The Fifth Open Book Fair now going on here in Moscow is all about a direct and sincere dialogue between the writer and his readers, an idea Andrei Bitov, Lyudmila Ulitskaya, Vladimir Voinovich and other leading Russian authors readily embrace.
Pushed to the sidelines of state politics and left to its own devices, culture has increasingly been turning to the methods of unofficial literature used to survive during the Soviet days, says the event’s program director Boris Kupriyanov. Our choice of Russians Abroad was prompted by a desire to see how Russian-language literature abroad differs from what we have here in Russia.
Another subject deals with Leo Tolstoy, whose 100th death anniversary we marked earlier this year, and whose literary heritage remains as alive as it was a century ago.
Pavel Basinsky’s Farewell, Paradise! A book that has just been unveiled as part of the Moscow event, is an attempt to find out the reasons behind the Russian classic’s decision to abandon his Yasnaya Polyana estate and his subsequent death in 1910. Tolstoy’s sudden exit is one of world culture’s biggest unsolved mysteries, just like the construction of Egyptian pyramids, Pavel Basinsky says.
I have always wondered, Basinsky says, what prompted the great writer to take up the path of wandering ascetic at the age of 82. He left home with just 50 rubles in his pocket and then died at a God-forsaken railway station. Many understandably remain at odds over the matter, which grabbed the international headlines in the early 1900s, Basinsky concludes.
Serbian writer Goran Petrovic and his British colleague Joanne Harris also signaled their readiness to take part in a writer-reader dialogue, which Russian author Roman Senchin says will focus on an array of sticking points related to literature. These include the creation of a much-needed image of a positive hero in prose, Senchin goes on to say, citing his own novel Yeltyshevy, where he admits he sadly failed to create ‘a hundred-percent hero’.
Writers are desperately trying to tackle the task, but to no avail, Senchin says, pointing to the modern way of life, which he laments gives little, if any , inspiration to writers so as to try to create positive heroes. Most people now prefer to go with the tide like Chekhov’s characters, who can hardly be called good guys, Senchin complains.
Many liken the Moscow Book Fair to the Edinburgh Festival, which successfully combines various art genres. The organizers of the Moscow event said, in turn, that the program includes demonstrations of films based on Goethe’s Faust plus an awards ceremony to give kudos to alternative rock bands.
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