Baby dolls; petroglyphs

“It’s difficult to predict, especially the future, but it seems that the new work of Lyudmila Petrushevskaya ..., ” writes Mikhail Zolotonosov about the novel “Number One, or In the Gardens of Other Possibilities” (M.: EKSMO), “ may well become the main literary event of the year. One or two prestigious awards can be guaranteed."

Zolotonosov is indeed better at predicting the past . “Number One” (even though in my opinion he is #1) will probably not win either choral praises or significant awards. The reaction of the literary community to the book - judging both by the eloquently meager publications and by frank conversations on the sidelines - is unprecedentedly sour. Almost no one likes the novel. The manuscript was, given the current lack of “large” prose declared by magazines, rejected by the editors of Znamya. That is, in the favorites of the premium scenario, now completely - with the exception of "Natsbest" - controlled by the "thick-magazine" reference group, of which "Znamya" is the flagship, the path of the text is barred. For "Natsbest", the author's surname is too much and not well rooted in the collective memory of readers, and the work is too outside the topic of the day.

Despite the fact that Petrushevskaya was always considered by her, this anger, to be a bard. A sort of visceral journalistic malice. As Galina Yuzefovich thinks , “Number One” is “an allegorical representation of the fate of the Russian intelligentsia.” Liza Novikova believes that “the novel is dedicated to theft.” M. Zolotonosov - that “the matter is mass debilitation from top to bottom due to “information immersion” in the criminal world.” Only Pyotr Favorov, involuntarily (and sometimes not without brilliance) fulfilling the book review duties of Lev Danilkin in the Afisha magazine, wisely washes his hands of it : “In “Number One” you can figure out a lot of social meanings: a novel about the suppression of the intelligentsia by crime, or about the metaphysical essence of theft , or about the problems of the disappearing peoples of the North... The very diversity of these assumptions testifies: ... there is no more public sound here than in “ The Kalush fell on the fur ” or in the description of the life and fate of the pig Alla” (links are mine. - B.K . ).

The thesis about theft clearly goes back to an interview given by the novelist (even before the book was published) to Radio Liberty: “The hero of this novel is a thief, and this is his life, such a strange thing.” But which of the central characters - ethnographer Ivan Ts. or repeat offender Valera - did Lyudmila Stefanovna have in mind? And what, in Petrushevskaya’s terminology, is a thief? In what way is he a thief? Valera is a thief by profession; Ivan - innocent victim; According to his frequent tap-dancing, his wife, a scientific discovery, and several thousand dollars were consistently stolen from him, that is, he himself does not seem to be stealing anything. With the exception of Valerina's flesh , into which Ivan's soul moves without asking - and instead of subjugating this flesh, it itself is subjugated by it, transformed from the inside to the same extent as it is clothed on the outside. The primacy of the body over the spirit is Petrushevskaya’s signature motif. Yes, in “Number One” for the first time a “theoretical basis” was provided for it - the mythology of the fictional Siberian people. However, after all, for example, “Time is Night” was nothing more than a monologue by Anna Akhmatova , reincarnated as a worn-out late Soviet graphomaniac; infernal life and loose physiology, like a virus, corroded and disfigured the aristocratic anima of the poetess - just as Ivan’s behavior and train of thought are cut and shredded by Valera’s conditioned reflexes and memories.

Although this time the reshaping is largely cosmetic. In the finale, it turns out that both, the intellectual and the idiot, were initially worth each other. Moreover: everyone is isomorphic to everyone. The bespectacled person is a fixer. The cyanotic girl - to her lemon-pale mother. That’s why Petrushevskaya’s cadavers change their “individualities” so famously. “Wow, Bald Yash has mastered metempsychosis... Hmmm. There is no such thing that people haven’t adapted for their needs.”

Alas, at least one such thing exists: “Number One” itself. An uncompromisingly experimental opus on the verge of commercial suicide. The perception of the text is deliberately difficult, the brilliant narrative technique is, in a Joycean way, hostile to the recipient. The concentration of horror in the climactic chapter “Evening and Night” surpasses anything ever revealed in Russian literature. “Father pulled down his pants, held them in one fist, and started pumping them with the other... We held her tightly by the elbows, she started screaming, “Are you crazy?” and he knew his blow... It was like a piece of wood. She slid down like that along the wall. There’s blood all over my head, flowing down my shoulders... We’re laughing!.. I already realized then that I would kill.” Reading like this can literally make you go gray, the consumer doesn’t like it. The EKSMO marketers also understood the situation perfectly: the circulation of Petrushevskaya is 7100, the circulation of Lyudmila Ulitskaya’s novel “Sincerely yours Shurik”, published almost simultaneously by the same publishing house, is 75 thousand. And the visual comparison of the bindings is impressive (by the way, the designer in both cases one - Andrey Bondarenko).

Super-successful on the market (at least in Moscow) “Shurik” is least of all capable of shocking the psyche. This irrespectively pleasant, but at the same time taking up an incredible amount of time from the reader, text seems to be intended for portion consumption; So - one tablet in the morning and in the evening - fellow citizens swallow glycine . “There is no plot as such, ” Inna Bulkina rightly notes . “ That is, it seems to exist, there’s just no development in it; there is a long chain of “episodes” strung together according to the “another lady” principle; instead of “development” we get some anatomical diversity . In essence, this is a typical composition of a picaresque or erotic novel." And, I’ll add, a typical recipe for a mediocre Western “psychological” novel - a very, very respectable craft, even though it’s sweaty and not too pretentious. Attempts to somehow raise the rank of the book - statements about Ulitskaya’s extraordinary “ human insights ” and, especially, that “Shurik” innovatively continues the traditions of the “great Russian novel” - are passionate to say the least. Olga Grinkrug outlined an eye of insight: “The appearance of the characters, their favorite words, addresses, shoemakers, manner of eyeliner and other small details of the biography were carefully collected from acquaintances.” Yes, Alexander Korn is a typical character, no doubt; but Steve O., for example, is also an undoubted type , however, it is strange to imagine him in the role of the main character, and not Anna K.

Seriously empathizing with the adventures of the long-eared dildo Shurik, wandering through the Moscow 70s knee-deep in rejected women, is hindered not only by the insignificance of the object, but also by the unreadability of the text: typos, stylistic mistakes, hasty lexical tautologies. Reviewing the magazine version of the first part of the novel, M. Zolotonosov noted “the carelessness, almost demonstrative, with which, for example, the author created Gilles Dalcroze, confusing Gilles Deleuze and Emile Jacques-Dalcroze. Or at the very beginning of the novel he made a “confusion”, erroneously asserting that in 1938, the Chamber Theater... was closed, merging with the Theater of the Revolution" - and further interpreted this negligence as a conscious innovation, a game with mass cult discourse. But no: in the book version, both errors indicated by the critic are carefully corrected. In general, the “exmosh” version is quite different from the “Novomirovsky” one, but the differences only highlight the randomness of any events and details in Ulitskaya’s world: what difference does it make whose piano playing Verusya listens to at the concert - Maria Yudina (who in reality seems to have died at the moment described) or Dmitry Bashkirov ? What difference does it make whether Alya Togusova died under the wheels of a car or survived and married a policeman? Out of mind, out of mind.

“The devil knows why the name “blue cities” has long stuck here in the imagination... Fedin had such an early novel (where is that Fedin? Who remembers?), everyone didn’t get around to reading it.” Konstantin Fedin had an early novel, Cities and Years. "Blue Cities" is an early story by Alexei Tolstoy. But where is that Alexey? Who remembers?.. It is impossible to suspect M. Weller, from whose collection “B.Vavilonskaya” (St. Petersburg: Password, 30 thousand) the quotation was extracted, that he is deliberately lowering himself to the standards of mass culture. Weller's long-standing role was as a paradoxical philosopher, a tactless destroyer of myths, and a creator of parable parabolas, equally masterful in concept and verbal design. The scattering of discursive manners in “Babylonskaya” is truly impressive, but, unlike “Number One,” it is not an experimental, but a purely commercial device (the analogy lying on the surface is “DPP (NN),” just crowned with “Natsbest”). Weller unleashes one intellectual attraction after another on the reader, trying to fill all the niches of the corresponding market segment with a single book. It is not surprising that he (not the segment, but Weller) often fouls: the story “ The White Donkey ” is chillingly reminiscent of the works of Coelho, the historiosophical play “Evening in Valhalla” every now and then strays into a Maximgalkin parody, the story “ Reservation ” (about Peredelkin’s writers) does not ridiculous and ugly vulgar. Those fragments that, according to the plan, should shock the most (they say, now people will read it and come to the prose writer’s house to punch him in the face) - “Confession of the President’s Lover” and “The Conspiracy of the Elders of Zion” - are, frankly speaking, not sufficiently catchy; precisely because the provocation is too ostentatiously staged, rational and, therefore, toy-like.

Three things save the book. Not at all ironic, deep and memorable story of Dream. The title cycle, in which Weller brings down on the capital of our homeland a heap of inventive cataclysms in the spirit (and not in the spirit) of “The Day After Tomorrow” : drought, cold, hurricane, flood, volcanic eruption, gun violence , nuclear bombing, pandemic, total Americanization, ossification, minus-presence in the present and past; invigorates. And, finally, the obvious fact that “B.Vavilonskaya” is much, much more talented and better than Pelevin’s “DPP”, with which it is forged to compete. (By the way, for those wondering what B is, I will quote the author’s answer to the correspondent of “Evening Petersburg”: “What did you think? If you see the name of the street “B. Pushkinskaya”, will you decide that it is in honor of Anna Kern?” )

Moscow, which was pestered by the vengeful M. Weller, as if nothing had happened, meows with horns and winks with neon from the pages of “ Shirts ” by Evgeniy Grishkovets (M.: Vremya, 20 thousand copies, about 10 thousand were shipped in less than a month). The publication of this fabulously compact novel seemed to outsiders more of a social than a literary event; the first critical responses generally boiled down to the expected thesis “ the continuation of the artist Grishkovets by other means ” ; Andrei Nemzer, associated with the esprit de corps (“Vremya” and the newspaper “Vremya Novostei” are components of the same publishing house), praised “Shirt” through gritted teeth, however, without failing to insert the malicious jargon of “crap” into the last phrase of the review...

Imagine the amazement of your humble servant: he liked the “Shirt.” A significant and iconic text, a kind of modern “Captain’s Daughter” (Grishkovets directly refers to Pushkin’s story). Well, or, so as not to go too far, “I want to be honest.” (Where is that Voinovich ? Who remembers?) From the long line of current examples of “new sincerity,” “The Shirt” stands out because it is literary. In addition to the absolutely hypnotic intonation familiar from one-man performances, the book has both compositional grace and a successfully found through symbol. (The same shirt that steadily becomes greasy by the end of the hero’s winter day. And the more blissful the mini-event, the greater the damage done to it: a gentle haircut at the hairdresser - hairs on the collar; a drink at the bar - a stain on the chest.) Or perhaps there is something else that Grishkovets did not put into the text.

Listen to the talk of the architect Sasha, a meek Rasgnak, a sentimental playboy (Lisa Novikova’s observation about the typological similarity of the two namesakes - street and Grishkovtsovsky is interesting). Through his conformist dreams and militaristic dreams, through romanticism, nobility and infantile sweetness, there glimmers social phobia bordering on sociopathy ; Holden Caulfield syndrome, history of pre-hysteria. “It’s good to be in prison. But not in ours, not now and not for a crime... I would always have clean, fresh shirts with loose sleeves and narrow cuffs... But only so that there would be no opportunity to give someone any - a note or receive a letter from someone. Also, so that it is known for sure that there is no way to escape from here... So that there is peace in my soul, so that there is no unavenged resentment or debt of honor. Fortress forever! To tell the truth, I wouldn’t want to meet such Sasha in a dark corner somewhere near Real McCoy. Especially if he is tormented by an unavenged insult. God forbid.

The novel's binding is almost entirely white; Over the hours while I was reading, stains appeared on it, the prints of my fingers stained with newspapers, and a fine amount of soot. Freshly washed shirts, cleanliness of vestments; in the Babylonian gardens of our possibilities they will not last a day. Having coldly formulated this law, I say goodbye until the next review. Sincerely yours B.