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The White Birch: A Russian Reflection
‘It has been hand-planted by Tsarinas and felled by foresters. It has been celebrated by peasants, worshipped by pagans and painted by artists. It has self-seeded across mountains and rivers and train tracks and steppe and right through the ruined modernity of a nuclear fall-out site. And like all symbols, the story of the birch has its share of horrors (white, straight, native, pure: how could it not?). But, maybe in the end, what I’m really in search of is a birch that means nothing: stripped of symbolism, bereft of use-value . . . A birch that is simply a tree in a land that couldn’t give a shit.’
The birch, genus Betula, is one of the northern hemisphere’s most widespread and easily recognisable trees. A pioneer species, the birch is also Russia’s unofficial national emblem, and in The White Birch art critic Tom Jeffreys sets out to grapple with the riddle of Russianness through numerous journeys, encounters, histories and artworks that all share one thing in common: the humble birch tree.
We visit Catherine the Great’s garden follies and Tolstoy’s favourite chair; walk through the Chernobyl exclusion zone and among overgrown concrete bunkers in Vladivostok; explore the world of online Russian brides and spend a drunken night in Moscow with art-activists Pussy Riot, all the time questioning the role played by Russia’s vastly diverse landscapes in forming and imposing national identity. And vice-versa: how has Russia’s dramatically shifting self-image informed the way its people think about nature, land and belonging?
Curious, resonant and idiosyncratic, The White Birch is a unique collection of journeys into Russia and among Russian people.
The birch, genus Betula, is one of the northern hemisphere’s most widespread and easily recognisable trees. A pioneer species, the birch is also Russia’s unofficial national emblem, and in The White Birch art critic Tom Jeffreys sets out to grapple with the riddle of Russianness through numerous journeys, encounters, histories and artworks that all share one thing in common: the humble birch tree.
We visit Catherine the Great’s garden follies and Tolstoy’s favourite chair; walk through the Chernobyl exclusion zone and among overgrown concrete bunkers in Vladivostok; explore the world of online Russian brides and spend a drunken night in Moscow with art-activists Pussy Riot, all the time questioning the role played by Russia’s vastly diverse landscapes in forming and imposing national identity. And vice-versa: how has Russia’s dramatically shifting self-image informed the way its people think about nature, land and belonging?
Curious, resonant and idiosyncratic, The White Birch is a unique collection of journeys into Russia and among Russian people.
337 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2021
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
January 28, 2022
Most countries seem to have a national tree; we have the oak along with a lot of other European countries, the Canadians have the Maple, the Greeks have the olive and New Zealand has the ponga! These trees supposedly have characteristics such as strength, that people have alluded to as the national character of their country. In Russia though, their unofficial national tree is the silver birch.
It seems a strange choice in some ways, it is very prevalent across the northern hemisphere and as a pioneer species, it is almost always one of the first trees to colonise areas. It can be found from the steppe, alongside rivers and railway lines and even thrives in the toxic landscape of Chernobyl. Its symbolism has nasty echoes of nationalism: white, straight, native, pure. It has permeated the consciousness of the country and revealed itself in the art.
I look out over the hills of Russia: fir trees, patches of yellow larch, and those spiny white birches, leafless in later September. Clouds leave map-like marks across the forests. The distance is a blue-grey far-away place. China lies beyond.
To discover for himself the significance that it has he explores both the country and the art that it has inspired. He begins with the images that Maria Kapajeva has collected showing various Russian women posing by birch trees as a form of collective national identity. They have been taken from a dating site where these women have uploaded their images in the hope of finding a partner. They are not always successful in this aim. To get a greater understanding though he needs to travel to Russia and his routes will take him along the Siberian railway, to the Saint Sophia Cathedral in Novgorod and to some of the countries that border this huge country. But he is there for the art, in particular the painting titled, The Rooks Have Returned by Alexei Savrasov, where he expands the significance of it for Russian culture.
The birch is nonetheless beloved – not only as a symbol, but as a living being. And that is important, maybe now more than ever.
I have read a few travel books set in Russia in my time. I think that because the place is so vast, different authors have sometimes struggled to get a grip on what exactly makes the country and the people Russian. I think though, in this book, Jeffreys has got to the very essence of what and how they define themselves and he does that through their art, their landscapes and mostly their love for this slender tree. For me, I thought that the book concentrated a little too much on art, but that is his primary career to be fair. I did really like the travel parts and the way that he interacted with the people that he encounters in Russia and outside the country on his travels. I liked the insight that he got from this perspective on the people of Russia, it is good to have a different angle on them.
It seems a strange choice in some ways, it is very prevalent across the northern hemisphere and as a pioneer species, it is almost always one of the first trees to colonise areas. It can be found from the steppe, alongside rivers and railway lines and even thrives in the toxic landscape of Chernobyl. Its symbolism has nasty echoes of nationalism: white, straight, native, pure. It has permeated the consciousness of the country and revealed itself in the art.
I look out over the hills of Russia: fir trees, patches of yellow larch, and those spiny white birches, leafless in later September. Clouds leave map-like marks across the forests. The distance is a blue-grey far-away place. China lies beyond.
To discover for himself the significance that it has he explores both the country and the art that it has inspired. He begins with the images that Maria Kapajeva has collected showing various Russian women posing by birch trees as a form of collective national identity. They have been taken from a dating site where these women have uploaded their images in the hope of finding a partner. They are not always successful in this aim. To get a greater understanding though he needs to travel to Russia and his routes will take him along the Siberian railway, to the Saint Sophia Cathedral in Novgorod and to some of the countries that border this huge country. But he is there for the art, in particular the painting titled, The Rooks Have Returned by Alexei Savrasov, where he expands the significance of it for Russian culture.
The birch is nonetheless beloved – not only as a symbol, but as a living being. And that is important, maybe now more than ever.
I have read a few travel books set in Russia in my time. I think that because the place is so vast, different authors have sometimes struggled to get a grip on what exactly makes the country and the people Russian. I think though, in this book, Jeffreys has got to the very essence of what and how they define themselves and he does that through their art, their landscapes and mostly their love for this slender tree. For me, I thought that the book concentrated a little too much on art, but that is his primary career to be fair. I did really like the travel parts and the way that he interacted with the people that he encounters in Russia and outside the country on his travels. I liked the insight that he got from this perspective on the people of Russia, it is good to have a different angle on them.
February 19, 2023
Part love-letter, part travelogue, part botanical explainer, this book lays bare the power, beauty and significance of Birch Trees. Jeffreys meanders both through Russia and the *idea* of Russia, through space and time, channeling birches to provide engaging perspectives on landscape, culture, history, politics, society and humanity itself.
February 18, 2023
This book about birch trees in Russia really helped me appreciate a bit more about that complicated country. I'll never look at birch trees the same. Wonderful book for thoughtful traveller who are curious about Russia.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews