An exploration of political jokes told under Stalin, “It’s Only a Joke, Comrade!” by Jonathan Waterlow, is possibly the funniest book to grow out of a doctoral project. Although it includes plenty of Soviet jokes and anekdoty (funny stories), “It’s not a joke book!” Waterlow insists. Instead, the book analyzes jokes in their historical context to consider accounts of public opinion under Stalin. Drawing on 273 criminal cases of Soviet joke tellers, Waterlow introduces the concept of “crosshatching” to show that political jokes were less a form of resistance than a way of sharing hardship, cultivating trust, and ultimately acquiescing to life under the regime.
The Moscow Times’ Anna Kasradze spoke with Jonathan over Skype about his book.
Q: How did you become interested in researching Soviet jokes of the Stalin era?
A: Since high school, I’ve been fascinated by Soviet history of the 1930s, but a lot of the historiography didn’t make sense to me. There were still scholars saying that people must either have lived in perpetual fear and trauma or been completely brainwashed to buy into the system. Nowhere in the world is a population 100% for or against its government.
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