Denis Bychikhin. The fruits of second-level reflection. Issue 12.

The fruits of second-level reflection. Issue 12.
Denis Bychikhin

Publication date: April 7, 2000

The tower is screwed

Today will not be boring. I just feel it.

Let's start with the fact that this week's reviews, as members of the Third International, eat what you can. That's what people say. But people won’t say it in vain. Because before we lived in huts, but now we have the Internet. Where's the logic? There is no logic. Let's go further.

Moreover, they, that is, reviews, are very different: for intellectuals, actualists, paradoxicals, their wives and girlfriends - in short, for everyone. (This is again an allusion to the Third International - I developed, that is, a metaphor).

So it won't be boring. At least I guarantee this.

. . .

As we have already noticed, a lot has been written about books this week. How this is explained, I don’t know. I also have a vague idea of ​​why this is needed. But I can share private, as if local, information.

Let's start with the reviews that can be found on the Internet. Firstly, this is a note by Fyodor Uspensky (“Results”, 4.04) about E.G. Babaev’s book “Memoirs”. The book is entirely about cult personalities - Akhmatova, Pasternak, Mandelstam. Moreover, they are iconic in certain circles. Therefore, the note itself is in a purely intellectual vein - that is, thoroughly smart, subtle and kind. Good note: “It’s remarkable that the protagonist of both the main part of the memoirs and the short story at the end of the book is a teenage boy, for whom the world of adults, be they poets or writers, scientists or a military brigade in echelon, is strange and attractive with its aching inevitability , the inevitability of the events taking place in him... E.G. Babaev was really no more than 15 years old when he met Akhmatova, he was only 17 when the war and evacuation ended, and Tashkent, which for a time became one of the literary capitals, suddenly was suddenly empty, turning into a Central Asian city, where, as in a dream, everything was familiar and recognizable, but no longer the same as before..."

Next is a short review by Alexei Makarkin, “Rasputin’s daughter tamed tigers. And wrote memoirs about her father” (“Segodnya”, 3.04). This refers to the peasant of the Tobolsk province Grigory Efimovich Rasputin, a man truly slandered, and his daughter Matryona, the actual author of the memoirs. As for the main premise of the article, it is expressed in one paragraph: “Of course, Matryona idealizes her father (for example, in her presentation he appears as a convinced supporter of agrarian reform and a guardian for the people’s good). Her memoirs are best read before or after the “anti-Rasputin” ones ( for example, the memoirs of Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich, also recently published by Zakharov) - this is how you can separate the truth from the myths. But her view of her father, subjective, a little naive and sincere in its own way, certainly deserves attention."

In my opinion, the biography of Matryona Rasputina is no less interesting: “In March 1917, she and her younger sister Varvara were detained by the victors, but quickly released. The new authorities asked Rasputin’s daughters only one thing: whether their father had an intimate relationship with the empress - the girls They claimed that this was a lie. In October 1917, she married Lieutenant Boris Solovyov, a man, apparently, of very adventurous inclinations. During the civil war, the couple ended up in Siberia, and after it - in Paris. At the age of 26, Matryona was widowed. , in exile she made a career as a dancer, and then, once in America, she worked as a tiger tamer. She died in an American nursing home in 1977." A ready-made plot for a separate novel. However, this information is enough. The novel may simply be bad and watered down. The newspaper format does not allow this possibility. At least, this plot impresses me in this presentation. I am for minimalism. So enough about the Web.

Now about offline.

Let's start with obligations: in particular, just in the last issue we promised to follow the work of an extremely original and, in its own way, total (in terms of omnivorousness and stylistic acumen) author, as far as I understand, of several publications at once. Lev, that is, Danilkin (if I could, fanfares would thunder here - in real audio).

Well, let's sing it how it goes. First, let us note the publication in Vedomosti dated March 30. The subject of the review this time was three books: “The Last Dream of Reason” by Dmitry Lipskerov, “Fairy Tales for Idiots” by Boris Akunin, “Money Day” by Alexei Slapovsky. For those who are already familiar with the text, it will be funny to compare the part of it that is dedicated to “Money Day” with Danilkin’s work on a similar topic in Russian Journal. There is versatility and inexhaustibility. As already mentioned, versatility and even mobility.

However, I really prefer the RJ text - it is much more voluminous. And without advertising "Vedomosti" (Shouldn't we recommend that unlucky "cheaters" subscribe to the newspaper "Vedomosti", which comes with the magazine "How to Spend" free of charge?)

However, the one in Vedomosti is not bad either. Slapovsky's heroes turn out to be aged Shuriks - Alexandra Demyanenko . "They are monstrously dependent in their way of thinking. They read Treasure Island, but did not understand." Poor guys.

But, frankly speaking, Lev Danilkin wrote much better about Boris Akunin in his current review - provocatively and with a relevant, politically literate accent: “Pelevin was the first to pay attention to the new Russian gangster discourse: it seemed to him that this was still an esoteric language, adequate to his philosophy. Akunin is another established literary code... To Akunin’s credit, it should be noted that his fictional bandit, when he meets Pelevin’s bandit, the philosophizing hammer, will certainly kill him without unnecessary problems, you know.” The style is truly all-consuming - not so long ago the author reviewed the book of the current president, and now his palette is shimmering with newly acquired shades. Sparkles, shines and blinds. The author, that is, wets as he wants. The author rules.

Well done author.

And he never tires of proving it. Here, for example, is his review of Michel Tournier’s novel “The King of the Forest” (1970) (“Izvestia”, 31.03). Here are no longer just local stylistic triumphs, here, friends, is the same remarkable insightful insight that struck us when we first met. I'm hardly going too far. My delight is hardly excessive. After all, we are not talking about ordinary intra-shop investigations. It's about discovery. About exposing the conspiracy. Simply a monstrous conspiracy of fascist academicians. Mostly Estonian - those that have built their nest in distant Tartu:

“So, Tournier’s fascism is a kind of doctrine of sign systems (based on the preference of some formal characteristics to others - the Aryan type over the Jewish). Now, after thirty years, it is curious to see the coincidence of the sign doctrine of fascism with the semiotic theories of the “Tartu school” (linguistic school, which was headed by Yu.M. Lotman for a long time)... Of course, it is absurd to accuse the “Tartu people” of latent fascism; but after Tournier, semiotics seems like a risky science: having recognized the priority of the sign, you will someday have to agree that people too. are signs and, accordingly, their formal features and the structures they form are more important than the “living” content. In fact, structural analysis is a disaster for an individual sign and a holocaust for the text.”

A! What! Not in the brow, as they say - far from the brow. This is what a fresh look means, this is where the spoken truth is. I hope appropriate measures will be taken. Immediately. In the near future, that is, time.

Speaking of time. On April 4, the “Culture” page in “Vremya Novostey” was devoted exactly half to book reviews (2 materials out of 4). In the “ Illuminator for the Intellectually Curious” section, which is led by Andrei Mikheev, head of the “Foreign Literature” section, this time there are six new books: “In Thunderstorms of Steel” by Ernst Junger, “The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas” by Gertrude Stein, “Writing Instrument Box” Milorad Pavic, the collection “Hotel in the Mountains” by Vaclav Havel, “Conversations with T. G. Masaryk” by Karel Capek and, finally, the book by T. G. Masaryk himself, who was three times elected to the post of President of Czechoslovakia, “Russia and Europe” (here one really cannot but agree with Andrei Mikheev - the Czech Republic has been lucky in its literary presidents). The main field of activity of the reviewer, of course, also affected the nature of his assessments of book publishing new products. Therefore, if, in addition to a rough outline of the content of the books, you also want to get an idea of ​​the quality of their translation, be sure to read the review. In particular, you will learn that “while apparently trying not to stray too far from the German original, N. Guchinskaya and V. Notkina (translators of Jünger’s book) retain cumbersome syntax and ponderous style, and in Russian the text often looks rather clumsy, and sometimes even comical (“Our handful were surrounded by mute silence and screams”).” Or these details regarding the novel by G. Stein: “Three chapters of this book were already published a year ago in IL in the translation by Tamara Kazavchinskaya; and although Irina Ninova’s version looks more sloppy and naive, in this case it is, paradoxically, all- still closer to Stein’s own plan.” And much more - from which there is simply not enough space here. Therefore, we recommend and move on.

In Novye Izvestia (1.03), the poet Konstantin Kedrov reviews Jaspers’ book “Strindberg and Van Gogh.” Reviews, as apparently befits a poet, passionately and unequivocally: in the sense that with an abundance of sad rhetoric, mournful pathos and - already for the complete set - with pounds and megatons of armor-piercing pathos: "Like Nietzsche, Strindberg hid from the world into bastions and castles of self-built madness. All who reject love are doomed to madness. Love cannot be taken out of the equation with impunity. It is not a whim, but the law of preserving life.” It seems that, like one of his heroes, Vincent Van Gogh, Konstantin Kedrov at times sees himself as a “Messiah, reconciling poor people with their unfortunate lot,” and his articles as “messages addressed to all people.” Otherwise, where would such insights come from: “To reach your ceiling, what could be more terrible for an artist, even if this ceiling is the sky.” Just asking - "Konstantin Kedrov. Winged words and expressions. Page such and such."

It ends very well: “The writer Garshin threw himself down the stairs headfirst and died, but at the same time he did not become Nabokov (this is really strange). Of course, art is programmed madness. However, madness can be either talented or untalented.” Perhaps I’ll take back my words about the madhouse and the headache - it’s somehow awkward and afraid for myself. So you program it, and yeah... Konstantin Kedrov will say that it’s from self-indulgence, and not at all called. And the ceiling was so-so - like in a Khrushchev building. Metaphorically speaking.

Now, what is called sweet

For relaxation and entertainment, we again recommend Tatyana Blazhnova’s review in “Profile” (3.04). This time we are talking about the collection of memoirs “The Furious Reformer”, published by the Sergei Dubov Foundation. The reviewer's comments are, as usual, charming:

“It’s already clear from the title that the book is about him: only Peter the Great was an accomplished, skillful reformer in our fatherland... As always in Dubov’s series, the authors of memoirs look at events as if from the outside...” Etc. Only the announcement of the play “Orpheus and Eurydice”, placed on the same spread, can compete with them: “Orpheus was a poet, Eurydice was a beauty. Having met her, he fell in love at first sight and made her his wife. But death came and separated the spouses... " (Anna Kuznetsova).

However, both writers are just small children in front of the compiler of a brilliant note about Boris Akunin (“Profile”, still the same issue). This is where akynstvo is, genuine, impenetrable and unchildish, moreover, simply on a sterile blue eye: “Grigory Chkhartishvili started writing detective stories out of mischief - it seems he had an argument with his wife. In two years he wrote seven books. He writes in the style 19th century. The main character of the series that was presented in Oblomov is the young nun Pelagia (one of the books is called “Pelagia and the White Bulldog”). The detective stories are so popular that they are going to be filmed.” There is simply nothing to cover it with. We can say that Rubinstein and his “Mom washed the frame” completely disappeared into the masses. The masses just have to digest them.

. . .

On this optimistic note, perhaps we’ll wrap it up. Let's even make a tight loop. The fact is that this was the last episode of “Fruits” in a weekly format. Which seems to have run its course.

Starting next week, if Fortune happens, I will be an eyesore every day with my own opuses. Which, however, will be much shorter and, as they say, more cumulative. 1-2 reviews, 2000-3000 characters. In other words, a small form.

But it's a big responsibility. And I have to prepare myself for it.

So that's all for today. See you on Monday.