Yan Levchenko. Masonarcissism

And this is precisely the diagnosis given to the narrator of this book by his wife, an irreplaceable supporting character, whose task is to continually demonstrate the rhetorical superiority of literary amateurs over its recognized professionals. The authorship of this brilliant characterization is not so important. It is important that the writer likes it.

, who needs no introduction Alexander Zholkovsky , is so strong that he is ready to look at himself through any lens and even flirts without the hypocrisy usual in memoirs. When his “vignettes” in the margins of the “text of life” beloved by humanities scholars just began to appear, the affectation in defining the genre was immediately noticed by criticism . That’s the reason: kitsch is an ambivalent phenomenon (Bakhtinists, no hands!), in other words, a conscious setup. OK, let’s not lie to each other,” the subject of the narration tells us, reeling with pleasure between his many identities from a Soviet linguist to an American Slavist, “I have nothing to add to the big narratives in which I lost faith when I fell into post-structuralism. I am left with a bunch of impressions of my own “I” in different “here” and “now”, and everything else is applied. And not because I’m cooler than everyone else (although not without that), but because this rest necessarily surrounds me. Or I surround him, what difference does it make... So the pragmatics of frivolous self-attribution is understandable. Moreover, if M.L. Gasparov , without further ado, staked out “ records and extracts ,” and I.P. Smirnov restrainedly satisfied himself with “evidence and guesses.” “Vignettes” are a search for a legitimate form of narcissism, which in its usual manifestation gives rise to a feeling of guilt in a well-mannered person. Hence the frequent masochism of the author's alter-ego - of course, "more than pride."

The book “Erosiped and other vignettes” is the most complete collection of notes that Alexander Zholkovsky, according to his calculations, has been keeping for about thirty years. The fact that “vignettes” “turns out... can form a solid volume” 1 is, frankly speaking, not such a surprise, considering the ratings of non-fictions in the field of non-commercial literature and the frequency of the author’s appearance in print. Compared to the previous edition 2 , the volume has increased by four author's pages, although thanks to the successful composition it seems that it is more. The material was divided into sections: “Childhood, adolescence, universities”, inevitably followed by “In People”, then the capacious “There” and the compromise “There and Here”. Finally, the fifth section is a bonus to the strict chronology of the main four, where the reaction to the “philologist's prose” is discussed. The narcissistic narrative takes on excessive completeness here, suddenly identifying not with the postmodern game, but with the earlier project of autoanalysis in the spirit of S. Eisenstein . We have to believe the quote that "Erosiped", along with "Potemkin", "looks like a chronicle, but acts like a drama" (p. 601). Thus, in contrast to the usual memoir format, the book reveals its construction and describes itself.

The author may, of course, be routinely annoyed by the relevance of the genre and the abundance of similar products, but it is all the more interesting for the writer to compete, and for the interested reader to compare. Even at the most superficial glance, Vignettist 3 by Zholkovsky gets a head start compared to other humanities scholars who have fallen into the temptation of fiction. The rhythm of the reader's walking is also worth calculating. Not all philological prose is convenient to read at breakfast and (then) in the toilet, on the subway and in the country. Thus, A.P. Chudakov (extended on pp. 574-575) obliges with an epic scope, L.Ya. Ginzburg (glorified on pp. 580-586) with existential depth, M.L. Gasparov (spread out throughout the “Erosiped” ) - an intellectual inaccessibility of which he is spectacularly and almost convincingly unaware. On the contrary, Zholkovsky’s book is convenient to read in all the places mentioned, and this is a guarantee that it will be read immediately upon purchase. But autobiographical notes are already an exciting and rewarding business. At the very least, it guarantees healthy interest on the part of a certain part of the audience, in contrast to scientific articles, the interest in which often has a mysterious origin (unless, of course, these are the articles that Vignettist wrote in his spare time or in a past life).

As for healthy interest, it is taken into account by the author with ironic helpfulness. In the book there is an index of names, where Anka the machine gunner is chasing Leonid Andreev, and “grandmother, old woman” is attached to Babel, simultaneously encoding the household name Zoshchenko and the very own “grandmother of colleague Ts.” Making fun of his scientific approach to data processing, Vignettist speaks in approximately the same “festive and mocking manner” as described on p. 166, the mathematician proposed using postal services to transmit thoughts over a distance. Simple-minded sarcasm makes “Bakanov, Colonel” and “Vasiliev, Comrade” turn from real, albeit anecdotal servants of the regime after years, into comedic masks. In turn, “Berlin, Isaiah, Sir” and “Hamlet, Prince” among teachers, friends and colleagues are an ironic but firm oath to history. Man of the second half of the last century cherishes his irony - a cure for stupidity and aggression. He, that is, the Vignettist, carefully cultivates his “pettiness,” his aversion to pathos and large forms, in other words, “Karamzinism,” as the one mentioned in the index aptly put it about the previous vignettes Arkady Blumbaum . By the way, in future editions of “Vignettes” (revised and supplemented), the index can be expanded to include concepts that happily complement the personalities. For example: "Invariant (obsolete)..." or "Semiotics, (false) science..." 4 .

The irony of the “archaist innovator” inherent in Vignettist is by no means total - otherwise the fight against the great style would be a primitive antithesis of the latter. In those rare places in the text where seriousness is suddenly revealed with “final directness” (chapter “About the Main Thing”), a tired man appears from under the narrative mask, ready to share the most important thing - the experience of freedom: “Now there are heaps of food, you can’t read books.” I want it, but there is an acute shortage of unity of command: there is no one to command, no one to report to. There is no one in charge" (p. 562). But these places are measured with therapeutic parsimony. The above experience is exciting precisely because it is free of “spirituality.” In case of high usage of words, Vignettist always has a phrase prepared, involuntarily given to him by the Jewish Slavophile Naum Korzhavin - “Unfortunately, damn” (P. 393). It is better to show off “too human” - male charm, excellent health, unique memory, always and everywhere reactive, unfading wit - than to teach, manage, evaluate from the point of view of eternity. A preventive measure, so to speak. Consequences of injury?

Speaking of her. The vignetteist fruitfully juggles the remnants of the structuralist method, moving the needle from ideology to personality, that is, switching codes and rebuilding from one level to another. Thus, the section “In People” ends with a detailed analysis of the hero’s actions, previously described in 32 points, recreating with a dotted line the life of the “average dissident of the 70s” (p. 280). The bearer of the quotation initials AZ 5 , among other things, immediately turns into material for analysis. Once upon a time, V. Shklovsky did something similar (“Review of this book” in the 1928 book “The Hamburg Account”), but, it seems, no one got to the point of a real structural analysis of “oneself” in the domestic tradition. Either out of laziness, or from excessive reverence for oneself, science, etc. Zholkovsky’s transformation of structuralism into sport is not accidental. Even during the period of corresponding storm and stress, he was somehow different. A bold revision of poetics, and even with a claim to return the formalists from the almshouse, where semioticians had shoved them with duty of respect, did not lead to the result that later seemed obvious to foreign colleagues. Zholkovsky did not become one of the people in the Tartu circle, although in one of the responses to “Erosiped” he received credited with being a leading figure in the semiotic movement. The passages cited in the book do not require additional emphasis: “I remember how Borya Uspensky told me that he had just submitted his “Poetics of Composition” (1970) to print and did not intend to engage in poetry anymore, because everything important had now been done” (S. 218). Skepticism was fueled not least by Lotman’s “Cossack” mustache (p. 343), as well as his rejection of modernity. In connection with Lotman’s love for the noble culture of the 19th century, the question arose, but was never asked, “in which particular place in the Pale of Settlement he would like to be born” (p. 240). Such well-thought-out “workshop” blasphemy, easy testing of an interested reader, is no longer provocative, but provides good entertainment. As, indeed, is the charming dogmatism of the writer himself. In response to a theory ballad sung at a seminar by the long-haired Marxist literary critic Terry Eagleton , he is seething: “Is that why the dry formalists trampled their boots and found out how the “Overcoat” was made?!” (p. 386).

Abacus by abacus; all eternity will be devoured by the mouth. Little stories remain, scattered through other people’s heads and texts, sometimes sucked out of a phrase, sometimes from a word, sometimes from an articulation (“Don’t stop skiing, they’ll burn” on p. 75, etc.). “Only quotable words remain in the memory,” Vignetiste complains about the minimalism of his notes about the greats. This sadness is recognizable and inevitable, just as lapses of memory and collapse of illusions are inevitable. Anyone who relies on their personal “hard drive” is confident in its reliability. And everyone ends up with access to a meager handful of “citable” files, the manipulation of which is so difficult to turn into readable literature. Confessing beautifully is already half the battle, and Vignettist knows this well. In the story about the failed attempts to make out the drunken transcript of Pasternak's table conversations the next morning, there is more of the notorious "spirit of the times" than in other lengthy and suspicious reconstructions of someone else's discourse. So sadness is light, if not feigned. If you don’t lie, you won’t tell, or Wherever the memoir doesn’t fit, the vignette will leak in. With this rather heavy imitation of a cheerful Stalinist song about the advantages of aviation over infantry, I would like to finish the praise of this heartfelt book with an erotic title.

Notes:

1 Novikova L. Books for the week // Kommersant. #4 (2843). January 14, 2004.

2 Zholkovsky A. Memoir vignettes and other non-fictions. (= URBI. Literary almanac. Issue 30. Series "New notebooks" (5)). St. Petersburg, 2000. (Review: Blumbaum A. // New Russian book. # 5. 2000 ).

3 The journalist of the Book Review, although he coined the word, called Zholkovsky “one of the first Russian structuralists.” It's like calling Lenin one of the first Russian socialists.

4 Literature for children and youth is rich in inspiring examples. Compare: “Show - 1) Bernard, 2) spectacle” (Zhitinsky A. The Journey of a Rock Amateur. L., 1990. P. 411).

5 Zholkovsky A. Zh/Z: Notes of a former pre-post-structuralist // Zholkovsky A. Inventions. M., 1995; Zholkovsky A.K. Zh/Z-97 // Moscow-Tartu semiotic school. History, memories, reflections. Ed. S.Yu.Neklyudova. M., 1998. An allusion to Roland Barthes’s initial book for poststructuralism “S/Z” with its apology for an ambiguous, floating identity at the level of the author, narrator, character confirms the passion for the game, one’s Other, etc. It must be said that Z/Z is not alone in his stylizations. Once, in an email from Sergei Zenkin, I noticed the signature SZ, weighty in its naturalness.