Viktor Erofeev: Oblomov as a reminder of all-Russian impotence

The country and Ulyanovsk celebrated the 200th anniversary of Ivan Goncharov with special pomp. This city gave birth to two gigantic Russian characters - Oblomov and Lenin. The main result of the discussion at the festival: the Stoltsy are triumphant, but there are no fewer Oblomovs

Maria Portnyagina, Ulyanovsk

— It would be better if they invited Vasya Oblomov, his song “Magadan” went around the entire Internet. Besides, his real last name is Goncharov, and it doesn’t matter that he’s from Rostov-on-Don,” Ksenia, a student at the pedagogical university, thinks out loud. Together with his friend Galina, they settled down on the “Oblomov sofa” in the very center of Ulyanovsk and discussed the performers whom the local authorities invited to a concert on the occasion of Goncharov’s birthday.

Sitting on a tall sofa made of metal and plastic is uncomfortable, but Ksenia is still trying to get her feet into the “Oblomov slippers” - a gift from local blacksmiths to the city. Doing this is no easier than deciding whether to go to a concert dedicated to the classics of Russian literature, which will take place on one of Lenin Squares.

— They invited Agutin and Matsuev, who will go to them? - Galina is indignant on behalf of the Ulyanovsk youth. - As if this entire anniversary for the report to the authorities is continuous exhibitions and conferences...

In response to my remark that Oblomov himself could have reasoned in a similar way, only lying on a soft sofa in his apartment, the girls eagerly begin to scold him too - as they taught at school.

“He has principles that are incompatible with life,” the future teacher Ksenia formulates. “And he was weak-willed, did not strive for anything, and was a loser in love.” I understand Olga: love is love, but she tried to mold Oblomov into something suitable for herself, and he?..

The young ladies eventually decide to go home: “The other day they will defend their diplomas.”

In search of a regional idea

Lenin fed the city for a long time, now it’s time to rely on the literary heritage
Photo: Pavel Golovkin, Kommersant

Ulyanovsk, which was Simbirsk until 1924, actually lives a stormy inner life. Like Ilya Ilyich Oblomov, he is looking for himself, which is visible to the naked eye. The region's leadership has been searching for urban identity for several years now. Having assumed the post of governor of the Ulyanovsk region six years ago, Sergei Morozov began by laying flowers at his monument on the day of the death of another Ilyich - the famous native of the city, Vladimir Lenin. The local press quoted the governor as saying: “I came here with a feeling of gratitude and respect for this man, because he did a lot of good for my homeland. We, in turn, must do everything so that his name is not forgotten.” Suggestions on how to re-perpetuate the name of the leader poured in as if from a cornucopia. For example, bring ownerless monuments to Ilyich from all over the country to Ulyanovsk and make a sculpture garden out of them. The climax was an appeal to the President and Government of the Russian Federation with a proposal to bury Lenin’s body in his small homeland. By the way, there is still no final answer to this.

This new old regional idea barely lasted for a year: the Ulyanovsk authorities abandoned the Leninist brand as not promising enough and tried to stop being Ulyanovsk, returning the native name Simbirsk. As it turned out, this is not easy either. The results of the population survey showed that the majority is against it, mainly out of fear of red tape with the exchange of documents. It even came down to performances on the streets.

Realizing that their city had an unpredictable past, the authorities switched to culture. But here, too, there was some creativity: Ulyanovsk residents managed to mark themselves as defenders of the Russian language by erecting a monument to the letter “E” (this was done in memory of Simbirsk native Nikolai Karamzin, who was one of the first to use this same “E” in written speech).

There was also an epic with Kolobok’s homeland: even the estate for this character was rebuilt 25 kilometers from the city. True, local residents complain: it is difficult to get there - the roads are failing. However, the search has not stopped: judging by the posters, of which there are much more around the city than advertising banners, “Ulyanovsk is a city of talents” and no less than “the cultural capital of Russia.” It is also known that Ulyanovsk is applying for the status of “Cultural Capital of Europe - 2020”; the head of the region was inspired by the experience of Finnish Turku: “It was also a sleeping city, but how it has transformed.”

In general, this is roughly what the cultural and ideological context looks like, in which the 200th anniversary of the writer Goncharov, the author of three novels with “O” - “Ordinary History” (1847), “Oblomov” (1859), “Cliff (1869) - and travel notes “Frigate “Pallada”.” “We have people who make the world proud, and we would like these people to be useful today,” the governor said, speaking to reporters instead of the revolutionary Ulyanov-Lenin at headquarters in the region. made on Goncharov, a supporter of the peaceful path of development and even at a certain period of his life a censor. The color red disappeared from the city, and was replaced by blue in the design of the streets.

Are we all Oblomovs?

From the holiday posters, Goncharov looks languidly at today’s Ulyanovsk residents. It seems that he has nothing to do with his own anniversary
Photo: Pavel Golovkin, Kommersant

The writer's museum is located in the house where he was born and spent his childhood, at the intersection of the main city streets: Lenin and Goncharov. Before the restoration, the address behind it was Goncharova Street, and the entrance was from Lenin Street, after which everything became the other way around.

“It’s probably no coincidence,” admits Ulyanovsk resident Alexey, who took part in the repair work. “But instead of leapfrog with addresses and entrances, it would be better to do without any rush.” He was born here two centuries ago, and before the opening we had to work on weekends.

This is not the harshest criticism of the anniversary organizers. Most of all, city residents were perplexed by the fact that among conferences, concerts and other literary readings, the only public event was the Goncharovsky festival in Vinnovskaya Grove not far from the city center. Moreover, they never got around to improving this memorable place for the writer (it inspired him to write “The Precipice”).

“It’s a pity that my “Oblomov” dream did not come true: they never erected a monument to the hero surrounded by his friends and relatives - Stolz, Olga Ilyinskaya, Zakhar and Agafya Pshenitsyna,” complains Viktor Kamenev, co-chairman of the Ulyanovsk literary “Oblomov Club”, not without ironically calling himself an “Oblomov expert.” “It would be better to spend the money like that, he is much closer to us than that other Ilyich.” There are still a lot of Oblomovs in Russia, they just often break themselves under the Stolts, but what happens in the end? Inferiority complex...

But in the museum itself, which opened after restoration on the anniversary day, June 18, there is no time for regrets: we barely made it in time! Just the day before, running through the halls and monitoring how work was being carried out on all three floors, Irina Smirnova, head of the Goncharov Museum, was automatically talking about the Japanese boxes brought by Goncharov from a two-year voyage on the frigate Pallada and surviving a seven-month journey through Siberia to St. Petersburg . About the cane, thanks to which the writer’s height was determined to be about 170 centimeters (“quite tall for those times”). But as soon as there was a pause, she instantly switched to literature: “Oblomov is far from vanity, he is the only free person in the novel, he does not care what they think of him in the world, he is true to himself, does not give in to persuasion, and gets up from the couch one day - just for the sake of love." “True, Oblomov, having three hundred zakhars, could afford to lie,” adds Irina and runs to figure out why they brought carpets that no one ordered.

However, many here have a personal relationship with Oblomov: local historian Nina Egorova even named her son in honor of her beloved hero - Ilya.

“I raised him like Ilyushenka’s parents, with the same affection.” True, at one time I reproached myself for not calling myself Andrei, like Stoltz, but now I don’t regret it. The main thing is that my son has a good heart.

His creator gave Oblomov a kind heart in memory of his godfather Nikolai Tregubov, who raised him, having lost his father early, and looked after the writer’s entire family. It is Tregubov that literary scholars call the main prototype of the hero. But Oblomov got from him not only kindness. As a little boy, Goncharov observed the life that his godfather, an educated nobleman, led: he did not get out of bed until lunch, had a long lunch in the company of friends, after which philosophical “beds” were arranged, at which the fate of Russia was decided. Although the novel was not conceived, of course, as a story about a beloved godfather. Goncharov presented in him “the fundamental properties of the Russian person,” and for this they recognize him as the creator of the Russian national type.

Only this type is not a diagnosis, as they teach in schools, it is the answer to a specific question in specific circumstances, and it is not Goncharov’s fault that the repetition of Russian history time after time makes these circumstances and this answer recognizable. As a participant in a long journey (the same “Frigate “Pallada””), Goncharov could observe how the West and the East were developing. He saw with his own eyes that business people set the world in motion, and came to the conclusion that the same future awaits Russia. Returning to his homeland, Goncharov was preoccupied with the question of whether the Russian people were ready for the coming era of change. In a novel published two years before the abolition of serfdom, he gave the answer - Oblomovism reigns everywhere.

“Oblomovism is a social phenomenon, and Oblomov represents the multifaceted Russian character,” Irina Smirnova is sure. “In Soviet times, the anti-serfdom orientation of the novel was emphasized, and here Dobrolyubov put a pig on Goncharov with his article. A prejudiced attitude towards the hero still persists: after all, it is easier for 16-year-old schoolchildren to explain the condemned side of his nature - laziness, and not to show that internal development is incomparably more important than running like a squirrel in a wheel to earn millions or buy ten Oblomovoks. Oddly enough, foreigners often understand better than us that the world lacks the soulfulness of this hero. And they envy us because they feel: genetically we are Oblomovs, and not at all Bezukhovs or Raskolnikovs.

But Angelika Molnár, a Hungarian pottery expert, is fighting the cliché “Oblomov is a lazy person” in her homeland.

— I fell in love with this novel and its hero. Oblomov embodies the Russian man - his slowness, his good nature, his desire to be in a narrow circle of close people, his dreaminess, the fact that he wants to think before acting. But I also have a personal motive: my husband is Russian and, to be honest, I started researching the novel in order to also understand it. Do you know how it ended? When I come to your hurrying, ever-fluttering Moscow, I now catch myself becoming infected with Oblomovism: I become deliberately unhurried, in no hurry to leave my room. But in Ulyanovsk it’s different, here there is friendliness and such patriarchy - it attracts.

Escape the Oblomov style

However, with all the charm of the character, literary scholars do not recommend setting the task radically - such as raising Oblomov to the level of a regional idea. The Soviet school tradition of presenting Oblomov as a slacker has not yet gone away, they remind.

“The emphasis should shift, albeit after a while,” says Irina Smirnova, who runs the Goncharov Museum. “The main thing is the popularization of Oblomov’s virtues, especially high morality.” To this end, we are holding a special Oblomov Festival in the fall, dedicated to the hero who is so needed in our time. The crazy rhythm of modern life, the thirst to succeed - Stoltsovism prevails today. But Oblomov is needed - like a life preserver.

A quick survey among Ulyanovsk youth who came to enjoy the Goncharov festival confirms that this work will last for a long time. Here are the most common opinions of those who understood who they were talking about: “Oblomov is a loser”, “In modern life you have to be active, people like that won’t survive”, “You won’t be an Oblomov for long - you have to earn money.”

However, maybe we just haven’t agreed on the terms? If this work is done, many experts on Goncharov believe, it will turn out that his hero is more modern than ever.

— Young people escaping from reality into virtual reality, why aren’t they Oblomovs? — says Antonina Lobkareva, a leading Ulyanovsk pottery expert. “Of course, not everyone who surfs the Internet, but some have a desire to preserve themselves, to be left alone with themselves, with their inner world. To spend a sober, conscious, even just a minute, without fuss - the need for this is great.

“It seems to me that all downshifters strive to find Oblomov in themselves,” Elena Kosmacheva, a descendant of the writer’s sister Alexandra, who came from Nizhny Novgorod for the anniversary, puts forward her version. “They are, as a rule, educated, thinking people, but having achieved a certain success, they begin to realize that money and status are not everything, inner harmony is needed. Maybe Oblomov is even a little Buddhist in this regard. And they are his followers. They quit work, lie down on the sofa, or go to Goa to think while lying on the sandy beach.

However, foreign guests who arrived for the celebrations also found the Oblomovs in their homeland.

“Modern Oblomovs exist in all technologically developed countries, where people are increasingly choosing a closed life,” assures Ikuo Onishi from Hokkaido University in Japan. “A person does not leave the house, contacts the outside world only with the help of a computer and various gadgets. But they still have to try to become Oblomov: after all, he himself is aware of his weaknesses and suffers. This is endearing.

And 67-year-old Elizabeth Simon, a descendant of Goncharov through his older brother, who came to Ulyanovsk from Paris, is sure that her ancestor wrote that progress at any cost is useless. By the way, 82-year-old Ulyanovsk resident Anatoly Frolov, who has been working as a caretaker of the city clock on the tower of the Goncharov Museum building for almost 40 years, agrees with her.

“We must give good things to people and not do bad things to them,” he explained to Ogonyok and added: “That’s how I am Oblomov.”

I wonder what kind of debate the anniversary of the next famous native of Simbirsk, the historian Nikolai Karamzin, will lead to in the city of Lenin? So far, his memory is immortalized by a monument to the letter “E”, a small square, a public library and a mental hospital nicknamed “Karamzinka” (the historian’s son allegedly donated serious funds to it). However, the regional leadership has already begun to develop a plan for large-scale celebrations on the occasion of the upcoming 250th anniversary of the city’s most popular historical character according to polls...

Which Ilyich should we refuse?