Andrey Levkin. Will to seduce

Alexander Sekatsky. Temptation and will: Prose, essays. - St. Petersburg: Borey-Art, 1999.

And anti-Sovietism - which just by definition did not determine the status and range of real literature - was annulled by the official abolition of the Soviet Union. At that moment (well, a little later, when everyone had woken up) it became clear that it would be necessary to introduce new words in relation to which to formulate. That is, which would define new ideas about good, evil and the meaning of life & literature. In general, there weren’t very many words, which is why the zone of serious writing itself became recognizable only by its representatives. You can live like this for some time, but in this version there will be no continuity, because it does not arise from memories.

During this period, the French style of thought was in demand as emergency words, which in Russia (I’m talking about St. Petersburg, of course) was just not a system-forming success. She defined the nineties from the intellectual side, but it is clear that someone’s Main Words introduced on a different basis could not have had complete success, and there are various differences.

Another problem that aggravated the state of speech was the democratization of society in terms of the emerging availability of media; Accordingly, a certain barrier enclosing this area was lost. That is, something has disappeared that separates literature from the fascinating stories of cattle. Well, and then there was the Internet, which led to the final emancipation of writing and the savagery of the masses.

That is, it was necessary to find a cultural space that could bring together disparate histories - giving them the opportunity to live and develop there. Accordingly, the environment, which was previously perfectly aware of itself and its boundaries, had to be redefined in the new situation.

As for the specific situation in St. Petersburg, there were two favorable things:

The presence of a community - albeit tired of each other.

Writing philosophers, whose constructions - due to the presence of a large number of clearly undemocratic words and terms - had the opportunity to become the basis for the consolidation of a new cultural space.

But here a nuance arises related to St. Petersburg as such. This city was the capital of virtual Russia - all of pre-Soviet Russia, according to history and literature textbooks, took place in St. Petersburg. After the collapse of the USSR, a return was almost implied, which, as we know, did not happen; moreover, it turned out that in 2000 in St. Petersburg there were no more than a fifth of St. Petersburg residents, and the rest were traditional proletarian Leningraders, whose life was already difficult.

In addition, there was a prehistory of St. Petersburg, which entered Russian literature as a mystical city that was about to be covered with a swamp. St. Petersburg, accordingly, then resisted this idea, which is where the books on the topic “Physiology of St. Petersburg” proving its real existence came from.

In the 70-90s, the physiology of the city was also used in St. Petersburg, but for exactly the opposite purpose - to prove its sought-after mystical nature. Of course, this was justified, since it was in this version that it was possible to preserve at least something remotely coinciding with the prototype during the scoop. Well, as a consequence - the inability of St. Petersburg to return to its rightful capital place after 1991. Although there was a chance, and remains. Whether this was influenced by the excessive mysticism of the approach or by its excessive sophistication - poorly applicable at the time of expansion of hot dogs - but, one way or another, in the last decade mysticism has not taken root in new bodies and is gradually turning into a folk craft, like Palekh lacquered boxes.

So Sekatsky - in fact, the previous one also applied to him. He, in general, is trying to build a certain zone in which real literature can exist, where it is possible to isolate oneself from all sorts of garbage around. As a philosopher, he uses a fair number of words that are inaccessible to an unadvanced demos, as well as concepts that are not used by such a given demos. For him, of course, these words are natural. In addition, he actively uses constructions that have no basis in the reality around us, telling all sorts of ancient Chinese and pseudo-magical tales.

Of course, the construction of a cultural space on such foundations is somewhat inverted, since it would be more likely the other way around - there would be space, and common stories would be found, but the attempt seems to be satisfactory in terms of the result.

If at this moment we move into the category of opponents of the philosophical attitude to the literary process, then we can accuse a group of comrades of imposing a given discourse on literature, forcing literature to correspond to this discourse. But this opinion seems empty: whoever wants what, let him impose it. Well, if literature succumbs to this discourse, then it will go there.

We can say that the borrowed structures play the role of concrete ceilings of a certain roadblock that will protect the desired literary territories from loitering simpletons. The task, of course, is by definition flawed, because here it is only the author who saves himself from everyone else, and not any territory. But in the absence of a capital space of written culture, such roadblocks will serve a reasonable function - at least by reporting the trouble that is taking place in the written space. At least - reporting that such a space exists.

In any case, the problem is stated and, in addition, a minimum of standard St. Petersburg metaphysics and rhetorical and textural moves close to it are used. That is, metaphysics, of course, is present, but indirectly.

Another thing is that the rhetoric of all these mogs (mogs, magicians, gogi-magogs, gogoli-mogoli, Mogutin, in the end) and their mighty-googlings, engaged in acid baling ten conventional bricks at a time, with the power of an altered state of the author’s thought, looks old-fashioned. All this gentle belligerence and fights logically work to determine the boundaries of the new - very narrowed, alas, ecumene.

When you talk about belligerence, you say that you yourself are a civilian. By pairing "Kant - tank", you make it clear that you are drinking with a mirror. By introducing into the text the story that

“Tzu Xia, telling the Wei king about his teacher, says: “Nothing can hurt him or stop him. He can do everything - he can pass through metal and stone, and walk on water and fire - for in everything he is like other things.” Why doesn’t the teacher do this?” asks the king. “The teacher is capable of this,” answered Zi Xia, “but he is also capable of not doing this ,” -

So, by telling this story, you demonstrate inattention to the life around you, that is, your fear of it. Because in Russia this story is told like this:

“A person comes to get a job, they ask him - What can you do? - I can dig. - What else? - I don’t have to dig.”

And this omission is all the more regrettable because the text itself, from which the quoted Chinese history is taken, is called “Zhuang Tzu and the Taoist Emelya”, and is dedicated to the proof of which similarity. But fear of life is also a literary fact.

In sum, we can say that this book, although a little old-fashioned (or a little second-hand), still belongs to the adventures of the New Age - which, undoubtedly, began and is gradually happening. The texture produced by Sekatsky’s simulacra (as defined by Nina Savchenkova) completely creates the basis for the author’s further adventures.

In addition, it is necessary to mention the introductory description of Sekatsky, made by N. Savchenkova, which is not a description of Sekatsky at all, but prose (but Borey would also publish her texts - prose, not prose, what's the difference). That is, this ontological-protective process described in this review itself has logic and produces literature.

Although, of course, there is an option that the cultural field will again happily begin to define itself by contradiction - having failed to define itself from its desires and intentions... After all, “just, literally 15 seconds ago, the presidential motorcade left the poultry farm” ( NTV, June 31, release at 14:00, about Putin’s visit to Yaroslavl).