I was reading up today about national linguistic reforms - mainly, Mustafa Kemal's reforms of Ottoman Turkish into the nearly-unrecognisable Modern Turkish, in a different script, grammar reforms, etc, and I'm aware that several early Soviet politicians - the most famous one being Leon Trotsky - who wanted to reform the Russian language, by transferring it to the Roman script and doing other modernizing efforts.
Now, one area where the Soviets actually did make a massive effort with payoff was their education and literacy programs. Now, what if the Soviets decided not only to modernize the Russian language - but to replace it entirely, by teaching all Soviet children Esperanto as their first language, 'The international language'? After all, it would certainly fit with the rhetoric and philosophy of the Bolsheviks the time.
So, let's give a PoD of Lenin learning Esperanto while in Switzerland, and, on his accesion to power, decides, with massive support, to replace the Russian language. What happens?
Now, one area where the Soviets actually did make a massive effort with payoff was their education and literacy programs. Now, what if the Soviets decided not only to modernize the Russian language - but to replace it entirely, by teaching all Soviet children Esperanto as their first language, 'The international language'? After all, it would certainly fit with the rhetoric and philosophy of the Bolsheviks the time.
So, let's give a PoD of Lenin learning Esperanto while in Switzerland, and, on his accesion to power, decides, with massive support, to replace the Russian language. What happens?