Ilya Lepikhov. Hay and straw

Hay and straw
Yakov Gordin. Decay, or Roll Call in the Dark. - In the book: Roll call in the darkness. Joseph Brodsky and his interlocutors. St. Petersburg: publishing house "Pushkin Fund", 2000.

Ilya Lepikhov

Date of publication: September 5, 2000

Yakov Gordin is one of the not most noticeable in the eyes of the general public, but certainly the most worthy domestic publicist. Over the past few years, he has not taken, it seems, a single rash public step, to which the passing time of social upheaval was so predisposed, and therefore has earned the right to respect and attention from reading Russia. Moreover, “Roll Call in the Darkness” is an exceptional work: in some respects unsurpassed, in others - first-class. If we take into account the fact that Gordin wrote his work in 1990, it is time for the reviewer to shut up and clap his hands for at least a quarter of an hour. “Roll Call in the Darkness” probably did not deserve any other assessment other than popular applause.

The formal direction of the book is not able to give any approximate idea of ​​its true content.

The perception of the Russian revolution through the eyes of the greatest poets of that time - Akhmatova, Pasternak, Tsvetaeva, Mandelstam - is worthy and nothing more. Correctly posed questions, good poetry, restrained commentary. Everything is smooth, correct and neat. A person with a humanities education cannot fail to recognize professional work. By the way, this is not so little. Not without minor discoveries. In addition, the approach reveals Gordin as an experienced and fearless publicist. Well, okay, Akhmatova - her social pathos is defined and verified by the era. And what is meaningful hidden behind the planted purr of Tsvetaev’s verse? And the tongue-tied Mandelstam, who wrote as if for himself, the Lord God and Nadezhda Yakovlevna? What was he worried about before the enlarged reality tore from him a black ode to mustaches and boots?

It turns out that everything is about the same thing: about the Motherland and freedom. Only he did it as a poet should - not in a cry, but in verse. Thus, if you follow the internal logic of Gordin’s narrative, his famous line “Russia, Leta, Lorelei” can be reduced not so much to Blok’s anthology: “Night. Street. Lantern...” - but to the same extent is a free paraphrase of Leonid Kannegiser’s poem “Russia” "Freedom. War." In 1918, the poet and socialist Kannegieser shot at point-blank range the chairman of the Petrograd Cheka, Moisei Uritsky.

But analysis of poetry, even if done for a noble, socially significant purpose, is a thankless task. The publicist entrusts himself to the arbitrariness of the public, expecting to interest them in something that, in principle, is hardly capable of producing any action. Among the readers there are not, and there should not be, a sufficient number of fans of the authors of Spektorsky or Poems about the Unknown Soldier. It is difficult for others to follow the content and nuances of Gordin’s thought.

It becomes truly interesting when the author moves a little away from poetry and tries to figure it out on his own - not to believe the truth, but to figure it out - how it became possible that what became possible with the fall of the Provisional Government.

The mystery of October, which we have been unsuccessfully trying to unravel for almost a century now, is either extremely simple or completely inaccessible to human understanding. A preliminary agreement seems to have been reached: October succeeded February. But why, in this case, did the February revolution happen? And here a consolidated opinion has been developed: because the troops of the Petrograd garrison did not carry out the order. In turn, the criminal self-removal of army units was a direct consequence of the quality composition of the reserve regiments, which were stationed in the capital of the empire.

The chain closes naturally: the October Revolution became possible thanks to the structural crisis of the Russian army, which turned out to be highly unprepared for modern war. The eternal Russian desire to improve quality with quantity turned into a rifle in the hands of yesterday's man. But a man has no time to think: whoever has more charges is right. The only thing that prevents complete identity with the Wild West is the absence of a sheriff. Lenin and Trotsky took over his function.

Today it has become fashionable to ignore the fact that the events of 1917-1920 were brought to life by a truly popular movement not so much “for” (freedom, land, happiness) as “against” (your freedom, your land, your happiness) . Not bourgeois, not noble, but definitely personal, “yours.”

Misunderstanding of everyone in relation to everyone could not but lead to mutual hatred, hatred - to brutality. But the pace! But the forms! This riddle is truly impossible to solve. The same people who, in 1913, rushed to swim after the royal steamer, which carefully cut out photographs of a boy in a sailor suit from the “Niva” and “Ogonyok”, in a week left no stone unturned from the thousand-year kingdom. Russian history, which had hitherto developed in full accordance with advanced social ideas, shrank and turned to dust. Could it have been different?

Hardly. Gordin cites an eyewitness account of the events that is remarkable in its eloquent frankness: “One can have different attitudes towards the struggle of the Russian intelligentsia against the monarchy. From a monarchical-synodal point of view, it can be considered madness and even a crime; from a liberal-humanitarian and revolutionary-socialist point of view, it cannot be considered "not to see the main meaning of Russian history. There is only one thing that is impossible to argue about: the grandiose scope and even inspiration of our Liberation movement that began a hundred years before the October coup."

Why not “In Memory of Herzen”?! The only thing missing is “young navigators of the future storm.” What pathos! What an onslaught! What a holy confidence in the correctness of one’s views, based on random and, in general, absolutely unscientific premises! The meaning of the existence of the intelligentsia was indeed found in the hundred-year-old Caesaremachy, but to put the intelligentsia and the state on the same level... The “meaning of history” of the state is contained in the hundred-year-old Caesaremachy? Unforgivable childishness bordering on mental illness.

The above quote is an excerpt from the memoirs of Fyodor Stepun, one of the largest and most sober Russian minds of the twentieth century. It's not just the end. This is a catastrophe. Amba. Krants.

One can only guess what kind of “considerations” and “questions” were bursting with Stepun’s contemporaries, who were much less experienced in mental activity. This is more than misunderstanding, it is mental deafness. In this case, there is no need to talk about any tolerance or condescension towards the counterparty. God be with Russian society. He knows the price - half a ruble. But power - it turned out to be so insignificant that no one even thought of understanding its reasons.

Following Stepun and Fedotov, perhaps two of the most serious Russian historical publicists of the post-October era, Gordin leads the reader to a conclusion that seems to us quite fair: on the right, on the part of the authorities, the revolution was unstoppable. This does not mean, of course, is inevitable that the victory of the system that eventually reigned in Russia . Construction, for all its irrevocable importance, is just a façade of a method. Alas, at the risk of making a mistake, we will assume that if Kaledin or Kornilov had won, the method would have remained the same. The historian is not a priest or a sensitive young lady from the Salvation Army: white genocide - it’s monstrous to even think about it - is better than red, but that doesn’t stop it from being genocide. And genocide is a good remedy for acne, but not for social ulcers.

The revolution, according to Gordin, and in this he is faithful to his great predecessors, could only be stopped by a correctly reflected leftist idea, which incorporated a new social doctrine, traditional religious consciousness and the proper measure of rigidity in carrying out the necessary measures. There was none of this in Russia in 1917. The monarchy was placed on one side of the political scale, and the dirty boot of a drunken sailor stepped on the other. The brothers won. The right-wing idea, left alone, could do nothing to oppose the Mauser.

The sanity of leftist ideology in Russian conditions is, perhaps, the main lesson of 1917. In this sense, Gordin’s book arrived just in time. It is becoming fashionable for us to be right. In Russian society, where until recently apathy, conciliation and criminal rhetoric reigned, conservatism, not of the most refined kind, is now raising its head. God be with her, with the test, but there is a limit to everything.

In principle, everything is quite simple: action gives rise to reaction, and in response to aggressive madness, the so-called. "creative intelligentsia", partly bought, partly simply maddened by love for their neighbor, we are dealing with the simplest desire of another part of society: would you like, gentlemen, to get punched in the snout, sir? And the face, of course, is figurative, and the jab (hook, cross - who can tell), fortunately, is still virtual. Yes, and the intention is understandable and in some places even noble, but absolutely, one hundred percent unfruitful.

Building a left-wing policy today is difficult, I would venture to suggest, impossible. But it is necessary to recognize - especially in Russian conditions - its relative correctness, thereby snatching social issues that are about to take their rightful place in the life of the new Russia from the hands of the communists and the social democrats who still cannot gather their strength. By the way, it is not known which of them is more dangerous for the state. But... And here comes the main reason for... no, not exactly polemics, but echoes of Gordin's text.

Like most sensible people, I am far from asserting the unconditional value of left-wing politics. Despite the fact that it is hardly possible in the whole world to find an example of an established leftist policy, a practice derived from leftist phraseology. But in no case should we ignore the power of the left word, the power contained not so much in elementaryism and populism, but in the universality of the proposed recipes. The left is much more understandable; their words flow from the external, more from sensations than from reason. The right worldview is the ideology of the citizen or owner. Left - a person's beliefs. In this sense, the mass, by definition, carries within itself a charge of social-democratic nihilism. This is joyless and dangerous; not taking this circumstance into account is criminal.

Moreover, if we move from the position of modern Russian reality to the position of common sense, then there seems to be no reason for panic. Indeed, if the right-wing politician is something like a car manufacturer, who sees, along with the blinding shine of alloyed wings, the blueprint of the apparatus as a whole, the left-wing politician is akin to a car mechanic. Alignment - wheel alignment - cash register - gas - traffic light. His calling is cosmetic repairs. There is no subject for dispute. Right, left - both are better.

But let's return to earth: the state is a very strange crew. All you have to do is twist the nut a little and it's all gone. The understandable desire to improve existing things will turn into complete non-existence. This, strictly speaking, is the fundamental difference between right-wing and left-wing phrases, conservative and socialist practice. The first builds a world out of chaos. The second adjusts the interaction of existing elements in the hope of bringing them into harmonious combination.

There is nothing fundamentally vicious in social harmony - on the contrary! But is it worth saying how limited its positive effect is in Russian conditions? Consistently left-wing politics in Russian conditions turns out to be impossible and simply criminal. But - may my liberty be forgiven - the same should be fully applied to the politics of the right. Can't help but relate.

The current political situation in Russia does not even approximately satisfy the norms of traditional division. There is no main thing in relation to which one should be determined. Socialist and anti-socialist, left and right - all these are nothing more than meaningless shells, at best passwords for identifying strangers who share... not even views, but general norms of everyday behavior - nothing more. The state of Russian statehood is well known, and decades of exhausting work for the nation are needed to give stability and certainty to at least some kind of social model. Then and only then is it time to start talking about direction . Until then, all talk about “right” and “left” is nothing more than the desire of one social force to isolate itself from another, an understandable desire, but extremely meaningless. And “rightism” and “leftism” themselves are something mysterious and incomprehensible, requiring such specific clarifications that it is appropriate for zealots from one camp to depict a haystack on their shield, and for the other a bunch of straw, only in this case the public will be prepared to distinguish between supporters of private initiatives and government regulation. “Right” - “left”, “left” - “right”, “hay” - “straw” - so, it seems, under the Tsar Father, non-commissioned officers taught yesterday’s farmers to march? I am afraid that most of the substantive differences will be completely exhausted by simple emblems. Both the right and the left - if they are only mentally healthy people - understand perfectly well that, in fact, for today's Russia there is no other distinction left between political forces other than their partial sanity. Everything that, in a broad sense, contributes to the strengthening of Russian statehood is sane, the rest - go see a doctor, they will sort it out. First, you should still build at least something, and then... Then - whoever wants anything. For some - hay, for others - straw.

Not having sufficient knowledge of the front and ranks, I remember, however, that hay was tucked under the recruit’s left shoulder strap. It turns out that straw is doomed to become the white rose of Russian politics? I absolutely cannot agree with this. There are objective reasons for this. On the site of the Moscow hay market - mind you - the building of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has been standing for almost half a century.

I would really not like to give such an important portfolio to the socialists.