Red Square is a part of Kremlin architectural
ensemble
Stretching along one side of the Kremlin walls,
Red Square has become a part of its overall architectural ensemble,
with seven Kremlin towers standing along its western side.
The compositional centre of Red Square, Moscow
is the Lenin Mausoleum, wherein lies the
body of the great revolutionary leader and founder of the Communist
Party of the Soviet Union and the Soviet State.
The Lenin Mausoleum is a classic
work of Soviet architecture. Its architect, A.Shchusev, employed
a simple and expressive design in the form of a monumental edifice,
faced in dark red granite and black labradorite, which embodies, as
it were, the grief of the people and the power of Lenin's eternal teaching.
Every hour on the hour to the peal of the Kremlin
chimes the guards are changed at the entrance to the Mausoleum. It is
a solemn ceremony that remains long in the memories of those who have
witnessed it. Summer and winter, rain or fine, an endless stream of
people come to pay their respects to the memory of Lenin.
During national festivities the Mausoleum becomes
a tribune before which pass the columns of demonstrators and participants
in the military parades. On both sides of the Mausoleum there are stands
of light-grey granite for the guests.
Behind the Mausoleum along the Kremlin wall the
revolutionary necropolis is located. Here lie buried outstanding figures
in the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and the Soviet State, leaders
of the international workers' and communist movement, scientists and
men of culture, great soldiers and national heroes. The memories of
many of these persons live on in the names of Moscow's
streets and squares: Kirov Street, Gorky Street, Kuibyshev Street, Krupskaya
Street, Maria Ulyanova Street, Sverdlov Square, Dzerzhinsky Square,
Nogin Square, Gagarin Square, Korolev Street, Lyusinova Street, Vorovsky
Street, Sapunov Street and many others. In your excursions round Moscow
you will frequently come across the names of
those who are buried in Red Square.
