Shostakovich's Symphony No. 11 means something entirely different to Russian audiences than it does to Western audiences. For one thing, a Russian audience knows that the themes of the Eleventh are actually themes from folk and protest songs and understands the emotional resonance of those songs. For another thing, a Russian audience knows the historical context of the songs and understands the historical meaning of that context. And, finally, a Russian audience knows exactly how much sincerity and how much irony, how much terror and how much triumph there is in
Shostakovich's Eleventh, in other words, it understands how to understand the work. Nevertheless, it is a measure of the immediacy of
Shostakovich's Eleventh that even a Western audience can be shaken by the work, can be roused even to riot because of its overwhelming power.