Yearning for Philosophy (Aleksandr Ogurtsov: in memoriam). Article I

Abstract

The article analyzes the tragic period of Soviet philosophy development, that has begun
with expatriation of the most famous Russian philosophers in 1922 and lasted until 1989, when
the article named “The Suppression of Philosophy” by A.P. Ogurtsov was first published. The
inner springs of physical and ideological terror against the philosophers, who tried to make
their contribution to philosophy, are revealed here. The produced analysis furnishes insights
into the logic of what happened. Also it provides the feeling of close continuance of the guiding
idea leading from the Hegelian dialectic to the colossus of Marxist-Leninist philosophy. All
this breaks off while stumbled upon lifeless coldness of emptiness, because “the logic of terror
means that there is no other space for the logic itself”. And then the investigation of the Soviet
philosophy turns into some kind of “nightmarish dream inside a dream”.