Oleg Postnov. Writer's Diary-5

Writer's Diary-5
About some properties of ice

Oleg Postnov

Publication date: April 8, 2002

If I were writing a review... but many will say that this is a review, although I would not write a review of this novel for very solid reasons, if only because, in my opinion, I would have to start from afar, talk about things that are by no means clear, doubtful, get into the wilds, doubt, look for arguments... However, if I were writing a review, then... it could be simple. After all, reviews are mostly divided into laudatory (often advertising) and others. There is nothing to say about the first ones. In others, everything has long been decided: so many lines about the plot, so many about the impression (from which the author will soon be ill) and a couple of biting phrases for the reader to remember. One of them is in the title. Everyone knows this recipe. With me, however, everything was different.

It was about six in the morning when I finished reading Ice. I didn’t want to sleep, I started scribbling phrases on a piece of paper that had turned up, and I got carried away with it. Look (they’ll say it again): I’ve been reading all night. How interesting and languid. That's right, now he'll start swearing . But why, really, swear if you actually read without stopping, and, having finished reading, became worried? After all, I was really worried. That's probably the point. And that’s probably why I read it, because I had my own interest. I saw the point in catering to this interest. That is, I suppose I have some complaints. But I’m not sure, that’s the trouble, that they refer exactly to Sorokin.

But first of all: first of all, I must say that the image of Sorokin itself does not evoke any special negative or positive feelings in me (I do not know him personally, so I only mean the “image of the author”). Meanwhile, there is some strange irony in the situation when “Blue Lard” , “Feast” , and now “Ice” are published in “Ad Marginem” . What these books rest on is no longer the outskirts, but the very center of modern book (and cinematic) culture; Turgenev or Aksakov would be the outskirts today (though they don’t exist). And this - again, only in my opinion - is very sad.

From the outside, "Ice" is entertaining. When reading you have to use this. If I put the book down, I wouldn’t have the strength to pick it up again. Inside the text, at the level of language, nothing happens in it, I’m bored there. Sorokin masters writing technique, so he can imitate different styles. It can even - as in the second part of the novel - correlate the evolution of a character with the evolution of his speech. But his language itself is not rich, but only diverse. Perhaps this is the main reproach, to which the following judgment also applies. It never seemed to occur to many current authors (and Sorokin too) that fiction is written primarily in literary language . This naive tradition of “transcribing” the speech of the heroes in accordance with some external “reality”, supposedly given to all of us by someone, “recognizable”, generally speaking, is a heavy legacy of Soviet (but not Russian) literature.

As an example, I’ll tell you an anecdote that happened, however, naturally, in the linguistics sector of a research institute. A dictionary of Siberian dialect words was compiled there (its fourth edition has now been published). The authors had a lot of field work, but the management came to the idea that they also needed to look at fiction. A whole intrigue ensued around who would read what. The wealth of Siberian ores is known. It is clear that everyone wanted Shukshin . It went to someone “in charge”. To the great amazement of this “main thing,” it was not possible to find Siberian dialects in the speech of the Shukshin Siberian peasants. Even ordinary vernacular is a rare guest for him. Which proves once again that a writer is not a tape recorder. Conversations in books are depicted - as characters and things - rather than written down. Words are only means. Otherwise, it turns out to be a dummy. It’s as if, instead of the word “cigarette” (we’ll talk about it later), a natural sample was glued to the page - or an object was drawn directly on the line, as is done in children’s books. It also comes out “recognizable” - however, for educational purposes. And this is not literature, but didactics. Literature exists - perhaps - for something completely different.

And all this is true, but again I doubt that I’m talking about Sorokin alone. No, I generally dislike - in him, in everyone - unmotivated inversions that give the style a common colloquial narrative, like: “he looked expectantly, from under his brows,” “she was a strong woman who had seen life” (these are not quotes). Deviations into common speech are boring, as soon as the hero speaks “like everyone else speaks” (almost at the same time, two different critics innocently noted that the heroes of Dostoevsky and Tolstoy speak “like no one has ever spoken in life”). What do they say? Known as: argot, jargon, taboo. And the computer honestly advises you to change the option when checking your grammar. “Punishment” for such “misdemeanors” comes soon: try reading, for example, Pilnyak . But Olesha did not suffer at all from the change of the century. But this is by the way.

With the method that Sorokin uses, the sound sequence of the novel is not only not built, but cannot be built. However - and this is especially surprising - there are fragments where everything is in order with the sound (as well as with the style). We have to assume that the author does not distinguish “raw” from “ready” in his text. One would think that he is a hack (which, I must admit, I sometimes suspect when reading a fashionable novel). But no, this is different. And it seems to me that I can guess what’s going on. Simply, Sorokin’s main advantage (almost erasing all the disadvantages) is that he is clearly passionate about his story, he likes to tell. He thinks in scenes, and they are interesting to him. Notice how he manages “multi-hero” episodes. But even the greatest of Russian classics often tried to avoid them (Tolstoy doesn’t count). Two or three characters per stage - and no more. Meanwhile, in Sorokin, every now and then four or five people are involved in the action, and this without any effort and without “preparation” ( Dostoevsky , for example, prepared crowd scenes with a detailed preliminary study of the image of each of the characters). It seems to me that Sorokin seems to see these scenes; they are given to him, as they say, for nothing. From here, by the way, various inconsistencies arise, such as the fact that, having broken free, the half-crippled characters grab cigarettes (real ones) or alcohol. With a strong blow to the chest - even just with a fist - a person does not want to smoke for a long time, and even if with a hammer... I don’t know whether criticism will be favorable to Sorokin this time, but journalists like to catch “blunders”. Meanwhile, it is precisely such inconsistencies that are an indicator of the vividness of fantasy, which has no time for calculations. Here the classics are also on Sorokin’s side: I can give a whole list of obvious inconsistencies among the best authors of the 19th century, starting with Pushkin . “I reviewed all this strictly: There are a lot of contradictions, But I don’t want to correct them...” In short, with Sorokin’s imagination everything is in the best possible way.

True, the mythology of “Ice” is not very original: an abbreviated retelling of the Gnostics , almost Basilides and Valentinus , in modern versions. Here, too, philosophers get bored, since they are forced to explain everything (that’s what gnosis is for, knowledge “how it really is”); and in fiction it is generally difficult to bear. But the development of the theme at times overcomes this unoriginality of mythology. In the first part - due to intense plot moves, in the fourth - by “removing” the myth with the help of a beautifully depicted child’s consciousness. In a word, if “Ice” is not Sorokin’s best work, then it is still better that it exists than if it did not exist. I will stop at this bold statement. After re-reading, I see that the judgments turned out to be somewhat arrogant, but this is because I “saving” on reservations (such as “in my opinion”). However, anyone can place them where they see fit. As for me, despite all my complaints, I still enjoyed reading, and this is the main thing. And I didn't write a review.

PS This note was ready when Dmitry Bavilsky’s article “Golem, Russian version” appeared in Russian Journal. Unable to resist, I read it. I can’t resist arguing either. The reader can judge for himself. But without the fourth part of “Ice” (which seems superfluous to Bavilsky), the myth about the cruel blue eyes would have remained “truth” - and with it the view of all of humanity as a bunch of machines made of meat. It has long been noted that in its extreme conclusions the teaching of the Gnostics - any - allows and demands cruelty. But a morning in the life of a little boy (which is very, very difficult to write the way Sorokin did), the life of a creature whose ignorance is so delightfully innocent, ultimately turns the complex construction of a text into literature. And here I’m not talking “in general,” but specifically about Sorokin.