Mikhail Edelshtein. And the army

And the army should be disbanded
Mikhail Edelshtein

Publication date: January 8, 2003

Trying to forget that besides sounds and words there was something else there...
A. Makarevich

1990s passed in conversations about the crisis of the Russian novel. The fault of this was not so much the novel as the Booker : the award of an overseas award turned out to be the main fun of the literary year, and therefore the public read exclusively novels throughout the decade. But in 2000 , the New World magazine and the National Reserve Bank established the Yuri Kazakov Prize to award it to the best storyteller of the year. And it immediately became clear: what was happening to the novel was just flowers. For unknown reasons, the real crisis is raging precisely in the area of ​​small forms. It's no joke: out of almost two dozen stories that have been on the shortlist over these three years, not a single one is truly good. That is, literally not a single one: neither in 2000 , nor in 2001 , nor in 2002 .

Here, probably, in order to avoid misunderstandings, we should immediately agree: when I talk about a good story, I least of all mean the skill of execution, the actual technical side of the matter. Almost all the inhabitants of the “Cossack” shortlists can write, including stories. Which, however, only makes it sadder. Because apart from sheer skill (very relative, of course, but still) there is practically nothing in their stories.

What exactly the “Cossacks” lack is, however, not so easy to determine. Don’t talk seriously about the spark of God, about the super task, about something that should stand behind the text... Colleagues will laugh. And then you will be ashamed yourself. So let's talk about internal necessity. That is, about the feeling that arises in the reader of the inevitability of the creation of this particular text by this particular writer. How about “the only words in the best order”? Well, probably something like that...

So: this is not the case. No, that's all. I’m reading, let’s say, the dandyish pseudo-baroque prose of Asar Eppel . I read, rejoice at the finds, admire how dashingly and not without genuine grace the plot is twisted. And then I close the magazine, and my inner Stanislavsky whispers to me in such a disgusting voice: “I don’t believe it! I don’t believe that Eppel could not have just as successfully written a story on a completely different occasion, on a completely different topic, with completely different characters. I don’t believe it, that behind this text there is something other than a demonstration of one’s ability to observe, notice, describe (the latter, of course, first of all, in short, I don’t believe in that very inner necessity.” And I have nothing to object to Stanislavsky. Because I myself do not feel this inner necessity either in Asar Eppel, or in the first “Cossack” laureate Igor Klekh , or even often in the best, perhaps today’s Russian short story writer , Yuri Buida .

Hence some childish mistakes even among the most experienced writers. For example, the lively old man from Vladimir Makanin’s story “ Inadequate ” is sitting in a village outhouse. The sun is hot. Lilac is blooming. And the hero, sitting in this very hot toilet, suffocates from the smell of lilac. Strong detail. Moreover, the story is not bad in its own way, far from Makanin’s worst. But the author does not see, does not feel, does not smell what he writes about, and that’s all. And the reader therefore does not sympathize with Makanin’s elderly lover of other people’s compassionate wives and public nurses, just as he does not sympathize with the one-eyed girl from Eppel’s story “In the Locomotive Years.” Why sympathize with them? They're cardboard.

In this regard, at first glance, “ The Experience of Belonging ” by Marina Vishnevetskaya stands out from the crowd. The story “takes my throat,” states Andrei Nemzer . Of course it intercepts. But only because what we have before us is, essentially, a slightly veiled, disguised non-fiction. We sympathize with the tragedy of the raw material, and not with the artistic truth of the " amazing story ." That is, the nature of empathy here is the same as when reading “The Black Book” or “The Gulag Archipelago”. And the story itself...

There is no need to talk seriously about the heroine’s arguments about Christian anti-Semitism. They can be used as an illustration for the encyclopedic article “banality.” However, with factual reliability, it seems that not everything is in order here either. The procedure for receiving compensation from the Claims Conference by former ghetto prisoners, as far as I know, was not at all as difficult as the author describes it. Employees of the Frankfurt Fund did not conduct any interrogations; they did not personally meet with applicants for payments, content with written statements and completed questionnaires. But it is precisely the need to answer questions from a representative of the foundation that motivates the confession of grandmother Riva in the story, who all her life concealed within herself the details of the death of her family in the Minsk ghetto.

Now is the time to make a retreat. In general, Vishnevetskaya is a special story. This is the third year that the writer has appeared on the list of candidates for the “Cossack title.” In the previous two cases, she did not receive the bonus. And for the third year in a row, Vishnevetskaya’s inclusion in the shortlist and her subsequent failure to receive the prize became the cause of the main “near-Cossack” scandal. The fact is that the above-mentioned Nemzer, a devoted admirer of Vishnevetskaya’s prose, stands up for the writer from year to year.

Of course, including a person three times in a row among the applicants for the award and ultimately passing the award by is somehow ungentlemanly. I sincerely hope that this year the author of “The Experience of Belonging” will finally receive the long-awaited “Cossack”. However, in fairness, it should be clarified that Vishnevetskaya is not “one of the best writers of modern Russia,” but a fairly average prose writer who writes, like most of Nemzer’s favorites, in a wide range from “almost very good” (“ This is such a tapestry ”) to “almost very bad" (“ R.I.B. (experience in demonstrating mourning) ”). “There will be no arguments: take it and read it,” as the same Nemzer says. Nemzer’s own predilection for professionally made, but irreparably mediocre examples of modern literature seems to me a very symptomatic phenomenon and deserves a separate discussion.

Next to Vishnevetskaya’s “Jewish” story on the short list is the quite anti-Semitic “ Yuletide Story #2 ” by Dmitry Galkovsky. We will not compare these two texts, otherwise we will have to admit that anti-Semite-phobes sometimes write better than anti-Semite-philes. Galkovsky is generally a talented writer (if the gift of skillful multiplication of emptiness can be called talent), and “Yuletide Story # 2” is the best of his three “Yuletide Stories.” The heartbreaking story of how evil agents of the American State Department take away a company from a Russian emigrant in order to transfer it to his son-in-law named Reznik, of course, recalls the collective paranoia of “Literature Day” and its environs. But on the other hand, why not write off this fragment as postmodern games with history? A convenient thing is postmodernism. However, whether Galkovsky writes well or badly - all these amusements of an adult naughty man have no direct relation to literature.

If anyone truly stands out from the “Cossack” six, it is Mikhail Butov . Butov understands that a good story is not so much a plot as an intonation, not so much a text as a subtext. Not words, but what is behind the words; not the lines, but what is between the lines. If awards were given for good intentions or for a correct understanding of the genre essence of a story, Butov would be a laureate. Alas, Butov cannot write a story equal to his idea. “I have poems better than Akhmatova and better than Tsvetaeva. Only I didn’t write them,” Olga Bergolts seems to have said. You can’t say more precisely about Butov.

A story built on intonation and subtext is especially difficult to execute. Butov’s style obviously lacks precision and subtlety to hit the mark. As the story progresses, the author alternates between journalisticism and verbosity; lectures on popular mineralogy (or maybe paleontology?) become tiresome, starting from the second paragraph. Only a few lines of final dialogue are written as the entire story should be written. Butov generally succeeds in finals. But the entire texts are only available in the New World CD reviews. Read at least the article about Robert Plant in the twelfth issue of the magazine for 2002 - that’s why it’s time to give a prize.

The mysterious Ivan Pluzhnikov was clearly on the short list for provincial talents. There is no other way to explain his appearance there. Pluzhnikov's story about a drug addict who is reforging and planning to go to Diveevo (in the story for some reason Deveevo ) is amazingly bad. I didn’t even imagine that this would be published, let alone nominated for awards. In some places, the author’s style reaches the crystal purity of self-parody: “An inexperienced person has a barrier, fear, instilled by parents, an environment far from drug addiction, the media, and so on, and the process of “syringing” itself, in general, is unnatural. Ivan was devoid of prejudices. Purely ethical This was a problem for him." It is impossible to seriously discuss this.

So, on January 9, one out of six (more precisely, out of five - Pluzhnikov is not counted) writers will receive a prize. Perhaps it will be Vishnevetskaya. So that Nemzer does not swear. And also for the tragedy of the material and for his length of service. Or Makanin. After all, a “living classic” (when a writer has absolutely nothing to praise for, he is usually called a living classic). Or Butov. After all, he is the executive secretary of the magazine responsible for the award. Although, most likely, it is precisely for this reason that they will not give him a “Cossack title”. So as not to tease the geese. Or Eppel. Why not? Or Galkovsky. Although this is unlikely. But it's possible.

Yes, in general - it doesn’t matter who. Something else is important. On January 9, the “Cossack” will be awarded to someone. And in vain. Because there is no better story among the shortlisted stories. There are five equally average works, each with its own strengths and weaknesses (plus Pluzhnikov, but we agreed to forget about him). And there is no better one. Like it wasn't last year. Just like it didn’t happen the year before. How there was no best novel on half the Booker shortlists. This means it’s time to create a precedent. The army, that is, the residents of the short list, should be sent home, no bonuses will be given, and the three thousand saved will be transferred to the next year’s budget.

There is nothing wrong with the fact that over the past three years not a single outstanding story has appeared in thick magazines. If it didn't appear in this one, it will appear in the next one. Or in a year. Just don’t tell us that we don’t have any other writers, and therefore we urgently need to reward someone from the existing staff. Or pass off Makanin as a classic, and Galkovsky as the hope of Russian literature. This won't make them write any better. And the time for condolences on this matter has long passed.