ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the Tambov case should be seen as a pars pro toto of the process whereby Russia’s Soviet past is being reinterpreted, with state authorities undertaking to fashion a new public memory of that time. It outlines the specific features of one of Russian Federation regions and describes how its residents, politicians, and social activists tended to reinterpret key elements of the era’s remembrance culture. The chapter explains when the trajectory of local debates about the past coincided with the discussions held at the central level. The civil war in Tambov Governorate took a far bloodier course than in Petrograd or Moscow. In many Russian regions the October Revolution was seen as the trigger of the sufferings and tragedies of the 1917–1922 period, and therefore the Bolshevik authorities found it a real challenge to create a new culture of remembrance focused on that glorious event.
