Mayakovsky, Советская азбука (Soviet Alphabet), letter Б (Moscow, 1919)
Page for the letter Б in a rhymed picture alphabet for children. A lanky figure in a top hat and tails, whose body forms the initial letter, bolts away beside the verse "The Bolsheviks look for bourgeois. The bourgeois race off a thousand versts." A class label, "bourgeois", is attached to a comic fleeing figure, and the rhyme supplies the verdict.
- Date
- 1919
- Period
- Interwar
- Made by
- Vladimir Mayakovsky (text and drawings), Moscow
- Region
- Eastern Europe and Eurasia
- Country
- Soviet Russia
- Medium
- Books and pamphlets
- Issuer type
- Individual
- Regime
- Soviet Russia
- Leader
- Vladimir Lenin
- Audience
- Domestic public
- Purpose
- Demonize
- Themes
- War and the military, Labor
- Event
- Russian Civil War
- Techniques
- Name-calling
- Source
- Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- Source
- Wikimedia Commons (scan credited to raruss.ru), retrieved September 29, 2026
- Rights
- Public domain (published 1919; author died 1930, term expired; Commons: PD-old-70-expired)
Vladimir Mayakovsky, Советская азбука (Moscow, 1919), via Wikimedia Commons (public domain)
Text on the object
[Б]ОЛЬШЕВИКИ БУРЖУЕВ ИЩУТ. [Б]УРЖУИ МЧАТСЯ ВЕРСТ ЗА ТЫЩУ.
The Bolsheviks look for bourgeois. The bourgeois race off a thousand versts away.
The initial Б of the first and third lines is drawn as, or hidden behind, the running figure, so the printed words start at ОЛЬШЕВИКИ and УРЖУИ; the missing letter is supplied in square brackets from the verse's known text.
