Pushkin at the Mass Grave
In the occupied territories of Ukraine, Russian cultural symbols are not neutral—they are weapons of domination. In Mariupol’s Primorskyi Park, a statue of Alexander Pushkin now stands over unmarked graves, the final resting place of civilians killed by Russian forces. This juxtaposition is more than symbolic; it embodies the deliberate erasure of Ukrainian identity and the imposition of Russian imperial culture. Yet, amidst this ongoing cultural genocide, Western debates appear more fixated on perceived “cancellation” of Russian culture in Ukraine—a framing that ignores the far graver context of cultural and physical annihilation in occupied territories.
The Western understanding of Ukraine’s cultural response to this war has at times been shockingly shallow. I too strongly dislike it when my Russian-speaking east Ukrainian friends face catty comments in western Ukraine. I don’t understand the point of complaining about someone in a foreign country reading Dostoevsky when Yuryi Boyko is still a sitting deputy in the Rada.
But to try to draw these examples into a wider narrative about Ukrainians ‘cancelling’ Russian culture is utterly perverse when Ukraine is in a war against an imperial power that uses its—Russian—culture to justify and obscure acts of genocide. There are many, many points I could explore here, from Russia’s appropriation of Ukrainian cultural legacy, the various Moscow-led mass murders of Ukraine’s cultural elites over the centuries, or even the hybridity of certain colonial contexts, but what I want to focus on here is the question of prioritisation and context.
The Context of Russification and Cultural Genocide
Russia’s cultural policies in the occupied territories of Ukraine are an inextricable part of the power dynamics between occupier and occupied. Libraries have been systematically ‘cleansed’ of Ukrainian books, replaced with Russian texts designed to indoctrinate rather than educate. School curricula are rewritten to present a distorted view of history, one that denies Ukraine’s sovereignty and glorifies Russian imperial narratives. Symbols of Ukrainian culture—and historical memory—are destroyed, while monuments to Russian literary figures—Pushkin being the most prominent—are erected as markers of occupation and control. Children are kidnapped, given new Russian identities and re-educated to hate Ukraine. Children lucky enough to stay with their parents at home are still re-educated. The price of avoiding deportation is becoming culturally Russian—at least outwardly.
We aren’t talking about cultural exchange here; it is an aggressive policy aimed at the annihilation of Ukrainian national and cultural identity as it is, to be replaced by a Russian imaginary of the provincial Little Russian identity. For those who live through this erasure, the trauma is profound. The Kremlin does not erect Pushkin statues because they are mega-fans of the Onegin stanza; they erect them as a symbol of Russian cultural supremacy and domination. This is the context that must be understood when considering the cultural backlash against Russian symbols in the rest of Ukraine.
Misrepresentation of “Cancelling”
As such, the term “cancelling” Russian culture in Ukraine is a misrepresentation. Ukraine is not engaged in cultural erasure; it is responding to cultural erasure. In many cases, this response is about protection—of Ukrainian identity, language, and cultural expression. In some other cases, it reflects (an understandable, if not always ideal) backlash against a power that has used and is currently using its cultural products to justify and whitewash war and genocide.
To frame the debate as “cancellation” misses the broader dynamics of power at play. Russian culture has been wielded by the Kremlin as a tool of imperialism. Its literature, music, and historical narratives are actively used to legitimise territorial expansion, whitewash atrocities, and undermine Ukrainian sovereignty. Enjoyment of Pushkin’s poems has little to nothing to do with a Pushkin statue in the current context. The former is verse; the latter is a marker of occupation, placed deliberately to reinforce the narrative that Ukrainian identity is secondary, even non-existent, in its own lands—lands Russia claims are its own.
A Personal Reflection
As someone who studied and taught Russian literature at Oxford University, I am indebted to the many lessons it taught me. Writers like Dostoevsky, Pilnyak, and Saltykov-Shchedrin have had a formative impact on my intellectual life and my identity. Yet, I cannot engage with their works at present—not because I disavow their artistic merit, but because I see how their cultural legacy is being exploited, and it makes it too painful, on a personal level. I know there are some for whom the ‘imperial nature’ of the literature itself is an issue, but I don’t really understand that argument. Yes, Russian literature often reflects the imperial nature of the times and society in which it was written. But I think that, like most people, I can read Dostoevsky without having to hate all the things Dostoevsky hated: Catholics, Jews, the Crystal Palace, Turgenev, Ukrainians, Poles, the English, trains, etc., etc.
What bothers me much more is that the literature I love is weaponised as evidence of Russian “greatness,” used to obscure the brutal realities of war, and justify the killing of Ukrainians. But my reaction to this would never be to focus my empathy on the dead writers and literature (especially given that nobody has banned anyone from reading Blok or Tyutchev) when there are living human beings being massacred, and then those massacres are disguised with statues of ‘great cultural figures’.
The Weaponisation of Culture
All of this brings us back to the main culprit: Russia. If you want to save Russian literature—save it from the Kremlin’s misuse of it. Russia’s weaponisation of its cultural heritage is evident in its propaganda. Since February 2022, the Kremlin has ever more increasingly invoked Russian literature and history to soften its image and distract from its militaristic and oppressive actions. For example, before 2022, any cultural or historical tweets from the Russian embassy in the UK tended to focus on the Arctic Convoys or WWII cooperation. Since 24th February, they have focussed on great Russian culture: ballet, literature, composers. Regardless of any debate as to how great the culture is (and I think some of the greatest literature, ballet, and classical music was produced in the Russian Empire and early Soviet Union), that is not the issue. The issue is that it has become a prop to whitewash and distract from Russia’s horrific destruction of Ukraine.
The Kremlin’s use of culture as a political tool impedes efforts to separate art from the actions of the state. When Pushkin’s image is used to obscure mass graves or justify Russification policies, it ceases to be a neutral symbol. It becomes an active participant in the erasure of Ukrainian identity. Any discussion of Ukraine’s cultural debates around the removal of Pushkin statues is really but a footnote in a much longer and more tangible story of cultural erasure. Or at least it should be. We can regret the Kremlin’s merging of historic talented Russian writers with the war without criticising those surviving through its consequences.
None of this is to argue either way about Pushkin statues in and of themselves. In Kharkiv, the main statue of Pushkin was removed and will be stored until after the war, when its placement and meaning can be reassessed in a context free from the constant threat of impending invasion, occupation, and (yet more) Russification. I like this approach, but, again, it hardly matters because I am not Ukrainian. All that is needed from me is empathy and support, or at least not twisting the complicated cultural legacy in a partly-occupied country at war into a story about cancel culture or, worse yet, a story that gives succour to Russian propaganda myths.
The backlash against Russian culture in Ukraine must be understood as a reaction to the Kremlin’s (and its predecessors’) deliberate association of that culture with acts of imperialism and genocide. The trauma experienced by Ukrainians is not abstract; it is deeply personal and immediate. In this context, prioritising the needs of those affected over abstract debates about cultural heritage is not only understandable but necessary.
As the late Ukrainian poet Viktoria Amelina (like so many talented Ukrainian writers, she was killed by Russians) wrote, “Russian manuscripts don’t burn, but Ukrainian ones do.” In my view, now is the time to report on and resist the destruction of Ukrainian culture, rather than ponder the perseverance (good and bad) of Russian culture.