Alexander Ageev. Hunger 10

Hunger 10
Practical gastroenterology reading

Alexander Ageev

Publication date: January 23, 2001

When starting the column, I promised myself not to read anything specifically for it, that is, not to build any exclusive stories - just record the usual flow, keep what is called a “reader's diary.” But from time to time this flow itself develops plot-like, to the point of being able to isolate, as they taught in school, the “main idea.”

For example, this week I read “crosswise” the thick volume of Alexander Arkhangelsky “Alexander I” (M.: Vagrius, 2000), the book by the French historian Marc Bloch “Strange Defeat” (M.: ROSSPEN, 1999), “a collection of psychological biographies" "Personal History" (edited by Dmitry Volodikhin, M.: Manufactura, 1999) and the sixth issue of "Emergency Reserve" , which has just been posted in its entirety online.

I read all this, read it (Arkhangelsky, though I haven’t finished it yet), and then I thought: the plot, as there is a plot! Both personal and impersonal. If we forget about Andrei Bychkov’s “The Catcher” , which he swallowed in the subway , all this reading is pure non-fiction, and, moreover, its structure is classically intellectual (sort of Bazarov’s Buchner, Focht and Moleschott, opposed to Pushkin).

What is this, I thought further, happening to me? Why have I been interested in all the “beautiful literature” for the past few years more out of habit and service than out of my heart’s desire, and only a few books touch my heart? Is it really not enough for me to experience purely professional joys when encountering - not so rarely - a high-quality, skillfully made text? Has the traditional Russian requirement for literature “to be more than...” really awakened? What a sin, Lord...

At the same time - I check myself - the persistent aversion to the “Literature of Big Ideas” has not gone away. You usually figure out the “Big Idea” on the first three pages and fade away from boredom, if only for the simple reason that you’ve run out of these “Big Ideas” once or twice, and “you always want to eat.”

That is, you want a lot of “ideas” (that is, simply “thoughts”), and not in filmed or encrypted form, which involves a long work of decoding, the result of which quite often is a large and undeserved gift to the writer from a critic. Critics today are smart, they don’t suffer from a lack of ideas, and they are always ready to read one of their favorites into a more or less decent text.

There are no words, this kind of “co-creation” is a mutually pleasant and mutually beneficial thing. The writer says to himself: “Wow! You never know how our word will respond. After all, I’m not completely a fool if Nemzer (Arkhangelsky, Kuritsyn, Remizova or Eliseev) discovered such an abyss of meaning in my modest opus!” The critic is also pleased: he “attached” a stray thought to a shameless text, and for this he did not need to write his own novel or journalistic article. To be known as a publicist recently is a great sin for a self-respecting critic...

What, exactly, is wrong with such mutual service? It’s bad that a critic and a writer (if we leave out any “nuggets” and other literary exoticism that clearly comes from below) are people, in general, of the same circle, and they revolve in this circle, modifications of the same ideas. The forms of their publication multiply and become more sophisticated, and the “substance” itself becomes depleted and worn out from repeated use.

What else comes to mind? That if I were a black man of advanced years or a teenager in puberty, I would be one hundred percent satisfied with the current state of Russian fine literature (both in the “mass” and in its “elite” sectors).

Why did I drag in an African-American here - somehow I didn’t realize it right away. Well, probably, this image is associated with the idea of ​​a problem-free high from consuming various kinds of narcotic reading material: you sit on a welfar and wonder about aliens, ghouls or blond beasts with a Nordic character.

And for puberty teenagers (if the wild fantasy of reading books comes to their minds) these days it’s generally lame: “this” is told in all the tedious details, variations and deviations. It’s not forgotten to “make life from someone”...

That is, “nature” - whether awakening or in need of stimulation - is now completely provided with its sensual food.

But here I am, a skeptical middle-aged humanist who still needs to engage in professional activities in “culture” for quite some time before retirement, not a “specialist” (not an “intellectual,” although not an “intellectual” in the traditional Soviet sense), experiencing obvious vitamin deficiency, consuming even very high-quality fiction. And, since vitamins are not obtained “naturally,” I read a huge amount of non-fiction, that is, I seem to constantly take Vitrum, Centrum and other calcium gluconate. Otherwise, it’s quite difficult to think and talk “about life and death” (what else, gentlemen, are you interested in talking about? Butov’s or Akunin’s plotting?).

Substantively speaking: when the German Empire collapsed (and indeed the entire European order, established in the 19th century), not only “The Decline of Europe” and “Reflections of an Apolitical” appeared , but also “The Magic Mountain” , and many other hypervitaminized things (from this hypervitaminosis By the way, Gorky’s “The Life of Klim Samgin” died ). But on the ruins of the communist empire, God knows what grows to this day - some kind of sluggish journalistic quinoa, vigorous mass-cult horsetails and orchids of insane beauty and self-sufficiency. Some kind of vegetarian restaurant, God forgive me.

Even on the ruins of our 60s, Andrei Bitov’s “Pushkin House” grew up , a completely worthy monument to them, but the 60s, in comparison with the 90s, although a very nice era, was much more meager in thought-generating events.

By the way, does anyone remember that in the 70s there was another attempt to write an intellectual novel that purported to sum up the era? And this attempt was made by - funny to say - Anatoly Ananyev , the most boring epigon of the most boring Aldanov. The novel was called “Years Without War” , it was impossibly sad and was remembered precisely for its insane (against the background of the professional caution of the others) claim. But nowadays there is not even a whiff of complaints - with progressive professionalism.

Another question is why, since domestic literature rarely pleases with fresh thoughts, not turn to foreign literature, since it is now translated freely and abundantly? A slippery question, answering which can easily be considered a supporter of some “special”, “third”, etc. the ways of Russia.

The point is not about “paths,” but about the fact that Russia over the past hundred years has radically removed itself from Western consciousness, and its painful, perhaps dead-end, but real hundred-year experience is practically not present in it; I personally feel this acutely when reading almost any Western book written in the second half of the century. That is, Thomas Mann or Hermann Hesse still have me, but the dearly beloved John Fowles or the coolly recognized Pynchon “didn’t even have me.”

You understand that I’m not talking about “Russian”, that is, I’m not talking about the theme, but about a presence of a different kind. So: in many wonderful Western books, neither me nor my country are present - we are not included there either as characters or as readers. It is, of course, possible and even necessary to endure this (at least as a fair punishment for the long-term sin of national arrogance), but the thrill from such “endure and fall in love” is not enough. But I’m not yet in an senile, frozen state of semi-indifferent “acceptance of the world,” but at a very active age, when I want to participate as much as I can in the reconstruction of a poorly organized world, and I want the benefit of a good and smart book...

Meanwhile, I’ve been chatting so much about lofty matters that I’ll have to postpone judgments about what I’ve read until Friday: I’ll just finish reading Arkhangelsky, because his book is almost the key to the unexpected plot.