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Thunder on the Steppe: Volga German Folklife in a Changing Russia

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This book is about the folk traditions of Volga Germans remaining in Russia at the end of the Soviet period, and may be of interest both to descendants of Volga Germans who left Russia for other countries on the 19th Century, and to Volga Germans who were displaced to Eastern Russia during the relocation of Russian industry and non-Russian populations (chiefly to Novosibirsd and surrounding regions) at the onset of Hitler's invasion of the Russian heartland. As a consequence of these emigrations, many of the old Volga German villages no longer exist - but the authors of this book visited some which remain.

(It is a matter of some irony that Volga Germans who were displaced to Eastern Russia followed the Kalmyk Nomads whose grazing lands on the Volga were granted to German farmers by Catherine the Great almost two centuries earlier, and who then fled (under conditions that decimated their people) to the East.)

"The authors collected numerous examples of modern Volga German folk traditions in Russia, and many of these are described in Thunder on the Steppe folksongs, folk medicine, proverbs, nicknames, poetry, dialect stories, drinking toasts, and foodways including recipes for Volga style vegetable soup, Gatletta (meat patties), Grebbel, Trockne Nudel, Riwwelkuche, Petschenya (cookies), and other dishes. Shortly after their arrival in Russia, the Kloberdanzes witnessed a country undergoing rapid political and social changes, culminating in a frightening military coup and thunderous collapse of Soviet Communism. A vivid description of the events surrounding the Second Russian Revolution as personally experienced by the two authors in a Volga German village also is included in the book."

For those interested in Volga German history, there is an interesting collection of descriptions of books on the topic at
http://www.webbitt.com/volga/books.html
Amazon carries 21 Volga German related titles including The Volga Germans: In Russia and the Americas, from 1763 to the Present; From Privileged to Dispossessed: The Volga Germans, 1860-1917 and The German Colonies on the Lower Volga: Their Origin and Early Development.

For the troubled and troubling history of the Volga Kalmyks see Where Two Worlds Met: The Russian State And the Kalmyk Nomads, 1600-1771