12 September 2024
By Leonid Nikitinsky
Source: Novaya gazeta
The very embodiment of the Russian and Soviet intelligentsia, someone whose roots lay in a different historical epoch, Nikolai Svanidze may no longer be with us, but he leaves behind many devoted followers.
Kolya Svanidze has left us. Referring to him as Nikolai Karlovich is nye-on impossible; I can’t bring myself to do it – that’s someone else altogether. For a man of many achievements, he remained humble, shying away from any sort of self-promotion. In recent times, he suffered – yet never complained – from a series of illnesses, refusing to pay them any heed whatsoever until they caught up with him. The last time I saw him was in an online chat with former members of the Presidential Council for the Development of Civil Society and Human Rights, two days before his death. He wrote about the agony of his situation, but not in reference to his health.
Svanidze was, probably, the only TV and radio anchor who stuttered. It was barely noticeable; his TV programmes garnered admiration rather thanks to their being so entertaining and engaging. Meanwhile, in his role as human rights defender, when he spoke, he was always to the point and concise. At the meetings of the Human Rights Council with the president, prior to Kolya’s expulsion in 2022 (the Council needed other people), Putin, in a show of respect, would always give the floor to Svanidze, who would quietly yet firmly list all the innocent individuals currently in prison along with those being illegally prosecuted. Not much may have come from it, but that wasn’t his fault. As to whether the respect was genuine, I wouldn’t like to speculate.
It’s generally hard to conceive of Kolya ever raising his voice. That being said, in January 2018, during a live broadcast from the Komsomolskaya pravda studio, Svanidze slapped his Human Rights Council and broadcasting colleague Maksim Shevchenko. His reason for doing so was that Shevchenko had said that, in condemning Stalin for neglecting the lives of Soviet soldiers, Svanidze ‘spits on their graves’. In response to the slap Shevchenko punched his opponent to the ground there and then. Kolya was certainly no fighter, and acknowledged his defeat, yet he still didn’t raise his voice.
All of this begs the question as to why he went to the Komsomolskaya pravda studio at all. Surely, he knew what was likely to happen if he did? Of course, he was fully aware of the inevitability of a provocation, but yet he didn’t feel like the victim. He won that round.
As guests at the home of Liudmila Mikhailovna Alekseeva, we raised an old toast to Soviet dissidents for ‘the success of our hopeless cause’. This was for him.
It wouldn’t be right to see Svanidze as a Don Quixote – he was a true Knight.
He was committed to standing up for the truth and for the rights of others; he cared far less for himself.
Svanidze was an exemplar of the Russian and Soviet intelligentsia. While he possessed thorough knowledge of his subject area, history, he never pushed himself to the fore. What did come to the fore in abundance were his competence and patience. As to the question of cooperation between a member of the intelligentsia and the authorities, and the moral limits of such an interaction, he had his own, very personal response. Kolya was someone whose roots lay in a different historical epoch, but he leaves behind many devoted followers.
Translated by Nathalie Wilson
