“Historical Beginnings Never Die”: The Image of Kiev in the Journalism of M. N. Katkov

For M. N. Katkov, the image of Russian Kiev was even more important than for other domestic conservatives. Actively advocating for the need to build a railway between Moscow and Kiev, and later supporting the idea of building a Kievan monument to Bohdan Khmelnytsky, the editor of the “Moskovskiye Vedomosti” skillfully combined religious, historical and philosophical issues with economic and technical issues. Katkov noted that it was after the reunification with Little Russia that Russia became a European state and acquired worldwide significance. Within the framework of the ideology of state (or, more precisely, “bureaucratic”) nationalism and the “centripetal” political metaphysics of the “Moscow Thunderer”, the ancient Russian capital acted as a kind of “assemblage point” for all periods of national history — including the advancing post-reform period. Thus, Russian Kiev in Katkov’s journalism acquired the features of a symbol of “conservative modernization”, i. e. true progress based on continuity with the national past.