Fafajockling

 I am proud to say my name appears in the acknowledgments- I read the whole manuscript in Russian and English and gave comments on it for one long, beautiful summer. I have studied Russian Lit and language in college, and been avid in Slavic lit since I discovered Gogol at age 13. That's my attempted credibility. All the same there was always a gap in my Soviet literature shelf... Bulgakov is great, the poets are powerful, Gorky ruled in college, and does Nabokov count? Don't let the Soviets have him! Then Platonov came to me after the age of 30, and I devoured his work, just stared into it from cover to cover. It is up there with Gogol and all the greats of any age. If you haven't read his work, it is an utterly different approach to reality; an inscrutable sense of humor; a signature clarity that is dissolved into paradox, a deadpan joke about a political idea the size of the universe, an idea that ended up looking like it would kill the universe to succeed, ...

I have read 100 novels from Russia, but that was fiction; not too much nonfiction... or it has been fictionalized in that Soviet way. But this... This is hard-hitting longform journalism, very gripping. At first it seems like fun and games, trailer parks and prostitutes and hard-edge punks in abandoned buildings. Then it gets so rough that it was like Kolyma Tales, one of the most brutal books I have picked up. Like that one, I found myself putting this book down and saying, "Man, I don't need to be reading this heavy stuff. Life is too short." Then I'd come crawling back. If you want a good, quick understanding of Putin's rise and what the state looks like, I recommend this book and Putin's People by Catherine Belton. Both books are hard to put down while being gut-wrenching to read. Russia is a place full of torment, suffering. Like a troubled person who destroys themselves, destroys others who try to help them, or hurt them, whatever... the worl...

 It's excellent stuff. Phases of matter, places both in human construct and topology, are all thoroughly redefined. Then there are the ornate metaphors, and the wise tone of gratitude toward life, which is ultimately a tour through the relics of those dead who came before, scattered with plants and parts they had yet to understand. It was only a little hard to understand if, or which of, these poems were written in English, or translated craftily from Russian. They feel like the outcome of much mental convolution, in any case, but a pleasure to read.

 Waaaaay overdue for a reprint! These stories are very stylish and quite eternal. I crave more, Zamyatin's plays and letters and other assorted things--most of which are only shady .pdf files or very cheap-looking public domain printoffs. Who even knows the translation quality... but my copy is Mirra Ginsburg, so, rock solid.  I don't care what Pevear says, I love Ginsburg. Volkhonsky also, what she says, it doesn't turn me to stone. Mirra Ginsburg's Master and Margarita cannot be topped. Here are the contents: Translator Intro Letter to Stalin A Provincial Tale The Dragon The Protectress of Sinners Two Tales for Grown-up Children: The Church of God and The Ivans The North The Cave The Healing of the Novice Erasmus In Old Russia A Story about the Most Important Thing The Miracle of Ash Wednesday X Comrade Churygin has the Floor The Flood The Lion While some feel early in skill, none I found unfit for reading, all bear the mark of this writer's genius--uncanny ...

Mondo hot book receives killer rave review! I thought this was going to be some old, pre-Lamaz class edition of Gogol. But it was quite crisp and new, and put out by the same wackadoodle anarchistos who released Kharms and other suppressed Soviets. Therefore it is great! I bought it because I never read any Gogol plays other than The Govt Inspector. And the intro is right: Gogol was not really a master of the stage craft. There are some really funny moments and some damn well written conversations (the translator is good, not verbose), but also too much monologuing and Vaudevillian stuff. The appendices are really good here, full of Gogol Notes and a lengthy essay about this poor man. Burned a whole play because someone fell asleep during a reading! And burned his last book too! Damn you, Gogol, why! However if you love Gogol as I do, then it doesn't feel like the decision is in your hands. Read all of his work. I guess pretentious old Nabokov should have done a translation ...

 A Russian man takes you from slapstick moment to slapstick moment through this orgiastic saga, and relates it to the human ass and how that relates to role reversal--in all kinds of reference, like religious rituals and garb, the study of anatomy, natural cycles. And Bakhtin, as an oppressed Russian citizen, loved Rabelais... idolized the free expression of each chapter. If I recall, he says "Gargantua and Pantagruel is the bravest book ever written." Extra doses of country respect go to the translator, who must have faced quite a challenge in deciding on the exact terminology for Bakhtin, such as his references to the "lower stratum" which occur on almost every page. I would like to have a look at the raw source material myself--educated Russians of the 19th century knew French almost as well as their own language, yet I wonder how Bakhtin chose to read Rabelais. (I have sided ultimately with the Screech translation of Rabelais. It has the most additional cl...