Remembering the Space Age. - Black Vault Radio Network (BVRN)

Chapter 13
the Music of Memory and Forgetting:
Global echoes of Sputnik II 1
amy Nelson
In times when history still moved slowly, events were few
and far between and easily committed to memory. they
formed a commonly accepted backdrop for thrilling scenes of
adventure in private life. Nowadays, history moves at a brisk
clip. a historical event, though soon forgotten, sparkles the
morning after with the dew of novelty.
— Milan Kundera 2
It’s been four long days since we frst started experimenting
on the dearly departed
soon she won’t communicate anymore.
— amoree Lovell 3
W
4 hile americans’ memory of the “evil empire” might be fading, the
Cold War continues to inform an increasingly diverse and interrelated
global popular culture in often surprising ways. among these, the enduring
1. the research for this essay was supported by a Summer humanities Stipend from Virginia tech,
the Summer research Laboratory on russia, eastern europe, and eurasia at the University of
Illinois, and a Faculty research Grant from Virginia tech’s College of Liberal arts and human
Sciences. For assistance tracking down musical and poetic tributes to space dogs I am grateful
to Karl Larson, tom ewing, Mark Barrow, robert Stephens, erik heine, andrew Jenks, and
especially evan Noble. I am indebted to Brian Britt and Greta Kroeker for their help translating
lyrics in languages I wish I knew better. Some material from this essay also appears in amy
Nelson, “Der abwesende Freund: Laikas kulturelles Nachleben,” in Jessica Ullrich, Friedrich
Welzien, and heike Fuhlbrügge, eds, Ich, das Tier. Tiere als Personlichkeiten in der Kulturgeschichte
(Berlin: reimer Verlag, 2008), pp. 215-224.
2. Kundera, Milan. The Book of Laughter and Forgetting, trans. Michael henry heim (Middlesex,
england: penguin Books, Ltd, 1980 [1979]), pp. 7-8.
3. Lines from the song “Laika: an allegory,” Six Sadistic Songs for Children (2005).
4. In its annual assessment of the attitudes of today’s youth, Beloit College’s “Mindset List for the
Class of 2010” notes that for today’s college students “the Soviet Union has never existed and
therefore is about as scary as the student union.”“Beloit College Mindset List,” http://www.beloit.
edu/~pubaf/mindset/2010.php (accessed January 20, 2008).