Comments on: Hussar Ballad: Soviet Crossdressing Wartime Musical

By: meardearna

meardearna — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 13:02:01 +0000

thanks for the brief bio on this fascinating (and inspiring) person!
Her story somewhat reminds me of Chevalier d’Eon’s, in that both their gender were so controversial during their lifetimes that it still challenges us now.

By: Jon Munger

Jon Munger — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 05:11:05 +0000

This is why I love history. It reminds me of this snippet of a story I heard. During the Third Crusade, the Saracens captured a green-cloaked archer. The archer maimed over a dozen men as they tried to close the gap. Upon capturing the figure, the Saracens were stunned to learn that the archer was a woman. After some debate, it was decided that a woman wouldn’t be worth the effort to ransom, and she was killed. Still, there, lost in the annals of history, is the story of a remarkable woman.

And the Durova story reminds me of the all female sniper teams the Russians used during WW2. Lyudmila Pavlichenko killed more men than cancer. And she got invited to the White House by Eleanor Roosevelt, who gave her a gun. Yes, the first lady gave an honest to God Russki killing machine a Winchester rifle, and presumably in the presence of FDR. Those were…simpler times.

By: Stagger Leah

Stagger Leah — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 00:09:59 +0000

This is totally cool and awesome. I completely agree, a better movie (but keep it a musical, heck yes) is necessary. I just find out about her from this article and I already felt insulted that they changed the story to her going after a dude.
Thank you for feeding my uniform fetish for another day.

By: Mer

Mer — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 18:38:22 +0000

Fascinating! I’d never heard of Durova, either…although I’ve seen the Durov Circus posters in collections of vintage carnival imagery. Thanks so much for this!

By: Tanya

Tanya — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 18:35:15 +0000

Gussarskaya Ballada is one of my MOST favorite movies from that time period of Soviet cinema. Golubkina did such a great job, and I think she made a pretty convincing boy in the film.

But I never knew that this was based on a true personage in history. Thank you for that revelation.

By: Alice

Alice — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 15:13:52 +0000

What an awesome story! Calls for a trip to the biography section of the nearest bookstore, I think!

By: s. suzuki

s. suzuki — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 15:12:11 +0000

I agree, this is very interesting. Thanks for highlighting/bringing Durova to the attention of people like me who had never heard of her.

By: Vivacious G

Vivacious G — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 14:09:14 +0000

What an amazing amazing story, thanks for posting.

By: Wood

Wood — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 13:18:32 +0000

Certainly an inspiration for Terry Pratchett’s novel “monstrous regiment”.

By: mildred

mildred — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 12:42:26 +0000

Sound kind of like Deborah Sampson. Hers is a similar case, a few decades earlier:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deborah_Sampson