"Informer 001, or The Myth about Pavlik Morozov", the book secretly written and researched during the years of 1980 through 1984 in Moscow, became a widely popular work in the underground Samizdat press and later brought Druzhnikov fame. This work was the first independent research investigating what the Soviets called “the murder of the century,” the death of a pioneer-hero who later became a tragic symbol of Soviet ideology. Pavlik Morozov, the barely grown hero-youth, turned his father into the NKVD secret police for treason and, according to Soviet propaganda was killed by kulaks, wealthy peasants, in 1932. For these actions, the Soviets recognized Morozov as the first honourable member of the Pioneers, a Soviet youth organization somewhat like the Boy Scouts, and was later held up as a model of behaviour and class morals for millions of Soviet-era youth. Dozens of books, plays, songs, and even an opera were written by Soviet writers about this young informer. Over fifty years these publications became the basis for the foundation of myths about who Pavlik Morozov really was. Druzhnikov upheld that the majority of media about Pavlik Morozov was fabrication or simply lies. Unable to find archival materials, Druzhnikov visited thirteen cities, searching for evidence of “the murder of the century.” He spoke with the remaining witnesses, including Pavlik's brother who was accused of espionage and sent to labour camp for ten years, his classmates, fellow villagers, participants in Morozov's murder trial, Chekists, and even managed to find Morozov's mother. In this sensational book, Druzhnikov makes an excellent case determining that the young would-be hero turned his father into the NKVD not from any particular dedication to the cause of communism, but rather, at the insistence of his mother who wanted revenge against Pavlik's father for leaving her for another woman. Furthermore, Druzhnikov makes a case that Morozov was very likely developmentally impaired and wouldn't even have been able to understand Leninism let alone believe in it. Druzhnikov doesn't think that the kulaks killed Pavlik but rather the NKVD who were looking for any reason to incriminate the kulaks as a societal class even if that meant fabricating a cause. At the height of the terror in 1937, the Soviets made numerous demands on the citizenry to turn in traitors, criminals, and other enemies of the state. One of the most interesting of Druzhnikov's findings was that Pavlik Morozov was never a pioneer during his lifetime; the government appears to have made Morozov a pioneer long after his death. The second half of Informer 001 deals with the creation of the Pavlik Morozov myth from his creation as a Soviet literary hero at the First Congress of Soviet Writers in 1934 and the subsequent monument dedicated to Morozov on Red Square to the still perceptible consequences of the Morozov myth today. While this book is written in the dry language of fact (Druzhnikov often says the book was written with “the cool reason of a historian”), Informer 001 goes far beyond the conventions of literary or historical investigation. Druzhnikov concludes that one of the greatest tragedies of growing up in a Socialist nation was that the Morozov myth, essentially a story of treachery, was used as an example of virtuous honesty and piety. When Informer 001 was published in London in 1987, Alexander Solzhenitsyn wrote: “Yuri Druzhnikov should be given every respect for writing this much-needed book. It's through books such as his that many Soviet lies will eventually be revealed.” The book was immediately banned in the former Soviet Union (The first Russian edition was published in Moscow in 1995), yet Informer 001 was known in the Soviet Union because Druzhnikov read it aloud on radio stations “Liberty” and “The Voice of America.” The book was later translated into a number of languages and two films were based on it.

Translated by Max Hannan

From Russian Writers of the Twentieth Century published by the Great Russian Encyclopedia, Moscow..

See http://www.druzhnikov.com/english/bio1.html