The spark that made the country blow up like a big, bad bomb was a lie, a lie we told everywhere and to everyone. And the lie we told all over that February of 1917? It was simple: no baked bread! And this made people get real mad and go real crazy! And it worked! Just to make sure, though, I even liked adding something more, because peasant that I was, I knew what would make the people really panic: no flour!
Ha!
There was plenty of flour, but it was stuck way out there in some railway cars, way out of the city, so much flour that I even heard it was rotting. But the narod-the masses-didn’t know this. All they knew was that the bread lines were getting longer and longer, and their lives more and more miserable as the war dragged on and on and on. They could live with sugar being rationed, they could live with just a few scraps of meat in their soups. But bread? Radi boga-for the sake of God-how could a Russian live without bread, be it white, black, or even that gray crap, eh?
“We’re fighting for the Romanovs and they won’t even give us a few pieces of stale crust!” I grumbled in one breadline after another throughout Moscow. “What do they think we are, animals? To hell with the burzhui!” I added, using the nasty word for the bourgeoisie. “I hear our masters have not only all the bread they can eat but even sugar and salt.”
“Well, one thing’s for sure-our German whore Empress has plenty of bread!” complained another of my comrades, who was always planted near me. “But maybe she’s not giving us any because she’s angry she no longer has Rasputin’s sausage!”
The crowd roared with laughter.
Rasputin, that damned dog, had been killed a few months earlier, which in truth made our job harder. We couldn’t let the political scene get easier or softer for the Tsar, which meant we had to stretch the shadow of that Rasputin as far as we could and agitate, agitate, agitate.
Just like a worm, I started whispering, “I’ve been to two other stores this morning and they both ran out of bread. Now I hear there’s not enough at this one, either. Look, the store’s about to close! They’re running out of bread everywhere!”
Even I was surprised at what happened next. Even I was shocked at how quickly things blew up, just like a match thrown into a barrel of kerosene. No sooner had the words passed my lips than some guy pitched a rock at the window of the bread store. And poof! The glass exploded into shards! And the crowd didn’t cower away but cried out and surged forward!
“Xleb!” Bread, screamed nearly every soul!
“Give us xleb!”
“We are hungry!”
I’d never seen anything like it-it was like a call to charge the enemy. One moment there were a hundred souls standing in line, long-suffering folk who had never complained, just poor people in felt boots and foul coats, always submissive to master and Tsar. The next moment every last one of them, right down to the old babushkas with their scarves tied round their heads, were fiery rebels! It was magic! Like one giant flame! The crowd burst to life, surging forward, breaking every window of the bread store and piling in, frantically grabbing all the loaves from the shelves, then pushing and shouting and shoving their way into the back and emerging with sacks of flour.
There was only one voice of protest, the shop owner, a short man with a waxed mustache, who shouted, “Stop! Stop, you fools!”
But the only thing that was stopped was him, this owner-two ruffians grabbed him and pitched him right through the broken window, right outside, where he landed with a thud on the cobbles. Blood streaming down his face, he struggled to get up, making it only onto one knee.
“You’ve been hiding bread from us poor people! They say you’ve been hoarding bread and waiting for the price increases -shame on you!” shouted one staruxha-old woman-as she kicked the groaning man. “Shame!”
That was all it took, one kick from an old woman’s worn shoe. It was like a signal. And then everyone was upon him, kicking and beating him, ripping at clothing and limb. He lived one more minute, no more. Their fury surprised even me. Like a lid finally blown off a boiling pot, the deep Russian instinct for revenge suddenly blew wide and could not be contained. People beat on the poor man as meanly as if they were finally beating on their serf-master who had beat on them! Yes, this was revolution, great revolution! Hurrah!
Turning away from the pulp of that man’s body, I saw a nearby restaurant that was famous for its wine cellar. Well, that would make people break in there-free drink!-but I, devil that I was, thought of something worse, something that would make them real crazy. Officially, there had been no vodka for sale since the beginning of the war.
“Comrades, I hear they’re hiding some ‘national treasure’ in the cellar of that restaurant!” I shouted, grabbing a rock and hurling it at the window of this other place.
The idea of getting their hands on some vodka wasn’t just a spark and a little flame, it was a big explosion! Suddenly people forgot all about bread and ran to the restaurant, splitting it as wide as a watermelon. And suddenly, too, other people came running, charging from everywhere, from this way and that. Within moments there were several hundred comrades, and moments after that several hundred more. Incredible! All of a sudden I saw a dead body thrown out the window-the owner would have been smarter to run out the back!-and then I saw some waiters run out, covering their heads as they fled for their lives. A few moments later proud people emerged, one after another carrying bottles of wine. With no way to open them, however, the folks smashed the tops on the stone curbs and then started drinking from the broken bottles, red wine and blood dribbling from their smiling, cut lips. There was no vodka, but who cared as long as there was free wine! Free wine!
And I shouted the slogan we were told to shout everywhere: “Grab nagrablenoye!” Steal what was stolen!
“Grab nagrablenoye!” repeated an unseen soul.
“Hurrah!”
And soon enough those very words were echoed up and down the street, shouted by one comrade after another as they broke into shop after shop, stealing not only bread and wine but eggs and milk, then pants and fur hats and fine ladies’ dresses, too. It wasn’t too long, either, before I saw real flames licking one storefront, toasting everything in their path. There were cries of pain mixed with shouts of joy.
Then in the distance came the sound of hooves, and the crazy crowd quieted for just a moment-the Cossacks? We all paused to listen, pondering our fates. Had they come to mow us down with their silvery sabers? Come to chop off our heads like tall poppies?
But what appeared around the corner wasn’t the feared Cossacks on wild ponies but our Russian troops, some thirty or forty Russian comrades on horseback, one old officer at the head. With clouds of steam pouring from the snouts of their horses, and with not sabers but rifles and pistols waving overhead, the soldiers charged right up to us. We, the poor masses, stood as one, knowing that within seconds half of us would fall dead.
But then something so strange happened…
“Xleb!” cried one toothless babushka, staring up at the soldiers. “We are hungry! We just want xleb!”
Yet again, that was all it took, just one old peasant woman calling out the obvious, and one by one the soldiers lowered their rifles until there was but one last gun raised: that of their old commanding officer. But he wasn’t pointing his pistol at us. He was pointing his gun at his own soldier boys.
“Raise your guns!” he commanded his men. “Prepare to fire!”
But not one of his soldiers did as he was told. They just stared defiantly at the officer, their brooding eyes saying it all: These are our own people, we will not fire upon our own brothers and sisters!
“I command you to take up your weapons and prepare to fire!” shouted the officer, his face bursting red as he trained his weapon on one particular soldier, a boy with blond hair. “Raise your weapons or I’ll fire upon-”
Suddenly there was a crack of gunfire, a noise so sharp that everyone fell silent. And gasped. At first I thought he’d done it, that the bastard officer had fired upon the blond lad, but no! One of the other soldiers had taken up his own weapon and fired on him, the officer! He shot his commander right in the face! For one long, shocking moment no one said anything, no one could guess what was going to happen next-would soldier start firing upon soldier, would they all fire upon us?-and we simply watched as the old officer, his white beard glistening with red blood, tumbled off his horse and fell to the ground dead as a log.
And then another of the soldier boys held his rifle high in the air and, in one long, glorious shout, cried, “Hurrah!”
The soldiers crossed over to the people, and in that second Russia changed completely. All the soldiers cried out in joy and the crowd whooped with delight, calling out to the soldier boys, welcoming them with bread and wine and brotherhood! Yes, it was mutiny, absolute mutiny! I shouted with joy, cried out with happiness! Unable to believe what was happening, I watched as one by one the soldiers leaped down from their horses and the people rushed toward them and embraced them, smiling and laughing.
Da, da, da, it was incredible, miraculous! I didn’t understand what was happening, and yet I did, I understood it all. This wasn’t like the revolution of twelve years ago when we the people had been battling the police and the soldiers, and the Cossacks, too. No, this was different. We were one, soldier and people and everyone else, united as one against the capitalist pigs and the warmongers and the tsar and his whore wife who sat upon all of us, the people! It was the Revolution, and this time I knew we would win!
Long live the Uprising of the Oppressed!