Yves Montand in the USSR

Mila Oiva is a cultural historian and an expert on Russian and Polish history. She is currently working as a post-doctoral scholar at the CUDAN Open Lab at the Tallinn University, Estonia. Her research interests focus on circulation of information. She is involved in projects studying the phenomenon through the 19th-century global news flows, contemporary Finnish and Russian internet forum discussions on medieval history, and the Cold War era transnational information circulation.Hannu Salmi is Professor of Cultural History at the University of Turku, Finland, and was nominated Academy Professor for the years 2017–2021. He is a historian of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and the author of volumes such as Nineteenth-Century Europe (2008) and What is Digital History? (2020).Bruce Johnson is a jazz musician and has been an arts policy advisor to Australian state and federal governments. With Hannu Salmi, he was the co-founder of the International Institute for Popular Culture, and his current research lies in music, acoustic cultural history, and the emergence of modernity.

“The volume is particularly noteworthy for its strong interdisciplinary dimension … . The multiplicity of these perspectives and the methodologies they imply make it possible to explore the complexity of the issues at stake in Yves Montand’s decision to travel and sing his French songs in several Soviet cities … from 17 December 1956 to 19 January 1957 … . The undeniable value of the book lies in the way the various sources are presented and linked Together … .” (Perrine Val, H-Soz-Kult, hsozkult.de, June 22, 2023)

• 1. Chapter 1: Introduction.- 2. Chapter 2: 1956 – The International Background.- 3. Chapter 3: The Soviet Thaw and Cultural Diplomacy.- 4. Chapter 4: Biography: Ivo Livi and Yves Montand.- 5. Chapter 5: Preparations, Hesitations and Decisions.- 6. Chapter 6: The Construction and Reception of Montand’s Public Image.- 7. Chapter 7: The Film Yves Montand Sings.- 8. Chapter 8: The Music: Lost in Translation.- 9. Chapter 9: Conclusions.