Making History

In Russia, people suffer from the stillness of time.
~Tatyana Tolstaya

Tsaritsyno is an estate on the outskirts of Moscow, and my destination for last Sunday’s outing. It’s a former royal preserve, but it has the weird status of becoming a genuine historical recreation of something that never really existed in the first place.

The park is a truly beautiful place on the southwestern edge of the city, with lakes, bridges, woods, paths and charming buildings. The great vistas were made all the more striking by the thick layer of snow on it all.

And like any Moscow park on the weekends, it was absolutely teeming with people. It was a winter sport paradise; every incline was dedicated to sledding, every pond crowded with ice fishermen, and the woods were full of cross country skiers. The one activity that takes place year round, however, is volleyball. There were a dozen courts in a clearing surrounded by snow-covered evergreens.

The estate was constructed in a gothic style for Catherine the Great. She came and inspected progress, but hated the designs and killed the project. So the buildings sat as picturesque shells for a couple of centuries until someone decided that they should finish the job. The government has been completing the construction for the past few years.

While the buildings will be dedicated to cultural pursuits, no doubt improving the value of the park, it still seems a bit strange to me. In a way, historic preservation seems to have run past the goal line and kept going. Preservation, or even its activist cousin Restoration, are charged with maintaining that which we’ve inherited from history. Instead, they’re on a tear to create what historians call a counter-factual, or “what if”, version of reality.

This is by no means a solely Russian phenomenon – witness Boldt Castle in the Thousand Islands. Unfinished by its robber baron owner upon the death of his wife, it long stood as a romantic monument to wealth, privilege, and love. But now, it’s being completed after sitting idle for nearly a century. All the tourists will be able to walk through rooms where the owners never sat, and never talked, and never slept. In fact, through rooms that never were.

Tastes change over time, it seems. In the 19th century, it was fashionable to build monuments that looked much older than they were; parks and estates were filled with newly constructed "ruins" evoking classical civilization. I'm waiting for the day when the ruins undergo work to reverse too much decay and return them to an appropriately ruined state. Or better yet; restore them to 'un-ruined' status by completely renovating them to an intact condition of what the original ruins represent.

But then, I suppose that’s just the reaction of someone who’s seen more than his fare share of authentic cathedrals and palaces so far during his time in Russia. Sometimes, the past is just fine the way it is – thank you very much.

Of course, Russia has a wonderful and ancient cultural legacy that’s vibrantly expressed through architecture and art. In places, it can be really hard to avoid it even if you’re trying. I appreciate it all - really I do.

I especially appreciate it when everything fits my pre-conceived notions of Russia.

Ahh, that's more like it!