New York Times Article about Elena Chizhova

Today’s New York Times included an article – Ellen Barry’s “A Writer Invites Russia to Engage Its Painful Past” – about Yelena Chizhova, who won the 2009 Russian Booker Prize for the short novel Время женщин (A Time of Women). I wrote a bit about the award and novel here. It appears that the novel is still not available in book form, though it’s online here. I do not know of any English-language translations of Chizhova’s work.

A Time of Women arose out of Chizhova’s memories of hearing her mother and grandmother speak about the blockade of Leningrad. Chizhova believes the “the vast majority” of Russians aren’t very interested in Russia’s Soviet past. Chizhova says: “They do not have the feeling that history continues. It seems to them that in the 1990s, we just started over. As if we were all born then.” I saw the first stages of this phenomenon when I visited and lived in Russia during 1988-1998. What stands out most is several people telling me they believed Solzhenitsyn’s writings about prison camps were already irrelevant.

Still, Barry notes that “there is no question that the past is exerting a pull on Russian art.” Two other big 2009 literary prize winners also take place in the past: Andrei Gelasimov’s Степные боги (Steppe Gods) is set in 1945 (previous post), and Leonid Yuzefovich’s Журавли и карлики (Cranes and Dwarfs or Cranes and Pygmies) takes place during several centuries (previous post).

Barry references an article about the 2009 Booker short list by Elena Dyakova – it’s available (in Russian) here.