Although there was greater freedom of expression following Stalin's death, little scholarly work was written within the Soviet Union on Stalin. It was not until glasnost that records and archives were made available to Soviet scholars. Roy Medvedev's 1971 biography Let History Judge was the most informative work done on Stalin prior to glasnost. Medvedev uses unpublished memoirs, family papers, and interviews with work camp survivors and relatives of victims to paint his portrait of Stalin. While many of Medvedev's conclusions about Stalin concur with those in the western media, Medvedev stops short of convicting Socialism for producing Stalin.
Stalinism is the sum total of the perversions of Stalin introduced into
the theory and practice of scientific socialism.
-Roy Medvedev, Let History Judge
The next serious look at Stalin from a Soviet perspective did not emerge until Soviet Military Historian Dmitri Volkogonov (now a national security advisor to Yeltsin) produced Stalin: Triumph and Tragedy during the height of glasnost. Like Let History Judge, Volkogonov's biography does not pass judgment on the socialist system. Rather, it makes moral and character judgments directly on Stalin.
Stalin's intellect in the moral sense has been all but nullified by being
inextricably linked to manifestations of evil ... any moral flaw in itself
represents a huge gap in the intellect, creating a twilight zone in the
mind, devoid of any scintilla of good.
-Dmitri Volkogonov, Stalin: Triumph and Tragedy
Not all de-Stalinist literature was non-fiction. Vladimir Voinovich's Zhizn' i neobychainye prikliucheniia soldata Ivana Chonkina: roman-anekdot v piati chastiakh (The Life and Extraordinary Adventures of Private Chonkin) (1976) uses humor and satire to deconstruct Stalin's legend. The story is of a private in the Soviet Army at the onset of the Second World War. Private Chonkin is inept as a military guard (symbolic of Stalin's ineptitude as a military leader). Chonkin spends more time in the nearby house of a female post office clerk than he does watching his post. This absenteeism is representative of Soviet society as a whole. Stalin's first appearance in the novel takes place during a dream Chonkin has while at the home of the post office clerk. In his dream, the airplane Chonkin is supposed to be guarding is attached to a horse (as if it were a chariot) and stolen. Chonkin, panicking, runs after the plane, but only runs into military personnel doing ridiculous acts. The sergeant is seen riding the quartermaster as if he were a horse. The senior politruk turns into a beetle, climbs into Chonkin's ear, and offers some information about Stalin.
I have been instructed to inform you that Comrade Stalin never had any wives because he himself is a woman
Comrade Stalin then descends from the sky wearing a dress. He then proceeds to order the sergeant to reprimand Chonkin (his authority undermined by his wardrobe).
"Comrade Sergeant," said Stalin, "Private Chonkin has abandoned his post and lost his combat weapon as well. Our Red Army has no need for soldiers like this. I advise you to shoot Comrade Chonkin."
In this scene, an ordinary Russian is confronted with disillusionment with Stalin. Chonkin obvious holds Stalin in high esteem, as Stalin is referred to as "Comrade Stalin." However, Stalin's masculinity is challenged in the dream (and throughout the novel). Put next to the womanizing Chonkin, Stalin appears as a castrated leader.
Reference is also made to Stalin's rumored unfaithfulness to his wife Nadezhda Allilueva. At a political training meeting in the beginning of the novel, Chonkin asks the politruk if it is true that Stalin used to have two wives. Stalin's alleged affair was with the sister of the commissar of aircraft production. Rather than try to provide an answer to this question, Voinovich presents Stalin as a woman, incapable of having even one wife.
Manhood is stereotypically presented in terms of sexual prowess and physical strength (military aptitude). Voinovich is directly challenging Stalin's manhood (in Soviet Union as well as most of the rest of the world that can be read as leadership capability). Before Chonkin wakes from his dream, Stalin is left holding a rifle which the sergeant has forgotten to load. The gun is a common phallic symbol, and an unloaded gun has obvious connotations.
Poets and writers have always been the source of independence and free thought in Russia. Stalin tries to kill this tradition, and bring the literary world under his thumb. After his death, writers have been the foremost critics of Stalin. The most famous work criticizing Stalin is Evgeny Evtushenko's Heirs of Stalin. The poem's imagery is self-explanatory, and pretty much sums up Stalin's legacy in the Soviet Union.
Official Deconstruction 
Visual Deconstruction 
Cinematic Deconstruction 
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