FREE ESSAY ON BEHIND THE URALS

BEHIND THE URALS

Behind the Urals
The United States that we live in makes it very hard for us to fathom what a struggling
nation is like to live in. In the United States, we are socialized to believe that
America is the most superior of all the countries and our prosperity will continue to
grow. We are very fortunate to be born into a relatively high standard of living as a
society, thus we cannot comprehend what it is like for countries trying to build
societies from the bottom up. John Scott portrays this brilliantly in his book Behind the
Urals as he examines individual people and their struggles as they worked in
Magnitogorsk. These citizens worked in the most inhumane conditions, all with the
intention to help their country develop under the new system of the Soviet Union. The
Soviet Union had just gone through an entire turn around in their political, social, and
economic spheres as they went from one extreme to another. The old Czarist government was
always out to serve the rich landowners, while treating the peasantry as second-class
humans rather than equals. However, when the Russian Revolution came to a head, and the
Red Communists or Bolsheviks defeated the White Czarists, Russia was left with an
entirely new system of thought in its government. This ideology viewed the working class
and peasantry as the main citizens in their society, while the rich landowners were not
nearly as powerful as they once were. Thus the workers of Magnitogorsk held a very
important position as they had the responsibility to help the Soviet Union take flight as
a country that could compete with other powerful countries of the world, all while
working under the most inhumane conditions. 
John Scott moved to the Soviet Union leaving the United States and in his eyes, its
unsatisfactory capitalistic way of governing. Scott may have been aided in making his
decision as he saw the United States slip into the Great Depression, a time when the
conditions in America reached an all time low. He left his roots in the United States to
begin a new life in a foreign country simply because he was disgruntled with American
governing and was appealed to by the Soviet philosophy of governing. It tool Scott a
tremendous amount of will and fortitude to leave behind everything he knew so well, to
start a new life on the other side of the world. He showed his courage as he began his
new life by starting a family, educating himself, and growing very successful. Scott knew
exactly what he was doing, as after some reflection I could find no issue that I disliked
in America so much that it would lead me to do what he did. 
The first worker we are introduced to in Behind the Urals is a man named Koyla, Scott's
roommate at his arrival in Magnitogorsk. He was depicted as a young, strong man and a
hard worker that had a huge responsibility for his age. There are not many 22-year-old
men that hold the position of foreman and have power over a sizable group of men. He was
a strong leader that had one agenda and that was for the prosperity of his country. Koyla
was very mature for his age as he showed leadership skills that very few men at his age
possess. He seemed to be an intelligent man as he was going to school to become a
technician in a setting that demanded a higher intellect level than the schools where the
majority of the other workers educated. You will never find anyone Koyla's age, or any
age, in the society that we live in today being asked to direct a group of workers under
the conditions that he did. Koyla's work ethic and strong will can be somewhat traced
back to his childhood and upbringing as it was too very demanding.
Another interesting character was the peasant who traveled for two weeks on foot with his
cow. His story exemplifies the struggles that were taking place in both Europe and Asia.
He, like John Scott but for different reasons, left his home, the famine, and
unemployment to set out for the Soviet Union where jobs and food could be attained.
Unfortunately, the peasant found nothing more than he left back home. He managed to find
some work but food was scarce and the living conditions were even worse than what he had
left. His cow could provide him with little milk due to the lack of food for humans, let
alone the animals. The reader can only imagine what the peasant left behind in his
homeland, as it can be inferred that it was as bad as an area could be. In contrast to
Scott, who left a somewhat run down United States, the peasant's living conditions in
both Europe and then the Soviet Union. This is one more instance that we cannot
comprehend because of the prosperous society we have grown accustomed to. 
Valdek, a Pole who traveled to Magnitogorsk, was a welder who was dissatisfied with his
life in his homeland. He, like many others, worked with enthusiasm and perseverance to
help the birth of Communism and the Soviet Union. Poland was known for being very harsh
on the working class, as it drove many Poles like Valdek to the Soviet Union. Valdek is a
prime representative of the people who traveled to Magnitogorsk, not solely for the food
or more money, but chiefly for a life that was easier on workers, and did not concentrate
so much on the well being of the upper class. Valdek was much respected in Magnitogorsk
and many of his fellow workers questioned the lack of a revolution in Poland. Valdek
explained to them that if there were talk of a revolution, the revolutionaries would be
immediately thrown in jail. 
Khaibulin, who was a tarter, exemplifies the diversity of the people who traveled to
Magnitogorsk. His ancestors raised livestock for centuries and overall were very
primitive. This concept is reinforced in the fact that people had not yet seen an
airplane or an automobile, but Khaibulin had never seen an electric light and even more
unbelievable, he had never seen a staircase. His people, for hundreds of years, never
came out of the fields and into modern society to acquaint themselves with the new
ideologies and inventions. They learned a particular skill, and kept it that way in their
resistance to change the way of life in which they were comfortable. Magnitogorsk was a
haven for the peoples of countries from all over the world, and in Khaibulin's situation,
had people coming from an extremity in which the modern world was a foreign idea.
Looking to the opposite end of the spectrum, there were people in Magnitogorsk who were
not there by choice. Shabkov, who was an ex-kulak, is a prime example as he was a peasant
whose community of peasants lived a little better off than most. His community is an
example of a collective farm that Stalin implemented, and is a society where all the
members use their individual skills to keep the society working. If a member of a
collective farm needed something from a household, was not willing to give something up
to the collective farm, then charges would be brought up against the person and they
would lose their property. The property would then be given to the collective farm and in
this, many people were punished without just cause. This happened to Shabkov, as he saw
his farm taken and he was sent to Magnitogorsk, to work off his punishment. Even with all
the injustice Shabkov underwent, he served his sentence with dignity and was respected as
one of the best workers there. 
In the beginnings of the Soviet Union, and more specifically Magnitogorsk, a diversified
group of people from various ethnic, religions, and national backgrounds all put forth
their individual efforts to develop the new Russia. The grueling environment that these
people lived in developed them into strong and proud workers. In looking to our home
front, I cannot find one example that even borders similarities to life in the Soviet
Union under Stalin's Five Year Plans. We can study the times, even look to experts in the
field for information on the topic, but we can never fully grasp the extreme environment
that the peoples of Magnitogorsk lived in. They jeopardized and sometimes even sacrificed
their own lives to build up a country. Lives were not lost in the battlefields, but
instead on the job as workers froze from the climate while working the blast furnaces.
The Soviet Union's success is usually given to the Communist ideology or even Stalin, but
instead it was the hard workers who came from all over the eastern hemisphere to take on
and complete the task of developing Russia.
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