/*Please note the following seminar reminders (4/29 and 4/30) and
*//*title correction (5/12)*//*:
*/*Thursday, April 29*
*Literature and Culture Seminar*
/"The Unknown History of Soviet Music"/
Simon Morrison, Visiting Professor of Music, Harvard University;
Professor of Music, Princeton University
1730 Cambridge Street, 3^rd Floor, Room S354
4:15-6:00 p.m.
*Friday, April 30*
*Early Slavists' Seminar*
/"The Beginnings of Modernity? Confession among the East Slavs in the
Late Seventeenth and Early Eighteenth Century"/
Nadieszda Kizenko, Associate Professor of History, State University of
New York at Albany
1730 Cambridge Street, 3^rd Floor, Room S354
12:15-2:00 p.m.
*Wednesday, May 12*
*Comparative Economics Seminar *
* *
/"China: A New Player in the Petroleum Market"/
Øystein Tunsjø, Visiting Fulbright Scholar, Fairbank Center for Chinese
Studies, Harvard University; Senior Fellow, Norwegian Institute for
Defense Studies, Oslo
1730 Cambridge Street, 3rd Floor, Room S354
12:30-2:00 p.m.
To purchase a parking permit for the Broadway Garage (located on Felton
Street, between Cambridge Street and Broadway), please visit Harvard
University Parking Services at
https://www2.uos.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/permit/purchase.pl.
If you need to register a new visitor login in order to purchase a
parking pass, choose "Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies" and
enter department code 2020 on the online registration form.
If you have any questions or problems, please contact the Parking
Services Office at
617-495-3772.
--
----------------------------------------------------
Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies
Harvard University
1730 Cambridge Street, 3rd Floor, Suite 301
Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone: 617.495.4037
Fax: 617.495.8319
http://www.daviscenter.fas.harvard.edu
/*Please note the following special events reminder:*/
*Wednesday, April 28*
*Book Talk/Director's Seminar*
/"Know Your Enemy: The Rise and Fall of America's Soviet Experts"/
(Oxford University Press, 2009)
* *
David Engerman, Associate Professor of History, Brandeis University;
Center Associate, Davis Center
Discussant: Andrew Jewett, Assistant Professor of History and of Social
Studies, Harvard University
1730 Cambridge Street, 3^rd Floor, Room S354
4:15-6:00 p.m.
*Thursday, April 29*
*Book Talk/Central Asia and the Caucasus Seminar*
/"The Spectacular State: Culture and National Identity in Uzbekistan"/
(Duke University Press, 2010)
Laura Adams, Program Co-Director, Program on Central Asia and the
Caucasus, Davis Center; Center Associate, Davis Center
1730 Cambridge Street, 3^rd Floor, Room S354
12:15-2:00 p.m.
To purchase a parking permit for the Broadway Garage (located on Felton
Street, between Cambridge Street and Broadway), please visit Harvard
University Parking Services at
https://www2.uos.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/permit/purchase.pl.
If you need to register a new visitor login in order to purchase a
parking pass, choose "Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies" and
enter department code 2020 on the online registration form.
If you have any questions or problems, please contact the Parking
Services Office at
617-495-3772.
--
----------------------------------------------------
Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies
Harvard University
1730 Cambridge Street, 3rd Floor, Suite 301
Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone: 617.495.4037
Fax: 617.495.8319
http://www.daviscenter.fas.harvard.edu
*Davis** Center** for Russian and Eurasian Studies *
*Seminar Calendar
May 1-15, 2010__*
*__*
*/For upcoming events not yet published in this calendar, please visit
our website: http://thyme.hmdc.harvard.edu/davis/index.php./*
*__*
*Wednesday, May 5*
*Comparative Economics Seminar*
/"Business Prospects in Russia: The View from Inside"/
Students from Moscow State University, Moscow
1730 Cambridge Street, 3rd Floor, Room S354
12:30-2:00 p.m.
* *
* *
*Thursday, May 6*
*Comparative Politics Seminar*
/"The Politics of Regulatory Reform under Putin and Medvedev" /
Mikhail Pryadilnikov, Post-Doctoral Fellow, Davis Center
1730 Cambridge Street, 3rd Floor, Room S354
12:15-2:00 p.m.
* *
* *
*Wednesday, May 12*
*Comparative Economics Seminar *
* *
/"China: A New Player in the Petroleum Market"/
Øystein Tunsjø, PhD candidate in International Relations, University of
Wales, Aberystwyth
1730 Cambridge Street, 3rd Floor, Room S354
12:30-2:00 p.m.
* *
* *
*Friday May 14*
*Early Slavists' Seminar*
/"Looking Anew at the Time of Troubles, the Smolensk War, the Southern
Frontier, and the Late 17th-Century Turkish and Crimean Campaigns
through the Prism of the Muscovite Command-and-Control Debate"/
Peter B. Brown, Professor of History, Rhode Island College
1730 Cambridge Street, 3rd Floor, Room S354
12:15-2:00 p.m.
* *
* *
To purchase a parking permit for the Broadway Garage (located on Felton
Street, between Cambridge Street and Broadway), please visit Harvard
University Parking Services at
https://www2.uos.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/permit/purchase.pl.
If you need to register a new visitor login in order to purchase a
parking pass, choose "Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies" and
enter department code 2020 on the online registration form.
If you have any questions or problems, please contact the Parking
Services Office at
617-495-3772.
--
----------------------------------------------------
Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies
Harvard University
1730 Cambridge Street, 3rd Floor, Suite 301
Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone: 617.495.4037
Fax: 617.495.8319
http://www.daviscenter.fas.harvard.edu
Dear Sir or Madam,
It is with great pleasure that I write to inform you about the unique
performance and American premiere of the play "Budzyn.” This first-ever
performance is being produced as a tribute to Holocaust victims
celebrating the World Day of Prayer 2010 at Harvard University.
At the conclusion of the performance, there will be a prayer ceremony to
celebrate unity and diversity in working for a world of peace and
justice, and to commemorate the recent tragedy for Poland with the loss
of the President Mr. Lech Kaczynski and government officials as well.
The Mayor of Cambridge, Mr. David P. Maher, Harvard University Associate
Provost for Arts and Culture, Mrs. Lori Gross, President of the New
England Holocaust Memorial, Mr. Rick Mann, Honorary Consul of the
Republic of Poland, Mr. Marek Lesniewski-Laas, Consul of Israel in
Boston, Mrs. Rony Yedidia will honor us with their participation.
The production will feature the Irving Fine Society Singers & Ensemble
performing music by Holocaust victim composer Edwin Geist, dances by
choreographer Cherina Eisenberg and special artistic collaboration of
famous actress Barbra Streisand.
This performance, which unites more than 40 people from 8 years old to
88 years old, working together on stage, will take place on Thursday,
May 6, 2010 at 8:00 P.M. at Sanders Theatre at Harvard University.
Please visit our website at www.budzyntheplay.com
<http://www.budzyntheplay.com/>.
We would be extremely grateful if you could spread the word about this
meaningful event.
Please don’t hesitate to contact me if you need more information.
Sincerely,
Sasha Yakhkind
Public Relations Director
budzyntheplay(a)gmail.com
617-816-0131
...............................................................................
* “Budzyn”*
*based on a recollection by Henry S. Newmann*
*produced and directed by Guila Clara Kessous*
*adapted by vanda Gyuris*
*assistant directed by betty rosen*
* *
*A tribute to Holocaust victims*
*Celebrating the World Day of prayer 2010*
* *
*Thursday, May 6, 2010, 8:00 P.M.*
*Sanders Theatre at Harvard University*
*45, Quincy Street*
*Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138*
*Tickets: $12; students: $8*
*Ticket Reservations: 617-496-2222*
* http://www.budzyntheplay.com
*Please send email inquiries to budzyntheplay(a)gmail.com
<mailto:budzyntheplay@gmail.com>*
* *
This first-ever performance is being produced as a tribute to Holocaust
victims
and to mark the World Day of Prayer 2010, celebrating unity in diversity and
working for a world of peace and justice. The production will feature
survivors, performers, musicians and dancers featuring music composer Edwin
Geist performed by The Irving Fine Society Singers & Ensemble.

“Budzyn” awakens our consciences to the question of theatrical
representation dealing with religious identity. The story takes place at the
Nazi controlled Budzyn labor camp in Poland, where the commander was
well known
for subjecting the prisoners to particularly cruel tortures and told as seen
through the eyes of one of its survivors, Henry S. Newman,

The commander, knowing that the young Mr. Newman had studied dramatic
arts in order to become a director, asks him to organize a small performance
with the prisoners in order to entertain him. The catch, however, was
that if
the Commander didn't laugh, he would humilate Henry in front of the other
prisoners before cutting his throat and assuring that he die in slow agony.

Visionary director Guila Clara Kessous uses all forms of art to
transmit
the testimony of this survivor while overcoming the simple reference to the
Shoah by attacking the crucial question of theatrical representation.
* *
SYNOPSIS
The voices begin on April 19, 1943. It is Passover in the Warsaw Ghetto
and the
Nazis occupy a young family. Only Henry and Benjamin remain together;
the rest
are lost, forced to exist only in memory. The two young brothers are
taken to
the Labor Camp Budzyn near Krasnik in Poland run by a cruel and vulgar
Kommandant Feix. We find out that Henry has studied to become a stage
director
at the university and is soon asked by Feix to direct a play for his own
enjoyment. The catch: Feix presents Henry with an ultimatum; either create a
play that humors him and live, or fail to capture the commander’s
attention and
perish. Henry struggles with limited resources and time to cultivate a
play from
scratch. The night before the play is supposed to premier for the camp
twelve
prisoners are hung and it is up to Henry to save those still alive. Can he
succeed? Will he live on, or will he fall victim to the war’s atrocities and
become a memory?
NOTE FROM THE DIRECTOR:
What intrigues me in this testimony is the fantastic use of theater as a
communication tool. This commander, who has full power over his
prisoners, who
has the right to keep them alive or dead and who takes full advantage of his
position savagely to satisfy his drive for violence by playing all sorts of
sadistic games, is somehow aware of his own inhumanity. He lacks
opportunities
to laugh as well as the power of distraction because he is “bored”. I am
fascinated by the idea that this commander, who spends his time
imagining new
refinements in the way he is going to condemn to death his next victim,
could
feel bored. In one way, through his request to Henry, he is trying to regain
access to what he has lost and what he knows the prisoners keep: a piece of
humanity. The ability to laugh, to forget the exterminator and
exterminated, is
only accessible through the experience of staging. Once again, it is
thanks to
the dramatic arts that Henry is able to survive, as he writes, “To hear
people
laugh in this unholy place was the greatest gratification anyone could ask
for.”
If there is one thing I have restrained myself from doing since I began
working
with the theme of the Shoah, it is to speak for the survivors. My work is to
engage with the survivor’s testimony and attempt to use theater to reconcile
historical truth with artistic impression. My work is first of all a work of
transmission and not of appropriation or even of creation. Creativity is
only
good if it adds to the veracity of the testimony. After the work that I have
done with Elie Wiesel and the numerous discussions I was able to have
with the
concentration camps’ survivors, I sensed an emotional paradox. It is a
kind of
lassitude mixed with a profound desire to go forward in fixing the
Shoah’s place
in societal and historical consciousness once and for all. Rosian Zerner, a
Shoah survivor and former vice president of the World Federation of Jewish
Child Survivors of the Holocaust, confided to me that "We no longer want to
lock ourselves up in a past history. We want to live, contribute to the
society, enjoy the company of our children and our grandchildren,
telling them
what happened, commemorating the Shoah but not wallowing in the pain of
memory.
Our experience has to reach beyond the Jewish community in order to
enable us to
touch as many people as possible." I wished to open this theatrical event on
this theme in order to reach a wider audience and escape the idea of an
episode
of a Jewish story lived by Jews and performed for a Jewish public. By
performing this play during the World Day of Prayer, my goal is to reach
beyond
the idea of community to present the idea of universality. The prayer
that will
end this performance isn’t addressed to a divine power but to ourselves, as
responsible humans with a duty to be responsible towards one another….
- Guila Clara Kessous, PhD
Producer & Director
Download press packet at www.budzyntheplay.com under the Press Section
--
Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies
Harvard University
1730 Cambridge Street, 3rd Floor, Suite 301
Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone: 617.495.4037
Fax: 617.495.8319
http://www.daviscenter.fas.harvard.edu
*Wednesdays April 21, 28 and May 5*
*Russian Language Table*
An hour-long weekly Russian-only conversation forum for anyone from
beginner to native
1730 Cambridge Street, 3^rd Floor, Lounge area outside room S354
5:00-6:00 p.m.
Table administrator: Alex Groce, Ph.D. Candidate in Slavic Languages and
Literatures, amgroce(a)fas.harvard.edu
--
Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies
Harvard University
1730 Cambridge Street, 3rd Floor, Suite 301
Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone: 617.495.4037
Fax: 617.495.8319
http://www.daviscenter.fas.harvard.edu
**/*Please note the following seminar cancellation:*/
*Thursday, April 22*
*Occasional Seminar *
/"The Cask and the Hoops: Why Did Stalin's Army Collapse during the
First Days of Operation Barbarossa?"/
Mark Solonin, Author
1730 Cambridge Street, 3^rd Floor, Room S354
12:15-2:00 p.m.
To purchase a parking permit for the Broadway Garage (located on Felton
Street, between Cambridge Street and Broadway), please visit Harvard
University Parking Services at
https://www2.uos.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/permit/purchase.pl.
If you need to register a new visitor login in order to purchase a
parking pass, choose "Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies" and
enter department code 2020 on the online registration form.
If you have any questions or problems, please contact the Parking
Services Office at
617-495-3772.
--
----------------------------------------------------
Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies
Harvard University
1730 Cambridge Street, 3rd Floor, Suite 301
Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone: 617.495.4037
Fax: 617.495.8319
http://www.daviscenter.fas.harvard.edu
/*Please note the following seminar title addition:*/
*Monday, April 19*
*Comparative Economics Seminar *
* *
/"Think You are Gutsy? Try Setting Up Your Own Business in Russia"/
Evgeniya Shamis, Fellow, Eisenhower Foundation; Founder and CEO of
"Personnel Touch" Training and Consulting Bureau, Moscow
1730 Cambridge Street, 3^rd Floor, Room S354
12:15-2:00 p.m.
To purchase a parking permit for the Broadway Garage (located on Felton
Street, between Cambridge Street and Broadway), please visit Harvard
University Parking Services at
https://www2.uos.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/permit/purchase.pl.
If you need to register a new visitor login in order to purchase a
parking pass, choose "Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies" and
enter department code 2020 on the online registration form.
If you have any questions or problems, please contact the Parking
Services Office at
617-495-3772.
--
----------------------------------------------------
Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies
Harvard University
1730 Cambridge Street, 3rd Floor, Suite 301
Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone: 617.495.4037
Fax: 617.495.8319
http://www.daviscenter.fas.harvard.edu
Oleg Dorman (filmmaker and professor, Higher Courses of Filmmaking, Moscow, Russian Federation) will discuss his work at Boston College on April 26, 2010 at 7:30 PM in Fulton Hall 511. The presentation will include fragments of Mr. Dorman's award-winning documentary "Podstrochnik" and will be moderated by Boston College professors John Michalczyk and Maxim D. Shrayer.
For more information, go to: https://events.bc.edu/cgi-bin/publish/webevent.cgi?cmd=showevent&cal=cal3,c…
===
------
Maxim D. Shrayer
Professor of Russian, English, and Jewish Studies
Department of Slavic & Eastern Languages and Literatures
Boston College
http://fmwww.bc.edu/SL-V/ShrayerM.html
--
Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies
Harvard University
1730 Cambridge Street, 3rd Floor, Suite 301
Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone: 617.495.4037
Fax: 617.495.8319
http://www.daviscenter.fas.harvard.edu
*/Please join us for the following special events:/
Friday, April 23, 2010***
*Undergraduate Colloquium on Russian and Eurasian Studies*
* *
*Opening Remarks / *1:15 p.m. / 1730 Cambridge Street, Concourse Level,
Room S050**
*Julie Buckler*, Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures, Harvard
University; Executive Committee Member, Davis Center
*Panel I / *1:30-3:00 p.m. / 1730 Cambridge Street, Concourse Level,
Room S050
* *
*Jorina Gjinari*, Wheaton College, /Climate for Foreign Direct
Investments in Albania/
*Zachary Ginsburg*, Wheaton College, /Constitutional Courts and
Democratic Consolidation in Eastern and Southeastern Europe /
*Matthew Ghazarian*, Harvard College, /Not "Low-hanging" Fruit But
"Uncontested" Fruit: Determining Western Support for Post-communist
Self-determination Movements/
*Brian Mack*, Wheaton College, /Sovereignty and Tatarstan/
*Benjamin Brown*, Wheaton College, /Russia//'s Sovereign Economy / * *
Chair: *Jeanne Wilson*, Chair and Professor of Political Science,
Wheaton College; Center Associate, Davis Center**
/ /
*Panel II / *3:30-5:00 p.m. / 1730 Cambridge Street, Concourse Level,
Room S050
* *
*Anna Shabalov*, Harvard College, /Long Road in the Dunes: Latvia and
the Soviet Historical Narrative/
*Linda Lee*, Wellesley College, /An Officer and a...Lady?: The Role of
Soviet Women in Combat during World War II/
*Molly Moses*, Harvard College, /Shamans, Mermaids, Songs and Spells:
Ethnographic Research in the North Baikal Region of the Republic of
Buryatia/
*Emily S(aras*, Wellesley College, /Folk Songs in Flux: The Use of Music
in the Ongoing Construction of Lithuanian Identity/ * *
Chair: *Serhii Plokhii*, Mykhailo S. Hrushevs'kyi Professor of Ukrainian
History, Harvard University; Executive Committee Member, Davis Center
**
*Friday, April 23, 2010***
*Exhibition Opening *
/Eurasian Exposure: Engaging the Old and New/
Student photographers from Harvard, Wellesley and Wheaton
1730 Cambridge Street, Concourse Level
5:00-6:00 p.m.
/
/
To purchase a parking permit for the Broadway Garage (located on Felton
Street, between Cambridge Street and Broadway), please visit Harvard
University Parking Services at
https://www2.uos.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/permit/purchase.pl.
If you need to register a new visitor login in order to purchase a
parking pass, choose "Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies" and
enter department code 2020 on the online registration form.
If you have any questions or problems, please contact the Parking
Services Office at
617-495-3772.
--
----------------------------------------------------
Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies
Harvard University
1730 Cambridge Street, 3rd Floor, Suite 301
Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone: 617.495.4037
Fax: 617.495.8319
http://www.daviscenter.fas.harvard.edu
*/Please note the correction to the following film information:/
**
Tuesday, April 20*
*Special Event in Commemoration of the Victims of the Recent Polish
Tragedy*
*Co-sponsored by The Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies and
The Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies, Harvard University
*/
/*Roundtable Discussion *
Mark Kramer, Program Director, Project on Cold War Studies, Davis Center
Igor Lukes, Professor of International Relations and History,
International Relations Department, Boston University
Terry D. Martin, Acting Director, Davis Center; Professor of Russian
Studies, History Department, Harvard University
Thomas W. Simons, Jr., Visiting Scholar, Davis Center; Lecturer,
Government Department, Harvard University; Former U.S. Ambassador to
Pakistan and Poland
4:15-5:45 p.m.
*Film* /
Katyn /by *Andrzej Wajda* (2007)
In Polish with English subtitles
6:30-8:30 p.m.**
Center for European Studies, 27 Kirkland Street, Room LL1
To purchase a parking permit for the Broadway Garage (located on Felton
Street, between Cambridge Street and Broadway), please visit Harvard
University Parking Services at
https://www2.uos.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/permit/purchase.pl.
If you need to register a new visitor login in order to purchase a
parking pass, choose "Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies" and
enter department code 2020 on the online registration form.
If you have any questions or problems, please contact the Parking
Services Office at
617-495-3772.
--
----------------------------------------------------
Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies
Harvard University
1730 Cambridge Street, 3rd Floor, Suite 301
Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone: 617.495.4037
Fax: 617.495.8319
http://www.daviscenter.fas.harvard.edu