in the development of Russian philosophy . . ." (v.1, v).  Back.

23. One of Zelinsky’s most important students was the Russian literary critic Michael Bakhtin, who, like Rand, was influenced by both Nietzsche and Dostoyevsky. Bakhtin attended St. Petersburg University during the first World War. He lived in Vitebsk during the 1920-24 period, but returned to Leningrad thereafter where he forged a dialectical perspective on semiotics and interpersonal communication that has influenced such contemporary theorists as Baxter and Montgomery (1996). See also Curtis 1986.  Back.

24. Adolf Furtwängler was the father of famed conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler. Thanks to George Kline (personal correspondence, 24 January 1999) for this information.  Back.

25. Almedingen (1941), who, in the early 1920’s, had first-hand experience of the history department at Petrograd University, provides an informative portrait of the university’s specialists in medieval studies. See Chapter Six.  Back.

26. It is of interest that the names Karsavin and Kareev (also spelled "Kareyev") can be found in Rand's We the Living [and "Red Pawn," respectively]. See Sciabarra 1995, 397 n.37. Almedingen (1941) actually mentions Professor Karsavin, among others, at Petrograd University (204).  Back.

27. Thanks to Peter Konecny for this information (personal correspondence, 29 January 1999). Konecny explains that several professors who taught at the school went to the university after the revolution. Kline observes that these schools offered, in essence, higher education courses for women before women were fully accepted into the university.  Back.

28. Tarle was later arrested in 1930 and tried in November and December as part of the "Industrial Party Trial." L. Ramzin, a Moscow professor of thermodynamics, was the leader of the party, which had allegedly planned to sabotage the Soviet Union's industrialization effort and to topple the government. Tarle was said to have been positioned to be the future government’s Foreign Minister. Like other senior academics, however, Tarle survived the trial, and was "rehabilitated" after 1932, in the Stalinist retreat from "radicalism" in the history profession. This "radical" historical professoriate, embodied by the Pokrovsky school from 1927 to 1932, was later denounced. Thanks to Peter Konecny (personal correspondence, 8 January 1999) for these points.  Back.

29. These five books were: Shkola i obshchestvo [Moscow, 2^nd ed., 1918]--a translation of The School and Society (2^nd rev. ed., 1915); Psikhologiia i pedagogika myshleniia ["The Psychology and Pedagogy of Thinking," Moscow, 2^nd ed., 1919]--a Russian version of How We Think (1910); Vvedenie v filosofiiu vospitaniia ["Introduction to the Philosophy of Education," Moscow, 1921]--presumably a translation of Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education (1916); Shkoly buduschchego ["Schools of the Future," Moscow, 2^nd ed., 1922], co-authored with Evelyn Dewey--a Russian version of Schools of Tomorrow (1915); Shkola i rebenok [Moscow, 1923]--a translation of The School and the Child (1907). Thanks to George Kline (personal correspondence, 29 November 1998; 24 January 1999) for this information. Kline consulted Iuri Mel’vil’s Amerikanskii pragmatizm (American Pragmatism) [Moscow, 1957]. Mel’vil reports that The School and Society was translated by G. A. Luchinsky; Schools of Tomorrow was translated by R. Landsberg; and How We Think was translated under the editorship of Prof. N. D. Vinogradov. Kline explains that "this is a standard formula for a translation done by one or several graduate students or others, and ‘edited’ by a professor" (personal correspondence, 24 January 1999).  Back.

30. See, for instance, her essay on "The Comprachicos" in Rand 1975.  Back.

31. Lapshin had taught this course in 1909-10, but given its presence so late in Rand’s college education, Lapshin had already been exiled. The course was also taught by: P. I. Voznesensky, apparently a specialist in educational theory, at least three times (1897-98, 1905-06, and 1906-07); and Sergius Hessen in 1915-16, but he moved to the University of Tomsk in 1917, and emigrated in 1923 (Alekseev 1995). Thanks to George Kline (personal correspondence, 8 February 1999) for bringing the Alekseev volume to my attention and for translating the relevant information.  Back.

32. In my own experience, I registered for a course of the exact same title as a New York University graduate student. Taught by the Marxist Bertell Ollman, it too was a course in dialectical method.   Back.

33. See my discussion of this issue in Sciabarra 1998, 149-52.  Back.

34. The word "mediations" was originally translated in the text as "mediacies." I owe the revised translation to George Kline, who consulted the original Russian source.   Back.

35. Rand probably escaped the dogmatic, scientistic applications of dialectic to the natural sciences. This canonical--and controversial--extension of dialectics was not affected until after the publication of the first German and Russian editions of Engels’s Dialectics of Nature, published in 1925.  Back.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

It took an extraordinary network of scholars and other passionate, committed individuals to locate the document, to resolve many of its puzzles, and to help me delve into the other fascinating mysteries of Rand’s Russian intellectual roots. Some individuals assisted me with issues tangential to the project, but I would like to thank everyone who helped--in ways large and small. Naturally, no one mentioned is responsible for the interpretations herein: Jacqueline Balestier, Juri Bespyatich, Nadja Bespyatich, Roger Bissell, Anna-Britt Kaca, Philippe Chamy, Stephen Cox, Michael David-Fox, Anna Ebeling, Richard Ebeling, Sheila Fitzpatrick, Murray Franck, Mimi Reisel Gladstein, Ed Hudgins, Olga Kats, George Kline, Peter Konecny, Andrei Lossky, Boris Lossky, Nicholas Lossky, Douglas E. Mayfield, Karen Minto, Bernice Rosenthal, Diana Rotblat, Piotr Shalimov, Richard Shedenhelm, Helene Sikorski, Philip Swoboda.

REFERENCES

Correspondence

Michael David-Fox, 23 November 1998; 29 November 1998

George Kline, 15 November 1998; 29 November 1998; 24 January 1999; 8 February 1999; 11 February 1999

Peter Konecny, 24 November 1998; 8 January 1999; 29 January 1999

Boris Lossky, 21 November 1995; 9 January 1999 (interview)

Helene Sikorski, 3 January 1996; 7 February 1996

Publications

Alekseev, P. V., ed. 1995. Filosofy Rossii XIX-XX Stoletii: Biografii, Idei, Trudy  [Russian Philosophers of the 19^th and 20^th Centuries: Biographies, Ideas, Works]. Second revised, enlarged second edition. Moscow: Kniga i Biznes.

Almedingen, E. M. 1941. Tomorrow Will Come. Boston: Little, Brown and Company.

Baxter, Leslie A. and Barbara M. Montgomery. 1996. Relating: Dialogues and Dialectics. New York: Guilford Press.

Bradford, R. W.  1996.  Hermeneutic:  The truth and Ayn Rand.   Liberty 9, no. 5 (May).

Branden, Barbara. 1986. The Passion of Ayn Rand. Garden City, New York: Doubleday.

Curtis, James M. 1986. Michael Bakhtin, Nietzsche, and Russian pre-revolutionary thought. In Nietzsche in Russia, ed. Bernice Glatzer Rosenthal. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

David-Fox, Michael. 1997. Revolution of the Mind: Higher Learning Among the Bolsheviks, 1918-1929. Studies of the Harriman Institute. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press.

Gimpelevich, Zina. 1997. "We" and "I" in Zamyatin's We and Rand's Anthem. Germano-Slavica 10, no. 1: 13-23.

Great Soviet Encyclopedia [Bol'shaia Sovetskaia Entsiklopediia]. 1973-1982. Translation of 3^rd ed. A. M. Prokhorov, editor-in-chief. 31 vols. New York: Macmillan. [Abbreviated in text as GSE, with volume number, publication date, and page number placed thereafter.]

Hunt, Lester H.  1996.  In search of Rand's roots.  Liberty 9, no. 4 (March).

Konecny, Peter. 1994. Conflict and Community at Leningrad State University, 1917-1941. Ph.D. dissertation. University of Toronto.

Kuvakin, Valery A., ed. 1994. A History of Russian Philosophy, 2 vols. Buffalo, New York: Prometheus Books.

Lossky, Boris and Nicolas O. Lossky. 1978. Bibliographie des Oeuvres de Nicolas Lossky. Introduction by Serge Levitsky. Paris: Institut d'Études Slaves.

Lossky, N. O. 1951. History of Russian Philosophy. New York: International Universities.

Rand, Ayn. 1975. The New Left: The Anti-Industrial Revolution. 2^nd rev. ed. New York: New American Library. [Reprinted in an expanded edition as Return of the Primitive: The Anti-Industrial Revolution, edited by Peter Schwartz.]

___. 1999. Russian Writings on Hollywood. Marina del Rey, California: Ayn Rand Institute Press.

Russian Philosophy: Philosophy as a Specialty in Russia, No. 1--A Publication for Reference and Information [Russkaia filosofiia: filosofiia kak spetsial ‘nost’ v Rossii, Vypusk 1--Spravochno-informatsionnoe izdanie] 1992. Moscow: The Russian Academy of Sciences, Institute of Scientific Information in the Social Sciences. [Abbreviated in text as RP.]

Scanlan, James P. 1998. Lossky, Nicholas Onufrievich (1870-1965). Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, vol 5: 833-38.

Sciabarra, Chris Matthew. 1995. Ayn Rand: The Russian Radical. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press.

___. 1998. Bibliographic essay: A renaissance in Rand scholarship. Reason Papers 23 (Fall): 132-59.

___. 1999a. Books for Rand studies. Full Context (February-March).

___. 1999b. Investigative report: In search of the Rand transcript. Liberty (October).

Zenkovsky, V. V. 1953. A History of Russian Philosophy. 2 vols. Translated by George L. Kline. New York: Columbia University Press.

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