Ideas and Ideals

The article analyzes the stylistic and linguistic features of the so-called “Brezhnev’s diaries”. Within the framework of the “linguistic turn in the history” methodology, it attempts to identify the relationship between the specificity of Brezhnev’s writing and his personality. The authors pay special attention to the verification of the Brezhnev’s records genre which is defined as a "log book". The article analyzes the nature of the records in comparison with Brezhnev’s speaking. Brezhnev was known as a skillful, spontaneous storyteller, he had a quick reaction, a multiple choice of epithets – features, alien to the standardized, public-political vocabulary of Soviet newspapers and public speeches of party and state leaders. It was the other way round with written speech. It was totally different. There was no place for jokes and improvisation. Even in his personal diaries he used the standardized, stilted language, which he used to speak working as a party leader, commissar. The authors come to the conclusion that Brezhnev acquired the “Soviet newspeak”, which actually became his second nature. The absence of any signs of deliberate design of the text in Brezhnev’s personal records indicates that the text is really a reflection of the personality of the General Secretary.