Spirits of electricity

On October 4, 2018, the Short List List of the Enlightener Award was published in the Gilyarovsky Center. There were Valia Demina and Alexei Ognev .

The ceremony was held in the museum hall, where the postscriptum exhibition dedicated to the theme of the Ostarbeters - the "eastern workers" of the Third Reich is now open. It presents documents and photographs from the huge archive collected by the Memorial society (it is available in digitized form on the Tastorona.su website). This is not a simple coincidence: the fact is that the book about the Ostarbeters “The Sign cannot be erased” was awarded the Enlightener Award last year.

Fragments of the ceremony of announcing a short list with comments by Asi Kazantseva, Boris Zhukov and Oleg Ventinov (Video by N. Demina)

Before the names of the finalists were named, the literary critic Alexander Gavrilov , the co -chairman of the Organizing Committee of the Prize, spoke about the new nomination “Enlightener.Digital” - from next year it will be awarded electronic projects.

Suddenly for a few seconds the light went out.

- The spirits of electricity welcome us! - the host joked.

The second co -chair of the organizing committee, journalist Alexander Arkhangelsky , was configured in a lyrical way:

- Now you will hear the "Crying of Yaroslavna" - this is the favorite genre of the Russian intelligentsia. Every year we come to us a hundred and half of excellent books. Among them there are brilliant and outstanding. In the summer, we are forced to conduct vivisection and make a long list. But our horror is nothing in comparison with the horror that the jury experiences when a short list is and chooses the winner. I thank God that this choice is not for me!

The short list in the nomination “Natural and exact sciences” was announced by Yevgeny Bunimovich -a poet, a teacher of mathematics, an authorized person for a child in Moscow:

- As always, we had disputes, what is “scientific”. There were books too “scientific” and too “pop”. There were books for which the jury was too smart, there were books too smart for the jury ...

The short list in the nomination “Humanities” was announced by the linguist Alexander Piperki , author of the book “Designing Languages”, Laureate of the “Enlightener-2017”:

- This year it was very difficult and very interesting to me, I read all 24 books [from a long list] and this in some places required a lot of mental stress from me, in some places I gave me aesthetic pleasure, sometimes both of them at the same time. And, of course, this was a very difficult choice, and at our meeting we could not always draw a border between two nominations. At least about three books, we doubted what nomination to include them. ... As a result, in each nomination there were 12 books, and what happened happened.

The ceremony was completed by Alexander Gavrilov, who admitted that every year the “crying of Yaroslavna”, smoothly turning into the prayer of the publican, is ready to break from his mouth, and he shuts his mouth, beats himself in his hands so as not to exclaim: “But this book? And this one! " - About not included in the short list of publications ...

We will learn the laureates of the Enlightener Award at the award ceremony on November 15, 2018.

Natalia Demina, Alexey Fire

Finalists of 2018. Photo by N. Demina

Finalists in the nomination "Natural and exact sciences"

Stanislav Drobyshevsky . Tales from the grotto: 50 stories from the life of ancient people. -M.: Alpina Non-Fikshn, 2018;
Alexey Savvatee in . Mathematics for humanities. Living lectures. - M.: University of Dmitry Pozharsky, 2018;
Irina Yakutenko . Will and self -control. How genes and brain prevent us from fighting with temptations. -M.: Alpina Non-Fikshn, 2018;
Sergey Yastrebov . From atoms to tree: Introduction to the modern science of life. -M.: Alpina Non-Fikshn, 2018.

Finalists in the nomination "Humanities"

Sergey Zotov, Mikhail Mayzuls, dilshat Harma n . Suffering from the Middle Ages. - M.: AST, 2018;
Vladislav Inozemtsev . Non -modern country. Russia in the world of the XXI century. - M.: Alpina Plisher, 2018;
Boris Kolonitsky . #1917. Seventeen essays on the history of the Russian revolution. -St. Petersburg: Publishing House of the European University in St. Petersburg, 2018;
Amiran Urushadze . Caucasian war. Seven stories. - M.: UFO, 2018.

Jury-2018

Alexey Semikhatov is the chairman of the jury, Dr. Fiz.-Mat. sciences, ch. scientific. sore. Fian;
Evgeny Bunimovich - poet, mathematician, Honored Teacher of Russia, Commissioner for Child Rights in Moscow;
Daria Varlamova is a journalist, co -author of the book “Go crazy! Guide for mental disorders for a resident of the big city ”;
Boris Zimin - entrepreneur, head of the Council of Zimin Foundation;
Dmitry Zimin is the founder of the Dynasty Foundation and the Enlightener Prize;
Roman Leibov is Dr. Filol. sciences, associate professor of the department of Russian literature of the University of Tartu;
Alexander Markov - Dr. Biol. sciences, professor of the Russian Academy of Sciences, head. Department of Biological Evolution of Moscow State University;
Alexander Piperski - Cand. Filol. sciences, associate professor of the Russian State University;
Irina Shcherbakova - Cand. Filol. sciences, head of youth and educational programs of the International Human Rights Society "Memorial".