The ideology bureaucrat who co-wrote Stalin's biography, enforced the Zhdanov line, and fell in a sex scandal
Khrushchev at the Gladiators hearing: 'Alexandrov is young, I get it. But you, at your age — what were you doing there?' With that, Kruzhkov and the ideology bosses all vanished from their posts.
Soviet philosopher and party ideology official. A specialist in classical Russian philosophy and aesthetics, he served as director of the Marx-Engels-Lenin Institute (1944–1949), where he co-authored Stalin's official short biography (1947) and supervised the compilation of Marxist canonical editions. As head of the CC Literature and Arts Department (1950–1953) and the CC Agitprop Department (1953–1955), he enforced the Zhdanovshchina cultural line and late Stalinist ideological control. In 1955 he was implicated in the 'Gladiators Case' sex scandal, stripped of all party posts, and exiled to the Urals; he later returned to academia as director of the USSR Institute of Art History (1961–1973).
Career Timeline
- 1931Graduated from Krupskaya Academy of Communist Education
- 1933Completed postgraduate studies, Philosophy Faculty, Communist University for Social Science Teachers
- 1940Awarded professorship
- 1941–1942Member, Bureau of Foreign Policy Propaganda
- 1942–1943Member, Soviet Information Bureau
- 1943–1944Deputy editor, War and the Working Class journal
- 1944–1949Director, Marx-Engels-Lenin Institute
- 1947Co-author of Stalin's official short biography (2nd ed.)
- 1949–1950Deputy then 1st Deputy Head, CC Propaganda and Agitation Department
- 1950–1953Head, CC Literature and Arts Department
- 1950Defended doctoral dissertation in philosophy
- 1952–1956Member, CPSU Central Auditing Commission
- 1953–1955Head, CC Propaganda and Agitation Department
- 1953Corresponding Member, USSR Academy of Sciences
- 1955–1961Professor, Ural State University; editor, Uralsky Rabochy newspaper
- 1961–1973Director, Institute of Art History, USSR Ministry of Culture