Mikhail Bulgakov records formalism cubism futurism Alexander Pushkin Nikolay Nekrasov Walt Whitman Marxist theory Ivan the Terrible Peter the Great Catherine the Great autodidact intellectual Leon Trotsky human nature Western Volga Volga Circus Grigori Alexandrov Lyubov Orlova Kremlin Bolshoi Theatre dacha Bolshevik arrest Russian
Keenly interested in the arts, Stalin admired artistic talent. He protected several Soviet writers from arrest and prosecution, such as Mikhail Bulgakov, even when their work was labelled harmful to his regime. He enjoyed listening to classical music, owning around 2,700 records, and frequently attending the Bolshoi Theatre during the 1930s and 1940s. His taste in music and theatre was conservative, favouring classical drama, opera, and ballet over what he dismissed as experimental "formalism". He also favoured classical forms in the visual arts, disliking avant-garde styles like cubism and futurism. He was a voracious reader and kept a personal library of over 20,000 books. Little of this was fiction, although he could cite passages from Alexander Pushkin, Nikolay Nekrasov, and Walt Whitman by heart. Stalin's favourite subject was history, closely followed by Marxist theory and then fiction. Stalin knew Marxist theory well and according to Bullock was an "effective debater" who would quote Marx and Engels in his arguments. He favoured historical studies, keeping up with debates in the study of Russian, Mesopotamian, ancient Roman, and Byzantine history. He was very interested in the reigns of Ivan the Terrible, Peter the Great and Catherine the Great. An autodidact, he claimed to read as many as 500 pages a day, with Montefiore regarding him as an intellectual. Lenin was his favourite author but he also read, and sometimes appreciated, a great deal of writing by Leon Trotsky and other arch-enemies. Like all Bolshevik leaders, Stalin believed that reading could help transform not just people's ideas and consciousness, but human nature itself. Stalin also enjoyed watching films late at night at cinemas installed in the Kremlin and his dachas. He liked the Western genre, although his favourite films were Volga Volga and Circus (both directed by Grigori Alexandrov and starring Lyubov Orlova).
